Field of bodywork emphasizing internal sensation
POPULARITY
In this deeply honest and emotional episode, Shilamida opens up about her ongoing journey with food. The cravings, the emotional eating, and the guilt that comes after. Following last week's conversation on her food awakening, this episode dives into what food freedom really means and why it's one of the hardest awakenings of all.She shares her truth about living in a body that's still learning, breaking generational patterns, and unlearning the “good girl / bad girl” language so many of us use when it comes to food. You'll hear how she's now studying somatics through a 10-month certification with the Soma School of Somatics, and how movement, breath, and awareness are helping her rewrite her relationship with nourishment, safety, and comfort.If you've ever turned to food for comfort, celebration, or relief, this conversation will feel like coming home.In this episode, Shilamida talks about: ✨ Her lifelong struggle with emotional eating and shame ✨ Why food can trigger safety, comfort, and dopamine in the body ✨ The link between somatic healing and breaking food cycles ✨ How she's using movement, awareness, and compassion to change her patterns ✨ The power of rewriting your stories — and that you're not alone in the processMentioned in this episode:
Danielle (00:20):Welcome to the Arise podcast, conversations about reality and talking a lot about what that means in the context of church, faith, race, justice, religion, all the things. Today, I'm so honored to have Sarah Van Gelder, a community leader, an example of working and continuing to work on building solidarity and networks and communication skills and settling into her lane. I hope you enjoy this conversation. Hey, Sarah, it's so good to be with you. And these are just casual conversations, and I do actual minimal editing, but they do get a pretty good reach, so that's exciting. I would love to hear you introduce yourself. How do you introduce yourself these days? Tell me a little bit about who you are. Okay.Sarah (01:14):My name is Sarah Van Gelder and I live in Bremer and Washington. I just retired after working for the Suquamish Tribe for six years, so I'm still in the process of figuring out what it means to be retired, doing a lot of writing, a certain amount of activism, and of course, just trying to figure out day to day, how to deal with the latest, outrageous coming from the administration. But that's the most recent thing. I think what I'm most known for is the founding yes magazine and being the editor for many years. So I still think a lot about how do we understand that we're in an era that's essentially collapsing and something new may be emerging to take its place? How do we understand what this moment is and really give energy to the emergence of something new? So those are sort of the foundational questions that I think about.Danielle (02:20):Okay. Those are big questions. I hadn't actually imagined that something new is going to emerge, but I do agree there is something that's collapsing, that's disintegrating. As you know, I reached out about how are we thinking about what is reality and what is not? And you can kind of see throughout the political spectrum or community, depending on who you're with and at what time people are viewing the world through a specific lens. And of course, we always are. We have our own lens, and some people allow other inputs into that lens. Some people are very specific, what they allow, what they don't allow. And so what do we call as reality when it comes to reality and politics or reality and faith or gender, sexuality? It's feeling more and more separate. And so that's kind of why I reached out to you. I know you're a thinker. I know you're a writer, and so I was wondering, as you think about those topics, what do you think even just about what I've said or where does your mind go?Sarah (03:32):Yeah. Well, at first when you said that was the topic, I was a little intimidated by it because it sounded a little abstract. But then I started thinking about how it is so hard right now to know what's real, partly because there's this very conscious effort to distort reality and get people to accept lies. And I think actually part of totalitarian work is to get people to just in the Orwellian book 1984, the character had to agree that two plus two equals five. And only when he had fully embraced that idea could he be considered really part of society.(04:14):So there's this effort to get us to accept things that we actually know aren't true. And there's a deep betrayal that takes place when we do that, when we essentially gaslight ourselves to say something is true when we know it's not. And I think for a lot of people who have, I think that's one of the reasons the Republican party is in such trouble right now, is because so many people who in previous years might've had some integrity with their own belief system, have had to toss that aside to adopt the lies of the Trump administration, for example, that the 2020 election was stolen. And if they don't accept those lies, they get rejected from the party. And once you accept those lies, then from then on you have betrayed yourself. And in many ways, you've betrayed the people who trust you. So it's a really tough dilemma sort of at that political level, even for people who have not bought into the MAGA mindset, or I do think of it as many people have described as a cult.(05:31):Now, even for people who have not bought into that, I think it's just really hard to be in a world where so many fundamental aspects of reality are not shared with people in your own family, in your own workplace, in your own community. I think it's incredibly challenging and we don't really know, and I certainly don't know how to have conversations. In fact, this is a question I wanted to ask you to have conversations across that line of reality because there's so much places where feelings get hurt, but there's also hard to reference back to any shared understanding in order to start with some kind of common ground. It feels like the ground is just completely unreliable. But I'd love to hear your thoughts about how you think about that.Danielle (06:33):It's interesting. I have some family members that are on the far, far, including my parent, well, not my parents exactly, but my father, and I've known this for a while. So prior to what happened in a couple weeks ago with the murder of an activist, I had spent a lot of time actually listening to that activist and trying to understand what he stood for, what he said, why my family was so interested in it. I spent time reading. And then I also was listening to, I don't know if you're familiar with the Midas Touch podcast? Yeah. So I listened to the Midas Brothers, and they're exact opposites. They're like, one is saying, you idiot, and the other one is like, oh, you're an idiot. And so when I could do it, when I had space to do it, it was actually kind of funny to me.(07:34):Sometimes I'm like, oh, that's what they think of someone that thinks like me. And that's when that guy says, calls them an idiot. I feel some resonance with that. So I did that a lot. However, practically speaking, just recently in the last couple months, someone reached out to me from across the political ideology line and said, Hey, wouldn't it be fun if we got together and talked? We think really differently. We've known each other for 20 years. Could you do that? So I said, I thought about it and I was like, yeah, I say this, I should act on it. I should follow through. So I said, okay, yeah, let's meet. We set up a time. And when you get that feeling like that person's not going to show up, but you're also feeling like, I don't know if I want them to show up.(08:24):Am I really going to show up? But it's kind of like a game of chicken. Well, I hung in there longer, maybe not because I wanted to show up, but just because I got distracted by my four kids and whatnot, and it was summer, and the other person did say, oh, I sprained my ankle. I can't have a conversation with you. I was like, oh, okay. And they were like, well, let me reschedule. So I waited. I didn't hear back from them, and then they hopped onto one of my Facebook pages and said some stuff, and I responded and I said, Hey, wait a minute. I thought we were going to have a conversation in person. And it was crickets, it was silence, it was nothing. And then I was tagged in some other comments of people that I would consider even more extreme. And just like, this is an example of intolerance.(09:13):And I was like, whoa, how did I get here? How did I get here? And like I said, I'm not innocent. I associate some of the name calling and I have those explicit feelings. And I was struck by that. And then in my own personal family, we started a group chat and it did not go well. As soon as we jumped into talking about immigration and ice enforcement and stuff after there were two sides stated, and then the side that was on the far right side said, well, there's no point in talking anymore. We're not going to convince each other. And my brother and I were like, wait a minute, can we keep talking? We're not going to convince each other, but how can we just stop talking? And it's just been crickets. It's been silence. There's been nothing. So I think as you ask me that, I just feel like deep pain, how can we not have the things I think, or my perception of what the other side believes is extremely harmful to me and my family. But what feels even more harmful is the fact that we can't even talk about it. There's no tolerance to hear how hurtful that is to us or the real impact on our day-to-day life. And I think this, it's not just the ideology, but it's the inability to even just have some empathy there. And then again, if you heard a guy like Charlie Kirk, he didn't believe in empathy. So I have to remember, okay, maybe they don't even believe in empathy. Okay, so I don't have an answer. What about you?Sarah (11:03):No, I don't either. Except to say that I think efforts that are based on trying to convince someone of a rational argument don't work because this is not about analysis or about rationality, it's about identity, and it's about deep feelings of fear and questions of worthiness. And I think part of this moment we're in with the empire collapsing, the empire that has shorn up so much of our way of life, even people who've been at the margins of it, obviously not as much, but particularly people who are middle class or aspiring to be middle class or upper, that has been where we get our sense of security, where we get our sense of meaning. For a lot of white people, it's their sense of entitlement that they get to have. They're entitled to certain kinds of privileges and ways of life. So if that's collapsing and I believe it is, then that's a very scary time and it's not well understood. So then somebody comes along who's a strong man like Trump and says, not only can I explain it to you, but I can keep you safe. I can be your vengeance against all the insults that you've had to live with. And it's hard to give that up because of somebody coming at you with a rational discussion.(12:36):I think the only way to give that up is to have something better or more secure or more true to lean into. Now that's really hard to do because part of the safety on the right is by totally rejecting the other. And so my sense is, and I don't know if this can possibly work, but my sense is that the only thing that might work is creating nonpolitical spaces where people can just get to know each other as human beings and start feeling that yes, that person is there for me when things are hard and that community is there for me, and they also see me and appreciate who I am. And based on that kind of foundation, I think there's some hope. And so when I think about the kind of organizing to be doing right now, a lot of it really is about just saying, we really all care about our kids and how do we make sure they have good schools and we all need some good healthcare, and let's make sure that that's available to everybody. And just as much as possible keeps it within that other realm. And even maybe not even about issues, maybe it's just about having a potluck and enjoying food together.Danielle (14:10):What structures or how do you know then that you're in reality? And do you have an experience of actually being in a mixed group like that with people that think wildly different than you? And how did that experience inform you? And maybe it's recently, maybe it's in the past. Yeah,Sarah (14:32):So in some respects, I feel like I've lived that way all my life,(14:44):Partly because I spent enough time outside the United States that when I came home as a child, our family lived in India for a year. And so when I came home, I just had this sense that my life, my life and my perceptions of the world were really different than almost everybody else around me, but the exception of other people who'd also spent a lot of time outside the us. And somehow we understood each other pretty well. But most of my life, I felt like I was seeing things differently. And I don't feel like I've ever really particularly gained a lot of skill in crossing that I've tended to just for a lot of what I'm thinking about. I just don't really talk about it except with a few people who are really interested. I don't actually know a lot about how to bridge that gap, except again, to tell stories, to use language that is non-academic, to use language that is part of ordinary people's lives.(16:01):So yes, magazine, that was one of the things that I focused a lot on is we might do some pretty deep analysis, and some of it might include really drawing on some of the best academic work that we could find. But when it came to what we were going to actually produce in the magazine, we really focused in on how do we make this language such that anybody who picks this up who at least feels comfortable reading? And that is a barrier for some people, but anybody who feels comfortable reading can say, yeah, this is written with me in mind. This is not for another group of people. This is written for me. And then part of that strategy was to say, okay, if you can feel that way about it, can you also then feel comfortable sharing it with other people where you feel like they're going to feel invited in and they won't feel like, okay, I'm not your audience.(16:57):I'm not somebody you're trying to speak to. So that's pretty much, I mean, just that whole notion of language and telling stories and using the age old communication as human beings, we evolved to learn by stories. And you can tell now just because you try to tell a kid some lesson and their eyes will roll, but if you tell them a story, they will listen. They won't necessarily agree, but they will listen and it will at least be something they'll think about. So stories is just so essential. And I think that authentic storytelling from our own experience that feels like, okay, I'm not just trying to tell you how you should believe, but I'm trying to say something about my own experience and what's happened to me and where my strength comes from and where my weaknesses and my challenges come from as well.Yeah, you mentioned that, and I was thinking about good stories. And so one of the stories I like to tell is that I moved to Suquamish, which is as an Indian reservation, without knowing really anything about the people I was going to be neighbors with. And there's many stories I could tell you about that. But one of them was that I heard that they were working to restore the ability to dig clams and dies inlet, which is right where silver Dial is located. And I remember thinking that place is a mess. You're never going to be able to have clean enough water because clams require really clean water. They're down filtering all the crap that comes into the water, into their bodies. And so you don't want to eat clams unless the water's very clean. But I remember just having this thought from my perspective, which is find a different place to dig clamps because that place is a mess.(19:11):And then years later, I found out it was now clean enough that they were digging clamps. And I realized that for them, spending years and years, getting the water cleaned up was the obvious thing to do because they think in terms of multiple generations, and they don't give up on parts of their water or their land. So it took years to do it, but they stayed with it. And so that was really a lesson for me in that kind of sense of reality, because my sense of reality is, no, you move on. You do what the pioneers did. One place gets the dust bowl and you move to a different place to farm. And learning to see from the perspective of not only other individuals, but other cultures that have that long millennia of experience in place and how that shifts things. It's almost like to me, it's like if you're looking at the world through one cultural lens, it's like being a one eyed person. You certainly see things, but when you open up your other eye and you can start seeing things in three dimensions, it becomes so much more alive and so much more rich with information and with possibilities.Danielle (20:35):Well, when you think about, and there's a lot probably, how do you apply that to today or even our political landscape? We're finding reality today.Sarah (20:48):Well, I think that the MAGA cult is very, very one eyed. And again, because that sense of safety and identity is so tied up in maintaining that they're not necessarily going to voluntarily open a second eye. But if they do, it would probably be because of stories. There's a story, and I think things like the Jimmy Kimmel thing is an example of that.(21:21):There's a story of someone who said what he believed and was almost completely shut down. And the reason that didn't happen is because people rose up and said, no, that's unacceptable. So I think there's a fundamental belief that's widespread enough that we don't shut down people for speech unless it's so violent that it's really dangerous. We don't shut people down for that. So I think when there's that kind of dissonance, I think there's sometimes an opening, and then it's really important to use that opening, not as a time to celebrate that other people were wrong and we were right, but to celebrate these values that free speech is really important and we're going to stand up for it, and that's who we are. So we get back to that identity. You can feel proud that you were part of this movement that helped make sure that free speech is maintained in the United States. Oh, that'sDanielle (22:26):Very powerful. Yeah, because one side of my family is German, and they're the German Mennonites. They settled around the Black Sea region, and then the other side is Mexican. But these settlers were invited by Catherine the Great, and she was like, Hey, come over here. And Mennonites had a history of non-violence pacifist movement. They didn't want to be conscripted into the German army. And so this was also attractive for them because they were skilled farmers and they had a place to go and Russia and farm. And so that's why they left Germany, to go to Russia to want to seek freedom of their religion and use their farming skills till the soil as well as not be conscripted into violent political movements. That's the ancestry of the side of my family that is now far.(23:29):And I find, and of course, they came here and when they were eventually kicked out, and part of that them being kicked out was then them moving to the Dakotas and then kicking out the native tribes men that were there on offer from the US government. So you see the perpetuation of harm, and I guess I just wonder what all of that cost my ancestors, what it cost them to enact harm that they had received themselves. And then there was a shift. Some of them went to World War II as conscientious objectors, a couple went as fighters.(24:18):So then you start seeing that shift. I'm no longer, I'm not like a pacifist. You start seeing the shift and then we're to today, I don't know if those black sea farmers that moved to Russia would be looking down and being good job. Those weren't the values it seems like they were pursuing. So I even, I've been thinking a lot about that and just what does that reality mean here? What separations, what splitting has my family had to do to, they changed from these deeply. To move an entire country means you're very committed to your values, uproot your life, even if you're farming and you're going to be good at it somewhere else, it's a big deal.Sarah (25:10):Oh, yeah. So it also could be based on fear, right? Because I think so many of the people who immigrated here were certainly my Jewish heritage. There is this long history of pilgrims and people would get killed. And so it wasn't necessarily that for a lot of people that they really had an option to live where they were. And of course, today's refugees, a lot of 'em are here for the same reason. But I think one of the things that happened in the United States is the assimilation into whiteness.(25:49):So as white people, it's obviously different for different communities, but if you came in here and you Irish people and Italians and so forth were despised at certain times and Jews and Quakers even. But over time, if you were white, you could and many did assimilate. And what did assimilate into whiteness? First of all, whiteness is not a culture, and it's kind of bereft of real meaning because the real cultures were the original Irish and Italian. But the other thing is that how you make whiteness a community, if you will, is by excluding other people, is by saying, well, we're different than these other folks. So I don't know if this applies to your ancestors or not, but it is possible that part of what their assimilation to the United States was is to say, okay, we are white people and we are entitled to this land in North Dakota because we're not native. And so now our identity is people who are secure on the land, who have title to it and can have a livelihood and can raise our children in security. That is all wrapped up in us not being native and in our government, keeping native people from reclaiming that land.