In this heartfelt comeback episode, Donna Joy Usher reflects on the transformative nine-month journey since her last podcast. From deep healing and relationship growth to worldwide travels and life-changing realizations, Donna shares her experiences and lessons learned. She explores themes like the power of being present, the importance of clarity and intention, and the profound impact of energy on our lives. This episode is an honest and inspiring deep dive into rebirth, integration, and embracing authenticity.
Welcome to Episode 64 of the Living Through Heart podcast! After a nine-month hiatus, Iโm back with a deeply personal and reflective episode. This is more than just a catch-upโit's a journey through the transitions, healing, and clarity that have defined the past months. Here's what you'll hear in this episode:
Thank you for joining me on this journey. I hope my reflections and insights inspire you to embrace your path with curiosity, courage, and compassion.
If youโre interested in exploring more, head over to my website, DonnaJoyUsher.com, where youโll find information about my fiction books, Savage Boho Studio, and tools to help you create a more empowered life.
LTH Episode 64 New
SPEAKERS
Donna Joy Usher
00:00
Welcome to the living through heart Podcast. I'm Donna Joy Usher, and I'm an analytical hypnotherapist, a psychotherapist, a spiritual healer, a tantrum practitioner, a shamanic practitioner, an award winning, Best Selling Author and owner and artisan of savage boho studio. I believe everybody is capable of creating the life they want, if they can just shift the beliefs, stories and energy creating their current reality. This podcast is an audible blog of my thoughts as I go on a journey to heal my soul, surrender into my feminine power and to live from the present moment in heart. I hope you find it amusing, interesting, thought provoking, touching, raw and inspiring. Hello. Welcome to this 64th episode of the living through heart Podcast. I'm Donna Joy Usher, and I just want to say I'm really honored that you're here listening to this, and I'm especially honored if you're here listening to this, and you are a long time listener, if you've been someone who has been listening to me for a while, and you realize that there has been a nine month break between Episode 63 and episode 64 and I want to thank you for coming back to listen to what I have to say again, even when I wasn't showing up in the last nine months. And if it's after January the 20th, 2025, that you've found me and you're listening to this, you won't realize that there'll be a seamless transition from Episode 63 to 64 in time wise. But perhaps the way I talk sounds different, as in what I have to say my insights, I'm not sure, because I can't remember, really, where I was at nine months ago. It's been a really big nine, nine and a half months for me, really big transition. And basically I had to, it's like a rebirthing. You know that nine months is quite symbolic. When I hopped on today and I saw how long it had been since I'd released an episode, I was like, yeah, that's about, right. It's a rebirthing of self to get to the point where I realized I still wanted to do a podcast, I still wanted to voice, I still wanted to catalog basically, or put out there my own journey, and the last nine and a half months has been huge. I've learned a lot, I've realized a lot, I've done a lot, I've traveled a lot, and I'm going to go over that briefly today. And you know, I've I've actually made notes and I've broken them down to what have I done? What have I realized? What have I learned? Where am I at and where am I going? And I'm sure there'll be some transitional crossover between those five things, because obviously they are all interlinked and hard to pull apart. But yeah, and a lot of stuff, when I get to the what I've realized and what I've learned, a lot of the what I've realized stuff is, is what I'm realizing at this very moment. Because I can't remember a lot of the stuff. I realized throughout the year. I did make some notes when I was in India, and I must go back and dig them out. I made some notes. Think I had all these podcast episode ideas when I was at the Usher meditation retreat in Pune. And I will go dig them out and have a look and see if I can remember what I was thinking when I had those concepts come to me, because I don't have you ever had this, but you like, you have this, like, Aha moment, and then you're like, Oh yeah, I don't need to make notes on that. This is so profound, I will remember exactly what I'm thinking about it when I go to record the episode or write it down, or tell someone about it, and then it kind of dissolves into you and just becomes a part of you, and becomes a part of the way you think and of your foundation. And you then, you can't remember what it was. And I can remember, I digress, I know, but anyway, I can remember when I sold my dental practice back in God, I can't remember what a year it was. It was a couple of decades ago, though, and I remember I was talking to my dental technician. No, I It wasn't when I saw my dental practice, it was when I had to close down my bathroom renovation business because it basically financially failed, and I chose to shut it down before I bankrupt. Wise choice. But I remember talking to my dental technician, and that had worked with me when I had my dental practice. And saying, I've learned five really important things about myself. And then he was like, Well, what are they? And I was like, Yeah, I can't remember. And the day before, I had known what they were, and then that day, they had just gone. And it wasn't that I had forgotten them, it wasn't that I had unlearned them. It's that I had become them. And so I'm going to talk to you about what I've learned, what I've realized, and there is going to be a bit of a leap. You may or may not hear a difference, or it may all make sense, and maybe I haven't transitioned as far as I'm thinking. We will see anyway, what have I done in the. Last nine and a half months? Well, when I and I guess really, what popped me off into the tail spin in a good way, lots of things did, but I got into the in Episode 63 you would have heard me talking about relationship and a new relationship, and, you know, accepting love and things like that. And so the last nine and a half months has been a progression of that, a deepening into that, and a really a lot of healing has come to me through that, and I think to my partner as well, but with, you know, from my observations, without him actually saying anything, I It feels to me like he's having a lot of healing as well. His isn't as obvious as mine, because he doesn't do any crying, and he doesn't discuss to me in deepest detail exactly what he's thinking and feeling like I do with him. So I just want to if you are listening to this, I want to thank you for listening to me and holding space for me. You know, holding space for me to be who I am and keep a very neutral expression while I'm talking to I might say it's, it's, it's quite a gift. Anyway, so yeah, a lot of healing has come to me, of of having love, of being loved, and a lot of things, energy has moved through me and out of me, through being loved, and during love making especially and realizing a deepening and deepening into myself through that. So that is obviously still going really well. And one of the things I've no, I will leave that to what I've learned. Okay, so what have I done? I'm still in relationship. I did a lot of traveling. You know, I think I had gone to Bali and done a Tantra retreat by April, it, or may have been just after that I did, I went and did a seven day living Tantra retreat with the embodiment and awakened academy that I studied with did my Tantra practitioner training through and then I went to Thailand. And I did another Tantra retreat with Sarita and usher beautiful, beautiful women. And I actually went with my