Episode 154 - A Heartfelt Return & The Practice That Is Changing My Life
My Dear Listeners,
Hello again!!!!!!
My heart is leaping with excitement to reconnect with you today after my recent travels to California. I’ve been away for a few weeks, and I’m bursting to share some of the gems and stories I've collected, starting with a new episode on the pod!
In today's episode, I’m sharing a personal story of what happens when we stretch beyond the confines of our comfort zone and into the vulnerable heart of our deepest desires. (Keepin’ it light and breezy on the first episode back, ya know. 😉)
I also want to introduce you to the gentle practice that has been my steady companion these last few weeks. It is a practice that is literally changing my brain and reshaping my life.
It is teaching me how to connect to a jar of honeyed compassion inside myself, and that loves my fears so hard they have no choice but to release their grip. I can't recommend it enough.
In the next few weeks, I’ll be letting you in on the next chapter of my life, our podcast, and our community. But for now, let’s start slowly and indulge in one gem of wisdom at a time.
Click here to listen in. 🎧
With Love Overflowing,
Mary
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Hello, beautiful beings, and welcome to Come to your Senses. It is so good to be in this seat and doing the dance between your eardrums, balleting across your neural pathways with a new episode.
01:01
Those of you who are longtime listeners of the podcast, you know I've been on a bit of sabbatical for the last few weeks and yet this is not the full return. The roll out, the red carpet pop, the champagne paparazzi bulb flashing debut of the full return, my full return to podcasting. That's still about two to three weeks out, just FYI. But in this episode today we're sitting on my office floofy chair and I want to just update you a little bit on some of the things I've been learning and gems I've been collecting over the last few weeks in my travels, as well as the practice that is just really changing my life, changing my brain and changing the way that I show up in my work, my relationships and even in my desires. The things that I want are changing as a result of this practice, and I'm also going to share a little bit about what's to come in the next few months here. It comes to your senses because there is change afoot, and really so much of what's changing in my life personally and also what's changing in the way that come to your senses lands in your lap every week all comes back to this practice that I want to share with you today.
02:39
So about a year ago I was riding in the car with one of my best friends, allie Monday, and it was raining. Allie and I were driving to get my first pair of hiking boots because I was a few weeks away from going to Northern California, to an equine therapy retreat at Kasari Ranch in Santa Rosa, california. And I remember saying to Allie something along the lines of you know, if I could live anywhere in the world, it would be Northern California. And she looked at me and she said well then, why don't you? And a chill ran through my veins in the way that only a best friend calling you on all your excuses on why you can't have what you want in life or why you can't pursue your deeper dreams and desires. That particular chill settled across my nerve endings and I thought, oh shit, I just let myself be seen in the vulnerability of one of my deepest dreams that I don't even talk about because it felt like such a big, impossible, deep dream and I let myself be seen by someone who holds me accountable to my dreams. What was I thinking? And I went on that retreat and had a truly transformative experience and I got a clear message from within the recesses of my heart and soul this is where I belong and where I want to be and soul, this is where I belong and where I want to be. And then I came home and I Put that dream in the shoebox. No, I thought about that dream every day for at least a year and agonized over it. And how will I make it happen? And all the things that we do in the labyrinth of moving towards desire.
04:53
And, long story short, I just spent a beautiful almost eight weeks in all different regions of Northern California Marin County, sonoma County, uh, santa Cruz, san Francisco, east Bay peppering my palate with some of the different flavors of Northern California and doing the thing that I had been afraid to do for 20 years. You know, 20 years ago I went to Northern California for the first time and I got a very clear message from my intuition this is where I want to be, this is what I want my future to look like and be like. And it was so far away and it's so expensive there and I don't know anybody there. And you know all of the really legitimate reasons that life throws our way to orbit away from the voice of intuition. And you know, come to your senses is awakening that sixth sense. And my experience with that intuitive sense is that we can throw obstacles towards it and hide from it and orbit away from it as much as we want, but it has its own gravitational pull.