(27:19):So that starts shifting over generations. Certainly, it can certainly shift the politics. And I think that plus obviously the sense of entitlement that so many people felt to and feel to their slave holding ancestors, that was a defensible thing to do. And saying it's not is a real challenge to somebody's identity.(27:51):So in that respect, that whole business that Trump is doing or trying to restore the Confederate statues, those were not from the time of slavery. Those were from after reconstruction. Those were part of the south claiming that it had the moral authority and the moral right to do these centuries long atrocities against enslaved people. And so to me, that's still part of the fundamental identity struggle we're in right now, is people saying, if I identify as white, yes, I get all this safety and all these privileges, but I also have this burden of this history and history that's continuing today, and how do I reconcile those two? And Trump says, you don't have to. You can just be proud of what you have perpetrated or what your ancestors perpetrated on other people.And I think there was some real too. I think there were people who honestly felt that they wanted to reconcile the, and people I think who are more willing to have complex thoughts about this country because there are things to be proud of, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and the long history of protecting free speech and journalism and education for everyone and so forth. So there are definitely things to be proud of. And then there are things to recognize. We're incredibly violent and have had multiple generations of trauma resulting from it. And to live in this country in authenticity is to recognize that both are true and we're stuck with the history, but we're not stuck without being able to deal with that. We can do restitution and reparations and we can heal from that.Danielle (30:15):How do you stay connected even just to your own self in that dissonance that you just described?Sarah (30:30):Well, I think part of having compassion is to recognize that we're imperfect beings as individuals, but we're also imperfect as cultures. And so for me, I can live with, I mean, this is something I've lived with ever since I was in India, really. And I looked around and noticed that there were all these kids my own age who were impoverished and I was not. And that I knew I have enough to eat at the end of the day, and I knew that many of them would not have enough to eat. So it's always been a challenge for me. And so my response to that has been when I was a kid was, well, I don't understand how that happened. It's certainly not right. I don't understand how it could be, and I'm going to do my best to understand it, and then I'll do my part to try to change it. And I basically had the same view ever since then, which is there's only so much I can do, but I'll do everything I can, including examining my own complicity and working through issues that I might be carrying as somebody who grew up in a white supremacist culture, working on that internally, and then also working in community and working as an activist in a writer in any way I can think of that I can make a contribution.(31:56):But I really do believe that healing is possible. And so when I think about the people that are causing that I feel like are not dealing with the harm that they're creating, I still feel just somebody who goes to prison for doing a crime that's not the whole of who they are. And so they're going to have to ultimately make the choice about whether they're going to heal and reconcile and repair the damage they will have to make that choice. But for my part, I always want to keep that door open in my relationship with them and in my writing and in any other way, I want to keep the door open.Danielle (32:43):And I hear that, and I'm like, that's noble. And it's so hard to do to keep that door open. So what are some of the tools you use, even just on your own that help you keep that door open to conversation, even to feeling compassion for people maybe you don't agree with? What are some of the things, maybe their internal resources, external resources could be like, I don't know, somebody you read, go back to and read. Yeah. What helps you?Sarah (33:16):Well, the most important thing for me to keep my sanity is a combination of getting exercise and getting outside(33:27):And hanging out with my granddaughter and other people I love outside of political spaces because the political spaces get back into the stress. So yeah, I mean the exercise, I just feel like being grounded in our bodies is so important. And partly that the experience of fear and anxiety show up in our bodies, and we can also process them through being really active. So I'm kind of worried that if I get to the point where I'm too old to be able to really move, whether I'll be able to process as well. So there's that in terms of the natural world, this aliveness that I feel like transcends me and certainly humanity and just an aliveness that I just kind of open my senses to. And then it's sort, they call it forest bathing or don't have to be in a forest to do it, but just sort of allowing that aliveness to wash over me and to sort of celebrate it and to remember that we're all part of that aliveness. And then spending time with a 2-year-old is like, okay, anything that I may be hung up on, it becomes completely irrelevant to her experience.Danielle (35:12):I love that. Sarah, for you, even though I know you heard, you're still asking these questions yourself, what would you tell people to do if they're listening and they're like, and they're like, man, I don't know how to even start a conversation with someone that thinks different than me. I don't know how to even be in the same room them, and I'm not saying that your answers can apply to everybody. Mine certainly don't either, like you and me are just having a conversation. We're just talking it out. But what are some of the things you go to if you know you're going to be with people Yeah. That think differently than you, and how do you think about it?Sarah (35:54):Yeah, I mean, I don't feel particularly proud of this because I don't feel very capable of having a direct conversation with somebody who's, because I don't know how to get to a foundational level that we have in common, except sometimes we do. Sometimes it's like family, and sometimes it's like, what did you do for the weekend? And so it can feel like small talk, but it can also have an element of just recognizing that we're each in a body, in perhaps in a family living our lives struggling with how to live well. And so I usually don't try to get very far beyond that, honestly. And again, I'm not proud of that because I would love to have conversations that are enlightening for me and the other person. And my go-to is really much more basic than that.Maybe it is. And maybe it creates enough sense of safety that someday that other level of conversation can happen, even if it can't happen right away.Danielle (37:14):Well, Sarah, tell me if people are looking for your writing and know you write a blog, tell me a little bit about that and where to find you. Okay.Sarah (37:26):Yeah, my blog is called How We Rise, and it's on Substack. And so I'm writing now and then, and I'm also writing somewhat for Truth Out Truth out.org has adopted the Yes Archive, which I'm very grateful to them for because they're going to keep it available so people can continue to research and find articles there that are still relevant. And they're going to be continuing to do a monthly newsletter where they're going to draw on Yes, archives to tell stories about what's going on now. Yes, archives that are specifically relevant. So I recommend that. And otherwise, I'm just right now working on a draft of an op-ed about Palestine, which I hope I can get published. So I'm sort of doing a little of this and a little of that, but I don't feel like I have a clear focus. The chaos of what's going on nationally is so overwhelming, and I keep wanting to come back to my own and my own focus of writing, but I can't say that I've gotten there yet.Danielle (38:41):I hear you. Well, I hope you'll be back, and hopefully we can have more conversations. And just thanks a lot for being willing to just talk about stuff we don't know everything about.As always, thank you for joining us, and at the end of the podcast are notes and resources, and I encourage you to stay connected to those who are loving in your path and in your community. Stay tuned.Kitsap County & Washington State Crisis and Mental Health ResourcesIf you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call 911.This resource list provides crisis and mental health contacts for Kitsap County and across Washington State.Kitsap County / Local ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They OfferSalish Regional Crisis Line / Kitsap Mental Health 24/7 Crisis Call LinePhone: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/24/7 emotional support for suicide or mental health crises; mobile crisis outreach; connection to services.KMHS Youth Mobile Crisis Outreach TeamEmergencies via Salish Crisis Line: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://sync.salishbehavioralhealth.org/youth-mobile-crisis-outreach-team/Crisis outreach for minors and youth experiencing behavioral health emergencies.Kitsap Mental Health Services (KMHS)Main: 360‑373‑5031; Toll‑free: 888‑816‑0488; TDD: 360‑478‑2715Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/Outpatient, inpatient, crisis triage, substance use treatment, stabilization, behavioral health services.Kitsap County Suicide Prevention / “Need Help Now”Call the Salish Regional Crisis Line at 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/Suicide-Prevention-Website.aspx24/7/365 emotional support; connects people to resources; suicide prevention assistance.Crisis Clinic of the PeninsulasPhone: 360‑479‑3033 or 1‑800‑843‑4793Website: https://www.bainbridgewa.gov/607/Mental-Health-ResourcesLocal crisis intervention services, referrals, and emotional support.NAMI Kitsap CountyWebsite: https://namikitsap.org/Peer support groups, education, and resources for individuals and families affected by mental illness.Statewide & National Crisis ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They Offer988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (WA‑988)Call or text 988; Website: https://wa988.org/Free, 24/7 support for suicidal thoughts, emotional distress, relationship problems, and substance concerns.Washington Recovery Help Line1‑866‑789‑1511Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesHelp for mental health, substance use, and problem gambling; 24/7 statewide support.WA Warm Line877‑500‑9276Website: https://www.crisisconnections.org/wa-warm-line/Peer-support line for emotional or mental health distress; support outside of crisis moments.Native & Strong Crisis LifelineDial 988 then press 4Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesCulturally relevant crisis counseling by Indigenous counselors.Additional Helpful Tools & Tips• Behavioral Health Services Access: Request assessments and access to outpatient, residential, or inpatient care through the Salish Behavioral Health Organization. Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/SBHO-Get-Behaviroal-Health-Services.aspx• Deaf / Hard of Hearing: Use your preferred relay service (for example dial 711 then the appropriate number) to access crisis services.• Warning Signs & Risk Factors: If someone is talking about harming themselves, giving away possessions, expressing hopelessness, or showing extreme behavior changes, contact crisis resources immediately.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that. Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.
Sascha Altman DuBrul is a writer and mental health coach who came of age in the New York punk rock scene of the late '80s and early '90s. In this conversation, he speaks with Kendra and Rich about his time in psychiatric hospitals and how those experiences led him to co-found The Icarus Project, a peer-based online mental health resource. They also discuss the concept of centered accountability, as well as Kendra and Sascha's shared experiences while working toward their Master's in Social Work, among other topics.Sascha is the co-founder of The Icarus Project, and author of Maps to the Other Side and the forthcoming Dangerous Gifts. He is co-creator of T-MAPs (Transformative Mutual Aid Practices). Sascha's work bridges lived experience, peer support, and movement strategy to reimagine mental health beyond diagnosis. Viist Sascha's Website: https://www.saschadubrul.comSascha's Substack: https://undergroundtransmissions.substack.comHistory of The Icarus Project: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icarus_ProjectLearn more about Staci Haines and Somatics: https://www.stacihaines.comLearn more about Jacob Moreno: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_L._MorenoSascha's Book Recommendation: Lipstick Traces: A Secret History of the 20th Century: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipstick_Traces:_A_Secret_History_of_the_20th_Century-In 2025, we are interested in talking to teachers, authors, artists, activists, counselors, community organizers, and anyone else who is dedicated to making a positive impact in their music community and our society as a whole. If that sounds like you, please reach out to us at thisisenoughpodcast@gmail.com.Visit our website: https://www.thisisenoughpodcast.comFollow us on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/enough.podcas
To be human is experience stress as well as being on a trauma spectrum. In this episode—part three of the Somatics Series—we define trauma in relationship to stress, in connection with Polyvagal Theory. Trauma is the energy of overwhelm in which we feel (and then, most often, come to believe) that we don't have the resources to make life work. This episode concludes by introducing the pathway out of trauma and stuck energy.
What if the deepest medicine you're seeking has been alive within you all along?In this week's Fire and Soul, I sit down with my dear sister Dr. Cass Naumann—doctor of Chinese medicine, ordained Daoist priestess, musician, and ceremonialist—for a profoundly moving conversation on the sacred alchemy of healing.Cass shares her remarkable journey from musician to healer, and how the initiations of grief, devotion, and spiritual cultivation shaped her path. We explore why ceremony matters so deeply in these times, how our bodies carry the keys to transformation, and what it means to activate our “inner pharmacy” of joy, presence, and connection.This is one of those deeply rich, heart-opening dialogues that feels like a ceremony in itself, and I'm so excited for you to experience it.
Rebecca A. Wheeler Walston, J.D., Master of Arts in CounselingEmail: asolidfoundationcoaching@gmail.comPhone: +1.5104686137Website: Rebuildingmyfoundation.comI have been doing story work for nearly a decade. I earned a Master of Arts in Counseling from Reformed Theological Seminary and trained in story work at The Allender Center at The Seattle School of Theology and Psychology. I have served as a story facilitator and trainer at both The Allender Center and the Art of Living Counseling Center. I currently see clients for one-on-one story coaching and work as a speaker and facilitator with Hope & Anchor, an initiative of The Impact Movement, Inc., bringing the power of story work to college students.By all accounts, I should not be the person that I am today. I should not have survived the difficulties and the struggles that I have faced. At best, I should be beaten down by life‘s struggles, perhaps bitter. I should have given in and given up long ago. But I was invited to do the good work of (re)building a solid foundation. More than once in my life, I have witnessed God send someone my way at just the right moment to help me understand my own story, and to find the strength to step away from the seemingly inevitable ending of living life in defeat. More than once I have been invited and challenged to find the resilience that lies within me to overcome the difficult moment. To trust in the goodness and the power of a kind gesture. What follows is a snapshot of a pivotal invitation to trust the kindness of another in my own story. May it invite you to receive to the pivotal invitation of kindness in your own story. Listen with me… Rebecca (01:12):Say, oh, this is for black women, and then what? Because I quoted a couple of black people that count. I don't want to do that. And also I'm still trying to process. When you run a group like that for, and it's not embedded in something like a story workshop or a larger kind of thing, the balance of how do you give people the information and still leave room to process all of that. I'm still trying to figure out what does it look like? What does it feel like? What does it sound like? And I won't be able to figure, it's not like I can figure it out before the group and you know what I mean? You just have to roll with it. So yeah,Danielle (02:01):All those things. That's so hard, man. Man, dude, that's so hard. It's so hard to categorize it. Even What's the right time of day to hold this? What are the right words to say to tell people, this is how you can show up. And even when you say all those things and you think you've created some clarity or safety or space, they still show up in their own way, of course. And they may not have read your email. They may have signed all this stuff and it may not be what they want. Or maybe it changes and it becomes something even more beautiful. I don't know. That's how I've experienced it.Rebecca (02:39):It's all those things, and I think, and this is what I want to do, this is taking this work into a community and a space that is never going to show up in Seattle for all a thousand reasons. And soDanielle (02:56):Thousands of dollar reasons,Rebecca (02:58):Right? Thousands of dollar reasons. And so this is what I want to do. And so the million dollar question, how do you actually do that with some integrity? How do you do it in a way that actually, I don't even know if I could say I know that I want it to produce a particular result is just when I started doing this on my own, I had a lot of people reach out to me and go like, this is amazing. This is a brilliant, this is something I've been looking for without knowing that's what I've been looking for. Do you know what I mean? I think that that's true, sort of that evangelical refugee space. That's true right now. I think it's appealing on those levels. I think for people who would not necessarily go to therapy for the hundred of reasons why that's an uncomfortable thing. Culturally, this feels like it has a little more oxygen in the room,Danielle (04:20):And I'll turn my screen off. I'll make the call and then yeah, then I want to hear a little bit about your business, more about your group, and I, I'd love to just, I want to focus this whole season on what is reality in the realm of faith, culture, life therapy, religion, if you're in a religion versus a faith. Yeah. Just those what is our reality? Because I think even as you talk about group, it's like what is the reality for that group of people for accessing care? So that's the overall season theme.Speaker 2 (05:00):Okay.Speaker 1 (05:02):How does that sound for you?Speaker 2 (05:03):That sounds great.Speaker 1 (05:04):Yeah. I know you have a lot of thoughts,Speaker 2 (05:07):But we do good bouncing off each other's thoughts. Me and you were good.Speaker 1 (05:13):So tell me how you started your own business.Speaker 2 (05:16):That's a good question. There's probably a long answer and a short answer. The long one is that I went and got a master's in marriage and family from a seminary 20 plus years ago, and by the time I finished my degree, I chose to go back to being a full-time attorney. And there's a story there, as there always is, that has to do with me almost being kicked out of theSpeaker 3 (05:55):ProgramSpeaker 2 (05:56):Because someone lodged a complaint against me as a person. The stated reason behind the claim was that my disability was a distraction to clients,(06:09):And I was absolutely undone and totally shredded, all just completely undone by the entire ordeal experience, all of it. It just really undid me in a way that I don't know if I could have put the pieces together then, but I think that played a huge part in me going, I'm going to go back to my original career, which was being an attorney, and I will put this down and I don't know. And so it's 20 plus years later, I still have that whatever was the inclination inside of me that made me say, this work is the kind of work I want to do is still there. And so I think this time around I felt empowered, I felt supported. I felt like I had people and community around me, people like you and lots of people that was like, I can actually do this, and I don't necessarily need the permission of an institution or the rubber stamp of another person to actually take what I have learned about living life and offer it to someone else. So I find myself now the owner and practitioner of solid foundation story Coaching, and we're going to see where the Lord leads and we're going to see where we end up.Speaker 1 (07:38):Okay. When in any moment, I might have to hop off here, you said nine 10 to nine 15, but what do you imagine then for your first offerings? I know you jumped in a little bit at the beginning and we kind of touched on it, but what are your first, what's your desire? What are you trying to offer?Speaker 2 (08:00):That's a good confusion too. I think a couple of things. I come from a very conservative evangelical Christian background that is also, there's these parallel roots in my background that are rooted in the black church. And every once in a while I can feel my evangelical why and what and why, and what I think the short answer is just care. You asked me what do you want to offer? And that I think my answer is care for a lot of reasons. When I look at my own story and my own life and my own path, there are lots of ways and places where I can identify. I didn't have the care that I needed. I didn't have the support that I needed to get where I wanted to go, sort of maybe unscathed, maybe in the shortest path possible with the least amount of obstacles as a woman, as a person of color, as a black American woman in the church, in as a person with a disability, all kinds of ways in which there were places in ways that I needed care that I didn't get. And even with all that being said, once, twice, maybe three times the exact right care at the exact right moment from the person who was capable and willing to give it, and it only takes one person at just the right time to offer just a few minutes of care and what is impossible becomes possible,(10:01):And what is too painful to breathe through becomes something that you can now face head on. So I think in some way, maybe it's paying forward what those people who offered me care gave to me, and now it's my chance to give it back.Rebecca (10:37):Right? Yeah. I mean, if I were going to go for the obvious, the things that we are most comfortable talking about at this moment in our country's history, to women who have faced misogyny in its most simplistic and its most complex and twisted ways to black folks and all that we have faced and struggled through to people of color. There are all kinds of ways in which out of my own story, there are corners that I recognize. And what do I mean by that, right? I have lived my life as an African-American woman, and so there are corners in life that I have come to recognize. That moment when you recognize that somehow this moment, which should be simple and just human has become racialized, and you catch it by a glance, a look, a silence that lasts too long, and you go like, oh, I know exactly where I am.