partner. We went for two weeks to Chiang Mai at our first overseas holiday together. And then I did another Tantra retreat, and then I came back, and then I was home for 10 days, and I went to India for about six weeks, and I went to the Usher meditation retreat, and I went up to Rishikesh, and I studied Kundalini yoga. I'm gonna call it that loosely. I came home and I'm like, I'm got a 200 hour instructor on Kundalini yoga, and I don't even know what it is, so I'm just gonna say I went and learned a lot of different things, but mainly I learned about myself, and I am gonna go into that in a bit. And then I came back. And what was interesting at this point, when I was over in India, I had this really big thing happen to me, which I'll go into in my realizations. And when I came back, huge, huge, huge shift. And what I got when I was over there was just say no, no to nothing new. It was like I just needed this massive amount of integration, which makes sense, because I had been on this healing journey and been going hardcore at it, throwing myself at it for years, and it was like I needed to just stop and integrate. And you know, I was meant to, a week after I got back from India, I was meant to go and do an ancestral retreat with the shamanic tribe I'm studying with. And then I was meant to go to Maui a couple of weeks later for a retreat with the through the conscious, conscious reprogramming, the mindset stuff that I had done and with the beautiful Rochelle, and then I was going back to Bali to be a helper on a Tantra retreat with with Sarita and usher again, Ananda, Sarita and usher, and all this stuff was There planned, and I just got this no to new things, right? And I was like, Okay, fine. No, I'm saying no to new office that are coming to me now, but I already had these things scheduled in. And, you know, through integrity, I need to follow through on them. And then the universe just cleared them all out of my way. Just it, just, I didn't even have to say no to any of it. It just went right. That's fine. We're doing it for you where you know you need this integration period. So I came back from India, and seven days after I got back, I got Dengue fever. Most people get it when they're in India. I thought I was I thought I was safe, and then I got it, and I couldn't go to the ancestral retreat because I had dengue.
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And then I and then, while I was in India, the next one in Maui got canceled. Michelle canceled it. So it was, didn't have to go to that. And then I'm like, Okay, so now I'm just gonna go to the one in Bali. And I was like, Okay, it's all it's i. Chakras, it's fine. I'm just gonna go and do some meditation. It's not gonna be any like deep root chakra, screaming, healing work that I just didn't my, you know, I just didn't want to do. And then 10 days before that retreat, I messaged them to say, hey, what's happening? When do you need Usher to help? And it had been canceled, and they forgot to tell us. So the universe, just the energy of the universe. It's amazing. You know, you can, you can manifest stuff, and you can hold the intent and the energy for things, and you will be the magnet that brings it. But sometimes there are just omens there, and sometimes it just does look after you. And that was one of those times I just really needed a really deep healing and integration process, which I'm pretty sure I'm still going through. Anyway, I'll get to that in a moment. So I did a lot of studying. I did a lot of travel, so I did a lot of study. I also did my Module 123, and four with the shamanic tribe. So at the moment, I'm going through mentoring program with them to finalize being certified as a shamanic practitioner, healing practitioner, and that's that was really profound. And I'll go into some stuff that I learned and realized through that in a moment. Also traveled to Brisbane and Canberra and hobat with my beautiful partner, so that was nice just to, yeah, further traveling together and just deepening our relationship. Another big thing that happened was I took over. You may or may not know I had a business, savage boho studio with a friend, the jewelry business, if you want to go check it out, savage boho studio.com is my website where I make beautiful crystal and copper, electro formed and electro plated pieces. And yeah, I'm really proud of myself with this, because I took it over with a friend. We bought the business, and we did all the rebranding, and then we started, like doing going to markets, and then she just wasn't able to show up in a way that to match me, in a way that I was able to, you know, she was working full time and studying, doing a double degree in psychology and counseling. You know, she had a sister and two children living with her, so she was kind of like being a caretaker as well. And then her health wasn't always the best. So I was pulling back as well, because I've been in work relationships before with people where I end up doing a lot more. And I kind of was pulling back too. And nothing was really happening with the business, and nothing really happened with the social media in the business, and we weren't really making anything. And it kind of grounded to the ground. Into the ground. And then I realized I really wanted to do it. I really wanted to move into creating and having this thing of my own. And at that time, I was still doing a lot of work with intuitive Academy and the amazing Keith Hodge and the beautiful intuitive team there, which I'm still a part of, but I was doing a lot of back end marketing and creation for him, and to be perfectly honest, it was just taking everything that I had was draining all of my energy, even when I wasn't working. And this is totally on me, even when I wasn't working in his business, my energy was draining into it because I was there energetically. So I made this big decision to take over savage Bucha studio when my girlfriend just started to study full time, and it wasn't going to be good for her financially to have a business, so I bought her back out, and then I managed to train I had kind of already started training someone to take over from me, because I had, in surety, I had been planning on going away so much so I stepped right back out of that. And I'm pleased to say that Chantelle, the lady that I, you know, trained to take over, is amazing, freaking amazing, and doing a far better job than I was in that her energy is 100% there, and she's committed, whereas I was always 100% there, but always wanting to do my own thing. So there was that sideline of commitment for me. Energetically, I was kind of always leaving, even though I couldn't leave, which is interesting, right? And that's something else I've learned and realized that I'll go into about the why of that, that I wanted to go over there and do my own thing, but I couldn't make myself leave. And then really what that meant that was that I wasn't being able to give myself 100% to anything, and then I was really exhausted all the time. So that happened, I took over savage boho, and I'm moving the business from Etsy to Shopify, and I'm getting into Pinterest and doing all this stuff. And my goal is by the end of the year that I'll be mainly doing online sales. At the moment, I'm doing a lot of markets, and they're fun, but they're also tiring, and my beautiful partner is helping me, and it's not fair on him and his energy I don't feel, even though he's fine with it. But so that's my goal, to go all online and being make, just making to order. And I love making new pieces to order and being commissioned to make things. So that's my goal. By the end of the year with that business, I also started workshops around my first workshop, pendant making workshop on the weekend, and it was a really like, I'm really chuffed. It was a great success. Everyone loved it, and got another one happening in March, and that's going to keep expand. Thing, because