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right person at the right time every time. To start your free digital marketing trial today, visit constant Contact dot com. You know and I don't want to be in this constant state of trauma and upset. Let me say, first of all, I heard you say I don't want to, but I want to offer you that instead of affirming because you're damning, you're you're important, You've got power, instead of affirming what you don't want, just make another choice.
So I'm choosing to. I'm no longer choosing to be reactive. I'm choosing this because choices your power. What's up, everybody, I'm Gammy and this is positively gam Every week I have raw, in depth conversation with inspirational people pushing for change on everything from aging, relationships, politics, wellness, to the current issues facing the black community. In this episode, we're going to be discussing how to cope as a society
saturated with trauma. Joining us today is yan La van zand iyan La is one of the most celebrated writers and speakers, and she's among the most influential and acclaimed spiritual life coaches. Iyanla embodies a no nonsense approaching her message. Currently, Illanla is the host and executive producer of the award winning breakout hit iyan La Fixed My Life, the number one reality show on OWN. Thank you so much, Illanna
for joining us. I feel so blessed today and I actually am feeling the need to talk to you today. Congrats on your new podcast, Everything's Podcast Now. So good for you, I know, thank you so much, thank you so much. I'm enjoying it. But how has it been for you fixing other people's lives? You know, I don't. Everybody says that I don't. I don't really fix their lives. I give them the information that they need to fix
their own life. You know. People come with their story and with their beliefs and with their everything, and you know, I go in to interrupt the patterns that they have and provide them with a different perspective on not only what the problem is, but what they need to do or not to get to where they want to be. So it's been quite a journey eight you. It has been.
And I'm a huge fan. I'm I watched you know all the time, and I must say that you really find some really creative ways to get people to really look at themselves and to look honestly at what's going on because and and that's hard work. Well that's hard work because most times we're in such denial we don't want to see ourselves, you know, and particularly for people of color, we don't want to move into anything with
the consciousness that there's something wrong with me. So when we when you start telling people that there's another way, what they hear is you did it wrong. And for people who have been oppressed or denied or help back for so long, that's a hard thing, but it is also a common human challenge that just reflection, self reflection.
It's hard, you know, But I think my team. I have an incredible team of producers that support me and coming up with what we call our launch pad and our exercises, and then I just go in and do the work. That's the easy part. Oh, that's the easy part. No,
that's the hard part. Actually, I was thinking earlier and I had this conversation with Will and with Jada constantly about compassion, and I was like, why am I charged this year and all within all with everything that's going on with trying to live my life from a more compassionate space, and it's just been so very challenging for me. It's just been really difficult and during this everything, with everything that's going on, and this year has been so
traumatic for so many reasons. We have the pandemic, we have the Black Lives Matter, protests, we have all the police brutality that actually has been going on for years and years now, we have the writers and the storming of the capitol, Like, how do let's start with, how do you personally deal with the state of affairs in this country and not lose your mind because I'm I get so full of anger and frustration. God is so for me. God is, God is in charge, God knows,
God is moving, God is shifting, God is changing. And so I don't have a story about anything that's going on because I know that everything is exactly as it needs to be in order for what is required to unfold. So I I you know, I haven't had no trauma, I haven't had no upset. You know, every now and then the thing that makes me crazier than anything else is they repeat the same thing over and over. Give me some new information. So you know, I just don't
watch it. But I think that everything And you know, I look at this, We're looking out and I'm looking in and I'm saying, okay, I do that. How do I lie, change my story, bullying myself, deny? How do I do that? And once I get it clear in me, when I see it out there. I know what it is. It doesn't bother me. We are looking at ourselves else But because as we said earlier, it's so hard for people to reflect and self reflect, we're making it about
what's going on out there? What are you doing in here? Turn the spotlight in instead of making it a spotlight that goes out. Everything that we're seeing is what we as human race do. This is the truth being revealed. Oh I'm so excited. I'm excited personally. I know that's a little strange, but it's very no not I understand, I understand what you're saying. It's just you know, in the moment, it's just it's just typically difficult for me
to go into that space. If the minute you think it's happening out there, it's happened, you'll get upset about the minute you think, oh, look what they're doing, Look what they're saying, as opposed to how do I do that? Have I done that? Okay? And then when I get it in here, when I see it out there, I said, oh, I know what that is. I know what that is. Okay, I know what you're doing. I don't need the news or anybody to tell me the truth because I know the truth in me, so when I see it out there,
I just say, thank God, I'm better now. I'm better now, you know. So, Yeah, compassion is the thing. I have compassion for us right now because we've prolonged and denied and we assisted for so long to the universe has now just dumped it all in our lap at one time. But that's because we didn't take the clues along the way. We know that racism exists. We know that white superiority is the foundation upon which this this country was built.