(11:53):I may not know the person in front of me, but I know people like them, and this experience begins to feel familiar, and I know what this corner looks like, and I know what it sounds like, and I know where the dip in the sidewalk is, and I know where there's this pothole that if you step in it the wrong way, you're going to twist your ankle. I know exactly how long you have to cross the street before that flashing red hand comes up. The ways in which, because you've been here before because you've struggled in a familiar moment, you know what it looks like and sounds like and feels like,(12:33):And because it is familiar, then perhaps you can offer something of wisdom or kindness to someone who's new to that corner who doesn't quite know how to navigate it. So I can say that about being black, about being a woman. There are all kinds of things in my own story that have made these corners familiar to me. So yes to all of those things, all of those kinds of people, that there's something I have in common with the parallels of their story that I can say, Hey, I know this corner and I have a flashlight and I can shine my light in front of your path so you can take another step.Danielle (13:17):How do you feel in your body as you say that?Rebecca (13:22):I feel good. It feels like me. You say, how do you feel in your body? Why would you ask that question? What do we mean by that? Which is part of this work, which is being able to recognize when I'm comfortable in my own skin and when I'm not, and being able to recognize why that might be true in any given moment. And so this part feels good to me. It feels like steps I was trying to take 20 years ago that got hijacked and sidetracked by what happened to me in grad school. And it feels like work that I was meant to do because of the corners that I know. So I feel good. I can breathe deep.Danielle (14:12):How do you know when you feel good? What tells you you're feeling goodRebecca (14:16):For me? That I can take a full deep breath. I have come to recognize that shallow breathing means I am not comfortable, so I can take a deep breath and it doesn't feel restricted to me that that's probably, for me, the most notable thing is to say that. And because I am not doing a lot of self editing, I feel okay saying what I have say. I don't have a lot of self-talk of like, Ooh, don't say that or don't say that. Yeah,Danielle (14:57):Which feels like something you can give your participants. I think I mentioned to you, I really wanted to hear about what you're up to business, but it really feels to me like a special kind of work in this season. And I know I mentioned, I was like, well, what's the reality of this season? Could you speak about the intersection of your work and what you see as the reality of our current climate?Rebecca (15:29):So when you first said that to me, my first reaction is go like, oh, I know what my reality is as a black woman, as a mother of two kids, as somebody that lives a mile from where the first enslaved Africans set foot on us soil. I have a very clear sense of my reality, but I'm also going like, and I'm sitting across from you, Danielle, who I know in this moment is living a very different reality as a Latino woman. And so the one thing, or sort of the second thought that comes to my mind after my first reaction, I know what my reality is, is something that I learned recently. I did a webinar and I moderated a panel, and one of the individuals on the panel is a Latino pastor. I'll call him Pastor Carlos. And one of the things that he said to me is that if my truth in any given moment is crafted at the expense of another human, my truth cannot be the absolute truth.Yeah. Now I'm paraphrasing a little bit. So Pastor Carlos, if you hear this, and please forgive me for the paraphrase, but what settled in me from his remarks is that if my truth in any given moment comes at the expense of another person, my truth cannot stand as the absolute truth. And he went on to say something of truth must always be defined in the context of community that we cannot discern what is reality, if you will, in a given moment without having that discussion and framing those contours in the context of community and connectedness to other people. So I could tell you my truth as a black American woman in 2025, and I already know, I know my sense of what is true in my world is going to look and sound and feel different than what is true for you in this moment. Right?Danielle (18:03):Talking about reality, I feel that even despite our different truths, you and I find ourselves touching ground like physical ground, touching energy, spirituality in the same way, not thinking the same. I don't mean that, but living in a space where you and I can connect and affirm one another's actual experiences in the world, actual day to day. I can tell you about a neighbor, you could tell me about work or one of your kids, and there's a sense that you haven't lived that exact, you're not with me in my house, I'm not with your kid in their school, but there's a sense that we can touch into a reality. We're in the ground somewhere together. So I'm wondering, what do you think makes that possible for us to share that space?Rebecca (18:57):I mean, it might be I part the willingness to share, and I don't mean, well, maybe I mean that in both senses of the word, the willingness to be shared in terms of vulnerable, I'm willing to tell you. And so when you ask me, Hey, how are you? When I say, Hey, Danielle, what's up with you? It's more than just the flippant, oh, I'm good. I'm cool. Right? It is this intentional move to slow down for 60 seconds or 60 minutes and go like, here's really happening with me.(19:38):And the other sort of piece of that, when I say the word share, I mean the willingness for there to be a little wiggle room in what I understand to be true. And that's not to say that I will take your truth and replace it with mine and obliterate my experience, not suggesting that I'm saying that my truth and your truth are going to butt up against each other and in the place where they touch, what do we do with that friction? Does that friction become a point of contention, a point of disagreement, a point of anger, of judgment where I villainize you and demonize you and other you? Or does that place where my truth and your truth rub up against each other? Does that become a place of learning? Does that become a place of flexibility of saying like, huh, I never thought about it the way you thought about it. Say more. And my experience between you and I is that there has been a willingness for years to go. What do you know about the world that I don't know? What do you see that I don't see? And how does your perspective actually alter if even just a little bit what I believe or know to be true of the world?Danielle (21:04):Yes, I agree with you. I think we find ourselves in a time though where the sharing of our reality feels unique, where groups, even groups, we would call them bipoc or black, indigenous people of color. You even see skirmishes between groups. And so I think it's laid in one with so much fear. Number two, with so much hypervigilance. And again, I'm not saying none of those things aren't warranted, but I think a group like yours or therapy or somatic work hopefully opens us up to be able to see the humanity of another person.That make sense or what do you thinking when I sayRebecca (21:49):No, it does. When you were talking about in this moment, it feels unique for groups to kind of share their experience. It caused me to kind of think about why is that right? And I don't think that's an accident. I don't think it is a coincidence. I think that there are powers that are crafting these sort of larger narratives that suggest that we have to be at odds with each other, that there isn't a way for us to see each other and recognize one another's humanity without there being this catastrophic threat to my own humanity. And I think part of why it feels so unique in this moment is because I think we're having to do some pretty significant work to fight against that larger narrative that would suggest that we can't be friends, that we must be enemies.Danielle(22:49):Yeah. What do you feel as you say that? I mean, when you say that I feel like I want to cry, I want to be angry, I want to be choked up, and those are all familiar for me. They're familiar for me.Rebecca (23:08):Well, mostly I feel a kind of loss. And what do I mean by that? I saw this clip on Instagram recently where it's a family. They're probably white, Caucasian American family sitting down to dinner at a table, the table's full of food,(23:33):And there's a bowl of strawberries on the table, which in my house during this time of year, there's forever. There's always strawberries in my house anyway. And so somebody says the blessing over the food, dear God, thank you for the food and the hands that prepared it, this sort of common blessing that is also an everyday occurrence at my house. Literally the words, God bless the food and the hands that prepared it. And then it cuts, the video cuts from the scene of this family, it tucked away safely in their kitchen to a migrant worker in a strawberry field who is being pursued by ice agents. And he says, you're welcome very much for the strawberries. And then the video ends that makes me want to cry, and it makes me think of you. And because that's not a thought I ever thought about when my kids pray, thank you for the hands that prepared it. The thought that went through my mind is like they're praying for me as the mom who cooked the food, who washed the strawberries and sliced them and put them in a bowl and set them on the table, never occurred to me until I saw that video I about the person who picked the strawberries and placed them in the container that found its way to my grocery store that found its way to my kitchen table.(25:08):And so now I wonder, what else do I not know? What else have I missed my entire life? What else did I not catch? And what does that mean for this moment in history when there are literally ice checkpoints in the city where I live?Danielle (25:39):I think to survive this moment and what I hear from my people, we have to take ourselves out of the reality of the moment somehow. You still had to get up and you had to make yourself some scrambled eggs. You have to eat your strawberry, you get to eat your strawberry. We're both at work today, et cetera. And whenever we touch into that other space, we have to let the energy process through us or we won't make it. And I think that process allows us to share a reality, the movement of energy allowing it. It's not like we can live in that state all the time, but I think there's certain segments of the population that don't allow anything in. They can't because otherwise it would contradict their view of faith or what's happened.Rebecca (26:31):Yes. Which I think is why I would do something like offer a group a story group, because it is the opportunity to intentionally take a few minutes to create the space to allow that to process through us.Danielle (26:49):So how do people then, Rebecca, find you? They're enjoying this conversation. I want to hear more from her. I,Rebecca (27:01):So I have a website. It's called Rebuilding my foundation.com. I have Instagram solid foundation Coach is my Instagram site. So two me an email, check out the website, join a group,Danielle (27:26):Join a group. What about people like, Hey, I want to hang out with Danielle and Rebecca. What does that look like? Oh,Rebecca (27:35):Yeah. I mean, we're good for at least once a year doing something together. So it sounds like maybe we need to pull a conversation together, maybe a group together, maybe like a two hour seminar workshop space, which we did last year. We did one with a few other of our friends and colleagues called Defiant Resilience. Again, to create this space where people could process what was happening in this moment in history with people who are safe ish, right? We can't ever really promise safety, but we create some sense of parameters that allow you to take a step or two.Danielle (28:25):Rebecca, what do you say to that person? I get these calls all the time. Well, I can't go to therapy. It's too much money. Or I don't know about group. I don't trust people. If people get stuck, what is one way you even got yourself unstuck to even start?Rebecca (28:40):Oh, yeah, true. First thing I'd say is if group sounds too risky and not going to lie, you and I both know it's risky.(28:55):You're taking some risk. So if that feels too big of a step, guess what? You get to be where you are. And then I'd say try it one-on-one session. Try it once, see how it feels. It is definitely something that I do. I know it's something you do too, where before you would recommend even that somebody step into a group that you might meet with them 2, 3, 4 times one-on-one once or twice to kind of see, this is what it would feel like to talk to another person about things that we have been taught you're not supposed to talk about. And slowly give a person the opportunity to decide for themselves what good care.You're allowed to say, this doesn't feel like good care to me, so I'm not going to do it today or tomorrow. And how amazing it can be to have somebody go, I love that you advocated for yourself, and I absolutely intend to respect that boundary because for so many of us, we either were taught not to set boundaries or when they were set, we have the common experience of them just being obliterated on a regular basis. So even that opportunity to reach out once, try and decide it's not for you, can actually be a moment of empowerment.Danielle (30:25):Yeah, I guess I think when I'm stuck, it's usually like we call some of those sticky points, like trauma points even. So I wouldn't say it doesn't always have to be major, some huge event, but I think there's often been, for me, there's a fear of getting help, whether it's a medical doctor or a therapist or a group or whatever it may be. Or if I have to call the county for something, I'm like, are they going to listen me? Are they going to believe me in all these kinds of situations and will they care what I have to say?Rebecca (30:58):Yeah. I think too, when you say fear of getting help, I go like, oh yeah, ding, ding. Right? I mean, some of that, at least for me, the narrative that can be around black women is that we have it all together at all times. We got it under control. And so the notion that I wouldn't have it under control all by myself, like 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the notion that I would have to request that someone else step in and assist means admitting something about myself that I don't feel comfortable admitting that I've been taught is not where I'm allowed to live. And so that also I think can be part of this fear. I don't know if that's true for you. Tell me how does that land?Danielle (31:49):Yeah, absolutely true. But it goes across so many realms where sometimes advocating for yourself, whether it's getting a question answered at a shoe store, to buying paint, to getting, I don't know, going to the er, the common themes I had my gallbladder recently removed, and two nurses told me that if I had been a man, I would've been seen faster. Because men, they believe men more about abdominal pain, and I think it's because there's maybe more expression by men of what pain is. And I don't know this for sure. I don't have a scientific research behind it, but part of me wondered, is it because my pain was indicated by my blood pressure, not by me telling them that's how they knew it. So I think that's one reason we have to really pay attention to our bodies, and I think wherever we are, we're not used to being believed, or even if someone knows, if they care, again, whether it's from going to pay a parking ticket, so going to the doctor, I just think across the board, people that are female are generally not as welcome to express how they're feeling and what's going on. Just some thoughts.Rebecca (33:11):Yeah. Again, right. It is that part where there's this larger story at play that impacts how we move individually and what we feel like we're permitted to do or not do, say or not say. You and I have talked about this before, that question of will they believe me is a kind of anticipatory intelligenceYou're trying to anticipate how you will be received, how your words will be believed, how your story will be read in any given context, and who has time, your gallbladder. And so I would imagine you're in this excruciating pain and you're having to not only tend to that, but are you going to believe me? Right? And what if the blood pressure indicator had not been there, right?Danielle (34:07):Yeah. Yeah. All of us are different. Okay. Rebecca, I'm going to put all your info in the notes. People are going to light up your phone. They're going to light up your email, and I do believe we'll be doing something collaborative in the future. Absolutely. Yeah. With other co-conspirators.Thank you for joining us today. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for listening to the raw conversations we're having, and I just encourage you to get in conversations with your friends, your family, people around you, people you really disagree with, maybe even people you don't like. Try to hold yourself there. Try to have those conversations. Try to be able to receive the difficult comments. Try to be able to say the difficult things. Let's keep working on moving towards one another. Kitsap County & Washington State Crisis and Mental Health ResourcesIf you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call 911.This resource list provides crisis and mental health contacts for Kitsap County and across Washington State.Kitsap County / Local ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They OfferSalish Regional Crisis Line / Kitsap Mental Health 24/7 Crisis Call LinePhone: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/24/7 emotional support for suicide or mental health crises; mobile crisis outreach; connection to services.KMHS Youth Mobile Crisis Outreach TeamEmergencies via Salish Crisis Line: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://sync.salishbehavioralhealth.org/youth-mobile-crisis-outreach-team/Crisis outreach for minors and youth experiencing behavioral health emergencies.Kitsap Mental Health Services (KMHS)Main: 360‑373‑5031; Toll‑free: 888‑816‑0488; TDD: 360‑478‑2715Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/Outpatient, inpatient, crisis triage, substance use treatment, stabilization, behavioral health services.Kitsap County Suicide Prevention / “Need Help Now”Call the Salish Regional Crisis Line at 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/Suicide-Prevention-Website.aspx24/7/365 emotional support; connects people to resources; suicide prevention assistance.Crisis Clinic of the PeninsulasPhone: 360‑479‑3033 or 1‑800‑843‑4793Website: https://www.bainbridgewa.gov/607/Mental-Health-ResourcesLocal crisis intervention services, referrals, and emotional support.NAMI Kitsap CountyWebsite: https://namikitsap.org/Peer support groups, education, and resources for individuals and families affected by mental illness.Statewide & National Crisis ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They Offer988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (WA‑988)Call or text 988; Website: https://wa988.org/Free, 24/7 support for suicidal thoughts, emotional distress, relationship problems, and substance concerns.Washington Recovery Help Line1‑866‑789‑1511Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesHelp for mental health, substance use, and problem gambling; 24/7 statewide support.WA Warm Line877‑500‑9276Website: https://www.crisisconnections.org/wa-warm-line/Peer-support line for emotional or mental health distress; support outside of crisis moments.Native & Strong Crisis LifelineDial 988 then press 4Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesCulturally relevant crisis counseling by Indigenous counselors.Additional Helpful Tools & Tips• Behavioral Health Services Access: Request assessments and access to outpatient, residential, or inpatient care through the Salish Behavioral Health Organization. Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/SBHO-Get-Behaviroal-Health-Services.aspx• Deaf / Hard of Hearing: Use your preferred relay service (for example dial 711 then the appropriate number) to access crisis services.• Warning Signs & Risk Factors: If someone is talking about harming themselves, giving away possessions, expressing hopelessness, or showing extreme behavior changes, contact crisis resources immediately.Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that. Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.
