Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is about how to have clear energetic boundaries, strengthen boundaries to protect from absorbing others energy or emotions, releasing and sorting other’s energies from yours, and how to feel healthy as an Empath with practices and perspectives from Family Constellations, energy work, Somatic Experiencing, Group Dynamics, and psychology. Following these are three healing experientials that can support grounding and strengthening energetic boundaries and clearing absorbed energy.

Candice Wu 0:32

Hello and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 0:45

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 1:07

I am really excited about the Soul Body Women’s Retreat, which is the sponsor of this podcast. Soul Body Women’s Retreat is in October 2018. And this retreat was inspired by the idea of connecting soul to body such you feel completely like yourself embodied and at ease, expressing yourself freely and creatively just the way it is truly you.

Candice Wu 1:32

The beauty of connection of soul and body is that you can develop the awareness to transcend the limitations and the belief sets that you’ve been living from that you can feel even freer and more conscious.

Candice Wu 1:45

This is a small group retreat. So if you feel inspired or aligned with this, feel free to reach out to me and I’d be grateful if you share this with anyone you thought would be interested. For this and future retreats, you can find out more at CandiceWu.com/retreats.

Candice Wu 2:00

Now, let’s jump into the show.

Candice Wu 2:06

As a healing facilitator and intuitive coach, I’m often working very deeply with people’s emotions, sometimes on very deep and traumatic ones, and sometimes very pleasurable ones.

Candice Wu 2:20

People are often asking me, how do I stay clear and grounded in my own energy? How do I not pick up other people’s energy? And how do I know what’s inside of me if I’ve picked something up or not? And how do I strengthen my boundaries so that I don’t absorb others energy? Is this possible?

Candice Wu 2:39

And so today’s episode is all about that. This is something I’ve worked hard at for the last 10 years. I would say about 10 years ago, if I walked into a room, a crowded room, I could feel the emotion like a tidal wave, it would feel like suddenly, I’m feeling differently from when I walked in. And when I left, I would either feel bad, self-conscious, maybe I’d have a headache or a stomach ache, perhaps I would feel a wave of sadness or angry or tense somehow in my body. And I really had no idea where it came from, other than, “Wow, I can’t handle being around people.” Or, “Wow, I have so many triggers that I’m just feeling so much anxiety in me, so much emotion. And here it all is.”

Candice Wu 3:29

So I attributed all of that to my own experience and just me solely. Of course, some of it was mine. Some of it was my personal triggers and the things that I would feel anxious about, but it felt like an extra load by times five. So some of it wasn’t mine. It was almost as if I was like a magnet to other people’s negative emotions.

Candice Wu 3:54

Sometimes that was very cool. Like, I would be very aware of how someone was feeling, especially if cared about them and could really relate to them. And other times, I was just left feeling horrible.

Candice Wu 4:06

It wasn’t until I learned about being an Empath, as well as the concept of Projective Identification and psychology and Family Constellations and Somatic Experiencing work, that I realized that I was picking up other people’s energy. And that while I could cope with that, and find ways to navigate that differently, I could also strengthen my boundaries so that I did not have to take in all that energy.

Candice Wu 4:35

Learning about this truly released me because I found ways to strengthen and fine tune my own energetic system, my own body, and my awareness so that I could have stronger boundaries when I needed them. That I could navigate and release any energy that I did pick up effectively, that it didn’t just carry around forever. And how to use the experiences that left me with something that was mine to learn and grow from, grow stronger in my nervous system.

Candice Wu 5:04

At this point in my life, I feel a lot clearer. I feel more grounded stronger in my boundaries. And I have more of a conscious choice of whether I want to tune into energy around me and emotion around me, as well as I can more effectively navigate what’s mine and what’s not and clear it if I need to, if I have picked something up that I’m not aware of. And I feel less blindsided by energy in general, that just somehow has stayed with me from who knows when in the day.

Candice Wu 5:36

So you might wonder if this topic pertains to at all “Have you ever felt icky or a different emotion after being around someone?” Yes, it could be something you’re triggered by. But it also could be some energy that you picked up or are holding for someone else. Perhaps being around groups, you may feel overwhelmed or almost taken over by a certain emotion. If when you’re around others especially if you are some sort of healing practitioner, therapist, a person that works with others in a health or healing capacity, perhaps you feel fatigued or exhausted, you might begin to feel irritation or edgy or angry.

Candice Wu 6:15

This is the body’s natural instinct to push back or reject, push out whatever it doesn’t really belong in your energy field. Perhaps something’s not digesting well in your body, or you’re feeling disrupted sleep or other physical symptoms, headaches.

Candice Wu 6:31

If you’re someone that doesn’t feel like you have enough alone time and you’re feeling overstimulated by sounds, light, smells, touches, and textures. Or if you’re feeling certain emotions, sensations in your body, thoughts that seem to be extra loaded or intense after being around groups or certain people, that may be a sense in you to look at, are you picking up other people’s emotions?

Candice Wu 6:58

Well, many of those aspects can be your own body’s experience or something that you’re reacting to. It can also be added onto by other people’s energies. And we’ll look at how to sort that out in this episode.

Candice Wu 7:16

So today’s episode is five-fold.

Candice Wu 7:19

First, we’ll look at what may be related to the experience of being unbalanced or loaded with other people’s energy. Here we’ll talk briefly about being highly sensitive and an Empath.

Candice Wu 7:32

Secondly, we’ll talk about understanding how to ground and direct your energy to be in yourself, so that your boundaries are stronger.

Candice Wu 7:39

Third, will explore knowing what’s yours and what’s not in terms of energy, sensation, or dynamics.

Candice Wu 7:47

Fourth, how to strengthen your own boundary and heal up any ruptures to your boundary, whether that’s an energetic or physical rupture, or something that’s even deeper.

Candice Wu 7:56

Which leads us to number five, is looking at the unconscious and conscious beliefs, the past conditioning, and internalized projections that connect with why you even take on other people’s emotions to begin with, if it is out of balance.

Candice Wu 8:14

So let’s begin with the first one what may be related to the experience of taking in other’s emotions, and what is an Empath or highly sensitive person.

Candice Wu 8:23

When you’re picking up on other people’s energies or emotions or thoughts, what they’re experiencing, it’s beyond just having empathy for someone.

Candice Wu 8:33

Dr. Judith Orloff who’s an expert with this, says that having empathy means our heart goes out to another person in joy or pain, but for Empath, it goes much farther. We actually feel other’s emotions, energy, and physical symptoms in our own bodies without the usual defenses that most people have.

Candice Wu 8:52

So whether or not you would consider yourself an Empath, if you are someone that feels very affected by other people’s energy or their moods, or you feel very intuitive and can perceive others very well, then you might be experiencing picking up other people’s energy or absorbing it not only emotions and energies, moods, and body sensations.

Candice Wu 9:15

People who are very empathic can also feel into other’s wishes, their thoughts, impulses, motivations, and desires like other people with empathic abilities.

Candice Wu 9:29

I was told very early and very young that I was too sensitive. And so this is something that I experience most healers who are Empaths or therapists that are very tuned in to have a struggle with because they’ve had to overcome the criticism of their gifts.

Candice Wu 9:49

Being empathic in this way is actually a beautiful gift. What it can also come with, is being very in touch with your inner world and having a complex inner life, feeling in touch with depth and creativity as well as spirituality or something unseen and deeper. Someone who has this ability to tune in and be sensitive can also be aware of the subtleties and nuances of situations and can attune easily to what’s happening.

Candice Wu 10:19

In my most natural state, I’m easeful and balanced. I feel buoyant and grounded at the same time. And I feel that I can turn on and off my ability to tune in. Once in a while, I feel like something’s hit me. And that’s usually when I look inside to see where that receptor is in me, that I can strengthen that aspect of myself so I don’t get blindsided.

Candice Wu 10:45

We all have the ability to pick up on other people’s energies, it just depends how diffuse or open your boundary system is. And if you are someone who has that ability more easily, you might have more of Vata quality. Vata in Ayurveda is one of the Doshas, one of the three main qualities of the whole universe.

Candice Wu 11:09

And Vata is the air and space quality, where it’s movement-oriented, and open versus Pitta, which is fiery, and Kapha, which is Earth and water. We have all three qualities, but somebody who is more open in their energetic system can have more of that Vata quality.

Candice Wu 11:29

So what I found in myself and in others that I’ve worked with around this topic of taking in other’s energy is that when we do that in an unbalanced way, usually underneath that are some beliefs that relate to it, which cause us to take in unconsciously other people’s energies. Sometimes there’s trauma, whether that’s developmental in the person’s lifetime, a soul like a past life, trauma, and also ancestral dynamics.

Candice Wu 11:59

So the dynamics within a family system that go way back. Sometimes it also connects up with Collective Oppression, or other archetypal and energetic dynamics in our whole system, where there’s a Developmental Trauma, sometimes that can relate to not having an emotionally available and good enough parent to be present, to reflect and mirror and be attuned to us as children, which can make it more challenging for a young person to have a core sense of self and to know themselves. To be able to have that reflection by someone we care about gives us a sense of ourselves.

Candice Wu 12:40

And if we don’t have that, then sometimes we don’t have this individuation that separates us from another. Other attachment issues like neglect and abandonment, or disruption at a certain age where maybe another child was born, or some accident or illness happened with the parents or the children, that can also affect how a person develops their sense of self. And it can certainly affect the physical and energetic boundaries of that individual.

Candice Wu 13:11

The difficulty with Developmental Traumas is that sometimes we don’t even know we have them. And we think that our childhood is just great. But also that it is really challenging for the nervous system to develop, if we’ve had disruptions in our childhood, especially ones that were scary, overwhelming or terrifying.

Candice Wu 13:33

Our nervous system as an infant is not built to handle all kinds of emotions, even pleasant ones. And we need the support of a calm, grounded, and attuned adult parent to support us in co-regulating so that our nervous system can develop and strengthen and be able to handle feeling all that.

Candice Wu 13:58

If we don’t have someone that has that ability to regulate themselves, it can feel like we’re also taking on the parents emotions, then we can quickly see how a very early imprint of this dynamic happens, where we’re absorbing other people’s emotions.

Candice Wu 14:17

And in the Family Constellations work, where we look at how the family dynamic is, it connects up with the whole body experience. And a young person who feels like their mother or their father isn’t able to handle their sadness perhaps, or their anxiety will come in and fill in that role. If there’s a sense of a disconnection between the grandparents and parents in our family system, we may take that responsibility upon ourselves to become like a parent to our own parents so we’d become parentified.

Candice Wu 14:53

And in that way, we take on a responsibility that’s far too great for us. We take on being the parent for our parents, which is not our position at all. And it causes us to take in energies and emotions and hold them for others thinking that they can’t handle it.

Candice Wu 15:09

In this way, we act like we are bigger than our parents. We act like we can handle more and that we’re stronger. And then we apply that to the world and begin to absorb other people’s emotions, just like we did to our own parents, if this is the case for your life.

Candice Wu 15:25

In other cases, one may have a parent who is somewhat narcissistic, where they’re acting as if the child is an extension of them, and must act accordingly. It’s quite manipulative in terms of what a parent might almost push their children into feeling. And so those boundaries between child and parent have been blurred, and messy.

Candice Wu 15:54

And all of this connects to the idea of Projective Identification. This is the concept where when one person in relationship with another, projects in emotion that they don’t want to feel, perhaps it’s undesirable or intolerable, or their nervous system is overwhelmed so much that they can’t feel it. So maybe it’s anger. And instead of feeling their own anger, they push it out of their energy system, and hope that the other person begins to feel it so that is taken care of.

Candice Wu 16:30

And the other person says, “Okay, I’ll take that,” unconsciously. Because their system has learned to take that in and they identify with that, so that they almost claim that anger as their own.

Candice Wu 16:44

This happens all the time in our intimate relationships, in our acquaintance relationships, as well as a whole in society, where certain groups of people don’t want to feel something and projected onto others.

Candice Wu 16:57

So if somewhere in your life, you’ve had this conditioning, whether that’s in your childhood, which can be a very intense kind of conditioning, in society, in your culture, or in a past life, then this can be ingrained in you to take on other people’s emotions.

Candice Wu 17:15

I think of it like this, if one person has all these different rocks of different emotions, and they’re able to feel these five rocks and not these five, and they don’t like feeling any of those emotions. So they toss them out and push them down in suppression or repression. Because it may be too intolerable for them to feel, or they just don’t want to feel that way, whatever is undesirable, this is like the shadow, right? We don’t want to feel these things so we push them out. And someone else not only senses that, but takes those rocks in and puts them into their pot of emotions.

Candice Wu 17:58

Now, the key piece is that even if those rocks are pushed out into the open space, the other person doesn’t have to take them in.

Candice Wu 18:08

Why does one take them in and put them in as their own set of rocks? And in my experience, personally and with others, it’s that there’s some sort of ingrained pattern and conditioning that this was about survival at some point to do so or in some way, it was helpful at some time. And now it’s just become a habit. Now, it might even be dysfunctional, and painful.

Candice Wu 18:33

So I find that I’m most balanced when I’m aware of what I’m taking in. In this example, what rocks I’m picking up, so that there’s a purpose to doing that. It might be to support someone else in being able to hold their own rocks, but not to take them in because I think they’re mine, or, to do so on automatic or unconsciously, and to just absorb everything around me.

Candice Wu 18:59

If you’ve had accidents, like car accidents, or falls, natural disasters, or other physical traumas, then the physical body, as well as the energetic boundary of the body, can be broken in certain areas where energies and sensations can just swoop in.

Candice Wu 19:18

Also, another aspect to consider is that your soul history, what your experiences were in your past lives, if you believe in that, or whatever you believe you came in with, is part of your past conditioning. And if it has anything to do with being a shaman, or healer, or witch in a past life, that may also be connected to how it is you take in energy now.

Candice Wu 19:43

And again here, I think that the ideal, the most healthy and balanced places to find a place of choice where you’re able to choose what to take in and what not to, and also to navigate how to deal with it when you have taken something in.

Candice Wu 19:59

So now, I want to shift gears and talk about how to stay grounded and strengthen your energy boundary without doing deeper work but to just look at how you can take different actions.

Candice Wu 20:12

When you’re in a situation where you feel icky, or somewhat uncomfortable, when you’re with somebody, or in a certain situation, try to distance yourself at least by 20 feet, and see if you feel any relief. See if it’s something that you’re triggered by. Or if it’s just as simple as moving away. You can breathe and send your energy downward into your legs and feet, just loosen up the ankles, and press into the bottoms of the feet. And imagine feeling like you are 500 pounds heavy, that you’re just rooted into the ground. And this sending of energy downward and strengthening of the muscles, activating of the muscles, helps the body know its own boundary, physically and energetically.

Candice Wu 20:57

A third thing you can try is to see your energy boundary, imagine what color or thickness or material this sort of energy boundary would be, if you could just make it up. And imagine that sort of force field around you. The interesting thing about some of these practices is that some of them will work for you at different times and some won’t work at all. Because with this exercise of seeing your energy boundary, I tried that very early on and it was like “This, didn’t do anything.”

Candice Wu 21:29

And that’s because I had a lot of developmental, ancestral, and soul trauma that was deeply rooted. And so changing the energy dynamic of all that was necessary before I could even have an energetic boundary around me that was working.

Candice Wu 21:48

So notice for yourself, which ones might work and not. So this third one of seeing your energy boundary, I would recommend practicing this on your own before you’re around people, or in a crowd. I would suggest doing this both physically as well as in your imagination so that it strengthens with your whole body.

Candice Wu 22:08

So as you picture some sort of energetic boundary or bubble that surrounds you, imagine being safe inside of it, and that you could even touch all the parts of your energetic boundary. And notice what color, texture, shapes, or material it would have to be in order to be strong enough for you to feel safe inside.

Candice Wu 22:29

And you can also picture what happens if energy comes at you, or some emotion comes at you and touches the boundary. Does it bounce off? Does it sizzle into flames? And as you feel into the energy boundary, and picture all the way around you like an egg shape up and down, side to side, front to back, use your arms to just check how far out you’d want it to be, or how close, and if there are any ruptures in that.

Candice Wu 22:59

Another thing you can practice is to be like an animal. Porcupines have a really nice boundary of these quills that just can spike up if they’re upset, and they don’t want someone to get near. So that’s something you can picture for yourself. And imagine your own energetic spikes coming up. And that is if you need a boundary that strong, if there’s someone you don’t want to talk to, or don’t want to come near you. Or if you’re feeling like there’s a lot of energy in the room and you don’t want to take it on but even just something into a lion at its rest state, it’s prepared to snarl or show its claws if it needs to. So just having that bit of readiness can support you in feeling a little more grounded in your body and prepared to protect yourself.

Candice Wu 23:49

Something you can always practice is a body scan. It’s just feeling head to toe, all the parts of your body. And as a daily practice, you can even touch your body, head to toe every part of it and just feel into whatever kind of touch feels good and helps you feel the edges of your body.

Candice Wu 24:07

What happens when we have trauma or when we have very loose energy boundaries is that our nervous system almost forgets that it has a physical body, a physical container to support us and to also act as that edge of inside-outside and what we take in and what we don’t. So touching the body from head to toe reminds us of that and gives us a sense of our personal edges.

Candice Wu 24:34

Another thing you can do is to practice setting healthy boundaries and saying no, when you mean no. And no is a complete sentence, there’s no need for an explanation. Sometimes you might need to interrupt someone to take a break. Or if someone asks too much of you, or takes and asserts it, then you can back up and say no, or let them know that this is not comfortable with you.

Candice Wu 25:00

Part of having loose boundaries sometimes goes into giving yourself away to others and letting them do what they want. Or not having a voice in terms of what you prefer. Letting others lead the way or just saying yes to everything that they asked for. And in some cases too, I’ve noticed myself, actually, I had parasites because I was in this place of always saying yes to others, and giving away my energy and letting others come first.

Candice Wu 25:32

At some point, I developed parasites because I had taken a trip to Sri Lanka and probably, you know, ate the food and water and wasn’t really prepared for that. And because my energy system was weakened already by this dynamic of just letting everything vampire off of me, I got sick.

Candice Wu 25:52

So with that, it’s really important to practice listening to yourself and not overriding what you sense, what you need, or what you want. I noticed that I’m most vulnerable in picking up other people’s energy when I don’t want to be in this situation, when my instincts tell me it’s time to go or my social meters out. And if I override that, I pick up a lot more as well as some part of my nervous system gets triggered because I’m not listening.

Candice Wu 26:22

From the Ayurvedic standpoint, I mentioned earlier that there’s a lot of Vata at times when you’re very empathic, or you are picking up other people’s energy. So you can be grounding foods especially if you know you’re going to be on a situation that you’re sensitive too, such as crowds or certain people’s emotions that you magnetized. Give yourself some weight by eating heavier foods that can be meats, if you eat meat or avocado, something that actually feels like it has weight, something sweeter and with more water.

Candice Wu 26:53

This is a lot of information but I want to give you a few more techniques from energy standpoints. At some point, I will transcribe all this and put it on my website so that it’s a little bit easier to follow but I will share just a couple more here.

Candice Wu 27:13

The Zip Up technique from Donna Eden is really nice. It’s like zipping up an energetic coat to protect you from taking on other people’s emotions or energies and it works with the central meridians of the body, the energy pathways that are moving up and down. And the way you do this is you take your hand or two hands at your pubic bone and as you take a deep breath up, slide your hands up the center of your body all the way to your lower lip. And you can do this while touching your physical body or a couple of inches away from it and just repeat this three times.

Candice Wu 27:50

The next one I want to offer you is called “Getting on the Grid”. It’s actually something my friends and I in grad school made up where we noticed this Alex Gray artwork. I will link this in the show notes so you can see it. But it’s this beautiful artwork of a person meditating and you can see each of the Chakras, the energy centers in the body, seven of them in different colors. And this person is sitting on this grid. And its got diagonal lines coming through each side, as well as lines, I think, top and bottom. And for us, it was really helpful to just say to ourselves “Get on the grid.” So, it’s like centering yourselves, containing your energy into your body and then getting on the grid of the universe where your solid and grounded. And I will lead you through that in the meditation that comes connected with this podcast in the next few days.

Candice Wu 28:46

The last thing I want to offer in terms of supporting yourself to be grounded is the approach that you take when you’re around people. Instead of thinking that you were there to help somebody especially if you’re a therapist, healer or wellness practitioner or that somehow you should give advice or be responsible for other people, instead, start to feel people as completely whole and autonomous, full of personal choice and their healing power within, that they have everything that they need inside of them. And sometimes it’s tricky because your mind starts running and thinking, “But they don’t, they need my help.” Even so, if you can release someone to their own inner healing and the universe is healing, you can still support them by showing them tools or guiding them or even sharing your thoughts of them, but to keep that respect, the deep respect and honoring of them as a human being with their own potential.

Candice Wu 29:46

So now we move to the third section of the podcast today. How do you know if you’ve picked up or absorbed other people’s energy? What do you do if you have and how do you cleanse and release?

Candice Wu 29:58

Some of the more general things that I do to cleanse and refresh and reset myself are to shower or bathe, use Epsom salt and baking soda to cleanse and sometimes I like to take a little apple cider vinegar digestively to move anything through.

Candice Wu 30:16

You can also imagine a white or yellow light clearing and cleansing your body like crystal clear light and sunshine, just refreshing all the cells of your body with breath.

Candice Wu 30:28

And the third thing is that I like to cough up energy, might sound funny, but it’s sort of like gagging and coughing and almost throwing up in the air where I feel like there’s stuff releasing out of my body. Maybe it’s my shaman history that I already knew how to do this. But somehow it’s very natural and innate to me. You can do this, it’s simple, it’s a little bit like lion’s breath in Yoga. Lion’s breath is where you take a deep breath in. And when you release your breath, you stick your tongue out as far as you can and you make some noise or a sound. It sounds like this.

Candice Wu 31:13

And you just hold your tongue out as far as you can, with the breath all the way out. You can try it that way just to release anything that doesn’t feel good inside. Or, you can actually try that and begin to cough and gag. It’s not a bad thing or a scary thing. But if you do feel scared, or overwhelmed, take a break or practice with a trained professional.

Candice Wu 31:37

And as you do this, you can also imagine whatever it is, that’s coming out. And when I do it, I just cough and gag. And sometimes I have a couple of tears come out. But almost immediately, I just feel released. Sometimes I’ll feel some sadness with it. Sometimes I’ll feel some other emotion that doesn’t seem like it’s mine. But as I cough, it just comes out. And I imagine what’s coming out if I can sense a color or an emotion and just leave it.

Candice Wu 32:09

Any of the grounding activities that I mentioned before, you can also do when you notice you’ve picked up some energy or when you’re not sure and you’re just checking in. So for example, a body scan or touching your body head to toe, breathing, grounding your feet feeling like they’re 500 pounds, any of those.

Candice Wu 32:28

I find the strongest tool in knowing if I’ve picked up or absorbed other’s energy is checking it in with myself. And the important thing for me is to do that throughout my interactions with others, or whatever interactions I’m having. Sensing into how I’m doing, where I’m at what I’m feeling around me what I’m feeling through me and inside, but also afterward, check in with myself, see how my emotions are, how is my body doing.

Candice Wu 33:01

And if I’m feeling something ungrounded or unbalanced, some other emotion than I was noticing before, something that’s a bit unfamiliar, then I will connect with it. So whatever it is I’m feeling, I will give a little space to myself, and tune in and just breathe into that space if I feel it in my body, in my heart, and I’ll just notice it. Let myself acknowledge what it feels like in my body. And I’ll sense into it.

Candice Wu 33:33

Sometimes this is where I talked to myself and talk to my body and ask “What are you? Whose are you? And sometimes I’ll just have this intuition of ”This doesn’t feel like mine. But what is it?” So I also connect with it and explore.

Candice Wu 33:51

If it is indeed a sense that it’s somebody else’s, the first thing that I do is just try to clear it back and give it back to who it belongs to, or give it up to the universe. I just imagine this energy, whatever color or shape it is, just traveling back to the person it belongs to. And with that person or persons, I just imagine if there’s any energy that’s mine, that I take that back and drop back to myself.

Candice Wu 34:21

This specific practice is another one of the healing experientials that I’ll share with you this week, to guide you through taking back what energy is yours, and releasing any energy that doesn’t belong to you back to where it belongs, so look out for that. If some energy doesn’t want to go or doesn’t want to move, you can stay with it a little bit further, and ask it what it needs to release or to leave, to let go.

Candice Wu 34:47

And whatever it says, without any judgment or filter. Just imagine what it needs and wants. Imagine it happening and see what happens in your body. So, whatever your left with, if you’ve cleared up other people’s energies, or you’ve imagined whatever emotions just going back to who they belong to, if you’ve done some resetting and clearing of your own energy, if you’re left with something still, then that likely means it’s a piece of your own trigger or some aspect of you that is a receptor for that issue, or that emotion or sensation.

Candice Wu 35:27

So what you’re left with, there’s a space in you to receive other people’s emotions in that same way, and it alerts you and lets you know this is where your work is. This is the place that your boundary is ruptured, and that you can transform and heal so you can become stronger if you want to.

Candice Wu 35:50

An example of this is, I was working with a client where immigration was something that had happened in their family history. What seemed to show up was that this family was very excited and hopeful that moving to the United States would be a better life. But it seemed that when they arrived, there was some large grief and disappointment, some pain and survival and struggle, because it wasn’t as they had expected, it wasn’t as accepting to their culture as they hoped it would be.

Candice Wu 36:25

When I was done with this session, I felt that this feeling of grief and disappointment was still sticking with me. I wondered, “Had I picked up my client’s pain, the ancestry’s pain, or was it my own?

Candice Wu 36:42

So I did some of the practices that I had suggested a bit earlier. And what I was left with was still the grief and disappointment. So that point, I knew that it had to do with me.

Candice Wu 36:55

Of course, what I’ve been processing for the last 10 years is the feeling of grief and disappointment of my childhood experience, that there were just things that I really wanted to happen and they didn’t, relationships that I wanted to go a certain way, and they went the entirely other way. So I’ve actually been more recently processing how this experience was to my spirit, that on this grander scale of entering this life with a lot of hope and optimism and excitement for what this life would bring, that early life was disappointing and full of grief and loss, though I wasn’t able to feel those feelings until much later.

Candice Wu 37:38

I’m grateful at this time of my life that I can feel into the gifts of what the trauma and disappointing experiences I had early on, have given me now for my life, but it doesn’t really change the grief and disappointment, those feelings are still there and moving through.

Candice Wu 37:56

So what I was left with after working with this client was my own piece of grief and disappointment. And working with it just reminds your system that this energy is there, and it pulls it up to the surface.

Candice Wu 38:12

So that’s how we know that there’s a piece of us that wants healing, is when something stays with us for longer. Otherwise, for me, at this point in my life, emotions that I’ve perhaps sensed into with others, just roll off my back and move through, or they’re just very easily fluid, and they don’t have something to stick on to, like Velcro.

Candice Wu 38:34

So this brings us to the topic of strengthening your own boundaries and healing up your energetic ruptures.

Candice Wu 38:41

As I mentioned earlier, you can work with your energetic boundary and picture it, use your hands to touch into it and sense where it is. And if you do find ruptures with it, sense what that is, let this attune you to your sense of what might need to be healed so that you can be stronger in yourself, and not let other’s energies come into you.

Candice Wu 39:06

You can work with the experience of energy swooping into your energy field, or, you taking up other people’s energy and absorbing it by imagining it more slowly. Imagine you could see energy coming at you, or that you’re just sucking it up, see how far it goes and where it touches into you, if you could imagine that. Let your body respond back to push it out whether that’s with your imagination of what you would do or literally and physically with your hands. Imagine taking other people’s energy and pushing it back out of your body and your energy field. So that it’s way out and as far out as you need it to be, then keep your hands up as if to say no, this blocks you from taking in more.

Candice Wu 39:55

And that’s something you may need to practice because I’ve noticed that I’m much more of a receiver of negative energies than I am a pushing back kind of person. And it may be something you need to practice to push back.

Candice Wu 40:09

This is a Somatic Experiencing practice. I’m sure it’s in other practices. But if you want to develop that further, you can work with somebody in Somatic Experiencing.

Candice Wu 40:19

I do that work myself and can also give you some recommendations. But if you practice this, you can develop a stronger energetic center and personal boundary so that you’re less likely to take in energies from outside of you.

Candice Wu 40:35

Now the thing you can practice is, putting your hands out and up like face up, as if you’re receiving and just imagine receiving pleasurable experience, joyful experience, and not taking in what others are feeling or negative emotions or any toxicity, but just taking in pleasure. So both the experience of putting a boundary up and saying “No” to what you don’t want to take in and opening the hands to receive what you do want to take in, letting that boundary be permeable to the different types of experience you want to take in and don’t.

Candice Wu 41:16

There are so many practices that you can do to strengthen your boundary. But I’d like to leave you with those today. As well as just a few thoughts about going deeper and excavating the belief sets and past conditioning that are underneath the whole energy dynamic, to begin with.

Candice Wu 41:35

What I found in myself and others that seem to absorb other’s emotions and energies, is a sense of responsibility for others, that they’re responsible for saving them or responsible for making them feel good or pleasing them. Some of the belief sets that I’ve held in aspects of my younger self and my adult self are that it’s my job to absorb all the negativity. It’s my job to absorb anger and loss, because other people couldn’t handle it in my ancestry at that time. It’s my job to fix all the problems. And I essentially exist for other people and for other people to feel good. It’s my responsibility to maintain others well being. It’s my responsibility to save the world.

Candice Wu 42:24

And you can see where all of these might lead my unconscious energy to just absorb everything bad and take it in and to digest it myself a couple of other belief sets that I’ve noticed in myself and others are what we’re feeling worthy of receiving. For example, believing that I’m only worthy of receiving bad or that I’m undeserving of receiving pleasure in goodness and joy.

Candice Wu 42:52

So taking a look at what unconsciously you feel you’re able to receive, that you’re allowed to receive or have, and also looking at what the conditions are of your worth, and being lovable. Specifically, I find that when we’re growing up, we learn different ways that we need to act or be, in order to be lovable or worthy. So did you internalize or come in with a belief that in order to be worthy and lovable, that you need to absorb all the emotions in the room, or that you need to take on more than what’s yours?

Candice Wu 43:32

Some people even resonate with the words in order to be worthy of God. “I need to save the world,” or “In order to be worthy of God,” etc. Whether or not you believe in God, sometimes that seems to hit some level of our being when you just say the words out loud, and going back to the way that we might have been parentified, or in some position in our family ancestry unconsciously, that takes on more than what our share is, that takes on a position that isn’t ours, what we’re actually saying when we do that is “I am bigger, better and smarter than others.”

Candice Wu 44:09

And in fact, if it was a parental vacation, where you felt like you were a parent to your parent, that’s in the position of saying you are much bigger than your parents. And that is untrue, without your superior to your parents. It also suggests that you can handle more than they can, or that they’re fragile and you’re not. But what I find is actually that’s a very deep lack of trust in others, and a dependency that others need to be in a certain place or in a certain way for you to be okay, that’s actually just more of a younger need, a dependency that our parents need to be okay so that we’re okay so it comes instinctually.

Candice Wu 44:53

And yet, as adults, we don’t necessarily need to be that way anymore. We don’t necessarily need to be dependent on that way. Because we have different resources. So what I suggest is to look at all of the underlying beliefs or dynamics of why it is that you absorb other people’s emotions, and let a lot of gentleness and self-forgiveness come in, you can use the words “I forgive myself for judging myself for believing that – whatever that is.”

Candice Wu 45:25

For example, “I forgive myself for judging myself for believing that in order to be worthy, I need to take in all the negative emotions.” And if you practice this, let yourself feel it, emotions have to move for it to shift your whole energy and physical system.

Candice Wu 45:46

Sometimes just shedding light on what the beliefs are underneath are ready, create a shift and allow for change to happen, so that you don’t have to live by that paradigm or dynamic anymore. Having these beliefs doesn’t mean all of you believes it. And certainly, your mind may not believe it at all, your mind may know completely differently. But there is a feeling sense inside that this is true on some level or in some part of you.

