Podcasts about Chodron

In this interview, Ajahn Kovilo, Ajahn Nisabho, and Ayyā Ahiṃsā interview Venerable Thubten Chodron, abbess of Sravasti Abbey in Washington State, about her decades of experience training monastics.

Several years ago, I read Venerable Thubten Chodron's book, Working with Anger, and I found it quite inspiring. A couple of months ago, her schedule finally allowed time to speak with me. We talked exclusively about anger, what it is, why it's harmful, and how we can work with anger in ways that heal relationships, rather than destroy them. She touches on anger's role in some of the most challenging situations, like gender bias and war protests, and how we can deal with these situations courageously and skillfully. Venerable Thubten Chodron is an author, teacher, and the founder and abbess of Sravasti Abbey, one of the first Tibetan Buddhist training monasteries for Western monks and nuns in the U.S. She teaches worldwide and is known for her practical and entertaining explanations of how to apply Buddhist teachings in daily life. She's the author of many excellent books on Buddhist philosophy and meditation. Venerable Chodron is currently co-authoring, with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, an extraordinary multi-volume series of teachings on the Buddhist path, The Library of Wisdom and Compassion. Episode 165: Venerable Thubten Chodron on Working with AngerFrom August 8-11, I'm leading an in-person three-day retreat at California's Vajrapani Institute. There, in the heart of California's redwood forest, we'll go through all of the analytical meditation topics from How to Train a Happy Mind, one by one. I'll give lectures and guide meditations on each topic, and we'll also have plenty of time for questions and group discussions. Learn more here.Support the Show.

The venerable Thubten Chodron helps us understand attachment in day three of Tricycle week. In her article she explains what attachment is and how it leads each of to suffer. Thankfully, she also shares with us ways to “take the Ache Out of Attachment”. :0) Come listen Sponsors: Amazon.com - Shop Amazon using this link and a portion of what you spend will go back to the show.   Meditation Coaching Schedule Time with Thom (Complimentary consultation) Become a Super-Fan of the Show Support ZEN commuter and get access to patron bonuses THANKS FOR LISTENING! Thanks again for listening to the show! If it has helped you in any way, please share it using the social media buttons you see on the page. Also, reviews for the podcast on iTunes are extremely helpful, they help it reach a wider audience.  The more positive reviews the higher in the rankings it goes.  Of course that means more peace in the world.  So please let me know what you think.  I read ever one of them. Did you enjoy the podcast?

In this special event, Ven. Thubten Chodron, founder of Sravasti Abbey, joins Clear Mountain Monastery for a Q&A about the differences in Mahayana and Theravāda practice, the concept of Emptiness, skillful means of building harmonious community, and what liberation means in this life.

In this episode of the Wisdom Podcast, recorded live as a Wisdom Dharma Chat, host Daniel Aitken is joined by Khandro Kunzang Dechen Chodron, student of the great Nyingmapa Tsa-Lung and Dzogchen master, Kunzang Dorje Rinpoche. Khandro Kunzang left behind a promising career in the early 1990's to pursue her practice of the Dharma and […] The post Khandro Kunzang Dechen Chodron: Immersion in the Ngagpa Tradition (#154) appeared first on The Wisdom Experience.

In this episode, I'm speaking with Venerable Thubten Chodron. Ven. Chodron ordained as a Buddhist nun 40 years ago and since then has been studying, practicing, and teaching Tibetan Buddhism. In this conversation, we talk about Venerable Chodron's journey, her teaching method, her view on when one is ready to teach the dharma, qualities to look for in a teacher, the practical application of rebirth, similarities among Buddhist traditions, her view on tantric practice, and more.

Ven. Thubten Chodron is the founder and Abbess of the Buddhist monastery, Sravasti Abbey.In this episode of The Seattle Psychiatrist - Interview Series, Jennifer Ghahari, Ph.D. and Buddhist Abbess Ven. Thubten Chodron discuss: how the use of mindfulness and simple meditative practices may lessen one's anxiety.  * For more information and to access additional free online materials (guides, articles and interviews) check out seattleanxiety.com  and click "Resources."

In this session, Ven. Thubten Chodron speaks on a variety of subjects, including the different modes of practice outlined in the Tibetan teachings, analytical meditation, debate, maintaining the monastic aspiration, and working with aversion towards external conditions.