We know that people have in order to maintain their position or deny other We know it, and then we've accommodated, we've tolerated it, We've gone along with it, and universe, you know, God is saying enough until we surrender, and surrender is coming. We're not. Yes, yes, that is a good word. I'm familiar with that word as a recovering addict. I'm familiar with that word surrender. So it's surrendering to to what is happening so that change can occur. Is
that a good way of absolutely looking at it? And you know what else gave me? All change is preceded by chaos. Think about when you want to clean your closet out. In order to do the closet, you gotta take everything out, and the bed, the floor, the shoot, you find the two things that you bought at you never wore. Everything is all over. So it's chaos and you have to sort through the chaos in order to recreate order. And that's what's going on. Like that is
such a good way to put it. Let me ask you, though, what are some techniques that we can use in order to to confront you know these? For me, it's still I still call it trauma, so that we're not keeping it all bottled up inside or have this emotional outbreaks. And I'm going to use my husband and I as an example. We have a very different way of looking at the pandemic and how we are managing it and right now and it is it continues to be an
area of contention for us. So for me, I've surrendered to and respect how he feels about the pandemic and how he wants to move about. And I asked him to do the same for me. And this morning the conversation just went left, like my, my, I don't even really want to talk about it, you know what? I mean, yeah, about the pandemic. I don't feel the need to converse
about it, like how many people are dying? Like the numbers are really high here in California right now, and I don't feel the need to discuss that because I know that compared to even him, we as a family out here are so in tune to it because we have to get tested constantly because we're all working and so we're constantly being tested. Like I'm on a first name basis with the E. M. T That comes to do our testing. I see him like two and three
times a week. We're friends, you know. But yeah, So I don't know, how do you have conversation with people and not just get all out of whack when you're talking talking about any of this. I find myself to
be on social media constantly. I'm on Facebook when things like when the riots are I got something to say about everything, and I'm on Facebook, and then after I'm done, I'm like, girl, then do you feel better now that you because I'm I'm going on there thinking that I'm releasing my frustration, But I don't feel that way after it's all said and done, I really actually feel even
more amped up. So then I'm like, maybe I just need to not be on social media, maybe I don't need to be watching the news, But then I feel uninformed. It is traumatic because it's such a abrupt and radical change to our habitual problem solving techniques. None of our problems solving techniques ROLLA don't respect none of them. Okay. So it is quite traumatic because one of the number one addictions of human beings, all human beings, is controlling,
and we have totally lost control. So to be informed is one thing, but to want to know what to do then stirs up something else in us as human beings, which is survival. So I gotta know what to do to survive because I can't control this thing. So we go here to get some info, and there to get some info, and there, and we're listening and this one
and then somebody says something, and no, that's crazy. And you know, so as opposed to trying to make it again, trying to make it outkay out there, you gotta get okay in here. When this thing first hit, I said that ain't got nothing to do with me. I'm not having it. I'm not entertaining it, I'm not engaging it.
