Candice Wu 0:00
In this episode is a conversation about the Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper video, racism and how it's been playing out in the U.S right now, the way my body expressed reactions and perceptions towards black people, and an experiential for you to open your own body-based exploration around people who are different from you.

Candice Wu 0:24
The Embody Podcast accompanies you on your journey of remembering and embodying your true nature, integration, and alignment with your vibrational clarity, self-love, and living a life of beauty and wholeness. It's a menu of transformative healing tools, experientials, meditations, and practices from a blend of Family Constellations, Somatic Therapies, and Holistic and Spiritual practices, sprinkled with vulnerable conversations with people who have the courage to be themselves, {alive now} Episodes with updates on my personal process and Reverie Episodes that are Spiritual succulents that honor, reveal, hug, shake or stir you into Love. I'm your host, Candice Wu, integrative and intuitive healing facilitator, and artist.

Candice Wu 1:24
Hi, everyone, welcome back.

Candice Wu 1:27
Today's episode is a deepening into the conversation around race wounds and hidden race wounds, racism, and how to work with this in the body.

Candice Wu 1:41
I talked a little bit about this already, including my personal experiences with some race wounds, both on the side of being the person holding a belief about someone that ended up hurting them and from the other side of feeling wounded or hurt.

Candice Wu 2:01
In that conversation was this opener, an invitation to look and to be with exactly what you feel. And to go into the deeper layers of what you experience and what you put upon others because of your own fears or because of looking good and doing what people call Performative Allyship, being an ally to people, like black people, perhaps, and just doing it for a pat on the back, and ignoring the deeper stuff that lives in your body that plays itself out.

Candice Wu 2:42
So that conversation started in that episode. You can find it at [CandiceWu.com/racewounds](https://CandiceWu.com/racewounds).

Candice Wu 2:50
It's your body that holds reactions and unconscious sentiments towards others that contribute to racism. And no matter who you are. If you're black, brown, white, yellow, every color or tone skin tone in between, going deeper into the dynamics of what's going on systemically means looking at your own body's reactions, along with any other actions that your heart feels called to take, if that's protesting, if that's speaking up, if that's donating money to organizations that are supporting black people or those that you feel you want to support. I suggest holding space for what's held in your own body and digesting it.

Candice Wu 3:41
If you don't involve your own body in healing racism or in your anti-racism efforts, it has a risk. Your support of Black Lives Matter or any other race movement, it has a risk of being only performative and not going deep enough or perpetuating the same underlying dynamics that you intend to shift, that you intend to be different. But because it's held in the unconscious of the body, it stays the same.

Candice Wu 4:12
There is an effect when we hold stuff that's living in our bodies. When you heal your body's experience and the unconscious lived experience, the world around literally changes. So I encourage you to build your own ability to respond to your own reactions and to respond in the world instead of reacting. This is your response-ability. And this is inner freedom. Inner freedom supports freedom for all.

Candice Wu 4:44
I promised I'd talk a little bit about Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper. And I think that's a great opening for this experiential that I want to offer today.

Candice Wu 4:55
So if you haven't seen the video with Amy Cooper and Christian Cooper, it might be interesting to look at that.

Candice Wu 5:04
What I witnessed was a white woman, Amy, calling the police on a black man who asked her to put a leash on her dog in New York City, in the park, and he was calm and anyway, I'm not going to describe all of it, you can watch the short clip. But what I want to highlight today, first is how extremely calm the black man was “Christian”. I'm amazed even I don't know if I would be able to handle it like that. And then secondly, how Amy, I kind of want to say just the white woman because this can apply to anybody, and it's really not about her personally. It can apply to me. Her reaction, I see, is because of trauma that maybe she doesn't know about. Her body flared up so much. And I can't assume what she felt. But I can see that her body was escalating and activated and her nervous system seemed to go haywire. She was yelling in a sort of uncontrolled way. And she weaponized calling the police against this man who — where it was totally not called for in that situation.

Candice Wu 6:41
And that's similar to what's happening with police officers. They're scared and they have a knee jerk reaction, or there's something else going on in this dynamic of their own lives and it's being taken out on a certain group of people, black people in particular, but people of other races, experiences too.

Candice Wu 7:08
So I don't want to exclude but I do want to be sensitive because right now is a strong time for listening and beholding space for black folks experience the space that hasn't been had and truly been acknowledging enough. And we would know that because it wouldn't exist if the society could hold enough space to honor respect and stand behind all people, especially black people.

Candice Wu 7:58
So this woman had this trauma response and this is not to excuse what she did. It is just to say that I think that's going on for a lot of people in the world and in the United States, that even with and now I'm not speaking about this woman, but in general, even with the best of intentions, we can still be holding these hidden pieces of ourselves that will have a threat response, a trauma response, given an experience with someone of another race in a particular circumstance, where that might not be proportionate to what's actually happening.

Candice Wu 8:51
And because this has happened for so long and reiterated itself, repeated itself over and over and over in many ways, in this country of the United States, and perhaps in other countries, it has become a place where we're on autopilot, we are numb and these protests are waking many people up.

Candice Wu 9:19
So in this experiential today, I invite you to get curious about what it is that happens in your body and to be honest with yourself, to see and feel what you feel, and to have the courage to allow whatever comes up to be part of your process, in looking at your own racism. Or, if you want to say it in different terms, the ways that your unconscious wounds and belief sets then you may keep down, can live out.

Candice Wu 10:07
The important idea here is Performative Allyship. It's when you ally with people that won't support, won't to stand by them and you do it for a pat on the back and not in a whole and embodied way looking deeper. And that's really dangerous because it's a way to avoid looking at the deeper stuff that we all have.

Candice Wu 10:46
I don't know maybe the Dalai Lama doesn't have it, I don't know. But I want to venture to say we all have something and you can listen to my episode about what I experienced. And those were just two examples out of many I've looked at in my life. Many places where I have seen myself have different responses in my body towards people who look different than me or who are different or people of a different race. And that means something, that does something when I don't acknowledge it.

Candice Wu 11:23
So it's important to know what's there and just own it, and be honest with yourself to do so, and to look at how that affects your interactions. It's not a time to put blame on yourself, but to be gentle, so that you can look. It's not a time to shame yourself, even though you may feel shame.

Candice Wu 11:54
So I'm talking to everyone, including myself. I'm not just talking to White people, how we feel in our bodies. When we see a person of another race, or of another, whatever, we perceive them as different. We have a reaction in our bodies. It may be one of welcoming and warmth. So see if that's there for you. It may be, I can't look, it's hard to look, it may be fear, it may be sadness because some memory gets triggered up from your ancestry through your body or your past life, wherever it came from.

Candice Wu 12:43
All of that affects how we interact with each other and what we ignore, what we look at, who gets seen, who doesn't? What part of you get seen and doesn't?

Candice Wu 13:04
And so here is an opening to deepen in your own personal responsibility, response-ability, the ability to respond, the ability to look and hold and be with your own reactions and respond.

Candice Wu 13:26
So if you would like to please jump into this experience with me, and you can have a pillow or some sort of object to support this process. I'm going to invite you to move around your space using that pillow or book or some sort of prop, even a piece of paper and you can write on it. And I'll let you know what this object or paper is going to represent in just a moment.

Candice Wu 14:00
If you are not in a space where you can do this physically, or you don't have enough privacy, say you're in transit or something, you can imagine this in your mind. I don't recommend doing this while you're driving though, so please find a comfortable, safe space.

Candice Wu 14:22
When I first began looking at my biases, reactions, perceptions, and beliefs around black people or about them, I was surprised to notice that I couldn't really look at them. I was afraid of their power actually. I had both an idealized view that they were like, all-powerful grounded beings who could dance, kind of like drum up their warriors' selves and dance it out in this way that I wish I could be. And that I might be like screamed at, that was the sense I got, that I might be screamed at by someone who is black, and I wouldn't be able to handle it.

Candice Wu 15:24
Well, the perception was that they were erratic or perhaps angry, uncontrollable and that scared me. The perceptions that I placed upon black people were more about me than anything else. They were about my childhood wounding where I could get screamed at and that was terrifying and some of that had not been digested and metabolized or integrated. They were about ancestral trauma, wounding from culture to culture through my ancestry that it was intergenerational, the history of black people and Chinese people against each other.

Candice Wu 16:10
They were also about the fear of my own power and fear of others being full in their power. That part of your own power is the freedom to stand up and speak your truth and be that warrior self. And if I could have it, that was scary, what that would be for me, and if others could have it, then my own reactions to that and what would I do with that, that was scary.

Candice Wu 16:40
So when we leave these perceptions, but not only perceptions, our body's responses, our wounding, our untouched wounds, stuck in time, it's like cobwebs and bones in your closet or in your kitchen and they are rotting, and they're creating this undertone. And that is the underlying foundation of systemic racism and violence. That is what can bubble up and fuel our interactions with people of different races or of difference. And we may not be aware of that.

Candice Wu 17:24
And when I did get more courage in myself to look and to feel that I really wanted to digest it, so that I didn't have that experience, and I wasn't putting that on black people around me and I did.

Candice Wu 17:49
I felt like a whole shift because when I would imagine looking at a black person or when I was actually in front of a black person, and I'm not saying all Black people. I'm saying ones that I don't know, or certain ones that maybe they dressed differently than White people, or Asian people around me. Or, they had a certain kind of attitude that I wasn't used to and I don't mean a bad attitude. I mean, like, they're sassy in a certain way. I couldn't look at them. I would – like – slink away or turn away. And I didn't even notice that response until I did.

Candice Wu 18:45
And so the experiential that I want to offer today is one of that kind of practice, to get to know if you haven't already, some of those reactions that you may have and if you already know your reactions, it's a chance to test it out, comb through it and see what's here for you today.

Candice Wu 19:12
So what I'd invite you to do is take a pillow, or some sort of object to use as a prop. And with that, have a space that you can move about, that's private and quiet. If you're doing this on public transit, or in a place you don't have that much space, you could try visualizing this in your mind, but I would not do this while driving or operating any machinery.

Candice Wu 19:58
We're going to invite this object, this prop to represent someone of a race that you are wanting to look at your own reactions within your own body. It could be a Black person, it could be another — a Black person of another color, if you are Black, could be White person, could be Chinese, whoever. Just choose one for now, and you can do this with any other kind of person or a person with difference, like a different ability, size, accent or language, different sexuality. This can be applied to anything.

Candice Wu 21:03
So as you designate this prop to represent this person, this kind of person, and obviously, it's like a generalized thing, although different people you know may come to mind. Place the objects somewhere in your space, just intuitively wherever it feels right. And allow yourself to stand in a space interacting with this person.

Candice Wu 21:29
Imagine this person. Notice where you stand and how close or far away and allow your body to move around until you find a place where your body goes, where you land, where what happens is just happening. And open your curiosities, so that you can just allow whatever it is that's here to be here, to be discovered, to be revealed, and maybe even to surprise yourself in the safety of your own experience.

Candice Wu 22:15
There's no judgment or shame about whatever you may experience and you may even experience your own shame or judgment, and that's okay too.

Candice Wu 22:38
Now, feel and begin to witness what emotions and sensations you have inside your body as you're aware of this person. Become aware of where your eyes are looking, where they can look, or where they cannot.

Candice Wu 23:06
Can you see this person? And what happens in your body when you do look?

Candice Wu 23:19
And be open to anything, maybe it's warmth, maybe it's nothing. Maybe it's fear or some tension or a tightening of your shoulder, towards your neck and ear. Look for the subtleties and just be curious as you explore inward and downward.

Candice Wu 23:53
And whatever distance you're at, notice if you go closer, just a bit or farther just a bit, what begins to happen there inside your own body.

Candice Wu 24:19
And if you allow yourself to recognize or acknowledge that this person has a right to be, and to exist, what happens in you?

Candice Wu 24:46
And experiment with saying to them, I see you. And if it's true or not, can you see them?

Candice Wu 24:55
Can you see that they have a family or that they came from somewhere in terms of having an ancestry of people behind them?

Candice Wu 25:14
Can you see that they may have desires or dreams and honor that, what happens in you?

Candice Wu 25:30
Can you see if they have wounds or that they have wounds? Are you open to seeing that?

Candice Wu 25:49
And now just looking at your own experience, your own body even more, notice whatever happens in your body. Are there any thoughts about this person that is beginning to reveal itself?

Candice Wu 26:10
Any fears? Assumptions?

Candice Wu 26:23
And these assumptions don't have to even be “bad”. They might just be any assumption that you don't know has an unintended consequence. For example, thinking an Asian person is smart. That's an assumption and that can have an undesired effect. Even if you think it's a good thing to think about someone.

Candice Wu 27:03
Notice what there is here.

Candice Wu 27:07
Again in your body, all the way down to your toes.

Candice Wu 27:18
And whatever there is here to notice or witness, just allow yourself a few more moments here to do so and experiment with this dynamic as much or as little as you want moving closer, farther, standing next to, standing behind, seeing their ancestry, letting them see you.

Candice Wu 27:56
Noticing any part of you that has dislike or disgust or any other uncomfortable feeling. And let yourself investigate that by just being with it.

Candice Wu 28:20
And you might take longer here or take note of pieces of what you experience, thoughts that may have come up. Recognize that not everything is going to come up here. Because this stuff generally happens when you interact with life itself. And there are different ways that circumstances can draw out unknown perceptions or things that were just hidden or that you've hidden from yourself.

Candice Wu 28:56
So this is just an opening.

Candice Wu 29:02
When you're ready, take that prop and release it back to what it is. The pillow or the object that it is. And check in with yourself again.

Candice Wu 29:14
Notice how you're feeling in your body. Anything that's happening for you.

Candice Wu 29:26
Thank yourself for having the time and making the time and space, for having the courage to look.

Candice Wu 29:36
And feel free to try this again with any other kind of person that is different from you. Just checking to see what there is to know, what there can be revealed to you.

Candice Wu 29:52
And if you have someone that's willing to do it with you in person, someone who is different from you, if it's a safe experience that you can set up for the two of you that's agreed upon, that might be really interesting.

Candice Wu 30:11
And know that there are lots of spaces of Systemic Constellations that hold space for race wounds and race dynamics, wounds of our ancestry.

Candice Wu 30:26
In this experiential, we just looked at the body's reactions, the body's experience, when in the presence of someone who's different from you.

Candice Wu 30:41
In upcoming episodes, I want to look at parts of us that hold certain wounds, certain perceptions that may open up to our own personal wounding, or the wounding of our ancestry that we've inherited or have been replaying.

Candice Wu 31:02
And I want to talk about some Spiritual perspectives that zoom out farther, that are not unrelated to what we're talking about, but from a different vantage point to look at, from the level of creation. How have we created this and what it is that we're creating so we can take a deeper responsibility? A farther back perspective of responsibility and come out of any of our own victimization where we feel like someone else is to blame or to fault or something. Not everyone will be ready for that kind of risk, possibility, or presence.

Candice Wu 32:03
Some people at different times need acknowledgment of other people because that's where the wound happened. But I want to offer these coming up, so stay tuned if you're interested in that.

Candice Wu 32:19
Feel free to reach out to me and share your own experience with this experiential or pieces of this work that you're interested in. My email is [embody@candicewu.com](https://CandiceWu.com/connect). Feel free to leave a comment if you're seeing this on Instagram, Facebook, or YouTube.

Candice Wu 32:36
Thank you so much, and please be gentle with yourself. Support your body if you need it. And again, thank yourself for practicing this today.

Candice Wu 32:51
I'll leave you with just a little music to transition and allow your body to come back into the present moment and to whatever else your day holds.

Candice Wu 33:03
Thanks so much for joining me. I'll see you next time.

Candice Wu 0:00
This is an a{Life} Now episode about polarity, and coming into oneness and neutrality, dropping into a deeper space of love, and creating a new way of being, a new Earth, a new Life, creating new dynamics.

Candice Wu 0:18
And in this episode, I share about a feeling of worthlessness and wanting to disappear that I had, that surprised me and gave me some unexpected healing and wisdom.

Candice Wu 0:34
The embody podcast accompanies you on your journey of remembering and embodying your true nature, integration, and alignment with your vibrational clarity, self-love, and living a Life of Beauty and wholeness. It's a menu of transformative healing tools, experientials, meditations, and practices from a blend of Family Constellations, Somatic Therapies, and Holistic and Spiritual practices, sprinkled with vulnerable conversations with people who have the courage to be themselves, {alive now} Episodes with updates on my personal process and reverie Episodes that are “spiritual succulents” that honor, reveal, hug, shake or stir you into Love. I'm your host, Candice Wu, integrative and intuitive healing facilitator, and artist.

Candice Wu 1:36
Something that I've always been interested in is the opposite side of things, the polarity. The two sides of one coin, and especially where there are things that we overvalue in our society or we stigmatize. I've been interested in finding some sort of neutrality, where I can feel for and understand both sides and feel the bridge in between that links them. And it's with that.

Candice Wu 2:15
The other day, I was noticing this feeling of, I feel worthless. I am worthless. I am nothing, and I want to dissolve into nothing. I want to disappear. And for most people and even by my own perspective, I have built up my worthiness and thought that it was important to feel into self-worth rather than worthlessness and to heal worthlessness. And that, I guess, I wouldn't say it was a bad thing. It's just that it's not a feeling that resonates with my being that I feel worthless.

Candice Wu 2:59
So if it's there, either ignore it or if it's not ignorable, not ignore it, but just, it doesn't have power. But if it does have power, then look at it and heal it.

Candice Wu 3:12
And so here it came the other day and it came with a bit of sadness. So, kind of familiar to maybe other past feelings of worthlessness or unworthiness that I felt, but it had a different quality and it was here now, so I followed it. And they followed it, more words came and it continued on from I want to disappear. I want to dissolve into nothing. I want to be nothing.

Candice Wu 3:44
I asked myself a question that sometimes helps me. If I could dissolve into nothing, if I could feel worthless and nothing and disappear, what would it give me?

Candice Wu 4:00
When the knowing came, I just teared up and it felt like such a relief. And it was that I would feel peace. It surprised me, it surprised my mind at least… like I would feel peace if I felt worthless. I would feel peace if I could disappear. But those were actually the keywords, “disappear”.

Candice Wu 4:24
What it really meant to be, and it came through those words, even though it may not make total logical sense, but it kind of does, in that there are parts of me that have felt like I owed others something, that I exist for others. And I feel responsible for others, their well being or for making people happy.

Candice Wu 4:53
At this time of my life, it's only fragments of me like, little pieces of debris that feel that way. And, here it was, in this different format unexpected and surprising format, where, if I could disappear then it would feel amazing and peaceful because I wouldn't have to answer to anyone else. I wouldn't have to feel responsible for anyone else. I could be in my own world and be me and just be responsible for me and live my life for me, that I exist for me.

Candice Wu 5:37
It really brought me to clean up my dynamics with others, another level, where I trust in my own freedom and autonomy and I am that. I claim that. I take up that space as well as see the sovereignty of others. And, they're through responsibility for themselves and deeper knowing of their autonomy and wholeness and strength, and capacity and their journey, their path whatever they choose to do. And however one chooses to experience and be as a whole in their existence.

Candice Wu 6:27
So, I was shedding a layer of peace, of feeling like I owed others something in order to be okay. And if I, from that place of feeling that way, if I gave to others in a certain way, and these are little small things now, like returning text messages, maybe when I am not feeling totally compelled to in my being but feel like I should or feel guilty, emails and such.

Candice Wu 6:30
I'm really quite good at it now to just do it when I feel, I'm connected with it and that is for me to do in that moment I feel aligned and I feel happy or delighted to do it or feel purposeful for myself. It's truly a feeling of being in harmony with myself, my desires, and living fully in my being for my existence and for others because that is true harmony. If I can be fully in my existence, and others can too, everyone has that choice too.

Candice Wu 7:42
The process of getting there is a result of that choice or the journey with that choice can be something with that, I'm deeply free and so are others. And from that place, then I can connect with the cleaner intention, more of me, present and congruent with a clear intention of connection. Not connecting with others because I feel like I owe them something or I'm responsible for them and dependent, codependent in that way, on the dynamic, so it's breaking free of that dynamic and healing it and letting myself be from a freer place that is delighted to connect with people and interconnected, when I want to be and how much I want to be, as well as knowing that unconsciously and energetically, there's still a collective connection.

Candice Wu 8:50
So the feeling of the words and feeling of worthlessness going to wanting to disappear, going to peace, freedom, and harmony was so powerful for me and I loved that spin on it, of worthlessness. And it reminded me of how much I enjoy looking at polarities, and how going on one side or the other of a polarity is actually coming from the same energy.

Candice Wu 9:24
So the need to feel worthy and the need to feel, in my case, this kind of worthlessness that I am not indispensable, that I'm not the sole provider for certain people or like, so needed by people gives me a lot of freedom. But that I can be there for other people if I want to. And both sides of that spectrum come from not a place that I'd like to criticize or put as lesser or lower or worse, but more so a developmental, appropriate place of needing to develop that knowing and that side of myself, needing to know what it feels like to be worthy, needing to know what it feels like to be worthless, and therefore being able to come into the center of neutrality, that I'm not either of those things with that. I'm neither of those things and everything both. With that, I'm the awareness that feels these experiences. And to move beyond it naturally is to have felt both sides and understand them in my body. And then it's not a thing anymore. And that's where it's becoming. It's really nice to feel more in myself. More here for myself and coming towards connection from a more easeful, pure, and clear place of desire when that's there. And when it's not there, that's just the right thing.

Candice Wu 11:26
So what this leaves me with for all of you and for myself is the — just awareness that we are none of the things that we are trying to say we are and we are those things at the same time, you know, we are enough… inherently… and there's a deeper enoughness and worth of our existence that just is and that goes back to just almost all Spiritual sources that are deep knowing that we are, we exist, and therefore have value just because we exist. And to just feel that in my bones and my knowing, and to look at the places that maybe I hold and attach myself to, as part of the polarity, the duality, and to allow those places to gently come to the oneness, where it holds both, the both and the nothing.

Candice Wu 12:40
So some of these words, you know, I explain this in a kind of complicated way. I'm sure I could have explained this more simply. But I hope that you're receiving the energy of this, no matter what, and that if you've listened to it, that there's something in it for you, perhaps, or some piece of it that just connects with you. And if not, feel free to just leave it.

Candice Wu 13:07
I wanted to share this piece with you. It relates to a lot of the things I have talked about on the podcast like touching into the shadow side of empathy in that episode. You can find it at [CandiceWu.com/empathy](https://CandiceWu.com/empathy). Just looking at ways in which empathy goes awry, turns awry, and the door just opened.

Candice Wu 13:34
And just looking at the other side of the things that we assume our values and we assume, should be a certain way. And the way we look at society as a collective and what's happening, even social justice, it's coming in as a disguised form of the same energy of the opposition, sometimes. And there's nothing wrong with that, it's just swinging from one side to the other and reliving the same energy or energetic dynamic and relational dynamic as well.

Candice Wu 14:20
And if that's the case in your life, are there ways that you want to come into the neutral space?

Candice Wu 14:28
A neutral space doesn't mean you don't take any action or do anything that helps people or that brings awareness or does some good, does some — and I question the word “good”, but does something that you want to create that feels good. It just means being neutral just means that you get to do it from a place of freedom and from a place that doesn't create the same effect from the opposite end.

Candice Wu 15:02
When we look at racism and anti-racism, that's often that kind of dynamic, where racism is on one polarity and anti-racism is on the other and it's coming from the same place of hurt. And it can often create the same hurt… or another level of hurt. And if you take the content out of it and look at the pattern, all dynamic of the energy or the things that are happening that it creates, produces something similar, another opposition.