Intro: We're not doing well. What's the hustle for? W Let Me Run This By You: Is there any such thing as an advocate?Interview: We talk to Kristin Goodman about horses, One Flea Spare, I Got the Blues, David Dastmalchian, John Hoogenakker, New Mexico, Yellow Boat, performance anxiety, Chicago College of Performing Arts, Michael Maggio, gender differences in conservatory education.FULL TRANSCRIPT (unedited):2 (10s):And I'm Gina Kalichi.1 (11s):We went to theater school together. We survived it, but we didn't quite understand it. 20 years later,2 (16s):We're digging deep talking to our guests about their experiences and trying to make sense of it all1 (21s):Theater school. And you will too. Are we famous yet? That was the big question. How are you? It's good to see your face.2 (36s):It's good to see you too. I am. Oh, I'm not, not great,1 (41s):But I am like faking it until I make it, but yeah, you can just start out there.2 (46s):Yeah. I didn't sleep. I had conflict in my house yesterday. I'm fighting with the freaking IRS again. And1 (1m 0s):Like that that's enough right there. Like that could be, you know what I mean?2 (1m 5s):The kid got sick in the night, horribly sick. It's just like,1 (1m 14s):It's the shit, the shit of life. You know, the shit of life.2 (1m 18s):Yeah. What's the for you.1 (1m 19s):Well, before I go on, I just want to say there was a, there was a friend that said that she had this visceral reaction to whenever she felt bad, she traced it back to this time at camp where she was in the cold. This is what you're, you're talking. Your check-in reminds me of, she was in her cold outhouse. This is so gross. But she said there's a visceral or like a bath, the camp bathrooms, not an outhouse, but basically the visceral reaction of a cold wet floor seeing here on the floor smelling.2 (1m 56s):Yeah, wait, that's what comes up for her when she's like,1 (1m 60s):When she has distressed, she remembers this visceral thing of cold, wet floor, disgusting cold wet floor, seeing smelling poop and seeing wet hair on the floor. That's what reminds me like they all go together for her. Yes. She's really in that. And when she's in that moment, I'm not friends with her anymore. But I remember her telling me this and thinking, oh my God, it's so apt. It's like, that is the thing. It's like this combination of things that come together that just make fucking tear, like not good, you know?2 (2m 32s):Good. And that I can really envision that floor. I feel like, I know, I feel like that was, I never went to camp, but I feel like,1 (2m 42s):Yeah,2 (2m 43s):It's not good. It's not good. And you know, like, I guess misery loves company because you know, I, a bunch of people that I talked to yesterday were like, yeah, it's not good.1 (2m 55s):It's similar. I have a similar vibe of like, what is it? You know, I'm S I feel, I mean, it's very strong to say purposeless. I mean, that's, I'm looking for, and I started therapy with this new therapist who I at first thought, oh my God, because she's, she's an older lady. And like, she did that thing of like on zoom. We, we meet on zoom and she did a thing where her camera was fucked up. So I only saw half her face. And I had to be like, Hey, pat, you gotta move the camera. Like I thought, oh, we're in for real. But she's Dr. Pat, Dr. Pat is, I won't say her last name on this in case I ever talked shit about her.1 (3m 35s):But anyway, she, she, she, she's turning out to be quite okay and eight and it's through my insurance covers it. So it's not, that's great. But you know, my bar was pretty low because my last therapist was an Orthodox Jewish guy who kept wanting me to have children. So she's better than that. But anyway, in therapy, I'm realizing that like, I'm really searching for what is it like, what is it I'm looking for in life? Not how do I make money? Not how do I get where I want to go? But like, what are the qualities in life that I am searching for?1 (4m 18s):I've never asked myself that question in my life. Wow. Okay. That's big. Yeah. Like, and, and there's all this shit going on. You know, my friend here, her, mom's got, Alzheimer's, I'm caring, helping care for her and her. Dad's on life support and it's a mess, but all that stuff is true and it's horrific. But I think that's all the stuff of life that's really shitty. But like the internal, when we've talked about this on the podcast, like my internal stuff is more painful usually than the external. Right. I mean, they, they, they really inform each other, but like the informed internal questions of what are the things, what am I looking for? Like if the, what is the hustle for, what is the, where am I going?1 (5m 1s):What the fuck, that's where I'm at. And it's super painful to know, to realize that, like, you know, I don't know the answer to that question. What am I looking for? I, I literally don't and my friend, I have a new friend who's also named Jennifer who said, she asked me this question. And she said, Hey, J boss. She calls me J boss, because someone asked her this as a writing exercise. And I'm going to ask our people this on, on Friday. Anyway. When did you feel when and where do you feel most at home?1 (5m 45s):And I'm like, oh, I w my first response was the coworking space. She's like, and, but it's because I feel like I belong here. Like there's a place to belong to. So that question got me on this. It got me really feeling like vulnerable. And, but like, I wanted to ask you that question, like, my answer was, holy shit. I have no idea. And then the true, if I told this to, and I told this to therapy last night, the true answer to that is in practical terms.1 (6m 29s):The first time I remember feeling at home was when I went to my partial hospitalization day program. Oh,2 (6m 37s):Wow. Oh,1 (6m 38s):Wow. And it was the feeling of after my dad died, you know, I was such a mess and had good insurance praise God. And I went there and I was ashamed and embarrassed, and I didn't want to be there, but I had no structure in my life because I'd left LA and had nothing, nothing to do. And I went there and I thought it was the first time in my life being sick. I felt like no one was pretending, not one person was pretending we had all reached the end of the line in the pretending the therapist. Like no one was pretending that we weren't where we were.1 (7m 19s):It was unbelievably like shocking, but it was also the biggest relief I've ever felt in my life. Well, that's,2 (7m 28s):That's the word I was going to say. I was going to say what it sounds like, what you really felt was relief that you were, I mean, because, and it makes sense that you would have spent your entire life up to that point, figuring out what you had to do to survive, which usually involves making other people happy and feeling responsible for other people's happiness. So the minute, you know, nobody was pretending to be happy. And even if they were, you, weren't in charge of whether or not they were happy that that would feel like a relief. And I, I mean, I haven't had that exact experience, but I do know that, and this is something about myself that I'd really like to change that because of my, the ways I've learned to cope.2 (8m 10s):I mostly feel at home when I'm by myself, which is not, it's not really the direction I want. It's not the thing. I want to be like fostering. I want to be fostering a feeling of being at home with the people that I love, instead of feeling afraid that the people I love, you know, can't help me. Can't take care of me. I have to take care of them.1 (8m 32s):Yeah. I think it is. I think it's, it's, it's right. It's two sides of the same coin. It's like wanting to be for me. Yeah. Wanting to also for my parents and my people. I loved in the past to take care of me and feel that sense of relief with them, but feeling the opposite and then finding a finally being like there is, and I feel like the people talk about this a lot in 12 step programs where it's like, I was, it's like, we're out of options. So like completely. So I don't like saying hit rock bottom all the time, because it was like the end. I will say the end of the road and payment, Pema, Chodron, you know, the Buddhist monk lady talks about this too.1 (9m 15s):Like nowhere else to go, like you're up against your shit. And there's literally nowhere else to run. And so that is like the worst moment. But then I think for me, the moment of admitting and, and saying, oh my God, I have nowhere else to go. I guess I'll surrender to this for me at that moment. In 2006, in may of 2006 or June, it was a day program at a hospital. But like, we can be anything that you just surrender and are like, I need help. Like I cannot, and I don't care where the help comes from necessarily. I'm not picky about it. I haven't had good insurance. So I went to a nice place, but it didn't have to necessarily be nice.1 (9m 57s):I was looking for the relief of the, the, the, the, the release of judgment in a group setting. So it could have been anywhere, but it happened to be a great hospital at the time. And so when it was so helpful that she asked me that question, because I was like, oh, I definitely didn't feel at home in my family. Right. So I didn't feel that. And I didn't feel, and I was thinking about the theater school and our podcast. There were moments where I felt at home within, I feel like for the theater school. And I don't know how you feel about this was sort of like a process of, for me feeling like stepping my toe in and feeling at home and then feeling no, not at home.1 (10m 40s):And then, so I didn't feel at home, like some people talk about like the drama club and their high school being a refuge and feeling at home. I never felt at home there. So, I mean, that was just a really, so it's a lot of intense stuff happening. I feel like for me and for the people that I love and know, and for me, it was really highlighted with this question, like, when do you feel at home?2 (11m 4s):Yeah. And I was like, right. Yeah. No, that's a very good question.1 (11m 10s):What about you like alone when you think of that you think of being by yourself?2 (11m 17s):Yeah. I mean, I have, I, I'm not, I'm not saying it's my fault, but I have perpetuated, let's say the dynamic wherein I feel alone and nobody can help me because of whatever. I'm not letting them help me. Or I pick people who can't help me or whatever it is. And so I I'm constantly like reaffirming for myself. See, nobody cares about you. You know, you don't have any, like, all you can rely on is yourself. That's the really message that I find myself working really hard to defend and to re affirm.2 (12m 0s):And I really don't want to do that. And I'm not suggesting that, like, I, it may be, I need a big paradigm shift, but maybe it's really just this internal work of being like, maybe it just let go. Now, how about serenity right now? How about finding some little bit of peace right now? Instead of thinking when I get blank or when I do blank or when I am blank, it's, that's never, it never, they never comes. I mean, this is the thing that really characterize. I felt like my sister's life, she was, was always, and for her, it was always about money.2 (12m 43s):Once I get my little, you know, this amount of money together, then I will. And it was some form of like, then I'll be happy once I get this job that I'll be happy once I get this boyfriend. And then I'll be happy once I get, you know, and you could just do that for literally your whole life and never got there. And I feel like maybe I've been saying to myself, some type of thing like that, I feel superior in some way, because I have this understanding, but really I'm doing the same thing. I'm I'm in internally saying, well, when I find success as a writer or when whatever my kids are older or with, and this just, it just doesn't work like that.2 (13m 26s):Because when those things happen, there will just be other problems. Like there's no utopia. There's no like,1 (13m 32s):No. Okay. So like mile miles. And I always say like, the panacea isn't even a panacea. Like we thought, you know, him getting a full-time, it's just so amazing how it works. Like him getting a full-time job with all these bells and whistles and all things was going to be the panacea. Well, then it turns out that the, you know, like the paychecks way smaller, because all the full-time job you put into a 401k, you put into that dah, dah, dah, dah, you put, it's not the panacea that you, that it it's just, there is no panacea. Like, and I think that, that, that's what, you know, what the great teachers and stuff that I like say is like, there is nowhere to run. Like2 (14m 12s):You stop looking for the place that you gone to. Yeah.1 (14m 16s):There is no way or to run you're here. And I'm like, oh my God. And, and I think there was a freedom in that, but with it being for me, but for the freedom, just like before I stepped into the rooms, stepped into the room of my day program, there was a constant fighting of trying to survive and trying to keep going the way I had been going, which was pretending to be fine and pretending to keep it all together and pretending to be whatever, you know, what my mom and my sister needed me to be. My dad was dying and I, for better, for worse. Like, I, I, I literally something cracked.1 (15m 2s):And I literally was like, oh, like I talked to the, I remember talking to the intake person and being an, even them just asking me like, what's going on, you know? And I just lost it. And they were like, okay, we'll see you at one eight, 1:00 PM. We'll see you in.2 (15m 20s):Right, right. Yeah. For me, the, for me, I really haven't figured out the difference between pretending and like a more healthy acting as if like, okay, it's not great, but I'm going to kind of go along as if it were, I, I really don't have a very good distinction in my mind between when I'm intentionally employing faking it till I make it versus I'm just pretending I'm telling everybody that I'm fine when I'm really not. Like, I haven't figured that out for myself.2 (16m 1s):I haven't figured it out. Maybe I haven't like, I don't, maybe I just haven't let myself get there. I don't know whether1 (16m 10s):I also don't think. I think again, like I was thinking about like, in the process of feeling at home, and again, I think it's an, it's an, it's a fucking process of yes. And like, sometimes I'm pretending and sometimes I'm doing vacant it till I make it, which is healthy. And sometimes it's just, I don't think for me, it's like, I got part of growing up, obviously in an alcoholic home is like the black and white thinking. Right. So it's like all or nothing. Like I have to be a total mess all the time and that's fine. And that's embraceable, or I have to be like stoic and I can, and I think some days for me is like, I'm able to really embrace the fake it till you make it in a healthy way.1 (16m 54s):And I'm like, okay, I'm going to do the things, walk the dog, do the, did a bit, a bit of it. And some days are just like, oh my God, I can't. But it's, yeah. It's figuring out which days are, which, and also, especially, you know, their shit to be done. Like if especially as seriously. And I, I mean, I don't mean to say this as like, but especially as parents, like there is shit to be done. I'm a dog owner, their shit to be done. So can imagine parents, if, if we parents are completely responsible for the wellbeing of their children and we know my parents didn't do a great job, they did the best they could. It wasn't good enough.1 (17m 34s):So like, there is a real thing about like, people depend on us to do shit. And so there is this2 (17m 42s):And you, you may not have kids, but you have that with, I mean, a lot of people rely on you at various times for various reasons. So really it's the same thing.1 (17m 52s):You can call me a people pleaser. There's also a thing of like, you, people I can call myself or other people can call me a codependent people pleaser, but the lady in the diaper still needs to go to the bathroom. So like, am I going to let her eat it? You know what I mean? Like, there's work to be done. I can't always do the work, but I think there's a part of me. And this is in my DNA. That's like, if a person is suffering and I can help not kill myself, but if I can help, then I do feel like it's my duty to help the lady go to the bathroom like that. I just, and so, you know, and there's people that are like, oh, you, you know, there's, we love to tell people, especially women, you're doing too much.1 (18m 32s):You need to do self care. You need to think about yourself. And I'm like, fuck you. You know what, I, I often can find that pretty like demeaning and also like angering, obviously, you know, anger comes up when people are like, this it's like the toxic positivity, but it goes beyond that. It's like toxic shaming for what we should be doing to take care of ourselves. Yeah.2 (19m 0s):Right. It's just the same thing as you know, is what it's purporting to be fighting against. Yeah. There's a lot of fine lines. I feel, I, you know, I think like the pendulum has really swung in terms of just having this conversation about self care. So, you know, I, I think it really does have to go that way before it can kind of shake out in the middle, but we are in this thing. I mean, for awhile, it was just probably so gratifying and in such a relief for people to be able to go online and see these positive messages and, you know, have these ideas introduced to them about taking care of yourself and having boundaries. But a little bit of knowledge is dangerous.2 (19m 43s):And you know, you can't go around calling everybody a malignant narcissist, and you can't go around saying that every time you want to do something you want it's, self-care, it's, you know, there's a lot of distinctions to be made here and, you know, and I'm there. And there's a lot of distinctions for me too. That's the phase of life I think I'm in right now, I'm trying to make some distinctions between, okay. So I'm not, I'm not just doing the whole reacting to everybody thing, which has defined my life up into very, you know, rather recently, but the answer is not to, just to go in the direction of whatever the opposite of that is.2 (20m 24s):The answer is to find the middle ground and people who are black and white thinkers, like me struggled to find the middle ground Conversation with somebody where I was complaining that this person who I pay, not a therapist, but, you know, I pay to do something for me that I can't do for myself. You know, I was saying to this other person like that, this guy is not advocating for me and the person I was talking to said, nobody advocates for anybody.2 (21m 5s):There are no advocates. And I was like, Hmm, what is that true? I maybe, I mean, I, I really like, it kind of stumped me a little bit like, okay, there's no advocates, what does that mean? Is that1 (21m 23s):More, or no, you just left it at that.2 (21m 29s):Everything is, you know, I mean, I guess their point was like, everything is up to you, which is, you know, actually something I'm actively trying not to buy. I'm trying to buy into the idea that I am not in control of everything. Right. So1 (21m 46s):Was this person, well, I won't ask who this person is, but I will say that sounds like a lawyer.2 (21m 54s):Well, it sounds like a really dejected person, right? Like,1 (21m 60s):Or person talk like that a lot. Cause I know, cause I'm married to one and he doesn't go that route, which is why he was probably not a great lawyer, but in some ways, you know, but hearing him talk about lawyers, that's a very sort of lawyerly thing to do, which is there is no one on your side. Really. There is just you and your willingness to make your life work, make your shit work and to speak up for yourself. And no one really knows yourself like you, so you it's up to you. But it, for me, it really is a dangerous stance because it also, it also sort of makes me angry in that when I was a worked in social services, I was a huge advocate.1 (22m 53s):And sometimes people's only advocate now, did I do it perfectly? No. And like, did I actually make a difference? You could argue that in court either way, but like I was their advocate and I think they're our advocates, but I think there is something, there is some truth in the fact that like we have, we, we have to take care of our yeah, we, we have, we have to take2 (23m 17s):Care of ourselves and well, that's for sure. But that's for sure. I think1 (23m 20s):Our advocates look, there are fucking Abbey. If you look at like, yeah, there are advocates.2 (23m 25s):Well, that's the reason I wanted to run it by you because I think of you as an advocate, I think I've seen you advocate for people professionally and personally and in your career as a therapist and in your career as a friend and in career as a writer. Yeah. Yeah.1 (23m 41s):So I mean, and I think that I take great pride in that and it can lead to like, we're talking about like a lack, a lack of, I wouldn't even say self care, but I can get run down and tired as shit and exhausted. But I was just saying, as I was walking into the co-working space and I was talking to an unhoused guy and helping them out with something and giving them a code and blah, blah, blah, because I had the shit in my trunk. It wasn't like, you know, so I'm giving this stuff to it. And I thought, oh right. If, if being, I did say if being a helper makes me a people pleaser, then I think I'm just going to have to own that because I, I, I cannot stand, I believe by and watch as people suffer without, without trying, because I feel like then there's no.1 (24m 33s):Oh. And it comes down to this, like when I was in the, my worst place, people helped me. that's the truth.2 (24m 42s):Yeah. And also let's be clear. I mean, being a people, pleaser is only a problem. When, you know, a person is like subverting, their, all of their own wants and needs in any given situation for the, that's not, that's not any type of helping is not necessarily, you know, pathological.1 (25m 3s):Right. And I think it's really good. You said that because like in LA, there is this whole thing about like your, your people, like you go, you know, whatever, look out for number one, kind of a situation. And like, you don't have to be rescue anybody and everyone's, and I'm like, that's fine. But, and also what are you going to do when seriously, an unhoused encampment creeps up on your lawn then? So like all of this, we, we all do things for ourselves has helped us to get into this mess. So when there's an unhoused person living on your front lawn, tell me what, what, what do you suggest like, cause what we've been doing every man and woman for themselves, isn't quite working out for us. So like, mean2 (25m 44s):That they're not1 (25m 45s):At all. And there is a part of me and this is a larger conversation that, that we can have at another time. But like that does think that Hollywood, like the service component being of service is so lacking in this industry. There is no, at least in social services, like there is a service component. It may not go perfectly, but there is really no wing of Hollywood that is a service component or a helping component. Right.2 (26m 17s):If it is it's, it's tied up in a lot of like, people's vanity.1 (26m 22s):It's interesting to me. So I mean, you know, I, but yeah, I, I think that advocate that we, an ICU is, and I do, I see most parents that I respect and love also are advocates for their little people all the time, 24 7 with systems, with other people, with their families. It's like, so I think without advocates, we're fucked.2 (26m 47s):Absolutely. And, and you know, like maybe the answer when, when you, when anybody is looking at any situation and saying there's no, this, or there's only this, this all in all or nothing, black and white, that's really that's diagnostic like,1 (27m 7s):Right. I think anytime you're on a date, you meet a new friend you're interviewing for a job. If the person you're talking with is living in a black and white world where there is evil and good and dah, dah, dah, you're, you're an I'm in real trouble. Like, I don't think I can work with those people because even if they're fancy and pretty and cute and to, you know, I don't think it's going to work out just because then I'm going to fall into the camp of either I'm good or evil and that's going to switch,2 (27m 36s):Right. Yes. Because you can never just be one thing. Yeah. Yeah. Stop trying to everybody stop trying to make everybody else one thing or another1 (27m 46s):It's our brains that are trying to like put things into boxes, but it right, right. It really gets us into, into me anyway, into a shit ton of trouble with my marriage, with everything when I'm like, oh yeah, the dog can never go to the bathroom in the house again. Okay. Well, right. Like good luck with that. Like I, it doesn't work.2 (28m 7s):Oh, good luck to you on your journey with your perfectionist.1 (28m 11s):I mean yeah. If it would've worked, we would've really cornered the market on that. Absolutely. Yeah. Like if really, right. It's really just trying to do what other people wanted me to do and to, and to really have no voice worked. I would have been the best version of myself 20 years ago2 (28m 33s):Today on the podcast, we are talking to Kristin Goodman, Kristin trained as an actor, but she is also a director, a playwright, even it has a history as a comedy writer. She's a horse officio, natto and lives in New Mexico with her husband who is also an actor. And we had a really interesting conversation about gender in theater training. And she has some really interesting thoughts. So please enjoy our conversation.0 (29m 1s):Well,2 (29m 22s):Okay. Kristin Goodman, congratulations. You survived theater school to survive as an MFA. You did you study also theater in undergrads1 (29m 33s):And theater. I started out in biology.2 (29m 37s):Oh, wow. So you made a real left turn to get4 (29m 41s):My father basically. So said your dad's a scientist. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, but it wasn't for, you know, I failed constant. I was just, I failed biology twice. So I was like, Hmm. Maybe as a biology major, you fail. Yeah. I realized I wanted to play a biologist on TV. Yes.2 (30m 5s):Much more fun than actually being4 (30m 7s):A buyer. That was really where I was going to get to be a biologist. Yeah. Yeah. And so,2 (30m 13s):But ma you must've done theater or something like that in school to give you the idea that that was what you could switch into.4 (30m 21s):Honestly, when I was in high school, I took drama because my friends were in it and they said it was an easy grade. And so I did that. I was not good. There was no training in my school. Like it was like, you, you knew what theater was. I didn't. So like, I remember doing scene studies and I was like, oh, I have to learn my lines. Oh, so sorry. So I didn't have a clue, but my best friend at the time was working at a comedy club downtown in Austin. And so I started writing material with her. And so we would spend our weekends downtown on sixth street at this comedy club writing material and hanging out with like grown-ass adults and doing that.4 (31m 9s):So that's what I started to learn. Yeah. That's how I learned to write comedy. And then my government teacher, it was during the Bush to caucus run when they were running against each other. And he, he gave us some ideas. He was sort of a really great mentor. And so she and I did a Bush Dukakis debate in class where we personally did them. And so we just started writing comic material and doing that. Which one were you? I was Bush. Yeah. I wish we had video, man. I would say. And then later, like that summer he was teaching summer school and he said, can you guys do this debate for my summer school class?4 (31m 55s):We were like, sure. Why not figure we go into a classroom. It was like an assembly of like all the kids who hadn't passed certain that, and they were laughing their butts off. So it was sort of, I was like, oh, this feels good. I like this. And then I went to a women's college where it was liberal arts school and I was still studying biology. But my second year there, I took a theater film class. And that was what made me go, oh, oh, I was taking photography. I was doing arts. You know, I was drawing, I was just doing that kind of side. But then when I transferred to university of New Mexico, I was going to go to photography program and I walked into the theater section and I just started wandering the halls and it wound up in the Dean's office and she ha she's smoking Capri cigarettes.4 (32m 48s):She's like coming up set am, what do you want to do? And I was like, I think I'm going to be a playwright. And she was like, all right, let's sign you up. So she signed me up and I transferred into there and I had Mac Wellman was one of my instructors. And he's extra crone from the Venezuela and Digby Wolfe who wrote for Laugh-In. Yeah. So, but ultimately I changed my degree to acting because I'm a horror for attention. And people kept telling me I was a really good actor. And I was like, really? They were like, yeah, you should be an actor. And so I just went into acting instead took me awhile.2 (33m 29s):That's that's not typical that you would that a person. I mean, in terms of the people that we've interviewed, starting as a writer, going to be an actor and now returning to writing among other things. So you didn't ultimately find acting that fulfilling or4 (33m 46s):Acting was I loved rehearsal. I loved figuring out the characters and playing once it got to performance, it was, it just, I didn't, I'd never understood the crossover. I never, I didn't nobody ever talked to me about, well, you can keep playing. It was about the product that everybody kind of pushed and I felt too much pressure and it just too much anxiety. And I was kind of miserable every time. Yeah. Very miserable.5 (34m 23s):That crossed my mind. When you were talking about writing in Austin, I'm like you that's the makings of a Saturday night live writer like that. A lot of, did you ever think about like, doing that? Cause I'm like, fuck, if you were writing as if you were a teenager, right. Would you ever be like, I want to write for so, cause that's what I was like, she should have room for Saturday.4 (34m 48s):Yeah. I didn't, it never occurred to me. I didn't, I was very, I was just, I was so confident in everything that I did that I never could discern what was, what I really wanted to do. And at my parents was pretty absent. So, you know, going into theater, I also had, when I got after my second year at this women's college, I went back to Austin for the summer. And I Reno, there's a comedian performance artist from New York named Karen Reno. And she was workshopping a one-woman show called Reno and rehab, something like that, or out of rehab or something like that.4 (35m 30s):And Evan, you knew LIS was the director. She had come out of New York also and she needed an assistant. So I got that gig working for her. And her producer was Chula Reynolds, who was Ann Richards campaign manager. And so I was hanging out with them all summer and working and at the end of that run or that workshop, Chula and Evan and Karen took me to lunch and said, you need to decide what you're doing because you're interested in politics. You're interested in entertainment. What do you want to be behind the camera in front of the camera? And they were just like, you need to focus, get your shit together.4 (36m 10s):So these very powerful, strong women basically were like, smacking me upside head saying, you don't know what you're doing, but you need to do you have an idea? So like, let's help her. So that was kind of the catalyst to me going. I think that's what clicked when I walked into that Dean's office was right. This is what I want to do. I don't want to be a photographer. I don't want to be a biologist. All these, you know,2 (36m 38s):Why do you think it was you? You said, because I was so confident in so many things. I had a hard time figuring it out, but is that really what it was? I mean, looking at your, with your adult eyes now, is it that you were just good at a lot of things? And so, or was it, did it have something to do more with figuring out what other people?4 (36m 59s):Yeah, probably absolutely. I thought it was confidence. So it was more about being confident that I could fulfill that for other people and for myself, instead of really hearing my own