On today's episode Luis discusses his practice of humanizing those he disagrees with, and how the killing of Charlie Kirk, and the response to it, inspired him to share his reaction.When one of the people who had abused him died, Luis thought he'd feel relief, but instead found grief and love underneath the fear he'd been trapped in. His own self-inquiry made him decide that it hurt him more to hate his abuser than it did to humanize him. From this realization Luis began his personal radical rehumanizing practice. He discusses what humanizing isn't, how we can dehumanize ourselves, and how we can relate to the sensations and emotions that arise when we dehumanize ourselves or others.You can listen to the episode Luis recorded with Daryl Davis here: [Ep. 199] How A Black Man Humanized KKK Leaders & Changed Their Minds w/ Daryl Davisand read more about him on his website.You can sign up for the HLN newsletter here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/join-my-newsletterYou can read more about, and register for, the live 7-week foundational course here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/course You can register for the FREE Food Therapy session here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/events/food-therapy-supporting-adhd-with-nutrition Sign up for our 6-month Embodied Relationships group, beginning in October: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/relationship-group----You can learn more on the website: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/ Learn more about the self-led course here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/self-led-new Join the waitlist to pre-order Luis' book here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/the-book You can follow Luis on Instagram @holistic.life.navigationQuestions? You can email us at info@holisticlifenavigation.com
KC welcomes her first guest of the new season, Kristi McLeod—a SubSoma Practitioner, Lead Facilitator in the SIT (Subconscious Imprinting Technique) Certification Program, SoulFlow Embodiment Trainer, Reiki Master, and public speaker. Kristi is a leader who always goes first, leaning into her edge, expecting the unexpected, and staying embodied through it all—then guiding others to do the same.In this powerful conversation, KC and Kristi explore:How SIT and SoulFlow unlock deep healing and transformation.The role of the nervous system in building resilience, authenticity, and true regulation.Why being in your body—not bypassing discomfort—is the ultimate key to sustainable business growth and life balance.How authenticity becomes a permission slip for others, in both healing spaces and entrepreneurship.Kristi's mission is to support practitioners and entrepreneurs in strengthening their nervous systems so they can navigate challenges, build grounded resilience, and create businesses (and lives) that feel whole, harmonious, and alive.And if you're ready to share space with Kristi firsthand, you need to get in the room for As She Rises Live October 18-19. 2025. Plus—Inner Circle and Goddess ticket holders will receive exclusive access to her facilitation during the private Mastermind Day on October 17.Take a screenshot and tag me on Instagram (@iamkcvolard)!Let me know what you're loving!Let's continue the conversation inside Catalyst Membership! Try it FREE for 2 weeks Get your ticket to AS SHE RISES LIVE in Vancouver Oct 18-19, 2025 HERE
What if the secret to healing isn't doing more—but doing less? In this episode, we explore the 7 Invitations of Organic Intelligence, a revolutionary somatic framework that helps you unlock your body's natural ability to heal, adapt, and thrive. These invitations aren't about fixing yourself—they're about creating the conditions for healing to unfold effortlessly. You'll learn:
Most of us were alone during our most traumatic experiences—and then left alone to try to heal from them. In this episode, Luis explores why isolation is at the root of so much trauma, how unexpressed survival responses can stay stuck in the body for decades, and why healing requires connection. He shares why group work is so powerful, how somatic practices and whole-food nutrition work together, and what it means to witness your body rather than become it.Register for Food TherapyExplore the 7-Week CourseLearn more about Inner Relationship Focusing with Maureen Gallagher PhDWatch Luis Teach about Freeze You can read more about, and register for, the live 7-week foundational course here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/course Sign up for our 6-month Embodied Relationships group, beginning in October: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/relationship-group----You can learn more on the website: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/ Learn more about the self-led course here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/self-led-new Join the waitlist to pre-order Luis' book here: https://www.holisticlifenavigation.com/the-book You can follow Luis on Instagram @holistic.life.navigationQuestions? You can email us at info@holisticlifenavigation.com
The Feelings or the BODY was never mentioned in our days in the boardroom, never mind our soul! In this paradigm-shifting conversation, I sit down with Brianna Rose, Somatic Business Coach, Founder of The Light Leader Collective, and former corporate marketing queen to explore what it really takes to build a 7-figure business from the body up.We go beyond mindset. Beyond hustle. This is about nervous system leadership, emotional mastery, and learning how to hold your next level of wealth, visibility, and power without losing yourself in the process.Brianna shares her journey from burnout in the boardroom to building a multiple 7-figure empire rooted in breathwork, somatics, and self-regulation. The discussion also touches on the challenges of navigating quantum shifts and the purging process that often accompanies personal growth and how to avoid self sabotage. This conversation is a call for business owners to embody their true selves and redefine success on their own terms.We would love to know your thoughts in the comments!Key Takeaways How somatics helps you break through sabotage and self-doubtWhy nervous system regulation is your real scalability strategyThe role of breathwork and body-based rituals in money expansionHow to navigate quantum shifts without burning everything downWhat it means to lead like a woman — regulated, embodied, and sovereignWhy business isn't built from your brain — it's built from your bodyFeatured Guest - Connect with BriannaGet Certified as a Somatic Leader with Brianna hereConnect with Brianna on Instagram hereConnect with ElaineWork with me or check out my programs here Chapters 00:00 Introduction to Brianna Rose and Her Journey05:05 Transitioning from Corporate to Spiritual Awakening10:31 Understanding Somatics and Kundalini17:01 The Quantum Shift and Its Aftermath22:48 Integrating Somatics into Daily Life30:01 Understanding Fear and Scarcity Mindset31:18 The Importance of Breathwork in Entrepreneurship32:33 Personalized Solutions for Unique Challenges32:58 Mass Awakenings and Social Media Influence34:44 Navigating Corporate Conditioning and Personal Growth36:41 Regulating the Nervous System for Decision Making37:47 Building Wealth as an Inside Job39:42 Sustainable Growth vs. Quick Riches41:57 Expanding Comfort Zones for Financial Success45:04 Self-Sabotage and Scarcity Patterns48:12 Listening to the Body for Business Success49:32 The Connection Between Inner Work & Business Growth51:34 Navigating Quantum Shifts and Personal Growth55:36 Embracing Soul Missions and Personal Evolution56:53 Navigating Financial Freedom and Spirituality57:38 Compassion and Empathy in Leadership58:39 Shifting Mindsets: From Hustle to Ease01:00 The Power of AI in Business Efficiency01:02 Desire as a Foundation for Business and Life01:03 Exploring New Experiences and Self-Discovery01:04 Reflecting on Past Versions of Self01:06 The Role of Somatics in Personal & Professional Growth01:09:52 Advice for Projectors: Learning and Expanding
What if the shadows you've been avoiding were actually the doorway to your greatest gifts… and your body was the key to unlocking them?In this solo episode of Fire and Soul, I open up about one of the most transformative seasons of my life. Since my last solo in May, I've completed my trauma-informed certification and am about to finish in attachment-style somatic certification, deepened my devotion to daily breathwork, and discovered a powerful synthesis between body-based awareness and spiritual frameworks like the Gene Keys.Along the way, I walked through a profound personal year 9… a time of intense shedding and release that touched every aspect of my life, from where I lived to long-held relationships and business partnerships. Out of this unraveling emerged something remarkable: a living practice of Embodied Ascension that has reshaped how I live, love, and lead.In this episode, I share:The power of daily somatic check-ins and how they unlock shadow patternsHow weaving Gene Keys with body awareness reveals our gifts and siddhisWhy breathwork and spiritual devotion have become my anchorsHow this integration birthed my first new offerings in years: Soul Work Foundation and now Soul Work SynergyThis conversation is both a personal update and an invitation. If you've felt the shedding, the dissonance, or the longing for a new way forward, my prayer is that something here resonates with your own awakening.Resources and links:Soul Work Synergy: michelle-sorro.com/synergyEquity & Self-Governance Live Q&A on 9/23 at 5pm PST : https://meetn.com/Event?ID=edec96fdcd Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
In this episode of Cosmic Injectables, Ali and Brie invite their soul sister, best friend, and the third star in their sacred friendship ménage à trois, Sami Bricco, into the cosmic lounge. Sami is a somatics coach whose work bridges the mind-body connection through awareness, embodiment, and nervous system regulation. Together, the three explore how her practice differs from the body-based somatic and emotional mapping work of massage therapist TJ (remember TJ?? We LOVE TJ!!! catch his episode: SPOTIFY or APPLE), and what makes coaching such a powerful container for transformation.But this conversation is more than modalities—it's about sisterhood. You'll feel the deep love and laughter between Ali, Brie, and Sami, and how their friendship has become a cornerstone of each of their spiritual journeys. From holding space for each other's cosmic glow-ups to walking alongside one another through the messy, mystical, and magical parts of life, this episode is a reminder that sisterhood is medicine.Find Sami on Insta or at her Website!Connect with Your Cosmic Guides: Briana Christine: TikTok | Instagram Ali: TikTok | Instagram Join the Cosmic Community: Follow Cosmic Injectables for more episodes filled with spiritual insights, laughter, and a touch of magic. Instagram TikTok
Reality and Faith Prompts1. What are the formations or structures for how you know you are in reality in regards to your faith? Do you have indicators? Internal senses? External resources? 2. Who are you in active dialogue with in regards to your faith? Who that is living and who that is passed on? 3. When you encounter dissonance with your reality of faith, how do you stay grounded in your experience?TranscriptsDanielle (00:00):To my computer. So thank you Starlet. Thank you Tamis for being with me. I've given already full introductions. I've recorded those separately. So the theme of the conversation and kind of what we're getting into on this podcast this season is I had this vision for talking about the themes have been race, faith, culture, church in the past on my podcast. But what I really think the question is, where is our reality and where are our touchpoints in those different realms? And so today there's going to be more info on this in the future, but where do we find reality and how do we form our reality when we integrate faith? So one of the questions I was asking Tamis and Starlet was what are the formations or structures for how you know are in reality in regards to your faith? Do you have indicators? Do you have internal senses? Do you have external resources? And so that's where I want to jump off from and it's free flow. I don't do a whole lot of editing, but yeah, just curious where your mind goes when you hear that, what comes to mind and we'll jump from there.Starlette (01:12):I immediately thought of baptism, baptismal waters. My baptismal identity forms and shapes me. It keeps me in touch with my body. It keeps me from being disembodied. Also, it keeps me from being swindled out of authority over my body due to the dangerous irrationalism of white body supremacy. So that's one thing. Protest also keeps me grounded. I have found that acts of defiance, minor personal rebellions, they do well for me. They keep me spiritually that I feel like it keeps me in step with Jesus. And I always feel like I'm catching up that I'm almost stepping on his feet. So for me, baptismal identity and protesting, those are the two things come to me immediately.Tamice (02:04):Whoa, that's so deep. Wow, I never thought about that. But I never thought about protests being a thing that groundsBecause I mean I've just been, for me I would say I've been working on the right so, and y'all know me, so I got acronyms for days. But I mean I think that the radical ethical spirituality that's tethered to my tradition, that's a rule of life, but it's also a litmus test. So for me, if you can't tell the truth, we don't have conversations about non-violence and loving enemies. I don't get to ethical spirituality unless you come through the front door of truth telling and truth telling in that sense of the r. And the rest arrest mix tape is radical. Angela Davis says radical and that's grasping stuff at the root. So before we have conversations about forgiveness for instance, or Jesus or scripture or what is right and what is moral, it's very important that we first tell the truth about the foundations of those realities and what we even mean by those terms and whose those terms serve and where they come from. I talk about it asking to see the manager. We need see the manager(03:24):Me that grounds me is now if something comes in and it calls me to move in a different way or corrects me or checks me in a certain way, I say yes to it if it comes through the door of truth telling because it means I also got to be true and tell the truth to myself. So that keeps me grounded. That kind of acronym is kind of how I move, but it's also how I keep toxic ways of doing religion out. And I also have come back into relationship with trees and grass and the waters and that's been really powerful for moving down into different types of intelligence. For me, the earth has been pulling me into a different way of knowing and being in that part brings me to ancestors. Just like you starlet my ancestors, I keep finding them in the trees and in the water and in the wind. So it's like, well I need them real bad right now. So that's where I'm kind of grounding myself these days.But to your point about grounding and protest, I feel most compelled to show up in spaces where the ground is crying out screaming. I feel like it beckons me there. And we talked about the most recent news of Trey being found and you talked about truth telling and what resonated immediately. And it didn't sit right with me that African-American people, people of African descent know not to take their lives in that way because of the traumatic history that when you say things like you don't suspect any foul play, it sounds like what has historically been named as at the hands of persons unknown where that no one is held responsible for the death of African-American people. That's what ties it in for me. And I feel like it's an ancestral pool that they didn't leave this way, they didn't leave in the way that they were supposed to, that something stinks and that they're crying out to say, can you hear me? Come over here Terry a while here. Don't leave him here. Don't let up on it because we didn't call him here somebody. So I love that you said that you are, feel yourself being grounded in and call back to the earth because I do feel like it speaks to us,But there are telltale signs in it and that the trees will tell us too. And so I didn't have a hand in this. It was forced on me and I saw it all come and talk to me. Put your hand here, put your head here and you can hear me scream and then you can hear me scream, you can hear him scream. He was calling out the whole time. That's what I believe in. That's how I test reality. I tested against what the earth is saying like you said, but I think we have to walk the ground a bit. We have to pace the ground a bit. We can't just go off of what people are saying. Back to your point about truth telling, don't trust nobody I don't trust. I don't trust anybody that's going to stop because you can't fix a lie. So if you're going to come in with deception, there's not much else I can do with you. There's not much I can say to you. And I find that white body supremacy is a supreme deception. So if we can't start there in a conversation, there's nothing that I can say to youTamice (06:46):That's facts. It's interesting that you talked about baptism, you talked about grounding and I had this story pop up and while you were talking again it popped up again. So I'm going to tell it. So we are not going to talk about who and all the things that happened recently, but I had made some comments online around that and around just the choice to be blind. So I've been talking a lot about John nine and this passage where it is very clear to everyone else what's happening, but the people who refuse to see, refuse to see.So in that, I was kind of pulled into that. I was in Mississippi, I was doing some stuff for the book and this lady, a chaplain, her name is Sally Bevin, actually Sally Bevel, she walked up to me, she kept calling me, she was like, Tam me, she want to come. I have my whole family there. We were at the Mississippi Book Fair and she kept saying, Tam me, she want to come join, dah, dah, dah. Then my family walked off and they started to peruse and then she asked me again and I was like, no, I'm good. And I was screaming. I mean I'm looking in the screen and the third time she did it, it pulled me out and I was like, this woman is trying to pull me into being present. And she said to me, this is funny, starlet. I said, I feel like I need to be washed and I need a baptism because this phone feels like so on right now and the wickedness is pulling me. So she poured, she got some ice, cold water, it was 95 degrees, poured cold water on my hands, had me wash my hands and she took the cold water. She put a cross on my forehead. And you know what she said to me? She said, remember your baptism?She said, remember your baptism? And when I was baptized, even though it was by a man who will not also be named, when I was baptized the wind, there was a whirlwind at my baptism. It was in 2004, that same wind hit in Mississippi and then I felt like I was supposed to take my shoes off. So I walked around the Mississippi Festival with no shoes on, not knowing that the earth was about to receive two people who did not deserve to be hung from trees. And there's something very, I feel real talk, I feel afraid for white supremacy right now in the name of my ancestors and I feel like I'm calling on everything right now. And that's also grounding me.Starlette (09:36):I was with Mother Moses last week. I went to Dorchester County just to be with her because the people were here. Take me. I said, I'll leave them all here. I know you said there are a few here, but give me the names, give me the last names of the people because I don't have time for this. I see why she left people. I see why she was packing. So to your point, I think it's important that we talk to the ancestors faithfully, religiously. We sit down at their feet and listen for a bit about how they got over and how they got through it and let them bear witness to us. And she does it for me every time, every single time she grounds, she grounds meDanielle (10:23):Listening to you all. I was like, oh wait. It is like Luke 19 where Jesus is coming in on the show and he didn't ride in on the fanciest plane on a donkey. And if you're familiar with that culture that is not the most elevated animal, not the elevated animal to ride, it's not the elevated animal. You don't eat it. Not saying that it isn't eaten at times, but it's not right. So he rides in on that and then people are saying glory to God in the highest and they're praising him and the Pharisees are like, don't do that because it's shameful and I don't remember the exact words, but he's basically be quiet. The rocks are going to tell the story of what happened here. He's walking his way. It kind of reminds me to me. So what you're saying, he's walking away, he's going to walk and he's going to walk that way and he's going to walk to his death. He's walking it in two scenarios that Jesus goes in to talk about. Your eyes are going to be blind to peace, to the real way to peace. It's going to be a wall put around you and you're going to miss out. People are going to destroy you because you missed your chance.Starlette (11:50):Point again creation. And if you're going to be a rock headed people, then I'll recruit this rock choir. They get ready to rock out on you. If there's nothing you're going to say. So even then he says that creation will bear witness against you. You ain't got to do it. You ain't got to do it. I can call these rock. You can be rock headed if you want to. You can be stony hearted if you want to. I can recruit choir members from the ground,Tamice (12:16):But not even that because y'all know I'm into the quantum and metaphysics. Not even that they actually do speak of course, like words are frequencies. So when you hold a certain type of element in your hand, that thing has a frequency to it. That's alright that they said whatever, I don't need it from you. Everything else is tapped into this.Starlette (12:39):Right. In fact, it's the rocks are tapped into a reality. The same reality that me and this donkey and these people throwing stuff at my feet are tapped into.You are not tapped into reality. And so that's why he makes the left and not the right because typically when a person is coming to Saka city, they head towards the temple. He went the other direction because he is like it was a big fuck. I don't use power like this. And actually what I'm about to do is raise you on power. This is a whole different type of power. And that's what I feel like our ancestors, the realities that the alternative intelligence in the world you're talking about ai, the alternative intelligence in the world is what gives me every bit of confidence to look this beast in the face and call it what it is. This isTamice (13:52):And not going to bow to it. And I will go down proclaiming it what it is. I will not call wickedness good.And Jesus said, Jesus was so when he talks about the kingdom of heaven suffering violence and the violence taken it by force, it's that it's like there's something so much more violent about being right and righteous. Y'all have to use violence because you can't tell the truth.Danielle (14:29):Do you see the split two? There's two entirely different realities happening. Two different kingdoms, two entirely different ways of living in this era and they're using quote J, but it's not the same person. It can't be, you cannot mix white Jesus and brown Jesus. They don't go together. TheyStarlette (15:00):Don't, what is it? Michael O. Emerson and Glenn e Bracy. The second they have this new book called The Religion of Whiteness, and they talk about the fact that European Americans who are racialized as white Tahi says those who believe they are white. He says that there's a group of people, the European Americans who are racialized as white, who turn to scripture to enforce their supremacy. And then there's another group of people who turn to scripture to support and affirm our sibling.It is two different kingdoms. It's funny, it came to me the other day because we talk about, I've talked about how for whiteness, the perception of goodness is more important than the possession of it.You know what I mean? So mostly what they do is seek to be absolved. Right? So it's just, and usually with the being absolved means I'm less bad than that, so make that thing more bad than me and it's a really terrible way to live a life, but it is how whiteness functions, and I'm thinking about this