Candice Wu 15:50
I know it's very pronounced with our president in the United States, Trump, and in other countries as well. There's a lot of opposition and polarity and divisiveness and we're really seeing opposition very prominently in our experiences as humans here.

Candice Wu 16:14
I don't necessarily like some of the things that I see. And where can I find a neutral space where I can bring loving, that isn't of the same pattern I see, is what I like to go for. And then, of course, there are just so many million ways that our dynamics are hidden to even ourselves and maybe to others too. Ways we feel like we're doing something good and it covertly creates the same wound or hurt.

Candice Wu 16:52
And so I just love this conversation.

Candice Wu 16:55
Let this be a conversation with you if it's a place of awareness that you want to build in yourself. If it's something you want to create, and as many people are saying, now we are creating a new Earth or we're creating a new vision. We're stepping into a new way of being. However you say that or put words to it, I think finding the neutral space where both sides of polarity can be held and dissolve into the oneness and the nothingness, the wholeness, the totality, the drop into a larger expanse of awareness, where that's more connected with source. When that can come through, we have the ability to really create something different.

Candice Wu 17:55
So that's all that wants to come through today. Thanks for listening.

Candice Wu 17:59
Sending my love out there to all of you and the energy of clarity, the light to be able to see yourself, see the world from a different standpoint that's not attached to polarity.

Candice Wu 18:14
Hope you're all doing okay and if you want to hear more from the {alive now} series, check that out at [CandiceWu.com/podcast](https://CandiceWu.com/podcast) and you can click on {alive now} to see the thread of all the episodes that were alive and present for me in the moment of recording and very raw, as well as other podcasts by me and guests and the experiential and meditations that you can tune into as well. And if specifically, you want the meditations and experientials for healing or grounding, loving yourself, you can find it at [CandiceWu.com/meditations](https://CandiceWu.com/meditations).

Candice Wu 18:54
Thanks for listening to the Embody Podcast to this {alive now} episode.

Candice Wu 19:01
See you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is the introduction to a cleanse on your relational world. Cleansing your relational world and your dynamics can support you in feeling joy in your life now, being more present, and releasing old ties that have kept you tied in. Also, just some brief updates about my trip to Mexico as well as a recent proprioceptive writing retreat and the sensual topics that have come out of that.

Candice Wu 0:31

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 0:44

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 1:05

Starting today, February 10th, 2020, for one month, I will be offering the first part of the dream classes that’s on Skillshare for free. This is about how to uncover and awaken your dream life, the basics of remembering and recording your dreams. So, it’s how to prepare your body somatically and energetically to be able to better remember your dreams and tips and tools for recording those dreams so that you can catch those dream fragments and stories as you wake up. You can find the class at CandiceWu.com/dreamclass1, and you’ll be able to sign up for a free membership there where the class is free once you get into Skillshare.

Candice Wu 1:53

There, you can also find other classes on how to support yourself in waking up your dream life and recording your dreams, accessing your dreams, the importance of dreamwork, and how it can support you and your life as well as upcoming dream classes that I will be creating on how to glean the wisdom from your dream life, for your waking life, for your heart and your soul, and for who you are.

Candice Wu 2:23

Welcome back to the Embody Podcast. This week, I am in Mexico, and last week, you may have heard the episode on solo travel, some of my fears that I was deconstructing and what was happening for me as I began the journey again to live abroad and travel. At this point, I am in Mexico, I’m in Mexico City, it would be today that I’d be transiting to Oaxaca with a friend, and if you want to hear about my travels and how it’s going, you’ll have to tune in next week because I’m recording this one week in advance so that I can let myself have time to settle in without worrying about the podcast and internet and all that stuff and just let myself surrender, wander and explore just the way I want to.

Candice Wu 3:10

One of the most exciting things for me about travel is to set myself into a completely different environment that lets me see, then see myself more deeply and also see where I’m holding constructs that are not really real, but you know, just one way of being because I get to experience the constructs in another environment or from a totally different angle, and language set, especially when another language involved. It comes with an entire embodied way of being an entire experience set that lives within the words and the experience of that culture.

Candice Wu 3:56

So, I’m excited about that and that relates right to what I did last weekend, which was a proprioceptive writing retreat at Hope Springs Institute. It was just what I needed. I feel like it was the perfect retreat for me to get connected with myself on a deeper level aligned to my experience, what I mean when I speak, what I, where I’m coming from, and yet also a stronger awareness of the space in between me and my projections or me and my thoughts, me and the experiences I’ve had, so that I’m more centered in my aware self.

Candice Wu 4:41

Coming up soon, I’ll also do an episode about that writing retreat and the process of it, and perhaps read some of the writings that came through, and it really is a process of listening inward and observing what comes through and writing it down, and then asking a question of: What do I mean by and whatever word has some aliveness? To follow that thread of energy and let it come through as to what is held in the proprioceptive being, the being of us that is aware of space and time and aware of our body, and holds the experience of this life and all the lives that came before it in terms of past and lineage, so it was amazing. And I hope to do a constellations retreat there. So, for all of you who have been asking about retreats, it’s coming and this place is magical and the perfect place to do it.

Candice Wu 5:41

A couple of weeks ago, I spoke about Mary Oliver in the episode where I read her poem, Wild Geese, and I’m still stuck with the words: “You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” And this writing retreat brought me closer to what I love and what touches me in a really deep way, and some of the themes that I’ve been exploring right now are sleep disruptions and tiredness, eroticism, gassiness, who people are to me, and the ones that seem highlighted in my life, my associations around fuck and fucking, the words fuck and fucking, sensuality, intimacy, polyamory and play. It’s a lot of relationship stuff, and sexuality and sensuality.

Candice Wu 6:36

I’ve been curious about true intimacy, like the deepest kind where there is bare seeing and nothing to hide and nothing to hide from, and that even the most mundane things have this vulnerable, intimate, erotic quality to them, when seen in that kind of light and that beauty. I had a romantic experience with someone recently that just brought me to this level of artistry, presence and being. And it also reminded me of the great tamer, this dance production that I recently saw in New York that had this quality of presence, seeing and the mundane things as sensual and beautiful, yet, also macabre and deathly, and disjointed, and this remembering of things, bringing things together.

Candice Wu 7:41

So, all that’s floating around in me, and if you’re interested in that show or Hope Springs or the proprioceptive writing retreat, I’ll link that on the show notes and get a little taste of what’s been going on for me. Well, stay tuned for that episode where I do talk more about proprioceptive writing because it is an important process now in my life, and I think it’s really helpful and just aligns with a lot of the ways that I already tune in and listen, and to write it down gives it another level but there’s a slowness to the quality of the process that is really powerful, especially when shared with another person or a group.

Candice Wu 8:25

But now for today’s topic, I want to talk about cleansing our relationships, bringing them all up to speed to the present moment, that is to say, to align to the right now, the truth of this moment, and giving it a space for what wants to have been said, and what wants to be said now as well as heard or received in the interaction and exchange between you and another. That may have been lingering festering inside you for a long time or that may be very present with you now in terms of timing that it’s happening now in your life.

Candice Wu 9:10

Have you had a relationship with someone that long ended? And this can be a friend relationship, a colleague, a family member, an animal, an intimate relationship, any, anyone, but that this relationship is still tugging on you in some way or coming back. Relationships are held within you. They’re not just a physical experience and on the physical dimension. So, just discarding them or ending it doesn’t always do the job. If we’re fully integrated in that moment, and feeling all the fields and acknowledging all of what is there, which is hard as a human being, then maybe it is done, and only you know, but if you’ve ever had that relationship that you haven’t been in contact with someone for years or even decades, but you can’t stop thinking about a certain thing about it, and it, perhaps bugs you where it hurts or you want it to go away and you push it away or better yet, you’re having dreams and they’re coming into your dreams or the thought like, why can’t I get over this or over them or why won’t this leave me? There’s a layer of frustration over the experience.

Candice Wu 10:34

And so, to let the frustration set to the side or any other feelings of shame or guilt, just give a little space for what else wants to be said, what else needs to be seen or acknowledged within that dynamic and dimension, and relationship, then perhaps it can truly integrate an end. There is a reason that it’s coming back, and that overall reason is that there’s something here for you to hold into your heart. There’s something to feel through about it, and there’s some wisdom there, and then there’s some letting go or some feeling through and releasing, perhaps. Whatever it is, is likely unconscious or buried so deep because it could be painful or it could be uncomfortable or maybe you just haven’t given yourself the time, and this is a chance here in this experiential to give yourself the space, the awareness, attention, and love, to hold the experience, to let whatever it is in that relationship be heard, be acknowledged, so that you can truly move on in your heart, in your psyche, in your soul, and in your body.

Candice Wu 12:08

So, it’s a chance to hit the refresh and reset button, and sometimes, this does mean saying goodbye fully where parts of you haven’t or sometimes, it just energetically ends certain dynamics and patterns of ways of being between you and this person or the meanings that you apply in this relationship. Perhaps, it just changes all that up, let’s that end and allows you to have something new going forward, whether that’s with this person or not, but you cleanse the palate, so to speak.

Candice Wu 12:46

We are working with our shadow with whatever we project in this experience onto the other person, what they mean to us and how we perceive them. The meaning of the interaction or exchange, and when we look at the shadow, when we connect with a person that has meant anything to us, there usually is a golden part of the shadow and a dark part, and to fully integrate, in my experience, noticing and witnessing, feeling through both has allowed it to fully digest and to organically have its place. And for me, to move on if moving on is necessary or whatever the movement is that wants to come through next. So, to receive the “good and the bad” to integrate the whole of it, the painful and pleasant parts.

Candice Wu 13:57

Nick Werber, one of my good friends and colleagues in family constellations and somatic work. He also was on the podcast twice. He says that he does a ritual with those that he cares about, and it’s: I say goodbye to who you were to make room for who you are. That is an incredibly powerful statement to do that regularly with someone you love. Whether that’s together or within yourself so that you can stay present to what’s truly here now.

Candice Wu 14:39

It’s really our own perceptions of that person that we’re saying goodbye to, and that’s part of who we are. But this goodbye, this ending allows us to take in something and find its completion, it’s fruits. You know, when someone dies or an experience ends. Have you had that experience where you’re just flooded with the feelings of appreciation or hurt or anger or fear, just all these different emotions that you might have felt throughout the experience and yet they’re culminating and coalescing right at this peak moment where the goodbye is coming or happening? The ending lets us see what it truly was, and so, if we give ourselves that ending on a regular basis, even internally, because each day has ended, because each moment ends as soon as it’s had and a new moment begins, then we can truly be present or have more of our capacity in the present moment than in the past.

Candice Wu 16:00

I think of horses and they’re so present. Yes, they do have trauma and that weaves in, but by and large, they face what’s right in front of them, and what they’re presented with, and they are congruent with theirs, what their body wants and feels in that situation and express that outwardly. Sometimes, they walk away from each other, and they do it. They don’t sort of do it. They don’t think about it, they don’t halfway do it, they do it or sometimes there’s a little bristle between one horse and another and later, they’re over it and their nuzzling. Sometimes, that’s their play, and sometimes it’s loaded with frustration or fight, but there’s clearness to how present they are in the moment, and they learn. They learn that if something feels different, and it’s a little safer, they can begin to let their guard down just a little. And of course, it’s at their pace, but the present moment gives them something new.

Candice Wu 17:13

And I wish that for all of you that the present moment gives you something new, fresh, something you don’t even know and expect, which Yes, I get can be scary. The unknown. It can be magical to be present in that unknown, to hold yourself with love through whatever it feels like.

Candice Wu 17:37

I had a couple of these long term relationships living in even though they were long gone in real life in “real life”, you know, in the physical realm, and one of them I was holding a lot of guilt and shame about how I acted with them and it wasn’t like I did anything wrong, but I noticed how needy I was in that situation, and this person just had a baby. And of course, they had their own needs, I was just so clingy with them, and it took some time for me to notice all of what came up for me and why, why I was that way or what happened that led up to it, and the belief sets that are underneath that, and all that was held with this place marker of this person, and it really wasn’t about that person at all, but about my fears and that situation and what was left undone.

Candice Wu 18:36

So, this is a chance to give yourself the attention and let your imagination come in so that whatever needs to happen can happen. Whatever did not get to happen can happen, and this is the way we can let ourselves digest it using that tool, the brilliant tool of our imagination to fuel and give resources to healing and wholeness. It’s a chance to bring all the cells in our body as much as we are aware of to the alignment of who we are now, in the present moment now, rather than leaving some incomplete and half, half baked, so to say or half moved through and experienced, but to complete those as we see them, knowing that not everything ever could be complete, but some can.

Candice Wu 19:32

So, I’m going to divide this episode into two parts so that it’s just this introduction and then the experiential, and that you continue into the experiential on its own without all this extra stuff in front. And if you want, you can repeat the experiential and do something like a one a day cleanse or once a week cleanse, were you do this experiential with another person, another person on perhaps the list you’ve made of all those important to you, all those who have been important to or have touched her life in some way, both positively and negatively or pleasantly and painfully, however, you see it the whole dimension, those that you wanted in your life and those who didn’t. You could make a list of all those people.

Candice Wu 20:26

You can make a list of all the present people in your life, those that you want to devote more time to or cultivate more as well as those who may want to find a new distance or space or boundary with, and you get to choose, you get to take a look at that and see what’s there and held in that relationship that means something to you. And if you don’t know where they are placed in your life right now or where you want to place them, in a sense, what you want in terms of that relationship. And of course, we can’t control what they want, but what you want, then you could do this process and see what happens in the aftermath because I’ve often found that this has been a reset button where even where I thought I would say goodbye completely and walk away and give a lot of space in between me and this person, perhaps not communicate with them anymore or way less. That reset, that cleansing has brought something fresh in our relationship and a new desire in me to connect and from a different place of myself.

Candice Wu 21:50

So, who knows? And I invite you to leave it open so that the space for something new can happen whether that’s being in their lives or not, whether that’s new relationships coming in and the space for it or other things that you can relate to an experience in your life that this gives space for. So, tune into the episode as it comes out later this week, and I hope you enjoy it and find more space for being present in what you want, here and now, today.

Candice Wu 22:27

Before we close today, and we tuned into the experiential, want to mention the ally with death experiential. It’s an audio experience now which guides you through a simulation of your death. I just wanted to bring it up because it really relates to this process of allying with death to integrate and bring space for the present. You can check it out at CandiceWu.com/death. Also, if this episode has been interesting for you, you might touch into a few other episodes that relate to relationships endings, letting go and sinking up with the present, including the episode of toxic relationships and ancestry, the challenging relationships in your family. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/podcast.

Candice Wu 23:27

The episode on Relationships Ending, Good Grief at CandiceWu.com/relationshipendings. There’s also the episode on energetic boundaries and how to strengthen your energetic field and clear any absorb energy, and that’s specifically Episode 30a: Sorting and Clearing your Vibration. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/ep30. And lastly, the episode on The Past Being Over and some experientials there at CandiceWu.com/pastisover. All of these will be linked in the show notes for you. So, check it out as well as all the things I mentioned in the podcast today.

Candice Wu 24:08

Before you go, I’d like to invite you to sign up for the Embody Community newsletter, and it’s a newsletter that goes out once or twice a month, giving you updates on where I am in the world, what’s going on with me, updates on podcasts and self-love notes as well as any retreats and events that are coming up. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 24:32

Thanks so much for joining me today, and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00
This is an experiential to support you in cleansing your relationship dynamics and to have more presence and space for what's coming in your life now. If you'd like some context around this experiential, as far as what this experiential might support you with, the ideas behind it, and what it might offer you, feel free to check that out at CandiceWu.com/relationshipcleanse.

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.

Here in this experiential, I will offer you a variety of statements and suggestions that you might do, as far as looking at a specific relationship that has meant anything to you.

I will also leave space for what organically wants to come up throughout the experience. The unique experience that is to you and this other person or people, and what wants to happen as it evolves and unfolds in the here and now.

In the intro episode, you might have heard me suggest that making a list of all the people that have been meaningful to you both in pleasant and unpleasant ways, both past and present, this can be really helpful in your process of cleansing and really taking a thorough inventory if you so choose to. If not, you might just choose somebody that you're working with now, in your soul, in your heart.

For you, it might be helpful or not to start with somebody who is easy in terms of your feelings for that person that it's not so complicated or complex, and then build-up to the ones that are more challenging, that bring either painful feelings or uncomfortable feelings, however, you choose to do it. It is incredibly resourceful for the nervous system if you choose something that feels safe to begin and build the capacity in your body to go towards some more difficult pieces.

If you have a large capacity for feeling and sensing through, this might not matter as much for you. But if you did want to play with it, it might also give you something different.

I trust that you'll know exactly who you need to begin with and how you need to begin, and will let your intuition guide the way. So feel free to connect with yourself in any way that feels comfortable, any way that's supportive to you, whether that's touch, just tuning in, noticing your breath or anything else.

Notice what's here for you, in this moment, finding that connection with the relationship to yourself.

And when you're ready, feel free to stand up if you want to take this into a full-body movement experience, or sit or lie down whatever's right for you.

I invite you to notice your whole body, your emotions, the sensations in your body, thoughts, images, movements, throughout the experience.

Now bring one person that has meant anything to you, or touched your life in some way to the forefront.

If you're standing, you might imagine them standing somewhere in your space, where you could put place markers, like a piece of paper with their name on it, or an object that can stand in to represent or just imagine it.

And as you open the space with this person, just notice whatever it is that you feel or perceive in relation to them. Are you able to look at them? Do you see them looking at you? Is it hard or easy to and what is the feeling? How is your body?

Stay with whatever wants to emerge and be felt, and acknowledged or begin to notice what words might want to be said from either end.

Feel free to say out loud to this person, anything that you might need to say.

Let yourself be as honest as possible. This is your private time and space, in your imaginative field.

Notice if there's anything you wish to hear from them, feel free to imagine them saying this, and yes using the tool of imagination as a healing support for you.

Continue to observe how this feels for you, what you notice in your body, what distance you and this other person are at and what feels comfortable. You get to decide.

Now, feel free to stand in the other person's place. So, if you're literally standing, you can walk over at your pace and look towards yourself, and if you're imagining this, imagine dipping up into the ethers and landing in their energy, looking towards you and feel what it's like to be in their place, looking towards you.

Notice if there are any words or affections or movements that want to be expressed, and let yourself do that.

Notice if there are any messages from this person to you at a deeper level, at the level of the soul and spirit.

Notice anything else there's to notice and to feel, and whenever you're ready, come back to your place. Feel free to imagine that you've washed yourself with crystal clear white light and lands back in your place.

Now I'll offer a few words that may or may not fit your situation, your relationship, or your vernacular, and feel free to adjust them as it fits you. And if something doesn't resonate with you, just let it pass and feel free to say whatever there is to say in your words, or wait for the next one. And we'll also leave some time at the end for anything else that wants to be said or felt.

So the first phrase from you to this person, feel free to say it out loud.

“Thank you”

The next one. “Thank you for the lesson.”

“Please.” And sometimes a strain as wishes come through there, “Please, please.”

Another one you can try on is, “No.”

And as we continue forward, if there are some that just really strike you more deeply, feel free to stay with that, pause here in the recording if you need to, or just ignore the next words or feel free to come back at the end.

And now a sentence, “I take responsibility for the hurt or pain that happened in this relationship and I leave you with yours.”

Another one you might try on is, “You will always hold a special place in my heart.”

“I receive what you gave me and I make more with it.”

“Thank you for your part of my journey. Thank you for being on my journey with me.”

And another idea is, “I agree to this for some time and I no longer agree to this.”

And again, just noticing which words fit for you, which don't, just leaving the ones behind that don't, and maybe taking the ones with you that do, and just a few more suggestions here to try on.

“Please bless me on my way and I bless you on yours.”

Or, “I am at peace with you.”

Or, “I can love you from a distance.”

Take a moment if you feel like it, to sense the color of your own energy and sense the color of their energy, wherever there's any color that's inside of you that belongs to them, let it magnetize back towards this person.

Take any time you need to sense into any other feelings that live in your body, that you sense in the relationship or space in between, any words that need to be said.

Now, notice if there's anything else that needs to be said or done in this relationship at the moment, any feelings that need to be honored within you.

If you want to, invite a clear white light to come in between you, the energy of presence and love.

Invite this person to stand and be at a distance that feels comfortable for you. Ranging from next to you to across the world or into outer space, whatever feels right.

Notice how you feel now at the end of the experience, take an inner imprint of what's happening inside and savor any parts of you that feel relief, expansiveness, any pleasant feeling while you take note of any feelings that are still wanting to make their way through.

Of course, as always, feel free to come back to parts of this that you wanted to come back to, or need more time with.

And, I'll leave you with a little bit of gentle music here or, you can do that or come back to your space and your surroundings and into your life.

Feel free to rewind this all the way back to the beginning of the experiential, where the experiential starts, if you want to do this with another person, or trust yourself to work with the next person knowing what you need, allowing the space for what wants to come up to do so organically.

And I wish you all the best with letting the dynamics end and conclude, to die, and for renewal, rejuvenation to happen within you and in your relationships.

Thanks so much for joining me today and see you next time in the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

In this podcast, we have Nick Werber back on the show, yay! In this episode, we talk all about intention setting and the process that brings in our lives, what it means and how to move through, as well as where our family systems intentions, our ancestries’ intentions come in, and how to respect those.

Candice Wu 0:22

Find out if Nick and I are the black sheep of our families and whether there’s a black sheep in you.

Candice Wu 0:30

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.

Candice Wu 1:06

The podcast is supported by so many of you out there listening and people who either quietly donate some money or give their feedback and their encouragement. Thank you all so much. And if you’d like to support the podcast in a more specific way, there are two options right now that are very interesting. You can sign up for a periodic personal meditation that I record personally for you based on your intentions and based on my intuition of what you’re sharing and what might be needed. And that can be a one time experience, an mp3 that I send to you, or a gift to somebody, or by subscription where you get that periodically.

Candice Wu 1:53

Or, if you’re interested in something that has more connection and contact with me, you can join my Embodied Group healing call. These very small groups offer a compassionate and embodied soul support space for anything you’re going through in life. So if you’d like to learn more about that, feel free to go to my website at CandiceWu.com/support.

Candice Wu 2:19

Following this episode will be a special recording by Michael Picucci of an adaptation of Bert Hellinger’s writing. So Michael Picucci is Nick Werber’s mentor and friend and fellow healer. And he speaks about him in the first episode that we have together that we recorded together last year and in this episode, so you can hear a little bit more about Michael Picucci and Bert Hellinger is the founder of Family Constellations.

Candice Wu 2:52

Both of these beautiful people and healers passed away last year and so what a lovely experience to have this on the podcast for all of you to experience. And, Nick was such a close person to Michael, that he’s offered to share this on the podcast and knows that Michael would really love for others to experience it. The offering in this meditation is called consenting and it’s lovely to inspire, bringing consent to people around you, situations, agreeing to what’s happening, and what your human experience is, such that it brings new possibilities or allows ease and brings the next unfolding. So be sure to tune into that later this week or following this episode, depending on when you tune in. And without further ado, here is Nick.

Candice Wu 3:58

Not really sure how to jump in Nick, this is your second time on the podcast. It’s so cool to have you here.

Nick Werber 4:04

Yeah, I’m really excited to be back again. I know, you know, since last week did that first podcast I’ve gotten, it’s surprising. It’s people, you know, every so often. It’s like, “Oh, I found you through, you know, Candice Wu and I love Candice.” So, I’m really excited to be back because, yeah, a lot of people love that first one, at least they tell me, so.