But I got to do. Okay, I didn't not know toilet paper, and if the toilet paper was pure, I was in a lot of trouble because I had no toilet paper, you know, so, but I have to do so Number one, I was just real clear that, Okay, this has to be a lesson and universal lesson that we're all learning. What is my lesson? For me, the lesson was for the past I don't know, fifteen sixteen years. I probably haven't spent two consecutive weeks in my home.
So when they said stay home, I had to get adjusted to not being busy, really just gets still, and that for me was traumatic. You know that about that? So here I am. I'm home. I'm not out in the world not doing my work. Who did you are? You know? So for many of us that was the issue. So you have the not being in control. What do I need to do to survive? And now my whole motus outa runde has been shifted, So that was challenged.
And many of us had to be home with people that we love but don't like, so that was a whole another thing. So I think your question, when I'm hearing you ask, is how do you communicate compassionately with someone standing in a different way than you are. So compassion really is about seeing the position or suffering of another and taking action to alleviate the something. Like you said,
you don't want to talk about it. Maybe somebody else does, but that's because their lack of control and their fear and their coping mechanism. Maybe talking about so how do you have compassion? And I think I heard you say it was your husband, so you can't tell him talk to me about that? What's said abound you? Okay, we're only gonna talk about this from six am to seven am, from noon to twelve thirty, from four pm to four
five o'clock, and that's it. Other than that, I'm gonna ask you not to talk about its TV, and if you do, I'm gonna leave the room. Can we agree to that as opposed to he shouldn't be or they shouldn't be, or why do they compassion? See the position or the suffering of another person and then take action to alleviate the suffering without sacrificing yourself. You can talk about it for half an hour. You don't even have
he's talking, You don't even have to respond. Your job is to listen and then what is your internal dialogue while he's talking, you know, like a lot of times, you know, people talk to me about everything in the supermarket, in the wal market, and in my brain, I'm in my mind, I'm saying, I don't have nothing to do it. It's I am not on this committee. I am not on the heel of your mother committee. This is what I'm saying in my brain. But I'm looking at her
because she needed to talk. And when she was finished, I said, you should go online and get on my mailing list because my newsletter might be helpful to you.
But got it. So that's what compassion is about, putting seeing where the other person is, seeing sense and feeling where the other person is and whether they're in a form of suffering or a form of fear or anger or whatever, and then doing what is required, what you can do without sacrificing your steps self to put an end of there, whatever it is they're going, because we
we are traumatized. Yeah, and I guess I really have to open my mind and be mindful while we're having the conversation because he senses from me that my attitude is, oh, here we go again. That is not compassionate. That's not compassionate, and it's not helpful. I remember the day when George Floyd was murdered and everybody was in such uproar, and I said, thank you God for that angel named George Floyd who came to remind us yet again that we have to deal with this racism and we have to
deal with these abuse. So now they're finding court officers, firemen, were tired police, retired military, all involved in this assault on the White House. So if they would go against a building because they didn't like what was going on in the building, what do you think they're going to do the people that they don't like, you know? And so I I my heart goes out to the Floyd family and the Martin family and the all of the families.
But I've just seen all of these people as angels who have come and made a masterful, mighty sacrifice to wake us up. And we still ain't woke up because you know, we marched and screened and protested, which we needed to do for what three four months? You don't even hear George Floyd's name, So what are we gonna do?
