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Healing the Sisterhood Wound & Embracing Feminine Liberation - With Lauren Melissa | EP 23
62 Plays1 year ago
In this episode I’m joined by Lauren Melissa, a feminine embodiment and somatic alchemy coach on a mission to liberate the feminine.
In this conversation we explore:
- Identifying and healing your sisterhood wound
- Toxic relationships
- The power of liberation for women and feminine magic
- Finding harmony and sacred union of masculine & feminine energies
- The transformation that occurs when working with a mentor & what to look out for
- The important of nervous system regulation and practices you can try out
- Being in your body vs feeling unsafe
- Cultivating internal safety
- & so much more!
LINKS:
- Join Becoming Her, my free 5 day challenge for the women ready to embrace her radiant rebirth and step into your bold, empowered self to receive the desires you’ve been dreaming about.
- Book an Elevate Your Love coaching call with me. For you if you’re ready to unleash your relationship potential and create a relationship transformation roadmap so you can finally get the love, sex and intimacy you want.
- Join the Wild & Free Retreat Waitlist to get the details about my next retreat in Costa Rica.
FOLLOW:
IG: @iamstephmorris
IG: @iamlaurenmelissa
FB: Lauren Melissa Archut
Website:
Share this episode and tag me @iamstephmorris on Instagram to spread the word! Don’t forget to leave a review on Apple and Spotify, then send me an email to hello@stephmorris.co & I’ll send you a custom Unfiltered Femme Embodied Meditation (screenshot your review and attach to the email you send).
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Transcript
Introduction to Unfiltered Femme Podcast
00:00:04
Speaker
Welcome to the Unfiltered Femme podcast. Your new world to get the lowdown on all things pleasure, sexuality, the mysterious female body, dating, relationships and everything you need to know to step into your most unfiltered, unapologetic, empowered and turned on self.
00:00:22
Speaker
I'm Steph Morris, a love, sex and intimacy coach and along with some incredibly fabulous guests, I'm here to spill the tea on those topics that are typically hush hush. The juicy things that you want to know all about that have maybe been a little bit too shy to talk about.
00:00:39
Speaker
Think of me as your fearless guide and partner in crime, creating a space for the unfiltered, the raw, the authentic chats where nothing is off limits and there's no such thing as too much. The Unfiltered Femme podcast is all about breaking down those walls and celebrating what it means to be an unfiltered, feminine being. I hope you're ready for a wild ride. Let's dive right in.
Meet Lauren: Feminine Embodiment Coach
00:01:02
Speaker
Welcome back to the Unfiltered Femme podcast. I am so excited for this conversation. Today I am joined by a magical woman called Lauren who is a feminine embodiment and somatic alchemy coach on a mission to liberate the feminine. Welcome, Lauren. How are you doing today? Oh, hello. I'm so excited to be here and I am wonderful. Happy to hear that.
00:01:25
Speaker
I would love to kick this off by knowing a little bit more around your
What Does It Mean to Liberate the Feminine?
00:01:29
Speaker
mission. This was going to be my first question. What does it mean to you to liberate the feminine and what does your mission look and feel like? Yes. What does it mean to me to liberate the feminine? Liberation is obviously freedom and the feminine has been
00:01:47
Speaker
There has been so much constriction and different levels of oppression throughout the ages for not just women, but the feminine and feminine magic and feminine mysticism and the oracle of the feminine and the power of the feminine. There's women and then there's the feminine. It's liberating women into their full power, their full freedom. I like to say taking back
00:02:16
Speaker
throne as an equal force in the world. Because for me it's all about sacred union. It's not about bringing down the patriarchy for matriarchy, it's about harmony and sacred union and union of the masculine and feminine energies and bringing that into the whole world. Liberating the feminine is really about bringing her back into her truth, into her knowing, into her
00:02:44
Speaker
I love that. That's so powerful and it's really important in this day and age with all of the messaging that's going around on social media for us to make that distinction that it's not about trying to tear one down whilst elevating the other. It's really about that sacred union of both. So super powerful. I would love to know what was your journey to liberation of your own inner feminine and inner masculine? How did you get into this becoming your mission and doing this work?
Lauren's Journey to Feminine Empowerment
00:03:15
Speaker
So my journey starts with a series of severely abusive relationships. So I went through my own journey of personal oppression and trauma and silencing of myself as a woman and my own feminine. I was very much like a tomboy, one of the boys and
00:03:40
Speaker
had this very it was always innately very feminine yet I didn't have sisterhood and a lot of female friends and there was like some wounding there as well. So my journey actually began with the feminine when I did my yoga teacher training in Guatemala in 2016 and that's when I attended my first
00:04:02
Speaker
sister circle. And at first it was like, oh, a circle of women. That sounds, I don't know, catty and not something I want to be a part of. And then I instantly was converted because I was like, Oh, this is way different. This circle of conscious women truly supporting each other. And this is real sisterhood. And this is what it's about. And I started to over the years connect the pieces around how women are pitted against each other. And
00:04:30
Speaker
the sister wound and the witch wound and all of these things came into my field to be healed. So that was like the beginning of my journey and it grew from there where I was through this process of
00:04:47
Speaker
healing my trauma and healing. I started to learn about the nervous system and the somatic work. And I was weaving in these pieces with the feminine as well, which all led me to the journey of the priestess path.