Candice Wu 4:27

Yeah, I get a lot of great feedback from it, too. And people really have enjoyed what you have to say, and enjoyed our conversation, and some people could just feel like that we were friends. And that’s so true. I just so appreciate you, Nick.

Candice Wu 4:43

And the first podcast we did was maybe about a year and a half ago. And for those of you who haven’t listened to it, or maybe want to review, it’s at Candicewu/nick and it’s also on your website. Right, Nick?

Nick Werber 5:02

True. I think it is. Yeah.

Candice Wu 5:04

At nwerber.com. And, Nick, can you just tell the listeners out there a little bit about who you are and what you do, just as a refresher?

Nick Werber 5:17

Sure.

Nick Werber 5:19

So, I call myself, you know, the label that I use as an integrative coach and a healer. And really, what that means to me is that I just, I pull in many different modalities into my work. And some of the big ones are Family Constellations work, which is all about, you know, this work of how so much of what we’re facing and experiencing didn’t start with us. You know that the context that we live in, has a huge effect on who we are so that can apply to family. It can also apply to our nation and our culture as well as our, actually our ancestral history of these things that long tail of history actually has a real effect on who we are.

Nick Werber 6:08

And then for me, all my work is really on this, founded on this bedrock of somatic trauma work, specifically a modality called focalizing. Which is, you know, really just the best practices I think of any time you’re working with trauma, that overwhelm is the enemy and you might hear this just in the way that I speak and the way I approach things is that just I think the best healing is done in this very stable, gentle space where people can feel safe and, you know, in addition to that, I also have a bunch of training and hypnosis.

Nick Werber 6:49

Sometimes the way I say it is that you know, the work is, all of it is focused on, you know, we have these very deep, unconscious parts of ourselves, as far as we know, we might only use somewhere between 1 to 3% of our brain and consciously, I’m sorry, only 1 –3 percent of our mind is conscious. And so all the work I do is really about working with the unconscious and how God affects so much of what we’re experiencing.

Candice Wu 7:22

Beautiful.

Candice Wu 7:24

And, Nick, I think I told you this before, but someone recently told me that you and I could have been brother and sister in a past life or siblings. And that just makes so much sense to me on many levels, which I’m not going to get into now, totally, but that just feels true in some ways, we’re like siblings in this healing, embodied work, and that’s part of what I so value about your work, how much of the experience in the process that you bring forward, that I love as well, and do my own versions of. But I also deeply value the way that you use your language and words to key into very important and relevant topics that we’re all dealing with in some fashion that get people, it like creeps in sideways in new ways, fresh, very refreshing way of speaking and writing that leave an echo in me. So thank you.

Nick Werber 8:49

Yeah, it’s an addition to the practice. I’m absolutely a writer at heart and love writing about the subject and I love that we were brother and sister in a past life. I believe it. I’m sorry, I interrupted you maybe in that past life I, you know, as an older brother, maybe I spoke over you I don’t know.

Candice Wu 9:12

Well, what I was told specifically was that in the past life, I always lived in your shadow. And I felt like, I could never like, come out of the shadow next to you. And so I was struggling with the feelings of like not being good enough in relation to you and always trying to win at that game but never winning.

Nick Werber 9:39

Oh God, it is sad.

Candice Wu 9:41

It is sad.

Nick Werber 9:45

I’m sorry.

Candice Wu 9:46

No. Yeah, you better be.

Nick Werber 9:49

Yeah.

Candice Wu 9:52

And just for all of you listening out there, the reason this came up was that, I, and I think I told you, Nick, I would read your posts and then I would just get, I would feel so, like, jealous to the point of feeling bad about myself, not the kind of jealousy that says, “ooh, this is exciting, this challenges me to grow,” which is probably more where I am at this point. But when I was getting triggered by your wonderful post, I was like, I’m not enough and like, now I need to be doing what Nick’s doing and I need to write like that and I could hear myself and I was like, “Why? Why am I? Why?”

Candice Wu 10:41

So it really helps to bring that into the light and for the emotions to move around it. But yeah, stop speaking over me, Nick. You hardly do that. No. You were just saying before we started recording that this is a totally different experience already and I’d love for you to share why with everyone.

Nick Werber 11:11

Well, last time, basically, I think we spent the first half an hour after we connected just working on why the microphone was so loud. And I, you know, I live in New York City and so there’s always some kind of construction or weirdness. Like, even this call I, you know, this podcast, I purposely asked you to do earlier in the afternoon, because when it gets close to two or three, there’s going to be school buses outside my window, you know, backing up and beeping and all that.

Candice Wu 11:39

The beeping yup. And you’ve got your mic from back in the day when you used to record music.

Nick Werber 11:46

That’s true. Yes. Yeah. I have the microphone that NPR uses and it’s really beautiful, and I pulled it out of the closet and it was dusty and there was something sitting on it so the phone is all deformed, but it sounds good.

Nick Werber 12:05

Yeah.

Candice Wu 12:08

Well, I made a big mistake, Nick, when you emailed me last night about some of the topics you wanted to talk about today on the show, I read it at 10 pm, your email and I, and then I couldn’t sleep for like four hours. So it’s really all your fault. I mean, that I read the email. Yeah, it was like 10 pm and I’m reading your email, and you’re bringing up the topics that you’re interested in, so I’ll just say some of them because I think they’re fabulous and that is what kept me up until like, two in the morning because I was just like thinking about these topics and your thoughts about them and so excited to hear from you about intention and the intersection of family and family history in regards to our intention, or how they weave in, what we reject and what we resist and how that impacts us and stays with us. You wanted to talk about the beautiful mystery and meaning behind who were born to in this life and what that we’re alive perspective can look like versus a dead perspective. And, then a little bit about narcissists versus empath relationships and black sheep, and also this misnomer of letting go of something or letting, letting things go. So, yes, obviously.

Nick Werber 13:42

When you put it like that, now it’s like, “Whoa, that’s a lot!”

Candice Wu 13:45

Right? I was like, boom, my head was like, Okay, yeah, I get it. Also, it was like getting back in the game of life after the holidays and I kind of just went into a cave.

Candice Wu 14:00

So before we jump in, you know, I was wondering, some of the words I wrote down for myself yesterday when I was just gathering myself trying to come back into my regular sort of schedule, as regular as that can be. But some of the words I wrote down were cave, because that was emerging cave and emerging out of the cave, surrender, the need for trust, clarity, but also not knowing at the same time, and then beauty and quiet. And I wonder, Nick, what words are popping up for you in your experience of life at the moment?

Nick Werber 14:41

I think flow is one, shame is another, connection, and I think the word, it’s almost like, expanse comes up because I feel, you know, I, as you know, Candice, I got married in September this past year and there’s, you know, so much an event like that kind of focuses you in such a powerful way. And, you know, right afterward it’s kind of holiday season comes through and now I feel like there’s this sort of expanse so now what do I do with the rest of my life?

Candice Wu 15:24

With the rest of your life? Yeah.

Candice Wu 15:26

It’s like, that’s a huge expanse. Yeah, I can imagine, right? Like having a wedding, you said focuses you so much. It’s like all your energies seem to culminate to that moment and all the people in your life at least from what I, you know what I saw of your wedding, and then coming into this I don’t know, quiet space or open space.

Nick Werber 15:26

Exactly.

Nick Werber 16:01

It’s open, and it’s playful. It’s like, I choose my adventure now. And I mean, I chose my adventure before too, but you choose it and then everything becomes very singularly focused. I feel now there’s a little bit more playfulness with each day, I can choose my adventure. And it doesn’t always have to relate to a particular goal either.

Candice Wu 16:25

Sounds really nice. I like that.

Nick Werber 16:28

Yeah, it is nice.

Candice Wu 16:29

Yeah. And then you said shame, connection. And there’s one other word I just forgot the first word.

Nick Werber 16:39

I think flow.

Candice Wu 16:40

Flow. That’s right. Yeah, do you want to say any more about this before we tune into the topics we have for today?

Nick Werber 16:48

You know, I feel like they’re going to come through in whatever we talk about. Because you know, I think speaking like this is a co-creative process. and whatever is living within us in this moment comes through. I’m borrowing a little bit from writers that I like and I recently a little bit of a tangent but I’ve been watching a little bit of Mad Men again and then interested in Matthew Weiner and you know, he basically said it’s every episode is what he was experiencing, you know when he wrote it. I think that’s true for most creation.

Candice Wu 17:31

Yeah, that makes sense. Where the energy comes through somewhere. So yeah, speaking of, oh, what were you going to say?

Nick Werber 17:41

I was going to say, I think I feel a sense that I’d like to talk about intention a little bit because it is, you know, new year’s time and it’s just so, I think it’s top of mind for so many people right now.

Candice Wu 17:54

Yeah, I was feeling that too. Yeah, did you create an intention for the year or for this time frame?

Nick Werber 18:01

I created several intentions and, you know, I found it actually reminded me how much I love intention that for me when I’m just working, kind of getting through my day doing tasks on a, you know, an hourly or a weekly basis, you know, whatever that kind of goal-line is, I start to lose track of meaning. You know, I feel like I’m kind of floating and I’m not sure where I’m going or, you know, maybe people relate to this where you just kind of realized, like, why am I doing this actually. And intention, I think, sitting down and actually writing down you know, here’s what I think is a life well spent, my time well spent and it’s not that I didn’t create a bucket list it was, you know, my intentions are a little bit more short term than that, but there’s just something very powerful to collecting yourself and in writing down, you know, here’s what I think is a good use of my time, here’s what I want to give to other people, here’s what I want to receive, and I couldn’t believe how much better I felt when I just did that simple process.

Candice Wu 19:27

Yeah, it’s, to me that’s actually such a playful process too, it’s like, I get this chance to gather myself and see what does feel meaningful and to clarify it. And I have felt that power of not just the writing down, but for me, I can use visioning like, seeing it in my mind and kind of carving out that vision in my mind that it’s not always so cut and dry like, I’m going to look at a vision of what I desire, what I’m looking forward into. But it’s this feeling sense that comes with seeing bits and pieces of where things are going for me and, or where I’d like them to go and it’s really fun. It’s like playing with consciousness, playing with myself.

Nick Werber 20:22

And I think when I hear you say that, you’re getting at something that I think is very important about intention, which is that intention is really supported when we find ways of moving beyond our just goal setting, kind of thinking mind. And so visioning is one way, when I do it, intention setting, I really tap into my body awareness quite a bit. And so it’s, you know, I think we have so much intelligence that is beyond our task-oriented mind and that intelligence is so important when it comes to, I think finding intentions that are valuable to us and valuable to the world and, you know, knowing, like you said, seeing what’s emerging ahead of you.

Candice Wu 21:14

I love that and when you say you use your body awareness and your body intelligence, what exactly do you do?

Nick Werber 21:24

So I actually have been playing with and this is what I used and this most recent intention setting process, a very specific way of working with body awareness, which is that I sit and I write the intentions, one intention per piece of paper. And then I actually put them out on the floor, and then stand on each one and embody the intention. And I’m sure this will sound very familiar to Candice in terms of Family Constellation process. You just step into the intention. Just close your eyes, tune in, and I do this with my clients as well. And it’s amazing how quickly just you get that little sense of Ooh, that’s, you know, it’s not the next five years, it’s actually in the next ten years I’d like to receive this or, maybe, you know, you start to suddenly get really strong senses of the wording of what you wrote. And, if you just connect with your body a little bit, you can feel, am I feeling contracted here? Am I feeling expanded here? Does it feel like a yes, does it feel like a no. And so that’s, I like things that get you up off the couch and connecting with things. Not only, you know, in your mind’s eye, but also in a physical way.

Candice Wu 22:45

Yeah, it brings more of us into the picture, alive into the experience. I love that.

Nick Werber 22:56

You know, this is, I have to give a little bit of a nod to one of my teachers, a person named Dr. Michael Pecucci, but he would say at this time, in a conversation like this, that we should set an intention for this conversation.

Candice Wu 23:14

Okay. We are.

Nick Werber 23:17

And I just thought that came to me it’s maybe a good idea.

Candice Wu 23:22

Okay. Yeah, why don’t we take a moment and feel that? Yeah.

Nick Werber 23:41

That’s funny that you said feeling because it definitely feels like a feeling to me actually.

Candice Wu 23:47

What are you getting?

Nick Werber 23:51

So, to me, the intention, and just for kind of our listeners, so there’s the intention that we might think we want to have at the end. But there’s a level of intention that’s kind of, it’s like, what already is there, asking to be connected to.

Nick Werber 24:08

And so that’s what the second part is what I’m speaking to when I say this, that for me, when I just think about the intention for this conversation, there is a fullness in my body. It feels like this feeling that I get when I’m like, wow, I listened to something that I’m going to be thinking about for a couple days and processing and referencing and it’s kind of that feeling of, I’m glad I spent time doing that.

Candice Wu 24:36

I love what you said, like what is already there and asking to be connected to and I find that when I tune in that way and listen, it’s a more aligned intention, like it emerges, it reveals itself. It’s already living. And yeah, I love the feeling that you’re bringing up the fullness, the feeling of the listening to something here.

Candice Wu 25:15

I got the words, being extremely honest with myself and outward, outwardly. And then also playing with the ideas that the concepts that we have put on the table like playing with you, Nick. And I think in your email to me about these topics you said, feel free to disagree or feel free to, you know, argue with this or something. And I was like, Yeah, I’m going to, let’s see what happens. And I could you know, we, just the idea of play and curiosity and what emerges out of that sort of challenge to on both sides, I think, but as more of a collaborative play.

Nick Werber 26:12

It’s, you know, it’s serendipitous almost that you know, honest and being outward, it’s funny, I, my partner Jen was sitting in our kitchen and I was talking about this podcast a little bit. I said to her that I think I’m going to be a little edgier this time. And I’m just going to say what I feel and, you know, maybe it might turn some people off. I don’t know.

Candice Wu 26:37

Bring it on.

Nick Werber 26:41

Yeah exactly.

Candice Wu 26:42

Yeah, I want to play with that, the edginess? Cool. So do we have our intention? Or was that just more, was it? I didn’t know if I heard a specific intention from you or just a feeling you’d like to experience. Is that? Am I getting it right?

Nick Werber 27:02

It was a little bit nebulous. I think the intention is to share something, both between you and I, that provides a sense of fullness provides a sense of, you know, a gift that you can sit with and play with, even, you know, for a time after this conversation and then I’m including the third player in the room, you know, the audience that maybe they can experience something that they can play with and sit with them, digest for a few days that gives them a sense of fullness as well.

Candice Wu 27:43

Yes, thank you for clarifying that. That’s great.

Candice Wu 27:48

And just inviting people to play with, play with these topics and disagree with us, or find where there’s a new opening and you know, I’m just saying that out loud because that also helps me do that. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Michael Picucci as well.

Nick Werber 28:11

Yeah.

Candice Wu 28:14

And just honoring him.

Nick Werber 28:19

He’s a major inspiration for everything I do. Funny, you know, on his website, when he was alive, it would, you know, you’d see Ph.D. psychologist but if you met him, he was very just quick to laugh with a very raspy voice, flamboyant gay man, who was a shaman and an energy worker, and you know, I think of him almost as the archetype of the Joker. You know, the one that kind of laughs and tells jokes but if you really think about what he’s saying deeply it’s, maybe the most honest, most real person in the room and a lot of ways. So there’s my little nod to Michael. Thank you, Michael.

Candice Wu 29:12

I wish I had the opportunity to meet him in person.

Candice Wu 29:18

So, intention, what comes up as you play with the concept or the idea of intention?

Nick Werber 29:34

What’s sitting with me about intention? You know, I have this community of healers and intuitive people that I love that are around me and both connected to them online and through some of the workshop spaces and communities here in Brooklyn that I’m in and everyone’s talking about intention. And I think the thing that for me, you know, I don’t think it’s touched on enough that I’d love. I think it’s helpful to acknowledge that, you know, intention is a process.

Nick Werber 30:11

When we set intentions, It’s not just that we write something down, and then we put it away in a shelf. And, you know, we hope sometime a year from now it’s going to end up on our doorstep.

Nick Werber 30:26

For me, and in my experience, and from my clients experience, it’s an active process. And one of the clearest ways that it’s very, really active is that I believe the moment you set an intention, what you’re really doing is saying, I’m ready to see what’s been standing in the way all along.

Nick Werber 30:48

You know, when you say, I want to find a relationship or I want to be making more money, it’s incredible how you know in the next few weeks or months people suddenly are playing in that shadow we stuff, those barriers that have been around for a really long time, that are directly related to these topics and, and I see that actually as a positive, it’s kind of, you know, whatever you want to call it. And, you know, universal intelligence or just the way the universe works is that it puts, it brings a barrier too and then it’s like, okay, now here’s your work. Now bring in your resources, you know who’s maybe, it’s a therapist or healer that you work with or just being a part of your community. You know, you have to resource yourself and actually go through it.

Nick Werber 31:44

For Christmas, I just got to my partner purchase me a sweater that says, “the only way around is through”

Candice Wu 31:54

Nice reminder…

Nick Werber 31:56

Yes, and that’s what this is. He set the intention to see the barrier and I think people don’t realize that happens. And so when they find the barriers, you know, when they come up against suddenly like, it just feels so hopeless and there’s so much doubt or I feel so much fear to go out and do that thing that I want to do, you start to, they might start to think, oh, maybe that’s a sign that it’s not really meant for me or you know, this isn’t going to happen or it’s not the right time. And it’s like no, like that, there it is, like you are now being given the exact wall you have to chip away at and your intentions on the other side of it.

Nick Werber 32:39

So I think what I want to, if there’s one thing people take away from this conversation, it’s that, to see intention as a process and to not be discouraged by the barriers, because that’s exactly what that processes, I believe meant to do is to bring up the barriers

Candice Wu 33:00

Yeah, I’m ready to see what’s been standing in the way all along. I love the words you expressed about that, it’s just such a nice statement. And we don’t always think about that exact position or approach when we’re creating something or like listening or creating something we want for ourselves.

Candice Wu 33:26

And I just think it’s such an important thing what you’re bringing up because, yes, so often, I’ve seen it in myself and clients everywhere. We find the resistance, the thing that scares us the most about it, and then we turn around and think, well, maybe that’s just not where we’re supposed to go because it’s scary or because it’s going to bring us some discomfort or let us look at something that we have not wanted to look at perhaps, and I see exactly what you’re saying too, in the way that barrier comes up and says, okay, you want this, you know, you want what’s behind this. You need this to come along. This barrier is the place where you’ve resisted or avoided, there’s an energy here and when you transmute this, when you transform or look through, go through it, as you say, instead of around it, that energy will come with you and support you in the end if you make it through. And we need it, we need it to go forward into the next thing. We need that expansiveness because that’s what we wanted to begin with. It’s going to bring us more. Thank you for bringing that forward.

Nick Werber 34:55

It’s almost like to give yourself credit. You know?

Candice Wu 34:58

Yes.

Nick Werber 34:59

There’s a reason you might not be making a million dollars a year, it’s because it takes hard, there’s a lot, there’s hard work, there are barriers there, there’s a lot to bust through. Now, if you come from a poor family, you’re leaving behind whole generations of a certain way of life. You know, it’s if you want that, if you want that intention, if you want to connect to that intention, there are some barriers you have to bust through and you know, that takes work. And so it makes sense that you maybe hadn’t connected to it yet. Again, you need the energy, you need the resources to be able to do that.

Candice Wu 35:41

Yeah, that just made me think, well, maybe that’s why people goal set instead of intention set? Because, I mean, maybe it also has a crossover, you know, even when we goal set there’s something that’s going to come up… but for people out there that are like FUI to intentions, like, I don’t want to deal with intentions or I’m not doing that. I’m giving yourself credit. Yeah, that it can be scary to set an intention because of the wave of things that might come in succession after that, on the pathway towards what you’re looking at.

Nick Werber 36:23

Exactly. And that’s why, you know, it’s also beautiful that if you set a really big intention and you’re not ready for it, you can stop.

Candice Wu 36:31

Yeah.

Nick Werber 36:32

You know?

Candice Wu 36:32

Yeah.

Nick Werber 36:32

You can take a pause.

Candice Wu 36:35

Yeah, I just love this. I have this image in my mind of a child, you know, I mean, I’ve been there standing on the edge of like a step and feeling like I want to jump down three steps. You know, I’ve done two. I’m going to jump three steps now. And I have this, I guess, maybe this is sort of archetypal image of an adult or someone older, saying just do it, go, just go. And like kind pushing you to go with their energy and with their encouragement. But there’s something incredibly beautiful about standing there on the edge and finding from within your own sense of I’m ready, or I’m ready to take the jump, and I don’t know what it’s going to bring doesn’t mean I’m ready and this is going to be easy. But that sort of leaning forward and being like, oh, maybe not, and kind of leaning back and playing at that edge, instead of just bypassing that and jumping without some sort of internal choice.

Candice Wu 37:52

And a friend mentioned to me this video, which I still haven’t seen, but I’ve been meaning to and I’ll link it to our show notes. I think this artist just recorded people at a diving board like high dive, and they were doing that, they would come to the edge. And some people would turn around and just never come back. And some people would like to stand there for an hour or something or like a period of time and go forward and back and maybe make the dive but it wasn’t really even about the dive I think. It’s just the process of us being human and being in that experience.

Nick Werber 38:36

And I think that I actually have seen that diving board video. So funny. YouTube is sort of my little guilty pleasure when I have downtime, so I’ve found it somehow. But to follow that metaphor a little bit, you know, I find with intention setting, we set an intention, or I set an intention and then it becomes, you know, okay, I started to receive it, you know, for instance, I had intentions about working with more and more people in group settings. And so I’m getting these group workshops are coming forward, they’re doing really well. And then it’s like, I recently, in the past year I was off or, in the past few months, I got the opportunity to work into this retreat in Mexico, which I’m sure we’ll talk a little bit more about, but you know, you can hit that moment of suddenly, Whoo, it’s like, it’s a much, it’s a bigger thing, it’s going to be more of a commitment, more of a commitment to the people coming. And then suddenly, it’s like the diving board’s too high. I don’t know about this one.

Candice Wu 39:44

Yeah, I asked way more of you.

Nick Werber 39:47

And I think those are, that’s really common that you get on a roll and it’s like, where’s your, what’s your tolerance and I’m not saying, you know, push through everything either. You know, I respect that tolerance level, that there’s, you know, that’s part of this work. That’s one of the barriers is fear, you know that you might come up against the fear, the fear of success, the fear of, you know, maybe speaking in front of a large audience or, you know, whatever your intentions include.

Candice Wu 40:18

Yeah, and this kind of loops me back to the beginning when you said that we can just get on a roll, or we can be in motion and wonder why we’re doing it or is this what we even wanted? And I think that that’s really challenging, it can be a really challenging place when the bigger thing comes, the bigger diving board or whatever it is, and you’re on the roll of the intention that you once had set. And there’s that place of, Okay, now it’s, I think that diving board is too high or this is really scary. This is a lot and it’s asking a lot of me. And when we feel into that place, it can sometimes mean this is no longer what I wanted or this is, wait, where have I gone? Is this what I wanted? And is it what I want now? And distinguishing that from the fear of the expansion and capacity, what it means to step forward and continue on? That can be a tricky place. Do you find that?