Everybody is talking about the fact that those protesters or rioters or insurrectionists or whatever they're being called today, we're able to roll up in the capital, thousands of them in the street, and people will say out loud, well, you know, it couldn't have been black people, and we'll say it. But what we're gonna do? What's our ask? What's our approach? What are we gonna do? What are we gonna do? We're just sitting here, one thing up our nose and the other one twiddling in our hair. Well,
what are we gonna do? And until we get clear about what we're asking and what we're willing to do to get it, it's gonna keep happening. Thank you? Can you please say that again in Yana because I I feel so so strongly about it, and I'm just not I still am not clear on exactly that. What is our ask? And how are we going to hold this administration accountable or whoever we think needs to be held accountable? How are we going to do that? At? What is
our act? That's the first thing, because until we're clear about the ask, we don't know who to approach. We don't have to approach. And you know I've said this for years everybody, please forgive me. Don't send me no emails and and send me dirty letters. I've said this for you, I've said it to all my friends and all my community leaders. For years. We've been affirming no justice, no peace. And I'm like, wait a minute, hold up, that's not what we want to say. We don't want
to say no justice, no peace. We want to say justice now, peace now. But we the very thing we've been saying is exactly what we have, no what we're getting, and no justice for And I'm like, oh, we can't. But you know, we get into the slogans and we get into the thing, and that's what we want to do. No, no, no, no no. So we've got to get clear about the ask. If we're asking for justice, what does that look like? And the other thing is, you know, I know you.
I'm a child of the fifties and the sixties. I'm a panther and you know, snick and the at all of this, and we had leaders, and so everybody is looking for a leader. But the piece that I find was then that I can't quite put my finger on now. Back then, there was a communal commitment to whatever it was, whether it was the free breakfast program or whatever, voting rights or early chilement education, there was a communal commitment.
But now we are so busy, you know, with everything else, and we get all into personalities or I don't like this when you can't trust that, when you can't do this, you can't do that, and this cancel culture where we don't tolerate mistakes and we don't tear people down. So there's no focal point. I don't even want to say leadership, but there's no focal point. And then the people that we have elected, you know, they don't seem to be coming out to ask us. So anyway, that's my little soapbox.
But what do we ask? No, But it's important, Yeah, it's important, Like how do we get that? How do we get back into that space? Is there? I don't want to say committee, but who are the leaders that we gathered together together to get us focused. Here's from the gammy again. You know, I come up out of
that community spirit. So we've become such individuals and seeking such individual fame and glory and advancement and notice and recognition, until the things that would support and matter to us all can't seem to come together, and we're so eager to be against something that we have lost the to know how to be for something. Against this, Oh I'm against that, I'm against you, I'm against him, I'm against her. But what are we for? And where are those communications coming?
Black radio is gone. I remember Bob Law from years ago, night Talk and if you wanted to get some information about what was going on in our community, you went to Bob Law and night Talk and you get the whole Where where do we go now as a community to get information? And then because the small stations are gone, is these big conglomerations lest your Facebook? But you know there's no communal meeting place, there's no communal mind. Yes,
there are small organizations. You know. Right now everything is or isn't black lives matter. If you're not in Black Lives Matter, how do you find out what's going on? And then if you're in Black Lives Matter or you're against this and there against that, it's it's crazy, but that's how things are changing. So my thinking, this is
just my thinking. This don't have nothing to do with no behind My thinking is let me continue to work with individuals and get individuals clear in their thinking and then there being and they'll be guided and directed into what to do and how to do it. So that's my contribution because if you told me today we're to go, I give to the Congressional Black Caucus, United Vigor College
Run Black Lives, Sank Jude's Children Hospital. But nobody has ever called me to collectively have a discussion about anything. Never they get my money. They don't call me and ask me nothing. And I if I needed you can't call nobody. You go on the website contact us and they give you an email form. We don't talk. We don't talk, So where am I supposed to go? Where do we go? But things are changing and they're gonna be different, and we have to We're were approaching the