repeat people coming back just to keep making stuff, and they basically, they, they get it to the point where it needs electroforming. And now I'm spending this week electro forming all their stuff and getting it finished for them. So that's a really, a beautiful for me, a really beautiful journey in teaching other people the love and the passion of making this stuff. But then I still get to do all the fun, chemical, nerdy, geeky science side of it as well. So, yeah, what else have I done? I did the traumatic training. Yep, told you a step back from key, sorry, just reading through my notes. Yeah, that's pretty much, I think, what I've done abroad, a broad thing, lots of little things, obviously, in there. So what have I realized? Okay, I think for me, the biggest realization is more and more, and this is definitely Joe Dispenza work, you know, more and more into the quantum physics side of us being energy. And to me, that is just the fact. Yeah, I think, I think that's it. And this is sort of what happened for me in India too. I just came back to the facts. The facts is that we are just energy. We're energy in an energetic body, and we're made up of photons. And photons are just light energy, right? Vibrational. We're made up of photons that's made into, you know, different like protons and neutrons and electrons, and then that's made into atoms, and that's made into molecules, and then that's made into tissue and into bone and into organs. And that makes us, right? We're actually made of, we're just made of vibrating energy, which, when you really get that, it's so powerful, when you you realize that all we are is Matt is energy. It's actually, it's actually photons, vibrating but also collapsing into matter. So they're going from the wave form of like, you know, light into collapsing into the matter of that which we are and we know, we collapse into matter consciously, by by choosing and by creating, by choosing to be something, you know, by choosing through our belief systems, unconsciously choosing through what we've learned from our, you know, caretakers, choosing who we are, and by that journey of uncovering who we really are, right, removing all those layers of like, the cloaks that were put on us, of hey, this is who you are, and this is what you look like, and this is, You know, all you can have, and all the limitations that were put on us being able to remove them and move move closer and close to the end that which, which we really are, which is really just energy that can create and do whatever it wants. And at an anatomic level, we're all the same, you know, we're all just made of energy, and everything else after that has come from the belief systems of ourselves, the belief systems of our parents, the belief systems of our ancestors, the belief systems of everybody around us. So for me, I'm realizing more and more about the importance of energy and holding the energy of that which we want, and so many things these days, especially I'm listening listening to podcasts about this, and that this is what you should be doing, and that and just seems to be a very outward and this is not everything. I'm just saying, there's a lot of it out there, though, a lot of outward focus, still trying to work out things, even when you're not, I mean, you know, even when you're not, trying to control things, trying to understand and work out things to do with other people and other places and other things, but the truth is that all we really need to worry about is the internal in ourselves. That's the only thing we need to focus on. That's the only thing we really need to put our energy into. And when we are fully focused on the inside of us and observing ourselves fully and what we're thinking and feeling and actually, then seeing that that's all just illusion, and it's all just story. And able to move beyond that and pass that into the energy of that which we want, and hold that energy, then everything is different, because we're no longer running around trying to stay safe, and that's exhausting. When you have to control the energy in a room and control other people and control your environment and control everything so that you can be safe and stay safe, that's exhausting. But instead, if we can just turn the energy inwards and be safe and realize that we are safe then and then hold the energy of that which we want, then it's a whole different ball game.
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Now, I just want to say up front too, that, you know, I know that I'm talking about these things from a privileged position, a white woman in a privileged country. You know, I'm not in a country that's at war. I'm not in a country of oppression. I mean, I if you want to believe in past lives, I know I've been there. I know I've chosen those experiences before, and I'm not choosing them in this life. So I'm talking from this point of view, and I know that there are people out there who will, who could maybe listen to all this stuff and just be wanting to throw. Rocks at me because they feel trapped in their situation because of terrible things that are happening that are outside their control. But there is always one thing that we can control, and that's our own mind, that's our own thoughts, that's our own feelings, that's ours. No one can take that from us, and that's that internal right? And I was listening to a podcast recently. I can't remember who it was. It may have been Jay Shetty, and they were talking about they had interviewed a woman who's, this is one of those really bad stories where I can't remember anyone's names, but she had been like a child in altwitch, and she even said that, even having gone through that, she realized that the greatest, the greatest prison we are in is our own minds, and when we can control that, when we control our own fear, or we control our emotions, when we even go beyond control, because control is like a word that comes from having to control because of fear, right? But we can move beyond that. And then, then we are limitless and we are powerless, because no matter what situation we're put in, we can be free. And I'm not saying that I'm at that. I'm not saying that I'm there yet, but I'm saying that I can start to taste it and feel it and see it. And once again, I'm saying that from the privileged point of view of not being in a really difficult, hard situation when I'm saying this. So I just, I do want to premise that, but hopefully people who you know this truth in what I say, no matter what the situation is, if people are willing to to look at them, to look at it, there's, there's always going to be truth for any situation in what we're talking about here when we get down to radical responsibility of self and being responsible for our emotions and our feelings and our choices. Anyway, I didn't write any of that down, so I apologize. I'm coming back to my notes now. So yeah, I realize about energy more and more, and also, what I'm realizing is the importance of clarity, clarity and intention, and clarity on your intention so powerful when you've got clarity of thought and when you understand the clarity of what you want. I mean, one of the problems I've had recently is actually not knowing what I want, not having any clarity on that. And that came through a big journey of not knowing who I was, and when you don't have any clarity on who you are or what you want, then you really are just aimlessly floating, hoping that you're going to find what it is that you secretly want on a deep level, but that you haven't uncovered yet. That can be a really frustrating place to be in so clarity is so important, having clarity of thought. And to me, clarity has such a crisp, clean, vibrant vibration about it, because clarity is also honesty. Clarity is being honest about ourselves and honest about our intentions and honest about parts of us that are there, you know, I I can have, you know, even