00:05:04
Speaker
and really diving into the feminine body and the middle piece in many somatic trainings, which is the womb work, the womb alchemy, working with the yoni, the armoring, and just really coming into the feminine body and healing on a deep somatic level. So it was like very much an evolution, my journey into the feminine. And then the piece that a lot of people do miss, which is healing the masculine.
00:05:33
Speaker
We focus so much on the feminine and to really be in our feminine, we have to heal our relationship with the masculine and the masculine with us. Thank you for sharing all of that. I literally could cry because everything you're saying, I'm like, yes! I love all of this stuff too. And I think I was telling you before, it's on a prep call with my good friend who's supporting me at my retreat. And I was mapping out, we're going through the schedule for
Societal Pressures and the Sister Wound
00:05:55
Speaker
all of the days.
00:05:56
Speaker
We were literally just talking about this, about how important it is to do the work of healing our relationship with our own inner masculine and the masculine in general. And that's always the work that I guide women in first before we dive into healing the feminine. Because for me on my own journey, it was such a missing piece. I was healing the feminine, doing so much work because I was so disconnected with that part of myself, but I did no work.
00:06:21
Speaker
to reclaim and to heal the masculine, to heal my relationship and to follow a relationship with my own inner divine masculine. And it was so profound when I stepped into that and was like, holy shit, why were the feminine trainings I was doing and all of this work, it was not teaching me to do that step first, which is so important. And like you started with, find that harmony and balance with both and see that both are so sacred and it's being
00:06:49
Speaker
in both that sacred union both which is where the magic happens we don't want to be all one or the other it's so beautiful so I love that you shared that so much and literally all of the things you're saying it's just so in alignment because I'm prepping for my retreat and all of these pieces are stuff that I love to do so let's dive in there are so many different ways and questions I have of things to to ask you about but
00:07:13
Speaker
Let's talk about this sister wound because this is something that is very common in our society and it is really an important part of this feminine reclamation and liberation journey, I believe. And I know when I first heard about this, I found it a little bit boring. I was like, I don't want to do that work. Like it sounds not exciting, like something that I want to dive into. So what has been
00:07:37
Speaker
your experience of healing the sisterhood wound, what does that even mean to you? And how like, where do people begin with this? What I have seen is the way that the world or the society that we live in that the conditioning has put this
00:07:58
Speaker
pressure on women to compete with one another, which interestingly enough goes all the way back to the housewives of the 50s who were told to believe that they needed to have it all together and that they needed to have this home-cooked meal on the table and the house was all put together.
00:08:17
Speaker
And these women, they would go to a house party and they would see, oh, she has it all together. Why can't I? But the reality is there's the plastic on the couches when nobody's home and the meals weren't even always home cooked and women weren't talking to each other. So they were just separated and suffering on their own. Women are so much more powerful together. So how do we control women? We keep them separate. We keep them othering themselves. We keep them in.
00:08:45
Speaker
So for my personal story with the sister wound actually looks a little bit different when I entered into the abusive relationship. I was pulled away from my blood sister who was my best friend and my best friend growing up from birth and I
00:09:08
Speaker
realized years later that I felt like there wasn't this deep wound of me being burned by other women some women that is their story they've been burned but for me it was like I abandoned these women in my life that that are so close to me that meant so much to me that I loved I abandoned them for this relationship for this man that destroyed me really so that's my personal story with the sister wound
00:09:36
Speaker
We can look in so many different ways, but it all comes back to separating us and keeping us apart and keeping us at odds with each other instead of coming together and being vulnerable together and really being supportive of each other and working together because we're so powerful together.
00:09:59
Speaker
Mm. I so agree. There is such a magic that happens when women come together, especially to do growth and healing work. It is truly out of this world experience, I believe, and feel too. Are there signs that you're able to share that could help women identify if they have a sister wound that is perhaps present that they could use working to heal?
Healing the Sister Wound
00:10:27
Speaker
Mm.
00:10:29
Speaker
Yes, the first one that is coming to mind instantly is feelings of jealousy or envy towards other women.
00:10:38
Speaker
And that is a really good sign of a few things. Is there a sister wound there that I can work through? And what is this woman mirroring back to me that I am denying in myself? So that is one sign right there. Another would be the very common saying of, oh, I'm not friends with women.
00:11:02
Speaker
women are catty or women are drama or I'd rather just hang out with the guys. That was like my big one right there was like, yeah, I would rather just chill with the guys than deal with that. Just like a general feeling of wanting to distance yourself and not be in intimate spaces with women or having a fear of being judged. Another big one, fear of being judged. And that's going to come in a lot if
00:11:32
Speaker
your sister wound is more around your experiences of being burned by women. That's such a good one. That just made me think about how I used to be, which was I was very judgmental of other women, but the way that it showed up was I perceived other women to be very judgmental of me.
00:11:50
Speaker
So I didn't think I was being judgy, but I've talked about this a little bit before on my podcast that when I would go somewhere, for instance, on a retreat or I could put myself out there in certain situations, like this is pre doing any of this work.