Nick Werber 41:34

Absolutely. When I hear you talk about that, I think we’re really connecting in some way to just the human condition, which is, you know, in some ways, we’re walking down a cave and there’s a light at the end of the tunnel, maybe, but we just have no idea what’s there and what’s ahead of us and there’s a lot of mystery so, absolutely, and, you know, there’s, I think this is also why it’s sometimes very attractive to listen to someone that says they know, that they, you know, they know the answers because we’re, you know, in a sea of mystery all the time being alive in this world, you know, and this doesn’t get you out of that process, but for me, I do think, you know, there’s kind of three ways that I think about working with intention.

Nick Werber 42:34

One is the setting it process, like the planting the seed, writing it down, which can be a really exciting and kind of expansive piece. Then, there’s what we’ve talked about, which is meeting the barriers, which is, can be so shocking how different it feels, it’s like, it was so expansive in the beginning now it’s so friction-filled, and that can kind of discourage people but there’s a piece in between and maybe all around, all of it, where I do think it’s nice to have some sort of practice where you’re connecting to your intentions on a regular basis. And you don’t even have to do it every day. But for me that writing it down and stepping on the sheets of paper, I do that once every other week with my intentions, to just see, you know, how am I feeling now? Is there still kind of a change or anything that needs to be shifted here? How am I sitting with it, just to kind of keep allowing my own intuition, my own body awareness to keep teaching me and showing me new things. But if you know even the most trained somatic healers that spend all their time with body awareness, which I really spend a lot of my time leaning on my body awareness even with my clients, that’s how a lot of my intuition comes through. You know, the body. It speaks in feeling, it’s not in words. And you know, even that, I think is a metaphor. It’s like, so much of the way life speaks to us is it’s the exception is when it’s extremely direct and says, go do this. But a lot of it is, you know, there are messages that are kind of in a gray area and it’s up to us to feel, what feels right for us.

Candice Wu 44:27

I didn’t really set intentions this year.

Nick Werber 44:38

You’re screwed. The way you said it was like you dropped a bomb.

Candice Wu 44:52

All this talk about intentions, and well, I think that as I’m reflecting on myself, that there just been different ways that I’ve worked with the process of intention and setting it and some processes feel more epic than others. And there are times in my life where it feels that it needs a very, almost like a ceremony to set an intention and to create the space for it. And other times of my life, it feels like a quieter process that’s, maybe this is also more along with the evolution of my own capacity and healing. That it feels almost like a part of me, a part of each moment, in fact, that if I had to put words as you eloquently said, you know, this is a feeling, this is an experience. But if I had to put words into the process, it might be something like, where am I right now and what am I feeling? And what do I want to lean into right now in the capacity of who I am like, the state of being that I’m in?

Candice Wu 46:17

And so the words I’d give it right now as far as intention, maybe it’s just going back to what I said in the beginning, surrender, and trust. And I’m not sure if that’s the intention, or if that’s just how I want to be right now, surrendering. And it’s very moment to moment.

Candice Wu 46:38

And I found that in the last couple of months, my astrologer said to me that it was Uranus and the chaos of Uranus, that it brings this unpredictability and changing your mind moment to moment even. What was in this moment can be totally the opposite the next or the next day or the next week, and I have felt that very much in the last couple of months. And so when I have planned too far ahead, for me, it will reveal itself. So I just felt like I’m just not going to waste my time doing that. And that’s very particular to me and my process. I don’t know if other people are relating to that. Maybe if you have the same birth chart as I do. But, surrendering to the moment and going deeper though, not just like to the topical, satisfaction of the moment, but something deeper of, a deeper movement towards the next movement. So in a way, it’s very unknown. It’s just this movement to the next. So yeah, there’s my confession about intention.

Nick Werber 48:00

Candice, I feel what you’re sharing about the way you’re working with intention just makes me think, you know, that is so you, and I think that’s one of the things I really admire about you is the way that you just freefall with spontaneity in so many areas of your life, and that’s brave, that’s awesome, and so it makes sense to me that you’d be saying that and I think in some ways, maybe we represent two different poles around on the subject, and people can take kind of little bits from either of us, because for me, it’s the spontaneity and the free fall. I get kind of lost and the planning really focuses me in this way that increases my effectiveness and, but of course, there are things that are lost.

Candice Wu 48:55

It’s beautiful.

Nick Werber 48:56

And you know, and spontaneity is, so who wouldn’t benefit from embracing a little bit more spontaneity, and I think you really are like a role model for that in a beautiful way.

Candice Wu 49:08

Thank you, Nick. It’s not that I don’t get lost sometimes too, though. But I also, I guess I’m okay with getting a little lost. Maybe that’s the thing.

Nick Werber 49:23

You have a high tolerance for it, maybe it’s a way of saying it.

Candice Wu 49:28

Maybe, but yes, I think you’re right. You know, there’s just a time for all different kinds of tools, and I think the processes you’re bringing up, they’re incredibly powerful, and they do work at times, work I mean, they will open things up and they will, if you follow through, if or I guess I should only speak for myself: when I feel through the resistance, I’ve landed in exactly where I want it to be in a way, but in a place, which I couldn’t even fathom! And on the other hand, I know it somewhere in my body, that’s what I wanted.

Candice Wu 50:10

So yeah, I think just putting up a menu of how we can all approach this thing called human experience, it’s really great. But let’s talk about family and lineage; and what you’re thinking about in terms of how that intersects with intention.

Nick Werber 50:38

Sure. So you know, for people that might not know, it’s really the focus of my practice is around how family and family history are at the root of so much of the barriers that we experience and you know, the way when I speak to this, I’m not really speaking to it from this kind of, maybe like a clinical perspective at it for me, it’s really at this kind of soul level that we’re born to these, this mother and father, you know we were, we might have had older siblings or younger siblings, or no siblings at all, and that becomes this very powerful template that follows us around. You know, the roles that we’ve played with our family, the types of people we were surrounded by, you know, I think I said an example is: if you had a parent that was a narcissist, and one of them was distant; and then… did you try to befriend the narcissist or did you reject them; and try to ally with the distant parent or, you know, the permutations are infinite. But it becomes this bedrock by which so much of what we’ve become, or how we emerge out of our family is so much a reflection, either an acceptance or rejection of where we come from, and why this, I think is relevant into intentions is, I think so many of us are probably aware on some level that our family has intentions too, and that those intentions were pushed on us. You know, and so the maybe the simplest one would be, go be a doctor, be a lawyer, but there it goes deeper than that, and then I’m actually very fortunate, and you know, and it’s actually complicated. When you don’t get this, it’s also confusing, too. But I would lean towards saying, I’m fortunate that I came from a family that the main message I got was just all we want for you is to be happy. I mean, that’s like I am very very thankful that I got that message, and there was not a push to be a certain thing. I didn’t have to be something.

Candice Wu 53:10

Wow!

Nick Werber 53:10

However —

Candice Wu 53:12

Yeah.

Nick Werber 53:13

Yeah, not to be glossed over.

Candice Wu 53:17

Yeah.

Nick Werber 53:17

I mean, that’s a huge deal. Yeah, it’s a big deal.

Candice Wu 53:22

But guess what’s the shadow side of it? What?

Nick Werber 53:24

Completely, yeah, completely shaped my life that I received that message.

Candice Wu 53:29

Yes.

Nick Werber 53:33

One of the shadow sides is, if you’re just supposed to be happy all the time, if that’s the goal, then you’re going to be falling short all the time.

Candice Wu 53:42

Yeah, I wonder —

Nick Werber 53:44

-the whole happiness at all times.

Candice Wu 53:45

All we want for you to is to be happy. Yeah, I didn’t know if it was literally happy, you know, and the pressure to be happy to come with that or if that just meant it was open, but it’s, yeah, sounding like that would create a lot of, we’re much more than just happy in our experience of life.

Nick Werber 54:12

And there’s depression in my family, which is, so obviously what that is a reaction.

Candice Wu 54:18

Now when you say that, yes.

Nick Werber 54:23

And so, you know, so then it becomes, well, what if I don’t, you know, it’s a little bit confusing. So it’s you know, it’s funny how these messages no matter what they are, even if it’s so simple and sounding so innocent… we just want you to be happy. It still gets confusing.

Candice Wu 54:41

And in a way, we could just turn it around and say, and maybe this is where you’re going but seeing that maybe the words were, are more, maybe the words are all I want us to be happy, coming from wherever that came from, but impressed upon you, it’s a totally different experience.

Nick Werber 55:09

Well, Candice, I think you’re nailing it right now, and we’re about to go very deep into my own, you know, constellation, but it’s yes, absolutely. It is, there’s a funny way and I think this can be extrapolated that the desires that our family have for us are so much, obviously a desire to have it, reflect on them in a certain way, and you know, absolutely the message of I just want you to be happy was, if you’re happy, then I can be happy and you know, maybe that will fix things for me and funny enough, me and my sibling were not very happy.

Candice Wu 55:56

That’s just a strange thing.

Candice Wu 56:03

Yeah.

Nick Werber 56:05

Yeah, that has to be earned, and it’s a process but I want to kind of bring it back slightly of our family has intentions for us, sometimes they’re very concrete, we’d like you to do a certain job, we’d like to be a certain type of person, and so when we’re setting our own intentions, that has to be included in our awareness about, you know, what is our intentions and what is our the intentions that we’re carrying, actually for someone else in a way, you know, if I’m happy then if I can do that, then finally maybe my mom can be happy.

Nick Werber 56:43

And so there’s a piece of that, that needs to be respected, and there’s also another part of intentions that I think is really important which is that anytime we change in a way that we are leaving this fear of where we come from, you know, you want to make a million dollars, and no one in your family ever did that, you are breaking through a barrier there that you know you are you’re part of this family consciousness and you’re leaving it, and so there is an element of guilt that comes with that. Whether you’re aware of it or not, that sometimes when we connect to our intentions and we’re creating change in our life, there’s a part of it where we are leaving something behind, you know, that’s change and in any form, you know, to connect to something new, you’re always in a way leaving something behind, and so that factors into our intention setting to —

Candice Wu 57:50

Absolutely!

Nick Werber 57:51

-where we come from, you know, what we emerged in within our family.

Candice Wu 57:58

Now, I feel this conversation is flowing two ways in my mind at the moment. Looking at our own intentions, and I love what you said about respecting the pieces that may connect with an inheritance or with other people in our life, or maybe given to us just respecting that versus you saying, no, that’s a bad intention then right? To give that up or change that, but just respecting, just honoring it, is just such a lovely approach you’re bringing.

Nick Werber 58:41

Well, and maybe the way of adding to that would be to say, you know, just because our parents wanted something for us, doesn’t mean it’s bad, and this starts to get into, you know, after working with many different people of different family backgrounds, different cultural backgrounds, you know, I feel very strongly that the family we’re born into is this incredible, it’s a wealth of information, it’s a huge teacher for all of us, and even if you disagree with the pieces of what they shared with you, there’s, you know, they still taught you how to tie your shoes and maybe cook. You know, there’s a million basic things that come across from a family that, you know, doesn’t matter how much you reject or how much you disagree with you. You’ve taken from them.

Candice Wu 59:46

Yeah. Absolutely, and there’s so much conversation in the world event, intention setting about getting to the why or understanding why you’re choosing that, and I think that’s very important and it’s part of what you’re bringing forward in this conversation, is what are the pieces that influence, the reason that you want this or you know, whether that’s personal family or other, any other systems you’re part of or if you believe in past lives, but here we’re speaking about family, and when you said just because parents wanted something for us, doesn’t mean it’s bad. I feel if we also get to the why of like, they wanted to be a doctor say, or they wanted you to just stay in the lines and not make a mess and not stick out, that there’s a why underneath that, and we can really get to that essential love that they wanted for us, and I can’t assume that’s for many people are all people, but it’s in my experience that lives underneath it, that there’s something underneath in the undercurrent of that more topical message that people have gotten, that says, well, we really just wanted you to be safe or we really just wanted you to be yourself or be happy or which, as we’re talking about comes with all sorts of stuff, but there’s something else underneath it that we can look at as well.

Nick Werber 1:01:41

You’re totally right, and I think safety is especially the big word and that brings up for me, you know, something that Suzi said, Suzi Tucker, our shared teacher, about this subject. You know, Suzi had been talking about the just ancestral component of Jewish culture across the world, and where you know how the history of persecution is affected people today, and you know, one of her, she always says these things are always like an aside, all the best, and then it’s like, whoa, I need to write that down, and what she would say is that in the shadow of the Holocaust and how many people were lost, it’s there’s many, obviously, Jewish families that push their children to become doctors, lawyers, bankers, and she put it, she said, you know, what’s the common thread line between so many of these career paths? It’s that there they are central, they are needed. Your society can’t work without them, and you know, when you think about the genocide, it’s like, how do you become necessary in the world? And I think that’s a really clear example of how ancestral history affects family on a really, you know, the macro affects the micro, but this is happening across all cultures and with all different kinds of histories that the past influences exactly what our mothers are telling us today.

Candice Wu 1:03:31

Absolutely, how do you become necessary in the world? That hits somewhere deep.

Candice Wu 1:03:43

So the thought I was going to say about looking into directions, like looking at the family in the past, and looking at what’s been carried through the generations and how that comes into our intentions and looking forward also in the other direction, well maybe it’s the same, but I had an experience where someone told me if you do want to have children, make sure you don’t do it because of wanting to give your children a different experience than you got, and I was like, yeah, of course, and then I was like, oh yeah, of course. Because actually, the thought that came next was, well, then what would the reason be?

Candice Wu 1:04:34

And there was this part of me that couldn’t think of what would be a good reason. Like, how do I verbalize what would be a good reason? How is it clear enough from the reactions of myself or from the reactions of my ancestry? And that was a little tricky, and what I got too was just for love and experiencing, allowing someone to come into life through me, but that they’re completely free to be however they want to be, and that was really hard to, in some ways, articulate it clear enough, you know, because wanting your child to be happy, there just can be so many shadow sides to that and unknowns unconscious parts. But even what I’m saying, I don’t know if there are some dark, like, unconscious parts, but I guess I’m tangenting a little bit because I also, as you know, Nick, I work with horses and I enjoy time with horses, and yet I struggle all the time with the fact that we keep them behind fences, and we keep them accessible to humans the way we want, but do they want that, and it would be some time as a whole for that to shift, but if we really believed in the freedom of another being, then you know, how do we see, and treat them, and think about that? And so I guess looping back to intention when it comes to bringing life in, maybe that does apply too to the things that we create, that are not just human life or animal life or caretaking for others, but what we’re creating as far as what we’re birthing.

Nick Werber 1:06:38

I think there’s so much metaphor and in birth and creation, and I think in many ways, you know, the creative pursuits are kind of a process, a feminine process and a lot of ways that birthing, that creation, that I really, I do appreciate what you said shared, and I just wanted to acknowledge that I think you are not alone, and I can imagine there are many people listening right now that would resonate with that about having children in order to change, somehow change the way, you know, give them an experience you didn’t have, and there’s a piece of me that just wants to say, I don’t want to, I don’t think it’s totally wrong to come into that, to come into it that way, but I think it’s so important to have the awareness that you know.

Nick Werber 1:07:39

There’s a cartoon about this that I love, they’re kind of these candy hearts, like the ones that we give out on Valentine’s Day, but their characters and one of them just has on the candy heart section, it says we will not let you get fucked up, and then the mother side says: our parents fucked us up, and then the little baby heart just says: “a new kind of fucked up”.

Candice Wu 1:08:00

Oh! I love that! Please send me that. we are going to link that here too.

Nick Werber 1:08:05

It’s the clearest, like you get it immediately.

Candice Wu 1:08:11

Yeah.

Nick Werber 1:08:12

And this is a huge thing, I’m sitting with right now where I am talking about with my partner about, you know, when we might have children and what I’m bringing them into the world, why I’m doing that, what is the intention behind that is a big thing, and I do get wrapped up sometimes and all the things I would do differently, and then I catch myself saying, you know, I actually was raised in a way that I think my parents were very focused on doing it differently, and that is, it has its own shortcomings in a funny way.

Candice Wu 1:08:51

I really appreciate you bringing that up and holding space for that not being wrong, and I do feel that too, and when we think that things like that are wrong or like that we shouldn’t do that, it can compel us, yes to find something different but it can also be a way that we don’t acknowledge, that we actually have those true desires inside of us and the more we put a blanket over that, saying, okay, let’s like, let’s not, let’s resist that and let’s not use that intention. Sometimes that really backfires and it just lives anyway.

Candice Wu 1:09:47

Circling back to the beginning of our conversation, you know, where you said, I think these feelings I’m having are going to emerge no matter what, and there’s such a power to just say acknowledging it, and respecting that and seeing where it has an effect if you can and claiming it. So it has a place instead of just this like, lingering thing somewhere in the unconscious that does pass forward and lives itself out is the little baby heart.

Candice Wu 1:10:29

So do you want to talk about one more topic, Nick? I know we just like laid out so many. So good, but we kind of are leaning into resistance, what we resist persists, but what are you wanting to talk about now?

Nick Werber 1:10:49

You know, I think again, it just all feels like a time of year to touch on these guys, but I would love to talk about the phenomenon of black sheep and fan. Because I think this is the time of year where all that stuff comes right back up and there are so many people that were the black sheep that are, you know, still in recovery from their family gathering or have you know, stayed home and held certain boundaries and, you know, had to suffer watching all the family photos go by on their Facebook feed or whatever; and I just, I think something that is just so important to me is a real respect for the phenomenon of black sheep, how they emerge and that they are such an important part of the evolution of our society and our culture, and so that’s what comes up for me, so then, I’ve, and then now I feel like I just want to put you on the spot. Are you the black sheep Candice, of your family?

Candice Wu 1:11:59

I saw your post that you are not the black sheep. And I was like, am I?

Nick Werber 1:12:04

I know.

Candice Wu 1:12:07

Yeah, that was great by the way. I really appreciate that, so am I the black sheep?

Nick Werber 1:12:13

Yeah, I can speak more to that too, but yes, I was not the black sheep in my family which a lot of people are surprised to hear that. But the spotlight was taken by another, but yeah, so yeah, you said did you say yes, you are —

Candice Wu 1:12:28

I was thinking about it. It depends on how you define black sheep, so would you define it for the people listening and for me?

Nick Werber 1:12:44

That’s a, it’s a great, yeah. You know, I think if the black sheep is characterized by being someone that feels very strongly out of place, sometimes people that feel that the black sheep and their family feel like their parents are their parents, in some way.

Candice Wu 1:13:06

Yeah.

Nick Werber 1:13:06

You know, how could I possibly be their child and they are often the carrier and the target of all the shame of the family. It’s like there’s this sense of, you know, its parents might have a tendency to almost project all their shortcomings on to the child that didn’t do what they told them or wasn’t enough or should have been smarter or different in some way, which by the way, children are always a reflection of their parents and so for a parent to somehow pointed to a child and say you’re the problem is just very short-sided. But so it’s I think it’s yeah, it’s often they feel a certain level of shame, black sheep, as they get older, might spend very little time with their family because they might become kind of tired of it all and I, you know, I think the kind of classic was like television show thing of, you know, family dinner and the black sheep eat the fastest, tries to get out of it, gets away from the table as quickly as possible, barely talks, if they do, it’s very brief. You know, kind of, it’s almost like black sheep I think have to be very protective of themselves because they can be such target within families.

Candice Wu 1:14:48

Yes, that was me. That’s like almost everything you named. I was like, oh, yeah, check, that’s been my experience.

Candice Wu 1:15:00

At certain points in my life, good chunks of my life definitely felt out of place. Like, how could these be my parents, but then I also saw ways in which I was just like them, a lot of shame, and very much directed towards me even it trickled into my siblings, how could it not, you know, the same directed to me.

Candice Wu 1:15:28

I was known for like, stirring the pot and making things worse; and that’s by virtue of me expressing my feelings, you know, saying what’s going on and what I feel and it was a lot of things my family wasn’t ready to look at, and I, so desperately needed them to and needed them to acknowledge because, for me, it felt like survival, and not having enough resource for myself to survive the emotions that were going on and the trauma that was passed down many years that hadn’t been dealt with, that hadn’t been integrated.

Candice Wu 1:16:15

Yeah, many moments of like running away from the dinner table, having stuffed my food in my mouth, and crying. Those are really rough memories, you know, and I’ve worked on them so many times, and this is still a little tender place. But I can say now that I’m in the best time of connection with my family after doing so much work, inner work and embodied work, constellations work, there’s still more of course, but I actually enjoy my family and they enjoy me now and they’ve also looked at a lot, and so the same isn’t really is as strong as like a strong of a tidal wave, and just maybe exists in little pockets now, but as far as like the family system, it seems, from where I’m standing.

Candice Wu 1:17:22

So yeah, I don’t feel like I’m the black sheep anymore, but I once was, and I know that you had shared Bert Hellinger’s idea of black sheep, think on your Instagram and your social media; and many people have shared that it’s really beautiful because speaking to the black sheep as the change, the healing bringing the evolution of the family system forward is so real to me too, and at times, that’s felt like too much of a responsibility because it was and other times, it felt like an honor, and of course my place… it makes sense… like I wanted to do that but so you’re not the black sheep?

Nick Werber 1:18:12

You know, it’s so funny, this always happens is that as I connect to something over and over again, it deepens, and I just, as I’m hearing you, I feel like, I have actually felt I really connected to something about me that’s a little bit more than maybe what I had shared, which is yes, traditionally in my family, there’s the obvious black sheep is my younger brother and he just was a huge handful in a lot of ways and really offended so much of the family in so many ways, but what I would say is, you know, I said this: when we started that he kind of took the role for me because I feel if he wasn’t there then it would have been me, and I always kind of wished I could have been as disruptive as him. But then I think I had this awareness of how it would just kind of destroy the family to have another kid that is rebelling like that and so I felt conscious of that of like, I don’t have a place to be the rebel anymore.

Nick Werber 1:19:26

But I will say this, is what I connected to as I was talking is that I’m actually, truly, from a family of black sheep. My father was the black sheep of his family and my mother was the black sheep of her family, and maybe that’s not absolutely 100% clear from my mother. There’s like a little bit of a gray area there but for my father, it absolutely was, and so it’s funny, it’s like I’m the child of, I’m like, second-generation black sheep in some way which has a huge role in so much of who I am because I wasn’t raised with religion. I’m the first person and both sides of my family to not be raised with religion at all; and there are a million other traditions that I was maybe not part of for partly just because of that, because there are so many traditions connected to religion.

Nick Werber 1:20:24

So, there’s a funny, I think I realized I’m broadening the perspective a little bit. I’m kind of in the sphere of the black sheep, but maybe on the micro-level, it was more clear that my brother was the big one. But can I actually, that Bert Hellinger quote, may I just read it?

Candice Wu 1:20:44

Please do.

Nick Werber 1:20:45

I think it really captures what I feel about black sheep and I think so many people when they hear it, have a feeling to add. So I’ll just read it. I brought it up because I think I had a feeling we’d be talking about it, so, “The so-called black sheep of the family are, in fact, seekers of deliberation roads for the family tree. Those members of the tree who do not adapt to the rules or traditions of the family system, those who are constantly seeking to revolutionize beliefs, going in contrast to roads marked by family traditions, those criticize, tried and even rejected those by general, they are called to release the tree of repetitive stories that frustrate entire generations. The black sheep, those who do not adapt, those who scream rebel, repair, detoxify and create a new blooming branch, countless unfulfilled desires, unfulfilled dreams, frustrated talents of our ancestors manifest themselves in the black sheep’s rebellion looking to take place. The family tree by inertia will want to continue to maintain the castrating and toxic course of its trunk which makes its task, the black sheeps task, difficult and conflicting that no one makes you doubt. Take care of your rarity as the most precious flower of your tree. You are the dream of all your ancestors.” And that’s by Bert Hellinger.