06:23
And this month in the coterie, which is my group coaching program, we are exploring magnetism and the way that magnetism. You know my my relationship to magnetism historically was trying to make myself more attractive to my desires and that is a element of magnetism. But after studying magnetism more fully through my mentor in embodiment, jenna Ward, more fully through my mentor in embodiment, jenna Ward, I now understand that magnetism is just another word for relationship and that with all of our desires, we are in a magnetic state, whether that magnetic state is deeply resonant and attractive or it is repellent, because there are subconscious fears or reasonings why that desire cannot or should not happen. So, for example, there was a conscious part of me that said, oh gosh, if I could live anywhere in the world it would be Northern California. But the subconscious part of me knows that that's going to require a shit ton of risk and is like, no thanks, I will happily suffer and complain over here. No thanks, suffer and complain over here, no thanks. But then things happen that put truth serum on our complaints and excuses and we can run, but we cannot hide from our true desires. And so I'm, in order to step outside my comfort zone and the zone of my identity, of what I thought I was capable of and what I think I'm deserving of and what I think the people in my life are capable of feeling if I go away, and all of the cobwebs that happen in the subconscious, I find that the people I know who take the biggest risks are also the people who have a really devoted practice to finding a sense of home and sanctuary within themselves and within the moment.
08:53
And for me, one of the practices that has really changed my life and changed my brain, and continues to do so every day, is this practice that I learned from Elizabeth Gilbert, called letters from love, and it's actually a practice that I've I've learned and have been doing for a long time. It's called two-way prayer, where you write a letter or a question to whatever force speaks to your soul. For some people it's love, for some people it's God, for some it's the universe. And it could be a specific question like what would you have me know about my taxes? Or it could be simple and open-ended, which is the path that I most often take, which is what would you have me know? Today, and in many previous episodes I've talked about this practice and how.
09:50
When I started doing it, I hated that question because I was writing to God, this outdated, externalized idea of a higher power. It was like I don't give a crap what you want me to know today, you asshole. And so I would write things like dear God, why are you so annoying? Dear God, why do you expect so much? And not even consciously writing to this outdated version of God, but realizing that when I would sit down to do this practice and so much anger and resistance would come up. I really had to do some work with my own inner spiritual Girl Scout, who confused being good and pure with being worthy of love from a higher power.
10:44
And a few months ago I heard Elizabeth Gilbert on Glennon Doyle's podcast talk about this process and I'll put the episode in the show notes and talking about it as, instead of writing to God, using the word love, unconditional love, dear love, what would you have me know today? And I started in January, a 30 day practice around it, which I am so grateful that I did, because it really instilled and developed this continual relationship between myself and the voice of unconditional love and helped me to see how, every day, I show up expecting love to tell me what to do, how to organize my life, blah, blah, blah. And every day the answer is the same, which is I love you right there, and you don't have to change or improve. I'm just going to keep on loving you, loving you. And I wanted to read to you a few choice lines that love has said to me.
12:02
I've gone back through my writing and there are certain lines that just really stood out to me. One is your gifts have no deadline. Another is you can't plan for intimacy, you just show up. Another favorite is I know. Love says I am the opposite of shame. Love says don't worry about straying too far from the flock, because I will follow you. You are the bulb I am, the soil Unfold into me. Every time I do this practice, there is a warm honey that settles over my spirit and that brings us to the final part of our episode.
13:13
Today. I have so many gems to share with you from the last few weeks. There are exciting things on the horizon to come, but for today, I wanted to just leave you with this practice as an opportunity for you to dip into that honeypot of radiance that is available to us through practices like two-way prayer, and to also say thank you for your patience, as I have been just in a bit of transition, and that transition continues. But for today, I'm going to leave it there and say that I'm so grateful to be on this journey, on the inner and on the outer, with you, and thank you so much for listening. I will see you in our next episode.