00:12:05
Speaker
But when I would go into these spaces, I would immediately scope out the women in the room and rank them and see who do I perceive to be on a higher rank than me, AKA, maybe more cool or maybe they were more powerful or actually more embodied in their sexuality, more confident. And then I would be like, I'm below them. So I already am prejudging them that they don't like me. So I'm not going to hang out with them. And I will only put myself around and gravitate towards the people who I perceive
00:12:35
Speaker
ultimately to not be as confident or as assured of themselves. So I'd be like, I'm going to just go over that with them because they won't judge me. But really, I was judging myself and judging these other women. And it was such an insight for me going on this journey of, oh, I see what I'm doing and I don't deep down feel worthy.
00:12:56
Speaker
of being around them but it was very present for me and it was great insight that we got some work to do here because my experiences were definitely feeling that judginess and cattiness and that pitting together of other women. I didn't really experience this supportive nature that we can have
00:13:15
Speaker
which I now have and I'm so grateful for because there is something so magic about having women in your life that you can message and call who are like, yes, queen. Yes, whatever you're doing, they will support you and cheer you on. It literally is a vast and really one of my desires for all women is to have that level of friendship where they can just be super open and share anything and everything from their relationship, their sex life,
00:13:42
Speaker
There are bodily functions like everything and have that support. It's so amazing. And it's not something that I had until recently in the most recent years. I wish this for all women. It's super powerful. I actually want to like reflect how
00:13:58
Speaker
I mirror your experience there so much. And I definitely went through that same thing where it was like, oh, like I'm lesser than so they're judging me. So I'm going to stay over here where it's smaller and safer and all of that. And that kind of made me think of something as well. Another sign that is more subtle and maybe harder to notice until you're more into the work of coming into the body and knowing what that feels like.
00:14:25
Speaker
But another subtle sign can be noticing when you're leaving the body, especially when you are around. You walk into the room of a group of women, are you staying centered, grounded in your body, or are you like, whoop, I'm out of here, I gotta dissociate, and I gotta put on a mask, I need to perform in some way to be good. How can people identify if that's something that they're doing, and then what is a practice that they can do to ensure they are staying grounded and in their body?
00:14:54
Speaker
Yeah, taking a moment to feel yourself. So like you walk into a room and you notice, am I still feeling myself? Do I feel myself grounded fully in my body? And that's something that we want to practice before we get in the room, right? That's something that we want to practice is why we do
00:15:15
Speaker
our practices. This is why we do the feminine embodiment work and we do breath work and other different types of practices where when we're alone, we can learn what does it feel like to be in my body? And it's really just a practice sometimes can be as simple as sitting down, closing your eyes, bringing your attention inward and saying, okay, what do I feel here?
00:15:40
Speaker
What does it feel like in my body? And just noticing sensation, noticing where our awareness is, noticing where do I feel my energy? Do I feel that all of my energy is up here in my head or even like above my head? Do I feel that it's maybe partially in my body but I'm still a little up here? Or do I feel fully grounded, fully rooted in my womb, in my root, in my seat?
00:16:10
Speaker
fully in myself. And it is a practice to learn what that feels like, but it's an exploration. It's just coming into the body and exploring. And then the more that we begin to understand what it feels like to be in body, then we can start to notice when I walk into a room, am I still in body or has my energy lifted up and out of me so that I can escape the experience a little bit?
00:16:37
Speaker
Thank you for sharing that. That's really powerful. And it always starts before putting yourself in those situations that you perhaps know can be a little challenging or uncomfortable to have that practice at home. Super powerful. Let's talk about safety, which I think is something that ties into what you were just sharing.
00:16:57
Speaker
I think this is something that people don't think about too much. We think of safety often in terms of get home safe or travel safe, like the large safety pieces. But what does safety
Recognizing and Healing Trauma
00:17:10
Speaker
mean? Like, how can somebody know if they are experiencing a lack of safety in their body? Where has this potentially come from? And what is some ways that they can identify this?
00:17:21
Speaker
Yes. This is where I'm going to get a little bit into the nerdy science-y stuff. Love it. It really just comes down to the nervous system now. So the nervous system does something called neuroception, where our nervous system is picking up on cues subconsciously, without our awareness, is picking up on cues all around us all of the time.
00:17:44
Speaker
So it's picking up on things as subtle as tone of voice and expression on someone's face. The environment around us, someone else's, the energy someone else is putting off from their nervous system, we're picking up on that.
00:17:59
Speaker
And our nervous system then, so it's picking up on these cues and then it's using our memory bank of experiences. And all of this is happening instantaneously without us knowing it. And it is going into our memory bank of experiences and saying, is this safe based off of my prior experience of life?
00:18:21
Speaker
And this is where we can be in situations where sometimes our nervous system is picking up on something that's actually dangerous. And this is alerting us to danger so that we can get to safety. And this is a healthy function of the nervous system. The problem comes in when we have had some type of trauma in the past that is still being stored in our body that hasn't been released. It's being actually like stored as a stress response in our system.
00:18:49
Speaker
And now the nervous system is picking up on something that isn't actually dangerous, but it reminds our body, our system of something that was dangerous in the past that we're still holding on to. And when that happens, it's triggering danger where there isn't danger. And this causes us to then want to escape
00:19:12
Speaker
the body or also shuts down our social engagement system. And when our social engagement system starts down, it's harder for us to interact with others, engage with others, be intimate with others. How can people connect with safety and how can they identify in themselves if they are experiencing a lack of safety? What does that look like? How can they identify? That's perhaps something that they need to work on, that they have that stored in their body from past experiences.