new time doing the old waves. And that's why so many of us are just challenged, right Yeah, And I guess you know, so that we can show up and be present and available for whatever our calling is. We have to learn how to stay calm and be mindful. And I know that you have a new app called Mind Matters Meditation. Tell them tell us a little bit
about that. What can we expect to hear on that app? Well, you know it really came out of the hysteria and the wahalla everybody was experiencing during the stay home order. And I would say, your whole bread not at it. I don't, I said, but it's your mind. Your mind
is what you're gonna need to get through this. So, because I've been teaped doing this for thirty something years, I just combed back through my files, my records, my everything, and just put pulled up what I thought was some of the twenty most powerful guided meditations that I've ever done. I have one on there that just says, do you know how beautiful you are? You know people were freaking out, couldn't get their nails done, their head done, you know,
but you are beautiful. I have another one called you know just peace, just how to be in peace. So, because my gift is my voice, people recognize my voice guide people into a deeper place within themselves because gave me We're not gonna do nothing out there. We gotta get it right here. And if we're not right in here, whatever we do out there is going to continue to be chaotic and uh reactive and aggressive. No, we got so up. We gotta be the thing that we're trying
to create. So twenty of my most powerful meditations where just listen. You know, I think the longest one is thirteen minutes. So if you don't have thirteen minutes to get in touch with your mind, then you've got a problem, got it that? I feel it would be a perfect way for us to close because meditation is something that I have committed myself to this year. You know, I've talked about it on you know, over and over again that meditation is a struggle for me because my mind
is always raising. But I definitely in this space. And what I've been going through, you know, last year and into this year is that reactivity, you know, all of that negativity and I, you know, and I don't want to live like that, you know, And I don't want to be in this constant state of trauma and upset. So would you kindly close us out and lead us through a quick meditation? I would love if you could
do that. Let me just remind you. Let me say, first of all, I heard you say I don't want to, but I want to offer you that instead of affirming because you're a daming, you're you're important, you've got power, Instead of affirming what you don't want just make another choice. So I'm choosing to I'm no longer choosing to be reactive.
I'm choosing this because choice is your power. The other thing about meditation or just stealing getting still that most people don't realize is the key to it is your breathing. That's what you in So let's just do that. If you just allow your eyelids to close for just the moment, KA and just connect with become mindful and aware of your inhale and your ExHAM. Nothing to do. Just be aware of your inhale and your ExHAM and whatever the rhythm is, whatever the rate is, we can regulate that.
So you want to inhale for three and exhale two right, and inhale one two three and exhale one two three not Just relax your shoulders rebelling with face, find the rhythm of your breath again and just listen. Listen inside within what's going on? What are you here? M what do you feel? Listen to your feet, just listen to your legs, and you can't do it wrong, So just let your mind go to your knees, Listen to your thighs.
Listen what are you aware of in your feet? Your legs, your knees, your thighs, what are you aware of and whatever it is, Just stay with the rhythm of your breath. You're in and you're out. Listen to your belly, in your chest, in your breast, just listen. Just be aware, nothing to do. Stay with your inhale and dregs. Listen to your shoulders, in your neck now, just listen to your face. Just listen, breathing in and and just to wage you just had a conversation within yourself. I take
along deep inhale and let it out. Whenever you're ready, you can open your eye lids. Thank you so much. It has been a blessing to talk with you, and I hope that you will come back and join us again in the time. It was such a blessing to be in conversation with the yall, M vans and today. And these are my takeaways. Number One, when we are in a state of upset, we tend to look at what's going on outside of us. Instead, try turning the
spotlight inward for understanding. Number two, during these times when so many of us are feeling traumatized, try to have compassion for others as well as for ourselves. Number three, consider the importance and the impact meditation can have on your life. Meditation put simply is stillness and the rhythm of your breath. And number four, be careful what you are firm in your life, remembering that choice is your power. If you're listening on Apple podcasts, be sure to rate
and review. Follow me on my Instagram at gammynars to share with me your thoughts on the episode. I'm here, I'm talking, and I'm listening. As always, stay great for us. Positively gam is produced by Westbrook Audio. Executive producers Adrian Bamfield, Norris Jada Pinkett, Smith's Amanda Brown and Balin Jeffrey. Co executive producer Samhote, Associate producer Erica Ron and Crystal Devons, Editor and mixer Calvin Bailiff. Positively Gam is in partnership with Art nineteen