now, after all the healing work that I've done, I feel parts step in, child parts step in, into situations and and they're thinking things and feeling things that I'm not proud of, but being able to admit that they're there and having the clarity on that also then allows me to control my reactions and to maybe not react and act out on a childish part. So I'll give you an example of that. Last week, I had a colonoscopy, and I've had them every five years because of history, familiar history, and for the first time ever, they found a polyp. And I had been pretty smug up to that point. I got to admit it, right? I mean, pretty smug because I hadn't. I'd never found a polyp, and yes, my diet was really clear, and because I exercised and did all this work, and they found a polyp, and it turned out to be pre cancerous, and it had just mildly dysplastic changes, it only just started to change. It was a great time to find it, because if I had found it before it changed, I probably wouldn't have taken the situation as seriously as I have in the realization of the clarity around hey, if I had left that five years from now, I would have had bowel cancer, and that's very this real, you know, owning that and admitting that to myself. It's, you know, I have to look at lifestyle choices around that, and diet and, yeah, it definitely is genetic. But then, you know, there's things I can do about that as well, through, you know, meditation and shifting my energy and stuff like that, and things that I've been talking about doing and I haven't been doing that. This is sort of like giving me the kick up the butt that I need. But I was going to talk about a part. So when I found out about this, and it was mildly dysplastic, and I was like, 90% 95% I'd like to say, just pure relief, right? I was like, the program up the front was like, fuck, they found. It right? But there was a very small part of me that I'm not proud of, that was wishing that it was just the tiniest bit worse than Marley, just plastic, so that when I told the story, people would be worried about me. And when I say people, I mainly meet my partner, and when I was like, Whoa, what's going on here? And then when I sat with that part of me, and she was the part that as a little girl, got given importance and got given attention when she wasn't well, when she was sick. And you know, when you got busy parents, right? They're getting on with the job, and you're getting on with your job as being a kid, and then they're not, maybe always as present as they could be, and not realizing it, because life's happening, right? And they're working and they're this, and they're that, and they're getting dinner, and there was this little girl, this little part of me that had gotten all this extra attention when she'd been sick. And I have these memories of like mum coming in and looking after me, and, you know, you know, stroking your hair or wiping your brow, and that feeling of love and importance and worthiness that comes from that right, that little one stepped to the front and she was wishing that it had been maybe to the point where, okay, so this is what she wanted. She wanted it to be at the point where it was totally curable without any sort of real intervention, or maybe, maybe have to have just another thing, but it wouldn't have been painful, another procedure that wouldn't have been painful and wouldn't have been like debilitating, and wouldn't have led to anything like me having to have like real treatment and losing all my hair or anything like that, right? She didn't want that. She just wanted it to be that little bit more like up in the air, so that they could create this like sense of like unsurety in my well being that might then promote like panic. Do? In other parties on my behalf, which would then make her feel really important. So this is, you know, and if you're like, listening to this and you're like thinking, This is bullshit, then you really haven't gone deep enough into your parts. And you haven't, you haven't, like, really started to uncover the layers, and you probably haven't got, like, really deep metacognition, because we all have this. A lot of people have the voices that they hear in their head all the time. I never had that. I had this really unconscious parts that I'm able to be more aware of now, and I'm sure that there are so many of them that I'm still unaware of. You know, it's always those layers going deeper and deeper, right? So anyway, clarity, that's where I was. I was at clarity, clarity of thought and intention and basically removing more and more layers of story, because the story creates a lack of clarity. The story doesn't always make sense. Makes sense to the person telling the story because they've made it up to make sense, but it doesn't always make sense when you're listening to it. So getting beneath the layers of the story and the illusion that we've created, back down towards the more of a non duality state, where there is no right or wrong, there is no good or bad, there just is, and then what we make it mean about ourselves. So that's one thing, I've had clarity. The other thing I've really realized, and this comes sort of hand in hand with clarity, is the vibrational and energetic power of words. So when you can go into yourself and you can find a feeling that's inside, and you can find a word whose vibration fits this feeling, and then use that to scribe, but then all of a sudden you have a lot of power over this thing so,
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and this comes with clarity, right? People have to have be able to have clarity about what they're thinking, about what they're feeling. And a lot of people are lost in loud and a cloud of confusion. And this is something else I've realized. A lot of people are walking around just running totally in unconscious programs, unaware, totally unaware of what's going on, just thinking that this is how the way the world is, and this is their reality, and this is, well, not even their reality. They don't even realize that. They just think that this is reality. They're not even realizing that their perceptional view of reality is totally different to everyone else's right. So they're in this state of confusion, because what I've begun to realize is that when people aren't getting into that depth of clarity with themselves, they're not willing to actually even stick their head under the water and have a look around what's around. You know, they're not even, not even going to put, like, the mask on, the snorkeling mask on, and just look into the water and see what's there then and then. They're not allowed to think about certain things that bring pain. Then the brain doesn't know what it's allowed to think about and what it's not allowed to think about over time, right? It's no, no, we can't think about that because that's too painful. I don't know. We can't think about that because that's too painful. And then over time, I think the brain gets confused about what it's allowed to think about, what it's not allowed to think about, so it doesn't think. About anything, and there's a layer of confusion there. Instead, that's kind of like a folk that is protecting them from feeling these things that they don't want to feel, but it's also protecting them from feeling things that they would want to feel, because you can't have one without the other. You can't cut off not feeling that and still feel the good things, and you can't not remember that, but then remember everything else. And there definitely is, I think, some people where memory loss and things like that is just purely coming from not allowing themselves to remember certain things or think about certain things. I'm not saying that all memory loss is from that, like dementia and Parkinson's, but who knows, energetically, that maybe that might be like, Why do some people get and why some people don't? Right? Who knows? I'm not saying