00:19:41
Speaker
So this is the nervous system creates this chain reaction and it's going to trigger some type of response in us, some type of activated response. We're going to feel the urge and it can be subtle. It could be big and it can be subtle. The urge to flee. So to escape the experience or even just back up a little bit and not fully go into maybe
00:20:09
Speaker
a full conversation with someone, we want to distance ourselves. We want to put space between us and the experience. There could be this subtle urge to fight, which can be big, but it can be so subtle where it's just this irritability where we are clashing against something. And it's again, it comes down to being able to notice the subtleties within ourselves, which is again comes back to that practice.
00:20:35
Speaker
or we're gonna experience the urge to just shut down and free. So it comes back to being able to be in awareness and notice these things that are happening subtly in our body. And that's where it's, okay, I don't feel safe. If I'm experiencing these reactions, it must mean that something doesn't feel safe. And then how do I come back to safety? And there's so many
00:21:02
Speaker
practices, but in the moment, I always like to come back to breath, come back to breath, come back into the body. And even if you have to take a moment and step away and just breathe, hold yourself, hold your body and say, I'm here, I'm safe, I've got you. And this is like in the moment, right? It's like,
00:21:22
Speaker
soothing and comforting ourselves. Then we go home and then we go into deeper somatic practice which we can do on our own but it's really helpful at this point to have a mentor or someone that we're working with that we can go into deep somatic practice. Maybe there's inner child work that we need to do or just a somatic practice to release these stuck energies and these stuck emotions.
00:21:45
Speaker
When you start to have the awareness that there is perhaps a lack of safety inside of the body, it's really hard to resolve that, right? When you don't know what it means or why it's there or like the power of the body. It's so incredible to have that support and witness from somebody who can guide you on the journey of
00:22:06
Speaker
finding safety, coming back to safety and perhaps releasing in a somatic way. What are some of your favorite practices that you find super powerful that you would work with clients through if they were experiencing a lack of safety, perhaps around somebody, like for instance, a woman, it doesn't feel fully safe around men. What would be a practice that you would guide them in?
00:22:32
Speaker
finding safe spaces and safe people that we can unravel. Being witnessed, having a loving witness and someone that we can truly co-regulate with. So someone who has a regulated nervous system, who is going to love and accept all of us. Finding those people, whether it's in community, in friendship, in family, or in a mentorship or therapist container.
00:23:00
Speaker
having that safe space, that is going to start to teach our nervous system safety, even if it's with one person to start with. And this is what teaches us to start knowing what does safety even feel like in my body? What does it feel like to be safe with another human? And I think that is one of the most important things. We could do all the practices in the world, but if
00:23:25
Speaker
We don't, if we can't bring it into a relationship with another human and feel safe, then that's the piece right there. But then when it comes to women, especially, and this is why I say this is like the biggest missing piece in so many somatic like trainings, is it's missing this piece with women. And so doing the womb work, doing Yoni de armoring, doing getting to know your body as a woman,
00:23:53
Speaker
and doing actual womb massage practices and yoni massage practices. And for anyone who doesn't know, yoni is the Sanskrit word for pussy. Women hold so much of our trauma in the womb, in the yoni, in this area, and there's so much tension being held there. And the base of our vagus nerve actually sits at our cervix as well. Doing the work, the actual hands-on work,
00:24:23
Speaker
in this area is absolutely life-changing for women, bringing us back into softness, taking our body that it is safe to soften and it is safe to be fully in our body. And the more we do this work and the more we come fully into our body and the more that we trust ourselves and that we're not looking outside of ourselves and the more that we can find this center of anchor
00:24:53
Speaker
truth and trust within us, the more grounded we're able to stay when we are in situations where we can assess, is this person safe?
Balancing Masculine and Feminine Energies
00:25:02
Speaker
Is this man safe? Do I need to remove myself from this situation? Or am I safe here where I can connect deeper with this human or this man especially?
00:25:15
Speaker
I love all of the pieces that you've just shared there. All things that I absolutely love and encourage women to do. Where do people begin? If they're like, womb, healing, yoni, massage. This sounds intimidating. Where the fuck do I begin? Because I think for a lot of women it's, you're telling me to massage my yoni.
00:25:38
Speaker
or Diyama, Mayoni, what does that mean? What are the benefits? Where do people begin with these epic practices? So there's where do I begin to do this on my own. And then there's getting support in really learning how to learning the map of the feminine body and learning how to really go deep into all of these places. But
00:26:05
Speaker
On our own, one of my favorite places to start is actually with breast massage. And yes, there are techniques that we can learn to do this. And we can also just love ourselves and touch ourselves. And it's really, it really comes down to, again, sensation and coming into the body and allowing ourselves to feel sensation. And maybe we don't even start with touch. Maybe we start with just coming back to
00:26:33
Speaker
closing my eyes, what do I feel? What do I feel in my body? And then just beginning to slowly touch our skin, what does that feel like? Touch just feeling sensation in the body again. And that sensual sensation with ourselves, being with ourselves, being in that intimate space with ourselves. Some women haven't
00:26:58
Speaker
touch themselves and I don't even just mean in like a sexual pleasure type of way which that's amazing as well but just touching our own skin, touching our own body, starting there and some women need to start slow because again they haven't even touched themselves in years or ever or even thought about it. Okay like why would I do that? Because that's how we start to feel
00:27:24
Speaker
all of these sensations and come back to that. And then it's just start exploring, just explore your body. That's where you want to start. So beautiful. Full permission slip for all the women to explore their bodies, get to know your own body, touch it in all the places, explore. I think it's so wild that we do just outsource so much of that to another person. And we don't really think about,
00:27:50
Speaker
providing that self-touch, sensual touch, self-massage to ourselves. And I think even for men as well, it's important for them to also be able to touch and nourish themselves in a loving way, and not to always be seeking that from another person, even though it's amazing and beautiful. From somebody else, and we all have that desire and that need, it's so powerful when we can meet our own needs in that way and really find
00:28:18
Speaker
through our own skin, our own hands, our own hair. So I love that you shared that so much. I think it's also really important to remember there's no right and wrong way. There is never a right or wrong when it comes to the body and touch and sexuality.