voice and hearing like what made me excited to wake up and work and do, regardless of the outcome,5 (37m 23s):Did you, did you, when you had that sort of talk with those women, how old4 (37m 27s):Were you? I was 19.5 (37m 30s):Holy shit. And did you keep in touch with them?4 (37m 33s):I did with Karen Reno for quite some time. And I just reconnected with Evan briefly on like LinkedIn, but not much after that, you know, when you're that young, you're just sort of like flying through the atmosphere, trying to grab on to anything that like feels good or, yeah,5 (37m 55s):I'm just so like in all the fact that they sat you down and believed enough in you, or I don't know what their motivation was, but it sounds to me like they fucking gave a sh you know, the game of shit to sit down with you at 19. I wish some also you were like assisting at 19 on a professional. I mean, that is, did you have over responsible as a kid or how did 19? I was like dating skateboarders and drinking. How did you end up seeing, so it's such like a go getter, kind of a gal.4 (38m 29s):Well, my dad he's German and he learned how to parent in the bootcamp and the Navy. And then, you know, we always, I always had horses and so I was always, you know, it wasn't, I wasn't watching Saturday morning cartoons, you know, I was outside and I was working and there were chores and it was so responsibility was something that I kind of was innately built into my, whether I liked it or not.2 (38m 60s):Yeah. So you mentioned horses and that's been a big part of your life, including you trained animals for film or4 (39m 9s):So when we move to was a ringleader, we moved to Los Angeles. I still had my salary from the Chicago college performing arts, where I was an associate acting professor. So I had that for the summer and then I needed to make money. And we were living right in Hollywood and up the road was a little boarding, stable, like sort of outfitter for like trail rides. And my friend who I wrote comedy with at, in Austin, she was living there and she said, oh, you should go up there because they have horses. And so we went up there and I S then they were looking for a manager, like an office manager.4 (39m 49s):So I went up there and started working for them. And as time went on, I was teaching horseback riding lessons to just your average Joes or actors who needed it, I would take like celebrities on rides and stuff and do that, which was super weird and interesting, but it was great5 (40m 13s):Intimate. Like when I've done horseback riding, when I did like a trail ride, it was just me in California and the trail guide. And it's an intimate thing to be on a horse with just it's quiet except for the horses. So like, was it like intimate? Did you talk to these people and get to know like how4 (40m 33s):Sure. Yeah, no, it was, it was, yeah, it was interesting. And you kind of, there was really nobody that I was, I mean, there were big, big name people, but nobody that I was like, oh my God. Like I, but I couldn't handle talking to at that point. I think, especially when you're the Wrangler, you know, you've got a responsibility and so they're, they're automatically sort of listening to you. So you kind of have a leg up and it's not about them being famous. It's about them being like, please, I don't want to die. Yeah. Right. Right. Yeah.2 (41m 13s):Not many people I don't imagine are in the position of, in that situation, training an actor, a trait, a horse, having expertise in both their area and yours. Did that come up in conversation with, with the people that you were working with and if it did, did it help4 (41m 30s):You do your job? Absolutely. Because if you understand how to maintain your objective and under, and stay in your character and be confident on the horse, then you're doing a good job. If, if you're freaking out about the horse, you're never gonna sell that. You're whoever you're supposed to be on that horse. So, yeah. Yeah.2 (41m 52s):It's an acting. I mean, I've never ridden a horse, but I'm kind of hearing you say, like, everybody needs to do a certain amount of acting on a horse because you have to project a kind of conscious4 (42m 2s):Oh yeah. And you can tell, I mean, my God, you can tell when you're like, oh, that person's should have taken some lessons before they plop them on that horse. The amount of people that get on horses and movies that aren't well-trained enough and do stuff astounds me, like astounds me, but5 (42m 25s):Dangerous for everybody involved. Right. The horse, the human, the whole, I just have this really a lot of respect for you in terms of, I mean, for a lot of reasons, but one of them is the horses. When I have been on a horse, the experience has been show intense. And so tra I had to trust, I've never had to trust anything that was alive. As much as I trusted being on that horse, you know, on a plane, it's like a horse. I was like, oh, Tammy was her name. And I said, Tammy, you, me and you, we're gonna, we're gonna get through this. And she was amazing, but like, it's, it's, it's a real, and they're huge. Like you don't think, oh, of course you're like, it's a huge animal.5 (43m 8s):And anyway, I think that that part is fascinating. Are you still doing, you have your New Mexico? Do you have horses and do you train them? Do you?4 (43m 16s):I do well last October we bought a horse property and moved to it. So I have five horses. Yeah. That's so cool. It's pretty great. It really, I did it. I did it for myself, but I ultimately did it for my daughter because she wanted a horse and it was during that pandemic, the beginning. And I was just kind of watching her just slowly getting more and more enclosed. And I was like, no, this isn't. So when I found the property and we decided to do it, you know, now her window overlooks, like are our nine acres and the barn.4 (43m 58s):And she gets, you know, she finished schoolwork yesterday and she just ran out there and rode two of her horses and spent the whole day down there. So2 (44m 8s):That's fantastic. That's very special thing you're4 (44m 11s):Providing for her. It's pretty satisfying.2 (44m 14s):So getting back to the theater school. So you did, you did theater in undergrad, but how did that compare to DePaul and doing the MFA and having this very intense acting program?4 (44m 29s):It was not even close. You know what, by the time I graduated, I didn't from undergrad. I didn't know what I was doing. I still, which is why I went to grad school. I was like, I can't go out there. I, what the hell I'm doing? Because I spread myself with the playwriting and then into the acting. And I just felt like I hadn't experienced or had the amount of, yeah. I just felt not prepared. And there was a friend who Eli had gone to school with at DePaul who was there at UNM for the graduate directing program. So he was like, you should audition for DePaul.4 (45m 9s):And so I auditioned for three schools and DePaul was one of them. And then I got in and it was, yeah, it was a really big wake up call for someone who I hadn't had a lot of movement. You know, the most dance I had done was I did flamenco because I was at UNM and they had like the best program. So I was like, well, that's what I'm going to do, but it doesn't really prepare you for movement on stage, in a very fluid way, but it helped. I'm sure it helped. And I hadn't had the Linklater. I hadn't had the, you know, the, just the training that I wound up with.4 (45m 54s):So it was, it was intense for me, very intense. It was a lot. It was it intense for you emotionally or just in terms of like acquiring a new set of skills socially? Not socially, but emotionally and like, yeah, physically acquiring all those skills and connecting all the dots and really just me with all my like guards up and all the, I really didn't know how to play. Honestly, I didn't grow up playing. I grew up working and so playing, you know, when I worked at the comedy place in Austin, that was playful, but I didn't equate the two for some reason.4 (46m 37s):And so when I got to DePaul and you know, Rick Murphy's asking me to play, I could improv because I had been an improv group in undergrad and I had done all that stuff before I got there. In fact, the, the MF, the guy that was there for a master's program, he started this improv group. So he taught me everything. Rick had taught him. Oh. So by the time I got to DePaul, I knew how to do everything. Rick was teaching. So I had fun, but I was still, I guess the biggest thing was I was so aware of how much money it was costing and how a debt I was going, that there was a side of me that was like, I better be good, like this better work.4 (47m 19s):And there was a lot of pressure to like, be an and learn and evolve into something that was going to pay off for me. And I think it kind of hampered my playfulness in some ways.5 (47m 35s):It's interesting. I mean, I think that that is so, and you could talk about this too, cause you're on sets now, but like this it's, it's the sense of place. I mean, I think that's maybe what I'm talking about about the heart, the schism that exists between when we're, when we're told to be playful, especially like in a Rick Murphy kind of a way, and really have a sense of, of, of joy about the work. But then there, there comes a transition where it's not play at all. It's like serious business. And I don't think I ever knew how to mix the two and that's why my acting isn't good. Like really, like, I don't know. I'm not, I'm just saying like, I don't think I ever learned how to bring the joy back to set.4 (48m 19s):Yeah. Yeah. It's5 (48m 22s):That I'm like, oh yeah, I never have fun on set. I always feel like I'm going to die. So like, but I didn't feel like that class.4 (48m 29s):I didn't feel that way in Murphy's class either. I saw it all around me. And when, when I, when the third year when we were mixed with the undergrads is when I really became aware. Because as a graduate student, you know, your acting professor could say something to you that was kind of shitty. And you could say, oh, go fuck yourself. Like, cause you're like, you know, I'm 22 years old, go fuck off. Like yeah. You know, and, and they would be like, oh, and you would be like, well, no, seriously go fuck off. Like, I don't need that. It still hurt. But you didn't, you didn't have that.4 (49m 12s):You know, when you're an undergrad, what I noticed the undergrads was it was, it was really, it could be very intense. And what I really thought, what I really noticed in the undergrads was the difference between the experience of the women were having an experience that men were having. I really felt like the women were pitted against each other or they were, or just in general society, that's what was happening. So there was so much competition between the women that it was agonizing to watch my friends, like, like just sobbing and bathrooms and like hating each other and not being supportive of one another and really like taking out their own insecurities on each other.4 (50m 0s):And when I saw the, the males that were an undergrad, there was just sort of like, Hey, that's great. I'm so glad you got that part. I wish I got it. Let's go have fun anyway. And it was just like, what are they giving them? What's going on?5 (50m 15s):And you had gotten to an all women's college, right? So like you,4 (50m 20s):I knew what w women were like, and it wasn't like that at the women's college that I was at the liberal arts school. I mean, it was very supportive and, you know, people do shitty stuff, but nothing where it was like, you were trying to con you were, you weren't competing with the other person. But I, I witnessed a lot of that just as an upper, you know, a graduate student watching the undergrads, really just squabbling for parts and not5 (50m 53s):That's quick. It's so interesting. And also, I'm just thinking of our interview with, with John who can Acker and Dave , who were competing all the time and yet loved, managed to love the shit out of each other as they went through and their relationship only grows stronger and stronger. And then you turn and there's women that started out being friends and at the end of undergrad, hated each other and never talked to each other. Again, it was still such a different, I never dawned on me, never Dawn on me until you said that, that there could be that disparity between discrepancy and, and, and4 (51m 29s):It was a very different experience for women. I felt, and I don't know what it's like now, but, but I, it was, it was hard to watch. It was really hard to watch2 (51m 40s):Also thinks that that was true for the MFA program that, that, that, no.4 (51m 45s):Okay. Not in my experience.2 (51m 49s):So then what did you like, what did you do with that awareness at the time? Did you talk to anybody about it or were you just kind of like, Ooh, don't touch that with a 10 foot pole.4 (51m 59s):I don't think I had the wherewithal to really recognize it. I just kind of saw it and steered clear of it. I mean, there were some graduate student, friends of mine that did get into that mix where they would start to bad mouth, another actress, or talk about how it wasn't fair or, you know, that kind of a thing. But yeah, I didn't, I didn't stick my toe in it. There was a really nice moment, like toward the end, very end of my time there, when we were in scene study class with Mike Maggio, and I remember two of my friends were up there acting, and it was sort of a train wreck.4 (52m 42s):And he was like, let's just come in. We'll just sit down and talk. I don't know if you were in this class, Jen, but he goes, he gathered everybody around. He was like, eat, you guys know that nobody's going to die. Right? Like that, this is just a play. This is not life and death. You can have fun up there and nobody's going to die. Are we, are we all in agreement with that? And I was like, thank you. Somebody finally said it.5 (53m 11s):What a relief.4 (53m 12s):Yeah. And everybody was kind of just staring at him like what? And I was like inside my head, just thinking, God, thank God. Somebody finally said this to these people because it was5 (53m 25s):So interesting because he was the one really closest to death in terms of his physical4 (53m 30s):Life. So he knew like, look, this is play. Like, why aren't you enjoying yourself?5 (53m 37s):My God.2 (53m 38s):Yeah. Yeah. There was just such a, I mean, we've talked about this a lot on here. There was just such a preciousness that the, that the, I think I'm trying to unpack, like why, why was it like this? And I think one part of it could be that the R the undergrad professors really took consultants quite seriously and talked about, I think what they were trying to do was talk about the craft in a way that engendered, you know, reverence from the students. But it wasn't articulated enough to say that you could step out of that at times.2 (54m 18s):You didn't always have to carry the mantle of like my crap, you know? And cause I just remember taking everything quite seriously.4 (54m 29s):Sure. Yeah. I would, I would, yeah, I did at times too. I mean, you know, my husband who was my boyfriend at the time would find me, like in my closet, crying, listening to Tori Amos really loud, you know, like, and he'd be like, are, are you okay? Like you just had to have an emotional outlet and5 (54m 50s):You feel supported like as a grad student or as a human that did you have like a circle of friends you felt supported there and like made good friends and like felt where I I'm like obsessed with this idea of feeling at home today. And like, did you feel at home amongst your people there?4 (55m 8s):Yeah, I did. I mean, I had a different experience in that I had this boyfriend, so I kind of had this life outside of the school, whereas other people were going to parties and they were hooking up and they were experimenting. And I wasn't part of that social circle, but I felt supported by my friends. So I didn't, you know, if they weren't supportive, I had no idea, but more often than I felt supported, you know, I, I remember after like our first intro, we were doing that, David Hare play that I hate so much. I can't remember the name of it.4 (55m 48s):Yeah. I think it's skylight. Ugh, that frigging thing. And I, we finished like the second performance or something and we were cleaning up the classroom and Murphy walked up to me and he goes, you, you got that. You got that monologue finally. And I was like, yeah. And he goes, the second one though, it's still aren't there. And Tisha was standing next to me. She goes, would you shut the fuck up? Leave her the fuck alone. What's wrong with you? And he was like, oh. And she was like, give her a fucking break. I was like, yeah, give me a break.4 (56m 28s):I'm working here. And he was like, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. But oh, that's great. So we did do that for each other and we did like stick up for each other because we, you know, when you're at that point and you know, I don't know about the undergrads, but all the grad students were paying for their way. Like there was no doubt everybody was paying their way. So you kind of had, you felt valid in saying, you know what? I don't need that I'm paying you. We thought they were, are supposed to be our parents and you didn't right. Oh God. Yeah. They were, they were, are equals to a certain degree. We felt. And so when, when these conversations would come up, at least from my perspective, I don't know if other grad students felt this way, but you know, I had a couple of really good friends who were really talented, who just left.4 (57m 17s):They're like, nah, I'm not going to do this. And you know, they have, they have a great life. I'm still in touch with them. And I think that you kind of have to want to be stripped down. You, you kinda have to want to have your ego dismantled to see what's underneath it. And, and I think that as actors want that writers kind of want that to find out what's in there. And so I think there was something to what they were doing that was really beneficial. My big thing that I think all conservatives, all conservatory training programs should have because of my experience in my third year, there would be that you need to have some kind of, they teach you how to get into character.4 (58m 3s):They teach you how to use things from your emotional life and PO so that you can just jump right in, but they don't teach you how to take it out. There's no decompression. Like they don't put you through. They don't have a technique and the tools for you to like release it. So when my third play that from my, my last year there, I did all the last three shows I did at victory gardens. Right. At one fleece, you were brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. Well, I went really, I went from one flea spare right into, I got the blues. It didn't have a break.4 (58m 43s):And I started having panic attacks at dress rehearsal for, I got the blues. That was my first panic attack was onstage dress rehearsal. I got the blues and Hoka knocker was sitting across from me and I was talking. And then all of a sudden I just stopped talking and I was very aware of the exit sign. I was very aware of like where I was, except I thought I feel so different. What's going on? And Hogan lockers, just looking at me. And he said, as said something else to me. And he said something else to me. And all of a sudden, I just started talking again and we're back. But after that, I was like, I'm not doing this. I can't, I'm not, can't go on stage again.4 (59m 24s):So I had to manage panic attacks all through that run. And then5 (59m 31s):How did you do it? Did you get help?4 (59m 34s):Eli's uncle's a psychologist in Chicago. So he got me some Klonopin. Great. And I was able to do every single show and every single night, Lisa volt would have to push me on stage. Like she would stand right behind me and just push me. And then I would just go into auto drive, complete auto drive. And it was, yeah. Yeah. So I, you know, I probably could have done a better job in that play, but I was definitely on auto-drive, you know, I was like,5 (1h 0m 8s):Yeah, I, you know, I S I started having panic attacks at my fourth year in DePaul or 30 or DePaul two. And I can't imagine, and I wasn't in a show. It did, like I was in yellow bow, but then it ended and I had a break from it. But the fact that you were able to continue. Like now I look at, I watch performances since being, having an anxiety disorder and performers in a different way. Like being able to manage panic while being another character and remembering it is like, this is a miracle, it's a miracle to me so that you got through it. I don't give a shit if you didn't fucking Merrill.5 (1h 0m 51s):Holy shit. Holy shit. I think that's brilliant. And also afterwards, you must've been, how did you feel? Were you like, what the fuck was that?4 (1h 0m 60s):So I have panic attacks, you know, all through. I mean, I was just taking Clonopin. I was, when we went to LA for the showcase, I had to manage it, then that whole summer. And then I finally got therapy and the like 10th session with the therapist, we were going through my life, you know, then finally she said to me, tell me about the play before I got the blues. And that was one police bear. And I said, oh, so she's just telling me this story. Tell me about it. And I started, I started from the beginning, but what I realized, I mean, by the end, I was just sobbing. I was a disaster. What I realized was I, I didn't know the difference in my brain between what Naomi had written and what I had created for my character.4 (1h 1m 48s):It was just a whole life that I created inside of myself. And that had things that I had created. So they were mine. And that play is a woman who's scarred from the neck down, from a fire, from saving her horses and her husband who won't touch her and this little girl. And, you know, there's the plague. And in the end, the little girl helps her kill herself with a knife. And then they shroud me and the Matt who was playing my husband and we're dead. And then Dave, who played the guard has this big monologue where he walks in front of us and he loved that monologue. And it took a while.4 (1h 2m 33s):Yeah. Day one thinking about me, like in a corset, under a blanket, try not to breathe, you know, he was performing. So that whole time I was just repressing, repressing, repressing all these emotions after killing myself on stage. And then I would go off stage and just breathe and then go on with my day. So when I started rehearsals for, I got the blues, it just stayed repressed. And then when I had my first panic attack, it was things like, I didn't want to be near knives. I kept thinking about why do I keep thinking about killing myself? Like there were all these things that I just hadn't added up with the fact that I had created a whole life and I'd done a good job from all my training.4 (1h 3m 16s):Like all that recall. And, you know, being able to walk on stage and have this whole history and this moment that it happened off stage, it worked, it all worked. It was all great technique. But again, nobody taught us how to compress all that shit. How do you get all that out of you so that you can move on to the next character or on with your life without carrying around with you,2 (1h 3m 40s):Right? Yeah. And this has come up a lot on the podcast and sometimes we've done this, I'll do it with you. Let's do a thought experiment about if we could have dictated the terms of that rehearsal process for you and somebody could teach you how to unpack decompress, what would it look like? Would it look like somebody on staff? Like, would it be sort of like having an AED, but maybe somebody who's trained in?4 (1h 4m 8s):I think someone who's either trained in trauma or mental health because every, I mean, every great play has conflict. Every, every story has conflict. So there's going to be trauma. And how are you going to find that within yourself, you're going to go to that place that has trauma in you to access that vulnerability. Right? So if you have somebody on staff, who's either trained in somatic movement, something that like you can like, then they take the actress from that play. And they do two days of movement to release all this stuff out of their bodies. Since DePaul was all movement, like it was all about the physical actor.4 (1h 4m 49s):So how do you let it out of yourself physically when you've been taught to put it in physically? I think that would benefit actors tremendously. And if they're trained in trauma, in mental health great too, but that they have to also be trained in some sort of physical outlet that helps you exercise that out.2 (1h 5m 11s):God, what if they had had something like, you know, followed in Christ love on technique? What if we, what have we integrated the study of that more with like helping ourselves in a practical way after rehearsal? Because even if it's not some big traumatic story, even if it's a children's story, it takes a toll, but this is something that I think people who aren't actors can't maybe wrap their heads around no matter what it is having to put yourself in a reliably, you know, heightened place, night after night or day after day as the case may be, is emotionally exhausting for everybody.2 (1h 5m 53s):No matter how much for how little trauma they have. Yeah.5 (1h 5m 57s):And you're moving, you see, like my panic is taxed started after I played a mother who lost her child to aids. Now I'm not saying that my real parents and my real childhood didn't, didn't start this whole process. But like that's when they started after that, right around that, and that intense experience with AF Kali who, you know, had his shit. And so it's just interesting. We never, and also the thing that we never talked about, that the, the movement part of it, the somatic part of it, I, I, I think you're right. I think it's not just about mental health. It's about the body releasing from the body, all the stuff.5 (1h 6m 41s):Oh, shit. That is some deep shit. Do you, do you use that with actors? Like when you're on set as a director or as a writer, what are your, are you conscious of that on your sets? Like about actors health and stuff, mental health and stuff like that?4 (1h 6m 56s):Absolutely. Oh sure. I mean, I opened a, okay. I just, when I just shot a short, that was a horror and the actress is she's, she's not as experienced as say we would have been coming from a conservatory, but she's been like taking lots of classes and stuff. And she's, I've watched her grow as an actress. And when I cast her, you know, I told her a couple of times, like I said, remember, this is film. I don't, you don't have to feel anything in these spots. I don't, I just need the shot. If you feel it, that's fine.4 (1h 7m 37s):But I'm, you don't have to go to a really dark, dark place because technically I'm going to grab what it is I need just from the look in your eye. So just remember, I don't need you to go really deep in all these sections and horrify yourself. And then I said, you know, make sure that you write out everything on a piece of paper afterward and release it so you can let it go. And she took it very seriously. She was, she really did her work and she gave a great performance. Also I directed a play a couple of years ago where it was two actors in there onstage the whole time. And it's very intense. And the male lead key, I mean, so confident, like just working his butt off opening night or the kind of gala night when the playwright had flown in and all these important people were there, the actress was like, Krista, come in here.4 (1h 8m 37s):And I went into the theater and she's like, he, he said he can't do it. He can't do it. He's freaking out. And I was like, oh, okay. So I went, I talked to him and he was like, I don't know, what's wrong with me. I'm freaking out. I'm panicking. I'm losing my shit. You know, he's like a 50 year old man. He suddenly is having a panic attack. And I remembered, I got the blues and I remember all those feelings. And I said to him, you know what, you don't have to do it. You don't have to do it. I said, you tell me, I would tell them you have the flu. I would tell him you have diarrhea and vomit. And there's no way we can do this tonight. I was like, that's fine.4 (1h 9m 16s):You don't have to do it. He was like, are you sure? I was like, absolutely no, you don't have to do it. And I knew by saying that to him, it would drop him, drop his anxiety down tremendously because having someone sort of affirm that you're not crazy that there's nothing wrong with you, that the end of the world is not going to happen. If you don't do this play tonight. And I told him that I was like, what the fuck? Like I told him, I said, the playwright flew in. And he had like the gear landing thing that thought they were going to die. I was like, that's real. I was like, this isn't it's okay. I was like, he can watch it tomorrow or he doesn't get to see it, whatever.4 (1h 9m 58s):And he totally was, he was fine. And he went on.2 (1h 10m 3s):So this ties in so beautifully to the thing we were talking about before we started talking to you today, which is about advocacy and whether or not we were asking each other, whether or not we felt like we had advocates in our lives or whether we are advocates. And what I hear you saying both from, even if you weren't like getting involved in what was the theater school politics were even just, I'm going to make the argument that even just the fact that you were holding space for that idea and kind of that it, that you having this idea that it shouldn't didn't need to be that way for the women. No doubt had some lasting effect in the ether. That is it because of theater school is a very different place now in no small part, because of all the people who were willing to say, Hmm, I don't, I don't quite think this is right, but so you did that there.2 (1h 10m 55s):And then you did that with your actors, and I'm guessing you probably do that a lot with actors and it's like Africa. It, it never, I feel like there's this idea that if we are nice to actor, that, that, that we're not going to get a good product or there's some weird mythology about people needing to really suffer. And it doesn't actually work that way. That's some romantic idea that has never been4 (1h 11m 21s):True. Well, it's, it's a power thing. It's, you know, directors or acting teachers who enjoy the power. Maybe they're not even conscious of it, but it's like, you know, you've got a bunch of like Barbie dolls and you're just in control of them and you get to play with them. And I think that that kind of power is intoxicating. When I was an acting teacher at Chicago college, performing arts, I was keenly aware of the power I had and I was very uncomfortable with it. I didn't like it at all. I didn't. And I, but I learned from watching the undergrads at DePaul and watching the professors and how things were dealt with in certain ways. And just even my colleagues at the, at Roosevelt, I, you know, the students were getting mad at me because I wouldn't validate them.4 (1h 12m 10s):They'd be like, just tell me if I'm doing a good job. And I was like, I'm not gonna do that. I'm not gonna do that. Because what I've learned is someone else is going to think you're doing a shitty job. So I would say, just do your job and enjoy doing your job. And if you're enjoying it and you're doing your work, that should be enough. I will give you direction. I will tell you where you need to look deeper. I will, I will give you what you need, but I will at no point tell you that. You're amazing. I also won't tell you that you're awful. And it was hard for them, but it, but it kept me from kind of drinking that Kool-Aid of like I was because they treated me, like you said, like parent, like, like I was suddenly their mom.4 (1h 12m 58s):And then the, the, the boys forget about it. You know, I was 30 years old. I was, they were like, oh my God, that's my teacher. And they were flirtatious. I mean, like beyond. And I was like, what the hell is going on? So I had to like, keep that at bay. I had to like, because you were the adult. And I was like, oh, this is what's going on. These male professors don't get it. They think this is a real thing. Think that girl really is in love with him. No, she's just desperately looking for the comfort of a parent of a mentor, a validation of safety, all those things.4 (1h 13m 46s):And he fell, right. You know, they fall