that that is it. I'm not even hypothesizing and I'm just chucking it out there because it went through my mind. But yeah, so that's something I'm realizing vibrational power of words and clarity and, yeah, being able to be really honest with yourself of what what you are thinking and feeling, and use really powerful words to describe that. And the deeper and deeper you go into that, the more and more powerful it is. And people think that feeling emotions is weak, but feeling emotions is actually the fucking strongest, hardest thing that there is, because when you can be with an uncomfortable emotion, and you can ride it out and get to the other side and have the realization that you needed to have and have the aha moment that you needed to have for that uncomfortable emotion to not be there anymore, then you've healed something, and you've taught yourself that you can be with uncomfortable emotions. And when you can be with an uncomfortable emotion, then you can have a great emotion as well. And the people who just bypass all of that, and they just sit in like, these, like upper like chakras. I'm just going to be like, me, me, me, me, and I'm going to, you know, do like, you know, when you just say stuff, and I'm going to sit in that. I've had a lot of them as clients, and they're not all happiness and light, you know, they're actually miserable underneath all of that, because they're just trying to buffer not going into it by being something else. And the more we can go into our shit, and the more we can acknowledge it, the more we can clear it out, because none of it's actually true. It's just energy trapped in our body. And when I say it's not true, yeah, bad things happened, but then what we made them mean about ourselves is not is what's not true? Because, yeah, bad things happen and good things happen too, right? Some people forget about that. Some people just concentrate on the bad things happen thing, but great things happen too. You can't have one without the other. You can't have the bad without the good, but then you also have the good without the bad, but it's how you allow yourself to operate within the mode of these good and these bad. And when bad things happen, and you're caught in an old program, and then you're allowing that bad thing that happened actually mean something, and give it dimension within your world, and allow it to mean back up some sort of belief that you've got, that you've had from childhood, that's you just staying trapped in the past and in this reality that you've created. And what you're making it mean about yourself, something bad happens to you. And all you make it mean is that something bad happened, but it doesn't actually mean anything about you. And then you get to choose how you react to that thing, or how you don't even act to it, maybe don't react, or how you act from that point on, and that's you and your power that's in your control. Okay, coming back to my notes, radical responsibility kind of touched on that. Yep. Oh, yeah. So something else I really learned and realized through the shamanic training is, yeah, the real power of ancestral energy within us. And one tribe who I'm studied studying with, have this retreat that the retreat didn't get to go to, which I'm going to next, or actually this year now, called give back. Take back is when you get this energy, this ancestral energy, out of your body, because it's not yours, right? It's not yours, and it was formed by people many generations back who learned to believe something, and now have passed this down the line as a way of staying safe and having watched healings and had healings with this new understanding of its basically, my new understanding is there is an issue that shows up in our world, how we're acting when we don't want to act, or how we're not acting when we want to act, or how we're feeling about something, or there's some issue in our world, in our reality. And then there's the the energy that's creating that, that's causing that. And then there's just, how do we get that energy out of our body? And it's really that simple, you know, broken down into it. And admittedly, the healings aren't that simple, because it's getting the energy out that's been there and giving it back, and then all the resistances that are there, and the dancing with that. But really what that's what it comes down to. It's just energy that's vibrating in our body that's actually not ours, but it's almost like, I. Just like a guitar that's there, and then the wind is blowing across the strings, and as the wind blows across the strings, it vibrates them, and now the guitar is making sound. But it's not actually the guitar that's moving its own strings. So it's like that. It's like this other thing that's creating this vibration in our body, there's energy in our body that's impacting us, but it's not actually ours, and we can't get it out. So that's something else I have really gotten a deeper understanding on. What I've realized in relationship is it's, you know, relationship, a lot of people just fall into relationship, and it's through, you know, you might have heard wound bonding, or whatever they call it, trauma bonding. So basically, it's, it's the energy of the past that's attracting them to each other, and they're getting more of the same, or of, you know, what they've learned to expect more of what they think they're worth. Just so trauma bonding. And then also, you know, you've heard, if you've listened to a lot of my podcasts, you've heard me talking about attachment styles. There's that whole anxious versus avoidant attraction that goes on, and what I've been creating with my partner, because we're actually both anxious attachers. And what happens? Well, I'm in saying that I'm not so much of an anxious attacher anymore. I've done a lot of work, and I'm more insecure attachment so that helps with this side of it, admittedly. But what normally happens when you either get two avoidance together or two anxious attaches together. There's no chemistry. It dies because the chemistry of the avoidant and the anxious that, like fireworks and that, like, you know, amazing makeup sex and all that sort of stuff, just not there, right? So when you're two anxious attachers Together, they don't fight. There's very little fighting that goes on, because if I'm anxious, you're attaching. And what can actually happen is that one will turn into an avoidant, right? One will become more avoidant, if the other, if the other one's more anxious than them, they'll actually turn the other one into an avoidant. Then you get that chemistry dance happening. So what I've been very conscious of creating in this relationship is a chemistry that's based on a masculine and a feminine energy. And so what that means for me is allowing myself to be more and more in my feminine which is not what I used to be. And I used to be very in my masculine energy. You know, brought up as the daughter, the youngest daughter to a man who had no sons, who probably unconsciously really wanted one, and treated his youngest daughter as like, I didn't treat me like a boy, but he wanted me to beat the boys and compete with the boys. And, you know, he got a lot of pride out of that, out of me being that, and then me wanting to, obviously, you know, make my dad happy and get the get that like attention and that affection and everything for making him happy. I just competed with boys and was in my masculine energy for most of my life, until I started doing my Tantra practitioner training and realized that that was a large part of my problem with my ex husband, was that we were both competing in the masculine energy, and more often than not, my masculine energy was winning, and I was just taking control of everything. So with this, I'm very cognizant of being in my feminine and noticing when I start to drop into the controlling and taking control. And something I've realized this is a good one.
