Untangle & Thrive Podcast

In this episode, we are going to peak around the corners of our desire for MORE. Many of us have shame with wanting more- we have acted out compulsively to buffer the pain of emptiness. We can confuse an anorexic life for a recovering life. And although interrupting compulsive activities, like overdrinking, eating, shopping, sexing is a good thing we can become entrapped in the other extreme, that MORE is bad, dirty, or not available. Learning to become safe enough to receive more from the world and give more to the world is where the medicine of healing shows up. Join me for a short, interesting conversation.

As Jung said, "Shame is the swampland of the soul." Today, I share with you the faces of shame and what we can do to help discharge shame. If you are stuck, often shame is lurking behind the corners of your psyche. Often, we feel like we have to attack and fix our shame, but this punitive response only enslaves it. Helping people learn to untangle shame's unconscious patterning and to find joy with becoming seen, just a little bit, is my life's purpose. Join me!

Nature has so much to teach us. In today's podcast, I am going to share many lessons that I have learned from wrestling with my front yard Holly Tree. Let's learn how to access our innate nature to thrive with difficult challenges. Join me!

In today's episode, I discuss the difference between fantasy and imagination. Fantasy is used to numb anxiety, helplessness, and powerlessness. In contrast, imagination requires us to work with reality and transform our struggles. When we are sensitive, overwhelmed, and immobilized by stress, we need more imagination. Listen today to learn how you can start using your imagination to see your problems differently.

Today we are going to talk about habits. Habits mean our nervous system has learned something, but NOT always consciously. Sometimes we develop habits that we are NOT even aware of until it becomes a problem or until we UNTANGLE it. Habits are a big part of who we are, And what we do habitually determines who we become in the future. We are going to talk about short-term habit formations and identity-based. Much focus in the self-help and behavioral therapy world is centered around behavior modification. However, the Untangle Method drills into the unconscious patterns of identity change to help create space for a more meaningful picture to arise.

Today we are going to talk about memories- traumatic memories and good memories. When we carry unprocessed trauma in our bodies, we often try leaving it all behind- the bad childhood, the horrible teacher, the bullying, the divorce, etc. But in our attempt to forget, we leave behind the good stuff. Join me today as we discuss what forms of therapy help to process traumatic memories and why this is critistical. Also of importance is how to reclaim the good memories to help us realize our life more fully. This is such an important and meaningful episode.

In this episode, we are going to look at how we need a system that can handle all feelings. Most clients I work with want to get rid of their negative feelings. Painful feelings suck, but we need to learn how to allow them, feel them, and move with them. Let's end this challenging year with a sense of humanistic kindness and grace for all our imperfections.

Most of us have a difficult time celebrating ourselves, even more so out loud or with others. A traumatized body doesn't allow receiving. It screams F*ck you. I can't. I won't. So imagine trying to get this body receptive to loving yourself, celebrating victories, and elevating worthiness. It can't. If anyone struggles with concepts, such as, Love Yourself, Let Go, and Be Proud, join me. As I walk you through the Untangle Method, we will recognize the part of us that can't receive and also locate the part of us that can.

Today I am discussing the difference between meditation practice and the Untangle Method. They are very different and yet, meditation helps create the space for the method to work. Join me as I break this down.

Today, I am going to talk about triggers and how they can do to help us heal. I know they are horrible, uncomfortable, and fraught with confusion, especially around the Holidays. But we can change our response to them, and by doing so find our songs of liberation, harmony, and joy. In this episode, you will learn:-How to take care of yourself during the Holidays-Why you may be feeling more triggered this Thanksgiving-Triggers are unresolved childhood wounds-How to befriend our triggers so they can help us profoundly heal, love, and belong

In this episode we will discuss how marring enchantment helps fire creativity, helping us overcome obstacles. Often, we try to attack our problems from the head alone. Untangling is a process of peeking around new corners to locate resources that have us engage in a journey of reclamation. Join us!

In today's episode, we are going to explore healthy boundary responses. Many of us assert boundaries from a place of desperation, overwhelm, and I can't handle it story. We want to understand our automatic responses with boundaries so that we can provide a space of renegotiation but also one of thriving! 

