The stories we tell ourselves are so much more powerful than we realize. They can make a sweet moment sour, and a sour moment bitter. They can spiral a bad experience into a bad life. We can’t change the past and the ways we have been hurt, but we can empower ourselves to write our own stories with intention, compassion, and self love. If you could put pen to paper and tell your truth, what would you say?
We are all conditioned to prioritize the negative over the positive. We’ll dwell on an insult way longer than we will a compliment, we’ll remember the bad experiences with the reverence of truth and the positive as some kind of fluke. What would life look like if you could reprogram your brain to accentuate the positive? How beautiful could life become?
Everyone is special. There has never been another you. Are you familiar with the divine light shining from within you? Have you stopped to feel the resonance of your own frequency? Everyone has gifts, struggles, and stories to tell. When we feel secure in our own light, we stop feeling the need to extinguish everyone else’s. Tap into your own abundance. Give yourself permission to glow.
Fear is just the body’s way of trying to keep itself out of danger, but it isn’t always a reliable narrator. The prospect of change–even good change–can trigger big fear reactions that, if taken too seriously, can hold us back from our own highest good. We can’t banish fear (we aren’t supposed to) but we can choose to transcend fear, moment by moment, by feeling the fear and doing it anyway.
To live is to suffer–that is the bitter truth that accompanies the sweetness of being alive. Our reaction to suffering is more important than the suffering itself; does suffering soften you, or does it close you off? When we are unconscious, we often find ourselves asking “Why is this happening to me?!!” Once we begin healing, the question changes to “What is this teaching me?” And from that shift, everything shifts.
Asking for help can be extremely uncomfortable, because of how vulnerable it requires you to be. This can be especially difficult for people who developed hypervigilance during childhood because of neglect or abuse. Being able to receive help is just as important as being able to give it, and a balance of both is fertile ground for healthy intimate relationships, lasting community, and deep internal healing.
Building community starts with yourself. Finding your soul family is a practice rooted in the soil of discernment. Discernment grows out of facing the ego’s natural fear of endings. If you aren’t empowered to leave behind what isn’t for you, how will you ever find what is?
The political is personal, the personal is political, and we are all on a spiritual trip (whether you realize it or not). Nothing exists in a vacuum. In order for activism to flow out from the heart space, it needs to be intersectional. In order for healing to be thorough, it needs to be holistic. After all, everything is everything.
The way we are taught the concept of discipline is rooted in egoic notions of forcing yourself into better ways of being. But what if discipline had more to do with heeding our intuition, listening to our bodies, practicing good self-care, and setting realistic expectations? Embracing a softer, non-linear approach to discipline creates an environment that functions from a place of gentleness, compassion, and surrender. And that is the secret to creating sustainable discipline in your life....
We are conditioned to believe that life should be hard. This leads us to put up with being less-than-happy for far longer than is good for us. There is a certain amount of difficulty and suffering that is unavoidable, as it is a natural aspect of being alive–but what would happen if we were to prioritize ease? What if the answer isn’t to grit our teeth and grind harder, but to turn up the volume on our intuition, to rest when our body says rest, and to lean into working from the effortless bliss...
The practice of political internal self-reflection is just as important as external activism. Tackling your implicit bias is a meditation on becoming more loving. Learning requires being open to being wrong, to be willing to let in new information. This current moment in history is (once again) demonstrating how detrimental to progress the human ego can be. Unpack your conditioning, exude radical acceptance, and like a drop in the ocean, you can become the change you wish to see in the world....
Living at this moment in history, where capitalism demands unsustainable productivity at greater and greater cost to humanity and our planet, burnout is inevitable. Navigating burnout requires self-care, self-compassion, and the understanding that it is a perfectly reasonable reaction to an unreasonable situation. Under a system that benefits from our suffering, rest is revolutionary.
Surrender gives way to bliss, acceptance, inner peace, and letting your intuition guide you along the path of your highest good, but it isn’t easy. Get into the habit of trusting the timing of your life. Everything is unfolding to create who you are becoming. Rejoice in the knowing that you are exactly where you are supposed to be.
When you haven’t learned discernment and you’re in the head space of being wound so tightly that you take everything personally, hell can definitely be other people. But when you learn to let go of the desire to control others, when you realize you can only control yourself, and when you learn to discern where the love is, heaven can be other people, too.
Trying to avoid the discomfort of facing the consequences of our own actions is what drives a lot of toxic patterns of behavior. This impulse is also what blocks us from being able to learn from our mistakes so that we can stop repeating them. There are few things more miserable than being stuck in a cycle that’s making you miserable. What if consequences are good, actually?
When you become accustomed to chaos you either embrace it through managing the chaos of others, or creating chaos yourself (and more often than not, some combination of the two). Both modes of operating only serve to create more chaos. If what you’re seeking is peace, you gotta get off the wheel, get those feet on the ground, and find a new way of being–one that’s rooted in love.