00:28:35
Speaker
I would love to dive into a little bit because it's not something that we've explored so much on the podcast yet, but the path of healing the masculine. And I'd love to hear more if you're open to sharing about where you started out in these abusive relationships, where you lost touch with the important feminine beings in your life and how you've come from that world into the world of the work that you're doing today, liberating the feminine, helping
00:29:04
Speaker
women to connect with that whilst also healing the masculine. What did that journey look like? What really helped you to go on that journey of healing? I really just saw that version of me six years ago with so much love and compassion for how she had allowed herself to be led so astray and was just completely lost in the woods with nothing but a vision.
00:29:33
Speaker
a determination to heal and to find her way home. And for me, a feeling. And I am definitely blessed and privileged in the sense that I had a really great childhood and upbringing. So there was always this feeling that I knew was there. What I now would say is, oh, a regulated nervous system, this feeling of being peace and centered.
00:30:04
Speaker
I didn't know how to explain it at the time. I just knew that something had been lost from me and I was determined to get it back no matter what it took. And it took, it was a long journey for me. It was a long journey. I went through, I went down a path of spiritual healing that there was a lot of spiritual bypassing and like toxic positivity involved. And there was a lot of healing in that part of my journey.
00:30:33
Speaker
But then I ended up in another abusive relationship because I wasn't actually doing the deeper work. And it was after that I really started to look at my own patterns and start to do the shadow work and the deeper inner work of, okay, what is it about me that is allowing these men in my life and attracted to these men? And I started to really shift my own patterns. And that started me on the journey of learning about the nervous system.
00:31:02
Speaker
of somatic work deeper and deeper into the feminine work. And then there was just this level of determination. And there was definitely a kind of like a split with my masculine when I, there was a point in my life when I was living like very much from my masculine and I was very driven and motivated to go. And I was like in that mode.
00:31:33
Speaker
And then I hit severe burnout. And that is where there was like a split with my masculine. And I went, it was like that pendulum swing where I went all the way into my feminine. And it was like only pleasure, only feeling good, only like just this leaning back. And obviously that does not work either. So it was like this swing into the other direction. And it was like, I don't trust
00:32:01
Speaker
my masculine anymore to not lead me back to burnout. So I'm just gonna stay in my feminine and we're just gonna flow and everything's gonna be wishy-washy. It was, it became this like nothing could land. There was so much creativity and so much flow and it was juicy and it was like good in so many ways and it was very healing for me and
00:32:27
Speaker
Nothing could land here on earth because I had disconnected so much from my masculine. Once I came into, okay, I need to learn how to heal my relationship with the masculine. I need to learn how to trust masculine again. And that part of the journey really changed everything and brought everything back into alignment and secret union within.
00:32:54
Speaker
I resonate deeply with your story. I think there's so many of us who focus on the work around the feminine, who've experienced that journey, right? Of discovering the feminine, healing it, and then being like, I want to live here and be all in pleasure and orgasms and flow. And it's amazing and it feels so good. And then after a little bit of time, it's like nothing's really happening. Like I'm not really moving forward in any direction. I'm just floating through life.
00:33:20
Speaker
And it starts to be a little bit, or my experience, it was quite chaotic. And I lost connection with a really big part of myself that has that drive and that ambition and motivation. And I think it's such a, like for me personally, that's such a beautiful part of me that I love, that
00:33:40
Speaker
wasn't necessary to disconnect from because I was labeling it as masculine. And the same as you said, I didn't trust myself in the masculine. I was like, masculine is bad. Masculine is wrong. I don't want to be in it because it's destroying my relationship. Like I put that down to why my relationship was lacking intimacy and chemistry at the time. So it was very fearful around that, my own inner masculine. So that reclamation journey was so powerful and so divine to come into harmony of
00:34:09
Speaker
with my masculine and with my feminine and to be able to see and celebrate both in such a powerful way. It's such an epic journey. Literally everyone I speak to though has similar in this work, has like similar experiences. We have to go so far one way and then the other way and then we're like, okay, now I got it. But then I personally still find I'm constantly relearning the lesson and have times where I'm like way more
00:34:36
Speaker
experiencing one energy and have the awareness so it's okay. But yeah, it's fun. It's all a journey and there's layers to it. And having the awareness is key. And yes, we have to do something with that awareness. But once we have the awareness, then we keep coming back to it. And it's easier and easier to come back to. And I love that you said,
00:34:58
Speaker
that it all became like chaos because it is, it's the feminine is the river, the rushing water, and the masculine is the river bank that contains the chaos that contains the energy of the feminine. Totally. And keeps it in direction so that we can do something with it. Yeah. Yeah. It's a very necessary part of life. What is some of your favorite nervous system regulation practices?