How do we become safe enough for a bigger life?  Join me today as we talk about the science of hiding and how to build resources to strengthen courage and bravery!  

In this episode, I break down 4 critical needs we need to meet resourcefully in order to thrive.  When we don't know how to meet our needs in all our relationships we suffer.  Learning to meet these 4 needs requires skills, artistry, and practice.  Join me today as I help you build a framework to meeting needs in new ways!  

Join me as we discuss how to alchemize a painful, dreaded experience into a neutral one and into a vibrant colorful one.  Untangling is my method to alchemize. And I didn't realize until I shared today in a mastermind group that I had to alchemize my book in 3 Steps. 

In this episode, I share my decision to travel to Costa Rica to facilitate a wellness retreat. How did I move from a NO to a  YES.  Was I happy with my decision?  What was the travel experience like during Covid?   We unwind frozen states as we become safe enough to mobilize within a new experience. Join me as we engage in this critical conversation.  

Welcome to this week's episode of the Untangle and Thrive Podcast!In this episode you will learn:What is emotional trauma?How do we unwind emotional trauma?And how do we build emotional resilience?  Take a listen! 

In this episode, we are going to deconstruct purposeful living.  We often need a new framework to realize our purposeful life. It is NOT a one-time event, but a process.   Often, when we are stuck or have unresolved relational trauma, we leave behind resources, skills, and talents that can serve us well today.  Part of the job is remembering the good experiences from the past, not the traumatic ones.   Join me! 

In today's episode, we are exploring how stuckness is deadness and what we can do to transform it.  When we are dead, there is some part of us afraid to come back to life.  Instead of fighting stuckness, let's create an environment to allow it to heal us. Join me!  

My motherhood story started fraught with unresolved trauma.  The insidious cycle of overwhelm tore me into pieces.   Many of us struggle with becoming moms for various reasons, but I find that often lurking behind things are opportunities for deep, rooted healing.   If you are struggling with being a mom, please know you are not alone.  In this episode, I share my challenges and what helped me, continues to help me thrive with the experience. 

In this episode, we are going to speak about the dance between certainty and uncertainty. How can met certainty in healthy ways that embrace the "uncertainty" of life.   Learning to let go, embrace emptiness, and embrace uncertainty can make many of us feel uncomfortable. Let like holding on. It gives us a sense of control. However, it also stunts aliveness, surprise, and richness with life.   Join me, as we explore our deeper waters. The part of that knows how to dance inside of more aliveness, take risks, and explore becoming more alive in all our relationships. 

Today I am joined with Reiko Gomez, fiReiko (RAY-co) Feng Shui Expert and Interior Designer, starting her business Reiko Design in 1999.  As a trained interior designer from the Parsons School of Design, as well as an advanced Feng Shui specialist certified by the American Feng Shui Institute, Reiko has mastered an approach to physical space that helps clients to overcome obstacles and realize their life goals.We are discussing how our homes offer a key to untangle and re-organize within our deepest nature.We are all stuck home, confronting uncomfortable realities and struggles.  Let's unite together to work with our space in ways the better ourselves and our place in the world.  You can find Reiko, www.Reikodesign.com

How do we embrace our chaos and disconnection in ways that grow our becoming more in synch, whole with life?  How do we develop a language of becoming to embrace the magical side of life?Join me as we navigate these waters together! 

Space in-between Christmas and New Years' can be tricky for many people.  I am keeping it short and sweet today.  There is tremendous value in intentionally getting lost. It allows us to be surprised by unexpected joy, awe, and mystery.  I am inviting all of us to "get lost" and create space to circle into your deeper nature.  With that, wishing everyone a safe, wonderful holiday week!

When love is tangled, confusing, and triggering, we train ourselves to shut down quickly.  However, we stay stuck in life and in our relationships when we don't feel safe to open towards love in healthy ways.  Join me as we explore and navigate opening our hearts to love again and again and again.

Do you believe you are not creative?  How does creativity link confidence?  How can we build more creativity into our problems, clutter, and decision making?  Join me today as we discuss creativity in various ways to help up access more resourceful responses.