in the context of all that is happening in the world because it's like you cannot be good and racist period. And that's as clear as you cannot love God and mammon you will end up hating one and loving the other. You cannot love God. You cannotStarlette (16:29):Love God and hate your next of kin your sibling. Dr. Angela Parker says something really important During the Wild Goose Festival, she asked the participants there predominantly European American people, those racialized as white. She said, do you all Terry, do you Terry, do you wait for the Holy Spirit? Do you sit with yourself and wait for God to move? And it talked, it spoke to me about power dynamic. Do you feel like God is doing the moving and you wait for the spirit to anoint you, to fill you, to inspire you, to baptize you with fire? You Terry, do you wait a while or do you just the other end of that that she doesn't say, do you just get up? I gave my life to Jesus and it's done right handed fellowship, give me my certificate and walk out the door. You have to sit with yourself and I don't know what your tradition is.I was raised Pentecostal holiness and I had to tear all night long. I was on my knees calling on the name of Jesus and I swear that Baba couldn't hear me. Which octave do you want me to go in? I lost my voice. You know them people, them mothers circled me with a sheet and told me I didn't get it that night that I had to come back the next day after I sweat out my down, I sweat out my press. Okay. I pressed my way trying to get to that man and they told me he didn't hear me. He not coming to get you today. I don't hear a change. They were looking for an evidence of tongues. They didn't hear an evidence, a change speech. You still sound the way that you did when you came in here. And I think that white body supremacy, that's where the problem lies with me. There's no difference. I don't hear a change in speech. You're still talking to people as if you can look down your nose with them. You have not been submerged in the water. You did not go down in the water. White supremacy, white body supremacy has not been drowned out.Terry, you need to Terry A. Little while longer. I'll let you know when you've gotten free. When you've been lifted, there's a cloud of witnesses. Those mothers rubbing your back, snapping your back and saying, call on him. Call him like you want him. Call him like you need him and they'll tell you when they see evidence, they'll let you, you know when you've been tied up, tangled up. That's what we would say. Wrapped up in Jesus and I had to come back a second night and call on the Lord and then they waited a while. They looked, they said, don't touch her, leave her alone. He got her now, leave her alone. But there was an affirmation, there was a process. You couldn't just get up there and confess these ABCs and salvation, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah. Why do you think they'll let you know when you got it?Danielle (18:56):Why do you think that happened? Why? I have a question for You'all. Why do you think that became the reality of the prayer in that moment? And we're talking about Africans that have been brought here and enslaved. Why do you think that happened on our soil that way? Why question?Tamice (19:12):I mean I'm wondering about it because when stylists talk and I keep thinking the Terry in and of itself is a refusal. It says what I see is not real. What's in front of me is not right. I'm going to wait for something else.I'm saying, the slave Bible, them taking stuff out of the Bible and it's like, but I feel like the ground, there was something about the ground that indigenous people, that indigenous people were able to help them tap into over here. It was waiting on that.Starlette (19:49):We didn't have punishment. We had a percussion session. So they ring shouted me. I didn't know what it was at the time. We didn't have all the fancy stuff. Everybody had put me in key. We didn't have, we had this and feet them people circled around me. We don't do that no more.Danielle (20:06):We don't do that no more. But don't you think if you're a person that is, and I believe Africans came here with faith already. Oh yes, there's evidence of that. So put that aside, but don't you think then even if you have that faith and it's not so different than our time and you're confronted with slave owners and plantation owners also preaching quote the same faith that you're going to have to test it out on your neighbor when they're getting saved. You're going to have to make sure they didn't catch that bug.Don't you think there's something in there? Block it. Don't you think if you know faith internally already like we do and run into someone that's white that's preaching the same thing, we have to wait it out with them. Don't you think our ancestors knew that when they were here they were waiting it out. I just noticed my spirit match that spirit. We have to wait it out. Yes, because and let's say they didn't know Jesus. Some people didn't know Jesus and they met Jesus here for whatever reason, and your example is still the white man. You have to wait it out to make sure you're not reflecting that evilness. I mean that's what I'm thinking. That's it's the absolutelyStarlette (21:20):Truth. There's a book titled Slave Testimony, and I know this because I just read about it. There's a testimony of an enslaved African-American, he's unnamed. It was written on June 26th, 1821. He's talking to Master John. He said, I want permission to speak to you if you please. He talked about, he said, where is it? Where is it? A few words. I hope that you will not think Me too bull. Sir, I make my wants known to you because you are, I believe the oldest and most experienced that I know of. He says in the first place, I want you to tell me the reason why you always preach to the white folks and keep your back to us is because they sit up on the hill. We have no chance among them there. We must be forgotten because we are near enough. We are not near enough without getting in the edge of the swamp behind you. He was calling him to account. He said, when you sell me, do you make sure that I'm sold to a Christian or heathen?He said, we are charged with inattention because of where their position. He said it's impossible for us to pay good attention with this chance. In fact, some of us scarce think that we are preached to it all. He says, money appears to be the object. We are carried to market and sold to the highest bidder. Never once inquired whether you sold to a heathen or a Christian. If the question was put, did you sell to a Christian, what would the answer be? I can tell you, I can tell what he was, gave me my price. That's all I was interested in. So I don't want people to believe that Africans who were enslaved did not talk back, did not speak back. They took him to task. He said, everybody's not literate. There's about one in 50 people who are, and I'm one of them and I may not be able to speak very well, but this is what I want to tell you. I can tell the difference. I know that you're not preaching to me the same. I know that when you talk about salvation, you're not extending it to me.Yikes. You need to know that our people, these ancestors, not only were they having come to Jesus meetings, but they were having come to your senses, meeting with their oppressor and they wrote it down. They wrote it down. I get sick of the narratives that we are not our answer. Yes we are. Yes I am. I'm here because of them. I think they called me. I think they call me here. I think the fussing that I make, the anger that I possess this need to resist every damn thing. I think they make me do thatTamice (23:35):Indeed, I think. But I didn't get my voice until they took the MLE off, had an honor with my ancestors and they came and they told me it's time. Take that mle off, MLE off. Shoot. Why Jesus ain't tell me to take no muzzle off. I'm going to tell you that now.Danielle (23:52):That's why I mean many indigenous people said, Jesus didn't come back for me because if that guy's bringing me Jesus, then now Jesus didn't come back for me.Starlette (24:07):Come on.Make it plain. Danielle, go ahead. Go ahead. Walk heavy today. Yeah, I meanDanielle (24:17):I like this conversation. Why Jesus, why Jesus didn't come back for us, the three of us. He didn't come back for us. It didn't come back from kids. He didn't come back for my husband. Nope. And so then therefore that we're not going to find a freedom through that. No, that's no desire to be in that.Tamice (24:33):None. And that's what I mean and making it very, very plain to people like, listen, I actually don't want to be in heaven with your Jesus heaven. With your Jesus would be hell. I actually have one,Starlette (24:47):The one that they had for us, they had an N word heaven for us where they would continue to be served and they wrote it down. It's bad for people who are blio foes who like to read those testimonies. It is bad for people who like to read white body supremacy For Phil. Yeah, they had one for us. They had separate creation narratives known as polygenetic, but they also had separate alon whereby they thought that there was a white heaven and an inward heaven.I didn't even know that. Starla, I didn't even know that because they said they want to make sure their favorite slave was there to serve them. Oh yes, the delusion. People tell me that they're white. I really do push back for a reason. What do you mean by that? I disagree with all of it. What part of it do you find agreeable? The relationship of ruling that you maintain over me? The privilege. White power. Which part of it? Which part of it is good for you and for me? How does it help us maintain relationship as Christians?Danielle (25:47):I think that's the reality and the dissonance we live in. Right?Starlette (25:51):That's it. But I think there needs to be a separation.Are you a white supremacist or not?Tamice (26:03):That's what I'm saying. That's why I keep saying, listen, at this point, you can't be good and racist. Let me just say that. Oh no, you got to pickStarlette (26:12):And I need to hear itTamice (26:13):Both. Yeah. I need you to public confession of it.Starlette (26:19):Someone sent me a dm. I just want to thank you for your work and I completely agree. I quickly turned back around. I said, say it publicly. Get out of my dms. Say it publicly. Put it on your page. Don't congratulate me. Within two minutes or so. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to disturb you. You are right. Okay. Okay. Okay. Did he post anything? No. Say it publicly. Denounce them. Come out from among them.Very, very plain. As a white supremacist or na, as a kid, as children. HowDanielle (26:56):Hard is it? I think that's what made this moment so real and it's a kind of a reality. Fresher actually for everybody to be honest, because it's a reality. All certain things have been said. All manner of things have been said by people. This is just one example of many people that have said these things. Not the only person that's lived and died and said these things. And then when you say, Hey, this was said, someone's like, they didn't say that. You're like, no, some people put all their content on the internet receipts. They did it themselves. That's not true. And I went to a prayer vigil. I didn't go. I sat outside a prayer vigil this weekend and I listened in and they were praying for the resurrection like Jesus of certain people that have passed on. I kid you, I sat there in the car with a friend of mine and then my youngest daughter had come with me just to hang out. She's like, what are they praying for? I was like, they're like, they were praying for a certain person to be resurrected from the dead just like Jesus. And I was so confused. I'm so confused how we got that far, honestly. But I told my kid, I said, this is a moment of reality for you. This is a moment to know. People think like this.Starlette (28:13):Also, white bodyDanielle (28:14):Supremacy is heresy. Yes. It's not even related to the Bible. Not at all.Why I steal away. This is why even the mistranslated Bible, even the Bible that you could take,Starlette (28:33):ThisThe version Danielle started. If you wouldn't have said that, I wouldn't have said that. This is exactly why I steal away. This is exactly why I leave. Because you can't argue with people like that. Now we're resurrected. IAll I need, it's like away. This is exactly why, because I can't hear what Howard Thurman calls the sound of the genuine in that. It's just not going to happen.Danielle (29:01):Can you imagine what would've happened if we would've prayed for George Floyd to be resurrected? Listen, what would've happenedStarlette (29:08):That he called the scumbag.Danielle (29:10):Yeah, but what would've happened if we would've played for their resurrection? Adam, Adam Polito. ThatStarlette (29:19):Was foundTamice (29:19):Psychosis.Starlette (29:21):Yeah. What would've happened? See, don't push me now. I feel like I need to pack. As soon as I said fill away, it's like people keep saying, what are you going to do if gets worse? I'm going to leave my, I'll sell all this crapAbout this stuff. This booby trap of capitalism. I'll it all don't about none of it. What matters most to me is my sense of ness. And when you get to talking, I almost said talking out the side of your neck. Jesus God, today, lemme God Jesus of your neck. You just need to know that's a cultural thing. That's going to have to be reevaluated. God. It just came right on out. Oh Lord. When you start saying things that go against my sense of ness that you think that I have to defend my personhood, that you want to tell me that I don't exist as a person. I don't exist as a human. Back to your reality testament. It's time for me to leave. I'm not staying here and fighting a race war or a civil war. You mamas are just violent. It's what you've always been.Tamice (30:28):Why would I stand in the middle? Why would I stand in the middle of what I know is a confrontation with yourself?Starlette (30:36):Oh, okay. Alright. I'm going to justTamice (30:38):You all. What happened last week is it, it is a confrontation with a really disturbed self and they're trying to flip it. Oh yes. They're trying to make it. Yes. But this is like, I'm trying to tell people out here, this is beyond you, Jack, that was a prophetic witness against you because now you see that what you're fighting is the mirror. Keep me out of it. I won't fight your wars. Keep me out of it. Look, James Baldwin said, y'all have to decide and figure out why you needed a nigger in the first place.I'm not a nigger. I'm a man. But you, the white people need to figure out why you created the nigger in the first place. Fuck, this is not my problem. This is a y'all and I don't have anything invested in this. All I'm trying to do is raise my kids, man. Come on. Get out of here with that. I'm sorry.Danielle (31:48):No, you keep going and then go back to starlet. Why do you think then they made her Terry? They had to make sure she doesn't buy into that. That's my opinion.Tamice (32:00):It's funny too because I see, I mean, I wasn't Pentecostal. I feel like who's coming to mind as soon as you said that de y'all know I'm hip hop. Right? So KRS one.Starlette (32:12):Yes. Consciousness.Tamice (32:14):The mind. Oh yes, the mind, the imagination. He was, I mean from day one, trying to embed that in the youth. Like, Hey, the battlefield is the mind. Are you going to internalize this bullshit?Are you going to let them name you?Starlette (32:34):This is the word.Tamice (32:34):Are you going to let them tell you what is real for the people of God? That's That's what I'm saying, man. Hip hop, hip hop's, refusal has been refusal from day one. That's why I trust it.Because in seen it, it came from the bottom of this place. It's from the bottom of your shoe. It tells the truth about all of this. So when I listen to hip hop, I know I'm getting the truth.Starlette (32:57):Yeah. EnemyObjection. What did public enemy say? Can't trust it. Can't trust it. No, no, no, no. You got to play it back. We got to run all that back.Danielle (33:11):I just think how it's so weaponized, the dirt, the bottom of the shoe, all of that stuff. But that's where we actually, that's what got it. Our bodies hitting the road, hitting the pavement, hitting the grass, hitting the dirt. That's how we know we're in reality because we've been forced to in many ways and have a mindset that we are familiar with despite socioeconomic changes. We're familiar with that bottom place.Tamice (33:38):Yeah. I mean, bottom place is where God is at. That's what y'all don't understand. God comes from black, dark dirt, like God is coming from darkness and hiddenness and mystery. You don't love darkness. You don't love GodStarlette (33:56):Talk. Now this bottom place is not to be confused with the sunken place that some of y'all are in. I just want to be clear. I just want to be clear and I'm not coming to get you. Fall was the wrong day. TodayI think it's good though because there's so much intimidation in other communities at times. I'm not saying there's not through the lynchings, ongoing lynchings and violence too and the threats against colleges. But it's good for us to be reminded of our different cultural perspectives and hear people talk with power. Why do you think Martin Luther King and Cesar Chavez wrote letters to each other? They knew something about that and knew something about it. They knew something about it. They knew something about why it's important to maintain the bonds. Why we're different, why we're similar. They knew something about it. So I see it as a benefit and a growth in our reality. That is actually what threatens that, that relationship, that bond, that connection, that speaking life into one another. That's what threatens that kingdom that you're talking about. Yeah.You just can't fake an encounter either.When I was tear, no matter what I've decolonized and divested from and decentered, I cannot deny that experience. I know that God was present. I know that God touched me. So when mother even made sister, even made, my grandmother would call me when I was in college, first person to go to college. In our family, she would say before she asked about classes or anything else, and she really didn't know what to ask. She only had a sixth grade education. But her first question was always you yet holding on?Right. She holding on. And I said, yes ma'am. Yes ma'am. Then she would, because it didn't matter if you couldn't keep the faith. There really wasn't nothing else for her to talk to you about. She was going to get ready to evangelize and get you back because you backslid. But that was her first thing. But what I've learned since then is that I can let go.The amazing thing is that the spirit is guiding me. I didn't let go all together. You got it. You got it. If it's real, if you're real, prove it. Demonstrate it. I'm getting chills now talk to me without me saying anything, touch me. I shouldn't have to do anything. Eugene Peterson says that prayer is answering speech. In fact, the only reason why I'm praying is because you said something to me first. It's not really on me to do anything. Even with the tear. I was already touched. I was already called. The reason why I was on my knees and pleading is because I'd already been compelled. Something had had already touched me. FirstThey called Holy Spirit. The hound of heaven. Damn right was already on my heels. I was already filled before I could even refuse. I was like, I don't want this. I'm going to always be star Jonah, get your people. I prefer fish guts. Throw me overboard. I don't like these people. Certified prophet because I don't want to do it. I never want to do it. I'm not interested at all. I have no too much history. I've had to deal with too much white body supremacy and prejudice and racism to want anything to do with the church. I see it for what? It's I'll never join one. By the way, are we recording? Is it on? I'm never joining a church ever. Until you all desegregate.You desegregate. Then we can talk about your ministry of reconciliation. Until then, you don't have one. Don't talk to me about a community day or a pulpit swap. I don't want to hear it. All Your praise. What did he say? A clinging, stumble, put away from me. Your conferences, all your multiracial. I don't want to hear none of it. Desegregate that part desegregate you, hypocrites, woe unto all of you white supremacists. If nobody ever told you that's not God. It's not of God. So I don't, for me, my reality is so above me, I know that Paul, because when I don't want to say anything, somebody is in my ear. Somebody was talking to me this morning. Somebody was writing a note in my ear. I had to get up. I said, please. I'm like, now I'm not even awake all the way. Stop talking to me. You can't fake that as much as I push against the Holy Spirit. You can't fake that. I don't want to do it. I don't want to say it. I'm of saying it. And yet I get up in the morning and it's like, say this, that post that. Write that. Somebody else is doing that. That's not me.As the mothers say, my flesh is weak. My flesh is not willing at all. I want to, all of y'all can go on. I'll pack this up and move somewhere else. Let them fight it to the death. I'm not going to, this is just my flesh speaking. Forgive me. Okay. This Raceless gospel is a calling friends. It's a calling. It's a calling, which means you coming into it. I'm an itinerant prophet. I'm heavy into the Hebrew scriptures. I come up with every excuse. My throat hurts. I got a speech impediment. The people don't like me. I'm not educated. It don't work. You need to know when people come to you and say, y'all need to get together, God speaking to you, the Pendo is coming. That's not like an invitation. That's kind of like a threat whether you want it or not. You're getting together.Everybody up. There's a meal ready, there's a banquet that is set and the food is getting cold and you are the reason why the drinks are watered down. That's go. You don't hear me calling you. ComeWhat I keep hearing. You have to know that God is speaking to people and saying that there's an invitation coming and you better get right. You better get washed up. Tam me said, you better let somebody pour that water over your hands. You better get washed up and get ready for dinner. I'm calling you. Come on in this house. Come on in this house. And this house is for everybody. Martin Luther King called it the world house. Everybody's coming in and you ain't got to like it doesn't matter. Get somewhere and sit down. That's that old church mother coming out of me and lemme just confess. I didn't even want to be on here this morning. I told God I didn't feel like talking. I told the Lord and you see what happened.Promise you. I'm a child. I'm full of disobedience.I was not in the mood. I said, I don't want to talk to nobody. I'm an introvert. I don't want to deal with none of this. Get somebody else to do it and look at it.Tamice (40:39):Yeah. It's funny because I woke up this morning, I was like, I'm not, I forgot. And then after all of the news today, I was like, I just don't have it in you, but this is, wait a minute. And it was three minutes past the time. Come on. And I was like, oh, well shoot. The house is empty. Nobody's here right now. I was like, well, lemme just log on. So this is definitely, it feels like definitely our calling do feel. I feel that way. I don't have time to bullshitSo I can't get out of it. I can't go to bed. I might as well say something. It won't let me go. I cannot do deceit. I can't do it. I can't sit idly by while people lie on God. I can't do that. I can't do it. It won't let up. And I'm trying to get in my body, get in this grass and get a little space. But I'm telling you, it won't let me go. And I feel it's important, Dee, you can't stop doing what you're doing. That's right. I mean is this thing of it is beyond me. It is living out of me. It's coming through me. And there has to be a reason for this. There's got to be a reason for this. And I don't know what it is because I know my eschatology is different, but I feel like, buddy, we got to manifest this kingdom. We have to manifest it until it pushes all that shit back. Come on. I'm telling you. Till it scurries it away or renders it and null and void, I'm talking. I mean, I want the type of light and glory on my being. That wicked logic disintegrate, wicked people drop dead. I mean that just in the Bible. In the Bible where Hert falls, headlong and worms eat em. Y'all celebrate that. Why can't I think about that? It's in your scriptures or daykin and the thing breaks and the legs of this