I took my process in July, and I remember coming home and there was a dandelion growing in my garden on the grass, and I picked the flower off. And I thought, oh, I should have gone and got my tool and dug the root out. And I just sat on the lawn and I thought, oh my gosh, The Hoffman process was like a bulldozer going through my garden, getting to the root of my patterns. Sorry. I don't know why I'm getting worked up here. Yeah.
Welcome, everybody. My name is Drew Horning, and this podcast is called Love's Everyday Radius. It's brought to you by the Hoffman Institute and its stories and anecdotes and people we interview about their life post process and how it lives in the world radiating love. Hey, everybody. Welcome to the Hoffman podcast. My name is Drew Horning, and Lori Radnask is with us. Welcome, Lori. Thank you, Drew. It is great to have you here. It's
great to be here. Lori, you and I are fellow employees at the Hoffman Institute. Will you share a little bit about your role? Yes. Thank you for asking. I look after all the operations for Canada. So I work with the students directly to get them enrolled into the process, help them to work through everything till they go right into the door. I also look after just the contracts for the business end of it and just overseeing the operations of Canada.
Great. And you've been doing that for the past year or 2 years? Yes. I was previously working with Hoffman Canada in 2,000 and 17, 18, 19, and then I had a little sabbatical, and I came back to Hoffman about a year and a half ago. Well, we're glad to have you back. Tell us a little bit about Canada, the site. You know, it is the
same process. We work in collaboration and, in fact, have created a partnership with Canada, but many students from the US because of the wait list in the US being 6 months or so. Many students go to Canada from the US and have wonderful experiences up there. Can you talk a little bit about the site and why someone might head up north? Absolutely. Well, first, Canada is a beautiful country, and if you've never been here, you'll wanna come to see Canada.
We host the process in a little town called Caroline, Alberta, which you would fly into Calgary, Alberta. It's a 90 minute ride from the airport, and it is in the middle of nowhere, and it will feel like you're in the middle of nowhere when you're going there, but it is nestled in a 100 acres of land, all surrounded by towering evergreens. It is a beautiful secluded location.
When you get out of the car, you just feel like you're in nature and you're surrounded by it throughout the whole week, which is beautiful. It sits on a 100 acres and there's lots of little walking trails, so you can walk in the woods. There's a beautiful river that's called the Raven River right behind the property. The classrooms sort of backs onto it, doesn't it? Yes. And so it is at
the back of the property. And honestly, no matter whether it is January, July, whatever month it is, I do find people taking a dip in that river, whether it's freezing cold out, you know, doing a cold water plunge or just on a hot summer day. For some reason, everybody feels it's just purifying to go in that beautiful river. All of the water at the process is all well water, so it's just really refreshing. The workshop room, when you're sitting in your chair looking at, you know, being taught by
your teacher, you're looking at all trees. And last month, we had a deer walk right up to the window and peek in the window at the students when when they were in the process, and it was just delightful. There's wildlife there. There's beautiful sunsets. When it's snowing, and if you've never experienced snow, why not come to Canada? I mean, people think we live in an igloo, but we really don't. Why not come to Canada and experience winter
when it's snowing? The trees are all just covered with snow, and it's just like a winter wonderland. So the property is beautiful. And one thing I wanna say is that the owners of sanctum retreat, I mean, we rent the property. We don't own the property. We rented off them for our processes. They are graduates of the Hoffman process as well. So they hold the space for everybody so beautifully because they've experienced the process themselves.