How do we use the Untangle Method to convert negative energy into creative energy?  How do we use the Untangle Method to convert negative energy into positive, creative energy?It isn’t so much changing your thought pattern but uncovering, discharging, and re-organizing your relational body bond.Join me today to learn more.Join me today!  

In this episode, we are discussing how to differentiate between unhealthy circles of hunger into healthy circles of hunger.The Tangled Self is the part of us that becomes stuck in circles of the past. Instead of managing these circles, we want to gather their emotional intelligence.  The Creative Self is also part of the same system but accesses the part of us that wants to stand inside of bigger life circles.  How do we do that?  What is needed?  Join me as a share.  

In this episode, we are going to untangle the ways we get in the way of embodying our poetry.  Let's get out of Thanksgiving drama, or any drama, and set up an environment to thrive.  Let's find the little circles of poetry in our everyday life. Join me as we navigate this meaningful journey and set up Thanksgiving just a little bit differently.

In today's episode, we are untangling the part of that whispers, "I Can't Handle It."  This part often calls the shots on our life with little to no insight.  As we learn to untangle our tripwires in our system, we create space to build a new experience, growing capacity to claim life powerfully.  Join me as we explore how to separate the I can't part from the part of us that can, the Creative Self. We often need help re-remembering this part of us that can access creative resources to show up in dynamic ways we never imagined possible.  Join me!  

How do learn from the aftermath of the election?  How do we reconcile we are divided completely as a Nation?  How do we get out of the noise of "the other" and join forces to unite polarizing views?Our political landscape is bifurcated and unintegrated.  We don't become well in fragmentation.  Now is a time to pick up the pieces, separate out what is real and what is not, and collaborate with each other.  Each side is terrified of the other side.  Each side is stubborn with their narrow, limited ideas.  Each side needs to language their unconscious threats, check them out, and decide to work together. And we can do this together.  Join me. 

In this episode, we are going to talk about dirty pain and clean pain.   Dirty pain comingles with shame, ensnaring us into the chaotic waters of shoulding, self-hating, judging.   This pain collapses our Stabilizing Floor of Ok-ness, hunching our spines and carving out our heart caves in ways that exile courage.   Shame pain drains our creative resources.   On the other hand, clean pain is more interested in discovering the roots of what matters to us deeply—the intimate desires of not wanting to live small, under-earn, or hide anymore.   Clean pain activates urgency to make the necessary changes to alleviate suffering.   Without reaching into this pain, we keep ourselves lukewarm, comfortable, unavailable to change.

In this episode, we are going to create a space for the parts of us that want to come out and claim more from life. We automatically censor parts of ourselves without even knowing it. We live in unconscious agreements to keep these parts away.  At one time, they may have caused us humiliation, neediness, shame, and regret.  We are in a war with our heads. The work is learning how to let them emerge again, take up space, and form our unrealized lives.  When we are punitive, abusive, and harsh with ourselves, we bifurcate ourselves.  This creates chaos, dissonance, and isolation  We misguidedly think once we get better we will become better.  Join me! 

In this episode, we are going to talk about the power one word, one event, or one thing can have over your life.  I will share with you a word that was said to me by my father when I was twelve, the lasting impact, and what I did to transform it.  Join me, work the untangle method on one of your words, and please share your story with me.  

Why are boundaries so difficult?  In today's episode, we are going to explore why we don't assert our boundaries, and what needs to happen to start asserting them in healthy ways.  Whether it is a boundary with self-care, bottom-line behaviors, or relationship agreements, we NEED a good relationship with boundaries.  Boundaries safeguard our, as well as secure our relationships.  Join me!  

In times of interruption, old patterns rise to the surface.  What had previously been submerged are now flying inside us and around us.  You might be finding yourself more anxious, impatient, acting-out, avoiding, or collapsing. Your body may feel like a siren.  Days may feel stuck, heavy, or foggy.  “Relaxing,” “calming down,” or “self-organizing” is not straightforward. What should feel relaxing might be aggravating.  What used to feel energizing might be exhausting. What was previously clear is now murky vagueness.  Interruption allows us the space to check things out, address unresolved issues, and become united within ourselves.  Instead of fighting this COVID interruption, waiting for it to be done, let's dive into ourselves to access greater healing, creativity, and vision. 