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What I realized was, when I would start to get the urge, my energy would start to go in to control the situation and just to take over, like it's okay, I'll do it. I'll do it because I'll do it more efficiently. I'll do it faster. I'll get it done. I'll get it done with less effort, less energy, right? Maybe that's true, right? Maybe it's true, but what I've realized is, just because I can do something more efficiently, more effectively and faster, it doesn't make it better. And it's the same as, like, it's one of these things. It's like, Where does our concept of best, better good come from, right? And who says that doing something one way that gets it done quicker is better than doing it another way? There is no in non duality. There is no best. There just is. And so that was a big one for me to realize that when my energy would start to flow in, and then that part of me would like, well, it's just better if it's done this way. And then to go, Why hang on? Why? What makes it better? What makes it better if it can get done in an hour versus get done in a week? It's really just our concept, our belief system, around what better is, I don't know if you're getting this, but I'm getting it that you're getting something out of it, too. So I'm being very having a lot of cognizance around noticing my urge to take over, to control, which is my patterning, and all those reasons for why it's so much better when I do it in reality, it's just that if I get it done, I get it done the way I like it. And. Therefore I get get what I want, and I stay safe, right? So that's really what that underlying program is trying to do, and then it's dressing it up and all these fancy words like, you know, more efficient. But in reality, it's just me wanting it done how I want it done, so that I get it done the way I want it done, and then I have control. So yeah, I'm being very trying to be my feminine and within that, trying to then also encourage my partner to be able to be more in his masculine, to meet me there, which is a really beautiful place to be. And, yeah, just moving deeper and deeper through the journey of that, the healing of that, that that's bringing, but also, you know, sexually, you know, exploring that, the elements of that. And I'm going in March, we're actually going to Bali for a few weeks, and then I'm staying on to do another Tantra retreat. But this one is about kind of the initiatives, and it's about women initiating men into deeper love making practices through Tantra. So I'm excited about that, and I will come back, hopefully with lots of concepts to share with you after that one. Okay, so, okay. So another thing that I'm just really sitting in at the moment with a friend of mine, beautiful Stephanie, and I have been discussing a lot about, you know, who do you choose to be? And there's a lot of stuff in the spiritual community, in the we were community around. It's, it's kind of like a, this is me, and story totally right. Me judging. But sometimes we hear stuff where certain people talking about other people, other people that they're interacting with, and maybe the person who's telling the story is maybe not acting in their highest like from their highest self, right? And then their excuse is that the other person has just chosen to have this experience through them. Oh, well, that's obviously the experience they chose to have by being with me. And maybe it's like, you know, this person can't be faithful, or maybe it's that they're choosing not to really show up as parent, or maybe it's this, but they're basically being in a state of self which maybe isn't in their highest being, and then excusing it away by putting it onto the other person and saying, Well, that's the experience that they've chose to have by be with me, right? Which is true on one hand, but then really what we've been bringing it back to and self observation within this, because obviously, when we notice it in somebody else, and the first thing we'll do is reflect it onto ourselves. And yeah, and I am seeing this in myself a little bit, which I'll talk about in a moment. And it's that, sure, maybe this other person was choosing to have an experience, but did it have to be through you? Like, who do you want to be? How do you want to show up in this world? And you know, for me, and this is not everybody's journey, I'm sure, but for me, showing up with integrity is really important. It's one of my one of my things. So, so what did I reflect on myself when I turned this back on myself, or what I saw in myself, which I wasn't very proud of, was a person who was doing a lot of talking and not a lot of doing so, yeah, I was talking about coming back to my podcast. I was talking about, you know, doing this. Was talking about doing that. I was talking about meditating every day and getting into that energy, and even before I got diagnosed with, like, a pre cancerous polyp, right? I was talking already about meditating with Joe Dispenza stuff, and going to the quantum field and on health, because I've got inflammation in my knuckles. And also about tidying up my diet and about getting back into I do this, DDP, yoga. I love it, this app, and I pay you for the subscription, and I haven't touched it for months, right? But in my head, I'm doing it. In my head, I'm doing it, but I'm just not actually doing it. And so that was me. I'm like, Here I am, like, judging other people for not, you know, showing up in their highest self integrity. And then I look at myself, and I'm like, Oh, maybe I should do a little less talking about shit and a little more doing of shit. So that's something else I've realized. I've had this aha moment the other day too, and I realized that a large proportion of society uses money as an indicator of success as opposed to happiness. I mean, when did that happen? When? When? And I probably was in that myself. And it's crazy, right? It's crazy when money is the indicator of success, not happiness. Because why do people want money? People want money because they think they'll be happy when they have the money. They think they'll be happy when they have the things. And sure, it can bring births of happiness, but it doesn't bring you a deep state of happiness. Whereas deep state of happiness can be happy without money, without money, and to me, that is a higher state of success. And so that's something I'm personally working on at the moment, too. And don't get me wrong, once again, I admit it. You know, privileged white woman, I worked really hard as a dentist for quite. Few decades, and I'm privileged enough to have some money behind me, but I'm also living a smaller life now as well. And, you know, starting a business from scratch and choosing that. And for me now, it's also the drive towards just being happy, just being able to be happy sitting still in myself and to have that radiate out through the day. That's what my goal is. So the biggest shift I've had in the last nine and a half months was happened in India and coming back from India. And I basically I got back from India, and I just had this part of my brain was missing, and I don't obviously, I mean physical matter brain. It's not like I had a lobotomy, but it felt like it. I felt like I had this huge, dark void in my mind, and all the concepts were gone. Everything was gone, and I didn't know what I believed in anymore, and I didn't know who I was and and I was like, okay, don't panic. It's okay. This is just something we're moving through, just some integration. And I walked around this hole in my mind for quite a while. It was probably a month and a half, maybe even two months before I finally realized what had gone and it felt like, you know when you pull a carrot out of the ground, well, I don't know, maybe you've never pulled a carrot out of the ground, but I've seen it happen, right? Or you pull a you pull a weed out. It has a really long, big, thick tap root. It felt like that had happened. So I'm sure that there was, there's still tendrils of roots there, right? So I'm sure that it's not totally gone. And even as I say that, I know it's not totally gone because I have been, you know, touching on remnants of it in different healings and stuff. But what had gone in the tap root was a tryingness, and what was left was just a beingness. And when I went to India,