Candice Wu 46:14

So be very kind and compassionate with yourself. Because at this time, in our human consciousness, we are living with so many distorted belief sets and limiting beliefs and places of suffering. So be gentle and let these come to the surface with kindness, so that you can find a different way.

Candice Wu 46:38

So that’s all I have for you today. We talked today about having clear energetic boundaries, how to strengthen your boundaries, and protect yourself from absorbing other people’s energies, and how to sort out what’s going on inside of you and practices to feel healthy and balanced.

Candice Wu 46:57

And so in this next week, I will release three different healing practices that can support you in exactly what we talked about. The first one is about clearing energies back to where they belong, becoming whole again, reclaiming your own energy.

Candice Wu 47:11

The second one is about getting on the grid. This is an energetic way to center your energy system and to ground and the third one is a Family Constellations, healing exercise, to release responsibility for what’s not yours, and to receive only the best. This will support you and seeing other’s strength and wholeness through their entire family system, or through their spirits so that you’re not responsible for anyone else’s emotions, even if they don’t want to take responsibility for themselves.

Candice Wu 47:44

I hope you enjoy these and feel free as always, to let me know how they are, give me feedback, ask questions. And if there’s any aspect of what we talked about today, that’s missing, feel free to let me know, I’d be happy to hear from you.

Candice Wu 47:58

Thank you so much for listening today and if you found anything touching, interesting or helpful, I would be so grateful. If you thought about donating on patreon, you can find the information at CandiceWu.com/patreon. And even just $1 a month can support all the backend of this work, this podcast and all the creations that I put out there so that I can continue.

Candice Wu 48:24

I’m so grateful for all the people who have already donated and several of you have chosen to donate at the level where you can receive a personal meditation and I’ve just loved doing those. So you might consider it if you’re interested in a little bit of personal healing and to exchange.

Candice Wu 48:42

Before you go today, I would invite you to listen to more interviews, meditations, and explorations at CandiceWu.com/podcast and you can subscribe to my bi-monthly newsletter, become a member of the Embody Community at CandiceWu.com/embody. We can get lots of free resources on embodiment and healing, meditations and info about some good stuff coming up. On the Embody Community Facebook group, I’ve started to do some more live feeds where I’m sharing some healing tips and ideas that I’m thinking about that you can explore with me and interact with other people in the community. So that’s all for today and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Introduction

This is the second healing meditation related to the series around energy boundaries and clearing any absorbed energies from outside of you.

You can find the full series of three meditations plus an introduction around tips and tools, about how to clear your energy to know when you’ve absorbed others’ energy and to use any opportunities of absorbing energy to bring more wisdom and strength.

You can find all that at CandiceWu.com/energy.

This particular meditation is called Getting on the Grid.

This was inspired by many experiences of my friends and me during grad school where we felt that we were ungrounded and had picked up on others’ energies after practicing sessions.

Purpose of Getting on the Grid

When we’re with or working with someone intimately with their inner world or with relationships, emotions, or anything that’s touching in at a deeper level, we may be having an energetic exchange at an unconscious level.

This meditation of getting on the grid is to support you in feeling grounded, centered, complete and whole, so that your energy boundary is strong, and that you can support yourself in being as clear and protected as possible from other outside energies.

This also allows you to come from the space of very deep respect and honoring for another person when you approach them, work with them, or if you’re in their presence.

So if you’re not a practitioner of healing work, or a therapist or a wellness practitioner of any sort, that’s okay, you can use this to feel centered in yourself no matter what kinds of interactions you are having.

The words “getting on the grid” actually came from an Alex Grey painting called, Theologue.

This painting is linked in the show notes at CandiceWu.com/energy.

And I highly recommend taking a look at it because it can help you have a visual for getting on the grid.

It’s a painting of a human in a lotus position with the legs folded.

In this person, the energy centers: the chakras, are all lined up the spine, and they’re lined up with a grid of the entire, what feels to me like the entire universe and surrounding this is this entire grid that maps out onto fire, mountains, earth, air, and space.

There’s an energy bubble around this person that feels like a strong energetic boundary and an aura of radiance.

The description under the painting is pretty complex, but it also gives a feel for this painting.

It says the union of human and divine consciousness, weaving the fabric of space and time in which the self and its surroundings are embedded.

And that’s exactly what getting on the grid feels like to me.

It’s aligning yourself to the grid of the universe, the grid of consciousness that you’re rooted and anchored in who you are, and nothing more.

So let’s jump into the meditation.

Take a moment to find a comfortable seated position where you feel supported and at ease.

So if that means placing a pillow or a block, like a Yoga block underneath you, a blanket rolled up. Support your body in feeling grounded and centered.

Now place your palms face down on your knees and touch your pointer fingers to your thumbs. This closes your energetic centers to yourself.

Just using this mudra, this hand position can also help you in grounding and closing off your energy boundaries so that you’re not giving away or receiving as much.

Now feel into your body exactly the way it is.

Sense your breath moving in and out of your nose or your mouth without changing it at all.

Notice any holding in your body, any tension or resistance to gravity and feel however it is to be in your body at this moment.

Awareness of the Energy Centers

Bring your awareness to your belly button.

We will first take a moment to sense into each of the energy centers, the chakras, and to circulate your awareness to the central channel of the body.

Sensing the belly button, take your awareness down to the pubic bone and now notice the perineum, the very base of the pelvis.

Now shift your awareness to your tailbone, and now the spine behind the belly button, and the spine behind the heart, the spine behind the base of the neck, or C7 vertebra.

Now notice the back of the head behind the third eye, the space between the eyebrows, and now the very crown of the head.

Sense the third eye, the space right in between the eyebrows, and now the base of the neck.

Feel into the center of the chest and now come all the way back to the belly button. Now continue to the pubic bone and now the perineum.

As you land on the perineum, draw an imaginary line from there up to the center of your diaphragm.

And now from this point, draw another line up from there through the chest up to the soft palate at the back of the roof of the mouth and imagine another dot there.

And from here, draw a line up to the very crown of the head, placing a fourth point there.

From the perineum at the base of the pelvis, the center of the diaphragm, the soft palate, and the crown of the head, imagine this central channel of the body called, Sushumna, all aligned vertically.

Notice your whole physiology as these four points in line. Imagine the rest of your body just falling away and with every breath out, just letting that exhalation grow longer, smoother, and deeper.

With this central channel of the body, imagine it syncing up with a universal grid. A grid of diagonal lines, vertical lines, and horizontal lines all to keep you rooted and anchored in time and space.

Alignment — Getting on the Grid

Feel yourself completely aligned with yourself, aligned with the universe and flowing, where you can release any holding or resistance and let your natural state be in sync with all.

Where you can see yourself completely connected to source to all things in complete harmony and as you feel yourself connected into this grid, sense your energy radiating and glowing out from the core of your being, that your energy boundary around you is strong, centered, and whole.

Feel free to visualize Alex Grey’s painting if that supports you in feeling grounded and centered.

As you sense into the four points of your body, from the perineum all the way up to the crown of your head, aligned with the gridding of the universe.

Let yourself be aware of any place in the body or in your senses that you’re aware of feeling centered, grounded, whole or calm.

Let those parts of you deepen and expand as you sense into them, staying with them for even longer.

Closing

Take as long as you’d like here and deepen into this feeling of getting on the grid.

And as you complete your meditation at your own pace, feel free to give a little movement to your body and slowly open the eyes.

This is a specific healing experiential or meditation that can support you if you feel that you've absorbed energy from someone or somewhere else or that you feel a little bit ungrounded, uncentered or icky after being in connection with someone else or a group of people, then you can practice this experiential to help clear your energy to also ground yourself and pull back all the energy that is yours that's out there.

Hello, and welcome. You're listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

My name is Candice Wu, and I'm a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist, sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

To start with, you might not believe in energy working in this way that you could send back energy to where it belongs or you could drop back in whatever is yours. I didn't for a long time, but as I kept practicing it and stumbled upon these practices that were overlapping in many different healing disciplines and spiritual disciplines, I found that I was able to access something that gave me a sense of how energy was working with me and how it's working through me. So, feel free to try this out for yourself and practice it over time, if it resonates with you, and if it doesn't, you can still practice it or you can scrap it, see what works for you.

This is the first healing experiential out of three that is in connection with the podcast introduction around energetic boundaries and having clear energetic boundaries. You can find the full series of this podcast including the discussion about clearing energetic boundaries, and how and what to do if you've absorbed energy from around you or from other people. That episode includes tips about cleansing and clearing your energy or just simple ways to feel in control and navigate energy as well as grounding yourself and healing any ruptures that are causing your energy boundary to be weaker or have a hole in it. You can find the full podcast at CandiceWu.com/energy. And now, let's jump into this meditation.

You can use this healing experiential and meditation when you feel that you have possibly absorbed some energy from outside of you, whether that's from a person, a group or a question. You can use it to check in on whether you've absorbed anything from outside of you or if you feel that your energy has been lost in some way, that you've given something that's yours, and you'd like to reclaim it.

If you're a therapist or energy worker, a healer in some way or you work with people in a deep and intimate way, this might be something you practice after your sessions with your clients or at the end of the day, this can help cleanse you so that you feel like yourself again, whole and grounded. If you're not a wellness practitioner, and you are a sensitive person or an empath or you just feel like you'd like to see if this is something that affects you of energy from outside affects you, you can practice this as well. Also, if you feel that you're having a particularly challenging situation with a person, a place or situation, you can use this tool, this meditation to also clear up the energy between you and whatever it is the thing that you're struggling with. So, let's begin.

Find yourself a comfortable seated position or lie down, and just let yourself release all of the day so far. Feel free to close your eyes, and drop all of your senses inward. Start to hear the sound of your own breath, feel the body from the inside out, and visualize the shape of your body. Begin to picture your breath going in and out of your body, and sense even deeper than the outer levels of the body, going into the cells, the tissues, muscles and even bones in the body. Sense any emotion that you're holding, and just let your body release even more.

Now, imagine your energetic field, and if that's tricky or doesn't make sense to you, just imagine your entire being, including your body and the space around you, and let yourself open to whatever color you might be if you were a color.

Notice whatever color your energy or your being would be, perhaps it's a combination of colors, let's see if there's an essential color that's yours at this moment, and it can be different from day to day, moment to moment.

Now, picture a person that you've been in touch with today or if you have a sense of where your energy is gone today or if you're holding on to someone else's energy, picture that person. If you're unsure of whose energy you may be holding or absorbed, just begin to picture someone that this energy belongs to. And as you picture that person or group of people, sense whatever color they might be if they had a color. It doesn't matter if you're right or wrong, just feel into the impression that you get.

Now, notice in yourself, where there's any color that belongs to this other person or these people. Picture where that is in your body and how much space it takes up, what it feels like in your body. And with your breath to help it along, send this energy back to whom it belongs to, and watch it release from your body, move into the air and back to anyone that this belongs to, and if that's tricky, you can also try releasing this energy into the universe, letting it dissolve and fade into nothingness.

Notice the sensation or emotion that might come up, whatever it is that you feel inside as you're releasing any energy that belongs to the other person or people, back to where it belongs.

And now, sense into the other person or the people you're noticing, look for where they're holding any of your color of energy. Sense where it is within them or within their energy field, and again, using your breath to support you, breathe this energy back into your body, back into your energy field, back into your space, and your being. Feel all of the energy that's yours come back to you, and notice whatever sensations are happening in the body, whether that's a tingling, a grief, tension, release, fullness, anything, this getting curious about whatever it is that you feel inside, however, this process is for you, and just double checking that you've received all of your energy back. You've reclaimed all that's yours, and that you've released all that's theirs.

Now, notice any part of you that's feeling expanded, grounded, calm or full, anything that feels good, pleasant or even neutral, and let yourself deepen and expand into any pleasant or neutral sensation in the body, any feeling of peace or feeling like yourself, and take as long as you'd like to hear just to feel into your own energy. If it's necessary to repeat the process with any other people you've been in contact with or someone in particular that you're having a challenging time with or challenging lifetime with, feel free to repeat this process as many times as you need, and at the end of your process, take some time to think yourself for clearing your own energy, reclaiming your energy and giving yourself the attention to rejuvenate yourself and cleanse.

And now, I'll leave you with about 30 seconds of silence that you can feel into whatever it is that you're with here and now, and you'll know when this meditation is over when you hear a little bit of music at the end.

Thank you so much for practicing today, and here's some silence for you.

This is the third of three healing experientials related to the episode about energy boundaries, and clearing absorbed energies as well as strengthening your boundaries. You can find the full podcast as well as the other two meditations at CandiceWu.com/energy.

Hello, and welcome. You're listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

My name is Candice Wu, and I'm a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist, sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

This practice is an amalgamation of family constellations, healing practices as well as somatic experiencing. Specifically, this healing experiential is to support you in feeling clarity in your order, and position in your ancestry. It is to support you in releasing any responsibility for other's emotions or their fates, what they bear in their life, any losses or traumas or emotions that are unintegrated from your family lineage from anyone in the past, what happens is sometimes we inherit them, we connect with them, and hold them with our family, and this healing experiential can help you release any of those energies or dynamics that belong to someone else, and shift you into the position, your true and natural position of who you are in your family system to receive the best from your family, to receive all the gifts, the strength, the love, and support, and to leave the rest.

This experience might go very deep for you, it might be challenging to connect with or doesn't resonate. See what happens for you, it is meant to be a taste of the family constellations work, and if you do decide to go further with it working with a clinician, whether that's a family constellations practitioner or another ancestral healing worker, in a group or individually, you can go very deep in shifting the connections of the ancestry that you've inherited, and the ways that you absorb others energy or have strong boundaries.

If you feel at any time that what you're experiencing is overwhelming or a bit too distressing, just pause the podcast, take a break, and let yourself rest in the safety of the present moment. Sense your surroundings and just find some grounding, feel free to come back to this exercise anytime or do it with some support, and just one other thing to mention is that our family lineage isn't exactly what equates to who we are in this world, we are much more than what we are given and who we are in a family system. We don't necessarily need to be dependent on the family lineage, but what happens is there are many unconscious dynamics that we are given that we're tied to. So, dynamics that we're not even aware of, and when we bring these to light, we can release them.

When we bring them to light as well, we also can see that we are much more powerful than the dynamics we are given, that we can tap into a spiritual sense that's far beyond our ancestry, that is the divine energy that's everywhere, that is who we are at the source. So, let's transition now and jump into the healing experiential.

For this particular activity, I'd invite you to stand up, and as you stand and I introduced the different aspects of the healing experiential, see what happens to your body position, to the way you are standing, whether it's easy or hard or where your weight is, what sensations you feel and where, what emotions, and anything you notice in terms of your movement or images that pop into your mind, thoughts, etc. So, we're just opening up to all the information that you could possibly receive and sense.

As I introduce each aspect, see what shifts for you and what might be staying the same, and just notice and get curious about that experience. We'll work with two parts your own family system as well as transferring that experience to another person in your life that you may be having a challenge with, whether you're absorbing their energy or you're not sure or there's just some very connected dynamic that you'd like to work with, we'll do those into segments.

The last bit of preparation is please be sure you have about 15 to 30 minutes from this point so that you can absorb and integrate what's happening in this healing experiential as well as give yourself some downtime in case some different emotions come up or you find out a new insight. So, here we go.

As you stand, just notice how you feel in your body right now. Feel free to keep your eyes open or close them or look down, just sensing inward. Feel your breath in and out of your body, and let your awareness go all the way down to your hips, your legs, your ankles, and your feet. Feel the bottoms of your feet, and just let your body be natural in whatever way it's expressing itself now or holding itself, letting your breathing just be the way it is, and if there's any movement or sensation, let that be expressed and felt.

Now, I invite you to sense and imagine behind you, your parents. If you have adoptive parents or other guardians or important people growing up, feel free to invite them as well.

Imagine one parent behind your right shoulder and one behind your left shoulder. If you have a father and a mother, place your father behind your right shoulder and mother behind left, and just notice what it's like as you imagine them right behind you. Notice any emotion, any experience, just getting curious and letting it be witnessed.

Now, invite your grandparents to stand behind them also in that order. Notice what it's like that they're in the picture as well. See what changes in your body, what might shift, and now, invite your great grandparents. Again, see any shift in yourself, any experience of sensation or emotion, and whether you know your great grandparents or not or even your grandparents, just inviting the presence of that person. It doesn't matter if they're dead or alive or if you were close to them or not, just sensing a presence, and let's continue to your great great grandparents, and farther back adding in their parents, and another two generations at least. Feel free to imagine as far back as you can imagine in your lineage, and just sense the magnificence of this family line that's still alive and strong today.

So, I invite you to turn around and face your family system, and just sense that this is your position. You are a child of your parents, and they're bigger than you. And take a moment if you feel that you are in the right place, just sensing into where your body might want to go. Sometimes, if you've learned early on unconsciously, that perhaps your parent needed someone to help them with certain emotions or your grandparent was absent, then you may have energetically moved to a different position without knowing it or perhaps knowing it. That's called parentification when you become the parent of your parent in some way. Sense whether any part of you has fitted position into another place, and not just ground herself in this place, coming back to your true and natural position of being a child to these parents.

We'll do one more piece of information gathering. If you skim the line of your lineage, just with an open heart and seeing beyond the mind. If you sense into your parents, then your grandparents, then farther and further back, do so slowly and just see if you are called to sense into any one particular person more, and what emotions you feel as you just hover your awareness over each person.

Notice if you feel a certain emotion, as you're aware of any particular person, for example, you might feel sadness as you look towards your grandma or you might feel anger or tension somewhere as you just sense back into the line of your family, and get curious about where you're feeling that and with home. This is not a process of blaming or anything at all, just gathering information about your sense and connection, and it's not necessary to know the exact facts or details, but you might have an awareness of what's connected with these emotions, what kinds of losses, traumas, challenges or situations may connect with the emotions you're sensing and picking up on. If something feels particularly intense, notice that as well.

Now, wherever you felt any emotion, whether that's intense or something that seems connected with someone else in your family line, see what happens if you just release any of those emotions back to who they belong.

You can even imagine a color or shape of emotion or energy and just let it go back to where this belongs, who it might belong to, and notice what happens in you as you do that. You may be carrying someone else's emotions in the family line, especially if that emotion was unintegrated or there was some sort of survival mode or having to move forward after something challenging or overwhelming.

So, check-in with yourself. See if there's anything else that you need to release back to where it belongs, back to whose story that belongs to. It might not be an emotion, it might just be a sense of a feeling or some sort of energy, and then coming back to your sense and grounding of yourself, and as you look upon this family line, your ancestry, feel in your true and natural position, your right position. Feel into the strength, whatever strength there is of this family line and the gifts that you can receive from them. See this family line connected all the way to the source that's behind everyone, and let herself receive from this position, the best of the lineage. Feel free to open your arms as your palms up, as if to receive anything that this family system wants to provide you or give you.

Try out the words: thank you or I receive only the best from you, and I leave the rest or I'm responsible only for myself, you are responsible for you and their support behind me.

Notice any emotions or sensations in your body as you experience these words. Again, the words are: I receive the best from you, and I leave the rest. I'm responsible only for myself, you are responsible for you and their support behind me.

And if that's challenging to see that support or that responsibility, in others in your family line, look farther back to see where there is support, where there is strength, responsibility enoughness, and take a few more moments to feel into anything that's strengthening, grounding or beautiful in this lineage.

Now, thank yourself and thank your family lineage for showing up and showing all of this to you, and when you feel ready, I invite you to turn back around so that they're all behind you. Feel their presence behind you just the best, just the love, the strength, and the gifts as you face the world.

Notice how your body stands. Feel your breath. Notice what it's like to be in your body at this time.

And now, I invite you to segment 2, inviting someone that's close to you forward, someone that you feel challenged with, perhaps someone you feel like you are absorbing their energy or their emotions, invite whoever that is, forward in front of you. You can be as close or as far away as you need to be to feel comfortable.

This may also be someone that you feel responsible for that it isn't your place to feel that way, with that you tend to give advice to or feel lethargic or drained after you see them. You look towards them. I want you to imagine their family line all behind them, just as you did yourself, their parents, grandparents, great grandparents, and just keep going as far back as you can imagine, even if you don't know any of these people or they're dead or alive. You can also imagine any other loving support that this person has to stand behind them, and feel whatever it is you feel as you look upon them with all of these people behind them supporting.

Now, feel the words, just as you did for yourself with your family line: I am responsible for only myself, you are responsible for you, and to have support behind you. And see the strength of their lineage, whether or not they can see it themselves. See farther back if you need to, the source, the love, or the light behind all of this family.

See that this person has everything they need in their family system, and within themselves, to be whole, to heal if they need to heal, to be themselves, and that you are not responsible for them. You're responsible for only you. See them with this deep respect and honoring that they are responsible for their own journey just as your parents are, just as each member of your family is, best as you care for yourself.

Take as long as you'd like here to sense into this dynamic and into this presence, into whatever it is you're feeling inside, letting it be noticed, letting it move if it wants to move, and when you feel complete, thank all of the parts of this person and their family line for showing up and release them into the universe. Thank your family line, your ancestry for showing up and just release them as well, and thank yourself for doing this very deep practice and exploring in this way.

Take your time to feel into whatever it is that came up for you, and whatever it is that you feel now, and I'll leave you with a little bit of silence that you can just breathe through your body wherever you're feeling any sensation or emotion, anything at all. You'll know when this guided practice is over when you hear a little bit of music at the end.

Thank you so much for practicing today and I'll see you next time.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is not just for the healers and empaths out there in the world, the therapists, helpers, counselors, wellness practitioners, doctors, firefighters, anyone who’s in a caretaking role, but it’s for everyone. In this episode, we look at empathy and where it goes wrong, from what place do we support other people or offer our help or care? Is it from a wounded place or is it from a place of wholeness and loving that goes both ways? We look at how it is that there are subtle ways that we try to save people, but that may be coming from our own fears, and how death, fear of death and fear of pain might be connected or tied up in these interactions.

Candice Wu 0:58

Hello, and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 1:11

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist, sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 1:29

I want to give a shout out to all of you who support me and the podcast by offering your money and donation to contribute to the behind the scenes production of the podcast. Each episode takes several hours to edit and produce, to format and to publish, and also, not to mention, my own creative effort of sitting with what’s here with me receiving your feedback, receiving information from around me to create something that feels alive and vulnerable, real. So, all of your contributions and donations are so wonderful. I appreciate it so much, and it really touches me that you’re willing to offer that.

Candice Wu 2:19

If the podcast has inspired you in any way or supported you, offered you something and you want to give back, I would so appreciate if you did and checked out all of my offerings that you can receive in return or just to offer donation without anything in return. And I have a new page for all that it’s at CandiceWu.com/support, I used to use Patreon, and we’re in the process now of shifting everything over from Patreon over to my website, just so that all of your every penny can go towards the production of the podcast, and the least amount of processing fees can be taken from that.

Candice Wu 3:03

So, jump on over to CandiceWu.com/support if you’re interested in checking that out, and you can follow the links to my offerings, all of my offerings, my one on one client sessions, the Ally with Death Experience, which will soon be an audio experience as well, the Sound Sleep Album, all of my retreats and workshops, as well as the personal meditations that you can order, and the embodied group call that happens once a month, all of that is in support of the podcast and the new creations that I’m putting forward and developing. Thank you so much for considering donating, and it’s always touching to hear from you, even if it’s to share your feedback about what’s working for you and what’s not on the podcast, and the experientials with the guests or to ask questions and offer topics that you want to hear about, and by just jumping on and listening or sharing it with a friend that you feel might be supported by one of the topics or experientials. Thank you so much.

Candice Wu 4:11

So, welcome to the podcast, I’ve still been in Michigan and enjoying it so much. It’s interesting that everything in my body is calling me to stay very, very grounded. I even tried to schedule a flight to see a friend, and the internet dropped out several times. Their website wasn’t working that the flight that I wanted to get was through my rewards card in my credit card, and so, I kept trying day after day and finally, I gave up on the credit card rewards. I just thought, okay, I’ll just pay for this. And I found a flight that I had been looking at previously, and then it turned to like $500 to go from here to Milwaukee, and it was like forget it, I just take the train, which is only going to, you know, be another hour of train ride, no big deal, and it may cost me like $58 or something like that.

Candice Wu 5:09

It really wasn’t about the money. It was just clear to me though, that I was getting stopped in my efforts here several times, and I listened to those cues, whether that’s a message from the universe, or if you see it, that maybe my spirit guides were sending me a message or just something in me was really not wanting that and it was manifesting or just coincidence. Whatever it is, I like to receive that as a message that I meant to stand the ground. So, of course, I booked an Amtrak ticket, and that just went through really easily.

Candice Wu 5:48

So, I do notice that one thing was moved through easily, it’s usually the right thing with when I’m feeling at ease, when I’m feeling at peace and content, do you notice that in your experiences where are your feelings that decisions come with ease and you feel very at peace? Do you feel that way? There’s a sense in me that even when I feel a little bit of anxiety about something, I first investigate what that is, is it a fear? Or is it something in me that’s telling me, “No, it’s, you’re not really fully in this.” Lately, I’ve been almost, my body is almost demanded that I be 100% in my decisions, in how I spend my time and in what I’m doing in my life at the bottom line, and in that moment, I noticed that I chose to do something recently and it was somewhat a big commitment, and it was only like 95% in it in myself, something and he was like, “Oh, I’m not sure I want to do this.” And I ended up doing it for other reasons.

Candice Wu 7:04

There were some reasons I did want to do it, of course, but while I was experiencing it, I saw all the reasons emerge to the surface as to why I was hesitant. There was a lot in me about the situation as well as I wanted to spend a lot of alone time in doing certain things for myself, that I needed to be doing even just sitting and being present, lately, through all that’s been happening energetically and astrologically. I’ve needed a lot of time to just sit and digest all that’s happening inside and out. So, the information I’m getting right now is for me to be 100% a yes, about the things that I choose in my life. I’m noticing that when it’s a maybe or if I’m not 100%, that it’s a no until I do feel completely all in.

Candice Wu 8:14

I know there are things that I need to do that help, on some level, I don’t want to do like certain tasks. I don’t love doing administrative tasks. I don’t love doing just like the technical things anymore, as much as I used to, and yet, underneath it all, I know, I want to be doing this because that’s for the podcast or that’s for this blog post that I’m writing or the newsletter or something that really comes down to, “Oh, yes, I do want to do that.” So, if I can’t find a reason all the way down to the bottom, then maybe it’s good to just let it go.

Candice Wu 8:54

Before we jump into the episode today, I also want to update you about the past life experience that came up, that I talked about in the podcast two weeks ago. This podcast is at Candice without comm slash deep mystery. If you want to check it out, I talked about how I went camping, slept with a knife in my hands because I made some bad choices, one could say, but those choices led me to reveal a past life memory and its fullness which allowed me to heal on an even deeper level, and where I’m at now is claiming that part of me, that is me, from this past life, that has all sorts of knowing and wisdom.

Candice Wu 9:44

So, after that acupuncture appointment that I spoke about, where this whole memory revealed to me that I was Native American, and had gotten raped by a white man and that my father had to leave me to die, I went in to see what was the next step as far as this memory like, why did I need to be seeing this now and what was it that wanted to reveal itself to me, from me? And where I was led was to claim this young woman that I was, as a Native American?

Candice Wu 10:24

My body gives me confirmation when I sense into and imagine what that life was like, and then I see or think something very quickly, and the confirmation I got was that I was a young girl hitting puberty and stepping into a rite of passage moment of being a woman, and I wanted to do a ceremony that really fit who I was and I was very fierce, was like Warrier, very stubborn. I wanted to do things my own way, very strong, and a leader wanting to be a leader, and in that time, I’m not sure how supported I was, in some ways, I felt too big to fit into the containers of the tribe, and it seems like the women of the tribe wanted to do the ceremony the way that we do the ceremony, and I got really upset and wanted to do it my way, and that’s where I got into trouble.

Candice Wu 11:34

So, as I looked into the eyes of my past self, I could see the ferocity in her, the fire and fierceness. I could see that she knew how to live in the wild. She knew the plants, she knew the horses, she knew the animals, she knew earth, and the medicine that each of those bring, as well as song in ceremony and how to fight. She knew how to use bow and arrow, a knife, and to maneuver and to use fight energy if she needed to protect herself or to hunt, she was a hunter. So, that just catalyzed in me the desire to take my ability to protect myself and be strong in myself to another level. A lot of people take martial arts or do some self-defense classes. I’ve done both of those at some point, and now, at this time in my life, I want to experience some different things and sharpen those skills that I do have. So, I signed up for a lesson in sharp weapons.

Candice Wu 12:53

While I was camping, I was, you know, the thought the only thing I had was the knife in my hands, and I thought, okay, I’ll just sleep with it. If you had listened to that episode, you’ll get the full picture, and so, now I’m just thinking, well, if I’m going to have a knife in my hand, I better know how to use it, and hopefully I never need to use it. When you learn martial arts, it’s not to learn to literally just fight people, anywhere you go and to be violent or aggressive in your life, it’s just that you develop the confidence that you’re able to use certain parts of your body and energy to protect yourself or to do something that’s necessary if you’re ever in that situation, and whether you are not in that situation, that confidence that you can develop is really strengthening for the whole nervous system, for who we are in the world.

Candice Wu 13:52

If we all feel more confident, more in our bodies, more able to protect ourselves, we can feel safer, and that’s the idea now, so, I’m taking the sharp weapons class, and combat weapons. I think that’s like a baseball bat and how to use things to hit in the proper way, as well as archery and bow and arrow, and it’s really fun, it’s so fun. And I’m also able to use my eyes in a different way to direct my energy and be a little more precise at a distance, especially with archery, I find that my aim is horrible, and it has a lot to do with my focus and ability to sustain that focus at a distance, and I don’t think it’s coincidence that I am nearsighted and need glasses or contacts.

Candice Wu 14:56

And also this past life part of me now is being more integrated into me, I pictured her integrating into my body, and being me, which is the truth, I believe, well, that’s the truth, I believe, is that through the many lives that we have, we cultivate different knowing and sets of wisdom that are in our bodies and moving wisdom. And when we birth into the next life, sometimes, we want to develop different parts of ourselves, and we might forget the previous parts or we might remember them and be a genius in that, but there’s something here in this life for us to learn, and there’s a way in which we can claim, remember, and use all the wisdom that came from different lives, that we developed in different lives.

Candice Wu 15:59

And recently, I’ve been more attuned to the interstellar world, the world outside of earth, and that there are other dimensions within earth and outside of earth that we might be learning in as well and bringing those tools into our lives here or maybe that’s where we’re moving on to next. I never thought I would believe in that exactly or I guess we just couldn’t find a way for it to click with me that that existed, you know, and some people talk about aliens or other life, and it’s starting to make a little more sense to me that we as energies, as part of the universal consciousness, we find ourselves in different dimensions or we go to different places and times and lifetimes to know the wholeness of the universe, all the possibilities, all the energies that we can be, that we are, and we get to experience human life to heal and to learn and to grow, and to be and to honor who we are.

Candice Wu 17:20

So, as I look into myself as this past life, I just feel a connection with earth and animals in a new way, and I had an Akashic reading with Venessa Rodriguez, who was on the podcast very early on. In that reading, my guides were telling me to stay on the land and to look into plant medicine and connect with the plants that that would be revealed to me, and all this feels very exciting. It feels very enlivening and resourcing.

Candice Wu 17:52

So, enough about that for now. Feel free to jump on to that episode two weeks ago, if you didn’t get a chance to experience that. It also comes with an experiential called “You are the way, that you are the way to the mystery of your life, and you are the way to everything.”

Candice Wu 18:14

So, now let’s jump into the episode for today. This topic has been on my mind for I don’t know, at least a year, but somehow, I’ve just resisted talking about it, and what made me come to it now is that many people around me are talking about and asking me questions about what I think about it, and it seems like a lot of people are sorting out who they are, and what’s happening in their dynamics with people in their intimate relationships with their clients or with friends, with colleagues, and really, that is the topic for today. It’s “Who are you in relation to others?” And is part of your role in your relationships to “help people or to care for them or to heal them, save them feel responsible for them.”