How do we embody greatness during difficult times?How do we take inspiration from others and apply it to our lives?  How do we unite within the brokenness inside of us and with our world at large?  Let's join collectively. Let's dissent.  In a world where women are expected to comply, I dissent.  In a world where love has been kept in a box with rules, I dissent.  In a work where fiction is told as truth and facts are twisted into lies, I dissent.  Let's take the time to form our Dissents and build a vision for our life, family, and country we want to embody.

In this episode, we are going to talk about the fires devouring parts of our country as a metaphor for the internal fires of hate that fuels chaos and destruction.  How do we convert destructive rage into greater connection?  How do we access the deeper wisdom of nature to help teach us?  What are some simple exercises we can do every day?  Join me!  Artwork by rupi kaur www.untangleandthrive.com

In today's episode, we are speaking with Frieda Edgette about how to harness skills to run your personal, business, or civic life more effectively.  Frieda is an award-winning leadership coach who formed Courage to Run, a nonpartisan running series and leadership community committed to being healthy to lead effectively in civic life today.  Join us as we discuss leadership skills on mindfulness, savoring, and vision to lead yourself into new experiences.  Frieda has a unique platform that merges a running with your body with your leadership spirit.  Download her free #CouragetoRun App in iOS.It is full of 1 to 15-minute "tabatas" (quick, high-impact strength exercises) that build the mindset, resilience, vision, courage, and care needed to be healthy and lead effectively in civic life today. ​Or visit her:  www.couragetorun.org  RegisterVirtual Courage to Run 5K & 20in20 ChallengeSeptember 13, 2020 * Across America

This week I have an amazing guest, GRAMMY-Nominated one-woman orchestra and harpist Deborah Henson-Conant.   Deborah is a force in her field. She is a performer, composer, mentor, coach, and innovator. Her signature is an 11lb carbon-fiber electric harp, designed specifically for her by the CAMAC Harp Company in France.   She is here to talk with us today about creativity and how we ALL need skills to access more creativity to transform our lives.   Even if you are not a musician, I know you can learn a lot from Deborah.   Deborah and I will be collaborating on an Untangle Workshop Sept 11, 12, and 13.   We will be combining music, movement, and imagination to gather an experiential UNTANGLE practice.  This workshop is a FREE bonus for any HipHarp Academy student.  Details:  www.hipharpacademy.com.   We are also offering it to ANY artists (musicians, dancers, illustrators, poets, vocalists, actors, writers, designers, etc) Artists who are:  Sick of getting in their own way of greater success, visibility, and ambition.  Trapped in the weeds of I am NOT good enough or PERFECT enough.  Hide behind costume/technique/or emotionality and want to understand a new freedom.Tired of under-earning and over-working.  Desire to emerge stronger from a crisis or a challenge.Eager for kills to become “safe enough” to ask for their needs, assert their desires, and claim their purposeful belonging.Join us. www.untangleandthrive.com

today I am talking about Harpist, Deborah Henson-Conant incredible grammy-nominated concert, "Invention & Alchemy".   In her concert, she uses stories and imagination to deconstruct the harp to ignite peace, freedom, and belonging.  And how we need to befriend chaos and tune into the instruments of our bodies. When our bodies hold onto unconscious wars, they create chaotic symphonies. We want to align within our body's chaotic forces in order to convert them into sublime harmonics. Join me. Receive a free ticket for her masterful concert! https://bit.ly/IA-RSVP

Whiteness is like an addiction: cunning, powerful, baffling.  Many of us are waking up from a Whiteness morphine drip.  It is confusing, disorientating, and liberating.  I am working with the work Whiteness to help people locate their unconscious relationship with it.When you think about it, none of our problems are technically difficult to explain. Their difficulty resides in they are disconnected or in unconsciousness conflict.  In coherency, our creative powers are boundless.  When all of our organizing system (unconscious and conscious) can agree on what is important, what else might we achieve?  This is always the next question when we awaken to our power.  We are at a tipping point for systematic change. Let's continue to wake up and dismantle Whiteness and replace it with Humanity. 