Wie wir lernen, Mitgefühl im Alltag zu entwickeln Seit einigen Jahren versteht die westliche Wissenschaft immer besser, was der Buddhismus uns seit Jahrtausenden lehrt: dass das bewusste Entwickeln von Mitgefühl sich positiv auf unseren Geist, unser Gehirn und unser allgemeines Wohlbefinden auswirkt. Julia Schütze #Whisper2Me www.juliaschuetze.at/whisper2me www.arbor-verlag.de

Wie wir lernen, Mitgefühl im Alltag zu entwickeln Seit einigen Jahren versteht die westliche Wissenschaft immer besser, was der Buddhismus uns seit Jahrtausenden lehrt: dass das bewusste Entwickeln von Mitgefühl sich positiv auf unseren Geist, unser Gehirn und unser allgemeines Wohlbefinden auswirkt. Julia Schütze #Whisper2Me www.juliaschuetze.at/whisper2me www.arbor-verlag.de

Summary:  On this episode of the Act To Live Podcast, Scott and Jaime talk about their definitions of the terms aggression, peace, and peace of mind. Scott then walks Jaime through a short quiz meant to better understand her current level of peace of mind. The duo then talks about the ways in which taking time to foster peace of mind can be helpful to ourselves and the world in general.   ACTion Event of the Week: Take time this week to focus on something - exercise, meditation, a mantra, etc. - that helps bring you peace of mind/inner peace. What did you notice?  Join us on the next episode of the Act To Live Podcast as we explore the health benefits of music. References: Alexander, C. Peaceful Body, Peaceful Mind, Peaceful World. Maharishi International University. https://research.miu.edu/maharishi-effect/peaceful-body-peaceful-mind-peaceful-world/ Cherry, K. (2020). Factors That Lead to Aggression. VeryWellMind.  https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-aggression-2794818 Chodron, P. (2008). The Pocket Pema Chodron. Shambhala Publications.  Unknown (2015). Peace: Sometimes It's More About CREATING it than FINDING it. Self Help Daily. https://www.selfhelpdaily.com/tag/how-to-have-a-peaceful-mindset/

American Tibetan Buddhist nun, Thubten Chodron, gives a humorous depiction of the consequences of believing in a solid self and an objective reality. Then, Chan teacher Guo Gu talks about founding Dharma Relief, a pan-Buddhist Covid relief program to distribute masks in the early months of the pandemic, and what’s next for the growing organization.