Candice Wu 19:19

In this episode, everything I’m saying, there’s nothing wrong with any way of being and as there’s nothing wrong with wherever you’re at. It’s really looking at, “Oh, that’s where I’m at.” Like, wouldn’t you rather know who you are being and who you are right now, than not know? And that knowing gives you the chance to make a clear, continue to make a clear choice in your sovereignty of who you are or to make a new choice. So, knowing and awareness gives freedom. The knowing and awareness is not meant for criticism, to shame yourself or to pressure yourself to be someone else or something else because the bottom, bottom, bottom, bottom, bottom line is that you are the energy of all consciousness, you are pure love through a body, and in this body, we’ve chosen different ways to express pure consciousness. And sometimes, we think that those ways are who we are, we identify where we feel we’re just one way, and that’s who we are.

Candice Wu 20:47

There are very specific ways of being that’s in our DNA. So, that’s a biological coding, but then there’s an energetic coding underneath that, an energetic signature of who you’ve chosen to be in this life or who you are in this life, whatever you believe in. And if you’re in line with that, you might feel very much true to yourself, and that is true to your sovereignty, true to your choice, and underneath that is the love that we all are, all possibility that we all are. Then there’s the layer, like, removed from your choice of who you are, specifically in this life that’s unique to you, and what you might express in your life.

Candice Wu 21:42

So, I want to tell you a bit about me and my development and evolution of this feeling that I was responsible for people and wanting to really heal others, to where I am today in a much freer place for myself and others, in a place that really honors myself more and honors other people in the fullness that they are. When I first came to being a therapist and healer, I had come from being a teacher working with kids, and I saw very early in my career how much wisdom children had, and how alive that wisdom was, how fresh and real it was. It wasn’t some lines that someone had fed to them. Sometimes, it was, but other times when they were really present, and I was really present with them, there were these gems of what they were feeling and thinking that would come alive.

Candice Wu 22:57

And so, after I was a teacher, I taught art for kindergarten through second grade as well as sixth through eighth grade, and I loved the middle school age. After that, I transitioned into going to grad school for clinical psychology, studying Ayurveda, studying yoga as well, and all these other indigenous healing practices at the same time, along with family constellations. And emerging from all of those learnings, there was a way in which I still felt so responsible for people’s emotions and their well being. After working with clients, sometimes, I would feel a weight in me, and then somehow, I was the one digesting the emotions that seemed to be part of what the person was telling me they were experiencing or the storyline in which these emotions would emerge from. So, it seems like people were not quite digesting their own energy, and I was taking it on and doing it for them.

Candice Wu 24:08

That was so much work, and I was also doing that in my personal relationships. I had this way of having friendships where we were there for each other through all of what we’re experiencing, and while that can be beautiful and I still have that in some ways, it was the primary way of connecting with people is to, you know, share each of our problems back and forth, and in a sense, be that co-regulating parental loving force that I needed to help me develop that in myself. But it wasn’t seeing it that way at the time, I was just continuing to rely on people in my life to give that to me, and I would give it back. And I found that that also in itself had an exhaustion level, because I was seeing the power outside of me to some degree, but not consciously.

Candice Wu 25:14

So, as I looked at this deeper, it revealed to me that I was a Shaman in a past life, and a witch. And specifically in my Shaman time, it was essential for me to be responsible for my village, for my people and tribe, and they came to me to receive healing and to receive guidance, and I would stay in my cave to restore and in that kind of worked because I was living in nature and was able to feel the earth resource and to use my shamanistic skills very well in moving energy and connecting with many dimensions to support me. I don’t really know the details of that, and it doesn’t seem that important right now, but what is really important is that, on a cellular level, I was skilled at taking in other people’s energy, like literally sucking it out of them, and then spitting it out, coughing it up, and I was the function of the healing.

Candice Wu 26:33

I realized that that was a very old way of healing for me, then it was from lifetimes ago, and that in this lifetime, it wasn’t for me anymore. I wanted to find what was me and a fresh way, an expanded way for me in this life, to grow into being of support to others, walking alongside people, instead of being bigger than them in a way. As a Shaman, that was expansive at that time it was needed, and it was purposeful and I wanted to do that. If you are doing that right now, or you find yourself having a similar way of being with these patterns, that’s okay. There’s no judgment from me, and there really isn’t judgment necessarily about that. The real question is, is that how you want to be and is that the best for your expansion and your well being in this life right now? And maybe it was before, like a year ago or yesterday, and maybe it’s not now, or maybe you were in a different way of being and now that is very interesting, enlivening and expansive.

Candice Wu 27:57

So, there’s no right way. There’s no best way that applies to all. There’s only what’s best for you, and another piece of this all is that, because I came into this life with this way of being able to take other people’s energy, and release it, digested and release it or just get rid of it, for whatever other reasons, I came into a specific family that needed that. With that, seemed to not have the functions of digesting their emotions, and supporting and loving their well being. So, early on, in my childhood, even as an infant, I had this impression and feeling sense that I was here to be responsible for other people, and we can look at this in all sorts of psychological or soul, soulful ways.

Candice Wu 28:55

We can see this from conditions of worth, through Carl Rogers’ work in psychology, where, what are the ways in which I have to act to be worthy and to be loved? And from a family constellations perspective, that’s very similar. Where do I need to stand and who do I need to be? Who, as in not myself, but who else do I need to be? What energy Do I need to hold? Or what do I need to do to belong in this family, to be seen? Where’s the energy, the direction of energy going from family members or I need to be right there, so they can see me and is that in the middle of chaos, is that in the middle of devastation? And for me, I felt so needing to be a parent to my parents so that I could be seen. There were things and patterns that had happened back in my ancestry that created that or were a part of that dynamic.

Candice Wu 30:05

So, it’s not to blame my parents, it’s started long before them, but it’s to say that I stood in the role of my parents, responsible to my parents, as a young child, and yet I could never fill that role. So, along with that came not being enough, and wanting to help my parents, so that I could ultimately be enough and be seen as enough, taking care of their emotions, taking care of their well being taking care of my siblings, from the place of needing to feel worthy enough, and that lived on for many, many, many, many years after that. And it’s not just a mental process to say, “Oh, I’m doing that. So, let me stop.” It’s in my body, it’s in the responses of my nerves system to what wasn’t safe, and what felt like was the safest I could get to, and where could I even find something for me, and there’s a deeper love there, too, loving other people loving my family members wanting everyone to belong, and making sure that they do by helping, by supporting.

Candice Wu 31:29

So, through all this, and working with all these pieces — past life, lineage, belief sets that come through from all this, I felt into a new way for me, that was to be in myself, to be fully who I am, doing what I want to do, loving myself, and therefore having a two-way kind of love that reaches out to others as well. That’s not from a place of “I’m not enough, and if I care for you, I’ll be enough or I’ll be needed or I’ll be validated.” It’s, I validate myself and I can use tools, and support and resource from around me to enhance my ability and capacity to love myself and to continue to develop it, it doesn’t just happen, suddenly, and ending there, but a continual process of that and being in the place of my adult present self that has capacity to continue to love myself and what comes up or to notice when it’s not happening, and can see others with that same capacity or a deeper capacity, the greatest capacity of all possibility, living in each person around me, no matter how they express in a human form.

Candice Wu 33:06

For me, it’s to be a compassionate witness to what they’re experiencing, to be present with them, to honor it, and not try to change it or assume that it wants to be changed or that they want to change to respect someone else’s desire, and move with them from there, checking in with what they desire and what their choices are, and ultimately, it’s seeing that they’re in the hands of the universe, which is them, which is themselves, and everything around them.

Candice Wu 33:41

In a family constellations perspective, it’s seeing that they have an entire lineage of wise and strong people where something had to go right for them to exist in this life, and to exist right now, and perhaps a whole soul belonging that they have, or entourage of guides, resource, earth, animals that may be supporting them in some way, whether they know it or not, that I can see exists for them as well. And if I’m able to hold that, I can see this person much more clearly, and if I’m also able to accept that death has its place, that pain has its place, that sadness has its place, anger has its place, and all of that is, is part of the beauty of what we get to experience, not just tolerable, but part of the beauty. Then when I see someone in pain, I don’t need to just immediately rescue them. Rescuing them is also something that can be done, and it’s not a bad thing. Sometimes, we need to be rescued. Sometimes, other people need to be rescued, but it also depends on what the deeper want, need and capacity is, and what one can do for themselves, which is much more powerful at the core than what another can do for someone else.

Candice Wu 35:31

Now, there’s, that’s also to be argued, like, there are definitely super impactful moments where somebody else has said something to me or done something for me, that made a huge difference. So, I’m not saying to not do any of that, but I am saying that I’m interested in guiding myself from my heart and also, my deeper knowing, and at any time my deeper knowing and my capacity to feel into my heart might not be the fullest it could possibly be, which is probably true, you know, this is why I’m here to expand and to continue to deepen in that. But even to the max of what I do have, at any moment, I might not be there. How much of me is here? How much of me is available? And from that place, what do I desire to do? And from the place that also holds another in their wholeness, how do I want to be and interact?

Candice Wu 36:45

If it’s a crisis situation, like something very immediate, that might be a totally different process. I’m not going to sit there and meditate on it or think about it like that, I might just act. In the aftermath, I might see who I was being in that moment and if I stand behind myself or not, and I can go for really any situation, crisis or not. Do I stand behind the choice I made? And one of my teachers, Suzi Tucker, says that she likes to make choices that allow her to continue to make more choices that she can stand behind. That’s my interpretation of what she has shared with me to be exact.

Candice Wu 37:34

So, it’s really also a question of how are we using our gifts, I do have a gift of being able to work with energy and do something with energy that people may or may not want to do something with. And as a young child that was overused, are you overusing your gifts or overworking? When you’re in an interaction with someone else, are you constantly using one way of being or one tool in yourself, one gift in yourself. I also want to talk about empathy in this episode. I love talking about empathy, I’ve had a really different relationship with empathy, and that definitely, relates to the process in which I see myself in my role.

Candice Wu 38:27

Empathy in the past, for me, has meant not just being in another’s shoes and seeing that perspective, but feeling it on a whole body and energetic level, and before I just wasn’t able to give it back. Like, I could feel into someone’s experience, and then somehow I’d be left with it, and it was my deeper pattern of taking that on and taking responsibility, but also, sometimes, it was my own experience being triggered. And me, relating to someone and having identified with them energetically, because I had that experience in some way and those feelings. So, for me, sometimes it was a double whammy, like, having to be triggered, my experiences being triggered, and looking at that and also seeing the umbrella or the holding pattern to that, which was to take on other people’s feelings and feel responsible for them, feel like I have to be bigger than them and hold that space for someone, when sometimes who I’m talking to is older than me or more developed than me, whatever, it really doesn’t matter if they’re older or younger, but in the case of my parents, it did.

Candice Wu 39:52

So, I want to talk about when empathy goes wrong, and I kind of hesitate to use those words, but maybe it’s better to say, when empathy goes too far, if we see empathy on a spectrum, where, maybe, one point of empathy is to be able to witness someone with some warm, with our capacity of presence and awareness there, and to see them in their experience and honor that they’re experiencing it and that their whole enough to handle it. If we see them in that light, versus if we see them with pity or assume that we feel something, that they feel something about it, then we can project our own feelings on them, and in return, they feel differently in relation to us.

Candice Wu 40:54

Have you noticed that where someone believes in you, versus where someone else so feels a similar doubt as you towards you? Like, “Oh, yeah, you know, not sure.” You might feel differently in your body and in your heart. So, that’s where I like to be in seeing myself as full and seeing another as full, and witnessing what’s happening and just being present, being there. It doesn’t mean I have to give advice or support or say loving words. It might just be as much as seeing what they’re experiencing. I see your pain, I see that you’re in this experience. From that place to taking on some of their emotions or when we assume as I said that someone feels a certain way, we’re projecting our feelings, but those are our feelings about that kind of experience.

Candice Wu 42:02

Have you ever had an experience where someone told you that they’re in a certain situation or something happened to them? And you say, “Oh, no, or you say, Oh, I’m so sorry.” And they say, “Oh, I am fine about it.” And sometimes, that’s denial, but sometimes that’s actually true, right? And so, we’re there’s a mismatch to how you assumed they would feel, and they actually feel. And maybe, they feel upset later, but right now, in the moment, they’re saying they feel fine. It’s a different topic to challenge them or say, oh, tab empathy and say, Oh, wait, you know, it seems like there’s something else here. That’s something else. But when we just outright assume something, and that’s not where they’re at, we get this chance to see that that was our own projection, and where we think or we can call it empathy to have offered that feeling from us. It’s not actually empathy. It’s actually being in our own experience, seeing it from our way.

Candice Wu 43:23

Also, when we feel for someone, we feel for them, instead of them feeling for themselves in a way, instead of seeing them and trusting their own ability to feel and experience. We might take on that whole energy of the feeling, and they may be discarding it are leaving it with you, maybe not, but that’s possible. That whole dynamic is a very developmental young experience for the person that might be discarding it, and that you may maybe their parental figure holding and being that digestive space. And this is an interesting dynamic, because then we also need to look at, if you’re the one being that parental figure or holding space, why are you doing it? It can be easy to say that it’s empathy, and I being caring and supporting someone, but is that serving a purpose for you that also is a pattern of yours or is something that keeps you in a cycle, or a smaller space for yourself, a dependency for yourself? Do you depend on other people to need you? Or do you pride yourself on the ability to use this tool and keep others dependent on you? Does this give you your validation or enough?

Candice Wu 45:01

Like, it has for me, in the past of varying degrees, you know, there’s a whole dynamic of empath narcissist that people label as this empath Narcissus dynamic, where someone who’s really empathic and intuitive, and sensitive attracts. They mutually attract each other. Someone who has traits of narcissism that may draw the attention towards them, and need that kind of support and dependency and can hook someone in to be that for them in almost every capacity or to varying degrees of their lives as a whole. That’s a whole different topic, and there’s so much more to that story, but we often see the empath with more empathy, I guess. We look upon that more favorably to be the empath in that situation, to be the helper in that situation, rather than the helped.

Candice Wu 46:17

We see that perhaps the empath is doing something better than the narcissist is doing because sometimes the narcissist, the person we call the narcissist, it really don’t like to use that label, we often see them as like, lashing out if the other person isn’t doing what they want or using manipulation to keep the person who is very sensitive and caring in that space for them, and yet, doesn’t the person who’s empathic and sensitive do the same thing. There’s a manipulation happening on both levels. When this dynamic is happening, of perpetrator victim as well, when it goes to that level that one is a victim of the other, both people are tied up with some energy coming from the same energy, both people are tied up with belief sets that come from the same similar place of worthiness, need or validation or dependency, somewhere we can find that there’s a place in which both are codependent. And in other cases of empathy, where empathy can go too far is where we put ourselves aside, we put others before us and prioritize their feelings and needs, and maybe sometimes even feel an urgency about that, and we put our own basic needs sometimes or lives aside.

Candice Wu 48:01

This can happen where a mother looks towards her child and says, “I need to give everything to this child, I need to be there for them. They’re not feeling well and x y&z places, and I need to be there and I need to help them.” And we look at that person’s life as a whole, and I’m not bashing mothers at all, I think being a mother is one of the most honorable and beautiful things one can do, but when a mother puts themselves aside and focuses all their energy on their child, we do need to wonder, what about their own life? And what does that say to the child, you’re worthy, but I’m not, and essentially at the bottom that says, that’s another thing, I’m not worthy of taking care of myself, and that message gets transmitted to the child inherently, implicitly in the body, in the actions, and those actions speak louder, sometimes than what’s covering it up, the helping that’s coming their way, all the energy coming their way. And it puts that child in a position of a lot of weight, like, I have to be so much better, or I have to have so much help, and I have to do this for my mother, too, because if I don’t, then she’s not going to be okay.

Candice Wu 49:35

And how different for a child to see their mother taking care of themselves, to see their mother in their fullness, giving them the space to be in their fullness or be in their struggle, whatever it is, but their mother reaching out from there, helps them to see the way because their mothers, part of showing them the way that she’s having, opens up a pathway that a child can see, “Oh, I have a way, too, and I am worthy of taking care of myself, and I can learn how to do that. I don’t always have to just give to others like my mom’s doing.” There’s a way that we implicitly and in our, in some way comes outside ways that we can be just like our parents, especially with the parts of our parents we resist or don’t want to be like, and this is where it can come out, you know, we can be just like our mom that gave us all the focus and energy and gave herself none by doing that somewhere in our lives, and then we don’t know how to take care of ourselves.

Candice Wu 50:49

So, I’ve used this mother and child example, but this really can apply to any relationship. If you are giving all of yourself to your friend, nothing to yourself, or very little and not enough, not taking care of what you really need to feel full, healthy and whole, then you’re not really able to fully be present for your friend or whoever else it is, anyway, but also on the receiving end, that support is coming from a very small capacity, small energy, and not to belittle it, but to say that there isn’t much there, if we’re giving away everything, one none to ourselves. So, that’s where empathy can go too far as well, and it can really take a toll on someone, and on the surface, it can be seen as a selfless act.

Candice Wu 51:53

We often overstate, I think selflessness, we see people giving so much to others, and we praise and we praise that, and how much do we praise people taking care of themselves? That’s very much shifting, we’re doing that so much more, at least in the fields that I’m running around, like the mental health field in wellness, there’s that’s shifting, where we’re saying, “Yes, good, you took care of yourself.” And there’s just through threads of time, where we valued being selfless, meaning doing for others and not yourself, meaning doing and being kind to the world around you at its fullest, and not needing to put yourself in that mix it as well.

Candice Wu 52:51

There’s a time and place for selflessness. If and I know that it’s also in many spiritual practices, it’s really a discussion of where someone is at the level of having transcended the ego dance, the dance of pain and being triggered like those triggers, those wounds are more healed, or at a level where they’re not in control of someone’s life, and where they’re maybe not even a thing where unconditional love is very present. That’s where some people might call these people or beings “Ascended Masters”. There’s a selflessness to that, and also, it might be necessary in times where someone is truly selfish and just very self-centered to the point that it’s hurting them. It’s not their growth edge anymore, that it hurts them and others or that the new growth would be to learn to let that love reach out to other people, not just themselves, and there’s a whole host of developmental like, young child parts to that that are probably connected.

Candice Wu 54:15

But when we force selflessness, even in that situation I’m talking about where it might be helpful to be a little more selfless, when we force it, and not heal it, and develop it organically. When we force it, there’s always some tension or resistance living in our bodies and in the system that we live in. In the community, our body will show it. We can’t skip being selfish, and developing our sense of self and caretaking for ourselves and being there for ourselves, loving ourselves developing an identity so that we can eventually release that identity and be fuller. That’s part of our developmental process as a human, as a child and in our soul, that we need to know who we are, and fill up on who we are, be seen and mirrored and take in all that love so we can know who we are, and be egocentric, like five year olds are, right? If they get to be. And if we didn’t get to be, we didn’t get that loving attunement, we might still be asking for that now in our lives, and that’s where we can give that to ourselves, and organically heal that so we can become more natural in the place of love from within, loving towards ourselves and loving outwards. Really don’t love to call it selflessness, but I did want to address that topic of selflessness.

Candice Wu 56:00

In order to ascend, when people talk about ascension, it’s about being one with the universe, the light that we are the unconditional love, that is who we are. When we ascend in human form, we must descend into the body and become embodied, live in the human form, master all the ways of being human, not just the functional things that we need to do and learn how to do in this consciousness of earth, and how earth functions right now and how people function on earth, but to come with our own creativity, and also, to master navigating all the emotions and ways of being that one can be, to have the capacity to embrace all of it and know how to work with it and use it, and feel your inner knowing.

Candice Wu 57:06

So, back to selflessness just for another moment here, when we do for others, and we take empathy to that degree, and supporting others or caretaking for others to the degree where not taking care of ourself, often that also serves to distract from what you need to do for yourself, whether that’s looking at a wound that’s really hard to look at or something that is going on for you. It serves to help you feel powerful or in control, or okay, when you can help other people when they’re not okay or see people is not okay, and continue to like, create bad or find, they can find those parts and others, and that’s how you’re relating two people, but we’re also, you might be distracting from your life path, like what you want to be spending your time with, where you’re most empowered, what you’re desiring for you and your worthiness? Do you feel like you are worthy of pleasure, enjoyment, peace, and those endeavors looking at those parts of us? If we continue to avoid those parts, we really don’t do a service to anyone. That is the deepest service, to all. It’s the deepest loving to know who you are and to move towards what you desire, to be in your pleasure, to be in your worthiness.

Candice Wu 58:54

There’s one last piece I want to mention with all this is that there’s a difference between being caring and being a caretaker as your one role or as your main role, and there’s nothing wrong with being a caretaker as your main role, like that might be your job title, that might be what you’re choosing to do. It’s really how you do it, and why you’re doing it. If you’re doing it on some unconscious level to distract from your own life, how much do you want to do that? It’s okay to do that. Sometimes, we need to distract from our lives. Sometimes, we need to feel that empowerment that we get when we can help someone else with their life, and also, recognize and have perspective that maybe our issue is not so bad, or we’re in this together. So, there’s nothing wrong with any of it. It’s the question for you if you want to explore it, only if you want to explore it, is that there are multiple parts of who you are. And are they all being looked at? Are they being offered in this life and expressed in who you are honored in yourself? Are we living our lives? Are we in our roles and our lives coming from a place of woundedness driving underneath, whether that’s conscious or unconscious?

Candice Wu 1:00:25

You may have heard of archetype wounded healer, and Sarah Buino has a whole podcast of conversations with a wounded healer, and talking about these very things, like, where are we coming from and who are we? What is a wounded healer and identifying that so we can see that happening in us if we want to see it, and make sure that that’s the choice we want to have or choosing what we want to have?

Candice Wu 1:00:58

And before we go and end this episode, I want to talk about endings and death. I touched into death just once in this conversation, but for me, all this conversation also amounts to embracing death and all sorts of emotions as part of the beauty of experience, as I mentioned, but death we’re often afraid of death or we have all these emotions that pour out from it or nothing at all. Everyone experiences that differently and sees it differently, but are you at peace with death? And if you’re not, what is your relationship with death? And how does that show up in ways in which you help others or are in relation to others?

Candice Wu 1:01:52

If I resist death or resist certain emotions, when I interact with others, then I resist to some degree, whether that’s subtle or not or overt, covert or overt. I might resist what they’re experiencing, and ultimately, that just honors them that might even dismiss what they’re experiencing or disrespect them. But when I have the capacity to honor anger, pain, death, sadness, annoyance, any emotion that is challenging, even joy, when I have the capacity to hold that in myself and see it, be with it, respect it, then I can do that for others to or I can begin to.

Candice Wu 1:02:54

Sometimes, we think that others need our help, we have a suggestion for them and we want to give it to them or give them our advice or do something for them, and we do need to keep ourselves in check because what does that say to someone else? That their situations not okay? That there are choices ain’t okay or we could do it better? My friend, Nick Werber talks a lot about this, embracing one’s fate, and in the family constellations world, we discussed that, that thought that accepting one’s fate means accepting their choices. It means accepting, not just accepting but respecting and agreeing with them of their own choice. It’s really not for us to agree, too, but respecting it.

Candice Wu 1:03:54

So, I leave you today with these questions. How are you relating to yourself? What parts of yourself are you able to be with? Who are you? Where are you coming from when you’re in a role of helping others or caretaking or coaching or being a therapist or being a friend, a daughter or a son, mother or father? How is it that you see people? Be honest, and in different situations that might be different. And how is it that you want to see people? How is it that is a deeper seeing? Where do you believe you know more than someone else whether you assert it or not? Or where you believe those thoughts that you feel, you know, more than them or why they’re where they’re at and that you can see something they can’t? There’s a fine line of intuition and asserting yourself energetically, inserting yourself and violating energetically, because you feel you know more. Were you working harder than someone else for their lives? And what parts of yourself need caretaking, saving or tending to, parts of yourself or asking for empathy? What parts of yourself want to feel worthy and in your pleasure, desire, and in the life that is 100%? You? And do you push that aside for others or do you push that aside?

Candice Wu 1:06:06

So, I think that’s enough for today. I loved this conversation and had a lot of fun. I’d love to hear your feedback, your discussions around this or what comes up in you around this, and if you disagreed with me or found something I said offensive, feel free to share that if you found something that helps you explore. I’d love to hear about that as well.

Candice Wu 1:06:34

To close today, I’ll just offer all the different podcasts that I refer to and the people that I referred to, as well as other episodes that can relate to this topic. So, I give a shout out to Venessa Rodriguez who did the Akashic reading for me recently. She is excellent and she also works with Feeding your Wild. Her episode on the body podcast is at CandiceWu.com/venessa, VENESSA, and there you can also connect up with her website, feedyourwild.com, I believe, and all of the different links that she offers.

Candice Wu 1:07:14

I shared about Suzi Tucker, my family constellations teacher, and you can find her at suzitucker.com or at CandiceWu.com/Suzi, her episode with me on the podcast, and her name is spelled SUZI. I also mentioned my friend, Nick Werber, who is a constellations facilitator. He and I love talking about death, and we did in this episode at CandiceWu.com/nick.

Candice Wu 1:07:45

I mentioned Sarah Buino in her podcast conversations with the Wounded Healer. I actually appeared on that podcast and it was so much fun. You can find that episode at CandiceWu.com/conversationswithawoundedhealer, and there you’ll be able to link to her whole podcast. Also, I mentioned the deep mystery of life episode that was two weeks ago at CandiceWu.com/deepmystery, and we spoke a lot about self-worth, worthiness. And there’s an episode that isn’t a discussion but it’s more like a download around worthiness, where it’s set to music and I just say affirmations and support the body in taking that in, and that’s at my website/worthiness.

Candice Wu 1:08:46

Also, if you want to stay up to date on my travels, on the podcast, guests experientials and topics, retreats, workshops, things that I’m offering, you can tune into my newsletter that comes out every two or three weeks. You can sign up at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 1:09:07

Thanks so much for joining me today. It’s really great to have you and looking forward to connecting with you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is about how the Hong Kong protests had compelled me to look at, am I standing up for all the parts of myself? What parts of myself do I siphon off or sacrifice in order to gain in other parts? And, where am I ready to be more integrated?

Candice Wu 0:20

Join me in this conversation as well as the experiential that is to follow around feeling incongruence and alignment, knowing what that feels like for yourself, so that you can check in with parts of your life, and also in future decisions that come up in your life.

Candice Wu 0:42

Hello, and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, Embodied Healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 0:56

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 1:17

This episode is sponsored by my workshops, there’s a workshop coming up in Chicago on July 21st, 2019. And it’s called, Restore the Flow of Love.

Candice Wu 1:29

It’s a Family Constellations workshop, which doesn’t mean it has to do with family at all. But what it does mean is that there’s a system in each of us, of dynamics and energies, and ways of being that live through our energy, our body, our way of life, and the way our body moves.

Candice Wu 1:49

And often, those dynamics are unconscious. They’re living through us, without us even knowing. But we can see the symptoms or the side effects of it all, in our challenges and what troubles us, or what we feel is a struggle. And that can touch into our love life, career, family, what we want to do in the world, how we want to feel, and what we do feel.

Candice Wu 2:18

So Constellations work is an experiential process that’s in the body, and in our felt sense without mental information, and offers us a way to look at three-dimensionally through our bodies, what those underlying dynamics are, that are showing itself to us so that we can reveal more for us.

Candice Wu 2:41

They’re the opening to what’s next, they’re a beginning. And often in our ancestry, there’s something that has happened that has been tragic or traumatic, hard to bear. And if those are not integrated by someone in the family, then they usually get passed down.

Candice Wu 3:03

The soul of the family wants us to see all of it and hold it all with love. And so in this process, usually some dynamics can relate to the ancestry, or a past life or some part of your inner world. And we restore that flow of life and love that you can step forward into your life with much more ease and know yourself that much more.

Candice Wu 3:27

If you want to check out the workshop you can find it at CandiceWu.com/flowoflove. And if you’re interested in workshops like this, but have missed the date for this, you can find more events at CandiceWu.com/events.

Candice Wu 3:44

Welcome back, everyone. I am looking over the lake where I am in Michigan, and it’s a gorgeous sunny day, the sun is almost going down. And it’s lovely to be here with you today to talk about something that has been touching my heart lately.

Candice Wu 4:05

Before we get there, I’m reflecting on the fact that July 4th was just around the corner and for the people in the United States, that is the celebration of Independence Day. And often people think about Independence Day being freedom, about the theme of freedom, or that theme comes up.

Candice Wu 4:25

As I was looking out at the fireworks the other night, I just felt a bunch of complex emotions. I felt like well, what is Independence Day?

Candice Wu 4:36

Well, a group of people immigrated here and got independence from Britain, which is what America stands upon. There are also plenty of people who lost freedoms and lost a lot in that experience, in that coinciding with it. And the question came to me, when do we stand for all people? How do we do that?

Candice Wu 5:03

We say we do that at times. And we don’t often know the way to completely follow through with that and desires conflict, there’s upset involved. And I’m talking about racial lines, I’m talking about ethnic and cultural challenges and wars, hurt on both ends, trauma of years and years and years. And so, as I think about this, and think about the idea of freedom or independence, I think about choice, which is what’s also ringing true with the conversation I want to bring today. And that sense of how do we really stand for all? The question begins with: How do we stand for all of ourselves? And: How do we see all within ourselves and hold that in harmony?

Candice Wu 6:01

So the way I’m speaking does refer to Parts work, where we think of all the parts of ourselves, the inner parts of ourselves, as a different aspect of who we are that we can touch in with, some parts of us are younger parts that may have gotten stuck in time, or fixated at a certain point in time because of a hurt or wound. Some parts of us are with us through and through, like our inner critic and have just made things to say about what’s going on.

Candice Wu 6:38

Other parts are very wise and reasonable, others, most parts protect and desire the best for us. And, how do we really hold space for all of those parts of us, all of who we are whether or not you call them parts. And all of who we are in harmony.

Candice Wu 7:02

You know, have you had a time where one part of you really wanted something and another part of you or on the other hand, the thing that you wanted wasn’t good for you or it wasn’t quite right or there’s disagreement there to some degree and you’re just in this debate back and forth. Well, you can consider those two aspects as different parts of you.

Candice Wu 7:27

You can learn more about parts work at CandiceWu.com/partswork where I talk about embracing all the different parts of you and how to work with different parts. But that’s not exactly the topic for today, even though it is the topic for today.

Candice Wu 7:44

For me, this conversation all started with seeing the Hong Kong protests. They have been, people in Hong Kong have been protesting the extradition bill that would allow China to extradite people into their country, to sentence them or try them in the case of a crime.

Candice Wu 8:06

And that began with a crime that was committed in Taiwan by someone who is, I believe, a Hong Kong citizen. And without going too far into this, one thing led to another, and the bill that they wanted to pass would allow China to extradite people too.

Candice Wu 8:25

The people of Hong Kong saw right away — many of the people of Hong Kong saw right away that this would crumble and wear down, that Hong Kong was promised to be after the handover of Hong Kong back to China in 1997. Hong Kong was promised to have semi-autonomy and hold its own elections. And slowly, it seems as though China has been interfering with that process. And the protests in 2014, show just that.

Candice Wu 9:06

So here I am in Michigan, in the US, looking at these photographs of millions of Hong Kong people flooded into the streets that I have walked, on the streets that I know pretty well from going there every, almost every winter, for the last 6 to 10 years.

Candice Wu 9:31

Hong Kong has been a second home to me in many ways. I visited my grandmother often when she was alive, my aunt and uncle and cousins, and it has been the place that has housed my family for many years.

Candice Wu 9:47

My family originally was from China, and back in the lineage. And at some point, they knew that they needed to leave. And they fled to Hong Kong, in order to escape the communist government and the way that people were treated. And they wanted more freedom, they wanted more opportunity, more rights. And so they landed in Hong Kong.