Authenticity requires a certain amount of ego-shedding. Identifying too hard with the roles we play in life (many of which are forced upon us through our conditioning) is a good way to lose the plot of the story of our lives as individuals. Sometimes its important to ask ourselves “Am I living, or am I LARPing?”
It's true that healing isn’t linear–it's messy, at times ugly, and heartbreaking; the struggle to feel better can feel like an obstacle course fraught with one’s own fears and insecurities. But there is an exponential trend to the path to healing; meaning there are some depths of despair and hardship experiences that the tools of self-love and resilience will protect you from ever needing to revisit again. And what a gift that is. If nothing else, there’s always the light of a clear blue morning...
Being seen can feel uncomfortably vulnerable and deeply triggering–especially if it’s the first time you’ve ever felt it. Realizing how long you’ve gone without such a simple human need can uncover wounds that are older than memories. It also leaves you open to more negativity, judgment, and rejection. It’s ok. If you can lean into the discomfort, being seen can be incredibly liberating. It can lead to uncharted levels of self-love and confidence. So go forth! And be seen!
Surrender is an active process, but progress is ever-unfolding. Evolution can be autonomic if you simply surrender to your own expansion. The ego resists growth because each realization and release brings about it’s demise–but it is through this process of death and rebirth that we become.
Holding a grudge is often seen as a negative thing, but my grudges have always served me very well. For the codependent people-pleaser who cares too much what people think about them, a grudge can be a gateway to healthy boundaries, self-care, self-preservation, self-love, and walking away from what’s not meant to stay. Let the bridges you burn light the way to your highest good. And so it is.
The ego is always protecting itself from death. One full-proof way of doing that is by projecting our internal issues outward. However, the truth is, that even when something seems to be external, the call is almost always coming from inside the house.
“It’s Never Personal” is a mantra that has helped me be more compassionate, more patient, and less conflict-averse–it’s also given me the awareness to walk on when someone’s struggle with themselves is causing harm to me without needing to hold onto resentment or blame. Everyone is fighting a war with themselves, everyone is living with their own wounds–some people are more destructive than others, but keep in mind...it’s truly never personal.
Considering the US became a “superpower” through genocide and slavery, its fascist leanings shouldn’t come as a surprise--but the selfishness and heartlessness of those who seek power over is always a tough pill to swallow. What used to be more covert (at least to some) is now expressing itself more clearly every day. Have we learned from history? Or are we doomed to repeat it?
The capitalist bandwagon support of the queer community is simply an empty-gesture-cash-grab and it’s annoying. But at a moment when LGBTQIA+ rights (as well as the rights of marginalized people across the board) are being threatened, it does feel nice to see a rainbow flag hanging up in a shop window. But is it enough? Let’s push it further than acceptance, let’s demand love–let’s push it further than equality, let’s demand freedom for all people. Let’s push it beyond pride, let’s commit to sol...
We are all running societal programs in our internal processing systems and the cishetero patriarchy is just one of them. The assumption that everyone is straight until proven queer is what leads to the necessity (and often trauma) of "coming out." This cis-hetero patriarchal program doesn't only hurt queer and gender nonconforming people, though, it sets impossible gender and relationships standards for cis, straight people too! Unpacking an oppressive system like this can be challenging (espec...
News of the death of a family member when you’ve gone no contact brings up complicated emotions. Since I went no contact, this has been my biggest fear and the thing that everyone brings up to try to guilt me into going back. It’s the thing people who’ve never had to cut off their toxic family can’t get past. Last week it happened, so I shared my feelings. It’s been a while since I cried on the podcast, so lol enjoy!! This one’s for you, Papa. Love, your Baby Duck <3
What is the opposite of shame? Pride! What is the opposite of hiding? Living out loud. What is the opposite of pretending? Authenticity. What is the opposite of oppression? Liberation. Freedom. Respect. Love. Happy Pride, beautiful soul family. To quote James Baldwin, “your crown has already been bought and paid for, wear it.” All power to all motherfucking people!
The idea of “The Victim Complex” is often used as a weapon by abusers, oppressors, and people who wield power to suppress and silence the victims of that abuse/the people they hold power over. In these scenarios, who really has the victim complex? The one who is simply sharing their experience? Or the one who is gaslighting, deflecting, denying, and doing the most to not accept responsibility. To speak one’s truth is the bravest thing. To own your own story is part of healing–it's inherently emp...
Too much rhetoric about The Law of Attraction is focused solely on individual capitalist-minded growth and not enough on the collective power we have when we channel our energy in the same direction. It is becoming increasingly important to present a united front and use all of our gifts, privileges, and knowledge to change course for the survival of humanity and to maintain our sacred stewardship of the earth. Co-creating a better world is possible, it will be beautiful, and it is absolutely vi...