This week Alyssa sits down with the wonderful Petia Kolibova, a women's transformation coach. Petia shares her journey from living with an eating disorder and feeling unworthy to now feeling fully empowered and confident in her life. Tune in for an incredible discussion on how Petia helps women to remember that we are all divine and powerful beings! Support the LAT Podcast Petia's website Tune in to Petia's Unapologetically Abundant Podcast   Transcript: Alyssa Scolari [00:23]: [singing] Alyssa Scolari [00:23]: Hello and welcome, ladies, gentlemen, human beings alike. This is another episode of the Light After Trauma Podcast. This is a podcast by trauma survivors for trauma survivors. I am your host, Alyssa Scolari, and I am happy to be here with you for another week. And this week we have... Oh you know what? I didn't even ask how to pronounce your name, that was so incredibly rude of me. Is it Petia? Petia Kolibova [00:53]: It's Petia. Alyssa Scolari [00:55]: Petia. Petia Kolibova. Petia Kolibova [00:59]: You got it perfectly now. Alyssa Scolari [01:03]: Okay. So we're starting off on a great note. So I am happy to have here with us Petia Kolibova She is a women's transformational coach who helps women who have been pushed down and have been playing it small due to toxic relationships or unhealed childhood trauma to create a life that is true to them and their soul purpose. Amen. Petia's mission is to help women who are on the path to healing from past wounds move through their limiting beliefs and internal blocks so that they can finally do what they want to do, what feels good to them, serve other women in a powerful way online. Alyssa Scolari [01:46]: Petia pairs feminine flow with strategic planning to give entrepreneurs immense clarity and exact steps to transition from side hustler to CEO. If she's not interviewing on her podcast, Unapologetically Abundant, working out or reading, you will find her in nature disconnecting from the world and connecting to herself. Welcome, Petia. How are you? Petia Kolibova [02:13]: I am doing amazing. Thank you so much for having me, Alyssa. And actually, I find it really refreshing that you didn't ask me how to pronounce my name, because every time I jump on an interview with people they're like, "Okay, so before we even introduce each other, before we start talking, how do you pronounce your name." So I was like, "Oh, this is nice, refreshing." So you are being original, unique and look how beautifully it played out. Alyssa Scolari [02:40]: Yeah, listen, I'm going for it. You know what it is? It was just that we started talking and then I already felt like I've known you for five years. So I was just like, "Oh, I got this." And I just didn't even think to ask. So yeah, it played out okay. So I appreciate you being here. You are a rockstar of a woman. So could you just elaborate and expand a bit more and what it is you do, because you are doing all types of incredible things. Petia Kolibova [03:11]: Well, thank you so much, Alyssa. That's so beautiful and such a beautiful introduction. And thank you for calling me a rockstar. I think it's very sweet of you. And if you would have told me this 15, 10, heck, even five years ago, I wouldn't see myself as a rockstar, I would see myself as a rock on the bottom, really, because back then it wasn't me who has a podcast, the love of her life who she's getting married in two months and getting myself [crosstalk 00:03:41]. Alyssa Scolari [03:40]: Two months! Petia Kolibova [03:41]: Right? And having a six figure online coaching business. Five, 10, 15 years ago I was very insecure, I felt that I'm unworthy, unlovable. And I was attracting the experiences that were just confirming that. They were confirming my feeling of unworthiness. I went through depression, anxiety, antidepressants. I went through the attempt of suicide, suicidal thoughts, eating disorder. And really the feeling that I'm just the waste of a space, like why am I even here? It didn't make sense to me, like why am I here? And I know that maybe not just your listeners, but people in general, they are thinking about, "Why am I here? What is my purpose?" Petia Kolibova [04:27]: I was waking up every single day and I was feeling and thinking that there must be more. If not, this is so silly. We're born, we go through the darkness then we get the job, maybe get married, couple kids and then die. I was thinking that if somebody, higher power, whatever you believe, universe, God created this, this is pretty silly, let me tell you. So I was holding on that hope that there must be more in life, this cannot be it. The world is spinning, the planets are not crashing into each other, we are breathing, our heart is beating, we don't have to control these things. So I wanted to believe that whoever is controlling these things that we don't have to think about has a higher intelligence than just bring us here, go through some suffering, go through glimpses of fun or joy, and then die. Petia Kolibova [05:24]: And that's something that really it was just this unstoppable curiosity in me to try to figure it out. So I was trying to figure it out through doing all the right things. I went to school, I went to fitness competition, I got married, I was doing all the right things, checking off the boxes. I got my Bachelor's in Marketing, I got my MBA, I got the great corporate job that I was raising the ladder. And I felt empty and I felt miserable. And I thought to myself, "Something must be wrong with me. What's wrong with me?" People look at me and they're like, "Oh you have such a great life, look how handsome husband you have." Who could have known he's a narcissistic and very, very different person behind a closed door than what you can see. Alyssa Scolari [06:14]: Right. The things that people can't see, exactly. Petia Kolibova [06:16]: Exactly. And I felt so much shame and so much guilt because when people would look at my life, everything on the outside looked great. I have a great body, I have a great job, I have a great looking husband, right? What's wrong with me that I am not appreciating what I have? But the things that I had were not things that were meant for me, because I was not true to myself. I was doing all the things that I thought that I should and those things that we think we should are not things that are true and right for us. Alyssa Scolari [06:50]: Yes, it's this idea that I think is ingrained in people that you have to achieve the American dream, climbing the corporate ladder, looking really good, working out, having a really handsome or good looking partner, having money. And it's like well these are the things that make you happy. And then you attain all of those things and it's like, "Oh, but I'm still really miserable." Petia Kolibova [07:15]: Yeah, exactly. And it's the thing, for some people this American dream really works, because that's what lights them up. We are not here to criticize one way or the other way, but it's very important for you to realize, "Who am I? What lights me up?" Because doing all those things, listen, my mentor, I have a business and marketing mentor, she's my friend, she's my mentor, I love her to life, she's making between 100 and $600,000 a month. And she is absolutely incredible piece of human being. I love her to life. It turns her on, it lights her up. She is a genius. She is a marketing goddess. That's how I have her saved in my phone, Shannon, the marketing goddess. Petia Kolibova [08:05]: And this lights her up, the spreadsheets, the numbers, the marketing. For me, it drains me. It drains me. That's why in my business I created a feminine flow and strategies that feel good to you so you don't have to be working hard and hustling. For her, it turns her on, for me, it turns me down. So we get to ask ourselves, "What are the things that really I'm curious about? What really lights me up?" Those are the things that are going to take you out from that darkness, from that feeling of meaninglessness. Those are the things that you get to start giving yourself permission to feel and to feel it all, not to bury or numb your feelings. Give yourself permission to feel it all, that's what's going to make you really feel alive. Alyssa Scolari [08:59]: Yes, because if you keep pushing down that feeling that's coming up that says, "Something's not right here", then I find that we end up finding ourselves back in the lull of attraction. And speaking of which, I think what you started off with, with the podcast and what you were talking about was really what the lull of attraction is. So would you mind sharing with the listeners what is the lull of attraction? Because it's so easy to get caught up in when we don't honor that feeling. Petia Kolibova [09:32]: Absolutely. And I love that question, what really is the lull of attraction? And it's funny because some people like, "Oh, that's woo woo stuff, I don't believe in that." It's like saying, "I don't believe in gravity, that doesn't apply to me." Whether you like it or not, it does apply to you and likes are attracting likes. Just think about it, you wake up in the morning and you're feeling like, "I don't want to wake up, I don't want to go to my job", and everything starts to be looking gray, everything starts to look overwhelming and frustrating. But if you can wake up in the morning and connect with your body, connect with your breath and really think about the things, "What am I really excited for today?" You get to step into that positive expectation. Because when we're expecting the best and when we're expecting the positive, the positive will come. Petia Kolibova [10:22]: And even if some challenges will come, like traffic or people you don't want to deal with or traffic ticket, whatever it is, it's not going to be such a big of a deal. Give yourself permission to create the life you truly desire by being what you desire. You get to be it first. It's like going to your garden, planting apple trees and waiting for pears to come. It won't happen. So everything you're planting out there, it's going to happen. And listen, it's not like I have made it, it's not like my life is perfect. We all are going through the things and ebbs and flows in our life. However, these ebbs and flows are not going to be the highest high and the lowest lows, not anymore. And that's something that lull of attraction really helps you. Petia Kolibova [11:13]: And I remember the first time that I started to learn about lull of attraction. And then I had a negative thought, I was like, "Oh my gosh, I screw it up. Now something really bad will happen." I was so paranoid like, "Oh my God, I thought about that." It's not like that. I feel like our first thought, it's instinct, like instinctual. It's like this first glimpse into what could be. Like you're waking up and you're feeling negative, don't worry, choose again. That's the beauty, each and every moment is a new moment and you can always choose again and that's what I love. Because sometimes we're feeling frustrated or overwhelmed. Do something that brings you joy. I go to the park, I go for a walk, I kiss my dog on her belly, that makes me happy. Alyssa Scolari [12:04]: That makes me the happiest. Puppy belly kisses, they're the best. Petia Kolibova [12:08]: Right. I love her to life. She is such a joy. Just playing around or I go take a shower. Or my fiance, I can do it myself, but he does EFT tapping on me, just the tapping on me on the meridian points, because that really helps you to, first of all, just to get present, slow down, get into your body, but also tapping on the energetical points that you can shift the energy, you can shift how you're feeling. So it's fun. Alyssa Scolari [12:41]: Yeah. And I love that you pointed out that just because I recognize the lull of attraction and I recognize that I'm getting what I'm putting out there, and just because I'm working on that and I'm actively trying to change things, doesn't mean that I'm never going to have lows. It just means that it's going to be so much easier. It's just different. It's more doable than suffering. It really pulls you out of a place of suffering and a place of meaninglessness. What is the point of anything? Petia Kolibova [13:26]: Absolutely. And it's really important to remember, because I even remember when I started my journey I used to be comparing myself with people who are a couple steps ahead of me or are doing the things or having the things that I wanted to. It's a slippery slope, it really brings you in a downward spiral. So recognizing that we are all on our journey and each of us is working on different things. And it would be super boring if everything is just like butterflies and rainbows. You would be getting bored so quickly, because we came here to experience things, we came here to grow, we came here to evolve. And growth is one of my core values. I really value growth. Sometimes to grow is fun and sometimes it's uncomfortable, sometimes it's scary, but we really cam here to experience this world and experience what is it to be a human. Alyssa Scolari [14:21]: Yes, we came here to experience all of the emotions both. And I won't say good and bad because I do not believe that there are bad emotions, but both the difficult ones and the easier ones. We came here to experience it all. I don't know that we necessarily came here to suffer in the way that we do when we go into this existential crisis of, "What does anything mean?" Now, for you, I wanted to ask, and if this is too personal of a question, please tell me and I absolutely will take no offense. You had mentioned both, I know this was on your website and you had also mentioned this earlier, that you had battled an eating disorder. Were you in the throes and in the midst of your eating disorder while you were "living the dream" with a handsome husband and climbing the corporate ladder? Was that when you were in your eating disorder? Petia Kolibova [15:26]: I was struggling with eating disorder for 18 years. So that was most of my life. I started with my eating disorder when I was 11 years old. Alyssa Scolari [15:37]: Wow, you were just a kid. Petia Kolibova [15:40]: Yeah, it was something that was the biggest part of my life and I never believed that I could overcome it because it was just like... I don't know if you know the show the Dexter. Alyssa Scolari [15:51]: Yeah. Petia Kolibova [15:52]: I used to love that show. And at that show he's talking about a dark passenger, something that comes over him and it's not him. I felt the same way with my eating disorder, it felt like it was controlling me that I didn't have a control over it yet usually people with the eating disorder, it's the control that we are craving, because our life on the outside feels out of our control. So we want to have control over something and your body or what you're eating is. And I was feeling so empty on inside, in my job, in my relationship, that I wanted to feel filled. And when you eat 10 doughnuts and french baguette and ice cream, you're feeling pretty filled. So I'm saying jokingly, but back then it was really challenging, because I didn't see it end, I didn't see how it would be possible to ever end. So to answer your question, yes it was part of my life for most of my life and I healed when I was almost 30 years old. Petia Kolibova [16:58]: Okay, so almost 30 years old. And what really helped me is I started CrossFit. And I know it's funny, but I started CrossFit and the classes were at 6:00AM. And I had to wake up really early. So if I would be binging and purging the night before, I would be really exhausted. I couldn't do anything. I felt like I want to die on the workouts. So what I did, I was working out three to four times a week. So I told myself, "I will skip this day, just one day just so I can sleep and work out and then tomorrow I can binge again." So that really helped me, just one day at a time. And then two days because I was working out two days in a row. So that really helped me to have something. Petia Kolibova [17:45]: So it's really, even if you don't work out, it's one day at a time, I can do it, ask for help. Now it's so much easier than before. This was almost a decade ago, so it wasn't as easy as podcasts, Instagram, all these things that are so easy nowadays accessible. For as then it was a decade ago when I was feeling alone and ashamed and guilty. Alyssa Scolari [18:10]: Yeah. Because what you do right now for your job is bringing people out of the shame and the guilt, particularly women, which sidebar or maybe not a sidebar, but sidebar for a minute, is there a reason why you specifically chose to work with women and women's empowerment? I love it. Can't keep the woman down, I am here for it, applaud you, but I'm just wondering was there something specific that led you to be like, "I'm working with women and women only?" Petia Kolibova [18:46]: I love that. And thank you so much for recognition of my work. And one of the reasons why I became coach is because I needed this. I needed someone to give me hope, I needed someone to hold my hand, I needed someone who would be listening to me. Because when you think about it, our biggest traumas come from us when we're growing up not feeling loved, heard and seen. When you don't feel loved, heard and see and understood, then you're bringing it into the adulthood and that's all I brought up into my adulthood feeling unseen, unheard, unlovable and doing crazy things just to be seen and to be validated and outsourcing my worthiness and happiness in other people. Petia Kolibova [19:27]: So that's why I became coach and why I became women's coach is before I was doing a life and business coaching with women, I was a personal trainer. It was part of my journey. And I would be working with men and women. And I started to really go within and ask myself, why is it that some days I'm really lit up and feeling amazing and some days I'm just dragging into doing the things, right? So for me, men were just more drama, for me, personally. I still had clients that I love to live. I have a client who is 80 years old now and he's amazing. I loved it. He was so dedicated. He was working out twice a week and it's just incredible. But I realized what really does lie to me up it's igniting woman and bringing in the hope and bringing in the possibilities because in my heart, I truly believe that as women, we are peacemakers, we are lovers, we are nurturers and we can truly make the difference because we are not only birthing babies, but we are birthing ideas. Petia Kolibova [20:42]: And I believe that it's time that we are shifting from patriarchy back to matriarchy when women are celebrated, listened and really respected. So I want women to step into their power, because I believe that when a woman is feeling good, she will share with everyone else around her, her family, her kids, her partner, her friends, she will give it out, right? Men, there are amazingly focused, right? I'm protector and provider, I got to go. But usually, he doesn't think about the family, the community. And there are some men they are, because it's all about masculine and feminine energy. But for me, who really, really lights me up are the women who came here to help others. I want to help women who wants to help others, whether it's your family and you just want to be a better mom or whether you want to create an online business and impacting thousands or millions, I'm here for that. But I'm only working with woman who wants to be helping others. Alyssa Scolari [21:52]: Yes. And it's so I think extra special, because you are targeting a group of people who are generally held down. Women much more than men go unheard, not listened to, not taken seriously, are raised to feel shame in their bodies, shame about no matter what women do, whether they are staying at home, whether they are climbing the corporate ladder, they don't do anything right. So I really love that and appreciate just the advocacy and the empowerment and the way that you say, "I want to work with women who want to help others in some capacity, who are giving back to the community and giving back to the world in some capacity." They don't necessarily need to be CEOs or business women, but women who are looking to give back. Petia Kolibova [22:52]: I love that. And one thing that I started to say that I would love to share with you, and this is just my personal feeling is when we say we are giving back, it's like I have taken something. I have taken something and I'm going and giving it back. So what I love seeing is I'm paying it forward. I'm just paying it forward. I'm giving it to those in need, because when we say I'm giving it back, I didn't take anything from anyone so why should I give something back? I'm paying it forward and I'm giving it to people who are open to it, because not everybody is. Alyssa Scolari [23:29]: Yeah, it's so true. And I also really want to touch on the inner child work that you do, because it sounds like you do a lot of work about helping women speak back or helping women to nurture their inner child so that they can feel seen. Petia Kolibova [23:55]: Absolutely. And it's something that we touched a little bit on, Alyssa, when I was mentioning that many of our traumas come to us because we're feeling unseen and unheard and understood. And some women who come to me, they went through really huge traumas, like a sexual abuse, physical abuse and things that we leave marks on you, not only on your body, but special in your soul and how we are perceiving ourselves. But then there are also women who come to me who are like, "Well, I had a great childhood. I had great parents, I love them, I have a great relationship with them," yet still there are some traumas when we feel unheard or unseen. Just think about it. Petia Kolibova [24:40]: One of my clients, she was on my retreat in Bali. And when we were doing a childhood, I do hypnosis, I do NLP, I do meditation. So when I was doing session with her, she was like, "Oh, I don't have any bad experiences from my childhood and anything. It was cool." And I was like, "Okay." I'm like, "Tell me something about your childhood." And she was like, "I don't remember." I'm like, "Oh, that's interesting. Why wouldn't you remember? What is there that you don't want to remember?" So I just invited her and I took her through hypnosis and we find out that she really felt abandoned by her father, because her father didn't come at night to cover her, to tackle her, because he was busy working. And so she felt unworthy because her dad didn't make time for her just to cover her. Petia Kolibova [25:29]: And this is when you think about it, this story, it's like the dad would have different perception like, "Hey, I love you so much and I want to work and I want to make money so you can have a better life than me. So I am proving you my love." For her, as a little girl, "Dad's working, dad is busy, doesn't have time for me, he doesn't care, he doesn't love me." So the stories that we create, we were able to go back. We were able to recreate that memory, meaning re-parent yourself, receiving the things that you wish that you received. So we created a different story, different scenario. She's a little girl, lying in a bed, her dad is coming telling her stories, covering her up, kissing her in a front head. And she creates this as a memory. Your brain cannot distinguish from a memory or a visualization. It can't. It can't feel the same way. Petia Kolibova [26:23]: Just think about it when you're watching movies. Listen, five minutes in a romantic movie, I'm already crying. We went on a wedding last weekend and they just start playing music and I'm crying. So it can take us back and we can feel it into our bodies. So recreating, re-parenting yourself. Thank God that we did that because a few months after the retreat, she reconciled with her father. She was able to recreate the relationship. She spent a couple months in Europe with him. He passed away. Alyssa Scolari [26:55]: Wow. Petia Kolibova [26:56]: If she wouldn't done the retreat. Alyssa Scolari [26:58]: Body chills. Petia Kolibova [27:01]: And I just had it, because she's local here. We had a VIP day experience together, which means spending all afternoon with me. And she told me, "I want to thank you enough. And again, because I cannot thank you enough for how you helped me to reconcile with my father." Because I could just leave it there and I could just say like, "Okay, you think you had a cool childhood. Okay, great. Next." But it's me trusting my intuition and each and every one of us has it. Trust your intuition, don't bypass things. You bypass things, you bypass love, you bypass life. Don't do that. That's why I do the inner child healing. Each and every one of us really need it. Petia Kolibova [27:45]: No matter what your childhood was like, I can promise you, there were things that hurt you. One of my clients, we were working on, her parents, they went in big grocery store, like Costco, when she was a little girl. They went shopping, she got lost and she had a trauma from that. They found her, come on, it's Costco. They put her in a register. It's like 10 minutes later. But she had a trauma of being unseen. So she went into the introverted stage of, "I don't matter. I'm not meant to be seen, because if I were to be seen, my parents wouldn't leave me behind." The stories we create as little kinds. It's important for you to go back because if you don't go back, you are going to do this over and over and over again, in all of your relationship with the relationship itself, relationship with money, relationship with your family, relationship with friends at work. You will keep recreating it because that little child wasn't taken care of. Alyssa Scolari [28:48]: Yes. And I really appreciate you pointing now examples that are less severe, because I think that trauma is not necessarily about the event itself. Not I think, we know research tells us trauma is not about the event itself, trauma is about the narrative that you've created around the event or the way in which the event was handled, et cetera. So I think it's really important to point out that none of us go unscathed in our childhood. We all had moments of feeling unseen, unheard, unloved, unwanted, whatever you want to call it. Petia Kolibova [29:37]: Absolutely. And it's really important to recognize and acknowledge your feelings. Because like my client told me, "Oh, there was no big deal, there was no nothing," because she made it a not big deal, but because she just put it under the rock instead of looking at it and how did I really feel? How does it make me feel now? So acknowledge your feelings. It's not that something is bigger and something is smaller trauma. If it hurts you validate that feeling, but you don't have to validate it and sit on it. It's when we can look at those feelings and acknowledged them that they can go through us versus us, "Oh, this is not big deal. Oh, this is already in the past." Then it sits in our body and it shows in a disease. Alyssa Scolari [30:28]: Yeah, exactly. Exactly, it does turn into disease. I love that you pointed that out because I think that it's so true when we keep it in. And then again, there comes that lull of attraction where we're keeping things in and more often than not, it's subconscious. We are attracting people and things that make us feel the same emptiness or make us feel unheard, the same feelings that we felt in childhood. Petia Kolibova [31:00]: Exactly. And that's why it's really time for you to shift. And it doesn't matter if you're 20 years old or 60 years old, the time is really now to start taking care of you and bringing into awareness and giving yourself permission to live a life that is true to you. Alyssa Scolari [31:17]: Now, how do you help people? And this is a loaded question. And I'm not sure if it's maybe too broad, but I'm just thinking back to the woman who was able to reconcile that relationship with her father. How would you help somebody where that wasn't an option? I'm sure you've had plenty of women who are estranged from their families. Their parents had difficult childhoods for reasons that really aren't able to be reconciled. Petia Kolibova [31:52]: I love that question. Sometimes we just get to do the work on ourselves, do the work for us not for them. For her, it was amazing. She was able to go back, talk to her dad. Maybe your parents don't want to speak to you. Maybe the parents, they are not here anymore. Maybe it's not a parent who hurts you, maybe it's someone who just is not even in your sphere. So what I do in those cases, I have a forgiveness framework that we do together because it's really important to forgive, not only them but to yourself. And the forgiveness framework is not just the forgiveness letter, because I did hundreds of those and I was still pissed and I was still frustrated and I was still hurt. Then I'm like, "Okay, I burned millions of letters and I'm still feeling it," but I created a forgiveness framework where I guide my clients through the steps of shifting their perception. Petia Kolibova [32:56]: And like you said, rewriting that story. First, it's framed as a letter, but it has specific steps that are consciously you're hurt, consciously you know this person hurt me, this person made me harm or this is the story that I have about the person. So your conscious mind wants to keep you safe, the conscious mind wants to keep you protected and will say like, "Stop, you cannot forgive this person, this person did you wrong," whatever it is. So when we work on the forgiveness framework, it's the subconscious mind. So the words that I'm using, the questions that I'm using, the writing the letter that I'm using, it really goes to your subconscious mind. So it surpasses the conscious mind where there is still some pain hurt and resistance. And we always start the letter with appreciation because no matter what that event created something for you, it created an opportunity. Petia Kolibova [34:00]: So first we look for the opportunity, because you can start a forgiveness letter and say, "You did this, this, this to me, but I want to be free so I forgive you." Your conscious mind will say, "That's a BS, you cannot, we cannot, and I'm still pissed and I'm still hurt." But when we start with celebrating the opportunity and looking at that person as something that added into our life, no matter how horrific, how big or small was the event or how we made it, we start first into the opportunity. And then where I take them is looking at this person as again, a little child. That's when the inner child comes in to work, because you're going to be looking at person who is adult differently than you will look at the small five year old who is scared, who screwed up, who is afraid. Petia Kolibova [34:57]: How did they grow up? Do you know that? If not, still imagining them like a little child. And thank them and tell them why they are not right to be in your life. So, for example, when I was doing the forgiveness framework, I did it for one of my ex boyfriends. I wrote it down and I said, "Dear, so and so I say, thank you so much for showing me what does it feel like when a woman is treated like a goddess and you give her massages and bring her gifts and bring her flowers. That was so beautiful. I know that you are still scared to get intimate because you never had that in your life." And then I step into, "You're not the one because the one treats me like the only one, it's family oriented, it's looking for commitment, it's loyal, it's committed and all these things." And then I said, "Thank you, I release you from my life." Alyssa Scolari [35:51]: I love it. I love this so much, because for the listeners out there, this is going to sound familiar to you if you've listened to previous episodes. So I have a private Facebook group where I post these daily engagement posts and there are quotes. And one of the quotes and this quote is I think one of the most controversial ones in the group, it's a group for trauma survivors. And this quote reads, "Someone I loved once gave me a box full of darkness. It took me years to understand that this too was a gift." And that was a quote by, Lord help me I am going to butcher this name, Pema, P-E-M-A, Chodron, C-H-O-D-R-O-N. This quote is one of the most controversial topics in the Facebook group, because people are, I think very triggered by it because they're like, "Well, I'm not going to be thankful for my abuse or thankful for what happens to me." Alyssa Scolari [37:00]: And I understand that, but I don't think that's what this quote says. I think this quote is saying similar to what you're saying, which is, it's not about accepting what was done to you, it's not about saying, "Oh, my abuse was a gift," it's not about saying, "I am so glad I married that narcissistic man," it's about, just like you said, a forgiveness framework and the ability to pull a gift from it. Petia Kolibova [37:36]: Yeah. I love that quote and I can see why it would be controversial, because when we are sending in our pain, we want to point out and give that pain to someone, we want to blame, we want to show, we want to ride like showing others and say that, "Oh, when you suffer then I will feel better," but it doesn't work this way. So when you're releasing that, it doesn't make it right, but it does make it bearable and understandable, because I was physically, mentally abused, because I was with narcissistic man or process or jealous man. Now I'm loving, I'm compassionate and patient. It's funny. I think that you have this thing in America, you go the extra mile. My client told me, "You go extra 100 miles for your clients," because I know what does it feel like sitting in a darkness. I know what does it feel like to be alone and not wanting to live. Petia Kolibova [38:32]: One time I attempted for suicide. Second time I was thinking about it again. That's why I knew I have to change my life. I didn't want to be here. And women are suffering quietly. They're keeping themselves busy. They're in the people pleasing mode. They are thinking that when I make everybody around myself happy, then I will be happy, but you won't. Alyssa Scolari [38:54]: Yes. That is speaking a very hard truth. Was that part of the inspiration for your podcast? Petia Kolibova [39:06]: I love that question. When I started my podcast over three years ago, it was called Be Strong Minded, because be comes from the being, that's the spirit. Strong comes from the physical. Minded is the mindset. So I wanted to blend those three, the mind, body, spirit. The spirit, body and mind in my case, and I had it for like a year, and that was when I started to really shift to my life because I realized that when I am unapologetically me, you either take it or you leave it and I don't care because I care too much and too deeply. That's when the abundance come into my life. Up until that point, I was working hard and hustling in my masculine energy and doing things, improving others and just keeping myself busy and really not living. Petia Kolibova [39:58]: And when I was able to slow down and step into the flow and the trust, that was the moment that I was really able to create the abundance. So that's when I changed the name of my podcast into Unapologetically Abundant, because when you become unapologetically, you and what you stand for, that's when the abundance can come in, in money, in freedom, in relationships, in house, in the richness of life and everything it can bring, but you get to be you. That's your purpose. That's why you came here. So that's why I renamed my podcast. Alyssa Scolari [40:34]: Yeah. I love it. It's incredible. So you're podcast is a podcast for specifically women, correct? Petia Kolibova [40:44]: Yes. Alyssa Scolari [40:45]: And it's all about the same principles that you work towards when you work with somebody solo basically, obviously not as detailed, but it's the same type of mindset? Petia Kolibova [40:59]: Yes, absolutely. I bring on guests who are living the abundant life and who are living fulfilled life. It's very important to live a fulfilled life. That's what I do. And then I have a short solo episodes where I am sharing bits of wisdom and mindset shifts. Alyssa Scolari [41:20]: I love it. And isn't it so beautiful when you are able to sit in a space with somebody who has become unapologetically abundant? Petia Kolibova [41:29]: You can feel it, because it doesn't matter what you say, it doesn't matter what you do, people can feel your energy. And that's priceless. I remember few years ago people were telling me like, "Oh, your energy is so amazing." I was like, "What are talking about? What energy? What?" Me in the beginning of my journey, I was like, "What?" And then they're like, "Oh, I always feel good when I'm around you." I was like, "Why?" I didn't get it. I didn't know that, but now I can see it. And even people when they're around me and in my life, they're like, "I know." That's I do like woman's weekends retreats, just here for a weekend in Las Vegas. I do international retreats in Mexico and in Bali, because I know that the feeling is just priceless. So it's really all about how you're feeling. How you're feeling is going to lead into what you're thinking. What you're thinking will lead into the action that will lead into the results and what you are ultimately having in your life. So it all starts with how you're feeling. Alyssa Scolari [42:37]: Yes. And it's 1000% accurate. I absolutely feed and thrive off of the energy that you have. Absolutely. And it is one of those things that you can feel the moment that you meet somebody and you just know. And you have it, you are the epitome and the definition of unapologetically abundant. And I love it. I am so happy that you came on the show. It has been such a joy to talk to you. So now, if people who are hearing less, if they are like, "I need more of this in my life," where can they go? So I know you have your social media, you have your podcasts, all of which I'm going to link on the show notes. And if people want to seek you out for services, where do they find you at? Petia Kolibova [43:32]: I love that question. You can find all the information on my website, petiakolibova.com, but also you can shoot me a quick message on Instagram or on Facebook. All of it is Petia Kolibova. I am very responsive. I have also my team who is helping me. And you never know if this really resonates. There is this saying, and it's funny because my new clients always come with that saying to me, when the student is ready, the teacher appears. So if you're listening to this and you're feeling moved and you're feeling like you're truly meant for more than what you're experiencing right now, whether it's your personal life and how you're feeling and you want to attract the love of your life or create health in your body or do you want to create online thriving business. I'm here for that. I'm taking usually just a couple of clients, a quarter, because with the wedding and the traveling and everything that is going on, I'm very present to my clients. So I take only a couple, but I would be more than happy to connect with you and see how I can support you. Alyssa Scolari [44:37]: Beautiful. And I will link all of that in the show notes for our listeners. Petia, thank you so much for coming today and for being a guest and for being so vulnerable and for the work that you do to help empower women, because feminine energy is divine and it is not given nearly enough attention. Petia Kolibova [45:02]: Thank you so much, Alyssa. I love what you're doing, your work and thank you for inviting me, recognizing me. And like I said, if I can do anything to support, I'm just a message away. Alyssa Scolari [45:13]: Thank you. Thanks for listening, everyone. For more information, please head over to lightaftertrauma.com or you can also follow us on social media. On Instagram, we are @lightaftertrauma. And on Twitter, it is @lightafterpod. And if you're on Facebook, please be sure to join our Facebook group. It is a private community where trauma survivors are able to connect and chat with one another. That Facebook group is called Light After Trauma. So just look us up on Facebook and be sure to join. Alyssa Scolari [45:46]: Lastly, please head over to patreon.com/lightaftertrauma to support our show. We are asking for $5 dollars a month, which is the equivalent to a cup of coffee at Starbucks. So please head on over again, that's patreon.com/lightaftertrauma. Thank you. And we appreciate your support. Alyssa Scolari [46:06]: [singing]