Candice Wu 10:09

So there is a soft spot for Hong Kong in my heart and for the people. And that is my heritage, that is my people.

Candice Wu 10:18

And, so here I am looking at these photographs and these videos. It’s just astounding.

Candice Wu 10:25

And what really touched my heart was, how many people were coming out to the streets, speaking up, and standing up for what they believe in is right for their country and for their people.

Candice Wu 10:40

This extradition bill, in some ways, likely wouldn’t have even, for most Hong Kong citizens and people, that extradition bill would not even affect them directly. Or, even probably indirectly. But they’re willing to stand up and speak up for what’s greater, that they want their freedoms, they want their rights, they don’t want to be controlled by China. And, they are standing up for those people who would be affected.

Candice Wu 11:20

And in so doing, they have put themselves at risk for being arrested or for getting hurt. The police have been pushing back against them. And for the most part, it has been incredibly non-violent.

Candice Wu 11:37

Hong Kong seems to be known for its polite protests, where students are doing homework on the streets, and where they’re handing supplies to each other, and very organized, clean up after themselves and non-violent.

Candice Wu 11:58

So there was some violence, though, but with the people who have been arrested, the people protesting are also trying to stand up for their rights. So they’re asking, they had been asking for looking into investigating the police brutality and into releasing the people who have been charged and shifting the charges off of being Riot charges. And they want the extradition bill to be off the table completely.

Candice Wu 12:30

So the time of me recording this, I don’t have much more information, except for that the bill was delayed, and there were several days of protests more than a couple of weeks ago now.

Candice Wu 12:43

And this conversation here isn’t about what’s right, or what’s wrong, or what we should protest and what we shouldn’t. But it’s about how incredibly powerful it was to see how many people were coming out to the streets. And how heartwarming, it was to me, to know that while most of these people wouldn’t be affected, they are standing up for all those who could be affected. And that’s a small handful of people, or likely a small handful of people, but also that they’re standing up for that greater sense, the greater need of their liberty and their human rights.

Candice Wu 13:25

So when I felt this, I just started crying, it felt like, wow, people are really standing up, people are really speaking out and caring about each other in such a beautiful way. And while I was feeling this heartwarming feeling of love and caring, that was filling up some of the wounds of places in me that have wished for that kind of support from strangers or from loved ones around me even.

Candice Wu 14:01

I also felt the pain of the fact that Hong Kong’s freedoms have been slowly being infringed upon and slowly crumbling.

Candice Wu 14:15

I feel how powerful China is. And, as I was sharing this with my mother, her perspective was that just Hong Kong doesn’t stand a chance against China especially. And for me, that was incredibly discouraging and disheartening, and on some level, that could be true.

Candice Wu 14:39

So, I sat with all this and felt that pain, felt for the people there, and they still have family there. As I went deeper with it, with myself, I felt that the Hong Kong protests were a perfect way for me to ask myself, “Am I standing up for all the parts of myself? Am I congruent and in harmony with all the parts of myself? Are they in harmony with each other?”

Candice Wu 15:12

And of course, this is a lifelong process. But I was looking at where in me, can I be more congruent? Where in me can I stand up for parts of me that I perhaps push into the shadows, ignore, abandon, or hide or turn a blind eye to?

Candice Wu 15:38

What this highlighted for me was the sense that in a few relationships I held, I was accepting part of the relationship, agreeing to part of it, and disagreeing to a whole part of it. And yet, I was just staying in it.

Candice Wu 16:01

I even had a dream, the other day that I was watching TV with one of these people, and everything they were saying was just getting me all pissed and angry and worked up. And we were watching TV. And while I was angry, it was as if, the anger wasn’t doing anything, it was just living in me and festering and growing. And yet it had no real outlet. Even though I was expressing the anger.

Candice Wu 16:32

Suzi Tucker, one of my Family Constellations teachers had a retreat recently. And she spoke to judgment, being a placeholder for movement. That where we have judgment can be this marker for perhaps a movement that wants to be had instead. And maybe that literally means to move away, walk away, move your body away or to have a different distance. And if we had that distance, perhaps we’d be able to be with ourselves, with our emotion, rather than judging the person.

Candice Wu 17:13

So in the dream, I was definitely judging that person. Not only was I angry, but I was judging that person. And yet, it was impotent, it wasn’t having any power.

Candice Wu 17:28

And that’s how I felt like these relationships in my waking life were, that I was just staying with these dynamics and living in them and they became somewhat toxic and not okay. Yet, the parts of those relationships that I did like, and these are two different kinds of relationships I’m speaking about. Those were enough to keep me into some degree, for some time, until that really exhausted me. And I began to realize that I felt incongruent. I felt uneasy all the time around these situations and dynamics.

Candice Wu 18:09

And for some time, what was good about it was allowing me to ignore and push away a whole other part of me or many parts of me, that felt uncomfortable, angry, dissatisfied, unhappy, and felt like my worthiness was questioned in a way, like the standards of how I want to be treated, weren’t being held to. And I was trading off parts of me for other parts of me to receive the “good things” about it.

Candice Wu 18:51

My friend, Twila recently shared with me some insights that she had around what’s coming up for her in her life. And she shared about how animals have been, she is very aware of how animals have been removed from their locations of heritage or where they thrive and placed into new habitats. And then they become very angry or violent, with the people around or other animals around. And they’ve been moved by humans. And at times, they’ve also been turned into a commodity. She’s questioning in her awareness, where are we creating a commodity out of things that ought to be sacred and honored? Like taking animals parts, and selling them and using them as a way to make money and as a valuable item, rather than a valuable creature, energy, and being.

Candice Wu 20:04

So I’m not really here to impart any morality or my values on you. But, when my friend Twila was talking about this, where do we sell ourselves came up to me? Where do I sell off parts of myself, sacrifice parts of myself, in order to gain in other parts? That really felt icky. For me, it gave me a wincing feeling in my body, which meant it really hit the spot somewhere, that I was, in fact, trading off the fullness of my joy and worthiness and happiness, peace and harmony for one part of me that was gaining something, and it was gaining some really good things.

Candice Wu 20:55

So, I also see myself very gently with this, because the gain that I was receiving was something I wanted to experience and was helpful to me for some time. And I’m really speaking to that tipping point place where there’s almost a balance between, this is good and this is not, or, this is helpful and this is not anymore. Where it’s uncomfortable in this sort of middle zone, where I’m not saying no completely. But I’m not saying yes, completely.

Candice Wu 21:29

And as many times as I’ve reminded myself that if it’s not a wholehearted and whole body, absolute, yes, whether that’s a relationship and experience, something I’m investing in or a person I want to spend time with, if it’s not a wholehearted “Yes”, it’s actually a “No”. If it’s a “maybe”, it’s actually a “No”. That something in me knows that it’s not completely aligned or congruent. And when it is, it is.

Candice Wu 22:02

So as much as I know that, in my mind, I’m still working through pieces of remnants of trauma experiences, where I’ve taken a lot of bad while taking the good. In other words, I’ve taken a lot of painful experience with the essential things I needed love, connection, and support. And so it is still working its way out, where I don’t have to have both, necessarily. I can have all of me be satisfied and supported, loved, and respected. And it’s important to have those boundaries.

Candice Wu 22:49

So circling back to the Hong Kong protest, seeing people stand up for the one person that could be impacted, or the dozen people that would be impacted, I felt I needed to do that for myself internally.

Candice Wu 23:11

And then I wondered how I could begin to feel more congruent inside. And that would allow me to be more congruent outside, and how my supporting who I am fully on the inside, could give way to congruent action outwardly, in my life, as a beginning and into the world around me.

Candice Wu 23:38

This is not something that is necessarily new to me, it just felt like a powerful hit of next level, looking at what in me wants even more congruence now.

Candice Wu 23:52

And if you are on my newsletter list, or you’ve seen some of my recent posts, you probably saw that those two relationships that I speaking about, I ended them, and one had transitioned into a bit of a different distance and that was working for a while. And eventually, it just wasn’t working at all. And once it ended, once both of those ended, I felt incredible relief.

Candice Wu 24:20

And I imagine the other person did too, the other people did too. Because there was just something that really wasn’t right in fit. And it’s not to blame the other person or people but our time had passed and our connection together was ready to move on.

Candice Wu 24:42

After those ended, a whole lot of stuff in my world, in my life shifted.

Candice Wu 24:49

I’ve been trying to sell a car. And that just went really fast.

Candice Wu 24:53

I had some beautiful, just amazing opportunities land in my space for some new creative projects coming up, that I just couldn’t even dream of, or think of. And here they are. And it feels really aligned and magical. And so, I do feel that I have found even more of myself through this process.

Candice Wu 25:23

And to go back to the Hong Kong protests, I also felt that I have refined my way of how I want to interact in the world around issues that hurt people and hurt me. We look around and we see so many injustices and pain. So many things that we feel tug on us to support or stand up for, it’s impossible to stand up for everything all at once. And that’s not the point.

Candice Wu 26:00

But for me, what I found is that I am looking out into the world from time to time and just sensing, what is touching my heart and what is connecting with me. What do I feel?

Candice Wu 26:16

And to slow down and take my time with feeling through that and asking myself those deeper questions of, what is this for me? When this feeling comes up for me, allowing my body wisdom to show me, what is this connecting to in my personal life?

Candice Wu 26:40

And as I feel that through, how do I want to respond in the world? And what do I feel compelled to do out of the connection with my heart and the loving that comes from loving what comes up in me, as well as, what comes up as a reaction to the outer world and what’s happening in the outer world, and living from that place?

Candice Wu 27:09

So we ended up talking about this topic with several people and posting about it on social media. And my sister and I decided to get an umbrella which is the signature of the Hong Kong 2014 Umbrella Movement protest. And we made a poster that just said something like, “We support you Hongkong, we stand with you”, and posted that picture online.

Candice Wu 27:33

I’ll link that to the show notes if you want to check out that post and that picture.

Candice Wu 27:37

But that felt really good. I also added some suggestions that I have thought about in me, about what I feel I can do about the situation from where I am, from where I’m literally located and standing.

Candice Wu 27:53

And for now, I’m just staying connected with the outpouring of what else happens around the protests and seeing what the Hong Kong people are doing.

Candice Wu 28:04

We can feel so bombarded with all the things that are going on. But if we stay tuned into what’s really drawing our hearts, and where our hearts are being called to look, and if we really look and feel, that might give us some compelling way to take action and be in the world with what has integrated and synthesized within our bodies and hearts, our souls.

Candice Wu 28:34

And if we can allow that to make its way into the world into its expression, movement, and being from who we are, and from what we believe in, connection with ourselves will bring a deeper connection with other people and the world around us.

Candice Wu 28:58

And we can take that idea of, the question of, are we really being with all the parts of ourselves and holding all the parts of ourselves in the best loving we can in this moment, then we can expand that into the world, into our connections and relations with others?

Candice Wu 29:20

Are we doing the best we can in our loving for all those around us? Not just some, but all. Are we turning a blind eye to some? Are we leaving some in the shadows or even pushing them there?

Candice Wu 29:42

So I leave these questions with you today along with the questions around, where are you sacrificing part of yourself in order to gain in another part of yourself? Where do you accept something that you’re gaining from?

Candice Wu 30:03

Well, you’re paying the price on the other end. And if you’re hurt like me, and you need a little reminder about what it feels like to feel congruent, to feel a real yes in your body, or to feel like something is truly aligned with you, tune into the experiential later this week, where we’ll work with that, and help instill that into the body, into your psyche, into your awareness. So that when a decision comes up in your life, you’ll have an easier sense, you’ll have a template to which you can check in with to see if something’s really aligning with you.

Candice Wu 30:48

And you can also take inventory on what’s going on in your life and where things might need to change in your life or where you want them to change.

Candice Wu 30:59

If you’re subscribed to the podcast, you’ll get that later this week. And if you aren’t, you can find it at CandiceWu.com/congruence.

Candice Wu 31:10

As usual, the experientials are free to practice on your own. It’s guided, so I walk you through everything. And you can practice them as many times as it feels like you’re called to.

Candice Wu 31:22

And if we circle around all the way back to the beginning, talking about freedom, independence. What I’m left with now, is the sense of choice. The freedom to choose, the freedom to choose to look where it’s painful, in order to make a change or the freedom to pause, so you can support your nervous system and not push too hard.

Candice Wu 31:54

There’s this whole discussion here around why it is that we turn a blind eye to certain things, that I didn’t really bring up. But I want to just speak to that briefly that we are protecting ourselves in a lot of ways. And sometimes that’s necessary and important, and it’s okay.

Candice Wu 32:14

And how do we be with the parts of ourselves that are protecting and that are paying a price or hurting? What is that experience? How do we deepen into being with ourselves and loving ourselves, as we see what’s happening? And that’s also a choice.

Candice Wu 32:36

The choice to choose loving, loving is witnessing. Loving is attending to, being with seeing, feeling through. So many ways to do that with all the parts of who we are and people around us, the world around us.

Candice Wu 33:01

It’s been lovely to have you here today. I appreciate you listening to all the different tangents of where this conversation went. And I hope that it inspires you to see the world around you in a deeper way. See yourself in a deeper way, and with more loving. And to make some space to hold more of you in congruence with yourself, gather more of your energy to the wholeness of who you are today. And to do so in a way that’s not to reject other parts of you but to bring in more into your circle of who you are.

Candice Wu 33:43

It is fabulous to have you here today. Thanks so much for joining me.

Candice Wu 33:48

Be sure to sign up for my bi-monthly newsletter if you’re interested in staying in touch with my travels. The new horse meditation and Constellations offerings that are coming out, with workshops and retreats, as well as offerings. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 34:09

If you’d like this episode, check out the episode on Shifting Out of Self-Betrayal. That episode was earlier on Episode 10 actually, and it’s about living a truer and more congruent life. One that allows your soul to thrive and be nourished and where you can be more aware of ways that you betray or turn against parts of yourself. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/ep10.

Candice Wu 34:37

Be sure to check out other healing experientials, podcasts, and more at my website at CandiceWu.com/podcast.

Candice Wu 34:45

See you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Introduction

Today you’re tuning into an experiential about congruence, feeling congruent inside and out and standing up for all of you.

Congruence helps us feel more aligned with who we are, feel in sync with yourself and what you’re about, and where what you’re experiencing agrees with you and you agree with it.

Hello and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, Embodied Healing, and self-love.

My name is Candice Wu and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Connecting with Intuition, This Experience

If you wanted to connect with your intuition, this is a great way to support that because it helps your body, your nervous system, connect up with when you felt congruent before or when you felt aligned in yourself before.

And this also helps us to make future decisions and look at our lives with more clarity, ease, and discernment. This is connected with a full episode, Congruence Inside and Out: Standing Up For All of You, which is a look into how a certain world event, the Hong Kong protest recently, connected with me to show me places in myself that I wasn’t being congruent, where I was turning a blind eye to some parts of myself while accepting other parts that I could receive in certain relationships that I was in. Check out the full episode at CandiceWu.com/congruence.

Let’s Begin

So if you’re ready to jump into this experience, feel free to find a comfortable place to be.

Let yourself ease into your senses. Feel free to look around your space and orient yourself just like cats and dogs do to sniff out the place.

Notice what feels comfortable or pleasant to look at and allow that experience to touch into your body, into your cells.

Reach into your heart and if you’d like to, or if you’re ready to close your eyes or look down and turn your senses inward.

Feel your own breath moving through you.

Begin to create a picture in your mind of what’s happening inside the outlines of your body as well as deeper in any sensations, emotions.

Sense the sound of your own breath, as you simply breathe in and out.

Feel your body from the inside out.

Connect with your lower belly, your low back, the sides of the body and the hips.

Feel free to give your toes a little wiggle in slow motion, sensing into your legs, ankles, and feet.

Choosing a Moment of Alignment

Now open your awareness to a time in your life, whether that’s recent or past, where you felt aligned with yourself.

This could be a small moment of having a cup of tea or a larger experience. An experience where you felt congruent and aligned meaning when you felt in sync with who you are. Where you felt like this experience is just right. Perhaps connecting with an experience where you felt like you made the right decision or you knew you did.

It could also be a situation that was synchronous or spontaneous, something that just randomly happened and it felt really good for you, where you felt like your body was saying yes.

So if you have multiple memories or ideas, feel free to just choose one of them. Sometimes it can be challenging for something to come into your awareness, a memory, if that’s you, notice what’s happening in you right now and how that feels.

If you have an experience or memory that brings up both positive and negative or turns out it was not a good experience after all, see if there’s a different one that you can choose, that feels more whole and complete.

If you need more time to open your senses and open your memories, and let one land in your space, just pause the recording right now until you’re ready.

Picture the Memory

If you’re ready to move forward, go ahead and picture this memory.

Dive right back into connection with yourself in the moment of this experience that felt just right to you, that felt congruent, with you, inside and out.

Notice you’re setting, notice the space around you and where you were, how the air was, if there were any smells.

Notice the sounds. Sense color or texture around you.

Let yourself remember anything you can about that moment.

Notice what you might have been wearing, how your body was.

Immerse in It

And let your body now immerse into this experience.

And as you connect with the moment that felt just right, that felt like you were in agreement with this experience and it was an agreement with you.

Notice how your body feels right now, what it’s like for you now.

Sense in your body, any sensation that’s happening, and where it’s happening.

Be aware of any emotions, the contraction or expansion in your body.

Sense how you’re breathing and also the temperature in your body.

Notice where your body is released, expanded, or spacious and take a moment to bring your attention to the spot in your body that feels the best and most aligned with this experience even if it’s a tiny little spot.

Practice

Sometimes it’s really clear what your body feels like when you feel congruent or aligned with yourself. And the more you practice, the clearer and clearer it will get. And other times it feels hard to distinguish or perhaps your body isn’t feeling very much.

I encourage you to continue to practice and do it a couple of times to the different memory just a touch into a moment in time and you can do this now.

Another Moment

Connect with a different moment that felt like you are congruent with yourself, that what you were feeling on the inside, connected with your experience on the outside, perhaps that you showed up as who you were, or that there was a connection between inner experience and outer world.

Notice how you feel now in your body as you connect with this second experience if you had one.

Again, staying with the place in your body that feels most pleasant, neutral or at peace.

Noticing inside, if there’s any color or texture as you feel into that sensation.

Take your time to deepen into the experience and notice what happens as you stay with it, whether it’s the first or second memory.

Anytime your mind goes away into something else, note that, observe that and just come back to what you’re feeling in your body, in your heart, picturing what’s happening inside, noticing your breath.

Rewind

If you’d like to do this a couple more times, which really reinforces the experience of congruence and alignment in your body, feel free to rewind the podcast or come back another time.

Closing

If you’re ready to close, just take a couple more moments and imprint this experience into your psyche, into your inner world, your body, your wisdom, as to how it is that you experience congruence in your body.

Make a mental note that you can connect with your body and check-in and feel into any moment and whether it feels like this or if it feels different, showing you a different emotion or piece of wisdom that your body is trying to tell you about the experience.

This can be a gauge for whether something is in alignment with you, as a whole or not. And again, it takes a little bit of practice to discern where a sensation is coming from, and what a sensation or emotion is connected with, whether that’s connected with some fear or whether that’s connected with congruence on one level but not on another. So it’s a bit of sorting.

Gentleness to Fortify Your Way

I recommend just continuing to practice and being gentle with yourself as you fortify your way of connecting with your congruence as you fortify your way of knowing. When life hands you an experience that you say yes to or that you say no to.

And as you begin to come out of the experience, go ahead and just start to move your body or stretch if you need.

Give your body a bit of touch that feels soothing or supportive on the belly or the legs or perhaps a self-hug, and notice the touch, notice the sensation.

Begin to slowly open your eyes and come back to your setting, noticing the place, noticing what’s around you, being right here.

More and End

I’m so grateful that you joined me today.

If you enjoyed this or are curious about other healing experiences and meditations that come from Somatic Experiencing practices blended with Family Constellations, blended with voice dialogue, Yoga, Ayurveda, and other Somatic and indigenous practice. Feel free to check them out at CandiceWu.com/podcast.

Specifically, all the healing experiential and meditations are going to be listed at CandiceWu.com/meditations. See you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is with special guest Kerry Maiorca of the beloved Bloom Yoga Studio in Chicago, and in this episode, we explore how to give yourself permission that you can’t do this wrong, that how we do self-care is more important than what we do, why first graders are better at meditation than you are, and being brave to do what’s enough and not more.

Candice Wu 0:25

Hello and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 0:38

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist, sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 0:56

This episode is sponsored by My Workshops. The next one coming up is July 21, 2019, in Chicago, Illinois, and it’s called Restore the Flow of Love, whether it related to abundance, money, love, relationships, your health, or disease, tension in your body, your career, your purpose, our struggles related to these connect with early unconscious and unspoken ways of belonging and the flow of love through the ancestry. So, the connection with our lineage is carried through our bodies, in the cells, the viscera, the heart, energy, in our disease, in our fluidity, in our freedom, and where those before us didn’t get to integrate a loss or trauma, where there was an imbalance or relationships, that flow of love is disrupted and is a placeholder for where there’s energy, strength, and resource waiting for us to open and for it to flow towards us.

Candice Wu 2:00

So, in family and systemic constellations, we constantly acknowledge these dynamics that are in the undercurrent of the system were a part of, whether they’re known or unknown. So, in this workshop will set up several constellations for people who are interested in seeing what those underlying dynamics are for, the struggles they’re having, or some area of life that they want something different, and in that, we restore the flow of love, allowing you to move from a more natural space from ease and freedom, and embodiment, authenticity, and truth. So, if you’re interested, check out the workshop at CandiceWu.com/flowoflove. If this day has already passed for you, you can check out all the other workshops coming up at CandiceWu.com/events.

Candice Wu 2:52

Hello, everyone, it’s great to have you, and I’m so excited to share this conversation with Kerry Maiorca today. Kerry’s mission is to inspire you to slow down, to breathe more deeply, and to do a little less. She specializes in teaching gentle and restorative yoga, and that’s how we met. I loved teaching restorative yoga at Bloom Yoga Studio in Chicago and the community, all the people, the space, everything that Kerry touches is infused with this spaciousness, this love, and the simplicity of everyone can do this practice, we all can take a deep breath. So, I invite you to do this now, to take this deep breath, and to slow down, and I invite you into this conversation with Kerry to be nourished.

Candice Wu 3:47

Kerry is passionate about sharing the depth of her practice in an accessible, individualized and down-to-earth way, and she is also the chair of the board for the Yoga Alliance and has been teaching yoga for over 20 years. She loves mentoring, both new and experienced yoga teachers, to help them authentically shine in their practice and who they are, and as teachers, and in September 2019, she’ll be co-leading the Nourish Life Retreat in Aspen, and that is complete with gentle yoga, culinary-nutrition classes, and a creativity reboot, and she’ll share about that in this podcast as well as you can check out all that information at KerryMaiorca.com and in the show notes attached to this episode.

Candice Wu 4:35

So, with this inspiration of Kerry’s presence here, I invite you to slow down right now, to feel a breath, to just take in whatever’s here for you to a little less as you listen in today. Maybe don’t multitask or maybe just slow down a little bit, and I invite you into this conversation with Kerry.

Candice Wu 5:12

Hello Kerry, it’s great to have you on the show today.

Kerry Maiorca 5:15

Thank you so much for having me. I always love getting a chance to connect with you and really dive into interesting topics.

Candice Wu 5:23

I know, we talked about such interesting things. I’m so excited to talk to you, and where I met you was Bloom Yoga Studio, Kerry, and it’s, this is a studio that has been just growing, the word bloom is just so perfect. It is continually blooming and so lovely, and also, you’ve grown even more into different parts of you, I just would like to open the space for you to share where you are on your journey and what you’re doing now.

Kerry Maiorca 5:58

Thanks, Candice. I love the word bloom, too, and I love it for so many reasons because I think that, to me, it calls to mind the cycle of plant life and flowers, growth, and that it is something that you know, can change over periods of time and develop in different ways, and that’s really what is most exciting to me in my own life, and you know, I founded bloom 15 years ago, and, you know, it’s amazing to say that it’s hard, it’s been so much fun, it’s sort of flown by, but I really started it for very particular reasons, which are still true today, but have kind of also evolved, and I really founded Bloom because I felt like yoga could be very intimidating for people, and I had experienced the transformational benefits of it for myself.

Candice Wu 6:52

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 6:53

The practice of the postures, the deep and conscious breathwork, meditation, and then for me also, a huge, huge part was the restorative poses and relaxation. I know we have that same love of restorative work.

Candice Wu 7:10

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 7:11

And I just found that it seems complicated to the outside world, and sometimes the imagery of what means yoga, and what is that all about? Who are you? Who do you have to be able to practice it? I found that so many people never saw themselves in that image, and never felt it could fit in their lives. And so, that was really what started the whole place, and that’s what we’ve drawn, you know, we’ve drawn people.

Candice Wu 7:41

Oh, yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 7:42

I just was talking with a trainee yesterday on our mentorship call, and he was saying to me, when I told people, I became a yoga teacher who’ve known me for my whole life, they could not believe it, and there’s just still, there’s like this barrier that people think yoga is other, and to me, like, you don’t need to be able to do anything fancy to be taking a deep breath, and slowing down, and that’s what I love most about yoga and what I love most about Bloom, and as you said, I really believe in a simple approach, because I think that that’s what works for me, you know, if I make it complicated, if I make it other or too esoteric, I don’t even ever get a chance to go into the depth, you know, because it just doesn’t feel like me, I’m silly, I’m goofy, I, you know, get frustrated. I yell at my kids sometimes, and then apologize later, you know, I make bad decisions. I’m a regular person. So, I think that’s really…

Candice Wu 8:47

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 8:47

….like, that is the thing I started it for, and I learned more about that as we’ve been open and it’s still so true for me today, and you know, now I’m shifting in different ways but that’s what, that’s what I love. That’s why I’m still doing this work. It’s not because of being able to do any fancy pose, it’s not about the splits or balancing on one hand, like that is not what I’m about. I’m about slowing down, breathing deeply, and just getting quiet.

Candice Wu 9:22

I feel that, you know, when I was a teacher there, which I just so adore of my time there and being just in that energy, and with people there, and also, being a student there at times, and just walking in the space is like I’m able to bring my whole self like, yes, the normal self. It’s not like I have to cut part of myself off and only be a certain part of myself to fit into this yoga class, and it’s so refreshing.

Kerry Maiorca 9:54

Yeah, I’m really glad that you felt that, and of course, oh my gosh, we were so delighted and honored to have you teaching at Bloom, and ah, you’re amazing, because I think you really embody that authenticity, and also, that sort of spacious, slow, deep work that I just, you know, whether I was in your class, or just being with you, talking with you, I always come away with that feeling, and it’s really inspiring. I love that about you.

Candice Wu 10:25

Thank you, I think restorative yoga gives me even more permission to do that because it’s this is the yoga. It gives me the format, to even go slower. So, it helps me.

Kerry Maiorca 10:42

But as a teacher, you have to be brave doing that. I think that the thing I’ve found, I talked about this a lot with teachers, and just think about this for myself. I’ve been teaching over 20 years, and still, I sometimes can go into class and think they’re going to want more.

Candice Wu 11:03

Oh, yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 11:04

And this is this pull that we feel like as practitioners, sometimes we should be doing more, you know, the terrible should.

Kerry Maiorca 11:13

And as teachers, we worry that all they want their butts kicked, so I better you know, throw in a few more Chaturangas and hold all these strong poses longer, and there is nothing wrong with that, I’m you know, I love exercise, and I love straight strengthening my muscles and working, and I also feel the yoga space gives us one place in our life where it isn’t about that, and so, as teachers, and as practitioners, we should just seize that and enjoy it, because it might be the only time we get to do it. You know, slow, soft, and still be yourself. You don’t have to be so serious, and it doesn’t have to be so sacred. It is simple. It’s, but, profound.

Candice Wu 11:13

Yeah.

Candice Wu 12:00

Well, what you’re saying, like, it is a brave thing to do that, to like cut through, the expectations that we have on ourselves that the outer world may have on us or what we’ve, I don’t know, somehow, it just feels like so distorted. Like, somehow we have distorted this image of yoga that is this doing more, kicking our butts in place, and yeah, there is a level of bravery just to do it simply and to say, “No, I’m going to be brave and not do more.” And be brave and do the simple thing.

Kerry Maiorca 12:34

And what’s so amazing about that, when you do that, whether you’re a teacher or as a practitioner, yourself, when you give yourself permission to do less, is that as you practice it over time, it translates into your real life. You know, for me, this morning, for example, I woke up and I had had a plan to do a more active asana practice, and I woke up and I just, I was tired. Like my body felt a little bit drained. But I still really wanted to practice, and so I thought, well, what can I do that honors how I’m actually feeling, you know, but and gets me that sense of connection, and so, I decided I was going to practice my meditation, and just do restorative only that day.

Candice Wu 13:25

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 13:26

And then the funny part was, that my youngest child who’s just almost four, she had another idea, which was she wanted to play with me in the morning, and so, I, my yoga practice became, “Oh, this is my time to connect with my daughter.” I went in, we played babies, we had a lovely time, I get to take a nap because that was part of the game. I was very happy.

Candice Wu 13:49

Oh, yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 13:50

And then I said to her, okay, now, you know, now I need to go do my practice. And so I went in, and I sat down and I practice my meditation for a few minutes, and then in she comes, you know, “Can I sit with you?” How sweet is that! So, I opened up my blanket and she sits on my lap, I cuddle her in, and she sat with me in meditation for maybe like two minutes, which for almost-four-year-old is a long time.

Candice Wu 14:16

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 14:17

And then she scurried off on her way, and you know, she got to see me advocating for myself, to take time to do quiet and stillness, and then she got to, you know, tap into it for a second, and for me, you know, the me of five years ago, would have felt frustrated, resentful, and also just sort of like, sorry for myself, you know, I woke up early, and then my daughter took this time for me that I wanted for my practice, but the real-life is always happening, and that’s where, if yoga is only about achieving the poses, and doing something, it doesn’t really help you in your real life. You’re sitting you’ll be bent out of shape, when you know, someone at work does something that bothers you or your partner had, you know, you have a fight with your partner, and you’re not going to be able to even see that as the yoga but that is the yoga.

Kerry Maiorca 15:13

And so, you have to have the actual practice, and you have to carve out the space and time to you know, get slow, get still, get quiet and do those practices, and I love my asana practice, it’s just become way less important to me, then the mindset, which carries off of my meditation and into my life, where I can see, “Hey, she needs to connect with me right now.” That’s beautiful, and I want to do that.

Candice Wu 15:36

That’s beautiful. And when you say that is the yoga, I love that, and what can you say more, that is the yoga and the mindset.

Kerry Maiorca 15:48

If you think back to what any of the, you know, ancient texts of yoga that whatever your tradition and approach, you know, those are there, you know, whether you really resonate with some of these texts or not, they are the foundation of what you are practicing when you are practicing yoga, and I always like to think about and when I’m teaching, you know, tell my students that the asana is the vehicle for what’s actually happening, you know, the asana, the poses themselves, those are not doing yoga, you know, we call that that it’s, that’s the easiest way to call it when we’re in a class, those are the things we practice to get us in our bodies and to connect with the breath, and you know, to also take care, its maintenance, I see asana as maintenance, it’s a way to stay a little stronger, a little bit gently mobile and balanced, and then to use the breath to regulate the nervous system, those are the maintenance tasks.

Kerry Maiorca 16:51

If it only ends there to me, that’s really, that’s short, changing what I could be experiencing with yoga. I like to think about what is the pose for, you know, why am I practicing oppose whether it’s restorative or active? What am I doing it for? Partly, I’m doing it to maintain the body but I could do that at a gym. So, what’s the difference? And so to me, I think the difference is the mindset, and the idea of, you know, non-harming, of being truthful with ourselves, like for me this morning, truth was, I need a slow, soft practice, and you know, some days it’s, I need to not go to the gym, today, I need to do something gentler with myself, or I need to go to bed really early, even though I was planning on doing a little work before bed, it’s those kinds of things, where you’re attentive to what’s actually happening, rather than putting should, over everything you do, and operating in a robotic way.