In this episode, we are going to look at how denial keeps a system in place.  I am going to talk about White Fragility and how we can hide behind the "good person", the "non-racist", the "one who has no problems" and YET we are in total denial.  I am gonna talk about how denial serves to keep us in a system that offers us an advantage.  It also doesn't ask anything from us.  People, let's puncture denial.  Let's greet reality even though it is messy, uncomfortable, and often shame-based.  Let's open our eyes, minds, and hearts to the problem of the day and align with dignity, grace, and equality for all.  I will be reading the preface of my book and part of the introduction of my book.  I appreciate your feedback.  I am also including a link to receive a group coaching class with people from around the world sharing in the Untangle Work.  Let's do this together!

Let's talk about Southern Racism.  In this episode, I am sharing my Southern shame and the struggles of racism I had to confront within my family.  Let's talk about people who enable old systems fo racism to stay in motion.Let's get uncomfortable and look are our own voiceless enabling.  Let's confront all the times we let racial slurs pass and said nothing, did nothing.  Let's come together behind the silence of shame and rattle awakening.Let's form new voices that match our humanity's hearts to hear the cries of injustice.  Let's support Black Lives Matter until systematic reforms are integrated to support equality for all.  It is time to get uncomfortable people. It time to form assert voices that interrupt the old systems.  It is time to say ENOUGH IS ENOUGH.    

In this episode, we are diving into couple's shame and what to do about it.   Many times we stay stuck in the shame, not sure how to mobilize into a harmonious union again.   Things need to get addressed, issues need to be voiced in a healthy way, and space needed to help to discover each other again.   This episode is not only for the ladies, so gentlemen come to this space to gather some ideas of what you can do to move forward.   I must say, coaching couples is by far the most difficult space I hold for people. Triggering money issues and disastrous sexual trauma are difficult terrains to navigate.   However, it is possible to recover and thrive.   We have to become willing to put down our swords and pick up our hearts. We must be willing to meet somewhere new in order to discover each other again.   Sometimes it starts with a foot rub, a hand holding, a gesture of maybe.  Whatever it is, lets start!  

In this episode, I am going to teach you how to UNTANGLE a trigger.  Whether it is flight anxiety, asking for a raise, asserting your needs, whatever!  We need to get out of the Shark Water of emotional triggers.  We need to find new land to support our life more optimally.  Grab a piece of paper and pen to work the 3 Steps as a Triangle Formation.  Many people need the 3 Untangle Steps to be broken apart to better engage. This Triangle Exercise has helped many!   Stay with me, this is worth your time!  

How do we unlock ourselves from shutting down or thaw a freeze?   Many of us, struggle to stay connected.  We trained ourselves early in life to shut down or freeze to survive overwhelming sensations.   But that doesn't mean we need to build a life around a shut-down state!  We can learn skills to emerge out of a freeze and reclaim our lives.   It all starts with the body.   Join me as I walk you through my process to unwind from a freeze.  

Let's talk about Mother's Day and the need for mothering.  Why do we become unavailable for mothering?  What is the difference between fixing ourselves and healthy mothering?  How do we cultivate healthy internal mothering to crawl us into new experiences? 

Imagination is the ability to engage with present reality and form a mental image of something that is not perceived through the five senses.  Our imagination can hijack us in unhelpful ways or we can learn skills to master resourceful imagination.  Everyone possesses a certain degree of imagination ability.  Imagination makes it possible to experience a whole world inside the mind. It gives the ability to look at any situation from a different point of view and to mentally explore the past and the future.We need to create space in our lives to develop our imagination. 

In this episode, we will explore our relationship to medicine.  What is your medicine?  Some of us try to find medicine in booze, pills, donuts, or shopping. This medicine is trying to buffer isolation, pain, confusion, disconnection. Often, we try to control or dominate these behaviors because part of us is terrified to let them go. Instead of managing the wars of self-hate and disconnection, we want to create space to explore our unconscious relationship with our medicine or with letting it go. As we connect our unseen life with our seen experience, we access internal medicine to heal,  thrive, and grow. Here, we reunite with a deeper part of ourselves, a deeper part of life, a deeper belonging with life.