Ven. Thubten Chodron, abbess of Sravasti Abbey in Newport, WA, went forth over forty years ago. Here she reflects on the eight "worldly winds" described by the Buddha and elaborated on by her teacher, His Holiness the Dalai Lama. More information and monastic teachings may be found at https://www.fourthmessenger.org.

For this episode of the Wisdom Podcast, host Daniel Aitken speaks with returning guest and author Venerable Thubten Chodron about her latest book with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, In Praise of Great Compassion. This is the fifth volume in the Library of Wisdom and Compassion series, which continues the Dalai Lama's teachings on the […] The post Venerable Thubten Chodron: In Praise of Great Compassion (#102) appeared first on The Wisdom Experience.

Kathryn (otherwise known as Mrs. ZenGlop) is taking a course online with Pema Chodron,  We were talking at dinner last night and one of the things she said that resonated was the gift of wonder.  That as we pay attention and practice, there's a real amazement that this moment is happening.  At all!  I know I get stuck sometimes in pushing to 'understand' the way my mind is working or the way to fit this realization or that understanding into some framework.  But before all of that is this glorious beautiful breath, and a body pumping with Oxygen and air flowing over the whole freaking planet...wow!More episodes on  meditation notes here: https://www.zenglop.net/zenglop/meditation/Buy my book On Mortality and the Human ImaginationSubscribe to a newsletter for occasional updates on the podcast, videos and other writing. https://www.zenglop.net/zenglop/zenglop-the-newsletter.htmlAnd/or subscribe to youtube https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoOlX6NXyQBABYljo1vAuHA?sub_confirmation=1

"hope and fear come from a feeling that we lack something; they come from a sense of poverty. We can't simply relax with ourselves. We hold on to hope, and hope robs us of the present moment... [but] maybe the only enemy is that we don't like the way reality is now and therefore wish it would go away fast. But what we find as practitioners is that nothing ever goes away until it has taught us what we need to know" (Chodron, When Things Fall Apart). We as people love security, we love knowing whats going on. The uncertainty of life, and the inevitable impermanence (death) leads us to make choices, seek pleasure, and distract ourselves with busy chores in the hopes that we have control over our own situation. However, we're cheating ourselves by doing this. We're not facing our greatest fears and allowing our fears to be acknowledge and politely put down. The pain that we endure is not something everyone readily welcomes into their life. It's an unpleasant feeling that brings with it, jitters, anxiety, and a need to quickly fill in the hole that the pain has left. We don't allow ourselves anytime to analyze what we're going through, and why we're reacting in the way that we are, instead we just rush through this pain. But something, we should all be aware of is the idea that these loss's are actually lessons. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/alexander-davis9/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/alexander-davis9/support