Kerry Maiorca 17:51

To me, the yoga of everyday life is learning to be more intuitive, and more connected, we use what we do in the yoga classroom, to develop those skills, to develop greater sensitivity to the body and the breath, and to actually be quiet enough to hear the thoughts, because most of our daily life doesn’t give us the space for that, or we don’t take it, we could, anytime. But it’s hard to take it with, you know, what we read and what we do on a device and our work, and our family, and listening to music, and you know, listening to wonderful podcasts, like yours.

Kerry Maiorca 18:29

You know, we’re always about input, and when you get on a yoga mat, you know, I practice and teach with silence. Some people use music, even with you know, very quiet music, you can still access this, but personally, I love to practice in silence because it’s not input, and then I can hear my thoughts and I can get to know, what am I saying to myself? Am I kind? Am I telling myself I’m not good enough? You know, it’s that to me is where yoga on a mat, whether it’s in a class or in my home practice, it’s the way to maintain the body to regulate the breath and the nervous system, and then to really just physically provide a rest. But it’s so much about the mind, and I get some of my, I don’t know if this happens to you, Candice, but I get some of my best ideas for writing, when I’m practicing, you know, and just…

Candice Wu 19:22

Oh, yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 19:23

…like the creativity, it’s just incredible.

Candice Wu 19:25

This start flowing.

Kerry Maiorca 19:27

Yeah.

Candice Wu 19:28

Yeah. I mean, I get it all. I get the creativity, some days, and some days, I get the grief for the sadness, or the anger or whatever. But it’s that place to really listen, as you’re saying, and I love how you’re speaking to not taking it as a robotic and rigid practice, but as that tool to learn the flexibility and mobility in your daily life, to be present to what’s happening and respond, and listen to how you’re talking yourself in those moments, when you made a plan for something else.

Kerry Maiorca 20:03

Yeah.

Candice Wu 20:04

When your daughter comes in and says, “Can I sit with you?” And what happens right in that moment, and what’s needed and honoring that, and it’s so interesting how we have segmented that from daily life, like yoga as a separate thing.

Kerry Maiorca 20:23

Yeah.

Candice Wu 20:24

And it’s not.

Kerry Maiorca 20:24

I love that, I love what you said about, it’s about flexibility and mobility in daily life. I think that’s so true, and you can see the class or the practice at home as the workshopping, you know, you’re developing strength, flexibility in your body, and hopefully, it comes with you. After you roll up the mat…

Candice Wu 20:46

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 20:47

…because life is not perfect, and there’s this feeling, I think that there has been this thought kind of running through my head, especially with kids, but you know, whether or not you have kids, everyone has busyness, or has can have busyness in their life, and there can be these times where you sort of tell yourself these stories, like when I’m not so busy, I’ll be more present, or I’ll be more patient or when I’m, you know, when this big project ends, that’s when I’m going to really recharge and take time for myself. And I, my mission is to empower other people and myself, continually remind myself that we don’t need to wait until things get perfect to find greater peace and well being and that we must prioritize that even in the busiest, most demanding stressful times because otherwise, what’s the point? You know, otherwise, it is just like you said, it’s such a separate thing.

Kerry Maiorca 21:43

And what I like about yoga is it’s not, it doesn’t feel separate to me. It feels so integrated because, you know, it’s a reminder, just, why not just take a deep breath now? And why not just when you’re tired in the afternoon, you lie down for 10 minutes and see, you know I think it’s just it’s so awesome. It’s such a great practical tool but like you said, it’s seen as this other thing that we do, and we’re wearing yoga clothes, you know, it’s like when we have a bunch of props and yoga clothes, and we’re like in a certain mindset, but it can be so much more than that.

Candice Wu 22:20

Absolutely. Well, and yoga in itself means union…

Kerry Maiorca 22:26

Yes.

Candice Wu 22:26

…and it is that integration of everything, not a separate practice, and I love how you’re saying this, we don’t need to wait until things get perfect to find greater peace and well being, and I definitely hear myself say at times, like when this week’s over, because it’s so busy,

Kerry Maiorca 22:48

Yeah.

Candice Wu 22:48

I’ll do the X, Y&Z or when this ends or when I’m not so busy, and now I’m just hearing that as you say it, just giving myself the cue that that is my signal, that I need to look at, “How did I get here to begin with, and let’s take that breath.”

Kerry Maiorca 23:06

Because it happens. That’s one part of the practice first. Yeah.

Candice Wu 23:09

Right. It already like I got here, I likely created that.

Candice Wu 23:16

Not to blame, you know, not to shame or blame or criticize ourselves. But yeah, I was just reading one of your articles about fear being your CEO, really not letting fear be your CEO, and it’s probably the times I let fear be my CEO that I got there to begin with, where I may be overloaded again, but to take the breath and just come out of it, the moment.

Kerry Maiorca 23:44

Yeah, and you’re so right, it’s totally not about blaming in any way. It’s, that’s not the point, because actually, the only way you can ever make a change is if you are aware of it, and that was sort of an interesting thing for me in my when I first came to yoga, you know, when we first practiced meditation, even in very small doses, I found it to be torturous, because the way my mind was working at that time was, as if was a scary place to be, because I just was like, I was just yelling at myself, I was just berating myself mentally, and you know, from the outside, you wouldn’t have known that and I’ve always been a very positive, upbeat, you know, kind of can-do person, but once I got quiet enough, then I was realizing, “Oh, my gosh, I am not nice to myself, mentally.”

Kerry Maiorca 24:35

And so, I think that when you do realize something like that, like, “Oh, man, how did I let busyness take over?” And I’ve really tried to remove the phrase, when someone asks me how I am, I really try hard not to ask, not to answer it by saying I’m busy, crazy busy, so busy, because it does something to me, it activates me in a way that is I don’t want to buy into.

Candice Wu 24:59

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 24:59

However, there are times when I look at my schedule and my life, and I think, “If I could go back and do this again, I would do it differently.” I’d structure you know, take this piece out or space out these big events, but, being able to say that even when you’re in the moment, you’re feeling the stress, you’re really feeling like, “Wow, that was not a decision I would make again,” that is powerful, and that is progress because at a certain point in your life, you had that same scenario and didn’t even see it, and so that’s what I like to think about whenever I’m having a moment where I’m feeling frustrated with myself and thinking, “I wish I would have done that differently,” made a different choice. I think to myself, “Oh, good. I just noticed that.” And even if I can’t do anything to change it right now, I’ve just noticed, maybe next time, I’ll notice and then maybe I’ll take action, but maybe not. You know, it takes a lot of time of just noticing before you can ever take action. That’s been my experience.

Candice Wu 25:57

Absolutely.

Kerry Maiorca 25:59

And I think that the other thing about that, what is the action, by tendency, I’ll speak for myself only. My tendency is one of extremes, and so I am great at being 100% on and just going pushing, you know, I can just go, I can do it, and then off, like off sleeping, you know, that’s really good and easy for, you know, that’s like great on and off is great. It’s the in-between. That’s hard, and so, I think when we think about us getting to this place where we’re super stressed, we’re feeling more like that hundred percent, and it’s not sustainable, it doesn’t feel positive. When we think about well, “What could I do to counteract that or help myself get back to a feeling of normalcy or feeling, you know, rested and nurtured?” The tendency is I need, you know, an hour and a half yoga class or I need an hour-long massage, I need a weekend away, or I need, you know, it can see me like the fix to that is something big, but what I have found, and what I’m trying to practice and teach is that the fixed can be small.

Kerry Maiorca 27:08

So, if I only have five minutes to breathe deeply, and to just calm myself down, that is really powerful, and if I do that on a more regular basis, I still need the longer thing, you know, I need the long restorative practice, I need time away from everyone to recharge, but, on a sort of day to day basis, you’re not going to have those opportunities, most of us, and so, what can you find? You can find small moments to breathe, or you can do a 15-minute restorative pose. That is magic. That’s like the thing I wish everyone would do. I tell my teachers so much like just set your timer, lie down, take a pose 15 minutes and see what happens. You’re a different person. It’s magic.

Candice Wu 27:56

Yeah, well, every time I do that, even for like two minutes, I’m a different person.

Kerry Maiorca 28:00

Oh, yeah.

Candice Wu 28:01

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 28:01

That’s right.

Candice Wu 28:03

Maybe even one or 30 seconds.

Kerry Maiorca 28:06

Or even a few, even three deep breaths. I mean, so, if I’m with my kids, and I’m feeling like I’m just up to my eyeballs in it, and I’m so struggling, I’m struggling to be kind and compassionate and patient, I will take even one breath, I’ll take a breath, exhale through my mouth and feel the tension releasing from my shoulders and my neck, soften my jaw, and then I sometimes not all the time have the presence of mine to say to them, “I’m sorry, I’ve been a little frustrated. I’m feeling tired. I didn’t get enough sleep, or I’m feeling a little bit stressed because I have this thing do later, and I was thinking about that.” And that’s amazing when I can do that, and some days I just plain can’t, but at least I took the breath.

Candice Wu 28:50

Absolutely. I love how encouraging you are to yourself now, and in even just noticing the thing that you’d like to change and encouraging yourself that you noticed it and that that’s a good thing. We don’t do that as a whole society. Like, “Oh, well, that should have changed years ago.”

Kerry Maiorca 29:11

Yes.

Candice Wu 29:12

So why didn’t, right?

Kerry Maiorca 29:14

Well, I do have some of that, too.

Candice Wu 29:16

Yeah. Don’t we all?

Kerry Maiorca 29:18

Yeah.

Candice Wu 29:19

Yeah. Well, I was curious, Kerry. What are you struggling with today? What do you tussling with, or what feels up in the air for you, of your learning?

Kerry Maiorca 29:33

I think that the thing I’m always struggling with is my relationship with time. I think that I am a person that fills up the space I’m in and fully, you know, fully loves and embodies what I’m in and doing, and I tend to want to put more into everything, you know, I’m a more person, I think it’s this, this struggle with more. I’m really trying to find enough, and to see, like, what would be enough to do today, in this time, I have? You know, like, in my own work life, I can set a list of, you know, five things I want to accomplish in a two-hour period and think that’s realistic. So, you know…

Candice Wu 30:26

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 30:27

….this evolution of what if I just did a little less, you know, so I think the reason I teach this stuff, is because I’m still working with it myself. It’s not I don’t teach it from a place of mastery, I teach it from a place of process and of this really strong conviction that there are lots of people who have the same struggle of more, and for those of us who are more people, the practice is, how can I do a little less and find enough. So, I think that that’s really where I am, and I see it in a lot of different aspects of my life. Just sort of my professional goals for myself, you know, with my writing or with, you know, projects, I’m taking on, that piece of it, I see it with what I want to try to do with my kids, I see it with my own, you know, personal practice and sort of self-care time, and it’s just always this balance. It’s like, what would be enough right now?

Candice Wu 31:32

I just take a really nice, deep breaths of that, how do I do a little lesson find enough? I struggle with that too, with time, and the most recent thing that happened for me, in my healing process about time, is that I found that it connected with my young self. Well, again, right, like layers and layers of working with. But here’s another piece, like my younger self, it came back to the same thing in a deeper way, that there was a feeling of wanting more time with my mother when I was younger, and there were certain circumstances of not, of perhaps me wanting more, than the time could give, but also certain circumstances where she had to be away and doing, and working. Certain occasions that when I was an infant, and then into young life, and I could just connect with that part of me that it was kind of life or death feeling that if I didn’t have enough time, it would just feel so terrible, and I needed more, I needed more, I needed more, and that just applied to the rest of my life blindly, you know, where I would just fill it with more, but it never really satisfied that.

Candice Wu 32:53

So, if filling my time with more was satisfying to the part of me that needed it, then it would have been complete…

Kerry Maiorca 33:01

Right.

Kerry Maiorca 33:09

Wow, that is so beautiful. I love that perspective, and I think, you know, thanks for sharing that. That’s, really profound, and I think that regardless of kind of that, whether that feeling is there as a child, or as you know, as an infant, there’s something that’s so universal in the part about kind of more love for yourself, too, you know, like, regardless of whether where that came from that’s, you know, I really love what you shared, I’m going to ponder that, and I know that what you said about giving yourself more just never does it, it just fills you with more stuff.

Candice Wu 34:21

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 34:21

Like it’s just more stuff, and sometimes, it just becomes even more distractions and more challenges, and more ways to take you away from your true self, and I love your choice of the word nourished, and that has become a really powerful word for me. Just in the last few months, I started working with my dear friend, Laura, and she’s, and now we’re business partners, and we kind of came together around this concept of what it means to be nourished because I was thinking about it, you know, sort of like the word bloom to me meant something really powerful. This word nourished, you know, it’s obviously it calls to mind food, and, you know, I tried to be conscious about what I feed and put in my body and my children, and my, you know, my husband, like, I love to cook, that’s one of my great passions, and I love to think about food as this really not just like kind of another should, and I should eat the healthy foods that this magazine told me to eat, you know, but rather to, again, tap into intuition, and to say like, “What would really nourish me, not just my physical self, but just sort of would feel like comfort and love?”

Kerry Maiorca 35:46

And so, there was that piece of that, and then to me that the what we were talking about with yoga, that is the other place that I felt like the self-care practices that have become so important to me. You know, I was doing a lot of the same stuff for many years, like yoga, massage, you know, running or hiking or biking or being in nature or taking a nap or like, you know, all these different, reading a book, all these different self-care type practices were in my life, but I realized it was with a very different mindset, and you can do, you can go do yoga or you know, go get a pedicure, or go for a hike, and you could do it in a way that’s kind of checked out, like there’s a way to do those self-care things, but to be a little bit mentally checked out, and they don’t have the same impact.

Kerry Maiorca 36:41

You know, it’s about how we do them, and so, this idea to me is how can we create a feeling of nourishing our whole self, so of course, with good healthy food, and then with whatever our movement practices for me, it’s gentle and restorative yoga, that’s in my end meditation, but then also, like, “Where are the other pieces of our life that helped to nourish us?” You know, it’s, to me, a connection with nature, and being, you know, being active, moving, you know, being strong, and then also bringing in this sense of creativity, like, do we have things that are just for pure joy, not work, I’m a person who can get all wrapped up in my work, and then my, you know, families like responsibilities, and then I find I just feel depleted.

Kerry Maiorca 37:29

So, when I go and take time, at night, after everyone’s in bed, I’m done with everything, and I sit down at the piano, and I just play piano for a little bit or I write a poem, or I sit just in front of the fireplace with tea, and I just not for long, it doesn’t have to be an hour. It can be 20 minutes, you know, it can be five minutes if that’s all I have, but when I bring these nourishing practices in, and I think about them from a different perspective, where it’s not about, well, I should really get my hike in, or I should really get my yoga in. It feels really different, and you give yourself permission to trust that what you choose to do is going to be enough.

Kerry Maiorca 38:11

You know, I think a lot of times, there’s a lot wrapped up in why we do these things, like why we practice yoga or do exercise or eat healthfully. A lot of times it comes from this kind of self-bullying, self-shaming place of like, well, if I don’t, maybe my body will change in a way I don’t like, and you know, I have been there, I’ve been through a lot of struggles with that, body image and unhealthy disordered eating, and like plenty of things, you know, in my early 20s was a major struggle, and this mindset shift is what enables you to love yourself and to trust that loving and nourishing yourself, your whole self. That is always a good move. You’ll never gonna regret that decision.

Candice Wu 39:04

I love that. Loving your whole self is always a good move.

Kerry Maiorca 39:34

Hmmm.

Kerry Maiorca 39:39

Exactly. It’s like a punishment reward mentality, and it’s this threat or worry or yes, and it’s so you don’t you can’t even recognize it as that until you really dive in and see it. You know, because of course, we know, we only get one body, so, you want to make sure you keep it healthy. But I think that it’s really about trust. You know, it’s about trusting that you know better than whatever the latest thing has come out in any diet or exercise magazine. Like, there’s just those things change all the time, because they’re selling magazines. Experts are selling books, like, you know, I think it’s a great idea to not put your sort of spiritual development or sort of the whole self-development in the hands of someone who’s trying to sell you something, because…

Candice Wu 40:28

Oh, yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 40:29

…..you know better.

Candice Wu 40:32

Absolutely. I tried to ignore a lot of things and a lot of input now because, oh, it’s just so much.

Kerry Maiorca 40:40

Yeah.

Candice Wu 40:42

And it clouds my ability to hear myself.

Kerry Maiorca 40:46

Yes.

Candice Wu 40:46

I think that protection from what’s just being told to us and fed to us is really important, so we can hear ourselves.

Kerry Maiorca 40:56

Mm-hmm.

Candice Wu 40:57

Yeah, thank you for that reminder. We can trust what we know inside, and we know better than what someone else might say to us, or encourage us even sometimes, it’s not always the right thing, but we need to listen to ourselves.

Kerry Maiorca 41:16

Yeah, and it’s also like what you see, when you look around, and you know, those around you, you might feel you’re trying to keep up and kind of match what someone else is doing, and you know, as a person who’s the competitive athlete, I have a strong competitive drive, and so for me, just like what you’re saying, I really have been. It’s a practice of, you know, withdrawal of the senses. It’s this take coming away from all the input, advice, you know, the sort of keeping up with the, you know, this and this or that friend, or this or that person to say, what’s really happening right now, and to know that, when you tune into that, you are taking care of yourself in the best possible way, and yeah, that’s all. That’s really that’s what you need.

Candice Wu 42:04

Yeah. So, tell me more about your nourish life retreat that you spoke of with Laura.

Kerry Maiorca 42:12

yes, well, I am so excited about this. So, Laura is a culinary nutritionist. She’s the founder of golden root nutrition and she does, I’ve been so honored and privileged to be able to eat her amazing food. So, she really creates and brings this beautiful balance of food that is whole and healthy, and it’s simple but it’s delicious, and she teaches other people how to do that, and I have learned so much from her myself, you know, just even like how to approach this topic that can seem very overwhelming, you know, if you’re trying to eat healthfully for yourself, or if you are responsible for cooking for others, there’s so much input and advice, and it’s overwhelming.

Kerry Maiorca 43:02

So, the retreat is going to consist of me leading some gentle and restorative yoga practices a couple of times, and Laura will be teaching culinary nutrition classes, and then we’ll be eating the delicious food we make. And then, we also will be in Aspen, Colorado, which is a gorgeous place, a really, a place of great wild beauty, and we’re going in September, which is an incredible time to be there because trees are all changing colors, the weather is just delightful, and I think a lot of times two people have an image of what Aspen is, and there is this other side of Aspen that’s kind of there with the sort of glamorous side, but our retreat, we’re staying at a family-owned in right in town, and it’s just so warm and beautiful, and we’re really going to be trying to create this place where it’s, you bring your real self, your very real, imperfect, perfect self, and we come together for sometimes of yoga.

Kerry Maiorca 44:10

There’s going to be some option to explore meditation every day, and then we’ll have these classes where you can just think like, “What could I do with my, the way I nourish myself with food that could just make me feel more energized?” Laura has this class eating for awesome energy, you know, how could I see the way my food could just contribute to my well being, and be delicious and enjoyable, and wonderful, and then we’ll also have time to do some connection with nature. So, we’ll have a, there’s this beautiful riverfront path, and a John Denver sanctuary, which I’m a huge John Denver fan, this is beautiful place where you can go and kind of look at his lyrics and to sort of reflect on in nature, in this beautiful place, his legacy, and then we’ll also be going to the top of Aspen mountain and enjoying a hike there and just a moderate hike, nothing intense, but really more about the practice of being in nature and being quiet in nature.

Kerry Maiorca 45:18

And then the last component of it is, we’re going to have a creativity night. So, I am, I just was writing this piece, it’s going to come out in my next newsletter, it’s called, “Where is the joy?” And it’s about this rut, I started to find myself and where I was kind of going through my everyday life, and just, you know, doing all the things I had to do even doing my self-care practices, you know, I’m vigilant, like I have to get that in, it’s very important to my mental well-being as well as my physical, so, I don’t miss it. But it was like, okay, my self-care practices of yoga, meditation and, you know, exercise or hiking, and you know, doing my family obligation things, you know, getting my kids to where they need to go being preparing, you know, doing all the things around the house.

Kerry Maiorca 46:08

And then you know, doing my work, I actually work for the yoga studio, for my own new writing ventures, for the retreat, and then you know, the end of the date comes and it was just like, “Wow, that’s it. That’s all I got left.” And I started to feel the sense of, you know, you go through the day, do you feel like you’re doing your day? You know, do you feel like you’re just sort of checking everything off the list? And is there any room for joy? Is there any room for things that have no purpose, but to nourish you and help you feel more alive? And so we’ll have this one night, just an hour, where we will gather by the fireplace, and you’ll be invited to bring, a craft, if you have one or journal if you like to doodle or write or that kind of thing, or will have a very special creative activity that will do, will provide it, and it’s just going to be a very small little time to be kind of quiet, and to focus on doing something that, again, doesn’t have a purpose. It’s not about making an amazing work of art. It’s just about tapping into how creativity nourishes you. So, I’m just so excited. I am like over the moon excited about it, and Laura’s amazing. I’m so honored to work with her and yeah, just I can’t wait.

Candice Wu 47:30

I love that. I love this, and I can feel your excitement, and just reading the details, as well, and hearing you speak about it now, especially this creativity night. I love the aspect of doing that together.

Kerry Maiorca 47:50

Mm-hmm.

Candice Wu 47:51

And it sounds like the space is open, that it’s an individual or group, you know, with other people kind of experience, but just being together with that intention of creativity sounds really lovely, and that joy without a purpose. It’s so important in our lives, and for me, it was life-changing to bring in joy without a purpose.

Kerry Maiorca 48:17

Yes.

Candice Wu 48:17

It was like, “Wait, I can actually do that.” Right?

Kerry Maiorca 48:21

I don’t have to be. Yeah like, don’t wait for someone to tell you to do it. You know, when we’re kids, it’s so easy. It’s so easy to just choose things that are just joyful, and you know, like, what are you doing it for know, just for fun, and as adults, like, we don’t need to wait until someone says. Just go have fun or just do this thing because it’s enjoyable. It’s that we need to advocate for ourselves to do that.

Candice Wu 48:48

We do. We do. So, how can people join the retreat or get more information? Where can people find it?

Kerry Maiorca 48:58

We have our website at getnourished.life, and we have all the information about the retreat there, and we’re keeping it very small, we’re only having 12 spots. So, get to it, if there’s interest.

Candice Wu 49:16

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 49:17

Yeah, that’s where you can learn more and then can register, and I also just wanted to share about it, I’ve had the experience with retreats myself, this kind of like, abrupt shift from my perfect retreat self to my imperfect daily life self. You know, for me, going away from my family, being in control of my time not having work to do, and eating healthy, delicious food and like, you know, doing yoga and meditation, all these things that can feel like for those few days, I’m like perfect. You know, my idealized self, and I was going to Laura and I have been talking about this a lot about how we really want you to feel like when you’re on this retreat, you are your regular whole self with all of your pieces. You know, it’s about being real, and it’s about whatever is going on in your life is still there, and that’s okay, and you can still engage in these practices in a way that just feels manageable.

Kerry Maiorca 50:21

So, we’re not doing, you know, six hours of yoga a day, and we’re not doing you know, a three-hour-long, intense hike. It’s like we’re doing little mini doses of everything, and then we’re giving you practical tools so that when you go back to your daily life, our hope is you just will bring in, just a tiny bit, like a little bit of something. And so, when people feel called to kind of escape, you know, we’re really trying to make this retreat, not an escape. You know, it’s about being in your life, but just trying to bring in to invoke some different ways of being with yourself. So, we’re thinking about it as this just a part of your life that is this sort of like recharge, want to recharge the batteries, so you can go back to your real life, and let some of that nourished spirit infuse your day.

Candice Wu 51:15

Oh, I feel that very much. It’s like not this getaway escape from reality. It’s, let’s incorporate and let’s weave in, and also not make this an experience that’s undigestible, but one that’s simple.

Kerry Maiorca 51:30

Right.

Candice Wu 51:31

And reminds you of the simplicity being enough, and that you can just bring one little thing into your life and see what it does.

Kerry Maiorca 51:40

Yes.

Candice Wu 51:41

Beautiful.

Kerry Maiorca 51:43

Thank you.

Candice Wu 51:43

Thank you. I’m so excited for you, and everyone that’s gonna be on the retreat, and I also, I want to hear about your mentorship for yoga teachers.

Kerry Maiorca 51:54

Oh, thank you. Yes, I am so excited about this. I’ve been training teachers since 2011, and I love working with teachers, whether they’re brand new or now I also lead a gentle yoga teacher training, and so that’s for established teachers and helping them really explore this approach I’m talking about, this gentle, softer approach. So, I’ve been doing that for many years, and this winter, I just launched my very first online mentorship program for teachers of any level of experience, and we just wrapped up our first session, and it’s a combination of a monthly over four months, a monthly video conversation around a particular topic, and then I send out a follow up that kind of talks about what we, about the key points. It also includes a 30-minute mentorship call with me directly one-on-one, which I’ve so enjoyed those conversations, they’ve been so rich.

Kerry Maiorca 53:00

I just really like this. It’s, I kind of one of my mentors or mentees who was just in the program said, “This is like grad school for yoga teachers.” And I was like, “I love that!”

Candice Wu 53:10

Oh, cool!

Kerry Maiorca 53:11

I surveyed a bunch of my past trainees before, starting to see that, “What are the topics that you most need?” Like, what do you most need a refresher on and sort of more support, both from me and from the fellow people in the teacher circle mentorship group, and so, I kind of picked those topics and group them in ways that felt logical and reasonable, but so much of it is to me really about being intentional and mindful about what are you doing in your teaching and why, and then even more important, how is your practice, because all of us as teachers, the further along you go, you know, it’s common for people to lose sight of the importance of their practice, and to let their teacher self overtake their practitioner self, and you’ve got to be a practitioner first.

Kerry Maiorca 54:06

And so, the mentorship group is really about all of those things, and we have like a Google group that we sort of I offer, little sort of tips or reminders throughout the month between calls, and then others share and oh my gosh, are the people who are in this group, they are so wise. I mean, I just, I love it. So, it has been a total delight, and I’m going to run another one, starting September through December. So, I’ll be opening that up soon for registration, but I just love it. I love working with teachers to refine.

Candice Wu 54:41

That’s so great. Yeah, and you have so much wisdom to share, especially that part where you talked about teaching from your process, and from process rather than mastery. I just imagine that helps so many people because we’re all in process. We’re not done.

Kerry Maiorca 55:02

Yup.

Candice Wu 55:02

And that’s exactly whole and right…

Kerry Maiorca 55:06

Yeah.

Candice Wu 55:06

….right now. So, I just, I appreciate the space you’re creating, and so glad that you’re doing this.

Kerry Maiorca 55:15

Thank you, Candice.

Candice Wu 55:17

Well, and there’s one more bit that I’m so excited for the podcast is that you’re offering an experience for people to join into. This will be an extension of this episode, and this episode is going to be found at CandiceWu.com/kerry, KERRY, and so, you’re offering an experience or meditation or some sort of guided practice. Do you want to say more about it now or do you want to leave it as a surprise as it comes out?

Kerry Maiorca 55:51

I think I’d like to leave it as a surprise.

Candice Wu 55:54

Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 55:55

As an exploration.

Candice Wu 55:56

That’s delightful. Yeah.

Kerry Maiorca 55:59

I love that you offer these. I love love love that you offer these, I think it’s just a great way. I think so much of this type of work can seem really just inaccessible or just sort of mystical or too out there, and like when you offer these experiential, you’re taking, I’ve listened to many of the ones that you’ve offered, I just think they’re lovely, and like then you take these ideas and concepts, and you immediately make them felt and embodied just like the name of your podcast. So, I really love that you do that, and I’m so excited to share. I can’t wait.

Candice Wu 56:35

Thank you. Thank you. I’m so excited to experience yours, I know that exactly. It’s like we talk about these concepts in our minds, and that is the way we can communicate across audio, across. Yeah, distance and time, and yet the real thing, the real practice itself is the being in it. So, I can’t wait to hear that and experience that with you. Is there anything else you want to share today?

Kerry Maiorca 57:06

I would like to thank you for having me and to thank you for your friendship and for all of the really amazing explorations that we’ve had together over the years. I just think I’m inspired by the work you do, and the way that you do it in a way that isn’t rigid or about kind of perfecting one thing and then delivering it again, that sort of robotic nature, but how, when I talk with you, I feel more inspired to be more fully who I am, and I love that about you, and so, I’m very grateful to you for inviting me to have this conversation in this way, and I look forward to our continued conversations and friendships, and to all the different ways that we’re going to keep learning more about ourselves, and that you know, and then hopefully, in the process, just inspire more people to do that and love themselves more.

Candice Wu 58:13

Thank you so much. That’s really touching, Kerry, and I have so appreciated our friendship and our companionship, and every time I talk to you, and we exchange our personal lives and what’s going on and just what we’re thinking about, I walk away with this feeling of, “Wow, Kerry notices one simple thing,” and that just makes such a huge difference to me, and then it gives me that feeling of noticing more of the little things in my life and recognizing how important those are and how that’s enough. Thank you. Thank you so much.

Kerry Maiorca 58:56

Thank you, Candice.

Candice Wu 58:57

I really appreciate you.

Kerry Maiorca 58:59

And I appreciate you, too, and your wonderful Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 59:04

Thank you, and I do have one more question if it’s okay?

Kerry Maiorca 59:09

Yeah, of course.

Candice Wu 59:10

I would love for you to talk about how first graders are better at meditating than we are. I loved that article.

Kerry Maiorca 59:20

Did you like that?

Candice Wu 59:20

I did, It was so, like, delightful, and I just would love for you to share it with everyone listening today, if they haven’t read this or this now.

Kerry Maiorca 59:31

Oh, that was so much fun. I, so, when my daughter, my middle daughter was in first grade, I was invited to come to the class and, you know, share some yoga with the kids, and I did this, I’ve done this with, you know, all of my kids where I’ve gone to their school and just taught a little yoga until they got too embarrassed to have me come.

Kerry Maiorca 59:54

My son’s in seventh grade now, that is not cool now. But I will say my kids do sometimes grab our yoga pretzels partner deck and do partner Yoga together, and that makes me so happy. But back then, I was invited to come to her class, and I’ve been teaching them yoga and all these wonderful kind of kids’ yoga adaptations and techniques. But when I found the love the most was the relaxation at the end, and I would always do a guided visualization that just helped them relax and seeing their little faces like it was magic. And so, I thought, well, you know, why shouldn’t I just give them more of that if that’s what they want, and so, I decided I was going to also teach them meditation, and I was like, all right, this seems a little intimidating, you know, how are they going to do? Everyone associates first graders have been really wiggly and high energy, and they are.

Kerry Maiorca 1:00:51

So, we went out, and we were really fortunate to be able to do this in the garden. So, we went out to the garden at our school, and I said to them, you know, “Okay, so we’re going to do our yoga, and then at the end, let’s try some meditation.” And I had a bunch of kids just shoot their hands up into the air, like, I know about meditation, cross their legs, put their hands into a mudra, close their eyes, and then go all like really peaceful and serene, just like they owned it like they’ve been doing it forever.

Candice Wu 1:01:19

Oh.

Kerry Maiorca 1:01:19

And they were like, I’m so good at meditation. I do meditate. They were so excited about it, and so that just kind of tickled me a little and I thought, “Okay, well, let’s see how it goes.” When we got there, to that part of the practice, they all took their seats and he got quiet, and you know, these very wiggly bodies really became still. And, you know, I don’t know what was happening for them in their head. I don’t know how much the stuck with them or didn’t, but the reason I wrote that piece why first graders are better at meditation than you are is because they were 100% unintimidated to just try it, and they completely put themselves in it, for how many minutes 2 3 5 minutes that we did it. They just like embodied meditation, and without any, you know, any other sort of inner voice telling them that they’re not doing it right, they don’t know enough, is this really meditation, and that’s been my experience as an adult until, you know, up until the last, like 10 years of my practice. So, halfway through.