Now that really says a lot, and they really take good care about the food and any of your dietary restrictions. We've got you covered in all aspects. Yeah. It's not as if the Canadian site is lacking. I mean, you've had full processes for a while now. Right? Oh my goodness. We've been doing processes there for 25 years. You know, it's not like it's a
new thing. Canada is not a new thing for the Hoffman process, but we've been we're now that we're amalgamated, it's beautiful that we can share our retreat site and get people to the process sooner. People always ask me, they say, well, what if there's nobody from California in my program or what if there's no one from New York in my program? I did my process. I'm from Ontario and I went to Calgary. I still had to get on an airplane. I still had to fly there. Nothing was changed,
but it doesn't matter. I mean, with technology today, you stay connected with your people that you wanna stay connected with in such a beautiful way. So it doesn't matter where you live. What I feel is right is when it's the right time for you, when you can block out some time in your schedule to attend the process, then it's the right time to go. It doesn't matter where you go. Hoffman's around the
world. It doesn't matter where you go. It's just what works for you, what works for your family for that you can unplug for a whole week and come and work on yourself. So, Laurie, why for you did you take the process? I have spent most of my life doing personal development. I mean, I've been a teacher of personal development, a coach. I've worked with people my whole career helping them. And then someone just said to me, Laurie, you need to go to the Hoffman process.
Just go. So I went to the process just to dig deeper on with myself. I believe in living a life that if, you wanna encourage people to be their best, that you have to be your best as well. So I'm always working on myself. I'll be honest. When I was going to the process, I'm like, here, I'm flying to Calgary. I'm spending all this money. I know nothing about the program. There's no agenda, and I'm an agenda person. And I'm just trusting to go out there to not know what I'm gonna be doing.
It's kind of a strange feeling. But you know what? At the end of the week, I was like, oh my gosh. Thank goodness they said to me, Lori, go to the process because I had an amazing week. It helped me to dig deeper in myself to really, get to the core. And if I if you don't mind me sharing an experience I had when I got home because I I took my process in July, and I remember coming home and there was a dandelion growing in my garden on the
grass, and I picked the flower off. And I thought, oh, I should have gone and got my tool and dug the root out, and I just sat on the lawn and I thought, oh my gosh. The Hoffman process was like a bulldozer going through my garden, getting to the root of my patterns. Sorry. I don't know why I'm getting worked up here. Yeah. So it was just like getting to the root of things that I had never gone that deep in myself before.
I found it so liberating that I didn't know what anybody in that room did for a living. I found it liberating that I didn't know anybody's last name. Whether someone's unemployed or whether they're a movie star, it doesn't matter. We're all there on the same playing field to do the best job and dig as deep as we can to become the best person that we can become. So now when I see a dandelion, you know, I'm always thinking of patterns of like, okay, how can I work on
my patterns? And you learn so many tools in the process that you can use them for your life going forward. It was a really great experience. That's fantastic. You know, students often have experiences that are metaphors to what happened to their internal landscape. And I love that you had this experience with the dandelion and felt the concurrent reality of what happened for you internally related to the dandelion. Because the dandelion's a weed, so it's kinda
like a pattern. I never thought of it until right this second. Yeah. Well, thank you for sharing that. I really appreciate that. What's it like, Laurie, to be in your shoes now, shepherding people? When you and I talked together a month or so ago when we talked about, hey. We should do a podcast recording, One of the things I noticed from you is that you were supporting people all the way in through. They've landed at the airport. They're on the bus.
There's a concierge kind of experience that you provide in helping students make it to the site. What's that like to see them on the front end, the back end? Share a little bit. Oh, well, you know, when I first have my first call with people, it's really building the trust that we can have that relationship, and I said that right at the beginning of the call that everything is confidential. All through your process, everything is confidential.
You know, we have a shuttle that picks everybody up at the airport, which we're the only site that does that, and that is a real benefit to the students. It's kind of a pain in the butt for me because if flights get canceled, it's chaos on the Friday. But I have my cab driver on speed dial. He takes that Friday off and just works for me that Friday so that he's ready to pick up any student that misses their flight or their flights are delayed, and
we have no control over the flight. So, you know, we've got you covered if that happens. And I always tell people, you know, don't worry. I mean, if if you're that worried, fly out a day early. You know? But if not, we've got a cab ready for you. And it's just beautiful to to really support people in that way because I know when I went to my process, I was nervous. I didn't know where
I was going. And like I said, I like to have an agenda, but what the process taught me is just be present in the moment. And giving up your phone is another thing that people really worry about and being unplugged. I'm the emergency contact for the course, so they know that their family can call me if they're in an emergency. I keep my phone on 24 hours a day during a process. It really teaches you to be present,
to let go. And when I did my process, I got back to my hotel on Friday, and they ask you to stay 2 nights post process for a time of rest, a time of integration. I get a lot of feedback on that. People don't really, why can't I go home and rest? And I'm like, because you're gonna go home and throw your laundry in, and you're not gonna rest. You know, you're gonna go back into your normal routine flying through an airport.