false God break. I want that. I'm here for that. I'm going after that.Danielle (43:14):You think that this is what the definition of Terry is? That we're all Terry serious. I'm rocking the whole time. I'm serious. Right. That's what I told my kids. I said, in one sense, this is a one person of many that thinks this way. So we can't devote all our conversation in our house to this man. And I said in the other sense, because Starlet was asking me before he got here, how you doing? I said, we got up and I took calls from this person and that person and I told my kids, we're still advocating and doing what we can for the neighbors that need papers. And so we're going to continue doing that. That is the right thing to do. No matter what anybody else is doing in the world, we can do this.Tamice (43:56):Yeah, that's a good call. I mean, I'm headed to, I ain't going to say where I'm going no more, but I'm headed somewhere and going to be with people who are doing some innovation, right. Thinking how do we build a different world? How do our skillsets and passions coalesce and become something other than this? So I'm excited about that. And it's like that fire, it doesn't just drive me to want to rebuke. It does drive me to want to rebuild and rethink how we do everything. And I'm willing, I mean, I know that I don't know about y'all, but I feel like this, I'm getting out of dodge, but also I'm seeking the piece of the city. I feel both. I feel like I'm not holding hands with ridiculousness and I'm not moving in foolishness. But also I'm finna seek the piece of the city. My G I'm not running from delusion. Why would I? I'm in the truth. So I don't know how that maps onto a practical life, but we're finna figure it out. Out in it. I mean, the response of leadership to what has happened is a very clear sign where we are in terms of fascism. That's a very clear sign.What else y'all are looking for To tell you what it is.Danielle (45:36):But also we're the leaders. We are, we're the leaders. They're a leader of something, but they're not the leader of us. We're the leaders. We're the leaders. So no matter what they say, no matter what hate they spew, I really love Cesar Chavez. He's like, I still go out and feed the farm worker and I don't make them get on the boycott line because if they're pushed under the dirt, then they can't see hope. So people that have more economic power, a little more privilege than the other guy, we're the leaders. We're the ones that keep showing up in love. And love is a dangerous thing for these folks. They can't understand it. They can't grasp it. It is violent for them to feel love. Bodies actually reject it. And the more we show up, you're innovating. You're speaking Starla, you're preaching. We're the leaders. They're leaders of something. They're not leaders of us. We're leaders of freedom.Tamice (46:31):Come on now. D, we're leaders of give us thisStarlette (46:34):Bomb. We're leaders of compassion. You coming in here with the Holy Ghosts, acting like one of them church mothers. We were in the room together. She put our hand on us. YouDanielle (46:43):We're the ones that can remember Trey. We're the ones that can call for justice. We don't need them to do it. They've never done it. Right. Anyway. They have never showed up for a Mexican kid. They've never showed up for a black kid. They've never done it. Right. Anyway, we're the ones that can do it now. We have access to technology. We have access to our neighbors. We can bring a meal to a friend. We can give dollars to someone that needs gas. We're the the one doing it. We're the one that doing itTamice (47:11):Fill usDanielle (47:12):Up. They cannot take away our love.Starlette (47:15):Receive the benediction.Danielle: Yeah. They can't take it away. I'm telling you, if I saw someone shooting someone I hate, I would try to save that person. I don't own guns. I don't believe in guns, period. My family, that's my personal family's belief.And I would do that. I've thought about it many times. I thought would I do it? And I think I would because I actually believe that. I believe that people should not be shot dead. I believe that for the white kid. I believe that for the Mexican kid. I believe that for the black kid, we're the people that can show up. They're not going to come out here. They're inviting us to different kind of war. We're not in that war. That's right. We have love on our side and you cannot defeat love, kill love. You can'tTamice (48:04):Kill love and you can't kill life. That's the only reason somebody would ask you to be nonviolent. That's the only way somebody would've the audacity to ask that of you. Especially if you're oppressed. If the true is truth is that you can't kill love or life, damn man. It's hard out here for a pimp.Starlette (48:38):Really. Really? Yeah. Because what I really want to say isTamice (49:27):I can't. Your testimony a lie. No. Your testimony. That would be a lie. And like I said, truth telling is important. But there are days where I could be that I could go there, but I witnessed what happened that day. I watched the video. It's just not normal to watch that happen to anybody. And I don't care who you are. And the fact that we're there is just objectively just wow. And the fact that all of the spin and do y'all not realize what just happened? Just as a actual event. Right. What? You know, I'm saying how has this turned into diatribes? Right? We need reform. I, whichDanielle (50:29):Which, okay, so I have to cut us off. I have a client coming, but I want to hear from you, given all the nuance and complexity, how are you going to take care of your body this week or even just today? It doesn't have to be genius. Just one or two things you're going to do. Oh, I'm going toTamice (50:51):Take a nap. Yeah, you taking a nap? Y'all be so proud of me. I literally just said no to five things. I was like, I'm not coming to this. I'm not doing that. I won't be at this. I'm grieving. I'm go sit in the grass. Yeah, that's what I'm doing today. And I have stuff coming up. I'm like, Nope, I'm not available.Starlette (51:14):What about you Danielle? What are you going to do?Danielle (51:16):I'm going to eat scrambled eggs with no salt. I love that. I've grown my liver back so I have to have no salt. But I do love scrambled eggs. Scrambled eggs. That's the truth. Four. Four scrambled eggs.Starlette (51:31):And we thank you for your truth. BIO:The Reverend Dr. Starlette Thomas is a poet, practical theologian, and itinerant prophet for a coming undivided “kin-dom.” She is the director of The Raceless Gospel Initiative, named for her work and witness and an associate editor at Good Faith Media. Starlette regularly writes on the sociopolitical construct of race and its longstanding membership in the North American church. Her writings have been featured in Sojourners, Red Letter Christians, Free Black Thought, Word & Way, Plough, Baptist News Global and Nurturing Faith Journal among others. She is a frequent guest on podcasts and has her own. The Raceless Gospel podcast takes her listeners to a virtual church service where she and her guests tackle that taboo trinity— race, religion, and politics. Starlette is also an activist who bears witness against police brutality and most recently the cultural erasure of the Black Lives Matter Plaza in Washington, D.C. It was erected in memory of the 2020 protests that brought the world together through this shared declaration of somebodiness after the gruesome murder of George Perry Floyd, Jr. Her act of resistance caught the attention of the Associated Press. An image of her reclaiming the rubble went viral and in May, she was featured in a CNN article.Starlette has spoken before the World Council of Churches North America and the United Methodist Church's Council of Bishops on the color- coded caste system of race and its abolition. She has also authored and presented papers to the members of the Baptist World Alliance in Zurich, Switzerland and Nassau, Bahamas to this end. She has cast a vision for the future of religion at the National Museum of African American History and Culture's “Forward Conference: Religions Envisioning Change.” Her paper was titled “Press Forward: A Raceless Gospel for Ex- Colored People Who Have Lost Faith in White Supremacy.” She has lectured at The Queen's Foundation in Birmingham, U.K. on a baptismal pedagogy for antiracist theological education, leadership and ministries. Starlette's research interests have been supported by the Louisville Institute and the Lilly Foundation. Examining the work of the Reverend Dr. Clarence Jordan, whose farm turned “demonstration plot” in Americus, Georgia refused to agree to the social arrangements of segregation because of his Christian convictions, Starlette now takes this dirt to the church. Her thesis is titled, “Afraid of Koinonia: How life on this farm reveals the fear of Christian community.” A full circle moment, she was recently invited to write the introduction to Jordan's newest collection of writings, The Inconvenient Gospel: A Southern Prophet Tackles War, Wealth, Race and Religion.Starlette is a member of the Christian Community Development Association, the Peace & Justice Studies Association, and the Koinonia Advisory Council. A womanist in ministry, she has served as a pastor as well as a denominational leader. An unrepentant academician and bibliophile, Starlette holds degrees from Buffalo State College, Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School and Wesley Theological Seminary. Last year, she was awarded an honorary doctorate in Sacred Theology for her work and witness as a public theologian from Wayland Baptist Theological Seminary. She is the author of "Take Me to the Water": The Raceless Gospel as Baptismal Pedagogy for a Desegregated Church and a contributing author of the book Faith Forward: A Dialogue on Children, Youth & a New Kind of Christianity. Dr. Tamice Spencer - HelmsGod is not a weapon. Authenticity is not a phase.Meet Tamice Spencer-Helms (they/she). Tamice is a nonprofit leader, scholar-practitioner, pastor, and theoactivist based in Richmond, Virginia. For decades, Tamice has been guided by a singular purpose: to confront and heal what they call “diseased imagination”—the spiritual and social dis-ease that stifles agency, creativity, and collective flourishing. As a pastor for spiritual fugitives, Tamice grounds their work at the intersection of social transformation, soulful leadership, womanist and queer liberation theologies, and cultural critique.A recognized voice in theoactivism, Tamice's work bridges the intellectual and the embodied, infusing rigorous scholarship with lived experience and spiritual practice. They hold two master's degrees (theology and leadership) and a doctorate in Social Transformation. Their frameworks, such as R.E.S.T. Mixtape and Soulful Leadership, which are research and evidence-based interventions that invite others into courageous truth-telling, radical belonging, and the kind of liberating leadership our times demand.Whether facilitating retreats, speaking from the stage, consulting for organizations, or curating digital sanctuaries, Tamice's presence is both refuge and revolution. Their commitment is to help individuals and communities heal, reimagine, and build spaces where every person is seen, known, and liberated—where diseased imagination gives way to new possibilities. Kitsap County & Washington State Crisis and Mental Health ResourcesIf you or someone else is in immediate danger, please call 911.This resource list provides crisis and mental health contacts for Kitsap County and across Washington State.Kitsap County / Local ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They OfferSalish Regional Crisis Line / Kitsap Mental Health 24/7 Crisis Call LinePhone: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/24/7 emotional support for suicide or mental health crises; mobile crisis outreach; connection to services.KMHS Youth Mobile Crisis Outreach TeamEmergencies via Salish Crisis Line: 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://sync.salishbehavioralhealth.org/youth-mobile-crisis-outreach-team/Crisis outreach for minors and youth experiencing behavioral health emergencies.Kitsap Mental Health Services (KMHS)Main: 360‑373‑5031; Toll‑free: 888‑816‑0488; TDD: 360‑478‑2715Website: https://www.kitsapmentalhealth.org/crisis-24-7-services/Outpatient, inpatient, crisis triage, substance use treatment, stabilization, behavioral health services.Kitsap County Suicide Prevention / “Need Help Now”Call the Salish Regional Crisis Line at 1‑888‑910‑0416Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/Suicide-Prevention-Website.aspx24/7/365 emotional support; connects people to resources; suicide prevention assistance.Crisis Clinic of the PeninsulasPhone: 360‑479‑3033 or 1‑800‑843‑4793Website: https://www.bainbridgewa.gov/607/Mental-Health-ResourcesLocal crisis intervention services, referrals, and emotional support.NAMI Kitsap CountyWebsite: https://namikitsap.org/Peer support groups, education, and resources for individuals and families affected by mental illness.Statewide & National Crisis ResourcesResourceContact InfoWhat They Offer988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline (WA‑988)Call or text 988; Website: https://wa988.org/Free, 24/7 support for suicidal thoughts, emotional distress, relationship problems, and substance concerns.Washington Recovery Help Line1‑866‑789‑1511Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesHelp for mental health, substance use, and problem gambling; 24/7 statewide support.WA Warm Line877‑500‑9276Website: https://www.crisisconnections.org/wa-warm-line/Peer-support line for emotional or mental health distress; support outside of crisis moments.Native & Strong Crisis LifelineDial 988 then press 4Website: https://doh.wa.gov/you-and-your-family/injury-and-violence-prevention/suicide-prevention/hotline-text-and-chat-resourcesCulturally relevant crisis counseling by Indigenous counselors.Additional Helpful Tools & Tips• Behavioral Health Services Access: Request assessments and access to outpatient, residential, or inpatient care through the Salish Behavioral Health Organization. Website: https://www.kitsap.gov/hs/Pages/SBHO-Get-Behaviroal-Health-Services.aspx• Deaf / Hard of Hearing: Use your preferred relay service (for example dial 711 then the appropriate number) to access crisis services.• Warning Signs & Risk Factors: If someone is talking about harming themselves, giving away possessions, expressing hopelessness, or showing extreme behavior changes, contact crisis resources immediately. Well, first I guess I would have to believe that there was or is an actual political dialogue taking place that I could potentially be a part of. And honestly, I'm not sure that I believe that.
In this episode of the Sound Therapy Network Podcast, I sit down with Tiffany Homan, Nervous System Navigator, Somatic Disruptor, and trauma-informed coach, to explore the profound role somatics plays in the healing process. Tiffany shares her journey from emergency medicine to somatic coaching, and how her work helps clients move from simply surviving to living soul-led, embodied lives. We discuss: Why nervous system regulation is foundational for any healing work How somatic practices help disrupt old patterns and restore safety The connection between body awareness, identity, and authentic expression The importance of integrating somatics into any transformational modality If you've been curious about how to deepen your own embodiment or support clients in feeling truly safe in their healing journey, this conversation will inspire you to slow down, listen to your body's wisdom, and trust its innate capacity to heal. Connect with Tiffany on Instagram: @tiffanyhomancoaching https://www.instagram.com/tiffanyhomancoaching Connect with Sound Therapy Network Follow us on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/soundtherapynetwork Find out more information on our trainings https://soundtherapynetwork.com
Your body remembers every touch, every rejection, every moment of connection—even when your mind has forgotten. But most of us are living from the neck up, disconnected from our bodies and the wisdom they hold about our desires, boundaries, and authentic selves.In this episode, I'm demystifying embodiment and somatic (body-based) approaches for intimacy issues. I'll break down what it actually means to be embodied (versus disconnected), why your nervous system holds the key to better sex and relationships, and how somatic approaches differ from traditional talk therapy.You'll learn a wee bit of the history of body-based healing—from Wilhelm Reich's "character armor" to modern trauma research—and discover why bottom-up healing (starting with your body) often works better than top-down approaches for intimacy challenges.I'm sharing the 5 specific benefits of getting more embodied: better emotional regulation, real confidence (not performed), authentic relationships, reduced physical tension, and magnetic presence that makes people actually listen when you speak.Plus, practical examples from my practice showing how embodied approaches help with everything from performance anxiety to not knowing what you want sexually. This isn't woo-woo stuff—it's science-backed work that creates real change.Perfect for anyone who's tired of living disconnected from their body and ready to access their full aliveness. Also perfect for anyone who simply wonders "what's the point of being more embodied? Why bother?" Get my free email newsletter with helpful tips, plus a free guide to Finding Your Deepest Turn-Ons, and learn how to work with me at https://laurajurgens.com.
Send us a textBurnout, reactivity, overwhelm are not just about workload. And they don't just happen to adults. It's a nervous system response, and there are plenty of environments where this work is so helpful in order to navigate fear. In this guest conversation with Stacey Louise, owner of Calm Fairies and a yoga therapist in children's hospital wards, we hear about her experiences helping children navigate stress and fear in medical settings. With this information, we dive into how somatic awareness and regulation can change how you lead, respond, and relate, especially under pressure. Connect with Stacey at:www.calmfairies.com.au - to find out more about the Calm Fairies volunteer program, where there is a Calm Fairy in a hospital near you, and to find details the app with free videos and resources to help kids in hospital (also in App stores)www.inspiredkidsyoga.com.au - for parents and educators to access short, easy tools within online courses.#SomaticLeadership #StressResilience #LeadershipWellbeingEnjoying the podcast? Don't forget to follow for more episodes packed with insights on growth, change, and living a more fulfilling life. Got a thought or story to share? Reach out via Instagram at @j_.leigh , on LinkedIn at Jess Jasch, or https://j-leigh.com.au/ - I'd love to hear from you!Interested in booking a free consult to discuss wellbeing consulting, or embodied leadership coaching for you or your team? Book your time here: https://calendly.com/jess-jasch/book-zoom-now
This week I'm joined by the incredible Natasha de Grunwald, a published author, international Breath-work, Trauma and Somatic expert with 30 years of experience. She is the founder of the Trauma Release Method and Seismic Orgasmic Breath experience.We talk about why mindset work alone isn't always enough, how trauma gets stored in the body, and why nervous system regulation is the missing piece for so many entrepreneurs. Natasha shares her personal story of healing, the power of breath-work, and what real somatic practice looks like beyond the surface-level trends you see online.What I love most about Natasha's approach is how playful and grounded it is. Healing doesn't have to be gruelling. We explore the tools she teaches - from titration to orienting practices - that help people feel safe, resilient, and able to face life's challenges without spiralling into fight or flight. Whether you're new to somatics or already curious about body-based work, this conversation will leave you feeling calmer, clearer, and more connected to yourself. Here are the highlightsNatasha's personal story and how trauma shaped her work (02:46)The missing link between body, breath, and healing (07:34)Play as a pathway to transformation (04:54)How titration builds resilience and safety (13:06)Breath as your most accessible somatic tool (22:39) Connect with Natasha:WebsiteInstagramTo find out more:WebsiteInstagramDownload the FREE Everyday Sales Machine GuideFree Quarterly Clarity Mapping ToolThis podcast is proudly produced by Wavemakers Audio
Dr. Eva Nowakowski-Sims: Where Psychedelics, Trauma, and Somatic Therapy CollideShe's a PhD, a licensed clinical social worker, a certified yoga teacher, and a psychedelic-assisted therapist. She lifts weights as therapy. She breathes, moves, and guides with intention.And in a world still stuck on surface-level mental health solutions, Dr. Eva Nowakowski-Sims is flipping the script—inviting us to go deeper into the body, beyond talk therapy, and into the sacred space where healing actually happens.In this raw and revealing episode of the Crackin' Backs Podcast, we dive into a conversation that challenges conventional therapy models and explores what it means to truly heal trauma—through the body, through breath, and yes, through psychedelics like MDMA and psilocybin.What You'll Learn in This EpisodeWhy talk therapy alone often falls short—and what finally made Dr. Eva say “there has to be more”The controversial but effective use of psychedelic-assisted therapy, and how to separate healing from "drug culture"What trauma-informed weightlifting looks like—and how strength can unlock emotional breakthroughsWhy yoga, breathwork, and somatics are essential for releasing trauma that words can't reachThe visible and visceral signs of real transformation in the therapy roomHow trauma shows up in the body—and how movement can help move it outThe systemic barriers to healing and the ethical questions surrounding access to these powerful toolsWhat Dr. Eva tells people who feel like they've “tried everything” and are still stuckHer vision for the next generation of trauma therapists—and the outdated mental health beliefs we must leave behindThis isn't therapy as you know it. This is real, embodied healing—from someone who's walking the talk. Learn More About Dr. Eva Nowakowski-Sims: Instagram: HERELinkedIn : HEREWe are two sports chiropractors, seeking knowledge from some of the best resources in the world of health. From our perspective, health is more than just “Crackin Backs” but a deep dive into physical, mental, and nutritional well-being philosophies. Join us as we talk to some of the greatest minds and discover some of the most incredible gems you can use to maintain a higher level of health. Crackin Backs Podcast
Sonya Brewer is a trauma specialist and relationship expert who specializes in creative life and relationship design for overachieving trauma survivors and their partners. She helps trauma survivors feel more alive, connected and authentic so they can create the lives and relationships they truly want. In this conversation Sonya shares vulnerably about doing her own deep work, including the processes she went through to heal her childhood emotional neglect and other traumas. She also talks about how her own healing has changed her work as a therapist and healer. Here's some of what we talked about: Discovering Breath Work and somatics Finding the right therapist and sticking with her for decades! Becoming a healer and leaving corporate behind Healing and retrieving young parts of herself Understanding and healing from emotional neglect Feeling the help, love and healing of her ancestors The limits of talk therapy in accessing some of our deepest healing Insights on Couples and Complex PTSD (and an upcoming book!) Show notes at https://rebeltherapist.me/podcast/250
Wellness work isn't about collecting more certifications—it's about integrating what you already know. In this episode, I'm speaking directly to coaches, yoga teachers, and wellness practitioners who feel overwhelmed, scattered, or stuck. I dive into why so many of us feel like we're drowning in tools but starving for strategy—and how embodiment, nervous system awareness, and community can change everything. You'll learn:
In this episode, Sheridan Ruth discusses practical tools to move beyond collapse cycles, imposter syndrome, and the push to prove. The post 447: Sheridan Ruth – Healing the Burnout Blueprint: Somatics for the Spiritual Leader appeared first on Your Sacred Purpose.