Nervous System Regulation and Community
00:35:28
Speaker
Hmm. Yes. Um, so breath is definitely one of them. Um, and breath can be simple and also a little bit tricky. And I think that the simplicity of it is just always coming back to conscious breath because
00:35:52
Speaker
Breathing is such an automatic thing that we all do. And then when we come into conscious breath, it's just noticing how am I breathing? Sometimes not even trying to change it, but just noticing the breath can start to bring you back. And consciously breathing is coming back to that conscious breath. And then there are very specific breath practices, depending on which state of the nervous system you're in. And that's where it gets a little bit more, there's a little bit more complexity around
00:36:22
Speaker
knowing different breath patterns and also learning the states of the nervous system. So once you've learned the states of the nervous system and knowing these different breath patterns to help. But I think just coming back to breath is always so powerful. Some other practices, I like to do a lot of vagal toning as well.
00:36:46
Speaker
There's like a handful of those types of practices. Some of them are with the voice, but even just humming, humming and sleeping is very toning for the vagus nerve and can be very regulating to the system. It's actually a signal of like safety to hear your own voice.
00:37:07
Speaker
so and it doesn't matter if you sound good or can sing that's such like a construct of no we're humans we're just meant to like dance and sing it doesn't matter what you look like it doesn't matter what you feel sound like speaking of dancing that's one of my biggest favorite practices dancing and then also shaking i love a good shaking practice
00:37:28
Speaker
What's your favorite vibe of playlist or songs like music to dance to? For me, my favorite, and there's a range depending on my mood, but my ultimate favorite is Slinky Silky. So any of the old 90s songs that have been like
00:37:45
Speaker
reworked into this like really sexy vibe. I love them. Oh, I need to get some info from you from Spotify. I always love hearing people's playlists, like making playlists for me is such a love language. I'm so obsessed. I do it all the time. And whenever I feel like someone has a good music vibe, which I feel like from what you're saying, I would like the music vibe. I'm like,
00:38:10
Speaker
Give me the inspo, share your music. I love that so much. I actually was just vibing so hard earlier that my friend was calling me to have this retreat prep call. I was like, I'm sorry. I'm a few minutes late because I was like, I was just feeling myself too much. I literally pick on the phone. I was just writing my bra. I was like, hi. I was just feeling myself so much that I was videoing myself dancing. And she was just like, oh my God. I love that.
00:38:39
Speaker
Dance is my most natural medicine. Dance was my embodiment practice, my somatic work before I knew what somatic work was. It was the thing that really naturally helped me in my early stages of healing and still to this day, but now I have more of an understanding around it. But dance is so powerful and music is so
00:39:02
Speaker
So true. And it's like the easiest form of somatic practice that we have access to. It's not complicated. It's actually really simple, but we over complicate things so much as humans. It couldn't possibly be so simple to regulate my nervous system as to sing and dance. There must be more steps to this as actually, no. Breathe.
00:39:24
Speaker
hum, sing, and dance. And there you go. You've got a regulated nervous system. And you want to take it to another level, do all of that in community. Sing with a group of people, go do an ecstatic dance and
00:39:40
Speaker
dance freely in community with other people. And now you're getting that aspect of that loving acceptance community. And that's it right there. Oh, you're making me so excited for my ecstatic dance and the last day of my retreat. I have
00:39:55
Speaker
You always will have a woman DJ come into the retreat space and we do the most epic, exotic dance to celebrate and witness each other while everyone's in their own process, obviously. But it's just amazing. And I'm so excited. Now I'm like, I just want to dance and move my body the best way. I'm so excited for you and your retreat. It sounds amazing.
00:40:14
Speaker
It is, it's so good. So I'd love to know what advice do you have for women if maybe they're hearing this and they're like, okay, so it sounds like I have a sister wound. It sounds like I maybe need to do some work around healing my healing the relationship I have to masculine. I also have some work to do around never system regulation and the feminine. Like where do you begin is the first part of the question. The second part of the question is what will change for them or what can possibly change on the other side of doing this work?
00:40:43
Speaker
I'm actually going to start with the second question. This, the second part, this work just ripples out into all aspects of your life. And that's what's so beautiful about it because the very first thing that's going to change is internal. The very first thing is that's going to change is your relationship with you, your level of intimacy with yourself, your knowing
00:41:10
Speaker
of yourself, your trust with yourself and the way that you feel inside of your body. That's what it really this work is all about is how do you feel in your body? And can you hold building capacity? So can you hold the full range full spectrum of life in your body? This work isn't just about feeling happy and joy all the time and feeling bliss. Yes, we get to feel that and
00:41:39
Speaker
It's because we learn how to hold the depths of grief and pain and heartbreak and uncomfortable emotions that we're able to have the capacity to experience so much more joy and bliss and pleasure and all of these things. It's a full range and that's the feminine. The feminine is a full spectrum. She has a range and
00:42:08
Speaker
By doing this work, we, again, it ripples out into all parts of our lives. Relationships become so much truer and deeper. And sex becomes so much better and juicier because we're in our body and we can feel, we can experience it. And we know so clearly now what is a no, what is a yes, where,
00:42:38
Speaker
What are the subtle movements that I want to go and experience in relationship, in sex, in pleasure? And then in my career or in my business or in my creativity, it's tuning us into life and it's tuning us into the mystery of life so that we can notice the subtle shifts in alignment and notice what is my next best step.