But I was never so happy to get to the room on the Friday, and and I called my husband, and I said, you know what? I'm great, but I'm gonna keep my phone off until I get to the airport on Sunday. And he was like, what? I said, yep. I'm gonna turn it off, and I'll talk to when I get to the airport because you wanna just stay in that space. When do you ever get an opportunity as an adult if you've raised your family, gone through school,
have been working? When do you get that time to just unplug and focus on yourself? If you only do the process once, well, then you only get one post process, so why not make the best of it. Right? Especially if you have young kids because, you know, when you get home and you have young kids, you're gonna be mom or dad right away the minute you walk through the Yeah. You don't get a breath. So take the time to really just have that couple of days to rest and go home when you're all refreshed.
Yeah. Tell us a little bit about how you got connected to Hoffman. I know you had a first chapter with the institute many years ago, and then you're back. And we're so grateful you're back because you hold so much for the Canadian students and the Canadian connection in our partnership with the US, our partnership with you. Tell us a little bit about how you transitioned from Hoffman graduate
to Hoffman employee. Well, it was the connections that I had back then, and I got such profound experience from the process I wanted to do more. My background is all about helping people when I look at my decades of career, you know, when helping women in business, helping small and medium sized businesses grow. I'm a speaker, an international speaker. I'm an author. I have done a lot of work with people, and when I did the Hoffman process, I wanted to connect in a different way,
not about business, not about money. I wanted to connect with people more on a deeper level. Like, how do you help yourself personally so you can go out in the world and be what you wanna be? So it was really inspiring to me, and I started really calling the database because Peter and Maureen, who really started Hoffman Canada, were retiring. And so they had everything in paper, and I started with Hoffman by having thousands of phone calls to make to
see if I could update the database. So you're calling people just like, is this you, and are you the one that did the process years ago? These are almost like cold calls, aren't they? It was horrible, you know, but I wasn't afraid to do that because I I knew it would help with keeping people connected. And from that, I started a small group in my home because some of the people that I called had never been contacted for 25 years. And I said, hey. You live, like, half
an hour from me. You live 15 minutes from me. So I started a continuing your journey group in my home, in my living room every month, and I had people driving 2 hours to come every month. You know, our teachers did the curriculum for it, and I just followed it, and we would have something to eat, and we would just support each other. So I did that for 3 years until COVID hit. We call those graduate support groups. In Canada, they call them continuing your journey
groups. That's what we call them at that time. You know, one of the things we know is that continuing your journey, keeping up with the tools and practices, keeping your process alive is important. And so one of the things we've done for decades is to have graduate support groups where volunteers who are grads will be trained up to support, and they generally have one meeting a month.
And graduates come together to engage in the tools and practices, but also to connect with one another to keep community alive. What was that like, and what did you see as the leader of your grad support group? Well, to be honest with you, I was nervous at the beginning, you know, because I'm like, I don't know if I'm equipped to do this. But you know what? I think it's getting over that fear and just just getting people together, and there's a curriculum that you follow so you
don't have to know anything. You just have to follow it and let the group lead because you're there to facilitate, but you're really there to be with the group as well and experience this for yourself. So if anybody is thinking about it, I would highly recommend it because I got so much value. Graduates are always after me, Laurie, are you gonna start the group up again? And, you know, I've just been a little bit swamped over the last year just getting everything switched
over to be amalgamated with the US. So and I always had a part in my heart for that too because when I started with Hoffman Canada, I came to the US office and sat with Liza, and she gave me her wisdom, and the office gave me their wisdom. I went from department to department, and they shared their best practices, which was so remarkable. And I then took it back to Canada. And then when, this time came that they were amalgamating with Canada, Liza called and said, hey, would you
come back? And I was delighted because it had always been our vision to work together. And one of the places that graduates because part of what I hear is that I'd love to do it. How do I find out about it? And so on the US website, there's a link, and it's called for grads, f o r grads, grads. And in that link is ongoing support. And then in ongoing support, there's grad groups, and that's where you can go find out all the places that we have grad groups
throughout the US. Talk a little bit about as a Canadian grad and, of course, it's not like our grad groups are exclusive to the United States citizens. If you want in you live in Canada, but you want to go to a grad group, or we have virtual grad groups based on time zones. And so many grads live in a place where there actually is no physical grad group, but they get together in these virtual grad groups that meet once a week.