Nick Werber 1:21:01

So lovely.

Nick Werber 1:22:29

Yeah, you know, it just for me, it captures so many things, but I just, I do feel that black sheep carve new roads for families, you know, without black sheep, families can just keep repeating over and over again; and it’s the black sheep that kind of forced them to face things. Even if the family that sits around the “black sheep” doesn’t receive anything, doesn’t take anything in, you know that the children of the black sheep are never going to be the same. They’re always going to experience traditions and family in a different way. So it’s, I think black sheep are just so intertwined with evolution and as he says, you are the dream of your ancestors and I really believe that our ancestors, it is their dream that we evolve and become more of who we are and more in tune with, what fulfills us and what serves others in the world and so that’s, I really, I can’t say enough of how I put black sheep on a pedestal, I really have a lot of respect for that role and families. So thank you, Candice, for playing that role and coming through it.

Candice Wu 1:24:08

Oh my god! No, I’m starting to think about black sheep in a broader context too, because originally when you said are you the black sheep and I had read your post referring to your brother, I started to think about black sheep in this sort of identified patient kind of way. You know, that language comes from the world of psychology and counseling. Like when a family says, we need help because so and so has a problem in our family, they could name one person as the one with the problem and yeah, I often think of that person is maybe the black sheep and that they have a lot of, they can typically have a lot of symptoms or maybe there’s alcoholism or there’s something that becomes very severe that the family cannot continue to look away; and I wouldn’t say that was me.

Candice Wu 1:25:14

I mean, the worst thing I ever did was, and it’s kind of bad, when I was 16, I got a speeding ticket for 51 over the speed limit. Yeah, it’s a lot. I don’t know, yeah, it was crazy. I never drove that way again but that’s probably the worst that I ever drove and so I couldn’t relate to it in terms of being a certain kind of like, severe set of symptoms or experiencing rebellion in a way that is very like oppositional or something like that but I think that’s the way I’m seeing now can be helpful for anyone that doesn’t perhaps relate to that kind of experience too, you know, and as you’re talking, Nick, that there are parts of us that feel like black sheep, there might be a part of us that we can connect with — has felt like it’s been black sheep, so to say. Maybe that’s just shame, you know, where we feel shame or —

Nick Werber 1:26:29

Well, I love that, it’s that perhaps the part of us that doesn’t feel like it belongs is actually the part that is bringing something to the world. You know, we don’t belong because something that we are, it’s not here yet, it’s not accepted yet but actually, if we can find acceptance with it in ourselves and just and share it and be it, then we actually are giving something to the world we’re hoping it, you know, by including more.

Candice Wu 1:27:07

Yeah, so we can find our inner black sheep, and parts of us that don’t feel like they belong, those are the most essential to the entire wave of evolution and the dreams of the ancestors of all kinds.

Nick Werber 1:27:27

Wow, it’s like where newness emerges from. Wow.

Candice Wu 1:27:37

That’s nice, Nick, nice. So nice place to close, to feel complete.

Nick Werber 1:27:43

I think there’s no way that we could switch to something else —

Candice Wu 1:27:44

Yeah, we’re done here. We are done, except I would love for you to just briefly talk about your retreat. Yeah, it’s coming out February 14 through the 18th…

Nick Werber 1:28:02

…through the 19th actually. Yeah, so, you know, I know you’ve done many retreats, Candice and I feel very strongly that you know, Family Constellations are beautiful one on one, they’re beautiful in a group workshop setting. But I believe that they take on their most powerful, most resourceful state when they’re in a retreat setting, there’s something about gathering with the group and being in that container for multiple days that just the energy just builds and I see it in my own facilitation. I mean, these the retreat work, I think that’s beautiful, and so, —

Candice Wu 1:28:55

Yeah, absolutely.

Nick Werber 1:28:56

Yeah and you know, I knew, and I know this because we met at the intensive, which is a form of a retreat, which was a super powerful and I think meeting you as a part of what made that so powerful for me

Candice Wu 1:29:11

Same here. Yeah, it’s huge

Nick Werber 1:29:16

So, yeah, so this retreat, it starts we’re going to be in Mazunte, Mexico, which is Southern Mexico, and it’s overlooking the Pacific Ocean, and it’s just a really beautiful place. Again, you, it’s like you can walk five minutes to the water, and we’ll be doing Family Constellations work and various forms of Shadow Work. The stuff that, you know, it really goes back to what we were talking about at the beginning of this call of, you know, when you set these intentions, you will meet certain barriers and at that point, you know, it’s important to call in your resources. So all the work we’re doing is literally to meet you at that point is, you know, resources that help people actually do the work of chipping away and doing the integration and processing with these barriers. So we’ll get there on Friday and be doing that work on this beautiful terrace that is kind of open-air and I’m just, I’m super excited about it because these groups come together and it’s just people leave as incredible friends and I still see from my past retreats, you know, people basically communicating with each other that I know had met at some of the work that we have been doing.

Candice Wu 1:30:44

That’s awesome. Yeah.

Nick Werber 1:30:45

Yeah.

Candice Wu 1:30:46

It sounds beautiful, and what a great time to you know, if you live in the Midwest or somewhere called to get out into a little bit of warmth and get the fire on the inside.

Nick Werber 1:31:01

That’s a big part of it. Yeah, that was a big part of why we reschedule it, you know, there’s going to be really beautiful deep work going on. But there is a lot of space built in to just go chill on the beach, which is, you know, just as important, and the weather I think is like, you know, the mid–80s basically, winter.

Candice Wu 1:31:28

So good.

Nick Werber 1:31:29

Sounds pretty good to me.

Candice Wu 1:31:31

Awesome. Where can people find that retreat, Nick?

Nick Werber 1:31:37

So if you go to my website, which is just NickNWerber.com, you can go there or my Instagram is @nwerber (instagram.com/nwerber), and then all of its actually being hosted through Maha Rose, which is this incredible organization that’s based in Brooklyn, and that’s of Maha Rose’s website, www.maharose.com is another place where you can read up about it.

Candice Wu 1:32:06

Thank you so much, Nick. This was fun, and do you feel like we, you? Yeah. How did we do on our intentions?

Nick Werber 1:32:19

I think we did great, and I really am. I think we did well, because I really, that it was funny that moment where you said, I think we have to close there was actually the moment where I had felt a sense of, oh, wow, I actually this is, it’s the exact kind of subject that I will spend the next few weeks thinking about of. You know, all those places where I don’t feel I belong, of which there are many, you know, is that possible? That’s just something that’s emerging that the world can I respect it in that way. So I think there is a fullness that I feel when I just connect to that right now, so I think we did well and, you know.

Candice Wu 1:33:04

Absolutely, yeah, to each their own of their experience and yeah, I’ll be thinking about that too, and it’s kind of like a twist on something I’ve been doing for some time. But the words are so poignant now like all the ways I feel that I don’t belong now or maybe in the past, yeah.

Nick Werber 1:33:33

Yeah, well, it’s so, you know, obviously, the reflex of way to experience that is it’s just the opposite. I don’t belong and there must be something wrong with me and all the stuff that we talked about. So it definitely is turning an idea on its head in a way that you know, I don’t know about you, but the moment I connect with it, I just, I feel that sense of my body relaxes and I feel clearer and you know, for me, it’s all the signals that there’s —

Candice Wu 1:34:03

Yeah, same here. I feel that playfulness that I was wanting about it, to approach it with playfulness. It’s a fun process to think about it in this way and I learned so much. Thank you, Nick.

Nick Werber 1:34:23

Thank you, Candice. I feel like we can do this again.

Candice Wu 1:34:26

We still have to talk about all sorts of things like letting — like, kind of

Candice Wu 1:34:33

I love that topic, that was the ones that kept me up and what we resist persists. Like how just looking at that in different ways and through the body. So yeah, a little teaser for our next podcast whenever that comes, but let’s do it.

Nick Werber 1:34:52

The perfect cliffhanger for now.

Candice Wu 1:34:55

Thank you, Nick. Okay, definitely see you next time and just want to say one more thing, actually, thank you so much for offering the music for the Embody Podcast, the intro and outro music. I still use it. It’s still on every single podcast and you created it. It’s so lovely.

Nick Werber 1:35:17

I know. I love it.

Candice Wu 1:35:18

Thank you.

Nick Werber 1:35:20

Thank you. Thank you very much. I’m so glad.

Candice Wu 1:35:26

I’m so grateful for Nick’s presence out in the world, and what he’s doing in support of other people, and in growing the work of Family Constellations in his unique way. It’s really beautiful to be challenged by his work and to learn and grow from it and also to exchange in the ways that we do as friends and as colleagues. Thank you so much, Nick, and thank you all out there for listening. I hope this does give you something to nibble on as we close today. Be sure to check out Nick’s website if you’re interested in his work or the retreat coming up, and his Instagram where he shares a lot of his writing, and again, his website is nicknwerber.com, and you can find all of the links at the show notes related to this episode at candice.com/nickparttwo.

Candice Wu 1:36:24

And as we send each other forward into this new year 2020, this is already been quite a long podcast, so I’m just going to pretty much close it out from here and send you off with of course Nick’s lovely intro outro music if you’re interested in staying connected, you can feel free to sign up for my newsletter at candice.com/embody where I share all about the podcast, and the experientials, and meditations that come out as well as events, self-love notes, and updates about me. Thanks so much and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

As a gift, Nick Werber has offered one of his favorite audio meditations on the subject of consenting to people and the present moment as they are. The meditation is originally written by German psychologist, Bert Hellinger, and as read by Dr. Michael Picucci. Dr. Picucci was one of Nick’s greatest mentors before he passed away, and Nick spent a year recording several of his meditations along with the audio version of his book, Vocalizing Source Energy. The content of the meditation gets at universal and enduring truth that our perception of the world around us shapes the world around us. What an honor to have him here on the podcast, sharing this experience with all of you. Though I’ve never met either one of you, Michael and Bert Hellinger, thank you.

Michael Picucci 1:11

This is Michael Picucci. I’m going to recite my own adaptation of a brief guided meditation, originally written by German psychologist, Bert Hellinger. The name of this meditation is Consenting. It is intended to be a deep and meaningful experience.

Before doing so, may I suggest you find a private, comfortable place for yourself, and then slowly find a sense of embodiment and an awareness of your body, perhaps take a few conscious breaths just noticing the natural in and out of the breath. Give yourself a few minutes to notice that we have a live body as well as a mind and let this awareness be an accompaniment to the meditation. As I share the meditation, feel free to let the words wash over you as you are listening to them.

This particular guided meditation is intended to have its own special effects on many levels and dimensions of your experience. Feel free to listen to it as often as it can be helpful to you in finding a better ground of being.

I begin, consenting, as soon as I have consented to other persons as they are, they can feel at ease. As soon as I have consented to a situation, as it is, it changes. It reveals to me new possibilities for action. On an inward journey, I may experience that an obstacle stands in my way. Often, it is something that I have not yet consented to, for example, a pain or loss that I have not gotten over, was something that must be resolved. There is something else to which I must agree, the time that I still need. As soon as I have agreed that I need more time, time leaves me in peace. I may move on.

I experienced something similar with my pain. What happens when I agree to it? When I no longer try to get rid of it? When I take it close to my heart and allow it to calm down in me? When I permit it to take the lead? Perhaps, this pain wants to take me to something that I have lost sight of, for example, another person, maybe this pain guides me back to something that is waiting for recognition and for a solution. Therefore, I stay with this pain as it is the whole time.

With this pain, something recollects itself inside of me. Is it that I pause on my inward journey, in the moment, exactly here? Or is it that this pain is leading me on to a decisive step because I have agreed to it? It takes me by the hand and leads me further and deeper. When I simply surrender, what happens to my pain? My pain, too, calm down and finds its peace. It closes its eyes as if its work is done.

As soon as I agree to everything, as it is, I gain precious time. As I stay in peace with me, something in me and outside of me grows as if of its own accord. These inner journeys are movements of life, I have agreed to everything as it is, I feel free to engage in the essential aspects of life. I may move on in a decisive manner.

These inward journeys of movements of life, what I have agreed to everything as it is, I feel free to engage in the essential aspects of life. I may move on in a decisive manner.

The forces of life first collect inside, only then, do they turn outside. Insights too, a first perceived inside. After that, they set something in motion outside. On our inward journeys, we consent everything as it is, first to ourselves and to our situation, to life as it is, and to the lives of other people. In this way, our inward journeys continue outside as well.

Our journeys to source energy, open other space for us inside. Rilke calls this space, the inner space of the world. In this space, we relate to life in a more comprehensive way, we see it differently, and we become different. After this, we return to our own space, changed, and we turn toward our everyday lives, changed. What is the nature of this change? We are in its service, a line with enough love.

Candice Wu 0:00

This week is part three of the whole conversation around taking, receiving and giving, and the balance of each of these. In this conversation, I explore who is the part of you that’s giving, and the balance of when you give and what that does in a relationship as to its relation to when you receive our take, how to balance relationships in terms of taking, giving and receiving, and what happens in the dynamic. I also talk about self-love and giving to the self as well as how that relates to our dynamics in relationships on the human level.

Candice Wu 0:42

This episode is part three of taking, receiving and giving and the balance of each of these as well as cleansing our dynamics and believes that are in relation to these three ways of being in life. I share some of my own thoughts on the balance of taking, receiving and giving as well as the thoughts of Bert Hellinger from Love’s Hidden Symmetry. Bert Hellinger is the founder of family constellations and explores these hidden dynamics.

Candice Wu 1:18

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 1:31

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 1:53

It’s so important to let die what needs to die. If you think about rotting fruit and you just let it sit there and you don’t throw it out or buried in the earth, it just sits there and keeps on rotting and decaying, and often what is within us that wants to be released and felt, and honored to release or end can fester. What wants to complete itself can be overdue. Have you ever had a relationship where it just needed to end or change in some way or something needs to be acknowledged or felt, and because that delayed or it was maybe hard to do so it got worse?

Candice Wu 2:43

Well, this is my experience at times and when I first experienced the death meditation by Ana T. Forrest, through her work of Forrest Yoga, and healing, it was really profound. It was a simulation of death, which brought me to face the experience of if I were to die in 12 hours, what would I want to say do or feel and experience? What would it mean to live? And so, with that experience, I have found inspiration and adapted the Ally with Death Experiential, which is a way to experience that simulation of death through an audio experience, and through prompts that ask of you to look at what needs to end in your life, what belief sets are you carrying that really weigh you down or create suffering, what in your outer world needs to happen, what needs to be said, what needs to be acknowledged, so that you can fully live life and come back to your playful, intuitive, creative, sensing, curious self. And if that’s not something you know, that part of you is, curious and playful parts of you, maybe that doing this can allow that to come and shine through.

Candice Wu 4:12

So, my adaptation of this experience includes the body it includes what happens inside as you’re feeling this, what are you noticing in your body, emotions, images. This is my own creation of what has helped me in partnering with the energy of death to let things truly release and die, and to imagine a death, and to let that happen so that I can find renewal and revitalization.

Candice Wu 4:47

If you’re interested in this experience, it’s fantastic for the winter or for your moon cycle or a phase of the moon cycle, in general, or anytime you’re feeling way down. stuck, anxious, depressed. If there are things you know you need to face or something that seems like it wants to be acknowledged within you, this is a great opportunity to experience it. It’s a 75-minute audio experience, and it’s full of stirring and provocative music that’s handpan music by a friend of mine, Larry St. Germain. He’s an artist and a musician, and he was so excited to take on this project and just poured his heart and soul into the fine-tuning, the mood and the energy that hold space for us to truly look in places, in the dark places, and face what it is that we need to really honor.

Candice Wu 5:52

So, that’s music by Larry Saint Germain, and it’s produced and edited by Chris Spiegl, who’s the editor of the Embody Podcast, and he did a fantastic job of amalgamating his chunks of sound to fit right in with my voice and fill in and hold the space for. You can find this experience at CandiceWu.com/death.

Candice Wu 6:17

Hi, everyone. Thanks so much for joining me today. This is going to be an interesting conversation. I’m literally in a robe because it’s cold here in Michigan. I have a cup of tea. I hope you’ll join me with something comforting to yourself in this topic of giving. It’s really beautiful to be able to give to yourself and receive what you’re giving to yourself. That to me means taking time for self-care and doing that in a way that’s woven through your day. So, that is part of you. Not just something you set aside to do, which is a beautiful thing, too, but having this cup of tea here, and receiving the benefit, really feeling into how that feels to give to yourself, the pleasure it is or where it feels comforting or soothing. So, I invite you to do that today. Whatever it is that would make you feel soothed in this moment, whether that’s a little bit of contact to your body or getting a blanket or if you’re in transit, to do something that supports your body in feeling more comfortable and cared for.

Candice Wu 7:43

I just spent about five days in New York on a visit, and so glad to be home in this cozy place in Michigan. There’s snow on the ground. It’s the week of Thanksgiving here in the United States and I just love this cozy feeling before the holidays, but I also want to acknowledge that I didn’t always feel that way, and I know for many people, holidays are a hard time, and that can relate to all sorts of family dynamics, belonging or expectations, but also, hurts and wounds of the past. So, here, as you’re coming towards any holidays of your culture or your ethnicity, maybe it’s a chance to look at what hurt or wounds have been here, what’s the feeling you have now and just take a moment to honor those rather than being harsh on yourself or critical or trying to push these parts of you away. And also, it might be a time to push these parts of you to the side in a sense of, if you need to have some boundaries around what you’re feeling to move towards what’s pleasurable as we started in the beginning of this podcast.

Candice Wu 9:06

So, I would like to just jump into this podcast today. The last couple of weeks, I’ve been talking about taking, taking what’s given to us, taking what we need, taking up space, and all of the dynamics underneath it that may prevent us from really being able to take what’s ours. We’ve also been talking about taking versus receiving and the active feeling around taking, the active assertion that’s needed to take, to take our place in our lives and in our ancestry. And also, the topic of receiving and how it is to receive, to receive love to receive all the things that are coming our way, and how we can step into by taking our place, step into all of what it is that is here for us, that is specific perfectly designed for us to receive in this life and to take in this life.

Candice Wu 10:06

I’ve talked about taking our place as a way of taking your true position in your family lineage, and also, in yourself, in who you are, the essence of you. What I didn’t talk about is taking our parents as they are, and how much that is a part of and the essential groundwork to being at peace in ourselves and loving ourselves, and feeling whole. Before I jump into that, if you want to hear the previous conversations, you can find that at CandiceWu.com/taking and CandiceWu.com/receiving. That’s part one into and they’re also linked to the show notes of this episode. If you’d like to catch up with that, you can start and that’s totally fine, too, I think. This conversation it all loops together.

Candice Wu 11:06

So, taking our parents as they are. I often hear people saying I don’t want to be like my parents or having criticisms of their parents, rejecting them in some way, and what that does, I know from my own experience, in myself and with my clients is that there’s a way in which that rejection holds the place marker for what we feel and what our young self feels or has felt or needs to feel, and that can be this beacon to where it is that our soul wants us to heal. And at the same time, if we leave it there, as we leave it there, there’s a way that we reject who we are in ourselves. There is a way I reject myself if I reject my mother or some piece of my mother.

Candice Wu 12:06

If we go towards the spiritual truth of the wholeness of who we are, we are all possibility. We are capable of every way of being, and if I reject this certain part of my mother, maybe the way that she is stubborn or something like that, then I also reject that part of me that has stubbornness or is possibly stubborn. And when I do that, there is a constriction inside of me. There’s some part of me that blocks itself off to the wholeness of all energy, which also relates to pleasant feelings and pleasant qualities or more desirable, societally desirable qualities. Our soul wants us to be multidimensional and multifaceted, and in every single way of being, so that if we ever need that way, we’re able to do it, and we have the flexibility, but also, that that’s just the essence of our fullness, period.

Candice Wu 13:23

That is my belief at least, and what I have felt is that when I’ve embraced that stubbornness in me, then I’m able to see myself with more humanity, compassion, and yet, I know why it is that I may have rejected this quality in my mother because perhaps it brought me hurt or in relation to her as a child. And so, these are these place markers, these rejections of our parents, place markers for what we ourselves are wanting to heal and look at, that’s why people around us are our teachers, especially when it brings us an unpleasant experience, just that they’re holding something for us to learn.

Candice Wu 14:15

So, taking our parents as they are, is challenging because it often requires us to feel the feelings that we have in relation to the way that they are, and we often needed our parents to hold that space or wished that they could to hold that space so that it felt safe enough to feel those feelings and that isn’t always there. So, it creates a bit of a bind, in a way, but as adults, we can find resource and other ways to support us in coming to that true acceptance, not just acceptance, but agreement of who our parents are, and when I feel in that place of full agreement of who my parents are with all of what and who they are, and what came before them, it’s a bigger picture than just them. I feel much more in agreement with myself.

Candice Wu 15:15

So, instead of saying, “Oh, my father’s a jerk,” and leaving it there, where my judgment, our perception is distorted because of my emotions, which is natural in a way or we tend towards that, where’s there a bit of neutrality, that may be the truth is he was absent, but that there is a greater reality. We’re truth to that. Where’s the compassion to see where that originated, that it didn’t start with him as Mark Wolynn, a family constellations writer and facilitator says it didn’t start with you in his book. Whether there’s a greater experience of the family system that makes its way down to me, where my experience of hurt has a place. And can we allow ourselves the grace of feeling what we feel and what we need to acknowledge that human experience not to ignore that to honor it, but also see farther back, and to honor a bigger picture? Jim Kolakowski, my first yoga teacher and spiritual teacher I really admire, he was on the podcast as well. He says if we could see the bigger picture, like the biggest picture, we wouldn’t be upset anymore. This we would understand so much more.

Candice Wu 16:44

So, that’s a preface to this conversation of giving is that piece of taking our parents as they are, that I didn’t talk about in that first conversation of taking and it’s so easy essential, and I’ll mention Bert Hellinger later in this episode, which is part of why I recall that piece that I wanted to share that’s so essential to the family constellations work, and the gift that constellations can bring is this very powerful honoring of who the people are behind us that give us the freedom and ability to honor ourselves, and that’s the preface to this conversation of giving.

Candice Wu 17:39

Giving, I have said in the first podcast of taking that it can be often overrated, like we just seem to hear messages or at least I do, that we should give and give, and give and give, and yet, somehow that doesn’t quite feel right. I often find that giving can come out of an incongruence with love, that it’s coming from another place. Have you ever received something from someone with a slight feeling of something more coming with it? Maybe there’s guilt coming with it or obligation or some feeling of debt or there’s, I don’t know, pity coming with it, sympathy, and maybe that’s okay, but this conversation here is to take a look at what it does come with for you in terms of you giving and how you receive or take in those relationships.

Candice Wu 18:44

I’ve certainly used giving as a way of trying to receive validation and love, belonging, and that comes from my early imprints of life that if I gave of myself, not just in gestures or gifts, but if I gave up myself, if I gave up who I was and became someone for someone else, then I would feel worthy. It went to the core it was like my existence was to give, my existence was for others, and that became extremely painful, over time, as I became aware of it. It did help me survive, and so, I appreciate that I survived and I’m able to look at all the pain that came out of that in a very loving way at this point in life, and over time.

Candice Wu 19:46

How does that sit with you to does anything come up for you now, as this conversation opens your relationship with giving, your relationship with what it means to give and what happens when you give? What you might expect or desire? And this is all happening, perhaps, on a subtle level. So, even if you’re like, “No, no, no, I’m pretty clear about that,” you might consider looking a little deep, more deeply and more nuanced, and just see what turns out for you.