Kerry Maiorca 1:02:22

My experience of being a practitioner, was when I finally got comfortable with meditation, I just never felt like I could really do it, until finally one day, one teacher gave me permission, and she said, “You can’t do this wrong.” And I realized, like, “Oh, okay,” and that the kids really got. They weren’t worried about whether they were doing it, right. They just did it, and so, that’s what I would love for anyone who’s even curious if the word meditation is intimidating to you. Use mindfulness, use quiet, use stillness, like whatever word works, but I just think that if we could, even for two minutes or three minutes, five minutes, just sit or lie down. Be quiet, maybe close the eyes if that feels safe, but just take some time to go in. We would feel a change in a shift if we did it on a regular basis, and that’s what I just loved about those first graders. They had moxy man, they weren’t worried about me telling them if they’re doing it right. They just did it, and they were awesome.

Candice Wu 1:03:25

They were telling you how to do it. Like, this is what it is.

Kerry Maiorca 1:03:27

I know, they really were. They really were.

Candice Wu 1:03:32

And just you can’t do this wrong.

Kerry Maiorca 1:03:34

Yes.

Candice Wu 1:03:37

That’s a great place to leave, and close our podcast today. Thank you so much, Kerry. Can’t do this wrong.

Kerry Maiorca 1:03:45

Let’s all go out into our day with that. Thank you so much, Candice, this has been such a pleasure.

Candice Wu 1:03:50

Thank you.

Candice Wu 1:03:55

Thank you so much for tuning in today and joining us. I just got so many little nuggets of information and insight that can just help me feel into a more easeful space, the softening and simplicity, tuning into how first graders can be with their exuberance and joyful delight, playfulness, trust and just doing enough. Thanks so much, Kerry for sharing all these pieces of wisdom and doing this in your daily life, not in a perfect way but as a practice, and showing us that it can be messy, it can be in process, and we can continue to love and know ourselves more deeply each step of the way.

Candice Wu 1:04:49

I encourage you to check out Kerry’s work at KerryMaiorca.com and link to the show notes of this episode at CandiceWu.com/kerry, and Kerry is spelled KERRY. Be sure to check out carries meditation that just takes you exactly where you are, with your messy or imperfect perfect life. Just taking five minutes of your day to be with what is here and to tune into yourself. You don’t have to wait to have a perfect life or the perfect setup to do meditation. This simple guided meditation welcomes you just as you are right now, harnessing your distractions and to do is to create a more spacious and easeful you.

Candice Wu 1:05:33

Kerry’s meditation can be found later this week on the podcast or at CandiceWu.com/kerry, KERRY. If you’d like to check out other healing experientially or guided meditations, and topics and guests on the podcast, you can go to CandiceWu.com/podcast, and when you click on each episode, you’ll find that there are healing experiences that are connected with either the guests episode or the main topic of the week, not every week has experientials, but also you can check out the list of podcasts and you’ll find all the experientials there. If you’d like to stay in touch about future retreats, workshops, or receive self-love notes, and also the podcast information, you can sign up for the Embody Community at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 1:06:27

I’m so grateful to have you here and listening, and I always love to hear feedback, whether that’s criticism or questions, ways that the podcast touched you or connects with you, and I’ll just leave you with that feeling of simplicity and doing enough that Kerry so inspired today.

Candice Wu 1:06:46

So, as we close today, I invite you to take a few of those deep breaths and feel into any bit of slowness or slower pace at your body can access now.

Candice Wu 1:07:01

Thanks so much and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Introduction

Candice Wu 0:00

Do you feel like you have no time for meditation or it’s just too hard to sit down?

Kerry Maiorca’s meditation here just takes about five minutes and you can start anytime, you don’t have to wait.

This simple guided meditation welcomes you just as you are right now, in your imperfect perfect life.

Hello and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist, sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Kerry on the Podcast

Kerry was on the podcast this week, where we talked about the struggle with more and being a more person, feeling enough, and living a simple life, being enough as well as trusting that you know your truth, and giving yourself permission that you can’t do life wrong. You can find her full podcast episode at CandiceWu.com/kerry. That’s KERRY.

And now, it’s a pleasure to introduce Kerry Maiorca of Bloom Yoga Studio in Chicago, offering this beautiful meditation that just embraces this moment as it is. Here’s Kerry.

Begin with Kerry

Kerry Maiorca 1:41

Welcome, and thanks for joining me for this experiential.

I’d like to invite you to begin by asking yourself two simple questions.

First, are you willing to carve out the next five minutes or so, just for you?

And second, do you believe that five minutes is enough to make a difference? I certainly do, but don’t expect you to take my word for it. So, let’s try it.

I invite you to practice with me today, a meditation that I like to call, “If you can’t beat them, join them.”

This meditation doesn’t assume that you’re perfect or serene, in fact, it requires and depends on the fact that there are upsets, disruptions in your mind and life.

So, first, find a comfortable place to either sit, lie down or stand, and then with your eyes open, but just soft, look around you.

Whether you’re in your kitchen, in your office, hopefully not behind the wheel of a car. If you are, wait till later. Just look around and see.

Take in, observe.

Notice the colors, notice the shapes, the objects and just notice any thoughts that are sparked by seeing your everyday surroundings.

Then, if it’s comfortable for you, I invite you to close your eyes.

If not take a very soft and more introspective gaze, and then begin to notice the state of your thoughts, where your mind is at this moment, without trying to do anything at all to change it, and without judging.

Just take a few deeper, slower breaths to tune into your mind state. The pace and rhythm of the thoughts, and the thoughts themselves if you slow in-breath, and out-breath to observe.

Notice and Join

And then, notice if there are any prominent themes that keep coming back in your thoughts or notice if there is an energetic state that you’re observing in yourself, rather than trying to change or deny or pretend it’s different.

I invite you to practice joining, making friends with what currently is. For example, if you’re feeling rushed, you’re multitasking, thinking about all the things on your to-do list, I invite you to practice now. Honoring that and stepping back from it.

You can do this by taking a deep breath in and welcoming in the state you wish to create, and a slow breath out, acknowledging what you wish to let go of. For example, you could inhale spaciousness and ease, and exhale, business.

I invite you to think if there are one or two words that might represent what you wish to welcome in in this moment, and one or two words that you’d wish to let go of, and just practice very simply inhaling to welcome in and exhaling to release.

Remember, it’s totally normal for the thoughts to push their way forward, for your to-dos to keep coming back.

I invite you not to resist that, but to just know that you can do that later.

Now, is the time for you, just a few more breaths playing with this, welcoming in and letting go.

Closing

Now, slowly bring your attention back to your breathing, and it’s normal everyday state, just watching.

Observe the state of your mind and thoughts how you’re feeling, and then if the eyes are closed, I invite you to let them just gently blink back open.

Again, softly taking in the room around you, taking in your internal state and observing how it felt to take just a few minutes to slow down, to get a little quiet and to connect with your breath.

I invite you to use this tool anytime you wish in your normal, everyday imperfect perfect life. Thank you for practicing.

End

Candice Wu 8:29

I’m so glad you joined us today, with this meditation offered by Kerry Maiorca.

If you’d like to tune into more healing experientials or meditations, guided experiences by myself or my guests on the Embody Podcast, you can check it out at CandiceWu.com/podcast.

Thanks so much for jumping in, and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:01

This episode is about the key to manifesting what you desire, which is finding the map on how to be you and getting to your core essence and believing that you are worthy. Within this episode, you’ll also be guided through a healing experience around worthiness and releasing beliefs of unworthiness, as well as the judgment around it and connecting with you, what you desire, and what makes you feel like you.

Candice Wu 0:27

This episode may not be for all audiences, please use your own discretion. If you’re uncertain whether these topics will trigger you, you can check in with the show notes which will give you a heads up about certain sensitive topics.

Candice Wu 0:42

Hello, and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast, a show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 0:56

My name is Candice Wu and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 1:16

This episode is sponsored by the Dream Classes on Skillshare that I created. I love Dream Work. And what I found was experiencing the dreams in my body, as well as preparing my body to experience dreams supported me in deepening in my dream life. So feel free to hop on to check out these Dream Classes that will support you in the embodiment piece, the support of your physiology so that you feel calmer and have better sleep and are able to remember your dreams better at CandiceWu.com/dreamclasses.

Candice Wu 1:50

Recently, the third class on developing your imaginal space and your ability to connect with imagery and feeling sense in your body just came out. And there are two other classes as well and more to come about exploring your dreams from an embodiment perspective.

Candice Wu 2:10

Skillshare requires a membership except for the free classes and you can receive two months free of membership if you connect to the link through CandiceWu.com/dreamclasses.

Candice Wu 2:28

Welcome back, everybody. It’s wonderful to have you here on the Embody Podcast. I’d invite you to just take a moment with me to breathe, to notice yourself, to come inward, arrive here and allow this little space and time for you to be with whatever comes through for you today in this exploration, in this podcast, and in your heart. Welcome.

Candice Wu 3:02

So I have a bit of a cold, it’s on the tail end. So my voice sounds a little different. But I’m excited to talk to you today about manifesting and the key to manifestation of what you desire. So this came clear to me that I wanted to talk about this because more and more increasingly as I do my healing work is I release untruths from my being, from my energy, allow my body to move through that, my ability to attract and be in sync with what my desires are, and allow my life to unfold from that place is much sharper.

Candice Wu 3:44

So about two weeks ago, I was talking to my healer and I was saying “I don’t know how all these things I want are going to come together. I just don’t know.” And she said, “Well, what do you want? And I wanted to be around my family. I really was loving it at that time. And right now, in Michigan, just enjoying, spending time with them. And it’s such a sweet time, it’s a time where I’m watching different parts of my family, heal the past and come to more love. And it’s a time that I’m just watching. People enjoy things in my family, the struggle is much less. I’m experiencing that as well. And just loving them for who they are.

Candice Wu 4:28

I also wanted to live in a place that I love, wasn’t quite sure if Michigan was that for me. I grew up here and lived here until I was about 25 or six. And, at that time I left feeling like I’ve never really wanted to go back. But now that I’m here, I really enjoy the energy. I love how grounded it feels, I love that I get to ride horses here. And that’s a major part of where my love and my energy wants to go is to connect with horses and to learn how to be a good leader with horses. If you’ve listened in to any of my past podcasts, you already know that. And I truly want to grow with horses, I’m not sure if I’m going to be having my own horse soon or what but just want to be closer to them. And the other thing that I really wanted was love. I wanted romance and sensuality and the ability to create with someone, someone that would be a life partner, someone that is ready and has their heart open and is also conscious of who they are in their energy in themselves.

Candice Wu 5:37

And so, two weeks ago, I didn’t really have that many of those pieces put together. I just knew I want to be around my family. And that’s really all I knew. And what I did was I felt into all the pieces of what I wanted, and got even clearer about what that looks like and how it feels to be with that energy. And felt into that.

Candice Wu 6:05

This is a process that many people do. Visualize something and connect with how they will feel when they have it and imagine that they already have what they desire. Imagine that experience is already here and they already feel that way now, and to feel it in their bodies. And that’s essentially what I was doing, to be very personal, which is also going to be a suggestion of mine later in this podcast is that I actually pleasured myself while I was imagining all the things I wanted. Because it gets me to an even deeper and more intimate and focused connection with the thing that I want, and it matches and aligns with sexuality, which is our creative energy.

Candice Wu 6:51

So yes, I do mean masturbating and picturing the desire that I have happening to me with me and in my life, and letting my creative sexual energy and power, hold the space for that and align with that, that I desire.

Candice Wu 7:11

That’s an idea I actually got from a friend of mine through Family Constellations. And the first time I heard her say that I was like “What? You do that?”

Candice Wu 7:21

And as I got more in touch with my own fantasy life in general, it just seemed to make sense. It just naturally arrive, there where I was picturing all the things that I desire and the deepest desires that I have of loving connection and sensuality and the way of being of connecting with another person in the way that I’d like to.

Candice Wu 7:45

Of course, there were other desires, as I’ve just told you of finding a place that I want to stay for longer, being with my family and being with horses. And I didn’t picture that this time necessarily, because all those things I feel will just fall into place. And I feel very worthy of it. But there was a piece of “Can I have this love that I truly desire, this kind of relationship, this place of connection with another person that is this way?” Because in some ways, that’s new to me, to have all of the pieces there that I want in the relationship and in the other and in myself. Growing into my worthiness of the kind of love that I want and the kind of life that I want.

Candice Wu 8:35

Pleasuring myself at the same time was something that brought it even more to fruit in terms of the feeling and the embodiment. And if we think about the things that we truly desire, the things that we really do desire for our lives, don’t they turn us on in some way? Don’t they light up our being, our heart, our different parts of our body? Maybe there’s a feeling of expansion somewhere in the body, when you think of the thing that you really want. If you’re not thinking of the fear, or the absence of it, or the lack of it, if you’re feeling that that’s actually possible, there might be an opening in your body, there might be electricity or a current of energy moving. Because our creative energy connects with liver, the liver channel, and that feeds itself from the toes and feet up into the inner thighs, and all the way through the groin area, and up the body. So it’s giving inspirations, giving breath and life.

Candice Wu 9:35

So as I was looking at all these things that I wanted in my life, I just thought how impossible for all these things to come together, I just don’t even see a way. And at the same time, underneath that all I knew that there was a deeper trust. I knew that I could trust my life and that these things would unfold when they would. And yet some part of me just really wanted it now and wanted to know now.

Candice Wu 10:03

So here we are two weeks later, and I spent a bit of time in San Diego doing Somatic Experiencing Advanced training. And at the same time, I was visiting an old friend, this friend is somebody who lived directly behind my house growing up. We literally have lived there since we were eight-years-old, both of us eight-years-old, moved into those houses. And we move through all those years and into high school together. And we drive each other to school. We really had no idea about each other’s lives just a little bit like we witnessed each other from afar, and we were friendly to each other. And now we have found each other again, and the love between us is incredible.

Candice Wu 10:52

This relationship is one that I couldn’t even dream of myself if I were to create all the details. It’s just more than I could even fathom and imagine. And there’s so much surrender to what’s unfolding, there’s so much possibility, there’s so much coming back to myself, and him coming back to himself. And us doing that together and creating from this place of very deep desire to know ourselves and to know each other.

Candice Wu 11:24

I’m in awe already of what we’re creating together and the enjoyment and the love that’s just exuding from us. And we’ve explored, him coming back to Michigan, and creating some workshops and seeing what will create together.

Candice Wu 11:40

So two weeks ago, I just had no idea that any of this would even happen. And I actually didn’t realize my love for Michigan, and the feel for Michigan right now was growing in this way. And who knew that someone I even knew, and someone that is not here now would want to be here. And my experience with horses is growing. And I’m able to go to the stables this week a lot and ride with a friend, while my teacher is gone and just have a little more freedom. Everything is falling into place. And I can hardly believe it in some ways. So wanted to offer you this story. This experience as an introduction to this podcast today.

Candice Wu 12:27

There’s a second segment to this manifestation story, which relates to this entire episode. And if you are on my newsletter list, then you received an email this last week about this moment of choice that I felt in me to surrender deeper into my path, surrender deeper into my spiritual being, and continue to choose more wholeheartedly the path of joy of this moment that leads to the next and to truly trust in that and to be on this path that looks pretty irregular.

Candice Wu 13:06

So within this conversation, there is a baseline in my thought process about surrender to what is and surrender to who you are, as an essential part of creating the life you want, manifesting what you desire, being who you are in flow.

Candice Wu 13:27

This kind of surrender also means to embrace all the pleasant and unpleasant and what comes and to take each moment as a learning, a lesson of love, a lesson of growth in this life. The closer I got to what I specifically desire at the core not what I desire from all of my wounds or from my fears.

Candice Wu 13:55

For example, because I used to have a fear of not having enough, I wanted to have a lot. I wanted to have a lot of money and things. And that’s not what I’m talking about, not talking about your desires that come from fear. And what I am talking about is looking deeper into your desires and what they are and what’s underneath them. Is there truly freedom underneath that or not? Is it bound to an outcome?

Candice Wu 14:27

I’ll talk more about that later. But what I want to say now is that we’re always manifesting. When we hear about manifest this, manifest that, we’re always manifesting, we’re always experiencing a physical outpouring and expression of our inner belief sets of the accumulation of inner belief sets, vibrations, energies, meanings, desires, all coming from all sorts of places.

Candice Wu 15:00

Some of those are very true to our core and connected with our spirit. A very free place of oneness and love, one that is abundant. Some of our desires connect with our Soul Karma, where we’ve had dynamics of this life, past lives, the lineage of our family, our personal history, and the things that we experience, the beliefs that we came in with, and we want to go the other way and find the other polarity or experience the other side of something.

Candice Wu 15:35

And there’s the very egoic place of just seeing our earthly life and going with society’s consciousness. And what we’ve, in general, as a larger society agreed upon is success, or what we should be doing in life, and the fears and the things we shouldn’t do. There are many different layers of where we’re acting from, and where our mind can tell us to feed into the places that we fear, or feed into the things that we have been taught, that are right for us, and right for the world.

Candice Wu 16:14

None of that is bad. And none of it is to blame yourself. There are just some aspects of what we are creating in our lives, what is showing up through us and around us. Some of those aspects are just so deeply unconscious. And all of these experiences that too manifest are opportunities for us to see ourselves, to see what is in this for myself, what is this showing me about the deeper beliefs that I’m having right now, who I believe I am.

Candice Wu 16:53

No belief or meaning that we take on should be judged as bad or good or bad, really, because with good comes bad. It’s just all part of this unfolding of layers of who we are. So that we can truly find ourselves so we can find who we are at the deepest, the spirit and the love and the abundance that we truly are the worthiness.

Candice Wu 17:20

So we hear it sometimes that you can be anything. You can have anything and be anything, do anything. When I feel into that sense, it feels like way too much like, just everything is too much pressure to figure out of all the possibilities.

Candice Wu 17:42

And in some people experience that that leads to fear of missing out, like I can do everything, I can be everything. But if I choose this, then I’ll miss out on that. So there’s a lot of anxiety around that fear, around that. And it’s hard for some people to choose one thing or three things or focus their priority, focus their energy on what they truly desire. Because there’s just so much, I don’t know that idea is that helpful most of the time.

Candice Wu 18:14

It’s helpful to realize that there are possibilities when you’re afraid to be yourself. So if you feel like, oh, there’s this thing that I want to do, want to be, want to move towards. But I don’t know if it’s possible, and to have the thought it is possible, because you can be anything. You can do anything that can help lift some of that fear, like “Oh, okay, if everything is possible, then I can do that. The thing that I do want.”

Candice Wu 18:45

But when we don’t have a clue of what it is we’re meant to be doing here, what it is that gives us life or what we truly deeply desire, then thinking that you can be everything can bring up that anxiety. Not for everybody, of course, that might be incredibly helpful. And I’d love to hear different experiences that people have about that. The bottom line is everything is possible, we can be anything.

Candice Wu 19:16

Because the way this universe is created, is from all possibility and all probability. The word “all” encompasses the energy of all that is possible, and that everything is possible. So that is true. There’s a reality to that.

Candice Wu 19:33

However, we come into this life, as an individual soul with individual desires. And we have the ability to connect with all possibility, the ability to connect with oneness and love and unity, and to be at union with the entirety. And it is a gift to see what our individual soul brings to this life. What desires and what gifts, and what offerings just by being. And for that to connect up with and in harmony with all others. That is an extremely powerful place to flow from to be as the universe. As this individual being in connection with the universe. That may all sound very heady. So I want to just take a moment to breathe and let that soak in.

Candice Wu 20:32

So in this life, perhaps we can’t be everything. Not out of principle, but out of practicality, out of the fact that we’re born in this human body. And this individual soul, that we have a set of gifts, and unique aspects. We can develop all other aspects if we want to, but it might take a long time, or we might not have the energy and why. But we’re here with a specific set of gifts. And perhaps we can’t quite choose who we are. But we are who we are. That at our deepest, there’s already an expression of life that wants to become fuller. That expression of life that is you, that wants to live in its fullness and express that is fullness at its greatest potential. And that aligning to your specific essence can bring the most enjoyment in this life, can bring the most beautiful gifts to the world to yourself and to others. Perhaps we can’t be everything, but we can only be who we are.

Candice Wu 22:02

So who are we? Who are you? Manifesting is about getting to that core and being in such loving connection with the core of yourself and releasing or completing what is not you. The belief sets that are untrue and distorted from truth. The energies in your being that want completion, that want to find resolve, that are stuck in your body, completing and releasing all that so that even more of your energy and your attention is directed right in connection with who you truly are.

Candice Wu 22:52

Who you are is love. Who you are is powerful and worthy. Who you are is a multiplicity of energies that you don’t need to identify with one of them or a set of them, but many and that there’s flexibility and fluidity. When we complete the wounds that we are trapped in or bound within that we’re repeating the patterns that lead us to a same or similar result, all of that is our energy on repeat. And it’s taking up a lot of energy to resist the outcome that we don’t like. It’s taking a lot of energy to continue to hold those energies in our body, the fear, the movement that wants to complete itself, but gets looped back in.

Candice Wu 23:55

And when that’s all complete, we have freedom, we have expansion, we have a presence of our being that can be right here and right now. That response to the moment is adaptive and flexible to what is going on right now rather than getting triggered into a response that was helpful in the past or incomplete from the past.

Candice Wu 24:21

This language I’m using about something complete or incomplete, comes from both Family Constellations and Somatic Experiencing. For me, in my experience of both of those said a lot of what we’re repeating in our lives, wants to find completion, we don’t need to just let it go. Although if you can do that, great. But a lot of times when it’s something traumatic to the body or overwhelming to the body in the past, then our body isn’t really ready to just let it go just like that by our mind and energy, letting it go. But the body needs to complete something. The movement wants to be had. And we are here to work with our bodies. So the expansion of ourselves into freedom into not living out of those wounds, those wounds being completed and resolved. This expansion creates a potent energy and power to create to get in touch with what you desire, because it’s clear, it’s less clouded by all the other things, you’re already much more in the flow of who you are, organically your body just unfolding.

Candice Wu 25:35

And the power and potency to draw what you want towards you, just by wanting it and the letting of it unfold, and the trusting that it will come.

Candice Wu 25:49

This may be a good pausing point to ask yourself, “How in touch with my essence, my core self and truth Am I?”

Candice Wu 26:04

“How much am I naturally and organically moving in life versus forcing or pushing?”

Candice Wu 26:12

“And what wounds or untruths, belief sets out of fear, am I living from?”

Candice Wu 26:36

As you ask yourself these questions, feel free to pause and take more time with each of them. And also be super gentle because this is all about loving. This is all about loving what comes up and noticing the feelings, noticing what happens in your body, noticing what wants to be honored and seen for what it is so that you can get to know yourself even deeper in terms of who you truly are. And so that you can experience this human form in its fullest with all of its emotions, and all of the ways of being of this body that wants you to partner with it.

Candice Wu 27:24

It wants you to have a pleasant experience here. It wants you to be in your inner truth, outwardly, and to live as you came to be as it is your birthright to be.

Candice Wu 27:47

So we’re working with our vibration, the collection of energies, feelings, body sensations, belief sets, that are stored in our energy, that are stored in our bodies, in our hearts.

Candice Wu 28:07

And the more that our vibration, the more that our being, connects with the deeper truth of who we are not the fears, not the meanings that we’ve picked up along the way that don’t hold a real reality. And what I mean is the body feeling that those are true or not true, not just our mind, but the more our body resonates and emanates from the place of truth, the easier and clearer it is to know who you are. And manifesting is not an action, it just is.

Candice Wu 28:47

It just flows from there. So I invite us all to take on the journey and the process of unfolding, healing, seeing, loving, sorting truth from untruth, completing and resolving all of that instead of pushing to manifest. But doing all of that in order to arrive at who we are, and enjoying the process along the way.

Candice Wu 29:25

Sometimes when people are thinking that they’re manifesting from a place of love and freedom, and this is something that I’ve done as well is that I can depend on the outcome. And I may not realize I depend on the outcome until the outcome is something I didn’t like. And then it’s a chance to look at and feel what fear is emerging right there. What aspect of the fear that you already know probably is showing up here? So then there’s more loving, more being human and experiencing it. This opportunity to love this moment and have more expansion out of it by surrendering to it. Fulfilling it, leaning in, and taking yourself on a healing process with it. Allowing the healing to come forward.

Candice Wu 30:19

The experience of not getting what you desire is the lesson. It’s the opportunity that if taken can lead to home, to yourself.

Candice Wu 30:33

In Yoga, all of this work is called Karma Yoga and also Guyana Yoga. Karma Yoga being the study of action and the intention, the seeds of intention that are underneath action. And often when we have Sanskara, which are impressions, are beliefs, untruths, distorted truth, when we have a Sanskara, that guides us to take action from it, which is what I was talking about earlier, acting out of your wounds or fears. And then another result comes from that. And if we keep tail spinning on that and go down that pathway farther in more and more iterations, then we’re just acting out of the result of another one and another one and another one. And we have very much lost ourselves.

Candice Wu 31:32

But if we can see the Sanskara, we can see the distortion, whether that’s mentally to start with, and then letting it drop into how it feels in us? How we act? How our body is? How we move from there and feeling through that.

Candice Wu 31:54

Completing that if it’s something the body wants to complete or resolve, then we don’t have to do more iterations of that. We transcend it, we heal it, so it no longer is part of us. We are no longer identified with it. And we can move back into the wholeness and love that we actually are.

Candice Wu 32:21

So the second piece of connecting with the flow of who you are and manifesting what you desire is the belief that we are all worthy of abundance and that what we desire is possible. Which if we believe that we are unworthy, or things are not possible, those are also Sanskara, those are belief sets that are not truths. Even if your reality what you believe is your reality, or perceive as your reality can confirm it. Because we like to do that. We are actually worthy.

Candice Wu 33:01

But not every desire is worthy. So coming back to the seeds of your intention, the baseline the roots of your intention, and where that desire comes from. That’s what makes something worthy. If our desires come from this egoic place of the mind and the fear and the basic self that just fears death and fears not having enough. If it’s coming from there, then we will certainly manifest that.

Candice Wu 33:35

We will certainly attract those experiences that show us what our belief sets are. What is happening in our vibration, even if we don’t know it in our mind. What’s happening unconsciously. But if our desire comes in complete connection with the core of our being with truth and love, expansiveness, and interconnectedness, the oneness that we came from, and are through this individual self, then our desire is completely in connection in harmony with the entire universe, then it’s completely worthy.

Candice Wu 34:19

Our true nature on this planet is wholeness. Wholeness within ourselves, wholeness with each other, with earth, with everything that’s here. And that means it is our power to embrace both pleasant and unpleasant, both life and death, to be with all of those energies, on the dark and the light sides as tools, as parts of who we are in our experience. And when we resist certain aspects, when we resist sadness or anger, when we resist working with it within ourselves, then we become enslaved, or we start to enslave it.

Candice Wu 35:01

In the series Magicians, I’ve been watching on Netflix, season 7, I believe, this man says “That would you fear or you hate is what you enslave.”

Candice Wu 35:17

When we enslave, or when we resist, we inevitably create that thing that we don’t want. And we use a lot of energy doing so. So how about leaning in and not resisting? How about feeling what that is and coming to our wholeness? So that can complete itself and resolve. And you can go deeper with who you are, who you actually are, because this isn’t it. This, meaning, the fear that exists isn’t you.

Candice Wu 35:54

I want to transition now, and just offer an experience, a brief experience of connecting with who you truly are, what you desire, and releasing some of the judgment around any belief sets that come with it, acknowledging these and just bringing some light into what’s there for you.

Candice Wu 36:22

So feel free to get comfy and in a private space with yourself. And take a moment to notice your breathing. Allow yourself to release the day and release any thoughts, just noticing if there are thoughts and letting them pass by. Sense to your body and just feel into your being, the deepest, deepest, deepest part of your being as you go into the heart.

Candice Wu 37:09

So we’ll begin with connecting to you. Just connecting to a time or place where you felt like yourself. Where you felt affirmed in who you are or validated. Or this feeling and experience that this is who I am. I feel just like me. This can be at any time in your life.

Candice Wu 37:44

If you need more time to arrive there, feel free to pause the podcast. And if you have something, go ahead and tune into that experience. Set yourself right in that moment where you felt like yourself. See what’s around you. And if there are other people with you or objects around you, whatever’s there, picture it and experience what was happening or what you were doing as if it’s happening right now.

Candice Wu 38:32

Feeling your body, what’s going on now? Is there any space in your body and breath or any sensation happening? Any emotions? Be curious and open about any emotions because sometimes this can release sadness or feelings of unworthiness or other fears. And sometimes it can bring openness and a sense of beauty or peacefulness, whatever is here, honor that.

Candice Wu 39:19

Stay with this feeling of when you felt like yourself. In this moment now feeling it in your body. And as you feel that, connect with what you desire right now in your life. And if what you desire comes in a form or a structure like “I desire to have X, Y, and Z or experience X, Y, and Z.”

Candice Wu 40:09

Get deeper, what you desire to feel, when you have all that or when you are experiencing that.

Candice Wu 40:22

What will you feel? And all that is here. Get to your core desire and feel into what it is that you will feel when all this is here in your body right now. And connecting with movement, sensation, emotion, images, and breath. If any moment your fears or doubts take you or distract you, just notice those and come back to feeling this experience as if it’s already happening right now.

Candice Wu 41:37

And now I invite you to look at any feelings or beliefs of unworthiness, of doubt, of fear around what you desire to feel. For now, just noticing those fears and doubts, beliefs. Any beliefs that you’re not allowed to have this or feel this way for any reasons at all.

Candice Wu 42:18

I want you to look at all of those beliefs, and say out loud, “All of these beliefs are untrue!”

Candice Wu 42:33

Notice how you feel as you say those words, “All of these beliefs are untrue!”

Candice Wu 42:47

And I forgive myself for judging myself, for believing. I’m unworthy of receiving and experiencing what I desire. That sentence again is “I forgive myself for judging myself, for believing, I’m unworthy of receiving and experiencing what I desire.”

Candice Wu 43:30

And one more, “I forgive myself for judging myself, for believing. I’m unworthy of having what is desire.”

Candice Wu 43:43

And you can switch the words around and say, “For believing that I’m not allowed to have what I desire.” Or any words that come to you in terms of how it resonates for you. And I want you to look back at the fears, the doubts, and beliefs. And as you feel into those fears, picture that part of you. Maybe that part of you looks just like you now where looks like a younger version of you, or a blob of energy, an object, whatever this part looks like. And as you connect with it, ask it, “What do you need?”

Candice Wu 44:52

And listen for anything it says without any judgment or filtering what you need. And whatever it says or shows you, imagine that for your fear now, perhaps it needs a hug. Perhaps it needs assurance, or maybe to release some anger, sadness. Maybe it needs to run, run away from something or be protected.

Candice Wu 45:36

Give this part of you your fear, whatever it needs in your mind’s eye now. Let yourself feel what’s happening inside. At any time, if you feel overwhelmed, go back to the moment you felt like yourself that we started with in the beginning. And it doesn’t hurt to even just tap into that and then come back to feeling into the fear and what’s here for you or what it needs.

Candice Wu 46:35

And if you need more time with it, feel free to pause the podcast and take your own time as long as you need. And just right now, if your eyes are closed, open them gently and just look around. Look around your space. Give your body a little bit of self-touch, to let it know that it’s here. This container that supports you in life.

Candice Wu 47:05

As you look around, tuned into what feels pleasant to look at. And feel free to just say these words out loud now. “I release any feelings and beliefs of unworthiness. I release any feelings and beliefs that I’m not enough. And I forgive myself for judging myself for any times and places that I did not trust my life.”