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I went trying. I was trying, trying. I was went to study Kundalini energy. And I, you know, Kundalini and trying this, and trying to be that, and trying to be this, and I go, you know, and all this stuff and trying to be something other than what I was, and trying to be magical. And there was all this stuff that was there that I was moving into this sort of, more into that spiritual, woo, woo side of stuff. And I was sitting in one of the lectures one day, and I can't remember which one it was, and I just was like, This is bullshit. This is just, I just had this awareness that even enlightenment is not the be all and end all, and just an experience that we have now. I think a lot of people, and once again, people gonna throw stones at this for me, and this is just my belief. Doesn't mean it's true, right, just where I'm at right now. So don't hate me, but I believe where I am right now, in this moment, that enlightenment is just another experience that we're here to experience in our lives, and that I've probably been because during during certain meditations, I knew what it felt like to have this energy running through me, even though I haven't had it in this life, I could feel it. I could feel the deep knowledge of it, and even touch into past life memories of having had it. And I don't have it in this life, right? And it's, I think there's a big belief that that's what we're working back to, and then, once we're enlightened, we don't have to come back anymore. What if that's not true? What if it's just another experience? What if it's just like, you know, we've had experiences of being deeply in the darkest shadow, maybe it's just an experience of being deeply in the lightest light. Anyway, I don't know, but anyway, there was a tryingness about me, and it was gone. And that was that period of time. How ironic, right? That this was the period of time that the universe just cleared everything away from me. All the retreats that I was going to go to got canceled, or I got sick and I couldn't go to them, and I just had to sit in this state of not knowing what was missing, not knowing who I was, until I finally realized what it was and I was more in a state of beingness and just acceptance. Now was that the end of it? No, I have been through many healings since then, and even when I was in Hobart with my partner, I went through this whole like awareness of not knowing who I was and realizing that all I was was a cobbled together concept of other people's belief systems and words and ideas, and every word that came out of me was just somebody else's belief or idea from my childhood, right of being mapped into and my by my parents and by my teachers and by friends and stuff, and I was just this cobbled together like, you know, just concept of other people's ideas and belief systems, and I had no idea who I was. And I realized the power of that was that I realized, you know, I talked in many, many episodes and many, many times I've talked about the power of the present moment and about how that's only the the only real thing. But. In that moment when I was in this state of realizing that all there was was cobbled together memories and ideas and concepts and beliefs and stuff, and I didn't know actually who I was underneath all of that was that the present moment saved me. It's what gave me the clarity I needed to be able to get through that and to have a healing which actually helped me get beneath it and closer to Yeah, feeling who I am, and being able to act and know who I am. But it was the clarity of the present moment in that when I could feel actually it was when my partner, he was touching my skin, just very, very gently stroking my skin, and when I was able to be fully in that present moment, just with his touch on my skin. Then that was me. I knew that was me in that moment. And then I was like, Oh, it was like, it was like, this crack through the wall to what was behind it and who I really was, and how I could experience things purely in the present moment, and I could feel the sun on my skin. And if I really concentrated on how that felt, that was me experiencing the sun on my skin. And it wasn't a program, it wasn't a belief system, it was just me being in that present moment experience it so that that that, like, gave me a really deep understanding of the importance of the present moment. And, you know, we talked about it. I've talked about how the past is just a memory. It's just a program, right? It is the past has created all the programs that we're in that then creates the future. So the past is just a memory, the future is just a dream. The only real thing is this present moment. I'd said it over and over again, but I didn't really get it until that moment that the only time we are really ourselves and really beneath the programs, and really beneath the layers is when we're fully in that present moment in ourselves. So that was something I realized. I what I learned this year, I learned, I learned a lot about electro forming, electroplating, definitely from a geeky science, chemical side of things. So it really satisfies that part of me. I talked about the energy and stuff, actually, one of the things I learned, which, you know, made me realize, probably I might have mentioned it before, I have some facial blindness, probably, I would say, a mild to medium dose of facial blindness where I don't recognize people, don't recognize faces, unless I know someone really, really well, and I realized that what I actually see on people a lot of the time is energy. And I've realized this in the past, when I had someone I was intimate with, and they would look totally different. Their face looked totally different when they were being loving and when they weren't being loving, they look like two totally different people. Their face shapes were different. In one it was long and thin, and the other, it was short and square. It was like the wildest thing, right? But where it really came home to me this month or this year was when we went to Canberra, and my partner is an identical twin, and to me, they look nothing alike. And my my my partner's sister in law was saying, how weird was it like seeing, you know, seeing him like in another person. And I was just like, oh yeah, it was really weird. But I was actually thinking, well, they don't actually really look alike to me at all, which was interesting. And that's when I realized, Oh, it's a different energy. And not saying that one of them's got a good energy, one one's got a bad energy, or a nice energy, and not nice energy, they both have beautiful energy, but they're both, they're both different energies. And I even sometimes watch the play on my partner's face when he's moving in and out of a masculine, you know, dark masculine energy. He looks totally different to me than when he's more in a child energy, or in a little boy energy, or in his feminine energy. And to me, he looks really different. And I can, I can see what energies he's in. Now I know about the look by what his face looks like. I know what energy he's in. So that was interesting for me. And which brings me to something else, I really realized it's very important, and I got this through the shamanic training. I mean, I'd heard about archetypes before, you know, when I studied psychotherapy and Carl Jung's archetypes, but I really got it in the shamanic training a couple of months ago, when we're talking about being in the adult archetype, and what does that mean to us? And we sat down and like we really analyzed when we were in our adult when we're in our power, what were the words, right? Once again, coming to this vibrational energy of the words, what were the words and their energy that were made a part of our adult archetype? And everybody's was different, right there, when everybody's energy was different, and what, what it brought, what they were in, in their archetype, was different. And then what that showed me