Known as Sacred Lotus Woman, Yeshe Chodron is a Shamanic Minister, Spiritual Life Coach specializing in Women's Sacred & Juicy Empowerment, and co-author of #1 International Bestseller, “Empowered Women of Social Media”.  Yeshe's career as a healer began in her late childhood, when she began to use her heightened abilities to read, track, and shift energies through intention, to assist others in seeing more deeply and clearly into their own reality, for the purpose of healing. Since then, she has received formal training and certification in a variety of healing modalities including divination, Polarity Therapy, energy reading, meditation, and shamanic journeying, healing & ministry, to name a few.  Yeshe's love for people and passion for the healing process has also lead her to include nursing, singing, yoga, life coaching, and belly dancing within her career. Yeshe's story of how she's been channeling and communicating with Mary Magdalene since she was 6.  What she learned when she merged with Mary Magdalene's consciousness for 60 days.  What she believes that the spiritual community misses when they talk about “unity”, “oneness”, “source”, etc.  “There is no separation between Mother Theresa and Hitler. There's only one human race. We are all together.” Yeshe's journey with becoming vegan and the soul contracts that animals have. “I believe that there is a soul contract that every black and brown human has to wake us up.” Why she feels deep gratitude for the horrible events that have taken place with black people.  “We all need to update our education on how to integrate new information into our beings.” How to integrate your feelings about white privilege and systemic racism.  Mary Magdalene is the Queen of the Earth.  Yeshe's channeling insights with Mary Magdalene and the Great Awakening.  The importance of putting our attention on life.  “We're living in a time that has been built on a lie that is ready to be burnt down.”  “Without the experience of global appreciation for ourselves as one human race, we can't move into that opening that creates the other things that we're going to be doing as humans.” “As much as we can be accepting of the way life is currently, the more you will thrive during this time.” Yeshe's free gift: https://bit.ly/dissolution-gift-materials Connect with Yeshe via email: yeshe@synergyhealingservices.com

Known as Sacred Lotus Woman, Yeshe Chodron is a Shamanic Minister, Spiritual Life Coach specializing in Women's Sacred & Juicy Empowerment, and co-author of #1 International Bestseller, “Empowered Women of Social Media”.  Yeshe's career as a healer began in her late childhood, when she began to use her heightened abilities to read, track, and shift energies through intention, to assist others in seeing more deeply and clearly into their own reality, for the purpose of healing. Since then, she has received formal training and certification in a variety of healing modalities including divination, Polarity Therapy, energy reading, meditation, and shamanic journeying, healing & ministry, to name a few.  Yeshe's love for people and passion for the healing process has also lead her to include nursing, singing, yoga, life coaching, and belly dancing within her career. Yeshe's story of how she's been channeling and communicating with Mary Magdalene since she was 6.  What she learned when she merged with Mary Magdalene's consciousness for 60 days.  What she believes that the spiritual community misses when they talk about “unity”, “oneness”, “source”, etc.  “There is no separation between Mother Theresa and Hitler. There's only one human race. We are all together.” Yeshe's journey with becoming vegan and the soul contracts that animals have. “I believe that there is a soul contract that every black and brown human has to wake us up.” Why she feels deep gratitude for the horrible events that have taken place with black people.  “We all need to update our education on how to integrate new information into our beings.” How to integrate your feelings about white privilege and systemic racism.  Mary Magdalene is the Queen of the Earth.  Yeshe's channeling insights with Mary Magdalene and the Great Awakening.  The importance of putting our attention on life.  “We're living in a time that has been built on a lie that is ready to be burnt down.”  “Without the experience of global appreciation for ourselves as one human race, we can't move into that opening that creates the other things that we're going to be doing as humans.” “As much as we can be accepting of the way life is currently, the more you will thrive during this time.” Yeshe's free gift: https://bit.ly/dissolution-gift-materials Connect with Yeshe via email: yeshe@synergyhealingservices.com Connect with Yeshe via Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dancingwithhealingspirit/ Learn more about Jennifer's monthly channeling membership by emailing: clientcare@souljourneys.ca to receive a monthly discount.

On today's episode, I have the distinct privilege of speaking with Ven. Thubten Chodron. Ven. Chodron is the founder and abbess of Sravasti Abbey, a Tibetan Buddhist monastic community in Washington. She teaches the Dharma, or Buddhist teachings, around the world, and has authored over 20 books, several of them with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Our conversation focuses on some Buddhist fundamentals, and especially compassion; how we can have more of it for ourselves and others. Ven. Chodron is humble, hilarious, and full of wisdom that I think is really relatable, and helpful in today’s polarizing climate. Sravasti Abbey's website: https://sravastiabbey.org/ Venerable Thubten Chodron's website: http://thubtenchodron.org/ If you'd like to learn more about Buddhism visit http://thubtenchodron.org/books/buddhism-for-beginners/ The book that I reference in the episode by Ven. Chodron and a Clinical Psychologist is 'an open-hearted life': http://thubtenchodron.org/books/an-open-hearted-life/ To support the podcast through a monthly donation, visit my Anchor.fm page. To support me in making my music, you can do so through Patreon. Either will support my livelihood and be very much appreciated :) If you have any feedback about the show, or you'd just like to say hi, I'd love to hear from you! DM me on instagram @rachelle.lanae or email me at rachelle.lanae.smith@gmail.com. I'm always looking for how I can better serve you, so let me know what you need and I'll do my best to make content that's helpful for you in practical ways. Be well, fail big, and go wreck your perfection. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/wreckyourperfection/support

You'll feel relieved from your fears with this... Today you’ll hear the sound advice from one of my favorite meditation mentors, Pema Chodron. In her book,When Things Fall Apart, she shares the best meditation strategy for us to apply  during these uncertain times in Pandemic Lockdown. So, I've decided to share her advice by reading the very chapter from her book that we all need right now here on the show today. Whether you're a strong meditation practitioner or you've felt that meditation didn't work in the past, THIS practice Chodron lays out for us is a great way to find the relief we seek all while recognizing we aren't as alone as we may feel. Though my personal expertise is in the mash up of  “family first” time management + child development, I have personally been practicing meditation for over 5 years now and attribute the overall sense of peace and calm that I feel every day to meditation. It's changed my life for the much better! I truly hope this episode is coming at a good time and you're able to give it a go over the weekend. Sending wishes of happiness and peace your way. xo Please join the conversation about this episode in the Raising Kindness Community Messaging Board on our website.

We have the choice to make good from the seemingly destructive. Chodron, Pema. “Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living.” Boston: Shambhala,, 2004. p. 36-37 & 42-43.

I’m gonna tell you a story about myself that I’m really ashamed of. I’m afraid you’ll judge me and look down on me. I already beat myself up enough about it and I came to the realization that it’s important to share our scars and be vulnerable so we can heal together. We’ve all allowed our emotions to run away with us, sometimes so much, it causes shame and regret. In the moment, it’s human nature to not want to feel negative emotions, pain or shame, so we do all sorts of things to try to get rid of these feelings that we don’t want to experience. I invite you to invite them in and be grateful for these heavy emotions and feelings. They are your own special gurus, showing up exactly at the right time to teach you what you need to ground you back to your Soul. So, here’s my story, but I warn you, I’m super embarrassed and ashamed of it. It’s beyond stupid and extremely petty, and just thinking about it makes me feel like a schmuck. But this is real life stuff that we stress over. Often the matter that occupies our minds are trivial, negative and makes no rational sense. On that night where my mind was going in a million directions, I had to invite my jealousy and shame to learn from them. I came across an old friend on instagram and she had 60,000+ followers. Instead of feeling happy for her, I immediately felt hot with jealousy and comparison. How did she go from having a few hundred followers to having 60,000 followers in 6 months? Yup, I warned ya, very petty. After a range of emotions: jealousy, insecurity, judgement, comparison and guilt, then shame showed up at the end of my turbulent cycle in my mind to really stick it to me and make me feel like crap. Instead of being happy for her, I was upset. By. The. Number. Of. Followers?!…how small and unimportant! I was embarrassed for even feeling this way and wasting so much mental energy on a lame topic. Shame beats us up and kicks our ass like no other. I felt shame for being so insecure and jealous. I felt like a loser for being upset about something so insignificant. I felt like a bad friend. A bad person. Comparing myself to her made me feel disappointed in myself. I felt like an ungrateful failure. I should know better than to feel so begrudging. More shame. The truth is, her content is really good! She’s sharing knowledge about boundaries and parenting and she’s changing people’s lives for the better. In fact, you’ll get to meet Courtney Burg next week on the podcast. She’s amazing! (We even talk about my jealousy). I tried to rationalize my feelings. I was proud of her and happy for her for success, so why was I so jealous at the same time? I didn’t want to feel this way. We used to be really good friends and would talk about inspirational books we read or the latest Super Soul Sunday episode and how we wanted to be Oprah and influence the world. She was doing it. I was not. At least this was the story in my head. Obviously, you’re here reading this, and I’m so grateful you’re with me this far. But that’s the silly thing about our mind. It can run wild and crazy with destructive, irrational thoughts. Have you been there too? The harder I tried to push away the feelings, the louder they got. I ping ponged this story and beat myself up until I looked at the clock and it was 3:45am! I had to be up in a few hours and had been on a hamster wheel replaying this story for 3 hours letting these toxic thoughts steel my sleep. I got sick the next morning. So, how do we quiet the chatter when we’re in the middle of a boiling pot of emotions? I had to get still. Even meditation didn’t help. The emotions were too intense. I channeled my dad who was my biggest advocate and gave the best guidance. I asked for an intervention in my chaotic mind. When I finally connected to my breath and slowed down my heart, I heard his voice, “You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be. We all have gifts. Come from abundance and you’ll receive abundance.” It was the perfect advice. You have no control over your thoughts and emotions. They will come and go. Instead of pushing them away, allow yourself to experience ALL emotions and thoughts. It’s how you react to them that matters. The good news is, this is under your control. As a new mom, I think about how I’m going to talk to Hunter when she’s jealous of someone or when she feels bad about herself. Just like I would teach her, I’m also learning to treat myself with love, kindness and grace. The way we would want to be treated, is also how we need to treat our emotions. Not something to be ashamed of, but see them with love, kindness and grace. Here’s a simple way to sit with your emotions without letting them get the best of you. It’s simple, but not easy.  It is a practice that has to be done constantly whenever you’re triggered. When you fall off (and you will because you’re human) and your emotions run away with you, come back to grace. You can always start again. That’s the practice. AWARENESS: Be aware of the emotion without getting caught in the drama. Come into the present moment by being present with your feelings. Refrain from Rumination. Put your hand on your heart and label the emotion you’re feeling. Usually your trigger is something to do with what you want or don’t want. Witness what you’re resisting. BREATHE: Breathe deeply for 5 intentional breaths and feel your heart. BE WITH THE EMOTION: Witness the sensation and hold space around it. Instead of letting the story boil with hot sensation, be in the simmer of the feelings. After a while of deep breathing, that sensation will soften. Even just sitting with it for a few seconds is a big win. Pema Chodron, author of Living Beautifully tells us to repeat, “This is my experience right now, and it’s okay.” Then go through into the next moment without any agenda. I’m not proud of this story. It’s petty and embarrassing and I’m really ashamed of myself. But I share it with you to show you my scars, so we can heal together. All of our emotions are valid. The work is to love your whole self and learn tools to become your highest self. When you fall out of alignment with your higher self, come back to grace instead of judgment. You’re not supposed to be perfect. You are perfectly flawed and fabulous.  You don’t have to become something you’re not. Just become more of yourself. It’s all about coming back to this moment. In this moment you can change. Welcome your emotions. All of your emotions, not just the ones you like. They are your personal gurus to help ground you back to your truth. You are enough. You matter. You’re exactly where you’re supposed to be. Let's talk more about it on instagram and my blog! http://yourblissfulsoul.com/uncategorized/ep74/

Thubten Chodron was born in Chicago and grew up near Los Angeles. She felt her life's calling was to help others, so she became a teacher, landing her first job in the inner-city schools of Los Angeles. Looking for something to do during summer break, she saw a flyer for a meditation course being taught by two Tibetan Lamas. Little did she know, taking this course would change the trajectory of her life. The teaching that resonated with her most was about setting motivations. She realized that though she was doing good things in her life, the motivations she had for doing them were self-centered. Chodron wanted to dedicate her life to living selflessly and with altruistic intentions. She felt the only way she could do that was to let go of her worldly attachments, including her marriage, and become a Buddhist nun. She believes we all have the potential to be happy and live altruistically, but we get in our own way. In this episode, Chodron offers her thoughts on how to set selfless motivations as we live our everyday lives. Plugzone: Personal Website: https://thubtenchodron.org/ Sravasti Abbey: https://sravastiabbey.org/ YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/sravastiabbey Books: The Compassionate Kitchen: Buddhist Practices for Eating with Mindfulness and Gratitude https://www.amazon.com/Compassionate-Kitchen-Practices-Mindfulness-Gratitude/dp/1611806348 Other book titles by Thubton Chodron: https://www.amazon.com/Thubten-Chodron/e/B000APM652

The Rubin Museum of Art presents a weekly meditation session led by a prominent meditation teacher from the New York area, with each session focusing on a specific work of art. This podcast is recorded in front of a live audience, and includes an opening talk, a 20-minute sitting session, and a closing discussion. The guided meditation begins at 17:21. If you would like to attend Mindfulness Meditation sessions in person or learn more, please visit our website at RubinMuseum.org/meditation. To view a related artwork for this week's session, please visit: https://rubinmuseum.org/mediacenter/tashi-chodron-10-16-2019-podcast This program is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine. Sharon Salzberg led this meditation session on October 16, 2019. If you're enjoying this podcast, you can listen to more recorded events at the Rubin, such as the conversation by Black American Buddhist leaders on activism and community, with DaRa Williams, Kamilah Majied, and Willie Mukei Smith. You can find it at: https://rubinmuseum.org/mediacenter/black-american-buddhists-on-activism-and-community

The Rubin Museum of Art presents a weekly meditation session led by a prominent meditation teacher from the New York area, with each session focusing on a specific work of art. This podcast is recorded in front of a live audience, and includes an opening talk, a 20-minute sitting session, and a closing discussion. The guided meditation begins at 17:21. If you would like to attend Mindfulness Meditation sessions in person or learn more, please visit our website at RubinMuseum.org/meditation. To view a related artwork for this week's session, please visit: https://rubinmuseum.org/mediacenter/tashi-chodron-10-16-2019-podcast This program is presented in partnership with Sharon Salzberg, the Interdependence Project, and Parabola Magazine. Sharon Salzberg led this meditation session on October 16, 2019. If you're enjoying this podcast, you can listen to more recorded events at the Rubin, such as the conversation by Black American Buddhist leaders on activism and community, with DaRa Williams, Kamilah Majied, and Willie Mukei Smith. You can find it at: https://rubinmuseum.org/mediacenter/black-american-buddhists-on-activism-and-community