00:43:08
Speaker
So it's going to affect all of our relationships, not just romantic ones. All of our relationships is going to affect our careers, our business, and just our experience of life, the way that we're experiencing life and how we're feeling in our body, where to start. So we've talked about a lot of little like starting places, but I would definitely say
00:43:34
Speaker
is learning how to feel your feeling, feel your body, learning how the nervous system works, what are the different states of the nervous system, and how do I feel that in my body? How do I know what each state feels like in my body? And having a mentor, so there's two parts of this. Nobody needs a mentor, and we can all figure all of this out on our own.
00:44:05
Speaker
having mentors has been one of the most special and amazing part of this journey for me because not only do we get there faster because we're learning from someone who has already walked this same path and has done it, has been there, but we're also getting the benefit of that loving reciprocal relationship, that safe relationship
00:44:30
Speaker
And it's just so much more fun to do it together and have that support and to have that sisterhood. And that's another area where we can actually work on the sisterhood wound is coming, finding community, finding spaces of community. And this can be free community, everything from free community, local community, online community, to joining paid group programs and containers with
00:44:59
Speaker
a mentor where there is this sisterhood building. And sometimes we have to, for me, I really started building a lot of relationships online and then was able to find in more in-person these relationships. Sometimes it even feels like a little bit safer when we do have that wounding to have a little bit of that distance. And then we like, okay,
00:45:28
Speaker
Now let's step into these in-person spaces and be face to face with women and actually touch each other. Like actually touch the women in your life because that can be life changing in itself. Just embracing that intimacy and taking it step by step. Don't throw yourself off a cliff. I think that's really important too. We don't want to just blow out our nervous systems.
The Path of Self-Discovery and Trust
00:45:50
Speaker
Don't throw yourself off a cliff. Just take it one step at a time and lean in.
00:45:56
Speaker
leaning into your edges. That is the biggest thing really is getting out of your comfort zone, just leaning into your edge and leaning in until that becomes comfortable and then leaning into the next edge and leaning into the next edge. Yeah. I love that. I also love that you said, you don't need a mentor. This is something that I used to always say to people, you don't need me.
00:46:22
Speaker
And I'm not going to change your life. You are the only one that has the power to change your own life. Don't give that power away to somebody else, to a coach, to a mentor, to a book, to an experience. If you feel like your life has changed as a result of something, that's because of the work that you embarked on.
00:46:40
Speaker
maybe was supported and facilitated by that thing, but that's on you. You are the one responsible and totally agree that we don't need anything. It's never coming from this place of lack, but we can desire things because we want to have that support and walk that path to someone who has
00:46:59
Speaker
experience similar challenges and can really shine the light a few steps ahead of us to guide the way and to help us on a path. So I think that's such an empowering lens for people to look at things when they are considering putting their time and money and resources and energy into working with someone, hiring a coach, a mentor, or going on an experience, for instance, like a retreat experience.
00:47:25
Speaker
And knowing that the ripple effect is massive because when you are fully seen and there's nowhere to hide, oh man, the discomfort that arises, right? Like it is so uncomfortable to be fully seen.
00:47:41
Speaker
And also it's like the most healing work that can take place when you're being so witnessed. I'll never forget the first coach I hired and we were working together online, which was very, I would not have been ready for in-person. It would have been way too much for me. And I just was like, I cannot hide in this space. I cannot hide on Zoom.
00:48:01
Speaker
She's looking at me as I'm moving my body and doing all of these things and it was so uncomfortable and so transformative and so powerful. And that's what it's about. This is what we are, the invitation is to celebrate and encourage other women to go on this journey. So thank you for sharing all of those pieces and also bringing it back to the nervous system because I think that is just such a critical piece that's quite often overlooked and people
00:48:27
Speaker
can think it's boring or not necessary.
Conclusion: Self-Trust and Personal Autonomy
00:48:29
Speaker
And it really is the foundation and the pinnacle of everything of being a human to experiencing a happy, fulfilling, successful life where you're not drowning. Nervousness and regulation. We have to focus on that. So thank you for sharing that. I would love to know what is something that you would like to close this conversation on? What is something that maybe we haven't touched on or that you want to reiterate? That is a really important piece of
00:48:55
Speaker
wisdom to share with people before we finish the conversation. So one thing that was coming to mind as we're speaking about if you're wanting to choose a mentor, something that was coming up is really choosing a mentor that they are guiding you to your own truth, to your own knowing, to your own power, your own
00:49:25
Speaker
It's not this way is the right way. My way is the right way. It's how do I help you know yourself better, know your way better and really coming back to trusting yourself. That is the most important part.