Laurie, talk a little bit about another way grads can stay connected is through refreshers. Can you share some about that? Yeah. I was delighted. We just did one in Calgary last month. It was great just to get grads reconnected after COVID. Now we're kinda coming back, and we've got one the end of November in Toronto. So I see this as a really positive to start grads getting back together again. So so mark it in your calendar to go
to the one in November. If you're from Toronto surrounding area, it was really great to get reconnected with everybody. How many grads came to the previous one you just did? We had 20 grads from Calvary. That's fantastic. So, Laurie, did your husband go to the process? When I started to work with Hoffman, I always had my office door closed because everything is confidential. So I never talked about really any student or I keep that very close
to myself. When I came home from the process, he just saw that I I just loved it, and and he saw how I was after the process. And then I didn't say anything to him because the the worst thing you can do is say you need to go or you have to go or I want you to go because then that just makes people not wanna go. At least that's how I feel if someone told me I had to go. And I should refrain that. When someone said, Laurie, you have to go to the Hoffman process, they just wanted me to go. They
didn't you know? So I think I said that at the beginning. But he just kinda came around and said, you know, I really would love to experience what you did. And then when we both did it, then our daughter really wanted to experience it. When I used to have my small groups, my husband and my daughter used to have to leave the house because they weren't graduates. So I would kick them out for my
small group, my continuing my journey group. So after a while, they both wanted to do the process, and they've both done it, which is amazing. I'm so thankful for that. And I still have a son who hasn't done it, but he knows that it's there. It's it's there for him when he's ready, and he wants to jump in and do this work for himself. That's great. And how has it impacted the 3 of you in your relationships,
all 3 of you being grads? Well, it's not to say our patterns don't come up still, but and we don't say you're in a pattern now, but we we really work together to, you know, just be the best version of ourselves that we can be. I imagine there's more grace as you navigate your journey and your connection with each other. Yeah. Really just, being able to support each other in whatever way you wanna go, without having judgment. The process really helps you not to have judgment. At least that's what
it's helped me. My daughter, for instance, I hope she doesn't mind me sharing this, but she is a single choice mom. So she had children by herself and that's not conventional, but at the same time, why not? You know? So I wanted to be a mom that was nonjudgmental and be supportive, and I think the Hoffman process and everything that I've learned has really helped me to pave the way for her. And I have 2 beautiful beautiful grandsons, twin boys. Awesome.
Laurie, what do you see in grads? Because you see them beforehand. You shepherd them into the process. But what do you notice over the course of multiple processes that you've been a part of? What are you seeing at the end? Enlightenment.
I think I see enlightenment. I I get a lot of, phone calls, texts, emails after the process, you know, just thanking me for helping them, bugging them to get some pre work in, whatever you wanna call it, getting them ready, getting them set, getting them unfearful.
I mean, I have actually been on the phone with someone at a process with wouldn't get out of their car because they were scared, and I actually helped them get out of the car, go get registered, and then they after they called and just, oh my gosh, I just needed that little bit of support. And when their spouse or their kids call and come into the process, it's it's a beautiful thing. When my husband did the process, I got my binder back out and I went through every day with him.