Geraldine Burns has been a pioneer in the benzo community for over 20 years. She is the founder of the first support group of its kind on the Internet, is host of a benzo podcast, and was a key player in the publication of the Ashton Manual. In Part II of this interview, Geraldine discusses the legislative efforts in Massachusetts, takes a look at the story behind BenzoBookReview.com, explores the continuing crisis of over-prescribing, and provides some wonderful tips for surviving withdrawal. https://www.easinganxiety.com/post/pioneering-benzo-awareness-an-interview-with-geraldine-burns-part-2-of-2-bfp027Video ID: BFP027 Chapters 00:00  Episode Introduction01:52  Shenpa: Easing the Urge to React09:15 Episode Format11:10 Interview Intro11:29 Benzo Legislation18:52 Benzo Book Review22:53  Why Stories Help24:55  Finding a Doctor27:11 How to Get Ready to Taper31:48 Find Your Own Path32:21 Should Benzos Be Banned?33:30 Closing Advice36:04 Wrapping Up Part II36:52 Moment of Peace  Episode Summary Geraldine Burns has been a pioneer in helping to get the word out about the potential dangers of benzodiazepines. In 1999 she started the first Internet support group for people wishing to withdraw from tranquilizers or already off and having problems. This was the first group of its kind and before it closed had close to 4,000 members internationally. The group was started to offer 24 hour/7 days a week support to people who have been made ill by prescription medications, to learn about symptoms of withdrawal, learn about tapering methods, and natural methods of healing. She is dedicated to the responsible and informed use of addictive prescription drugs.  Resources The following resource links are provided as a courtesy to our listeners. They do not constitute an endorsement by Easing Anxiety of the resource or any recommendations or advice provided therein. Chodron, Pema. “Don't Bite the Hook.” Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Dont-Bite-Hook-Resentment-Destructive/dp/B00BW8X5HO.ReShel, Azriel. “Shenpa and the Art of Not Getting Hooked.” Uplift Connect. March 23, 2017. Accessed July 8, 2019.https://upliftconnect.com/shenpa-art-of-not-getting-hooked.GERALDINE'S PODCAST: “Benzodiazepine Awareness with Geraldine Burns”GERALDINE'S WEBSITE: BenzoBookReview.com“As Prescribed” – A Documentary Film on the Benzo Crisis The PodcastThe Benzo Free Podcast provides information, support, and community to those who struggle with the long-term effects of anxiety medications such as benzodiazepines (Xanax, Ativan, Klonopin, Valium) and Z-drugs (Ambien, Lunesta, Sonata). WEBSITE: https://www.easinganxiety.comMAILING LIST: https://www.easinganxiety.com/subscribe YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/@easinganx DISCLAIMERAll content provided by Easing Anxiety is for general informational purposes only and should never be considered medical advice. Any health-related information provided is not a substitute for medical advice and should not be used to diagnose or treat health problems, or to prescribe any medical devices or other remedies. Never disregard medical advice or delay in seeking it. Please visit our website for our complete disclaimer at https://www.easinganxiety.com/disclaimer. CREDITSMusic provided / licensed by Storyblocks Audio — https://www.storyblocks.com Benzo Free Theme — Title: “Walk in the Park” — Artist: Neil Cross PRODUCTIONEasing Anxiety is produced by…Denim Mountain Presshttps://www.denimmountainpress.com ©2022 Denim Mountain Press – All Rights Reserved

The Compassionate Kitchen with Venerable Thubten ChodronAired Thursday, 23 May 2019, 7:00 PM ETFood is undoubtedly one of the great pleasures in life… we all spend a good deal of time thinking about it, preparing it, eating it, and then cleaning up afterwards. But how many of us have ever thought about the many activities associated with food as a spiritual practice.What if, instead of seeing these activities as chores or engaging in them purely for pleasure, we could use them to increase our kindness and care, and as reminders of how we wish to live out the values that bring meaning to our lives.Venerable Thubten Chodron has been a Buddhist nun since 1977. She has been a close student of the Dalai Lama with whom she has co-authored several books, and is founder and Abbess of Sravasti Abbey, one of the first Tibetan Buddhist Training Monasteries for Western monks and nuns in America.Acclaimed for her warm, practical, and humorous explanations of how to apply Buddhist teachings in daily life, Ven. Chodron joins Sandie this week to talk about her latest book, The Compassionate Kitchen, in which she shares some of the practices from the Buddhist tradition that help us make eating and all the activities related to it become part of our spiritual practice.For more info, visit: https://thubtenchodron.org and https://sravastiabbey.org/

“All Addictions stem from this moment, when we meet our edge and we just can’t stand it.” More wise words from Pema Chodron as I continue reading from Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times. In this episode, I read Chapter 3: This Very Moment is the Perfect Teacher. At the end, I talk about a recent meeting I had with my edge as I was making an attempt at Marie Kondo-ing my bedroom and check out from overwhelm with a bag of chips. And I share an analogy about the importance of feeling the feelings instead of eating the chips. When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times - Pema Chödrön Jess Lively - IG: @jessclively  Podcast: The Lively Show Katie Dalebout -  IG: @katiedalebout  Podcast: Let it Out Episode 248: How to Not Always Be Working and Following Correct v Right or Wrong with Marlee Grace Let’s unravel together on IG! Join me @unravelingrachel.  

Works and Concepts DiscussedPsychopathia Sexualis, Richard Freiherr von Krafft-EbingFranz Kakfa, The MetamorphosisPema Chodron (Link to the Pema Chodron foundation)When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice for Difficult Times, Pema ChodronTonglen (Link to Chodron’s Tonglen meditation)Healing Back Pain, John E. Sarno, MD (book)All The Rage (link to film’s website)You Were Never Really Here ( film, based on the book by Jonathan Ames)You Were Never Really Here (book, link via Amazon, please use local book seller if possible)Wake Up, Sir! A NovelI Pass Like NightI Love You More Than You Know: EssaysBlunt Talk, Seasons 1 & 2 (available on Prime video) See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Sheila and Maria raise awareness on the topic of shifting the family mindset to focus on efforts over achievements.  Harnessing the value of perseverance to raise children who thrive on challenges and are excited by learning opportunities.    "The best thing parents can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort and keep on learning." - Carol Dweck, author of Mindset   This episode is grounded in the belief that "if we want to change the world, we have to change the way we raise our children" (Marianne Williamson). Praising our children for things that come easy to them, teaches them to expect and need extrinsic praise and rewards.  We believe that we can raise children who are able to try hard, embrace challenges, and fail fearlessly by shifting our focus from praising their achievements to praising their efforts. This episode is packed full of resources, support, and encouragement for parents of young children and older children alike, to help shift your parenting mindset and raise innovative, independent humans who are ready for life's challenges.   Resources From This Episode Carol Dweck, Mindset: https://mindsetonline.com/ Pema Chodron, Fail, Fail Again Better: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25509916-fail-fail-again-fail-better Dr. Shefali, The Conscious Parent: https://drshefali.com/the-conscious-parent/ Dr. Shefali, The Awakened Family: https://drshefali.com/the-awakened-family/ Big Life Journal: https://biglifejournal.com/

Jenn and Jeff enjoy a beautiful fall afternoon in the bedroom to discuss the self-reflecting classic, "When Things Fall Apart" by Pema Chodron. They also sing a little bit. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/touch-podcast/support

Your Creative Sparks: CREATIVITY is the spark of ENLIGHTENMENT. MAKING ART is creating the opportunity for ENERGY to flow through the artist and out into form. We are ALL MAKING ART together, creating this giant canvas, this giant performance we call LIFE. The magical song of the Lobsterbird calls to us from the heart of the emerald forest, where she collaborates with Nature to help us bend our awareness around the concept of “Aesthetics”. There are ways of knowing other than our physical senses. Our understanding of who and what we are is deepening. Paying more attention to the energetic qualities of our existence is accelerating and elevating our human consciousness. Letting go of aesthetics is another key to expansion and enlightenment. Leave us a Rating & Review! Your Travelogue This episode was inspired by our podcast manager trying to wrap her head around the concept of “Aesthetics”, as presented in a previous episode with Gerald Busby. [3:06] Sacred Survival School? Sonya Louise is helping Sophia prepare for her Vision Quest, helping hone both the practical and mystical skills she will need to rely on. While here, Sophia decides to get Nature’s input on the concept of “Aesthetics”. [5:15] Gerald’s ideas on “Aesthetics” as understood by Lobsterbird: i believe he means creating a world in which things look and seem a certain way. that when we put a layer of opinion on anything, it becomes an aesthetic choice we make, instead of it simply existing as an amorphous, undefinable energetic entity (which it is at its very essence). in short, aesthetics = the world we perceive to be real. [8:24] Aesthetics and Artists: An artist who has been working on their craft for a very long time will develop an “aesthetic”. Over time, the art that is produced is a product of this one stream of consciousness, an energy stream that is embodied in a person – the artist – and so similar themes and patterns will come up, creating a certain essence of it because of the imprint of the artist on it. [10:45] We perceive things in 3D form, as material objects. We are under the assumption that we are touching and feeling and sensing everything exactly as it is. For instance, we perceive each other as having a specific human form. But we are actually just a channel for energy flowing into form, and our consciousness chooses that form. [16:40] Is a rock really a rock? Gerald Busby’s “Aesthetics” also talked about the “context” we put on things. Our thoughts about it offers context, and without that context, the form would simply dissolve into energy. Without assigning it form and meaning, the thing itself wouldn’t exist. [19:29] To really BE: If presence is our power, and perception is our power, than we can enter a process of letting go of aesthetics... letting go of the meaning of things, especially the meaning of things that we have been given by others. [24:50] Buddhism and the Five Skandhas: How sensing> feeling> perception> formation> and consciousness can be summed up in poop, and why that stinks.  [28:04] Art is a representation of what we do with our consciousness all the time. [34:54] When we go out into Nature, a quietness descends in our mind. There’s a power that the earth has to somehow unravel the conditioning of context. We can tap into something here, a different way of being, untainted by our need to exert our human influence on it. [37:17] Practicum! Go out into nature. Be. Notice the sensations. Shift your senses. Allow your Self the space to sense without putting any kind of label on it, without having a reaction to it, without telling yourself whether it is good or bad. Allow your consciousness to experience this world without labeling it. [40:25] Links and resources: Lobsterbird’s newest book: Level Up: Power Practices for Spiritual Superabundance by Sophia Remolde Episode 18: Gerald Busby in New York City Episode 12: Power Truth of the Universe #1: Energy is Everything Episode 13: Power Truth of the Universe #2: Perception is Power Episode 14: Power Truth of the Universe #3: Consciousness is Creation Here Pema Chödrön talks about Tibetan Buddhism’s five skandhas—the mental and physical characteristics that create and sustain the ego—and offers a simple lesson. Music for this episode was contributed by Daniel Munkus and recorded in the Hudson River Valley at Subtle Soup Studios. For more info, visit: www.subtlesouprecords.com. Podcast management and creative copy provided by Sonya Louise, celebrating the Summer Solstice in Little Silver, New Jersey. Sonya Louise is also the force of Nature behind Sacred Survivor Quest, as heard on today’s episode. For Free Energy Readings from Sophia and to learn about upcoming Hero’s Way Pilgrimages, visit: lobsterbird.com. ✨The newest pilgrimage is happening in Colorado in August! If you are interested in soaking in some magic so you can Level Up, shoot an email over to magic@lobsterbird.com for more details!✨ If you liked this episode, please subscribe to our podcast and drop some starshine on us in iTunes. Leaving 5 stars makes it possible to bring you more goodness. Bonus points for leaving a review!

In this episode, Margy helps Jess power through a light depression.

Confused about carbohydrates? Well you are not alone and learning what good carbohydrates are is the key to a successful healthy diet. To understand why carbs often get a bad rap, first, we need to be aware of the different types of carbohydrates.   Why is this important? Because carbohydrates are our body’s primary source of energy. If you eat healthy carbs, as part of a balanced diet that includes protein and fat, your body will function the way it should.  If you consume unhealthy carbohydrates, you can develop serious health issues including diabetes, auto-immune disease, and obesity. In today’s podcast, we break it down. Learn which foods are good carbohydrates and how they contribute to weight loss, normal blood sugar and energy. We will also learn where all the bad carbohydrates are hidden and which foods to avoid. If you found this podcast information helpful today, please share on social media and consider writing a review in iTunes. The more reviews we receive, the more visibility and higher ranking iTunes gives our podcasts. Please join our healthy and supportive community on Facebook – We are over 313,000 strong and growing – here is the link. I am now doing a Facebook Live Cooking Show every Friday at 3pm PST so please try to join us. If you have any questions or comments for Ordinary Vegan, email me at questions@ordinaryvegan.net. I love hearing from you and appreciate your reviews, feedback and kindness. Thanks so much for joining us today. I hope this podcast and all my podcasts help you live a long and healthy life. You can support today’s podcast sponsor by visiting www.healthiq.com/ordinaryvegan References: Pema Chodron - When Things Fall Apart Dr. John McDougall - The Starch Solution  

This extra-curricular content contains two guided meditations from the wise and wonderful Thubten Chodron. The first ten or so minutes contain a basic introduction to meditation.  After that comes a meatier mind dive into the topic of self-forgiveness, something I think we could all use. It provides some powerful perspective on making mistakes, owning them and ultimately moving forward from them and separating yourself from them. Explore more of meditations from Thubten Chodron at thubtenchodron.org Dig in to some other sources for free meditation at Thirdeyedrops.com

Thubten Chodron (born Cheryl Greene) is Tibetan Buddhist author, teacher, and the founder of Sravasti Abbey, the only Tibetan Buddhist training monastery in the United States. Thubten Chodron is also a student of the Dalai Lama and other Tibetan masters. She has published many books on Buddhist philosophy and meditation, and has co-authored a book with the Dalai Lama. For a full write-up, meditations and more mind melds, THIRD EYE DROPS ThubtenChodron.org Sravasti.org

I have spent years trying to be a better person. Good lord! Recently I was reminded of how much I felt this way when I was a teenager, and trying to understand my Christian upbringing. Everyone can question the thought that there is something wrong with you, and you need improvement. You can practice imagining being OK with who you are right now, no need for anything different.

Pema Chödrön is a Buddhist teacher and prolific author with an incredibly strong, yet compassionate and grounded perspective. This book is all about facing challenging times with courage as we lean into our fears and grow. We'll explore a bunch of Big Ideas on everything from why we should meditate to how long the process of actualizing takes (roughly the rest of our lives :)!

Pema Chödrön is a Buddhist teacher and prolific author with an incredibly strong, yet compassionate and grounded perspective. This book is all about facing challenging times with courage as we lean into our fears and grow. We'll explore a bunch of Big Ideas on everything from why we should meditate to how long the process of actualizing takes (roughly the rest of our lives :)!

We've all got places that scare us and in her great book, Pema Chodrön helps us shine a compassionate light on them. We'll explore some Brilliant Ideas including the fact that being mad at someone and holding a grudge is kinda like eating rat poisoning thinking you're going to hurt the rat. Not so much. We'll also look at idiot compassion and the practice of rejoicing in others' good fortune and other wonderfulness.

We've all got places that scare us and in her great book, Pema Chodrön helps us shine a compassionate light on them. We'll explore some Brilliant Ideas including the fact that being mad at someone and holding a grudge is kinda like eating rat poisoning thinking you're going to hurt the rat. Not so much. We'll also look at idiot compassion and the practice of rejoicing in others' good fortune and other wonderfulness.

Thubten Chodron, a long time Western Buddhist Nun, and founder of Sravasti Abbey in Washington State, took time with us to discuss her work as a teacher, including all of the work she has done with students online. She shared with us the potential down-sides of having a purely digital relationship with a teacher, as one doesn’t have the opportunity to see experience teacher as a living example. Chodron also commented on an issue she sees our society having with spiritual practice, in that we tend to want things to be easy and quick. Her, and other teachers, have observed a tendency to want a kind of “push-button enlightenment”. The truth, she says, is that there aren’t any shortcuts when it comes to transforming the mind and realizing suffering and it’s cessation. We finish off our conversation with Chodron exploring what has changed as Buddhism has come to the West. She mentions that much of the packaging has changed, but that it’s always a tricky process differentiating the packaging from the teachings of liberation. What is culture and what is the dharma? She gives her opinions on the subject, and shares some of the ways in which her community is trying to change with the times. We hope you enjoy this conversation with one of the West’s most beloved Tibetan Nuns. This is part 1 of a two-part series. Listen to Part 2: Monasteries as the Conscience of Society. Episode Links: Sravasti Abbey ( http://www.sravastiabbey.org )

Now that you can question the suffering of death...or at least begin to look...can you find freedom in seeing that you are completely alone, and it's OK? This does not mean lonely!

Your self-hate may never go away. Who would you be if you gave up the idea that you will be secure later, and there's a way to eliinate pain? You might be surprised at the freedom.

"Whatever we're doing could be done with one intention. That intention is that we want to wake up, we want to ripen our compassion, and we want to ripen our ability to let go. We want to realize our connection with all beings."  Pema Chodron   In the New Year, we often make...