Candice Wu 48:13

Just notice how you feel as you say those words, feel free to repeat them. Rewind and repeat. If there are more emotions coming through, just stay with them. Let them move through. And again, just coming back out and seeing your environment, letting yourself arrive back here. Feel free to put your hand on your heart and just give some thanks to yourself, gratitude for taking the time and energy and space to heal, to look at yourself and to know yourself.

Candice Wu 49:12

Thank you so much for following through that journey with me. And I’m just delighted to be able to share that with you. These are pieces of all sorts of healing that I’ve journeyed through myself and keep using these tools, as well as pieces that I’ve gotten from different healers that I combine for what works for me.

Candice Wu 49:37

I mentioned very early on in the podcast, when sharing my own personal experience that you can pleasure yourself or masturbate to give your intention a congruent power, your ultimate creative energy. And that the things that you truly desire can open up to let that turn you on.

Candice Wu 50:02

I’m not going to walk you through that. But if that is something that resonates with you, or you feel intrigued about it, feel free to try that and see what that brings you. A lot of times when I do that, I enjoy it while it is happening. And then if I have an orgasm or have some sort of release, then also a lot of emotions release, sadness and other feelings that want to move out. And that’s a really powerful part of it.

Candice Wu 50:38

If you do want a bit of a guided process around that, I interviewed Harmony Niles earlier on this year, and she did some work and a little podcast on Core Erotic Themes. So tuning into your sexual fantasies, and what you desire sexually. And what I found is that when you get to the sexual fantasies that are yours, if you do feel connected sexually, if you get to the ones that are unfiltered and untamed for yourself, you can often get to a feeling that you want to experience in your life a very deep and core feeling that you desire. So you can find that at CandiceWu.com/harmony.

Candice Wu 51:27

And there’s also a couple of other podcasts that I recommend if this episode resonated with you. There’s the Worthiness episode that you could not be more worthy at CandiceWu.com/worthiness.

Candice Wu 51:42

And the parts work, embracing the many parts of yourself with voice dialogue, and Internal Family Systems work. That is at CandiceWu.com/parts.

Candice Wu 51:55

I really enjoyed having you here on this podcast with me and journeying with me in your healing. It is wonderful to have you here and to hear any of your feedback. Feel free to email me if you have an experience you want to share, questions, any desire for future podcasts, topics, anything like that I love hearing from all of you listeners.

Candice Wu 52:19

And before you go, I’d like to invite you to listen to the podcast that came before this one. It’s been over a year of podcasts. And the way that I designed this podcast series is every other week, there’s a guest, a guest healer or wellness practitioner, where we have vulnerable conversations about their lives, and about who they are and what they offer in the world.

Candice Wu 52:46

And the other weeks, they do solo episodes, where I bring a topic. And then usually I have some experiences on there. And either those experientials are within the podcast like today’s or they’re in additional ones, separate ones where you can tune into just that podcast over and over if you need to, or want to. Or you can share that with someone who might need that experience or meditation to support them in their lives.

Candice Wu 53:15

So it’s really quite a menu. It’s not necessarily that you listen to every podcast in order. And a lot of my listeners that I hear from are telling me, a lot of you are telling me that you’re just picking and choosing the ones that feel right for you and that resonate or strike something in you. I love that. And that’s absolutely what it’s made for. So enjoy. And check out all the other podcasts that CandiceWu.com/podcast.

Candice Wu 53:43

And I invite you to sign up for my bi-monthly newsletter if you want to stay in touch and get updates about workshops, retreats, self-love notes and the podcast itself at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 53:59

I am wishing all of you love and that you are loving yourself no matter what’s going on. And if you’re not to see that and come to more witness of yourself and loving of yourself, embracing of this human experience that you’re going through. And as always, I’m here to support you if you would like to have any support. If you’re a new client or someone new to the process of support with me, you can have a free 20-minute consultation, can find that at my website as well.

Candice Wu 54:36

Thank you so much for joining today and I’ll leave you with some music so that you can wind down and enjoy and I’ll see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

Where can we soften? And how do we invite our bones to change? In this episode, Lauren Maxwell and I explore finding pleasure, how to change the shape of your spine, where we can soften to support and know ourselves and the human task of learning to feel safe in your own truth.

Candice Wu 0:18

Lauren teaches people how to uncover the south and chaotic times and to heal their spine.

Candice Wu 0:27

Hello, and welcome. You’re listening to the Embody Podcast. A show about remembering and embodying your true nature, inner wisdom, embodied healing, and self-love.

Candice Wu 0:40

My name is Candice Wu, and I’m a holistic healing facilitator, intuitive coach, and artist sharing my personal journey of vulnerability, offering meditations, and guided healing support, and having co-creative conversations with healers and wellness practitioners from all over the world.

Candice Wu 1:01

Some of you have already heard about the dream class that I have on Skillshare. It’s a class on how to unfold and awaken your dream life so that you can harness the power of your dreams, take the wisdom of your dreams, and bring that into your life. And so this class is about how to record your dreams, harvest your dreams, or remember them and create intentions for your dreams that you can begin to collaborate with your dream world.

Candice Wu 1:45

It’s a class that is free until the end of January. So that means you can view the class for free right now. I would love to invite you to see that class and to take that into your life. And to also take a look at the future classes that I will have, that will invite you to explore your dreams through embodied and natural ways, and to feel into the meaning of your dreams. And bring that energy into the wholeness of your being and your daily life.

Candice Wu 1:59

So look out for those classes. And you can find this class at CandiceWu.com/dreamclass1. And if you do decide to sign up for a premium Skillshare membership, you can do so at the link as well and get two free months for free or some other special offer from this link that I’m offering at CandiceWu.com/dreamclass1. And that premium membership will allow you to access the future classes that are within the premium membership. That also includes other teachers and other skills that are being taught. All sorts of things like yoga, photography, arts, really interesting things. So feel free to check that out. And I would appreciate your support and checking out the class and giving me your feedback and joining in. So again, it’s CandiceWu.com/dreamclass1.

Candice Wu 2:55

Welcome back, everyone. It’s wonderful to have you here today. I’m thrilled to have Lauren as a guest here. I want to just give you a quick update by now. I’ve been in Ireland a couple of weeks, and I am getting adjusted quite well to the cold, to the mud, to working with horses. Last week I shared an alive now episode where I talked very candidly about what are the challenges that I’m experiencing and what I’m learning, what I’m going through, as far as living on a farm, being with four horses and learning natural horsemanship. All the things that I’ve never done ever in my life, and it has not been easy. So you can check that episode out at CandiceWu.com/horselifeireland.

Candice Wu 3:46

But for today let’s jump into talking with Lauren here on this subject of where can we soften on all of the wonderful topics that she brings. She has a zine called How to Uncover Self in Chaotic times, and very simple and basic practices that everyone can get on board with. I love how she talks with such a gentleness around herself and reminds herself where she can soften and be compassionate to herself.

Candice Wu 4:18

She is a creative human being who specializes in writing, storytelling, and her daily practice, and also is a Yoga for alignment back care and scoliosis teacher who believes in the transformational power of healing work. In her personal yoga practice, she was able to eliminate her back pain and change the shape of her spine. And what she found was she was laughing and creating more. And so now she’s honored to help others do the same thing.

Candice Wu 4:46

That’s really lovely to see how Lauren creates a soft open space for others to gently and lovingly come back to self. So she offers yoga ritual and intuitive coaching that is meant to empower others to navigate their life challenges in a way that honors their truth. And she loves helping others choose a softer paradigm for success to claim their creative channel in the world and step into a more loving relationship with themselves. So without further ado, here is Lauren.

Candice Wu 5:21

Today is a lovely day to have learned Maxwell on the show. Lauren is a creative human. She’s a storyteller. She’s a yoga teacher, she does yoga for alignment, back care and scoliosis. And she has this wonderful zine on How to Uncover Self in Chaotic times. And today over here, in Germany, where I am, it’s kind of gray, it’s very slow, it’s after the holidays. And Lauren, as I understand it, it’s raining over there. It’s the perfect weather to tune into the feeling of softening, which is one of the energies that you bring to the world. Welcome, Lauren.

Candice Wu 6:05

Thank you so much, Candace is such a pleasure to be here. Thank you for having me, it’s an absolute pleasure to have you. And I would love for you to just share a little bit about yourself, what you offer to the world, what interests you and who you are.

Lauren Maxwell 6:19

Thank you, I really appreciate your intro. And you know, the ability that we all have to step into these multifaceted identities because so often, you know, we end up kind of sticking with one label or another. But I’ve been exploring, you know how I am, a writer and a creative, and a student, and a teacher, and an intuitive coach. And I focus on back here I specialized in scoliosis, herniation, spondylitis, general back pain, and other things. And all my work centers on the idea of uncovering self and learning to nurture the truths that are there, whether that’s in a physical practice, or a spiritual or a creative practice. So the idea is to find and create together soft open space to really feel comfortable and doing that.

Candice Wu 7:14

That’s beautiful. I love the feeling of tuning into softness. And I’m so curious, when you first learned about that, or brought that into your life? What was that like for you?

Lauren Maxwell 7:29

Yeah, you know, it’s been a really interesting journey, and something that I think everyone might be able to relate to, in some way. Because the idea of softening can have to do with the physical body, or the emotional and energetic body. And often, in my experience, those things are very intertwined.

Lauren Maxwell 7:46

So for example, when I began my own path, in the back care world. I was living with a lot of back pain and had sort of a hardened, almost protective shell that I had developed with my own back and my own tissues. And as I began to work on that, I thought I was working on other things in a different plane, you know, inner work, work with personal development, and struggle and healing. And then eventually, it became clear that those are all related, and you know, everything is actually connected. And so the ability to soften energetically, physically, really had to do with thinking a lot about boundaries and protection, which enabled me to learn how to step into my truth with confidence and express that and be that in the world, without this sort of fear element and this need to self protect and hold. And so I think that the idea of softening can be really powerful, especially, you know, in a society that doesn’t necessarily encourage that.

Candice Wu 8:55

Absolutely. And when I think about what you’re doing with working with the back and the spine, and alignment, it makes complete sense, that kind of softening, that centering and healing also connects right up with the alignment of self, alignment of who you are, and truth. Is that how are you seeing that work for yourself and for your students?

Lauren Maxwell 9:22

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think in terms of the back, we can literally carry a lot there. And so for example, with me, I was also working at the same time with the chakra system. And over time, with the guidance of one of my teachers who was doing a really beautiful series on the chakra system, her name is Caitlin Heppell, she’s in New York City, I discovered that, you know, some issues I thought had to do with the heart chakra, were actually maybe money for a chakra, the solar plexus, and that is the center of self-protection.

Lauren Maxwell 9:58

And you know, we often find that we’re gripping there and I was finding at times that sometimes I couldn’t catch my breath, you know, the diaphragm was literally a bit tense and tightened up. And as I learned to soften into that, and release, because you know, it’s maybe working with healthier boundaries, or thinking about that in a different way, I was able to soften the breath, soften the solar plexus, learn to be in my body, and therefore in the world, in a different way. And that really did support my emotional work and healing as well.

Candice Wu 10:33

Beautiful. For a person who is learning to soften in that way. How do you describe that? How do you do it?

Lauren Maxwell 10:42

Yeah. Wow, this is such an intriguing question to me, you know, because I’ve thought a lot about pleasure. And the idea of allowing ourselves to live with the themes of pleasure rather than guilt and shame, for example. And I think that pleasure offers so many keys to our own healing, you know, if we stop and are willing to listen, there can often be signals or allies waiting for us there within a pleasurable experience.

Lauren Maxwell 11:17

And, you know, in the book, Emergent Strategy, which I’m reading right now, Adrienne Maree Brown. And I recommend this book to everyone it’s so great, calls herself a pleasure activist, and she talks about and this really resonated with me and the thinking and work that I’ve done around pleasure in my own life.

Lauren Maxwell 11:35

She talks about how pleasure encourages stepping into evolution and expansiveness and growth and confidence, you know, in its own way, whereas we’re living through a lens of shame and guilt, we’re probably acting from a place of constriction and limiting ourselves, and that same lens of fear that I mentioned earlier.

Lauren Maxwell 12:00

So, you know, I’ve really thought a lot about, when you find something pleasurable, you know, how can we listen to what it’s telling us, and also, I think, corresponds with what we mentioned earlier about how our society doesn’t necessarily encourage softening or pleasure, instead, we’re taught, that, you know, success corresponds with blood, sweat, and tears, and we have to, you know, grab the bootstraps and pull ourselves up. And there’s certainly something to be said, for you know, working through difficult times, and finding achievement anyway. But there’s also another approach that is within us and available to us, and is stereotypically, often thought of as more feminine in nature, and it’s more collaborative and more community based and more cyclical. And, to me, that does correspond with the ideas both of softening and of pressure.

Candice Wu 12:55

There’s so much in that with what you just said. I’m just taking it all in.

Lauren Maxwell 13:02

Yeah.

Candice Wu 13:03

Let the stuff get into me. I think, pleasure, it’s in my early years of healing work, I and yoga, and being in my body, I just had no idea how to feel pleasure, really. And I think that I had just conditioned myself to harden and to protect, and to survive. And I did that very well with all this tension in my body, and by the time I got to my healing work, it was like, okay, let’s feel through all this stuff. And I kind of like plowed through it. So it wasn’t in such a soft way. And then when pleasure came into the mix, it was like, oh, there’s a different way to do this all.

Lauren Maxwell 13:56

Oh, I love that. Yeah, wow, it’s so interesting, the way that we will approach our healing and unfolding work with that same, you know, achievement mindset, success mindset, milestone mindset, that we’ve been so programmed to buy into. And the writer and tarot reader, Sarah Gottesdiener, who did the many moons workbook has also influenced my thinking on this by talking about how, you know, healing is not linear, and progress was not linear. And that also ties back into these spiraling and cyclical patterns that we were talking about earlier, that are everywhere in the natural world, and that I think we have the ability to allow ourselves if we, you know, stop and listen and consider different patterns that we might start to adopt.

Candice Wu 14:45

Yeah, and to think of cyclical and moving in and out, and just how things can weave in and come loop back in sometimes or jump back to a different place to try to control all of that, is a complete hardening and, like, so much tension.

Lauren Maxwell 15:09

Yeah.

Candice Wu 15:10

So you have, one of the things you share in your biography is that you change the shape of your spine and you had back pain. Can you tell us about that?

Lauren Maxwell 15:21

Sure. So I thought that my spine was just built a certain way, and that I needed, the one that I was going to have to live with pain, and just kind of accept that. And it was really an illuminating and beautiful experience to meet a teacher at yoga union in New York City, who took one look at me and said, hey, we need to fix that shoulder. That’s probably why you’re having hand pain. Listen, do this practice and then you’ll probably start to feel better.

Lauren Maxwell 16:08

So I was sort of tied to my old thinking around yoga and the practice I’ve been doing for years. And I thought, oh, well, if I slow down and approach this differently, I might lose strength, I might lose flexibility. And she said, Lauren, but what if you can do something better for yourself on a deeper level. And I thought, okay, that’s interesting. So I tried it. And sure enough, my hand pain and back pain disappeared within about two weeks. And you know, I had tried physical therapy, chiropractic. And it’s not to say that those things aren’t valid, because they are, but it’s to say that looking at my spine in a very personalized and therapeutic way was transformative. And my mind was blown.

Lauren Maxwell 16:30

And I had been sort of drawn to studying yoga for a little while, but I thought, no program felt quite right to me. I felt like I was searching for something that offered a different kind of depth, and I wasn’t sure what that might be, or specialty. And then all of a sudden, it was like, oh, this is it. So I had some asymmetries in my spine, a bit of curvature and then most importantly, I had my upper spine, there’s a natural rounding in the upper spine that everyone should have. But mine was accelerating into hyperkyphosis, which is a bit more rounding than should be there.

Lauren Maxwell 17:07

And this, you would know, what I was talking about with a visual, the shoulders begin to round, the chest begins to collapse, the head begins to come forward off the spine. And this is really can be a form of heart protection, this can be just a simple issue with posture, for example, I’m very tall and also very relational and you know, my moon is in Cancer, I love connecting with other people. So I find myself often getting down on their level trying to get my eyes in the same position as theirs. And then, of course, all of our technology and devices makes it really hard to stand up.

Lauren Maxwell 17:45

And sometimes you have, for example, my joints there but hypermobile so that makes it easy to be slouchy. So anyway, I ended up doing this practice and what we do in the back care style of yoga, is take a lot of time to linked in and traction the spine. And then we also strengthen the postural muscles, so that the body can support the structure of the spine and learn how to sometimes stand in a different way.

Lauren Maxwell 18:19

So sure enough, after about nine months, I was seeing a chiropractor who takes X-rays regularly and we took my X-rays, and you know, my spine had changed. And it was just amazing that the hyperkyphosis was totally gone. And you know, I did grow. So I was getting a bit taller. So I knew that that had happened. And I also knew in my yoga practice, that things had shifted.

Lauren Maxwell 18:42

And so it was, you know, again, a reminder to myself, to try not to be results-oriented with this amazing X-ray. But also it is a wonderful validation to see, you know, the time that you’ve put in has been meaningful and has counted for something really important. And so it’s like, always that reminder and this is something I often share with my students, when they say like, talking about scoliosis, for example, well have the curves reduced, how many degrees, what are the numbers.

Lauren Maxwell 19:16

And I totally understand that because that’s where I started, because you want to live without pain, and you want to know that change is possible. And then the thing is, okay, the X-rays are great, but the true gift is living without pain is being comfortable in your own body, which when you’re at ease with your own back, your own shoulders, your own spine, then I think you can be more at ease and the world around you. And that also corresponds with living your truth and accepting it and presenting it as it is.

Candice Wu 19:48

What I’m also hearing from what you’re saying is that sometimes when we want something, it can lead us in the right place. Sometimes it doesn’t, but it can sometimes lead us, you know, to the right path. But then if we stay in that sort of militant path of getting to what we want, like the degrees of the back changing, or whatever, it can at some point limit us from what deeper healing there is, what deeper ease there is, and there is some letting go of, of that whole way of being.

Lauren Maxwell 20:27

Hmm. Yeah, I think that is a beautiful point. And it reminds me of what we were talking about in terms of like, the healing work being cyclical, and cyclical versus militant, if we were to call it that, you know, it’s like, sometimes you address something, and you really feel significant progress. And this could be in your back, or this could be in your emotional life, for your family life, for your own development. And you think, oh, wow, I’m just so proud of myself, I made some progress there. And then, you know, four months later, it might kind of reappear, and you’re like, but wait a second, I thought I dealt with this. And it’s a beautiful practice to learn to say, well, I’m just spiraling through the same thing again.

Lauren Maxwell 21:17

And it might not be as powerful or as controlling as it was the first time around, because I have worked with it. And I have grown, but recognizing again that it’s not a linear path that we’re on, but we will touch these things again and again.

Lauren Maxwell 21:31

And I’ve thought about this in terms of like, the sort of, like, deep, you know, painful struggles that we might go through, but also simply in terms of like, our relationship with our cell phone, for example, you know, like, this is something that we’re all very involved with. And it’s still like, I’ve had times where I felt like, oh, you know, I’m doing great. I’ve put some boundaries in place about what I want the dynamic to be between myself and my devices, you know, and this feels wonderful. I’ve felt like, my brain feels free and expansive, and then all of a sudden, a few months later, it’s like, oh, I think I’m spending too much time on my phone again. And it’s, you’re like, I thought I dealt with this. But yeah, no, it’s the cycle. And you know, we have an opportunity to revisit and reframe and it never has to be the same.

Candice Wu 22:19

Yes, I hear you. I definitely have that experience. You know, just yesterday, I was like, wow, this feeling of grief and fear is coming up and it’s so familiar, but actually, when I went and revisited it and took it to adapt, and a seriousness, like stayed with myself, it actually was a different kind of grief, like just another facet to the diamond.

Candice Wu 22:48

It wasn’t the same exact feeling. And it was coming from a different angle, it was touching in on some parts of my family system that probably experienced this kind of grief. Or actually probably didn’t experience it, but it was left behind for someone else to. But yeah, that cyclical nature, I find that even though it’s such a familiar feeling, if you go a little deeper, if I go a little deeper, I find that it’s something slightly different or a new part of it.

Candice Wu 23:21

So I’m so curious, what is the practice that you did for two weeks that helps everything shift?

Lauren Maxwell 23:31

Yes. So this was, you know, yoga for back care. And it is a very intentional way of looking at the spine and how to address it with yoga postures and breath work. And there are a few principles that I like to think about when working with people that worked in my own body. And you know, first, it’s important to decompress existing muscle patterns that might be pain-inducing.

Lauren Maxwell 24:06

And then it is also important to lengthen the spine like we were talking about, create space for new patterns to be formed. And then yes, form those healthier patterns, strengthen the postural muscles, or teach under working areas of the back, that need to work more or, but you know, all of these things.

Lauren Maxwell 24:27

And then also, there’s an integration component. And these are things that I’m so grateful to my teacher, Allison West in New York City. And also the kind of matriarch of Yoga for Scoliosis, out of the Ayengar System by Elise Browning Miller. They each have themes and principles that they work with. And then it’s interesting, because I think the different teachers in this system, all experience it in their body in different ways, and then you know, unique things to offer students.

Candice Wu 24:55

Beautiful. Sounds amazing. And it’s like this shaping and molding of the back and body.

Lauren Maxwell 25:02

Right, right. It is. And that has been fascinating for me to think about over the past couple of years, because I have a beloved, you know, body worker who, yes, supports the physical structure, but also works with energetic and emotional release, because like we were saying that those things are tied together. And I had a sort of some issues with a shoulder and she’s working on my right collarbone. And I said to her, are you moving my bone right now? And she said, Yeah, why not? You know, bones are alive and well. And they can be, we can work with them, we can negotiate with them. So that’s something you know, I talked about a lot with my own students.

Lauren Maxwell 25:42

And the bones are always regenerating new cells, so in that simple way of thinking about it, like, yes, why can’t you invite the bone into a new position?

Candice Wu 25:57

Yeah, I love it. Yeah, yeah. Well, it’s like talking to your body. It’s communicating and having this relationship and inviting it to step into something different.

Candice Wu 26:11

Yes.

Candice Wu 26:11

I love it. It’s true. And I love the listening component to because I think it goes back to the personal work, the work of uncovering self and the softening. There’s a lot of listening involved, you know, and on a healing journey, in general, it’s like, okay, am I listening to what my back is trying to tell me? Or am I listening to what that tight? solar plexus, the tight money for a chakra is telling me? You know, what’s, what’s there? What can I offer to that situation? What is that situation telling me and just with pain in general, you know, kind of like stopping to listen and say, well, what is the message here? And can I take some steps to offer compassion to that scenario, offer healing to that scenario?

Lauren Maxwell 26:58

Yeah, it gets such adept to how we can relate to ourselves and heal and feel more at ease in our bodies, like a whole slew of steps before we might need to take medicine, when we might do that in combination, or in compliment to but there’s just so much more. And I think we can often just like feel a pain and release a very past way of being for me, I’d feel pain and be like, oh, gosh, what’s wrong with me? Maybe I need to go the doctor, or what do I need to take to make this better, but there’s, it’s about that listening, as one line of, you know, connection with the pain or with the experience?

Candice Wu 27:50

Absolutely. And I think when you are willing to listen and offer that kind of combination of dedication and compassion, to your own body, your own spirit, really miraculous things can happen. And I do think that there’s absolutely a time and a place for Western medicine. And at the same time, it is very healthy and wise to say, what else can I be doing?

Candice Wu 28:19

For example, with back care issues? Often in the Western medical world, the thought is, well wait and see what happens and or do we need pills and surgery? And so in my mind, if there’s something that can be done in terms of simple decompression for pain relief, or breath work, then why not explore it?

Lauren Maxwell 28:40

Yeah, especially when we can tune in and support ourselves with it. Just right then and there.

Candice Wu 28:48

Right. It’s always available.

Lauren Maxwell 28:51

Absolutely.

Candice Wu 28:52

So what kinds of miraculous or maybe even surprising things have you uncovered? For yourself, like about self? About yourself?

Lauren Maxwell 29:05

That’s a good question. You know, one interesting piece has been opening the creative channel more freely. And I do think that creative channel and spiritual channel are very closely intertwined. And this is something that I had sort of experienced over the past year, and then recently picked up the book, The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. And you know, it turns out, she’s been writing this exact same thing for 25 years, or something like that, maybe even longer. And so that’s so beautiful too, because it brings to mind that, you know, this is a universal truth and how cool that I kind of stumbled into it. But other people are experiencing it too.

Lauren Maxwell 29:49

And so the creative channel, a spiritual channel idea has been just like, yeah, there are so many ways to tap into the truth that is there within all of us. And sometimes it’s creative, you know, I like to do free writing in the morning, which in the artist’s way is referred to as morning pages. And it’s just kind of like, at least maybe three pages or so of unstructured, free-flowing writing. And I find that that’s where my ideas really shine through. Whereas, if I were to try to do this later in the day, after I’ve been tied into technology, and devices, and work, and expectations, and meetings, it’s a different experience. Writing is a very different feeling. So I love to be very intentional about that, not looking at a screen for a while until I’ve had that chance to touch in, do some writing. And then I find that that sets up my day differently.

Candice Wu 30:50

Yeah, just having that time to go inward and express freely before everything else happens in your day. Sounds really precious.

Lauren Maxwell 31:01

Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, there are some days where the right thing might be to take a walk in the morning or to have a yoga practice in the morning. I tend to be a little bit quieter and more reserved in the morning and save physical things through later in the day. You know.

Candice Wu 31:21

Yeah, I’m not a stereotypically morning person. So the writing works well.

Lauren Maxwell 31:25

That’s good.

Lauren Maxwell 31:26

But I think that taking time for in whatever way works for you to connect with self in the morning, before you engage with the rest of the world is a powerful tool. And finding your right balance with things, what really works for you if you’re a morning or not person.

Candice Wu 31:46

Right, right. And, you know, I think tapping into your own truth in that way, often can help you present the best of yourself to the world, when it’s time to do that. So, you know, whether it’s in partnership, or in a job, or whatever it might be.

Lauren Maxwell 32:04

Yeah.

Candice Wu 32:05

So I’m curious, where are you on your journey and what challenges or struggles do you face nowadays?

Lauren Maxwell 32:16

Yeah, well, you know, one thing that has been a theme in my life for the past few years, is the idea of place, and this has become a challenge, because I’ve been moving around a lot, and kind of working between three different cities. And also, without knowing exactly what city I might end up in next.

Lauren Maxwell 32:39

So dealing with some unknowns, dealing with some moving and so, you know, the practice through me there is how can I look at this as an opportunity and a gift, rather than just focusing on the challenges and the struggles. Because the challenge side of it is kind of felt like, while my foundations are kind of like experiencing some upheaval, it can be harder to feel grounded, and really tap into the work that I want to be doing, the writing I want to be doing and that kind of thing.

Lauren Maxwell 33:09

But you know, the gift of it is place can teach us so much. It was a trip to Utah in 2016, that astounding, you know, National Parks there, that really kind of started shifting my brain and ended up you know, changing my career changing my lifestyle. Because in Utah, I saw amazing colors and just expansive sky and clear night skies, incredible views of the moon and stars. And I came back from that trip feeling kind of depressed, like, well, I’m going back to working on a computer every day feels a little bit limiting.

Lauren Maxwell 33:49

And I then thought.

Candice Wu 33:51

Yeah.

Lauren Maxwell 33:53

Yeah. You know, and everyone talks about, you know, post-vacation blues. So that’s nothing you need to me, but I started thinking, well, how can I experience that sort of mental freedom? Almost creative freedom, spiritual freedom, just like my brain feels expansive? How can I feel that in my every day, why do I need to save that for vacation, you know? And baby steps there lead from one thing to another. So yeah, that theme of places just still coming back.

Lauren Maxwell 34:23

For example, right now I’m working with one city where I live for a few years. I feel very comfortable, very known, have very dear friends, a very kind of safe haven home that I’ve created. And then a newer city where I don’t know anyone, but it’s a creative and exciting place and the new city is Nashville.

Lauren Maxwell 34:44

And you know, it’s like, the gift of that is kind of being able to express the latest evolutions of yourself to people and being seen in that way without being seen for like, who you’ve been for the past seven years or whatever, you know, and both are beautiful, right? It’s like there’s the gift of being known and appreciated and having your evolution witnessed by others. Sometimes they don’t understand and sometimes they do, and that’s fine. But there’s also a gift and just being able to present yourself as who you’ve become.

Candice Wu 35:19

Yeah, it’s so present in the moment, who you are right now.

Lauren Maxwell 35:25

Right.

Candice Wu 35:25

And no one questions it or is puzzled by it. You know, they just accept what it is.

Lauren Maxwell 35:31

There’s nothing to compare it to pass you wise.

Candice Wu 35:32

Right.

Lauren Maxwell 35:39

Yeah.

Candice Wu 35:40

Oh, interesting. Yeah, I think I didn’t know that about you that you were moving around so much. I think we actually have a lot in common with that, as you said to me before we started recording here.

Lauren Maxwell 35:54

Yeah, it’s really interesting to go from place to place. And I think the interesting thing for me is feeling at home in myself, regardless of what’s around me. And moving around has been able to give me that opportunity to practice that, like that my home is my body.

Candice Wu 36:16

I love that. Yeah. And I love what you’re saying about the evolution. The evolution of you being presented in this one moment or what’s evolved in you. And I think traveling, moving around from place to place really can bring that forward, for me as well.

Lauren Maxwell 36:39

Absolutely. And you know, there’s a lot of inspiration and changing place, and our observation of our surroundings, you know. Again, if we’re willing to listen. And so, about being at home in your body, I’ve really felt that too and had to ask myself, yeah, what makes me feel grounded no matter which space I’m in? And how can I, you know, I deal with in my, like, astrological makeup and my dosha, a lot of fire and air in a little water. So it’s like, Earth is the piece that I need to always be remembering to include, you know what I mean, so that.

Candice Wu 37:18

Yeah.

Lauren Maxwell 37:19

Grounding practices, whether it’s breath work, or opening the pelvic floor, or even just working with, you know, I love things like black obsidian and hematite. These kinds of things that can help center us back into ourselves and draw energy back in and make us feel protected and centered.

Candice Wu 37:39

Hmm, beautiful. Yeah, I think that’s such an important question. Like, what can make you feel grounded? And what really makes you feel like you? And getting in touch with the truth of you is a lot of your practice is in mind, too.

Lauren Maxwell 37:54

Yeah.

Candice Wu 37:55

Definitely.

Lauren Maxwell 37:56

Absolutely.

Candice Wu 37:56

So you have this beautiful zine: “How to Uncover Self in Chaotic times”. Am I saying the title correctly?

Lauren Maxwell 37:57

Absolutely. Yes.

Candice Wu 38:06

Yeah. Yes. And I love to the part about, I’m just going to quote you here, in you’re talking about shifting from “We have to suffer to succeed to well-being and pleasure, reframing and rejecting the patriarchal capitalist society. So when we choose to operate from this different paradigm, we issue a way of life that was formed on the backs of slaves, and the incarceration and abuse and marginalization of entire groups of people.” I was just astounded by reading that because it just completely resonated. It’s like we’re completely shifting to that softness, to that connection, and listening, collaboration and respect. That shifts what I guess can bring something different. And well, let me just ask you, what does that mean for you? I’m curious, how you feel into that.

Lauren Maxwell 39:12

Yeah, I think there’s so much there and really appreciate you, you know, taking the time to read and share that. And for me, as a white cisgender woman, it’s been, you know, really important to think about my own participation, you know, in racist society, in patriarchal society.

Lauren Maxwell 39:37

And there are some thinkers who have influenced me in this regard. Layla Saad online is one of them. Rachel Cargo, and they talk, they’ve talked a lot about dismantling our participation in racism in, you know, the white patriarchy. And a lot of times, you know, I feel like, it’s not my place to speak on these things, but rather to listen and to really consider how I’m benefiting from the systems. And then, given my intrinsic privilege, what opportunities do I have to, if any, to shine a light on marginalized voices, to use my privilege in a way that can help to tear down systems that I don’t necessarily agree with.