Candice Wu 20:29

When I think about giving some words come up with giving time, giving attention, giving energy, gifts, foods, cards, offering attention, hugs, kisses, love, compliments, giving thanks, giving up, giving myself, what that means. When we give what feels like too much only we can know what that is. There’s a polarity. There’s a polarity on the other side of giving too much is asking for too much. What you want from other people, what is underneath that giving might be something that you are wishing for and drawing for energetically.

Candice Wu 21:31

Now, I want to read an excerpt from Love’s Hidden Symmetry. What makes love work in relationships, and this is a book by Bert Hellinger, Gunthard Weber, and Hunter Beaumont. Three very prominent family constellations, people and Bert Hellinger being a founder of this modality and work, culminating the work, and I’m on page 12, 13 and 14 if you have the book or if you’re hoping to get it, but here is this conversation about the conscience and balance in giving and taking.

Candice Wu 22:11

And they say, “Our relationships and our experiences of guilt and innocence begin with giving and taking. We feel entitled when we give, we feel obligated when we take. The oscillation between entitlement and obligation is the second fundamental dynamic of guilt and innocence in every relationship. It serves all our relationships since both giver and taker know peace only when both have given and taken equally. When we receive something from someone, we lose our innocence and our independence. When we take, we feel indebted and beholden to the giver. We feel this obligation is discomfort and pressure, and we try to overcome it by giving something back. We can’t truly take anything without feeling the need to give, and taking is a form of guilt. Innosense in the service of this exchange becomes manifest as the comfortable feeling of entitlement that comes when we take fully and when we give a little more in return, then we have taken, we feel innocently carefree and light-hearted when we’ve taken fully, and our needs have been satisfied and when we’ve also given fully in return.”

Candice Wu 23:31

So, in this conversation, what we’re talking about is that when we accept, we take from someone we receive, that it’s typical to feel that sense of guilt and obligation, and that the balance of some energy exchanges is off-balance, but it can be balanced when we give back. I find that to be true and the very basis of relationships of human, of the humankind, which we are here for or we are here in, and where he says, this statement, “it’s better for you to feel obligated to me than for me to feel obligated to you,” is something that really rang true for me when I started to look at my relationships with others and how I was using giving in order to gain something.

Candice Wu 24:29

So, this is beyond just a balance and exchange of energy that’s natural and clean of other things. What I find is that giving is often connected with these other things, of wanting validation and wanting more in return than just a thank you, and wanting someplace of our belonging to be secured by what we’re giving and what we get out of that. With that idea that “it’s better for you to feel obligated to me than for me to feel obligated to you,” they talk about the helper syndrome and say that such self-centered striving for freedom from need is fundamentally hostile to relationships. Whoever wants only to give without taking clings to an illusion of superiority, rejects the bounty of life and denies equality to his or her partner. Others soon want nothing from those who refuse to take and become resentful and withdraw from them.

Candice Wu 25:41

So, when giving becomes so weighted, and someone does not take it all, and I see this when I hear compliments being given back and forth like someone says, “Oh, you did such a good job,” and this was like a team collaborative effort and you did such a good job and the other person says, “No, you did” or they like, they contribute all the credit to the other person back to the other person. It just feels like they’re tossing this ball and back and forth, and it’s getting bigger and bigger, but nobody will really hold it, and to really hold it, perhaps, needs that acceptance of some level of guilt or some discomfort.

Candice Wu 26:23

When I look at all this, my reaction is that yes, I have found this to be true, but also that it’s mixed up with those early dynamics of what we needed from our parents, and we carry around any leftover needs to other relationships. And so, when that ball gets bounced back and forth with more, more need for validation, and instead of just accepting it, we give it to the other person and we hope that they’ll take it, but we hope that they’ll take it and give us something back, and yet, we still can’t take that. I’m describing something very particular which may or may not be part of your experience, but I wonder if you see this in your life or in other people, in yourself. We are the places that it’s very hard to receive and take. Even just a compliment, just to accept it fully. Do you bounce it back to somebody else? Is there a feeling of obligation or guilt? Are you able to feel that and hold that or do you stay in the innocent place where in a way you require others to feel that guilt or obligation instead of you?

Candice Wu 27:53

And maybe guilt and obligation or not the right words for what’s being bounced back and forth, I can imagine others’ feelings there, but there’s this quality of a very basic human need that’s being tossed back and forth that is also being denied back and forth. So, going back to Love’s Hidden Symmetry and what these authors suggest is that a full exchange, fully receiving and fully taking is what creates a very equal balance in relationships.

Candice Wu 28:31

Can you fully receive and fully take? There’s a way that neutralizes and doesn’t let it bounce back and forth, but there’s a place for it to absorb in and to build more. They also talk about when reciprocity is impossible, for example, when the power dynamic is in a way that you’re not meant to or that it isn’t possible to for things to be equal in a give and take, for example, parents to children or when someone is very sick, and they really cannot give back in a certain way, and the answer might be to give it forward, give it forward or to thank and acknowledge that this is something, a gift that one cannot give back. And often that also balances that given take.

Candice Wu 29:37

So, I see this in many relationships, and also, with giving to yourself, with self-love, with healing, with healing the parts of me that have wanted and needed from other people, I’ve come to find a different place, a lighter place where that giving doesn’t ask for as much from other people, and I don’t know if it’s selfless giving, there’s this common conversation or pressure in society to be selfless when you give and not expect anything in return. I think that also comes from very deep philosophies, a spirituality of many kinds, and we have to be careful about that because when we fake it, it becomes this underlying, unconscious or energetic or pushed down, repressed dynamic. And we do make ourselves better than human. In that way, we say we’re not subject to those human desires that we actually have, that we’re pushing down and hiding, and we will pretend that we don’t need anything, and yet, it acts on this unspoken level that can be visceral and palpable.

Candice Wu 31:04

But I do believe that there is a place of selfless giving or giving without expectation, but it comes with earning it. It comes with really looking and feeling through, and having the capacity to feel through where we use giving, taking or receiving to feel belonging or feel worth or to reject it or to ask for it, and what those three x indicate as far as those young dynamics or maybe even past life dynamics that come into this life.

Candice Wu 31:48

I have this view, also, because when I work with horses, I may have told this story in another podcast, but I can see this clear reflection of the places in me or the times in me that I want something back when I give. So, I give a carrot to a horse, and there are some days that I feel like, “Yep, just giving it to them and they’ll enjoy it. However, they enjoy it. Maybe they’ll drop it to the ground even, maybe they don’t want it or maybe they gobble it up and just walk away.” And I’m fine with that. That just is satisfying in itself, but when I first started giving food to horses, I could see that I wanted something back. I wanted them to love me. I wanted them to cuddle with me and give me some sort of loving attention that said, “I like you and I honor, I value you and you’re something to me.” And of course, when they just grabbed the apple out of my hand and walked away and ate it, and didn’t look back, there was something in me that had to look at my own experience in what I was projecting onto that horse, those needs that I was expecting them to fulfill for me.

Candice Wu 33:18

So, working with horses gives me this very clean look at how I can give and not expect, and I don’t know that working with horses is free of the balance of give and take, especially in this setup of when horses are under the care of humans and there is a power dynamic, but it gives me a bit of a cleaner look than most human relationships do. So, it might be a fun exercise for each of us if we gave to someone, if we give a gift or if we give a compliment or give our time and energy, and they just experience it however they experience it and don’t say anything, not even, “Thank you” or, you know, they take it and then receive it. What would we or what would you expect from them in those moments? Would you expect a gracious “thank you?” Would you expect something later in return?

Candice Wu 34:29

I think it’s just important to recognize this level of who we are, and perhaps, how that’s tied to a younger self or another part of us that really needs something, and that actually the kindness that we do to both ourselves and others, when we honor what’s truly there in our desires, we honor our humanity and we clean up the dynamics that are within us, that are between us from these things that we push down and secretly asked for.

Candice Wu 35:09

So, another way to look at this is to look at the opposite. When you receive or when you take, is there a level of your own guilt or unworthiness coming up that you don’t deserve that or feel uncomfortable taking it? Does that ask more of someone else when you reject it or when you slightly bounce it back the other way or fully do that? To you play into the experience that giving means that someone holds a debt to you and that you hold a debt to someone else when you receive? I could feel that very palpably. In my experience in the past that when people gave, I felt so uncomfortable, and that I had to almost immediately give back something or else I wasn’t worthy of that initial giving, I wasn’t worthy of being in a relationship, and how much tension and anxiety was written in that.

Candice Wu 36:23

And so, if you receive something in this way, what does it mean about when you give? What are you asking others for? Is there a way that you’re asking for a favor, care or love, and how much of it? Because it’s okay to ask for care and love. It’s okay to ask for validation. It’s okay to want these human things. How much of that is a healthy level in your adult life, and how much of that is your child’s need? And how much of that asks from another place of a past life or fulfilling, balancing out something from the past life? All of It’s okay. For me, I just rather know where it’s coming from and how much I’m asking of someone, and when I acknowledge that, it seems to go better, for me and the other person. It almost feels like, this, it’s better when we acknowledge that this is a giant boulder rather than pretending it’s a rock and it feels like a boulder when I ask someone to hold that for me or move it from one place to another.

Candice Wu 37:43

There are very subtle ways that we are asking for more or we’re asking for something and not claiming it, and this conversation here, for me, it’s very interesting to just look at that, and clear up some of those things to know where I’m asking of others, something more than perhaps, the relationship can hold or wants to hold, and to be able to give some of those things to myself so that there’s less burden on my relationships, and there’s more delight, and there’s more loving, true acts of loving that I can receive and give, and holding myself. And when I stay unconscious to it all, it just seems like there’s some level of action that has a pull in the relationship that I’d rather know about than not.

Candice Wu 38:52

So, how do we align with a truly loving act of giving and receiving, a delight in the act of it, like, delighting and how the horse just takes that carrot and does what he wants with it, rather than expecting them to do something specific with it or after. My experience, also, comes from Vedic science, where one of my favorite concepts is Pragya, and that is the concept of pure action, complete action, meaning, when you do any action, it comes so connected, it comes out of an intention that’s so connected and clear, and whole that is conscious. An action that comes from why you’re doing it, and all of us or as much of us is in that action as possible, then that action does not need outcomes or fruits of that action in order to feel complete.

Candice Wu 40:10

There are many concepts in Vedic science and philosophy around “action that does not rely on the fruits of that action to fulfill itself”, and the beautiful thing is when that happens, typically, the outcomes and fruits of that labor are quite abundant, but without the pressure on that to come to fruition. So, Pragya, this experience of complete action can be applied to giving when we give, we just delight. We can just delight in the act of giving and feel complete in that, but if there are parts of us, our younger self, other parts of us that want and that don’t feel complete in it and that want something more than that will play itself out, too, so, even though we think that we are complete in our giving or in our action in that moment, there might be unconscious parts or subtle aspects of us that are playing out or it might be conscious. The more we can hold it in our consciousness, the more I can hold my younger self’s hand, and give my younger self what it needs, instead of expecting someone else to give it. Then that action feels complete or more complete, as complete as it can.

Candice Wu 41:53

Not sure if there’s ever a time that one is fully, fully, fully conscious of every single thing, but we continue to unfurl and see more of ourselves as the days go on, and when we look at this dynamic, it is a paradigm and dynamic we live in, at certain times, and we don’t have to, so there’s something more, there’s a different way of being, there’s that human reality of what we wish for and wished for, and where that comes from, and there’s also a level of self-loving where we can give to ourselves so that that isn’t expected in between a relationship, but that doesn’t make us a place where we do that doesn’t make us superior and not needing anyone at all, not needing others to give to us at all, not needing love or validation from anyone at all that can be so violent, on the other hand. So, where’s that balance for you?

Candice Wu 43:12

Another way that I notice what is tied in and entangled with giving and taking is how do I feel when I don’t give, and if others are giving. There was a time in grad school that we were asked to bring food to share, and I did it. I think I was too tired or didn’t have time, and then I just thought, “Oh, forget it. It’ll be fine.” But when I got there, and everyone had brought something and I didn’t, I felt so guilty, and I think that might be what Bert Hellinger, Gunthard Weber, and Hunter Beaumont were talking about in this book, Love’s Hidden Symmetry, that you feel the guilt when you take, and I remember feeling in that moment, “Well, can I exercise the feeling of taking and receiving without having given here? Am I able to just allow this basic human experience of taking and receiving?” And I noticed that that might allow others to take also and not always have to give, that kind of breaks up the dynamic of the back and forth, but it was also my way of justifying that I should just try to take, but that I could separate taking, and this experience of only taking and not giving from defining my worth or feeling judgment about myself, and then I can also separate someone else’s worth or any judgment from when they just take and accept without giving back.

Candice Wu 45:05

Is this something you resonate with? Have you experienced when you don’t give? What happens there? What thoughts go through your mind — judgments, feelings, sensations? What impulses happen? So, for me to be in the wholeness of everything, I think that level of self-loving as well as acknowledging the human level of what I desire, need, and the young parts of me that desire and need, holding all of that in this sphere of what I can see and look at, gives me the best place to have lighter interactions and clean up my ways of giving and receiving, and taking.

Candice Wu 45:56

For me, that gives me a way to feel in alignment and congruence with the way I’d like to be in this life and the way I’d like to relate to others. So, both feeling that self-loving, fulfilled, that is earned, and noticing indicators of where there are unconscious places that I asked for more than I’m claiming or that I asked for something in return and continue to find more and more subtle layers of worthiness, feeling worthy of taking and receiving, feeling worthy of giving and not expecting others to be of certain way as they receive it or don’t receive it, and this interesting place where if others asked more of me when they give me something if I can sense that or if there’s a wish on their side that something is returned. Do I want to play into that dynamic? Do I want to name it? Do I want to just acknowledge it internally? What’s the most loving thing to do in that moment for myself and others or what do I want to do and play with and experiment with? We don’t have to live in the same dynamic as someone asserts towards us.

Candice Wu 47:32

So, what comes up for you now, at the end of this conversation, in this balance of giving and taking, and what’s tied up in your dynamics, as we approach Thanksgiving in the United States, even in our saying thanks. How can we do that in a more genuine and full way? And if that’s challenging, being compassionate and gentle with ourselves to look at what’s there, what’s embedded in that, what’s embedded in the impulse to give back right away if that’s what we feel, or to not even take it at all. Is your “thank you” way of saying, “No, I can’t accept this.” Why do you say that? Or you shouldn’t have. What does that say? And to have that loving for yourself that just allows all of it to be experimental and playful, and a way to see more of ourselves, because we’re all in this, we’re all experiencing some of these dynamics somewhere, because we are human, and this is our playground to explore other ways we can share and assert ourselves, and receive and relate.

Candice Wu 49:12

So, this Thanksgiving, I want to give thanks to myself for the grace in that playfulness and curiosity, and exploring, doing it without judgment if possible, and just loving myself where that judgment does come up, and I invite you to do the same, and I also want to send a very big thanks from my heart for all of you out there that listened to the podcast, that share it with other people that feel inspired naturally, and also, those that are supporting the podcast in other ways by giving some money, financial contribution to nourish the podcast on the back end, and to keep it going in that way. This goes back all the way to the beginning of when I started the podcast of why or from what place I was doing the podcast.

Candice Wu 50:17

I actually felt like this was in a lot of ways for me, like a gift to myself that I could just have this platform to express things, to push my own edges, and share things that have been harboring inside of me, but also ideas and knowledge, and practices that I wanted to just put out there in some format. And people would ask me, does it cost you money? Or are you getting anything in return? Is that a good marketing platform? Things like that, like people in the business world.

Candice Wu 50:56

I feel that I really ran with this Vedic concept and philosophy of pure action, of being in congruence with the clear and pure intention of why I wanted to do this podcast, which wasn’t to expect some outcomes, but it was the action of doing it just for doing it and the delight of that, that this podcast has actually given me many returns and other ways, and all of you have been a part of that, just by receiving and giving me feedback and sharing kind words, sharing your support.

Candice Wu 51:42

You know, this is interesting timing because this is the 99th episode, and next week will be the 100th episode of the Embody Podcast. It’s crazy, and the count does not include all the meditations and experiential that would be, I don’t know, 130 if we counted all those pieces as separate, but all those experientials relate to their umbrella, their parent episode, which is 100 episodes.

Candice Wu 52:16

So, while we’re here, I want to just share that you can find all those episodes at CandiceWu.com/podcast, and you can even search episodes that relate to what you might, what kind of nourishment you might need or topics you’re wanting to explore, and you can go to CandiceWu.com/meditations to find all the experiential and meditations that I’ve created and shared as well as those of my guests on the podcast.

Candice Wu 52:44

Thanks so much for joining me today, and I look forward to connecting with you with the 100th podcast next week. So, tune in for that if you’re interested. I have a very special guest that she and I share something very important in common, and you’ll find out what that is next week.

Candice Wu 53:03

Take care, and see you all next time on the Embody Podcast.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is about receiving, specifically taking versus receiving, and how we block ourselves from receiving what we desire, how we can be in the state of being that allows us to receive what we desire, and how all of that relates to embodiment and all of the emotions that we have the capacity to feel.

Candice Wu 0:22

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 0:36

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 0:57

I’m so excited to announce to you that the Ally With Death Experiential audio is finally out after, I don’t know, if you’ve been listening in for the last year at some point, I’ve been speaking about it even a year ago, but this is a really beautiful, provocative, moody and stimulating audio-guided experience, that is me guiding you through a simulation of your death and what you need to let go of what wants to die that needs to die in your life or end what you’re ready to release to make space for the next step of your life, how you want to be in your life that feels like you, and what is life-giving for you.

Candice Wu 1:47

This audio experience is really special because it features music by Larry Saint Germain. He plays the hand pan and it just bubbles and stirs, and shakes up what’s inside that might be stagnant in you or weighing you down, making you feel anxious or depressed or what’s stuck inside. So, the sounds, the music, really stir things up and bring forward along with the prompts that I asked, and guide you through in terms of feeling like it’s your own death so that it can really bring you to that edge of vulnerability and honesty in yourself.

Candice Wu 2:32

The experiential is about 75 minutes long, and it’s produced and amalgamated by the editor of this podcast, Chris Spiegl, and he does an amazing job of putting together all the sounds in a way that connects right up with what’s happening through the experience. So, this experience is fabulous to do on the new moon, which is coming up soon and is once a month, and it’s also really great as we’re entering in the winter season, letting what needs to release and transform and transmute, do so and create the compost for fertile life coming up. You can find that at CandiceWu.comm/death, and it’s also a great gift for the holiday season for yourself or anyone who is in your life that you feel might benefit from it. All of that money goes to fuel the podcast and it just gets recycled into more creations and more of these podcasts that offer different topics and meditations to you.

Candice Wu 3:36

Hello, everyone. It’s fabulous to have you here. I invite you to just take this moment to feel into yourself, connect and notice how it has to be in your body, notice if your energy feels whole and collected in yourself or it feels like it’s scattered and running around in circles are going amok. Notice if your mind is somewhere else that’s part of your energy and your attention, and notice this without any judgment. It’s just a moment to observe and gather information about what’s happening inside.

Candice Wu 4:26

Thanks for joining me. It’s great to have you here, and before we jump in today, I want to give you a little update about where I am in the world and what has been in the spotlight of my life. I was recently in Grandville, Ohio at Denison University, was Molly Shanahan/Mad Shak Choreography, that dance company, and they have been working on this incredible piece about the movements and the expressions that come alive and are born from a traumatic experience.

Candice Wu 5:00

I’ve been so grateful to be part of that project by being a somatic consultant and bringing all of my embodied knowledge, intuition and expertise to their process, and it’s been incredible. They’re looking at layers of personal trauma, collective trauma, dance culture trauma, and what’s been ingrained in their bodies as a way of being, but also shifting that to witnessing what’s there and loving what’s there, and letting the movements come from a very deep place of their experience of humanity.

Candice Wu 5:37

So, they had a soft premiere in Chicago two weeks ago, and last week had their first weekend of shows at Denison university with talkbacks afterward, and it was just so incredible to see them working with how their bodies are moving and honoring their bodies rather than overriding and pushing through. We’ve talked all about overwhelm and how to support themselves in that process, resourcing and how to be supported by each other and look at something pleasurable when their body feels overwhelmed. It’s been wonderful. And so, shout out to them and deep-felt gratitude. Hopefully, I get them on the podcast one day, talking about their amazing artistic process and their research in this project.

Candice Wu 6:28

So, a little fun story, the last night I was there, I stayed in the Buxton Inn the whole weekend, which was fabulous, and I had read that there was a ghost in one of the rooms and there was a ghost, the ghost of the historical Inn that the owner of it, the founder, rather, who just overlooks the place, and sometimes there are occurrences in Room 9, and on the third night, of my visit there, I had to switch rooms because they didn’t have the same room for three nights. So, when I asked what room it was, they said Room 10, and I was like, few! I’m so glad it wasn’t room nine. I just didn’t really want to deal with that I was a little bit nervous about it, and then we got to Room 10 and it was gorgeous and adorable.

Candice Wu 7:22

And then the person, the receptionist said that it can get pretty noisy because it’s right above the staircase and the reception desk and the restaurant, and I said, “Is there another option?” And what was the other option? Yes, it was room nine. So, I decided to go for it, and I was still kind of nervous about it. I have never really been scared of ghosts. I don’t see ghosts or spirits in a very visual way, and yet, I have many friends that do and I just always thought, “Well, I don’t know if I want to see all of that.” And I had such an interesting experience. I decided to just talk with that spirit when I got to the room and just let them know that I was at peace with him, and I believe it was a he, and that’s what one of the founders is a he. And so, it felt like yeah, we’re at peace.

Candice Wu 8:29

And then, I was actually reminded by Chris Spiegl, the editor of this podcast and my former partner that I traveled with that, “Yeah, I was with the ancestors of this in this historical Inn,” and that just clicked to me in that moment. “Oh, my goodness. Yeah. I work with spirits all the time.” I work with ancestors all the time, with family constellations and my own ancestors, ancestors of other people and spirits, past selves, spirits from all sorts of dimensions. I don’t know why it just didn’t click to me that this was actually really familiar territory until that moment. And so, then, it just felt like, “Oh, okay, we’re fine here.” This is not new territory for me, and I know how to navigate this. And in fact, when I see things that might be scary to people through the ancestral work, through family constellations, it has never truly scared me.

Candice Wu 9:39

So, I go to sleep and I have the best sleep ever, and in the morning, I half woke up and I had sleep paralysis, briefly what seemed brief, and I’ve only had that a couple of times in my life. It doesn’t really scare me. It just is a really strange feeling, but here this time, I felt certain that there was a spirit that was like on the right side of my body. And in my half-waking state, I said in my mind, “No, get off of me. I don’t want you on top of me.” And he did, and I felt released some energetic grip, and then I could move again a few moments after.

Candice Wu 10:24

So, I did have an incident or occurrence or interaction, and it was fine. It didn’t really scare me. I just, it was interesting. I had boundaries while I was asleep. So, I was appreciating myself for that. So, whether or not that was actually the spirit or ancestor of this hotel this in, I don’t know, that’s just what it felt like, and that’s my account of the experience at the moment. So, before all this, before I went to sleep, I actually asked my pendulum whether there was a ghost in the room and it said, “No,” and then I asked, Is there a spirit in this room, and it said, “Yes.”