What does it mean to choose a wholeness paradigm instead of a pathology lens when it comes to neuro-affirming care? In this episode, I sit down with the brilliant Nyck Walsh to explore what happens when we bring compassion, authenticity, and somatics into the conversation about neurodivergence. Together, we touch into the radical permission it takes to be fully human and to rest into identities that have often been misunderstood or pathologized.We explore the relief, grief, and even terror that can arise with late-in-life neurodivergent identification—and the profound sense of liberation that can come with finally having language for who we are. Nyck shares what it means to honor authenticity beneath masking, to unpack internalized ableism, and to reconnect with innate wisdom that has always been there, waiting to be trusted.Our conversation also weaves in the intersections of privilege and oppression, the deep longing for belonging, and the all-too-common question: “Am I ___ enough?” Together, we name how neurodivergent folks often carry both tremendous courage and tremendous vulnerability as they navigate authenticity, safety, and connection in a neurotypical-dominant world.You'll also hear about Nyck's model of Neurodivergent Somatics, his international counselor education programs, and his forthcoming book with Norton Professional Books, Neurodivergent Somatics and Therapy: an anti-oppressive model for whole person care (March 2026).This is a conversation filled with tenderness, truth, and courage - an invitation to see neurodivergence not as something broken or deficient, but as whole, wise, and worthy.About NyckNyck Walsh (he/they) brings a whole person, anti-oppressive, intersectional somatic lens to working with Autistic and KCS/VAST (more affirming language for “ADHD”) folks. A white, Autistic, VAST, queer, and trans counselor, Nyck is the director of the Nyck Walsh Counseling & Training Center and creator of the Neurodivergent Somatics model.He curates reparative experiences for late-identified Autistic and KCS/VAST people to connect with their innate wisdom, dismantle ableism, be supported through challenges, and make meaning of their misunderstood neurodivergent experiences. His counselor education programs have attracted an international following, with both neurodivergent and neurotypical counselors alike reporting that they feel deeply supported and validated by his approach.While being human brings no shortage of complexity, Nyck delights in frolicking in nature and living among the trees with his four-legged bestie in the mountains of what is colonially known as Colorado.Find out more at his website: nyckwalsh.comFor the transcript of this episode, please visit (you will find it below the episode description):www.shelby-leigh.com/podcasts/neurodivergent-somatics-with-nyck-walshAnd, if you're interested in an assessment or 1:1 work with Shelby, you can find out more here:shelby-leigh.com/autism-and-adhd-assessmentsshelby-leigh.com/one-on-one-healing-supportIf you're a therapist or coach, you might like to check out Shelby's Body of Work program - open for enrolment for another week - 9 months of support for practitioners to bring their whole, human selves, not just the professional persona.shelby-leigh.com/body-of-work
In this episode of The Psychedelic Podcast, Paul F. Austin speaks with Dr. Brian Tierney, a licensed somatic psychologist and professor of neuroscience. Find full show notes and links here: https://thethirdwave.co/podcast/episode-319/?ref=278 Dr. Tierney unpacks the emerging paradigm of network neuroscience and how our brain's default mode, salience, and task networks interact with trauma, attention, and healing. Dr. Tierney is a somatic psychologist, neuroscience and psychopharmacology professor, and psychotherapist with a passion for integrative healing. Specializing in trauma resolution, couples therapy, and somatic experiencing, he blends cutting-edge science with ancient practices to create transformative healing experiences. He is the host of the Boundless Body podcast and the author of the upcoming book Visionary Somatics. Highlights: What is network neuroscience? How trauma disrupts brain network coordination Understanding the salience, default mode, and task networks Why somatic healing involves connective tissue, not just cognition The dangers of spiritual bypassing through “idealized embodiment” “Character armoring” and body-held trauma patterns How imagination serves as a ground for healing The death–rebirth archetype in psychedelic experiences Transcendence vs. transformation in modern healing culture Why safety and grounding are non-negotiable for deep work Episode Sponsors: Psychedelic Coacing Institute's Intensive for Psychedelic Professionals in Costa Rica - a transformative retreat for personal and professional growth. Golden Rule Mushrooms - Get a lifetime discount of 10% with code THIRDWAVE at checkout
Unlocking the Secrets of Somatic Healing with Angel HowardIn this episode of the Samantha Parker Show, Samantha sits down with Angel Howard, founder of Wild Heart Expressive, host of the Upshift podcast, and author of 'Issues in Your Tissues.' Angel delves into the core concepts of her book, explaining how our bodies store emotions and how somatic movement therapy can help release them. The conversation navigates through her journey from corporate America to holistic healing, her struggles with personal trauma, and how somatic work has helped her regain trust and balance in life. The discussion also touches upon the impact of past experiences on our physical well-being and provides practical advice for engaging in somatic practices. Angel also shares exciting news about her new PBS show 'Women Our Age' and an upcoming retreat in Sedona, Arizona.00:00 Introduction and Guest Introduction00:20 Discussing the Book: Issues in Your Tissues01:17 Angel's Career Journey02:58 Corporate Burnout and Personal Struggles06:52 Trust and Healing Through Somatic Experiences11:40 Sobriety and Recognizing Triggers17:47 Changing the Narrative and Neural Pathways17:58 Somatic Movement Therapy18:28 Finding Peace Amidst Chaos18:57 Breathing Techniques and Embracing Chaos19:47 Exploring Vibe Plates and Massage Guns20:19 Beginner's Guide to Somatic Practices23:27 Personal Reflections and Regrets24:45 The Impact of Somatics on Life27:07 Success vs. Significance29:31 Promoting Somatic Resources30:43 Upcoming Projects and TV Show32:58 Retreats and Final ThoughtsAngel Howard Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/angelhowardofficial?igsh=MTN3b3c3YXRucTg3NQ==Step into Your Sober Era! Are you ready to embrace a life of clarity and empowerment? ✨ Check out Sam's Sober Club on Substack for journals, tips, community and more [Subscribe Now ➔] Sam's Sober CLUB | Samantha Parker | Substack Want to Work with The Samantha Parker for Content Management CLICK HERE Follow me on TikTok https://www.tiktok.com/@samanthaparkershow YouTube https://www.youtube.com/@thesamanthaparker Instagram https://www.instagram.com/thesamanthaparker/
Welcome to Somatics with Sarai. Together we'll journey from stress, overwhelm, and survival mode to regulation, resilience, and embodied freedom. This podcast is about nervous system regulation and somatic practices that create real change in the body. Before this evolution, the show began as The Multidimensional Journey, where I explored plant medicine and spirituality. That legacy remains an important foundation — and now the path continues here, rooted in the body.Get Your FREE Somatic Starter Kit → https://winning-speaker-5924.kit.com/ea1a80267cStart feeling calm, grounded, and in control of your life again with my free Somatic Starter Kit. Inside, you'll get simple, science-backed practices to regulate your nervous system and break free from the cycle of anxiety.About this video:Are you tired of trying meditation, journaling, or traditional talk approaches — and still feeling stuck in your fight or flight response? In this video, I share the missing piece most approaches overlook - working directly with your nervous system.You'll learn:* Why fight or flight isn't about lack of effort or “trying harder”* How your nervous system drives fight or flight(and what to do instead)* The simple “Counter Vortex” method to get unstuck fast* The exact first steps to calm your body and mind & help your system releaseIf you've tried *everything* and nothing has worked, this video is for you.✨ Somatic Nervous System Reset ConsultIf you're ready for personalized support, email me at themultidimensionaljourney@gmail.com with the subject line: “Nervous System Reset Consult" and I'll reply with next steps and availability.---
In this second episode in the Somatics series, we explore Polyvagal Theory as a tool for raising awareness and befriending your body. Exploring the three central states in Polyvagal Theory (safety/connection, fight or flight, and shutdown), as well as the freeze state that most humans get stuck in, we name practices for getting your body unstuck and moving forward towards flourishing.
In this episode, I sit down with Psychedelic Somatic Therapist Christian Snuffer for a conversation about attunement—what it really means to be in touch with ourselves and each other, and why it's at the heart of healing.We talk about the nervous system (of course), and about how somatic awareness—paying attention to what's happening in our bodies—isn't just a side practice, but the actual doorway to healing. We explore how joy can sometimes feel just as threatening as pain when our bodies are wired for survival, and how dissociation shows up as a protective reflex when emotions feel too overwhelming.Christian brings such wisdom about the power of language, the pull of community, and the way nature herself teaches us how to return to regulation. Together, we explore why healing isn't a “problem to solve” but a process of becoming more fully human.If you've ever wondered why you avoid your feelings, why you can't quite let joy land, or why regulating yourself as a parent feels impossible some days—you're not broken. You're in the process of remembering.We also share about Christian's new Attunement Collective, a free space for people ready to deepen their somatic and relational practices with support.This one is tender, grounding, and full of those “aha” reframes that make you exhale. So good. You can connect with Christian and his work on his IG page @_attunement, and find access to his many offerings!
In this episode I talk with Chelsea Biagioli, host of Talk To The hand - Exploring Grief with Puppets, about how she incorporates play into her grief practice. We share stories of childhood play - potions, spells, and waiting for the make-believe world to come into focus - and how our play changed as we grew up. We wonder about the value of spending time in imaginary worlds, what it prepares us for, what we lose when we think of it as frivolous and how colonial capitalism benefits from a world that leaves make believe behind. We decide to stay devoted to play and to invite as many beings as we can into our fort. Want to join us? Want to come out and play?
In this episode—the first in a new series about befriending our bodies—we explore how awareness of our body's feelings, experience, and sensation is the engine of sustained change. In a society in which we are encouraged, implicitly if not explicitly, to disembody—to dissociate from embodied awareness—we begin to lay out a path towards fully inhabiting our bodies and, thus, our lives. This, as this series bears out, is the crucial foundation for building a life of abundance and flourishing, for our sake and for the sake of the world around us.
Love addiction is a set of symptoms most often associated with romantic relationships. But these symptoms can also show up in our relationship with work, which might look like this: seeking unconditional positive regard (ie earning validation and worthiness from the work we're doing, the company that employs us, the person who manages us), while we overvalue this company or person (and undervalue ourselves and the contribution we are making at work), all while self-neglecting as we overfunction in order to get that external validation. And all of this leads to exhaustion, health issues, and ultimately burnout. In this episode, Jodi talks with burnout and productivity specialist, Tamu Thomas, author of Women Who Work Too Much, about toxic productivity, ambition and the cultural conditioning that shapes us. Tamu shares her personal experience with overfunctioning and how this led to a necessary life change; and why women often end up being the "selfless caretakers", how this leads us into a cycle of toxic productivity, and how we can change that...plus much more! Show notes and resources: Music by JD Pendley Link to Jodi's website and link to join her newsletter for upcoming announcements For more information about Tamu Thomas, visit her website and follow her on Instagram @tamu.thomas Purchase Women Who Work Too Much here Disclaimer: This podcast is shared for educational and informational purposes only. It is not intended to be a substitute for mental health treatment with a licensed mental health professional or to be used in place of the advice of a physician. If you are struggling please don't delay in seeking the assistance of a licensed mental health practitioner or healthcare professional. If you're in crisis please visit NAMI.org or call 1-800-273-TALK for 24-hour assistance.
In this episode, we're joined by a very special guest, Betty Dupont — a longtime physical therapist turned somatic movement instructor who's helping people release chronic tension and reconnect with their bodies in powerful ways.For nearly 30 years, Betty supported the Nantucket community through manual physical therapy. But during the 2020 pandemic, everything shifted. After being introduced to Somatics—a method that reconnects the brain and body to heal both emotional and physical trauma—she found herself on an entirely new path of healing.We talk about:Her evolution from traditional PT to SomaticsThe profound turning point that sparked her healing journeyHow unresolved emotional and physical trauma shows up in the bodyWhat Somatics is (and how it's different from yoga or physical therapy)The unexpected ways this practice helps heal trauma and chronic painWhy slowing down, tuning in, and letting go can be the most powerful thing we doThis is a grounding, enlightening conversation—and I'm so honored to share Betty's wisdom and story with you.Follow Betty on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/surfsidesomatics/?hl=enLearn more about Betty: https://www.surfsidesomatics.comLearn more about essential somatic: https://essentialsomatics.com
Anxiety is at an all-time high—and so are the searches for ways to calm the mind and body without medication.In this powerful episode of the Somatic Movement & Mindset podcast, Clinical Somatic Educator Heidi Hadley explains why moving slower actually calms your nervous system faster. You'll discover how micro-movements and slow, mindful somatic practices switch off the fight-flight-freeze response and help regulate emotional overwhelm.This episode explores:
Are you holding yourself back in the name of ‘getting it right'?In this heartfelt solo episode, Sarah Faith Gottesdiener shares the unfiltered truth about her creative process, the evolution of the podcast, and what it's taken to show up consistently—even when things felt unfinished, unpolished, or not quite “right.”This is a powerful conversation about the courage to begin, the discipline to keep going, and the grace to let your work evolve over time.You'll hear:Why making something imperfect is better than not making it at allThe difference between perfectionism and a devotion to excellenceHow years of psychic readings made Sarah a highly attuned interviewerThe spiritual, somatic, and structural practices that sustain creativityInsights from Clear Channels, her signature course on voice and visibilityJoin Our Community: Join the Moon Studio Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/themoonstudioBuy the 2025 Many Moons Lunar Planner: https://moon-studio.co/collections/all-products-excluding-route/products/many-moons-2025Subscribe to our newsletter: https://moon-studio.co/pages/newsletterFind Sarah on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gottesss/PROMO: POD33 for $33 off Clear ChannelsUpcoming Events [London]: August 9th: Intuition For Right Now: Regain Trust, Build Confidence, and Heal Old WoundsAugust 10th: Integrating the Gifts of Your Spirit: An Archetypal Deep Dive and Regression with Sarah Faith Gottesdiener
Hey Team! This week I'm talking with Britt Piper, a somatic experiencing practitioner, trauma educator, and author of Body First Healing. Britt's work focuses on understanding how trauma impacts the nervous system and brings both professional expertise and a deeply personal understanding of what it means to heal. In our conversation, we start with Britt's story and then we dive into what somatic therapy actually looks like, how trauma can live in the body long after the mind “knows” we're safe, and why the nervous system often gets stuck in survival mode. We also get into the science behind stress responses, intergenerational trauma, and practical ways to start listening to your body's signals instead of fighting against them. Also, just as a quick note before we get into it, today's episode includes discussion of trauma, including mentions of sexual violence, substance abuse, and suicidal thoughts. If these topics are sensitive for you, please take care while listening - feel free to skip ahead or pause when needed. Books Body First Healing by Britt Piper The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk It Didn't Start With You by Mark Wolynn Therapy & Practitioner Resource Somatic Experiencing International - https://traumahealing.org/ The Embody Lab - https://www.theembodylab.com/ Britt's Body First Healing Program - https://www.bodyfirsthealing.com/ If you'd life to follow along on the show notes page you can find that at https://HackingYourADHD.com/234 https://tinyurl.com/y835cnrk - YouTube https://www.patreon.com/HackingYourADHD - Patreon This Episode's Top Tips 1. Somatic practices are body-based approaches to healing that focus on how trauma and stress are held in the nervous system rather than just the mind. They employ gentle techniques, such as tracking body sensations, subtle movements, and breath, to help the body complete its stress response cycles. 2. SI-BAM is a tool from Somatic Experiencing that helps track your internal state when emotions feel vague or difficult to name. It stands for Sensation, Image, Behavior, Affect (emotion), and Meaning. It begins by noticing physical sensations (such as tightness, warmth, or buzzing), and then observing if any mental images arise. It is followed by observing your body's behavior or impulses (fidgeting, leaning forward) and from there checking for any identifiable emotions, and noticing what meaning or story you attach to the experience. 3. If you feel stuck in the same emotional patterns and if stress, anxiety, or trauma seem to “live” in your body, showing up as chronic tension, pain, or fatigue, somatic therapy could be an option for you. Somatic work can give you tools to gently release that “stuck” survival energy and restore a sense of calm. 4. When dealing with trauma, you don't have to go it alone, but it is also important to work with a practitioner who understands what they are doing. And understand that somatic therapy is just one of many options that you can use to help you get the help you need.