Lauren Maxwell 40:26

And that has really led to a lot of thinking about how, you know, our actions, really, when we can tie our actions to our belief system and to our values. So in behaviors, start to meet our values, that’s when you know, we can begin to change our own life, our own way of being in the world, and that can start to have a ripple effect on those closest to us and our communities. And that just starts to go outward and expand. And, you know, we’re responsible, first and foremost, for our own actions.

Lauren Maxwell 41:02

And so that’s why it’s really important to think about, okay, are these systems benefiting me? And what can I do about it? And I think that place where actions meet values is where meaningful change starts to happen.

Candice Wu 41:14

Hmm, that’s beautiful. I really like the feel of that going inward. That taking care of self and revealing self, feeling into wholeness and well-being for oneself to create the backbone of that shift versus there’s absolute beauty and all sorts of social justice and activism that’s out there, and people supporting one another. There’s just so much there that’s really helping change things. And I think that having this as the primary backbone to each individual, and then stepping into the world with whatever else can be offered is just so essential.

Lauren Maxwell 42:04

Absolutely. And I think it also relates to, you know, each of us being called to do the work within ourselves. And this applies to activism and to healing work, like, it’s so easy to talk about, you know, the issues that we see in the world. But until we really pause and look at our own lives and our own, the way that we’re acting and behaving. Is it relating to our deepest values? Or is it relating to what we think society has, expects of us or requires for success, so-called success? Or is it just kind of been programmed into us? And we haven’t stopped to think about it. So how can we stop to think about those things, take personal responsibility for our actions, and then seek collaboration and community in that?

Lauren Maxwell 42:53

And that’s another thing that I’ve really been working on is, how can I, you know, feel that sense of community around these beliefs and this work?

Candice Wu 43:02

Yeah, it’s one thing to do to it on the inside, which I’m very good at, like, I can work with my own inner world and heal so much. And I think that has a very collective unconscious connection. But then it’s also very supportive to find that community that you’re speaking of.

Lauren Maxwell 43:27

Yeah, I think so too. And that’s part of the process of learning to feel safe with your own truth. And those things are, you know, first, you learn, okay, maybe how do I work with energetic boundaries? How do I work with boundaries in the day-to-day? Then you might make a little progress and you might begin to say, you know, am I surrounding myself with the people who support me in this truth and who support the things and feelings that I want to be experiencing each day and those values that I want to live by.

Candice Wu 44:06

I’m just thinking back to when we began this conversation, and you talked about your back holding, and protecting, and being a bit of armor around the heart, and holding so much. And it’s interesting to bring that back to this part of the conversation about protection and boundaries. Because it’s like, creating new kinds of boundaries and protection that are on the outside, but also support this ease and well-being in your body. Because it’s like a replacement for the armor, the tension of armor that constricts the body, but rather, opens now.

Lauren Maxwell 44:58

Absolutely, I love that. And it reminds me of another point that I recently saw in Emergent Strategy by Adrienne Maree Brown, and she talks a lot about how these collaborative behaviors are mirrored in nature and how powerful that is. And so it’s like the oak tree, you know, can withstand crazy flooding, when the house is next to it are being ripped off their foundations, because the oak tree has not driven down into this singular, individualistic root system. But instead, it’s reached out to all the oak trees around it and has sort of intertwined its roots. And they have found so much strength together in that community. And I think that’s true.

Lauren Maxwell 45:42

But again, it always begins with self. And all right, how can I give myself permission to be true, be soft, be who I am, you know, if there’s pain blocking it, how can I listen to the pain and move through it? And then maybe once you get comfortable with that truth, you can start to sense who, around you, fosters and cultivates that? You know what I mean?

Candice Wu 46:11

Absolutely. It can be so powerful to do that. I remember one of the times where I was just really feeling alone, in my own healing work and discovery of self and where I was growing into. And I realized I had this belief that I had to do it all by myself, and to open that up and realize that there are other people out there that would want to talk about this stuff, too. It was an incredible feeling. And then I started creating a women’s circle. We met every couple of weeks, and it was just so beautiful. So I can completely connect with what you’re saying.

Lauren Maxwell 46:52

That sounds wonderful. And my next question was going to be how did you find that feeling? And I love the idea of a women’s circle. And I think that, yeah, these people are out there, you know?

Candice Wu 47:04

Yeah, I think many people are craving that kind of connection, where it is a safe place and has some kind of boundary around it that supports that free connection and authenticity.

Lauren Maxwell 47:19

Absolutely. Yeah. And it’s almost like, liberating in a way to know that you’re stepping into a circle or class or something like that, where depth of thought, depth of conversation is encouraged. Whereas in your everyday exchange, sometimes it can feel like, okay, not quite sure who’s into that. I mean, sometimes, you know, automatically, but I can be nice to just step into a space and know, this is encouraged here, just sharing, evolving together, supporting one another.

Candice Wu 47:52

And being able to be vulnerable in that way. It’s so precious as well.

Lauren Maxwell 47:58

Absolutely. Yeah.

Candice Wu 48:00

So let’s switch gears, Lauren. Would you like to play little lightning round?

Lauren Maxwell 48:04

I would love to.

Candice Wu 48:06

Okay, I have some fun questions for you. Let’s see. Let’s start with this one. What curious dream have you had lately?

Lauren Maxwell 48:14

Oh, my goodness. I’ve had so many because I’ve been kind of trying to learn to work with dreams, you know. But let’s see this is perhaps, oh my gosh, yes. Okay, I just remembered too, so now I know which one I’m going to go with.

Lauren Maxwell 48:30

I dreamed that I was in space. And I was on a mission to go save someone, like, on another planet. And I was with two friends. And this was the incredible part, the door opened and I could see the moon, and another planet, and earth. It was so close to me. It was like, I could reach out and touch it. You know, there were none of the normal space issues were there. I had no trouble breathing and I didn’t float away. So we were just able to open the door, experience space, and it was incredibly like, mystical and alluring.

Candice Wu 49:06

Wow, I can hear the amount of excitement, inspiration, and its empowerment in your voice.

Lauren Maxwell 49:14

Yeah.

Candice Wu 49:14

Thinking about this dream.

Lauren Maxwell 49:16

Absolutely.

Candice Wu 49:16

Oh, that one sounds really fun to dive into and embody.

Lauren Maxwell 49:23

Yeah.

Candice Wu 49:25

Cool.

Lauren Maxwell 49:26

I don’t know if the second one is interesting to you or not. But you know.

Candice Wu 49:29

Do you want to share it?

Lauren Maxwell 49:30

Why not? I had a funny dream that Connie Britton was, I ran into her and she just like, automatically became this, I don’t know, sort of maternal figure. She was hugging me. She was putting these beautiful clothes on me, beautiful hat. And I’ve always appreciated Connie Britton. So I thought that was amusing.

Candice Wu 49:54

Sounds fun. It sounds really fun.

Lauren Maxwell 49:56

Right.

Candice Wu 49:56

Right.

Lauren Maxwell 49:57

It’s like maternal energy, like, okay, how are we working with that? You know, these kinds of things?

Candice Wu 50:03

Oh, wow, that sounds really fun. Oh, okay.

Candice Wu 50:08

What is one daily ritual that you have?

Lauren Maxwell 50:14

Well, I have a few and I don’t necessarily get to them every single day. And I think, you know, we’ve made it clear that my yoga practice is very important to me. And I mentioned walking in nature. That’s really important to me when the weather allows, moving my body, getting the brain and blood flowing. But another thing I’ve really been finding value in this year is tarot cards. And I’ve been studying on my own and often pull cards to explore questions that I have, or upcoming events or transitions. And I find a lot of value in the archetypes and the symbols. And see it, kind of, as a mirror into my own wisdom.

Candice Wu 50:55

Awesome. Okay, um, what do you have doubts about?

Lauren Maxwell 51:02

Doubts that pop up from time to time about my own, you know, worthiness, enoughness? So being accepted by certain groups just how I see myself, you know. If I see myself as a creative or an artist, or writer. Do other people see me that way? And then I always have to kind of circle back and remind myself, well, it doesn’t matter. And you know, part of this whole process, for many of us, is releasing the need for external validation and external indicators of success. That’s one of those things that cycles back for me and I have to continually remind myself of my own sovereignty, my own, again, sense of truth. And that is what it is, regardless of who recognizes it.

Candice Wu 51:49

I love that. Absolutely. Yeah, I resonate with that, too. And it’s an interesting thing to want to fit into a group, like that you identify with in some way. And if we’re truly ourselves, we wouldn’t exactly fit into the way that the group is.

Lauren Maxwell 52:07

Absolutely. In the way that it is, because we’re adding something uniquely ours.

Candice Wu 52:14

Yeah, yes, it’s so true. And oftentimes, I think that ties back into the idea of a label, and we don’t fit cleanly within these categories and these labels. And sometimes, rather than trying to kind of smush these various facets of ourselves into one, why not just let it be what it is, and it might not feel totally comfortable in terms of what that label has made you think, should feel comfortable, you know?

Lauren Maxwell 52:43

Absolutely.

Candice Wu 52:44

Okay. The last question is, what job would you be horrible at?

Lauren Maxwell 52:49

Oh, that’s a good question. I think I would be horrible as a flight attendant, because takeoff and landing, especially if there’s turbulence can be a time when I have to deal with my own anxiety. I don’t need to be dealing with, you know, hundred other people’s anxiety as well.

Candice Wu 53:12

You might scare a few people.

Lauren Maxwell 53:14

Yeah, exactly. I mean, you know, I love teaching breath work, but I’m not sure that’s the place.

Lauren Maxwell 53:24

Like it’s being in a plane, it brings so much air, right, as you said, you’re already like…

Candice Wu 53:31

So true.

Lauren Maxwell 53:31

…air quality Vata, right?

Candice Wu 53:33

Yes.

Lauren Maxwell 53:33

Adding so much more air quality, the quality and sense of air to the body. So you don’t need more than that, more than what’s on the ground sounds like.

Candice Wu 53:45

Yes, that is so true. I’ve never thought of it that way. But makes sense.

Lauren Maxwell 53:50

Of course, it does.

Candice Wu 53:52

Well, thank you so much, Lauren. I’ve learned so much about you and about the type of yoga that you do, as well as I just feel inspired by this conversation of pleasure and softness, and community.

Lauren Maxwell 54:09

Thank you so much.

Candice Wu 54:09

Is there anything else? Oh, you’re welcome. Is there anything else you want to share today?

Lauren Maxwell 54:15

I don’t think so. I just really appreciate being here with you and the space that you hold for these conversations. And so thank you for that. And thank you to all of your listeners.

Candice Wu 54:25

And I want to give you just a little space to invite you to share your offer for our audience for all the listeners today.

Lauren Maxwell 54:34

Yes, I am so excited about that. And would love to offer a handful of free half-hour consultations for anyone who might want to explore themes of uncovering self. For anyone who might be living and dealing with back pain. And then also a discount on the first private session booked. So if you reach out to me via my website, email me and mentioned the Embody Podcast. We can schedule that together.

Candice Wu 55:05

That sounds like a wonderful opportunity. And do you work? It sounds like you work online as well. In different places?

Lauren Maxwell 55:13

I do. Yeah. With back care, we can talk about practical things like sitting and sleeping and how you might be able to support your own spine. And I can also share yoga practice of course without the hands-on component through online meetings.

Candice Wu 55:32

Great. So where can people find you as well as your zine?

Lauren Maxwell 55:38

Thank you. Yeah, so find me at softopen.space online and then over on Instagram at Lauren_only and Lauren.yoga. I would love to chat with you there, feel free to send a message and email. Whatever feels right.

Candice Wu 55:57

Thank you so much, Lauren, you are a beautiful gift to the world. And I can just tell that whoever comes in contact with you through this work or just in life is going to be touched by the softness that you do bring and the compassion that you’re bringing. Thank you.

Lauren Maxwell 56:17

Thank you so much, Candice. That means a lot to me. And I appreciate the chance to be here with you and the way you make us all feel seen and valued.

Candice Wu 56:30

Thank you. Okay, until next time.

Lauren Maxwell 56:33

Okay, take care.

Candice Wu 56:36

So great to have Lauren on the show today, I already feel that soft open space and that softness infusing into my being. It’s something that I come to from time to time, that gentleness, put that word soft, is so just right for me right now, to see myself with softness, to soften into what I’m feeling right now to just let the guard down a little bit and let things be easy, even through the hardship, even through stuff that doesn’t feel so easy.

Candice Wu 57:12

I hope you enjoyed this episode. And if you resonated with Lauren, check out her website at softopen.space and maybe take advantage of that 30-minute consultation for free and the offering of a first full session with a discount after that.

Candice Wu 57:32

You can also check out her taster, which is going to be a Pranayama. A breathwork practice from yoga that can support you in feeling into your alignment and what’s here now for you.

Candice Wu 57:47

Thank you so much for joining us today. And I invite you to check out that dream class that I spoke about earlier at CandiceWu.com/dreamclass1. And if you want to continue to be notified of other classes or received the self-love notes that I have for you every other week as well as the podcasts that go out, you can join the Embody Community at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 58:13

Also, if you’re interested you can join the Facebook Embody community where there are 5 to 10-minute videos from wherever I am in the world, just offering some self love tip or a healing meditation or experience from family constellations, somatic experiencing, or another bodywork practice that can support you and feeling like yourself, and moving through the daily stuff, as well as the trauma or whatever else is cluttering up your feeling of being yourself. And that’s the Embody community on Facebook.

Candice Wu 58:46

Well, I want to leave you with one more thing today. And as many of you know that Mary Oliver died just a couple of weeks ago. And I’ve been sitting with this poem that she wrote for quite a bit of time now since she passed away. And it’s called I Did Think, let’s go about this slowly. It’s from her elegy to her partner. And here it is.

Candice Wu 59:05

“I did think. Let’s go about this slowly. This is important. This should take some really deep thought. We should take small, thoughtful steps. But bless us, we didn’t.”

Candice Wu 59:34

So hope you take that with you as you go today. And give yourself that sort of forgiveness and compassion when you don’t do things the way you intend or the way that you feel you want to. Thanks again for joining me and Lauren today, and I look forward to seeing you next week on the Embody Podcast.

Introduction

Hello, welcome back. This episode is with my special guest, Lauren Maxwell, who is a back pain for yoga specialist and a coach. Lauren has a full podcast conversation with me at CandiceWu.com/laurenmaxwell.

So, check that out to find more about Lauren, and this practice here is a guided practice that includes mudra, which is gestures with the hands, as well as a few poses and movement to guide to into a breathwork practice, which is Viloma I, the pranayama that is from the tradition of yoga.

I love how Lauren talks about feeling safe and centered here, and knowing that you’re breathing, being conscious of your breath, as well as the mudra that she’s using that as the gesture of inner secret, protection from limiting beliefs and releasing beliefs, as well as how she explores with you how to expand the inner landscape of the mind.

Expand the Inner Landscape of the Mind

So, grab a yoga mat or find a space where you can do a little bit of movement with your body, grab a blanket, because you’ll need that for the practice, and enjoy.

Begin with Lauren Maxwell

Hello, and welcome. My name is Lauren and I’m so glad to be here with you today and honored to share a breathwork practice for centering and protection.

In the classical yoga text, the yoga sutras from Sri Patanjali, we learned that the point of all yoga, all its many components, is simply to still the fluctuations of the mind. We all know that the world today, especially does not lend itself to quieting the mind, there’s a lot of noise and a lot of chaos, and pranayama or breathwork is a beautiful way to find tranquility.

Working with the breath is a subtle and powerful approach to soothing the nervous system and shifting reality of the body, whether it’s the physical body, the subtle organic body or the emotions because we breathe all day, every day.

It’s easy to forget what a magical way this can be, to explore a sense of feeling safe and protected, and centered and grounded. So, that’s what I hope you experience after breathing today.

In Yoga: A Gem for Women by Geeta Iyengar, she talks about this beautifully. She says, “Just as the moon is not reflected clearly in the turbid waters of a river, so, also the soul is not properly reflected in an oscillating mind. A clear mind alone reflects the soul. For self-realization, the fluctuations of the mind have to be removed.”

Breathwork is one way to work with mind and body to help find that quiet calmness. The breath is known to clear toxins released move stored emotion, balance the subtle body or the energetic body, even help change the body structure and to shift consciousness.

I’ve experienced all of these things to be really true and powerful in my own life, so, I’m super happy to be able to share them here today.

Also, in Yoga: A Gem for Women, Geeta Iyengar says that pranayama studies the pulse, makes the body supple and the complexion radiant. The sutras also say simply that pranayama brings up your mind. So, pranayama, I think, has a bit of a mystery and confusion surrounding it sometimes. So, I just wanted to give you a very clear introduction to what pranayama is.

“Prana” means air or breath or vital life force, which is a really nice and simple way to summarize that, and “Ayama” means expansion of length, breadth or volume. When we join those two words together, we understand that pranayama means directing or controlling the breath or put another way, directing life energy through conscious breathing. So, it’s kind of gathering the magical life force of the universe and then using it intentionally within the body to produce the desired result.

There are many different forms and styles of pranayama, the one that we’re going to be exploring today is called Viloma I. Some of the breathing practices within pranayama are quite advanced and really should be explored with the help of an experienced teacher, but the Viloma I is one that is quite accessible and powerful that we can explore here together, today.

Viloma means against the grain and Viloma I is interrupted inhalation. So, we’ll be working with interrupting the inhalation very intentionally, and I’m going to talk you through everything. Ideally, in pranayama practice, we would prepare the body and mind, and nervous system together to really optimize the experience.

So, we’re harnessing vital life force and we want to make the most of it, right? Well, hopefully someday we can explore that in person together and for today, we’re going to be doing a few things to lightly open the ribcage and activate the energetic channels of the body so that the prana can flow more freely.

I have provided some images over on my Instagram, which is lauren.yoga to support your practice today, you’re welcome to reference that or simply to move through it as it feels best to you. There’s a blanket setup that I do recommend using, if at all possible, you can use any blankets or towels that you have at home, as long as they’re folded as firmly and neatly as possible.

Folding the blankets carefully is important because it enables the body to release fully into the support without any distractions. The point of this blanket setup is to open the ribcage and open the chest and support the entirety of the torso and the spine so that you can access the breadth and the depth of the lungs without any strain.

This careful preparation allows the pranayama to bring its fullest benefits to the body, the mind, and the nervous system. When working with the breath, it’s important to avoid any signs of stress or strain. The work is very delicate and uplifting, and not meant to be anxiety-provoking. So, if at any point, you find yourself experiencing stress, simply return to normal breathing.

That might be exactly what your body is asking for, today. We work with breath retention for many reasons, and it’s nice to think of it almost as a percolator. So, when we retain the breath, we hold this beautiful life force energy of the universe inside of us for a moment to let it work its magic and percolate and then we release.

If you experience any anxiety when you try it, just take a nice exhalation instead and try retention another day. This practice is completely yours, so, please feel empowered to ease into it and care for your own needs in a way that invites tranquility and peace for the nervous system rather than excitement.

Now, I want to invite you to pause the recording and prepare your blanket setup if you haven’t done so yet.

Now that the blankets are ready, sit down on the blankets and cross the shins in the middle of each shin. The feet will rest underneath the knees and you’ll find yourself in sukhasana or easy pose. The hands can rest on the thighs and take a look and see if the knees are up above the hip socket. You want the knees to be in line with the hip socket or below. If they’re above the hip sockets, no worries, simply take the head blanket off of your setup or find another tower blanket nearby. Fold it and place it underneath your hips. You want to add enough height so that the knees are in line with the hip socket or below.

The point of this is so that we can work with a long neutral spine. If the knees are above the hip socket, the lower spine is rounding. We already round our spine a lot in everyday life with technology or slouching while using our devices or sitting at a desk or in the car. So, we are choosing to work with along the spine here partly because it does open the energetic channels so that prana will flow more freely in our breathwork practice.

Now, that you found your seat, close the eyes, soften the skin of the eyes and soften the skin of the face. Begin to watch the breath. Be a witness to your own inhalation and exhalation. You may find that it begins to soften or deepen or expand. We’re going to work with a mudra today. A mudra is a gesture or a seal. Mudra translates to bringing forth enchantment or pleasure, which is a beautiful thing to work with.

The hands and fingers contained so much energetic content, that measure can be a powerful way to call forth certain things into our life or into our body or into our mind. Today, we’re going to work with Gupta Mudra, the gesture of the inner secret. Gupta Mudra provides protection from our limiting beliefs. It’s helpful for exploring and releasing limiting beliefs that keep us from experiencing the safety of our true inner being. It reduces stress and supports the function of the immune system. It helps to relax the shoulders, neck, face, and head, which can be helpful for neck pain and TMJ. Most of all, Gupta Mudra enhances a sense of centering and safety which is what I hope that might offer you today.

To begin, interlace the fingers loosely with the fingers pointing towards the chest. Interlace them so that the right thumb is on top. I recommend doing the interlacing towards the middle knuckle or slightly above depending on the size and shape of your hands and fingers. Now, bring the base of the hands gently together and if the hands or fingers feel too restricted or tight here, simply take the base of the hands apart and bring the interfacing of the fingers closer to the fingertips. Then bring the base of the hands together. Cross the right thumb over the left thumb, and bring the hands gently down in front of the abdomen.

Close the eyes now. Return to watching the breath. Now, soften the shoulders. Soften the neck. Soften the elbows away from the sides of the torso so that you find some buoyancy in the side chest and in the armpits. Allow the mudra, the gesture to be wide and soft. Sense the earth underneath both sit bones. From the support of the earth, reach up through the crown of the head lengthening the spine. Soften the shoulder blades back and down onto the back, nestling them towards the back of the ribcage. Keep the buoyancy in the sides of the chest as you widen the very edges of the shoulders. Now, maintain that width as you soften the neck, soften the eyes and soften the skin of the face.

Gupta Mudra, as limiting beliefs are released, I rest in the sanctuary of my true inner being. Breathing in, I know that I am breathing in. Breathing out. I know that I am breathing out. Breathing in, I know that I am breathing in. Breathing out. I know that I am breathing out

If you’d like, repeat these phrases with me internally as you continue to breathe softly and expansively.

Breathing in: I know that I am centered. Breathing out: I know that I am safe. Breathing in: I know that I am centered. Breathing out: I know that I am safe. Release the measure and open the eyes. Now we’re going to do a bit of movement to open the channels of the body and prepare for an optimized breathing practice. Stand and take tadasana, mountain pose. To tadasana, parallel the feet and stand with the feet at hips with the parts so that the outer ankles are underneath the outer hips.

Stand tall reach through the crown of the head. Widen the collarbones, widen the sternum. Soften the grip on the diaphragm. Soften the corners of the eyes and the corners of the mouth, and continue to breathe. Now, take both arms and reach overhead, Urdhva Hastasana with the reach of the arms we lengthen the spine and open the side of the body. We lift the sides of the chest which helps prepare us to access the lungs and pranayama. If you notice that as you’re lifting the arms, your ribcage is kind of shutting out in the front or popping out so that you can put the biceps next to your ears. Simply move the arms a little bit wider and forward in front of the ears. If the ribcage is popping forward, don’t grip it back into place. Simply soften it towards neutral so the spine can be in a soft, neutral position.

Working with a neutral spine, again is meant to prepare through pranayama, allow the nervous system to be quiet. If the rib cage is popping forward, then the kidney band is being pressed inward and that’s right where the adrenals are and can be very exciting for the nervous system. So, return to the reach of the hands even if they’re slightly in front of the body, and use that reach as you inhale to lengthen the spine upwards.

Sense the earth underneath the soles of the feet, and from there, lengthen up through the crown of the head and then through the fingertips. Take your left wrist in your right hand and pull the left wrist over towards the right and a side bent. Keep the feet sensing the earth underneath them, and open the left side of the rib cage, in a side bent. Continue to breathe. Breathe into the left side body and as you inhale, find spaciousness, as you exhale, side bend a little further.

Now, return to reaching the arms up, lengthen the spine and then take the right wrist in the left hand and pull the right wrist over towards the left, opening the right side of the body. From the planted feet, inhale spaciousness into the right side of the ribcage.

Exhale, side bend more towards the left. Inhale, find spaciousness and expand. Exhale, side bend more towards the left. Bind expansiveness and side bend towards the left. Now reach the hands up towards the sky once more, keeping the spine neutral and the ribcage and the kidney band quiet.

Now, if you’re in a place that allows it I would love for you to take an Adho Mukha Shvanasana downward facing dog. This pose is invigorating and is a great way to prepare the body for the rest of pranayama.

As you take downward-facing dog, focus on keeping a neutral spine as much as possible. This might mean bending the knees to take the hamstrings out of the equation. So, while you’re on the floor, use the strength of the arms and the shoulders to press the hips away from the hands. Press press press, bending the knees if you need to, and the focus is pressing the hips up and away rather than pressing the heels towards the floor. So, focus on the lift and pushing the hips as far away from the hands as possible. Soften the base of the skull here, soften and lengthen the diaphragm and push the hips away. If you’re ready to try straightening the legs here, lift the skin of the size up and back as you press the hips away from the hands. Continue to breathe. Smooth out the breath as much as possible, especially as the work becomes sensational.

After you’ve taken 10 breaths and Adho Mukha Shvanasana, place the knees on the floor and come up. Next, you’ll take a seat on the blankets and move into baddha konasana or cobblers pose. Bring the soles of the feet together and let the knees go wide. Place the hands on the lower shin directly above the ankles and use the grip of the hands to pull the chest through the upper arms. Lengthen through the crown of the head and keep the spine long and neutral even here. Soften the breath, soften the diaphragm and as the needs move away from one another, you may find that the torso can go forward.

For our purposes, we’re going to keep the spine long. So, if the spine begins to round and flex forward so that you can reach the floor, simply lengthen it again even if it means not going down as far as you’re used to. Lengthen through the crown of the head and then turn at the pelvis over the thighs and the spine simply moves along with the pelvis. Take 10 breaths here. Breathing in: I know that I am centered. Breathing out: I know that I am safe. Breathing in: I know that I am breathing in. Breathing out: I know that I am breathing out.

Next, you’re going to take a spinal twist and then move into our breathing practice. Sit on the narrow edge of the blankets and place both feet towards the left side of the body and place only the right sit bone on the corner of the blanket, both knees are facing forward and with both feet to the left side, cross the left foot over the arch of the right foot and sit tall. This is Bharadvaja’s, a seated twist, and all you’ll do is lengthen up through the crown of the head finding a neutral spine again, and then turn towards the right. The left hand will rest palm facing outwards with the back of the hand against the right thigh. From there, you’ll inhale, lengthen up and exhale, twist towards the right.

Place the right hand behind you as you twist with the elbow out and the armpit again buoyant, the fingertips can be delicately cut on the floor. Inhale, lengthen. Exhale, twist.

Now, come out of the twist and prepare to go to the other side. To twist towards the left, you will put the feet on the right side of the blanket. Put the left sit bone on the edge corner of the blanket, and with both knees facing forward, the right foot can rest gently on top of the left arch. Inhale, lengthen through the crown of the head. Exhale, twist towards the left. Place the outside of the right hand on the left thigh and widen the chest, soften the diaphragm. Inhale, lengthen, and exhale, twist. The left hand is cupped delicately behind you on the blanket if possible, or wherever feels most comfortable and you’ll use the buoyancy of your elbow and the side of your left chest to invite the spine to turn further and continue to breathe.

Now, we’re going to move into our pranayama practice for Viloma I. So, to begin, you will recline on the blankets with the pelvis on the floor. Go ahead and position yourself so that you’re sitting in front of the narrow edge of the blankets. Once you’re there, you will lie back. This is called Shavasana, and once you lie back on the blankets, place the leg straight out in front of you with the feet together and the feet lightly flexed. Now, pick up the head in your hands and glance down to put yourself in an aligned position. So, look at your feet and make sure that the heels, the pubic bone, the sternum, and the chin are all in one straight line.

Lift the pelvis very slightly and lengthen the tailbone away from the lower back. Adjust yourself if you need to, and once you found that line, gently place the head back on the blanket. As you do so, delicately stretched the back of the neck so the base of the skull moves is away from the top of the shoulders. This lengthens the vagus nerve, which is associated with the parasympathetic nervous system and enables the body to rest and restore.

Before you release the feet, place the arms beside you on the floor with the palms facing up. Gently press the forearms down into the floor to nestle the shoulder blades back onto the back. So, as you press, you lift the chest ever so slightly and invite the shoulder blades to go back where they belong, and then release the arms into the floor, soften the chest, and allow the feet to fall outwards from the midline into a soft and open position.

If for any reason you feel uncomfortable here, adjust your setup find comfort, add length, add height. If your chin feels like it’s up above your forehead and you can actually touch both to check, add another blanket or towel underneath your head so that the forehead is slightly above the chin. Once you found a comfortable reclined position, close the eyes and rest, we’re going to move into a breathing practice. So, here just begin to watch the breath, allow it to soften again.

You’ve prepared the body, you’ve invited the nervous system to consider a different way of being. You’ve let the body know we’re going do something here today. We’re going to explore safety, protection, and release.

To prepare, take a full and soft inhalation, and exhale completely. Inhale fully and pause. Exhale completely, pause. Inhale delicately, pause. Exhale fully, pause.

Now, return to unconditioned breathing. Hear the breath is soft. The breath is breathing you. As a reminder, if at any point during this breathwork you feel anxiety or stress, simply return to this place of soft normal breathing.

To prepare, take a full and soft inhalation and exhale delicately. Inhale completely. Pause. Exhale fully and softly. Pause. Inhale softly. Pause. Exhale completely.

And now, returned to unconditioned breathing. Soften the skin of the eyelids from the center of each eye to the corner. As you breathe, keep the eyes soft, the forehead soft and the jaw soft.

I’m going to talk you through a few rounds of Viloma I interrupted inhalation. To prepare, take a full and soft inhalation, pause at the top.

Exhale delicately and fully. Into the back bottom ribs, inhale one third. Pause. Into the sides of the chest, Inhale one third. Pause. Into the top chest, inhale one third. Pause. Take a tiny sip of air in, and exhale completely and gently.

Take a few rounds of unconditioned breathing, as limiting beliefs I released, I rest in the sanctuary of my true inner being.

For another round, take a full and soft inhalation and pause. Exhale gently into the back bottom ribs. Inhale one third. Pause. Sides of the chest, one third. Into the top chest, one third. Pause. Take a tiny sip of air in, and exhale fully and delicately.

Take a few rounds of I’m conditioned breathing. Breathing in: I know that I am breathing in. Breathing out: I know that I am breathing out. Breathing in: I know that I am breathing in. Breathing out: I know that I am breathing out.

Now, take a full and soft inhalation for Viloma I. Pause. Exhale completely. Into the back bottom ribs, Inhale one third. Pause. The size of the chest, one third. Pause. Into the upper top chest. Inhale one third. Pause. Take a little sip of air in, and exhale delicately.

Now, return to unconditioned breathing.

Breathing in: I know that I am centered. Breathing out: I know that I am safe. Breathing in: I know that I am centered. Breathing out: I know that I am safe.

For another round, inhale completely and gently. Pause. Exhale delicately. Into the back bottom ribs. Inhale one third. Pause. Into the sides of the chest one third. Pause. Into the top chest one third. Pause. Take a tiny sip of air in, and exhale softly.

Return to unconditioned breathing. With each breath, expand the inner landscape of the mind.

I’m going to leave you here and invite you to accept the support of the earth beneath you. Relish the feeling of centering and protection and enter softly back into your day whenever you’re ready.

Thank you so much for being here today. Before I leave, I want to take a moment to thank my teachers, Allison West and Caitlin Hippo, who have both influenced my approach to breathwork and also to Geeta S. Iyengar for her book Yoga: A Gym for Women, Anodea Judith four Wheels of Life, and Thich Nhat Hanh for his meditations. All of those people influenced this practice and I’m grateful for their work.

Thanks so much and have a beautiful day.