Candice Wu 11:05

So, in that moment, I got the message that maybe we shouldn’t be calling these ancestors of somebody, ghosts, and yes, they may be hanging around to finish something, but aren’t so many other spirits and energies here, too, if you believe in that. So, that’s my two cents on the topic of ghosts and spirits, today. Maybe you have more experiences or this enlivens some memory of something for you, I’d be happy to hear what your experiences, you can always reach out to me and share.

Candice Wu 11:44

One more thing I want to touch base on is that I had the most amazing astrology reading by Elena Sakopoulos. She’s the founder of hidden gift astrology, and you can find her on Instagram @hiddengiftastrology. I don’t get any money for saying this, I just really like her work, and she’s a friend of mine, and I spoke with her today after feeling very, very, very, very confused and kind of all over the place with some decisions and things that are going on in my life, relationships and all sorts of things, and I just got so much clarity and in fact, that chaos, that chaos I was describing was part of my chart with Uranus in a specific location.

Candice Wu 12:30

So, it’s really great because I felt way validated in my desires right now, my striving for certain kind of freedom in myself, the eccentric way that I’m setting up my relationships and structuring my boundaries, and defining what works for me. All of that was really reflected in my reading today, where she looked at the arc of some of the planets, transitions of the planets and what might be coming up for me. She has a holiday sale. So, it’s totally worth it and a gift certificate sale, so, you might check that out if you’re interested. I just got one for my mom.

Candice Wu 13:12

Alright, so, let’s jump into this episode. Last week we talked about taking versus receiving specifically about taking and that taking comes before giving, and it is, this very developmental process that is necessary and becomes an essential way of our assertive right in our lives. So, if you’re interested in learning more about that, check out the episode at CandiceWu.com/taking, which is part one of the series of three. Today’s on receiving and next week is on giving, and that leads us up to the United States Thanksgiving holiday.

Candice Wu 13:56

My initial reason for wanting to talk about this is that sometimes people feel like they’re not allowed to take, that they can’t take what they need even, and it just feels so painful because I know to myself this experience of not being able to reach out and take what I need, and that I deserve that and I’m worthy of it, and I’m not talking about stealing or taking what’s not mine or more than what I need, but just what I need, and what I desire. So, that episode goes way deeper into that developmental necessity where that can take us in terms of how we assert ourselves, and what we feel we’re able to take on in our life if we’re even able to take up space, take our time, all sorts of ways that taking is important.

Candice Wu 14:47

So, here we are today with receiving. What is receiving? Receiving can be allowing something to come to and agreeing to it, allowing yourself to take it, absorb it in, hold it, be with it, have it, and when we think about receiving, we often think about what we’re attracting to and what we contain in our being that comes our way, what we absorb in. The biggest thing I have to say about receiving is that it is all in the body. It is all about how the body, the cells of our body, the muscles, the tone of our tissues, what it does when something comes our way. It’s all in our capacity to feel that we’re worthy of receiving and that we are allowed to, and our capacity to feel all of our feelings.

Candice Wu 15:55

If we are blocking certain feelings, if we think that they’re bad that we have them, and this happens in subtle ways, like, we think we should feel better instead of just feeling what we feel where we want to do something about it to cope with it, certainly there’s a place for that, because there are times where we really need to just do something about it so we can do something else. And it’s my hope that you come back to those feelings because those feelings are real treasures, which give the pathway to allow you to receive what you want to receive because if those feelings are there, that might be sensation or emotion in your body, that’s energy, and it’s taking up space, and it might have a certain kind of direction or quality to how it takes up space in your being and your energy field, and in your body, and it can block other things that you do want to receive more of from coming in.

Candice Wu 17:05

Sure, it can also block more negative things from coming in, which is probably a way that of survival if that is your way, that may be a whole other conversation, but if we build our capacity to be with what’s present in our bodies, what feelings we have, thoughts, emotions, sensation with a witness, with the feeling that our body can hold it and not overriding, where when we feel like our body is not big enough that we just plow through where we develop that capacity over time, then that is the direction towards receiving what you wish and to be able to consciously create and attract, and allow what it is that you can’t consciously want, not what is unconscious. There’s all sorts of stuff coming our way that is unconscious, that we’re not aware of, that our bodies and energies are conditioned to, and we’ll talk about all that today.

Candice Wu 18:18

So, the capacity to feel all of our emotions is part of a receptive mode of our body, a state of being that is our appear state of being, that has access to all the modes of communicating from and with our bodies and energies, that these emotions are tools, part of our toolkit, and when that’s blocked, it’s blocking our receptivity, and when it’s flowing and open, more is able to flow towards us.

Candice Wu 18:50

There are certainly times to block our energies and to close in and not receive more especially if you’re feeling overstimulated. So, there’s not a good and bad of any of this, really, it’s just where you’re at, what’s the next thing for you, where do you want to develop your capacity or what’s needed in this time and place for you in your life and on your journey, now.

Candice Wu 19:18

Abraham Hicks talks about receptive mode, and I’ve often enjoyed some of her talks, although, she does not seem to give away towards building that capacity for receptive mode, at least not in the talks that I’ve listened to, and it’s not quite trauma-sensitive, where if you have had experiences that have traumatized you, that have been overwhelming to you or your lineage, which I don’t know anyone that doesn’t have something, she doesn’t quite give away towards building that receptivity rather than saying just do it, and for some people that really works, and for some people, it doesn’t. So, it may take some healing process over time, it may take that building of capacity over time, learning about your body and building a relationship, which is all about what this podcast is about, to build your receptivity.

Candice Wu 20:26

When I think about our state of being, and being in a receptive state of being, receptive towards what we desire, so much goes into that. One piece is that on a human physical level, we come into this life through our parents, and we come into this life into an energetic field of the soul of this family system that is the biological family, and this is really important because that gives not just like our gut flora or our DNA, but that DNA is intricately one with the experiences and the amount of safety that’s in the system based on how much they’re able to integrate the experiences and celebrate the good things and look at the really hard and tragic things, and what’s leftover.

Candice Wu 21:31

Sometimes experiences are so traumatizing and tragic that the people that experienced them weren’t able to actually look where it wasn’t safe afterward, and those energies of emotions and experience get passed down and connected with later people in the ancestry which we are part of. So, it’s not a bad thing. It’s just indicating to us where there is the next step of healing or looking that brings us back to our wholeness, our natural, safe state of being.

Candice Wu 22:15

Whatever system we came into, when we were an infant, even in utero, there’s a level of felt sense, safety or unsafety, some spectrum of that, based on all of the collective experience of the family system, and what’s happening in the collective consciousness at that time as well and in the culture, and then we get to a very personal level of the parents that we have and what they’re holding in their bodies and nervous systems, how their nervous systems are, what level of safety their nervous systems feel, which give how much capacity they’re able to attune and mirror and bring safety to their child. What level of coherence and the ability to hold their own experience as well as their babies? So, that brings us to the question of, what was it like when you entered into this life? What’s your impression? Where’s that held in your body? And what did you receive?

Candice Wu 23:27

Literally, what did you receive, not just in good stuff, and things you needed. If you got some of that, you must have gotten at least some of it to survive to this point, if not a lot in your life, but what did you receive that might have been unpleasant or unwanted or uncomfortable that may have felt like you had to receive that or else you wouldn’t survive or it was just a tidal wave coming at you and your life. So, all of those experiences early on can tie into what messages we receive about ourselves and as well as messages we came in with, maybe from a past life or from another dimension of experience, from other experiences before this life, if you believe in that, which I do.

Candice Wu 24:24

So, our early ways of experiencing the world, the world around us, this nature versus nurture conversation, I believe it works in collaboration, that if our nurturance, by those that we were born from was attuned enough than it needed to nurture our nature, specifically to what kind of being we were, and yet there are all sorts of factors that come into play beyond this that we cannot say that it’s only pointing to our early experience, in my opinion. So, as we bring this to the conversation about receiving, what comes to mind and heart for you when you bring up the topic of receiving? What do you feel with that idea and concept? And where do you feel it in your body?

Candice Wu 25:28

I was a container for all sorts of unwanted emotions, for example, shame, fear, and anger of others in my ancestry, and then later, I also found past lives or lives of other dimensions where I wasn’t able to feel the heartbreaking grief and loss of some experiences until now… because it wasn’t safe. And if this topic is in interesting to you about the ancestry, you can check out the family constellations episode at CandiceWu.com/ep5 or go to the other podcasts where, with guests and with myself, we related to this topic at CandiceWu.com/familyconstellations where you’ll find all those listed, and if you’re interested in in the past life stuff, you can just go to my podcast CandiceWu.com/podcast and search past lives and you’ll find all those episodes that connect.

Candice Wu 26:37

So, we can be receiving all sorts of things, we can receive, “good things,” pleasurable things desirable, money, abundance, we can receive unwanted things, things that are painful, undesirable experiences that repeat themselves. We may be receiving energy that is not ours, energy we don’t want to contain in our body. We may receive vibrations or energies from someone that feels supportive or lifts us up, prayer maybe pleasure or joy, money, and abundance, resource, opportunities, possibilities, gifts, compliments, touch or hugs, contact. Receiving also involves being seen and receiving someone seeing you, receiving support and being held, receiving food, receiving love. Sometimes, where love might be tangled with other things that we don’t want, like when paired with obligation or pain.

Candice Wu 28:03

If you want to look into this more deeply, there are two podcast episodes and that’s at CandiceWu.com/love and also /lovepart2. We can receive respect and healthy admiration, sensuality, sexual pleasure, simple pleasures of looking at things and receiving the beauty, human enjoyment, receiving flavors and smells, sounds, ecstatic experiences. So, as we make this list up, see what else comes up for you about what can be received, but here, now, as we bring up a more reflective space of receiving and how you experience it. I want to ask several questions that may stir up what it is been like for you in your world and perhaps what will be the next step in your capacity to receive.

Candice Wu 29:29

So, with the topic of receiving, what are you receiving in your life? And I’m not just talking about the pleasant or good things, “good, good things.” I’m talking about what is arriving in your space and that you’re accepting in or taking in. Some of this might be unpleasant or unwanted or undesirable, and some of it may be joyful or pleasant, what are you receiving? If you need more time to reflect on these questions, I invite you to pause the podcast, and then just continue on when you’re ready, and this may be a great place to journal if you’re interested. So, feel free to pause and grab a journal or a cup of tea and come back to it or just meditate with me and see what comes up here.

Candice Wu 30:44

So, just to give a little bit of the opposite experience I named that I was a container for unwanted emotions and other painful things that came through the ancestry, and that created some imprint for how I would interact with the entire world, and yet, I’ve also been over time as I’ve healed so much of my trauma and difficult experiences, I’ve been able to receive so much good, so much pleasure, peace of mind, peace, time, being with people and receiving a lot of love, interaction, and intimacy. I’ve received so many opportunities to connect with people that are feeling really aligned with me and stimulate my own creativity. I’ve received a lot of support from people that support this podcast as well as my life and my world, my creative endeavors, who I am as a person, and I’ve also learned to receive from myself.

Candice Wu 32:01

So, there will be another reflective experience later in this episode as well as some self-forgiveness that will offer to support some clearing of belief sets and things that come up around receiving, but before we go there, I want to talk about what causes a blockage of receiving. We kind of touched on it already, but if you’ve had experiences where you’ve had to protect yourself, energetically or physically, and you may not have been able to do something that you needed to do to protect yourself that may be an experience of trauma, and in some way, the body does it differently and finds a way to survive it, and so, that might be tension in your body, in your tissues or muscles and that can create you know, you’ve heard the sense of there’s a wall between us where it’s like talking to a brick wall where they’re so cold, or I feel so distant.

Candice Wu 33:08

So, whether it’s a physical boundary or not, there’s a way our body creates an energetic and then physical experience that can block us from receiving the things that we really want and need to receive. It’s a way of shutting down the frozen state tonic immobility of playing dead that the body needs to do to protect due to overwhelm, and if that sounds somewhat familiar to you or you feel numb quite a bit or you can’t receive, you might check out the Nervous System Overwhelm Episode at CandiceWu.com/overwhelm, which will give more details about that experience.

Candice Wu 33:52

If you’re receiving too much of something that’s unpleasant, you might look at what your spirit is trying to draw you to, because this may be the next spiritual lesson or the spiritual lesson of your life, but this is where the energy is, this is where your receptivity is on the other side of this experience. So, it’s guiding you to get through it, to move through it, to build the capacity there, to feel through that and know that possibility of a human experience so that you’re going to arrive back at a natural state of safety, flow, and coherence.

Candice Wu 34:36

This also might relate to a disruption in early life around merging with your mother. In utero and as infants we have this experience of merging with mother, with the energy of mother where we’re not separate, where we’re physically not separate and then when we come out with even, there’s an experience of needing to be with to survive, and we need the regulated nervous system of our mother to feel safe enough to develop our own nervous systems and capacity to then, at some point, begin to separate and learn that we are a separate body that can handle with this nervous system that’s building and with mothers still present, that we can be safe in the world, and that’s why we need to be within 36 inches of the heart’s space of our mothers.

Candice Wu 35:39

I think that the HeartMath Institute does research on that, but if there’s some disruption around merging like it doesn’t feel safe or mother had to give up the baby and you were adopted or the mother got sick or depressed or something that happened, another baby came too soon for this infant, then that can feel to an adult person that had this experience that hasn’t yet healed from that or healed around that, that you can receive too many other energies and emotions from the outer world because there’s still a need to merge with something safe.

Candice Wu 36:27

A lot of empaths feel that way, that they can be flooded with emotions that they don’t know whose they are and it can feel very unsettling to be in a group. I certainly was that way for a long time, and as I developed my nervous system capacity and sense of self, it’s easy to have a boundary and not take in other emotions, but there are times where sometimes, there’s a space in my energetic boundary that take something in and it relates to some receptivity in myself or some similar experience that my body and spirit wants me to look at.

Candice Wu 37:11

Feeling blocked in receiving can relate to the belief sets that we’ve internalized over lifetimes, ancestry in this life, both conscious and unconscious, and the ones that are unconscious are the ones that usually live and control more of our thoughts and behaviors, our experience in life. I think also because most of the time, they’re undesirable or we have some resistance against it, but this is showing us again, something that wants to be seen, felt through and bringing us to a larger capacity.

Candice Wu 37:55

This brings me to another experience of ancestry and our interconnectedness with all people and creatures is that we have, deep in us that interconnectedness, and what I see and believe as this love, that we do love all creatures and beings, earth as well as an animated living being, breathing, breathing being, and that when we see that others are not receiving something or having something or if they’re in pain or they’re in an excruciating experience, that we might decide somewhere in us that we can’t have it either or we can’t have more or we can’t be in pleasure or peace because other people aren’t or certain animals are not, and then we choose to suffer as well.

Candice Wu 38:59

That’s one way looking at it. It could be someone who died in our family ancestry or in a past life or in another dimension or in this life, especially if they died young like a baby or stillborn child, in utero, a younger adult or if someone died by suicide, there is this deep love that binds us that wants them to be okay, and we want to do it with them sometimes or want to feel that they’re not having to do it alone or their survivor’s guilt, like, why did I live and they didn’t? Sometimes, we have in our perception that others don’t have as much or receive as much or they’re not as happy or they’re suffering, and then we also choose to suffer. This is all tied into the family constellations, conversations, and I could go on a lot longer about it, but for today, I’ll just leave it at that. I’ll connect this with a story that I have of eating shrimp and crab legs.

Candice Wu 40:07

One day, I was having a special romantic night with someone, and we had just bought crab legs from the store and made them. And this is a while back when I was really working on my worth and what I could receive, and as I was eating them, I started crying and the thought was, should I be able to have this when I know my grandparents don’t? And there was this feeling in my body of like, I shouldn’t have this, I’m not allowed to, how could I? And it was like betrayal and disloyalty to them. So, there’s a way in which we might be loyal in order to love those that we love. We might be loyal to suffering or not having as much or not allowing ourselves to receive, and it feels like a betrayal to receive more or it feels like we’re going to be betrayed if we receive more, like, we’ll be called selfish or we will be ungrateful or other beliefs that may come up.

Candice Wu 41:17

I wrote a blog post on the invisible bonds of love, money, and abundance in our ability to receive that, and I talked about how my grandpa was sold for money and how I was so holding that experience of loss, of disconnection in the family line that also related to money, and that really affected how it came down the line as to what I thought I could receive, and if I even felt enough in myself. You can read that blog post at CandiceWu.com/invisiblebonds, and with all these links, I’ll link them to the show notes as well.

Candice Wu 42:02

I’ll touch briefly on two other things because this is becoming quite a long episode, is the ability to say, “No.” If we’re not able to say no or have boundaries, that can sometimes cause us to not be able to receive what we want because we’re just receiving everything then or we are taking on everything or all the things that just come our way, and by selecting what we say yes to and say no to, it’s really important, because it gives the energetic space for what you want and tells the other things, “No.”

Candice Wu 42:38

The second thing is expectations. When we want something so much that the intensity of that desire actually means or shows that there’s the opposite fear attached, like, fear we won’t have it or what if we don’t have it? Then that is actually fear coming through. It’s not a state of being of abundance and receptivity, it is fear playing itself out by wanting, by expecting things to be a certain way that is attachment, because fear creates that tie to attachment, but all that can show you where the fear lies, and looking and feeling that fear is honoring and deepening your capacity, so, it’s showing you the next chapter or program of your school of life and where the energy is blocked, and on the other side, without the push or force of expecting it to be there is usually more.

Candice Wu 43:43

So, just a little shift in gears is that I believe that we all have the right to receive and we have a share that’s ours, that if we’re in alignment with who we truly are, there’s all sorts of abundance that is specifically going to reflect you because you’re worthy and you’re here. The juice of your essence is connected with the infinite world of possibility and that gives you the space to create anything and to be in the flow of the possibility that you are because you are that conscious energy that makes all things. So, that can get a little heady but wanted to say that before we jump into looking at some belief sets because belief sets really get down to the core of what and how much you’re able to receive and the beliefs connect up with a whole set of feelings, emotions, energies, and images in your being that create this way, one way of being.

Candice Wu 44:56

So, looking at beliefs, this is the second part of this podcast, of reflection. Take a moment and just feel a couple of breaths move through your body, and we’ll look at some beliefs and feel free to write down some that come to you or that resonate with you as I say them. What do you feel the permission to receive? What do you feel you’re allowed to receive? And that’s different from what you think you’re allowed to receive. What you feel you can and are allowed, and are permitted to receive? Are you allowed to receive love, belonging, a sense of home gifts, compliments, money, expansion, what are you allowed to receive?

Candice Wu 46:04

Complete the sentence: To receive love would mean ____ or in order to receive love, I need to _____. And this is just ruffling up the belief sets that are here, not necessarily cleansing them out yet or shifting them to what you truly want, just what’s here, and just to adjust that one: to receive, fill in the blank here would mean to and fill in the blank here. So, for example: to receive money would mean to betray my parents or would mean to bend over backward, that’s just an example, and fill in the blank here: to receive a compliment would mean to be ____, some options are selfish, full of yourself ungrateful, disrespectful or maybe you’re at the place where it feels good to be grateful, thankful.

Candice Wu 47:30

What are the rules around what you’re allowed to receive and what you’re not or what amount you’re able to receive? What opportunities come to you and what opportunities do not? When you see other people experiencing things, when are the moments that you feel like, “Oh, I could never have that or that wouldn’t ever happen for me?” Is there a limit to what you feel you deserve? And where are other beliefs connected with your ability to receive or what you can receive or what you do receive? Your worthiness, being good enough or being enough, being a good person or being valuable, lovable, to have beliefs like I’m not allowed to receive because I’m a bad person or a failure or I’m not allowed to receive until I x y&z, and there’s a way you hold yourself hostage, and fill in the blank: If I receive ____ then others will think ______ and just see what there is here for you.

Candice Wu 49:21

And as we close this section of belief sets for now or a million other beliefs that’s I could come up here, which I invite you to explore. I just leave you with the forgiveness statement that my healer Charmayne Kilcup uses with me all the time and I use with my clients is: I forgive myself, for judging myself for believing and then fill in the blank for yourself or I forgive myself for judging myself for having to experience, and then as you turn these around into what you like to believe, and are consciously moving towards, not as an affirmation, but as a way to help clear judgments that and energies that connect with the opposite, use the statement if you’d like: I forgive myself for judging myself for forgetting and add in anything that fits their like, for forgetting that it is safe to receive now or I am worthy of receiving. I deserve what I need. I’m allowed to receive pleasure. I’m allowed to receive gifts and compliments without being judged, and really ask yourself, “Is it safe to receive?”

Candice Wu 51:01

In some settings, it’s not or there’s a feeling that receiving something will threaten something else. It may be important to name those things and see if they’re true, now. Certainly, if you’re in a situation where your life is being threatened or you’re being abused and it’s not safe, I invite you to get extra support and recognize that is not safe. So, I’d like to end here with just a few comments about when you do receive the thing that you’re wanting to receive or something else that just beautifully comes your way. Check to see how you receive it. Do you say thank you, and have an open heart to receive it?

Candice Wu 51:56

Have you ever set a compliment to someone and they said, “Oh no, that’s, you know, it’s all you or it’s Oh no, that’s not really me or something.” It almost feels like a rejection, right? It is a rejection. It’s like handing someone a gift and they don’t take it. So, are you doing that to opportunities or love that’s coming your way to support and certainly you can say no, but do you say no in instances where you actually want to say yes? You might open to the unexpected and say, “Thank you.”

Candice Wu 52:38

Ken Honda was on the podcast recently talking about money, and he is Japanese and looks at our relationship with money, and he loves to say, “Arigato in, Arigato out.” So, when you receive and when you give, there’s a thanks. So, when we receive something, just like in the beginning when I said it’s all in the body, in our feeling sense or openness or contraction, when you receive, how is your body speaking? What’s happening? Is there a way you can soften and allow it to come in, and say thank you and feel into that thank you? Or do you need to say no and block it and say, “That’s not what I want?” And what are you saying in different instances?

Candice Wu 53:36

Attuning to receiving and pleasure and what you desire is a practice. It is you’re right, but it is a practice, because we’re often receiving so much other stuff that we’re conditioned to that, we’re programmed for that or we are accustomed to it, and our bodies need practice to feel the things that you do want to have. So, take time in the peaceful moment. Take time in the beauty of receiving an opportunity and revel in it or when someone sees you, savor it. If you’d like to develop these capacities further and attuned to pleasure further, I have a bunch of different resources for you, and I’ll link these on the show notes.

Candice Wu 54:31

So, I’ll just mention these now, and feel free to jump on to the website and just click on these or write these down or find them as you hear them. Where you can find this specific podcast is that CandiceWu.com/receiving, and there is an experiential called Embodying Your Desires in Love: Receiving and Taking. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/ep65.

Candice Wu 55:05

Also, Ancestral Order — Clearing up Responsibility and Receiving the Best. This is a Family Constellations experiential, and it’s Episode 30c, so, you can find it at CandiceWu.com/ep30. And then, I have a couple of blog posts on pleasure and attuning to pleasure, you can search through my blog post and just click on pleasure and find a lot more but this specific one is at CandiceWu.com/pleasure, and it’s three ways to attune to pleasure.

Candice Wu 55:44

So, I’m wishing you all the capacity to receive because as you receive, others have more permission to receive and as you receive, you fall into the right, the alignment of who you are, to receive all that is here for you to receive, to experience everything you want to, and that opens up more. So, thank you for receiving, and I invite you to look at your boundaries around receiving and continue to practice. Be gentle with yourself when you hit those bumps in the road that feel like you’re not receiving because those are the bumps that lead you towards the smooth, open road.