And when my daughter went, we both got our binders out and we went through every day. You forget what you did because the week is so jam packed and when you get your binder out, I do it quite regularly when a process is in Canada. I get my binder out and I follow along because if I can't be there in person, I'm there with them in spirit and following along and kind of just reliving the moment myself. So, you know, that's a beautiful
thing. If family or friends go to do the process, follow along in your book, and and you'll be just amazed at what you'll be reliving the process in the week while you're there. And when we say follow along, we mean you're in your home sort of tracking where they are, but you're not actually in the process. Yes. You're you're at home with your binder. Yeah. And so when it's Tuesday, you look at Tuesday and you go, wow. Look at what they're going through on Tuesday.
What a way to stay connected to this person you know who's in the process, and you're not with them, but on some level, you're with them in spirit. And just supporting grads to let them know. If a husband and wife go, we don't give them the same teacher. And if anybody you know, like I say, like, if your wife called and asked me a question, I would even say that I talked to you because it's your confidentiality. So I hold that at the highest regard.
Yeah. I think that's important, and grads know this, that confidentiality is the cornerstone of our work, and so we hold it tightly. And it's actually part of the reason people who have more of a higher profile trust us because they know that their name, their image, their story won't be revealed, and that not only will we hold it tightly, but that it's the culture of the process so their fellow classmates
hold it tightly as well. You know, one thing I always say to people when they're doing their prework because the prework does take, I say, 8 to 12 hours for them to to complete, and you wanna do that and really take the time so that you're that's your preprocess work. So you when you
go into the process, you're ready. But I always say write like nobody's reading, and it gives you the freedom to take the filter off because you're there working on yourself, and the only person that's gonna read that prework is your teacher. And I scan it to make sure it's ready for your teacher, but, you know, really take the filter off because you had nothing to hide. There's nothing there's no judgment. I always say we like you to get to 50 patterns and I think I had a
150. So I you know, like, there's no right or wrong number. There's no judgment on the number of patterns that you have. It's just acknowledging, being aware of your patterns, and then working through those patterns throughout the week, which is great. Laurie, what's it like as we wind down here? What's it like for you to talk about Hoffman, to talk about your own experience, your family, talk about these grads that you help out so much? What's it like to reflect out loud about all of
this? You know what? It's it's, it's really gratifying work. There's a lot in that word gratifying, isn't there? Yeah. And, my friends are like, why did you come out of retirement? And I'm like, well, I haven't finished, you know, my life work yet. And that is really helping people. And this work is helping people in a different way. It's beautiful. Seeing someone go in at the beginning of the week and how they transform by the end of the week, it's really a beautiful
thing. And that's why it's been around over 50 years because of the transformation that it does for people, and to be a part of that is is really a blessing. I'm blessed with your presence and your words here and your emotion, Laurie. I didn't mean for that happen. And and yet out it came. Right? You
know what? I think sometimes when you have the opportunity to really connect with a place inside yourself unconditionally, to be loving to yourself You know, what I learned for myself too is that I never said thank you to my intellect before I did the Hoffman process, and I never said thank you to my body. And this body's been through a lot, many surgeries, and, I have another surgery probably coming up on my ankle.
And I'd still have to say thank you, body, you know, for being able to walk where I can walk right now because my ankle's bad. But, again, just being able to be in touch with yourself at a different level that you probably haven't been before, you know, to really be grateful for your body, grateful for your mind. You know, sometimes I I thank my mind and sometimes because it's giving me the ability to do the things that I've done in my life, without listening to that inner voice that tells
me not to do it. So, you know, the process really helps you to be thankful for all aspects of self. Well, all aspects of myself are thankful and grateful for, you and this conversation and how you showed up and the wisdom you shared today. So thank you, Laurie. Well, thank you for having me on and great to, to share this time with you. I look forward to teaching in Canada sometime in the future and
getting to enjoy this journey with you. Well, maybe when you come to Canada, you'll be able to say process instead of process. I know. We do say it wrong, don't we? Thank you for listening to our podcast. My name is Liza Ingrassi. I'm the CEO and president of Hoffman Institute Foundation. And I'm Razzi Grassi, Hoffman teacher and founder of the Hoffman Institute Foundation. Our mission is to provide people greater access
to the wisdom and power of love. In themselves, in each other, and in the world. To find out more, please go to hompaninstitute.org.