What do you really want—and how do you even begin to ask for it? In this episode of laidOPEN, I'm joined by somatic sex therapist Susan Morgan Taylor, a healer and teacher who guides people through the often-overlooked terrain of embodied desire. With over 25 years in somatic healing, Susan brings a grounded, intuitive approach to what she calls the Pleasure Keys Process—a set of practices designed to help individuals and couples reconnect with their sensuality, emotional truth, and authentic connection. We dive into how early wounding, stress, and disembodiment can short-circuit intimacy—and what it really takes to come back into alignment with your body and your partner. Susan shares how her background in massage therapy and intuitive healing shaped her path, and offers practical, heartfelt wisdom on navigating low libido, sacred sexuality, and the art of noticing, naming, and negotiating in relationships. Whether you're in a long-term partnership or simply curious about deepening your relationship to pleasure, this conversation is an invitation to slow down, tune in, and reclaim the wisdom of your body. Show Notes: 00:00 Introduction to LaidOPEN Podcast 00:07 Meet Susan Morgan Taylor: Somatic Sex Therapist 02:48 The Pleasure Keys Process 03:20 Intuitive Healing and Somatic Work 04:50 The Importance of Touch and Consent 05:39 Navigating Desire Mismatches in Relationships 09:24 The Wheel of Consent 11:19 The Pleasure Keys Framework 16:55 Understanding Low Libido in Women 23:44 Exploring Sacred Sexuality 32:11 Exploring Sensitivity and Numbness 33:03 The Role of Physical Sensation in Relaxation 33:41 Martial Arts and Body Work in Emotional Healing 34:54 Understanding Numbness and Its Origins 36:25 Pathway to Emotional and Physical Healing 38:45 Sacred Sexuality and Emotional Depth 43:34 The Paradox of Polarity and Union 49:56 Sexual Freedom and Self-Knowledge 52:49 Practical Steps for Emotional and Physical Awareness 55:43 Conclusion and Resources
Abby and Patrick are joined by somatics practitioner Sumitra Rajkumar to clarify the theory and practice of somatics and its relationship to ideas of personal and collective transformation. Sumitra walks Abby and Patrick through somatics as a theoretical perspective that sees the self as both thoroughly grounded in our individual bodies but also always bound up in relational, social bodies as well. She unpacks how somatic practice differs from talk therapy by using techniques of “bodywork” and other exercises to explore histories of “shaping,” undo habitual patterns of embodiment, address trauma, and cultivate a capacity to remain centered and present under pressure. As the three explore, what sets Sumitra's approach apart from ostensibly “apolitical” or openly right-wing traditions is a self-conscious, critical awareness of power dynamics and different people's varied relationships to historical oppression and their own bodies. Over and against “apolitical,” mystical, or openly right-wing tendencies of other practices, Sumitra's vision of somatics is particularly attuned to the physical and psychic tolls of maintaining compassion, resisting burnout, and building relationships of solidarity with strangers. Rich with psychoanalytic resonances throughout, their conversation focuses in particular on the concept of the “transferential constellation,” which clarifies a great deal about the different dynamics between right and left mass movements, and casts many difficult experiences – whether in a consulting room, at a protest, or canvassing by knocking on doors – in provocative new light.The Action Lab: https://www.actionlabny.org/Art of Purpose fellowship application: https://www.canva.com/design/DAGsmA_TIm0/7-aSlMVivPoR4kHvJD-Hbg/view?utm_content=DAGsmA_TIm0&utm_campaign=designshare&utm_medium=link2&utm_source=uniquelinks&utlId=h12e5faa7a3#1More on somatics and Sumitra's work:What is somatics? Somatics in practiceInstitutions Sumitra mentions include:Generative Somatics: https://generativesomatics.org/BOLD: https://www.boldorganizing.org/The Embodiment Institute: https://www.theembodimentinstitute.org/The Organizing Center: https://www.theorganizingcenter.org/The tweet that started this conversationHave you noticed that Freud is back? Got questions about psychoanalysis? Or maybe you've traversed the fantasy and lived to tell the tale? Leave us a voicemail! (646) 450-0847A podcast about psychoanalysis, politics, pop culture, and the ways we suffer now. New episodes on Saturdays. Follow us on social media:Linktree: https://linktr.ee/OrdinaryUnhappinessTwitter: @UnhappinessPodInstagram: @OrdinaryUnhappinessPatreon: patreon.com/OrdinaryUnhappinessTheme song:Formal Chicken - Gnossienne No. 1https://open.spotify.com/album/2MIIYnbyLqriV3vrpUTxxOProvided by Fruits Music
Welcome to Healing with Kink!
This episode is a very personal story from a workshop I attended 6 weeks ago... During the workshop, I had an experience that broke me open in profound ways that have changed my life for the better. *(Important note below)* And I'm definitely still integrating what happened, but at this point I've spent enough time in integration to feel excited to share the story with you.**IMPORTANT NOTE: What I forgot to mention in the episode was that the experience was so strong for me, I had to spend the rest of that evening back at my AirB&B, going back and forth between laying down on the bed crying with emotional opening/release - and getting up to do intentional movement practice to feel everything fully and integrate. I didn't eat, I didn't distract myself with social media or tech... I just spent the evening & night solo - feeling, integrating and then went to sleep. It felt like the comedown of a profound psychedelic medicine journey... that's the best analogy I can come up with.If you're someone who's interested in personal transformation, and different ways that can happen, I think you'll really enjoy this episode.
What if claiming your victimhood was the first step toward real empowerment? In this episode, I'm sharing a personal coaching moment that completely changed the way I relate to anxiety, trauma, and the fawn response. I'll explore how naming your pain isn't weakness—it's wisdom. And how what looks like self-sabotage is often your body's most intelligent form of self-protection. I dive into:
It's time for another encore!Ep.67 (originally released September 20, 2023) — Originally from Chile, Magdalena Weinstein spent the first 17 years of her life living under the rule of an authoritarian dictatorship. In this episode, she shares her childhood experiences, family life, and what motivated her to immigrate to the US in 2004. Magdalena speaks very candidly about the challenges of being in immigrant in America, and about time spent in a series of traumatizing and controlling environments - dictatorship in her formative years that stoked an early hunger for autonomy; years spent as an Iyengar yoga student and teacher striving for whitewashed dominion over her body; and a decade of investment in a coaching program where she experienced mind control and ongoing racial micro-aggressions. She generously shares each of these stories with us, poignantly illustrating what all of these seemingly unrelated experiences have in common. In 2019, Magdalena trained as a trauma specialist. In the final third of the episode, she helps us understand how trauma related to control is stored in the body and what, both individually and collectively, we can do about it. She describes the differences between control and personal agency, particularly in terms of owning and choosing psychological and somatic states. Then, Magdalena calls on wellness practitioners to trade Western idealism for a more realistic and collective approach to the growing challenges we now face as humans.Magdalena Weinstein, SEP (she/her), is a Somatic Trauma Specialist who offers trauma recovery interventions utilizing Somatic Experiencing®, Touch Skills, Neuro-Linguistic Programming, the Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP), Parts Work, and Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy perspectives. Blending the fields of Somatics, Neurology, and Social Justice, she is committed to helping individuals and groups transition towards personal, ancestral, and collective trauma healing. Her specialties are developmental and complex trauma, C-PTSD, PTSD, chronic conditions, domestic violence, and sexual assault trauma, and social justice dynamics, including racial trauma, immigration trauma, and war trauma. Originally from Chile, she was born and raised in a Dictatorship for her first 17 years of life and immigrated to the USA in 2004.She lives in a rural home in Mendocino, Northern California (on unceded Pomo Territory), with her husband, their two children, dogs, cats, and snakes. She has a private practice in her home studio, is an assistant at SE trainings, and is a member of the DEI committee at Somatic Experiencing International. She is also finishing the first year of Biodynamic Craniosacral Therapy Training.Referenced In This Episode:Heather Cox Richardson - September 11, 2023Doppelganger: A Trip into the Mirror World, by Naomi KleinSapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah HarariSupport the showThe stories and opinions shared in this episode are based on personal experience and are not intended to malign any individual, group, or organization.Join The Deeper Pulse at Patreon for weekly bonus episodes + other exclusive bonus content. Follow The Deeper Pulse on IG @thedeeperpulse + @candiceschutter for more regular updates.
What if pleasure wasn't just allowed on your spiritual path—but essential to it? In this episode, I'm talking with Emily Fletcher, founder of Ziva Meditation and former Broadway star, about how pleasure, embodiment, and emotional alchemy can actually accelerate your healing and manifestation. We explore:
In this episode, I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr. Jaime Stover Schmitt. Jaime began traditional yoga training at age six, continued it through high school, and started teaching yoga in 1974. She began offering her integrative approach to yoga therapy as Spanda® Yoga Movement Therapy in 1987. Her offerings are informed by not only ongoing classical yoga study, but by her training in myriad forms of bodywork, movement therapy, career as a professional dancer, and doctorate in Dance Education. For over three decades, Dr. Schmitt has mentored yoga therapists, trained teachers, and led workshops globally. During the podcast, we spoke about her new book, "Somatic Practice in Yoga Therapy." Support the showConnect with Inner Peace Yoga Therapy Email us: info@innerpeaceyogatherapy.com Website Instagram Facebook
I have been an Occupational Therapist since 1991. I started out working in neuro rehab - brain injury rehabilitation, and loved it. I've always been a person who is constantly seeking out more education, especially when you find that you aren't able to help people enough, with what you know. So I studied and became certified in NDT, or Neuro Developmental Treatment early in my career. As I moved into other areas of rehab, I took trainings in Myofascial Release, Hand Therapy, Craniosacral Therapy, and Manual Lymph Drainage. I kept looking for “that thing” that resonated with me. While I learned a lot with these courses and they brought more understanding and different techniques to use, none of them were “it” for me. And they didn't teach people how to help themselves. It was another technique to do “to” them. I have owned my own business, Atha SomaYoga, since 2017, and have an office inside Core Physical Therapy in West Des Moines. I offer mainly private sessions focusing on helping people become aware of their basic resting breath and posture, and imbalances they may have, then help them retrain them through the work of Buteyko Breath Re-education and Somatics. Then I help them retrain their functional movement, with additional tools from yoga, including the poses, philosophy, and Ayurveda (the sister science to yoga) so they can keep themselves moving well, and helping to decrease their pain and/or tension. I lead the 200 and 500 hour Therapeutic SomaYoga programs in Des Moines, through Yoga North International SomaYoga Institute, and am also starting to offer Continuing Education in Somatics and breathwork, to PT's, OT's, and possibly massage therapists, etc., in the future. To connect with Pam: https://www.athasomayoga.com/ To get in touch with Tyler: https://www.tylerkamerman.com/
In this episode, Anna Grear, LLB, joins Evan H. Hirsch, MD, to explore how somatic healing and hypnotherapy can unlock recovery from chronic fatigue and long COVID. Drawing from her 32-year journey with ME/CFS and her background as a law professor turned hypno-healer, Anna Grear, LLB, shares a powerful mind-body approach to healing through self-awareness, nervous system balance, and unconscious transformation. Formerly Professor of Law and Theory at Cardiff University in the UK and currently Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Waikato in New Zealand, Anna now helps people with long-term complex fatigue conditions and spiritual emergence. She combines a deep passion for the intelligence of the body with advanced tools in mind-shifting and hypnotic influence. Her work focuses on health optimization, radical human potential, and awakening the healing wisdom within. What you'll learn in this episode: -. How somatics and hypnosis influence the body's healing capacity -. Why chronic fatigue is often a mismatch between ancient biology and modern stress -. Techniques to regulate the nervous system and access deep calm -. The role of perception, safety, and neuroplasticity in recovery Learn more about Anna's work at: http://www.hypnocatalyst.com Listen to her audio gift here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2113402/15218459 . We help you resolve your Long Covid and Chronic Fatigue (ME/CFS) by finding and fixing the REAL root causes that 95% of providers miss. Learn about these causes and how we help people like you, Click Here. Do you have fatigue, brain fog, shortness of breath, muscle pain, or other strange symptoms? You might have Long Covid. Take our free quiz to find out if Long Covid is behind the mystery symptoms you're experiencing, Click Here. For more information about Evan and his program, Click Here. Prefer to watch on Youtube? Click Here. Please note that any information in this episode is for educational purposes only and does not constitute medical advice.
https://www.liseloensmann.com/ About Missing WitchesAmy Torok and Risa Dickens produce the Missing Witches Podcast. We do every aspect from research to recording, it is a DIY labour of love and craft. Missing Witches is entirely member-supported, and getting to know the members of our Coven has been the most fun, electrifying, unexpectedly radical part of the project. These days the Missing Witches Coven gathers in our private, online coven circle to offer each other collaborative courses in ritual, weaving, divination, and more; we organize writing groups and witchy book clubs; and we gather on the Full and New Moon from all over the world. Our coven includes solitary practitioners, community leaders, techno pagans, crones, baby witches, neuroqueers, and folks who hug trees and have just been looking for their people. Our coven is trans-inclusive, anti-racist, feminist, pro-science, anti-ableist, and full of love. If that sounds like your people, come find out more. Please know that we've been missing YOU. https://www.missingwitches.com/join-the-coven/
In this episode of Literally First Class, Keri Ford provides a comprehensive resource guide for personal and professional development. She discusses her credentials in trauma work, the importance of mentorship, and the dynamics of conscious partnerships. The conversation delves into attachment styles, recommended readings on relationships and healing, and the significance of somatics and the nervous system. Additionally, Keri shares insights on money mindset, feminine leadership, intuitive eating, and various programs available for those seeking to work with her. Takeaways Keri Ford emphasizes the importance of a resource guide for personal growth. She is a trauma-trained practitioner with extensive credentials. Spirituality and healing work are central to her approach. Conscious partnerships differ significantly from traditional relationships. Understanding attachment styles is crucial for healthy relationships. Books on love and relationships can provide valuable insights. The Body Keeps the Score is a key text in somatic healing. Money mindset can transform one's financial relationship. Feminine power is essential in leadership roles. Intuitive eating fosters a healthier relationship with food. Episode Resources: Book your free 15-minute Somatic Strategy Call with Jalena (no sales pitch, just a free nervous system audit)! Explore Keri's programs such as Power Hour sessions, VIP Days, and Private Mentorship. Subscribe to The Newsletter and VIP e-mail list for advanced insights, strategies, and exclusive resources to drive growth, inspire peak performance, and elevate your impact. Step into Keri's FREE Somatic Success® community on Facebook and connect with like-minded individuals on your journey to success! Join us for an exclusive Champagne Club Dinner—a special evening for female founders & investors to connect over great food and conversation.
What if your inner chaos is sacred? When I first pictured a yogi, I imagined someone always calm, serene… maybe even a little untouchable. But the more I've learned—through somatics, spirituality, and lived experience—the more I believe that true healing means feeling everything. Even rage. In this episode, we dive deep into:
In this episode of The Psychedelic Podcast, Paul F. Austin welcomes Dr. Richard Blake, a pioneering psychologist and breathwork researcher, to discuss the science and clinical application of Conscious Connected Breathwork (CCB). Find full show notes and links here: https://thethirdwave.co/podcast/episode-307/?ref=278 Dr. Blake shares key insights from his groundbreaking randomized controlled trial—the largest to date—on the effectiveness of CCB for reducing anxiety. The conversation explores the distinctions between breathwork modalities, how altered states are reached without substances, and why trauma-informed facilitation is essential for safe practice. Paul and Dr. Blake also dive into the pitfalls of mainstream psychotherapy, the overlooked power of lifestyle interventions, and how breathwork compares to both SSRIs and psychedelics in measurable outcomes. Dr. Richard Blake holds a PhD in Transpersonal Psychology and is a pioneering researcher in the field of breathwork, psychedelics, and holistic mental health. He conducted the largest-ever randomized controlled trial on Conscious Connected Breathwork (CCB), providing groundbreaking scientific evidence on its effects on anxiety and well-being. Dr. Blake works with RUNGA, where he is dedicated to advancing the evolution of mental health treatments—moving beyond head-centered approaches to include breathwork, psychedelics, nutrition, exercise, and other integrative healing practices. His mission is to help people unlock deeper levels of psychological resilience, nervous system regulation, and self-awareness through embodied and experiential methods. Highlights: Why breathwork is a potent tool for trauma and anxiety Comparing Holotropic Breathwork to newer trauma-informed approaches Facilitator-to-client ratio standards for safety The ethics and economics of group breathwork sessions Inside the largest randomized trial on CCB for anxiety Why 5% adverse effects matters—and how it compares to SSRIs The “pivotal mental states” hypothesis explained Integration of talk therapy and altered states The power of community and connection in healing From peak performance to depth psychology: Dr. Blake's story Episode Links: Website RUNGA Breathguru Richard on Instagram RUNGA 90-DAY INTENSIVE, START NOW FOR FREE. Episode Sponsons: Golden Rule Mushrooms - Get a lifetime discount of 10% with code THIRDWAVE at checkout
What if anxiety wasn't a flaw, but a signal? In this solo episode, Darin peels back the layers on a topic that affects every one of us: anxiety. But instead of treating it as something to suppress or escape from, Darin offers a bold new perspective — anxiety is your body's cry for balance in an overstimulated world. From breathwork and food to sunlight, grounding, and mindset, this episode explores practical and biological ways to stop reacting and start responding with awareness. With science-backed tools and soul-level wisdom, Darin invites you to reclaim your nervous system and transform daily stress into a signal for deeper connection and healing.