00:49:44
Speaker
is trusting yourself, trusting your own knowing, being in your body and knowing that if something doesn't feel good for you, then it doesn't have to be for you and nobody else knows better that what's for you than you. Not a mentor, not your parent, not your partner, not your friends. It all comes back to you. And that is the path of coming home, coming back to ourselves.
00:50:12
Speaker
because that is how we all comes back to truth. And there is no, there cannot be intimacy without truth. And when we are in our truth, fully in our truth, that is when they're able to very clearly discern what is for us and what is going to keep us on our path and take us off of our path. Because sometimes we have to make really hard choices
00:50:40
Speaker
really hard choices. I left a relationship, a five year relationship this year with a man that I loved and it was no longer truth and it was no longer aligned and it was very hard. And it's not just all easy fun and rainbows all the time. We sometimes have to do really hard things and we have to be able to be grounded in ourself and in our truth and be able to look within ourselves for answers. So even if we have a mentor who can
00:51:06
Speaker
support us and guide us. We never want to be going to a mentor for answers, but rather for someone who's going to guide us deeper into ourselves. Truth bomb right there. That is really the way I see coaching and the way that I coach is guiding people to their own answers. That's really what it is about. We're not here to tell anyone what's right or wrong or follow this strategy and you'll be happy in life or you'll
00:51:35
Speaker
Do whatever of course there are elements of the come into it and also is really important to run everything through the lens of the body and discern what is my. In a compass guiding me to does this feel good to me or is there maybe a different way that feels more aligned with me and i think this is such an important.
00:51:54
Speaker
piece of advice to share to everybody because there is so much noise out there obviously there's working with coaches and mentors and if you're paying a lot of money to work with someone you're going to take that as truth to a certain degree and knowing that you have the power to say no or to run things through you absolutely should be running it through your own
00:52:14
Speaker
lens of your body of what is truth. And then taking it down a level with the noise on social media, the books, the podcasts, like there is so much information out there. And especially on TikTok, there's just so much shit, like so many uneducated people just sharing a lot of shit that we then take as gospel. Oh, somebody put it on TikTok and has a million followers there for it. That must be the truth.
00:52:38
Speaker
No, not the way. And I also wanted to echo that everything that you just shared, it literally the words could have come out of my mouth in terms of the relationship ending. That was the same experience I had not saying, but last year, a seven year relationship in marriage was no longer in alignment and true for me. And that was exactly what is more complicated than that, obviously, but that was sort of what I had
00:53:03
Speaker
discovered from the journey and knowing that my body is no longer aligned with this and my body was sending so many clear signals that it wasn't in alignment for me for my future. It was absolutely necessary and 100% it for those amazing seven years and it was not the truth for me.
00:53:22
Speaker
for my heart, for my soul, for the woman that I am and desiring to become, it was no longer in alignment. And without the connection that I had to my body, to my inner compass and to my own truth, I would probably have not been able to have the courage to close that chapter and walk away and be open to what is unfolding now on the other side of that.
00:53:44
Speaker
I echo truth. It's really all we have and the connection to our body. This is what life is about. The rest unfolds naturally when you have that connection to your own body, to your yes, to your no, and to your truth. So thank you for sharing that and closing out with this beautiful wisdom that can really be life changing. So to wrap this up, I have a few questions that I would love to ask you that I like to ask all of my guests.
00:54:11
Speaker
The first question, and it might be what you just shared, but I'm going to ask it anyway if there's something else. If there were one thing that every human on the planet could know or experience, what would that be? It is very close to that same thing. You know the way. You know the way. And your path will never leave you. Your path is always going to be there. You have many choices in your life.
00:54:42
Speaker
that can veer you from your path or take you closer to your path. Your path will always be there and it doesn't matter how far you stray from it, you can always find it again. There are always these strings of destiny, these tiny little pathways that will guide you back to your path. And it's just, it doesn't always make sense either, but it's following the inner nudges, it's following that inner wisdom, it's following
00:55:11
Speaker
What is the next best step? What is that inner knowing? And just trusting that. I'm trusting it, trusting it. And like I said, it doesn't always make a logical sense, but trusting that inner knowing, that guidance will always guide you back and then guiding you back into alignment with your path.
00:55:36
Speaker
And your dog agrees. I can hate your dog. Yes. I love that. What is something that you're celebrating right now? Ooh. I'm celebrating this year and hasn't even started yet. My niece was just born. I just watched my niece enter into this world. So I've been spending a lot of time with her. I have just so many
00:56:04
Speaker
workshops and podcasts and just so many things planned for this year, where I'm really just taking on the world this year. I am just like, I have a message. I'm screaming it from the rooftops. And I'm celebrating that I am showing up completely dearmored, completely bare, completely raw, completely naked, just stepping into this year. Yes.
00:56:30
Speaker
Yes. I love it. I'm celebrating that for you. That's powerful. What is something that is bringing you pleasure right now? My beautiful community, my local community, the friendships that I have nurtured and developed over the past maybe year and a half since I found this amazing community that's just bringing me so much.
00:56:55
Speaker
joy and nourishment right now. And just, yeah, really getting into that. Beautiful. Well, Lauren, thank you so much for being here, for sharing your message here on the Unfiltered Fam. There are so many amazing nuggets and pieces of wisdom that I can't wait for everybody to dive into and they can let us know what they have loved the most. So thank you again for being here. Keep sharing your message. Amazing. Thank you. It's so great to share.