was that, like, these archetypes are actually like, you know, I've done in the spiritual healing, when, at the end, when we're doing the healing, and we. In different energies, and we might bring in forgiveness, and we might bring in love, and we're layering these things up. But an archetype is an is like a combination of different energies all together in a ball, like of energy that we can bring into us and we can align ourselves with, and then we can be that, because we are just energy. So, you know, the archetype of the adult for me was like, you know, you like that integrity, the confidence, you know, powerful, but not in an arrogant, bad way, right? Just being in my power, having my voice, but then also being curious and being playful and being adventurous and and being a creator, and all these different things to me. Being in my adult is I can feel that energy versus when I drop into my child, or when a child hijacks me, like what I was talking about, that little part that wanted me to be sicker than I was. I wasn't sick at all, right? She just wanted just a little bit, just a little bit. And that's a child energy that's there wanting to hijack me and take me out of my adulthood so that she can feel safe in a different way. So, yeah, I really got that. I got that we can choose what vibrational energy we want to be in and call it into our body and step into it when we're really aware of it, because we are just energy, and we get to choose, right? And anything other than a choice is just a program running. And I even realized that today I was going for a walk, and I was feeling really sad and really lonely and like this sort of like stepping into, like, you know, you know, into the person who is recording the podcast and who is doing the yoga and he's doing the meditating, for some reason was making me feel really sad and alone. And I think it's because all the years that I was doing it, I was sad and alone, right? And it's like this. It's been like
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in my my neurons have been wired together with that. And there needs to be a pruning that goes on where the sad and alone is pruned out, and just the power of being able to be in myself and be be alone without being lonely and be in my power and meditate and do yoga and things like that are still there, but that other thing is gone. Okay, so where am I at? Well, yeah, I said it before. I've not been acting in my truth. You know, I've been doing a lot of talking and not a lot of doing about certain things. So today, I said to myself, where would, what would it be like a year from now, just a year from now, if I meditated and did my yoga every day, even if it was just 10 minutes, just 10 minutes of each just exercised, you know, went for a walk, did a bit of yoga, did a bit of meditating, what would my life be like a year from Now if I just did that. And then I decided to go find out. Let's go find out. What will it be like a year from now, from having done that, you know, how will I feel? What will my life be look like? What will I look like? How will I feel on my body, you know? And also tightening up my diet as well, like cutting the sugar back out, you know, Christmas was not good from a sugar point of view. And, you know, I'm still in it, so I've decided to, yeah, put my money where my mouth is, and actually do it. And just for a year. I mean, it feels like, when we step into these things and we're like, that's it. From now on, I'm not doing this or I'm doing that, and that's, that's a lot of pressure, right? Not a pressure on the inner child. But if I'm just saying, Okay, let's see what a year from now. I mean, if it gets I can break it down to a month from now, and say, a month from now, a week from now, a day from now. You know, how do I feel? How do I you know? How do I show up in this world? So that's where I'm at with that. Yeah, the next year I really want to get, as I said, savage boho studio, to the point where I'm just in online sales and just creating from commission pieces and running workshops. I think that that would be really fun, yeah. And I'm just really still working into what my purpose is, right? And that was one of the reasons, you know, why it took me nine and a half months to put another episode out, a podcast episode out, like, what was my reason for doing it? And then, you know, I hopped on to simple cast where I hosted my podcast, and I had a look, and there were 697 episode downloads between when I put my last episode out, and between now. And I know that's not a lot for a podcast, but for me, it is 697 episodes, and that's not 697 people. Maybe it might be 69 people who listen to 10 episodes, but there's still 69 people who were getting something out of my words and maybe finding value in them, and maybe it's helping them change and shift their own lives. So what is my purpose? I still have no freaking idea. I feel like it's to help women, and I feel like it's to help women have happier lives, to be happier, to find self love, to be more secure in themselves. You know, I'm talking to a lot of friends who you know same as me in our early 50s, and who are really. Noticing like they're feeling invisible, like, now that their children have grown up, they feel like their purpose is done, right, and they're feeling invisible and the workspace. And I think these women are where I'd like to be having, you know, helping, helping them find themselves. You know, because so many women lose themselves in being a mother and helping them find themselves again, and to find the Self Love Again, the self acceptance again, and their confidence again, and to realize that they're not as and this is not my words, but what has been told to me how they feel. They're not washed up, they're not invisible, and they're still in their power. So I think that that's where my purpose is, in helping helping other women just, you know, find a new lease of life and to find joy. And how am I going to do that? Well, definitely through the podcast, you know, maybe through the energy that is in my jewelry as well. Maybe helping women find joy in making jewelry. Maybe through my books. You know, when I release that book I've been writing for three years, just a fiction book, but I want to get that out there. Maybe it's through my books that they find, you know, some fun and some adventure and some stuff. There's a lot of ways I can help in small ways, and it doesn't have to be a big way. Doesn't have to be, you know, running some massive business. And that's how I used to think it had to be. And that was my ego, that was me wanting to be important, and now that that's gone, I really find myself, yeah, what do I want? And is just being happy? Enough of a purpose. Is just being a happy have a happy life, enough of a purpose. And I don't see why not, right? Let's see why it can't be. But I also do feel like I would like to help other women also have a happy life, and maybe that's my purpose anyway. I think I have no idea how long this episode is, but I just have a feeling it's pretty long, so I apologize for that. I hope that you got something out of it. Moving forward, my plan is to release a podcast episode every two weeks that felt okay for me, not too much pressure. And I don't want to be just talking for the sake of talking and releasing stuff, for the sake of releasing and being on a deadline. I want to be able to bring, you know, lots of insight and and the other thing I'm planning on doing, too is finding really inspirational women and doing some interviews every now and then on other inspirational women. So that's is my plan anyway. Thank you so much for being here and for listening to this, and I hope that you have an amazing rest of your week. I just want to say thanks for listening to this episode of the living through heart podcast. If you want to find out more about me and what I'm up to, head on over to my website, Donna Joy usher.com they're going to find information on my fiction books, on my jewelry business, savage boho studio, and also on any content tools or courses I'm creating to help women to feel empowered, enriched, important and in love with their lives. You