Candice Wu 56:36

Thank you so much for joining me today, and listening all the way through to this podcast. I am so grateful for you being here, and if you would like to give something to the podcast and allow me to receive it, I would gladly receive it with open arms and an open heart. You can find my support page at CandiceWucom/support, and there are just a bunch of ways where you can contribute to the podcast, and also receive something in return if you’re interested, for example, the personal meditations, the Ally with Death Experiential that I mentioned earlier, the Embodied Healing Group or if you just want to give a donation without any of that, I will gladly receive that, because it does support and nurture this podcast and keep it going.

Candice Wu 57:25

Also, feel free to sign up for my newsletter that comes out once or twice a month at CandiceWu.com/embody. Let’s leave with a little bit of music here as you let your ears receive some pleasant sound, hopefully it’s pleasant for you or feel free to shut it off if you say, “No,” but thank you, again and wishing you all a lovely experience today, of life.

Candice Wu 0:00

This episode is part one of three of taking versus receiving and the balance between taking and receiving versus giving, and where we’re coming from in each of these.

Candice Wu 0:14

Part one here is specifically about the assertive energy of taking, and where that comes from developmentally, how we can use that energy in our lives when we need it, and to clear up any belief systems, belief sets that interfere with our ability to use that tool in our lives.

Candice Wu 0:38

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.

Candice Wu 1:12

Hi, everyone, welcome back to the Embody Podcast. It is fabulous to have you here. We have here part one of three of this exploration around taking, receiving, and giving and it’s going to be very interesting because the last episode will land on the week of Thanksgiving for the United States. But regardless if you have Thanksgiving or not coming up, the ideas around giving, taking, receiving can be very interesting to explore. And part of my interest in this is looking at those ways of being and clearing up belief sets that just don’t belong with it, things that we’ve associated with giving or taking, or receiving as a society as well as personally in your lineage maybe or in your soul, and just cleaning that up so that there’s a very clear way to take in your life to receive and to give that it comes from a very congruent and deep place of concurrency, and integrity.

Candice Wu 2:21

Before we go into this conversation, I am thrilled to announce that the Ally with Death experiential, that I used to have as an online experience where you type in your responses is now an audio experience. So it’s a recording that is set to some moody and provocative music, along with my voice guiding you through a death of the old ways of being that you may have that are ready to die, habits and belief sets that you may want to release or recognize now, and find a way to transform and an experience to rebirth you into what feels more like you, now and today, what feels life-giving and present.

Candice Wu 3:07

This is just a fabulous creation by me and a friend of mine, Larry Saint Germain, and he is who created all of the music that is just going to shake up all of what stagnant and decaying on the inside and ready to die. His music along with the editing and amalgamation of the music by Chris Spiegl, which is also the editor of the podcast, and a friend of mine and former partner of mine. This is just a beautiful creation by the three of us that was originally inspired by Ana T. Forrest who created the death meditation.

Candice Wu 3:52

So if you’re interested in shifting out of stagnancy, or if you’re feeling stuck in your life, if there is anxiety or depression, uncertainty about the next steps or what you need to be doing in your life, if there are ways of being that feel just not serving you anymore, or uncomfortable, or like, you need to change, or if you just want to get some clarity for yourself or you’re intrigued about how death can support life, how embracing death can give you more life or you’re interested in following nature’s guidance to go inward and let die what needs to die as the winter approaches, then check out the Ally with Death audio experiential. So if you dare, then you can find that experience at CandiceWu.com/death.

Candice Wu 4:45

It’s a great gift for someone who might benefit from this or you’re feeling like need some support in this area, something to shake things up or stimulate something new, provoke something new. I love this experience. And even for myself at least twice a year, I love to do this. And so it’s a great way to let die what needs to die and to build a relationship with death, which gives us more life. It’s really, truly building our relationship with life. And when we resist death, we resist life.

Candice Wu 5:23

So looking at death, the ability to see what death brings, what can die and how it feels, and what needs to can let us embody something else in this life for us, and what’s really true and alive right now. So again, that’s at CandiceWu.com/death, and it is on sale now until November 15, 2019.

Candice Wu 5:50

It’s so fitting that this experiential is birthing itself here on the tail end of Dia de Los Muertos and this shift of mercury going into retrograde at the end of October and into November, where for me, I felt a lot of shift in myself. I felt like things did need to die. And even one day, last weekend, I was in this half-awake, half-sleep state and I heard myself say in my mind, I am dying. And it wasn’t the kind of I’m dying that people can typically say like, I feel awful, I’m dying. It was more like I knew and I felt aware that there were things inside of me that were dismantling and dying off and breaking off, crumbling and it was really interesting. I didn’t really have words to describe what that was, but I knew in my feeling sense and my felt sense that something was happening and that growth was happening even though it was very uncomfortable.

Candice Wu 7:09

It took a little bit of time for me to verbalize what was going on and now I can say that I was letting go of some ways of being, where I might protect people from their feelings by accommodating them, not telling people what I really want, need or what I want to say. But really, I’m protecting myself and at the same time, I felt like there was a very strong oath that I had taken somewhere in my life, and somewhere in my soul in past lives, to protect the men. And what that took out to be was to protect men from their emotions and to work around that and shapeshift so that men around me didn’t have to feel uncomfortable or have reactions. And I know that growing up, that was a survival mechanism, because my dad might blow up or say something really mean to me. But while I’d worked with that a lot in my lifetime, especially in the last 11 years, 10 years, it felt deeper than that.

Candice Wu 8:24

So as many of you know, that are working with me or have heard the podcast, or have heard the work of Charmayne Kilcup, which is one of my healers, who brings this method through Robert Waterman, her teacher, is that I used forgiveness statements to release this a bit. And when I said the words: I forgive myself for judging myself for all the times and places that I vowed and promised to protect men.

Candice Wu 8:53

I could feel something in my body shifting even though mentally I may not have known what that was and it felt like more of my body opened up, more freedom opened up, more capacity to be present. And that was showing itself a little bit before this feeling of I’m dying inside. But as that happened, I think more that died in me, the need to do that and the need to protect myself and others from our feelings and reactions and it led to me feeling more like myself, and more assertive and also feeling more aligned with the present moment where I’m making choices that reflect and are congruent with what I need and desire right now, and less attached to future outcomes, like what will happen in the future if I choose x, y, and z now, where I know that even if I have those thought processes things can change between now and “the future”.

Candice Wu 10:05

And so when I make decisions like that, it really doesn’t serve me and it’s really just a little bit of anxiety about, anxiety that’s feeling of not trusting myself in the future, not trusting what may come. And so along with this dying inside, I have felt more aligned with joy and what’s true to myself now, and more able to just make a very clear and direct choice for myself.

Candice Wu 10:39

It’s really comparable to my experience with horses and all the work I’ve done with horses and just watching them and learning from them is they’ll just go for what they want. And they’re working with what’s present in the moment, what’s presenting in the moment and responding to that and choosing what they’re feeling like doing without the thinking of the future.

Candice Wu 11:05

And as I’m saying this, I realized that I’m not exactly saying that I’m not going to be thinking about the future in choices that I make. There are definite times that I will be doing that and need to be doing that and that’s an important tool. I’m more speaking towards other things that just don’t affect the future and they’re more clearly aligned with what just needs to happen now.

Candice Wu 11:31

So as I say all these, what in you is dying? Or, what do you want to let go of and shift or shake off of you? What beliefs in you are up for reevaluation or ways of being, ways that you interact with people? Where are there places that you can try something different and what would happen? What are belief sets that if you didn’t have to live with or live by, might create a different result in your life?

Candice Wu 12:13

I’d love to hear from you if you’re interested in sharing with me what’s happening for you and if you’re interested in going deeper, as I mentioned earlier, the Ally with Death experiential is a great way to do that.

Candice Wu 12:27

And also, as we’re nearing the holiday season, I would like to just have this moment to remind us all of giving some time to ourselves, to tend to what’s happening in our inner world. Well, a lot in the outer world can be happening.

Candice Wu 12:46

These last couple of days, I noticed that I had some tension start to build up in my neck and my shoulders and when that’s the case, I know that I’ve been neglecting something that wants to be honored inside and maybe some emotions that want to move. And when I just scoot by life, without giving myself that extra time and space, it can just be this slow accumulation of what wants to be seen inside and it builds up for me in tension. Does that happen for you and do you need a little time to just sit with yourself and perhaps even give a little self-touch or contact to your body in a way that suits your body?

Candice Wu 13:41

So I invite you to do that right now. Just take this moment while we’re here together and let go of your tension on anything in the outer world and turn that energy towards yourself to give yourself this moment of peace with yourself that doesn’t ask anything more of yourself, doesn’t pressure yourself to be any certain way or to do, or accomplish anything. And if there’s a way that your body would like to be touched, a way that feels soothing or caring to your body, allow yourself to do that. Maybe that’s a soft hug or touching a place in your body, on your body that feels like it needs support, or a release without pressuring your body to release or do anything.

Candice Wu 14:46

Just sense into your breath, how you’re doing in this moment, how it is to be in your body, right here.

Candice Wu 15:04

And even this one minute of doing so, notice if anything changes in you or reveals itself.

Candice Wu 15:21

And now we’ll shift into our conversation for today, which is about taking and it’s part one of the taking, receiving, and giving conversation and as we, just to conclude this moment of taking space and time for yourself, feels like a perfect bridge to the conversation of taking.

Candice Wu 15:45

Taking can mean so many things. It can mean taking what you desire, taking space, as we just said, taking time, taking up space, taking a pace that’s right for you, taking what you need, taking a walk or a hike, taking more or take two, like, try again, or do the second round, like in every rehearsal take two, take three and also taking your place, taking your place, your sense of belonging and who you are. What other words come up for you around taking where taking is something that’s necessary or needed?

Candice Wu 16:51

I’ve often felt that people stigmatize the act of taking, like, they shouldn’t take or that it’s selfish to take and you should just give.

Candice Wu 17:04

So this is part of why I wanted to have this conversation today is that there’s a relationship between taking and giving, and give and take. There is a difference between taking versus receiving. And how can we look at these and peel off on pair of things that have been tangled up with the ability to take, receive, and give so that we can be really congruent and very present with what’s really happening when we do any of those actions.

Candice Wu 17:55

I want to start with taking and the majority of the conversation today will be about taking. Next week will be about receiving and the week after about giving. And I’ll just briefly say here, well, there’s the stigmatization of taking at times, I’ve often noticed an overvaluing of giving.

Candice Wu 18:20

Giving is absolutely a beautiful thing and it can make us feel really good. It can make others feel great. But it can also deplete those who overgive. And why do we do that?

Candice Wu 18:34

I’ve often done that myself. Where does that come from? Is there a deception coming from that, the need to please others or do the nice thing, the thing that might make others see you in a good light? Is there a manipulation involved? Is there a sense of appeasing or fun, which is often spoken as the fourth state of fight, flight, and freeze. Fun or appease is a way that we might freeze in parts of us shut down, parts of what we need or need to express, to put that aside, in order to please and accommodate or submit to someone else and their needs so that we can get some safety, love or attention from that or perhaps belonging.

Candice Wu 19:31

So, that’s just a very brief touching on giving and also what’s to come in two weeks from now.

Candice Wu 19:43

And right now, I want to talk about the developmental experience of taking and a lot of people say, you need to give and take or there’s a give and take, and what my teacher in Family Constellations, Suzi Tucker says: “it is take then give”, that taking comes before giving.

Candice Wu 20:10

So my interpretation and my understanding of that is that developmentally we need to take and receive in order to be able to turn around towards others and give. So let’s break that down a little more specifically, that taking what we need, means taking love, it means taking food and nourishment, reaching out for support, reaching out in something, someone being there to receive us. We cannot truly give before we take because there might not be much to give if we don’t have what we need inside.

Candice Wu 21:08

Somehow as children, we tend to be able to give, even if it seems like we have not received what we needed. Perhaps, we did receive something and we’re just not aware of it or from farther back where we have some capacity on us. Or, it’s just clear that we are giving without having received what we need, and there’s a price to pay for that.

Candice Wu 21:42

So I’m specifically talking about when we’re young, that it’s developmentally necessary to be supported in what we need. We need a sense of safety, we need food, we need touch. We need love and attunement, and attention. We need someone to reflect who we are and what we’re feeling, what we’re experiencing. We need someone to protect us, we need the support of a regulated nervous system that gives us the ability to build a nervous system that feels safe. We need to feel that we belong and have a place.

Candice Wu 22:30

And so when we’re young, we need to be able to take what we need. And taking is more active than receiving, we absolutely need to receive. So if our parents give us something to hold out our hands and let that come into our hands, or the ability to let someone’s attention towards us come into our hearts and bodies. And of course, if that wasn’t there for you, then there may be all sorts of disruptions or even an experience of trauma because of it. But we also need to be able to take.

Candice Wu 23:15

So if you think of a baby breastfeeding, the baby needs to be able to suck in order to eat and receive the milk. We need to be able to ask for what we want and take it. We need to be able to just be that spunky child that grabs what they need, because we need to know what we need and that it’s available for us to have. We need to be able to feel allowed to ask for things and assert those things that we need, what we want, and we need the permission from others to take what we need to have what we need the right to take. It is a right and it’s more assertive and active than receiving, even though receiving is also a very important essential aspect.

Candice Wu 24:15

So when we talk about taking, I don’t mean taking what’s not yours or taking more than you need that’s coming from lack. It’s really about the sense of abundance and that there’s a right to take what is yours, what you need, and what you desire from a place of that capacity to receive and have. If we had the right to take what we needed, would we need to take more than that? Maybe not.

Candice Wu 24:55

If we felt trusting that we could take what we needed, we could have it, then we might have a different way of being in the world and with each other. Sometimes we take from others if we think we can’t have it or can’t create it for ourselves, maybe that comes from jealousy or a place that we weren’t able to take and receive in our lives. Again, that’s a sense of scarcity or lack. But also coming from a real experience perhaps, of not having what you needed when you needed it, not being able to take and reach out.

Candice Wu 25:38

So, when I was younger, I stole things, like, I stole clothing, I stole lip gloss, and I look back upon that and see that I, perhaps was trying to fill the gap of what I needed where I could, sadly and close would never really fulfill the nourishment and the love and the safety and belonging that I actually needed. And so I had to take what was not mine and I couldn’t. I felt like I couldn’t take love and safety because it wasn’t there in the way that I needed it. So we might displace our needs, our basic needs of taking what we need and take beyond more than that.

Candice Wu 26:31

So I do wonder if this is the root of greed. Feeling like we can’t really have or take what we need, what we truly need, and then finding ways to replace it, that really don’t satisfy or quench that need but become a vacuum and insatiable, unfulfillable.

Candice Wu 27:00

And when we talk about taking, I don’t mean stealing, as well. And I don’t mean when it relates to someone else sexually, like taking what you want in terms of someone’s body or their energy because that’s also not yours to take and consent is an essential part of that process and another conversation in itself.

Candice Wu 27:27

So I want to pause a little bit in this conversation because it’s been a bit amorphous for me to talk about taking the development of taking, what taking refers to and I want to just allow a space and moment to check-in, for you to check-in with yourself if you desire about what your relationship with taking is.

Candice Wu 27:53

Do you allow yourself to take in general, to take what you need to take what you want? If you reach out to take, do you expect it to be there? Or, do you feel you can’t take what you need? Can’t have what you need or get what you need. Do you take more or too much? And is that just your perception that it’s too much or is it truly more than you need? For example, me stealing or hoarding or crossing boundaries and taking what’s not yours, are you taking more than your share? Because that can come from that same energy of lack or scarcity or some wound where you needed something and it wasn’t there for you. And if there is a kind of taking that is more than what you essentially need. Is there a place that you weren’t fulfilled in your needs?

Candice Wu 29:22

And as we go a little deeper here with more questions to ask yourself, what is your impression of your young life? And if you were able to reach out and take. If what you needed to take was there and available, was it abundant or was it scarce? And what comes up for you in terms of your images or sensations or feelings when we talk about taking and taking what you need?

Candice Wu 30:12

When I’ve worked with this, I had an impression of what it was like for me when I was in utero. It’s in ourselves and in our bones, the impression of whether or not we could take what we needed. We could have it, that could relate to our young life. It could relate to past life experiences or the sense of how it is in our lineage and ancestry, in our family systems in the world.

Candice Wu 30:53

So let’s switch gears here for a moment. If you need a little more time with those questions, feel free to rewind and repeat them or take a break here and pause. These are deep questions and they may not be answerable at the moment but something you take with you if they’re interesting or you’re curious.

Candice Wu 31:12

But now I want to take a moment to talk about our place in the world. And I will reference my teacher Suzi Tucker again, she says that the right place is always taken, and that can mean a million things.

Candice Wu 31:33

She says the right place is always taken not given and what I understand that to mean is that when we come into this life, there’s this way that we unconsciously sense that we need to be in a place, a literal position to our parents or others in our lineage that we stand in and that typically isn’t our place. It typically isn’t the place of a child to these parents, able to receive all they’re giving us and move forward in life as an adult. It typically is that we’re standing as a parent to someone else, or standing next to someone who’s dead. Because that experience hasn’t been integrated in the family system or nobody wants to look and so that place that we’re given, isn’t really the right one.

Candice Wu 32:34

And when we look at scarcity or lack, if we’re in a place that is not ours, there is nothing there for us that is truly ours, it’s not our right place. It’s not where we belong and it’s not where we can receive all the love and support that we need because it’s out of order.

Candice Wu 32:56

And in Family Constellations Work, we see this very dimensionally and literally, with people’s bodies representing the people in your lineage and where you’re standing, given the dynamics that are unconscious and what you were given in your life. And we look to where your places and what’s needed to support the shift of coming back to where your place is, and your place, the most simple truth is that your places as child to these parents, whether that’s mother and mother, mother and father, father and father, whoever, or however they describe themselves and it is only from that place that you’re able to receive the love that is for you, the belonging that is yours.

Candice Wu 33:56

The gifts in the lineage that are sending their way down, flowing their way down to you the life force that gives you and animates your expression in life, and allows you to turn around full, and with all of these gifts and strength, and support and love, to look towards your life with momentum and movement forward, that’s your place.

Candice Wu 34:26

And that right place is always taken, because we’re always, almost always, I’ve never seen differently, given a place that’s not ours. And so when we take our rightful place, it is us coming as adults to say, this is my place and this was my place as a child, and to recover all of what is there for us to receive and take what is all there for us. So that we can move forward in life and we can give. We can be, we can live, we can experience with fullness and ease, and it doesn’t feel restricted by the fact that part of our capacity, our energy, and our awareness is somewhere else in a different spot but more of us is here.

Candice Wu 35:24

And the interesting thing is we often don’t take our place because we feel we need to be there for someone else or protect someone else or, we can’t get what we need in our true place and we must come to find what it is that would truly be there if we did take our place.

Candice Wu 35:48

We see this also with leaders. If they don’t take up that leadership role, are they going to be able to do it wholeheartedly, like if others push them into that role, and there’s a part of them that doesn’t truly want it?

Candice Wu 36:04

Taking our place might mean taking up our alignment with who we truly are, who we really are, and what that means. And sometimes that’s scary, to be our full and whole selves when we’ve had experiences or messages that tell us, we’re too much or we shouldn’t be ourselves, we shouldn’t have what we want or do or be the thing that we are, the way that we are when there’s a judgment towards us.

Candice Wu 36:43

And so it’s hard to take our place sometimes, but isn’t that what we’re here to do? And what if everyone did that, lived in the truth of who we are, and expressed it just as we are and if we allow each other to do that and honored each other for it.

Candice Wu 37:04

And I do believe we have that chance right now as a collective to begin and continue for many doing that, seeing yourself as you are more and more, seeing others when they express themselves, taking our own place, taking up the love that we are, taking up the beauty and the gifts that we are and allowing them to express in a way that is right for us. There are belief sets and messages that we get, as I said that stop us from taking our place or taking what we need, taking in general, if we go back to this more general topic of taking, taking what you desire.

Candice Wu 37:58

For me, I’ve had messages of, I’m selfish, I shouldn’t take what I need. I shouldn’t take what I want, that I have to give to others before taking what I need. I have to be selfless and not concerned with myself at all, that it’s cruel to take what I need or others won’t have what they need if I take it. And that refers again, in my opinion, to lack taking more than you need. But this is all relative, isn’t it? What’s needed and what’s not and who decides that? Only you decide what you need.

Candice Wu 38:42

And if you’re truly in connection with your deeper self, your inner self, then what you need is what you need period. And you can come to find more and more layers of why you need what you need or why you desire what you desire. And yet, do you feel worthy of taking your place, taking what you need and what you desire or taking what’s yours. You have a place in this world, that’s a given because you’re here. So if you have a place, there’s all sorts of abundance that is yours. It’s yours. It’s nobody else’s, it’s here for you, and there’s space for you to have what you need and what you desire. And when we truly feel and believe that that’s true and live that, it’s my sense that what we have then becomes enough and we may not need or want, as much as we might have in the past or think we do.

Candice Wu 40:11

So as you take this in for you, what kinds of beliefs come up about taking what’s needed or taking your place and what you desire? Are you allowed to? Can you?

Candice Wu 40:28

And what are the possibilities for you if you use the energy of taking, that assertive energy that allows you to have what you need? The baby that just sucks on mom’s breast and just takes the food they need, because it’s there.

Candice Wu 40:49

Where in your life is this energy needed or can be utilized to bring you more in yourself and to bring a sense of wholeness to yourself and congruence?

Candice Wu 41:10

So as we conclude today’s episode, I plan on taking a lot of time to myself and letting my friends and family know that I may not be as available, putting certain boundaries in place so that I’m not overextending myself this month, taking up space and letting my body unravel and unwind even more and feel safe and at ease and what do you need for yourself and what is it time for here? What if you could take what you needed and also let others do that when they need it.

Candice Wu 42:05

So thanks for joining me today and next week we will be talking about receiving and what may block receiving, what gets tied up in receiving. It’s balanced with giving and how we can be in a more receptive mode so that we can receive more of what’s here for us.

Candice Wu 42:34

Thanks so much for joining me today and if you want to be on my newsletter, I’ve decided to take more time in between newsletters, so it’s coming out generally every three weeks now.

Candice Wu 42:46

And the newsletter comes out with updates about me, the podcast events and retreats that are coming up, and self-love notes. You can find that at CandiceWu.com/embody.

Candice Wu 43:01

It’s always wonderful to have you here and I’m so grateful for your support. If these podcasts touch you or support you in any way, and you’d like to give back or send some gratitude to me or support the podcast, you can do so at CandiceWu.com/support by offering a one-time contribution, or subscribe to a monthly contribution that just continues on an ongoing basis. And at that website too, you can find all sorts of options for you to receive something in return for your contribution like personal meditations, or you can be part of the Embodied group healing call that happens once a month and even the one on one retreats and personal sessions and other experiences that I offer. All of that goes to support the podcast which offers free meditations and experiences here.

Candice Wu 43:59

You can also find the free meditations at CandiceWu.com/meditations. And there you can search for any meditation based on what you might be needing in your life right now or any topic that has been on your mind and see what there is on the podcast from me and my guests. Again, that’s at Candicewu.com/ meditations.

Candice Wu 44:25

It’s been a true pleasure to have you and I can’t believe that it’s actually been two years since I went to Chiang Mai, Thailand and that’s where the birth of the podcast happened in February, a year and about eight months ago so we’re coming up on two years of podcast, crazy!

Candice Wu 44:50

Well, everyone, take care and see you next time on the Embody Podcast.