Explore every episode of the podcast Authentic Living

 It’s natural for us to want to get what we want. Unfortunately, we often use bargaining as a way to get what we want and to seek a sense of safety--that might not actually be safe.  When we are trying to get to acceptance of any difficult reality, we might reach the stage in which we bargain. So, if I'm dying of cancer, I might bargain with life by saying "I'll never do that again if you just let me live." And this is natural, for we really want to live. However, bargaining can become toxic, in that it may keep us stuck in a ever shrinking loop of "IF I... THEN he'll...". We might, for example, stay for years in a toxic relationship or situation bargaining and bargaining with the same reality, looking for different results. So, "IF I can just say it right, THEN she'll stop drinking." "IF he would just treat me better, THEN I can finally feel loved." "IF I stay and become very loving, THEN he won’t hit me again." "IF I hang into this heinous job for ten more years THEN I can retire and finally get to do what I want.""You can see her that there is always an IF/THEN. That's what makes it a bargain. And as you can see, we can stay trapped in really bad situations and relationships through such bargaining. We can get stuck for entire lifetimes in these toxic bargains. These are bargains with the devil in which we sell our souls for a magic trick. Come learn how to stop bargaining and start LIVING!

Did I just hear that “Dun-Dun” that goes off whenever “Law and Order” comes on? We do get the two mixed up quite a bit—Karma and law and order. What’s been passed down to us is a definition of Karma that means that what goes around comes around. So, we can always say to that—expletives deleted—ex-husband or wife, “Yeah, well what goes around comes around!” believing with all of our hearts that they are going to get theirs. Right? And we can say to those selfish, close-minded whatever, whatever politicians that they are going to get theirs too. Then we can wash our hands of the whole affair and assume that in this lifetime or the next, or the next—justice will eventually be done. Dun-Dun! Law and Order! But what if Karma isn’t what goes around comes around? What if it doesn’t fall in that dualistic framework at all? What if the Law of Karma, gives us something much higher, much more powerful and soul-enhancing than law and order? Tune in to find out more.

You cannot read a paragraph of modern day spiritual books or hear any spiritual speaker on the topic of the EGO without being informed that the Ego is a bad thing. From this perspective the Ego is thought to be the enemy. It is that part of us that wants us to fail, that wants us to be unloving, unkind and inconsiderate, to be afraid and to live inauthentically. In that way that old Ego sounds a whole lot like that old devil, Beelzebub, Iblis, Shaitan, the Dragon, the Serpent, Abaddon, Belial, the father of this world, the god of all lies, Lucifer, etc. This idea of the Ego has us believing that we must fight against it. In fact many would say that we need to "get rid of it" or even kill it. But  wouldn’t this mean that Ego fights Ego or even that Ego kills Ego? Surely the divine doesn’t need to fight, right? What if we’ve misunderstood? What if the Ego is just a liaison between the inner and outer worlds? What if we absolutely need this balancing liaison in order to have good mental health? Wouldn’t fighting it then mean losing that liaison and, therefore, our own mental health? Is it possible that this view of Ego is but another part of the dualistic trance state that has us all believing that we are not who we really are, not a constituent part of the divine? Don’t miss this life-changing show.

We are excited that Clarissa Pinkola Estés, PhD comes this week to tell us about the unveiling of her long awaited audio work and online series called “The Dangerous Old Woman, Myths and Stories of the Wise Woman Archetype.” World renowned author of “Women Who Run With the Wolves,” which was on the NY Times bestseller list for 145 weeks, she is an internationally acclaimed poet, Diplomat Jungian psychoanalyst, post-trauma specialist, award-winning social activist and writer, as well as a cantadora, (keeper of the old stories in the Latina tradition). Dr. E, as she is affectionately called by her many followers, jokes that there have been a few “sightings” over the years, though she disappeared from public view for three decades to write. This week she comes out into the “clattering world” to talk with us about her work. Come and listen to her unique storytelling ability, soothing voice and deep understanding of the complexities of humanity and grow closer to your own soul.

Mark Nepo is an author, poet, philosopher, beloved teacher and cancer survivor who has, for thirty years, been exploring how we can stay awake and authentic when our wounds make us numb and hidden; how we can minimize what stands between us and our experience of life; how we can create a practice that wears down what thickens around our hearts and minds. And today we are going to talk to him about those very things, as we explore together the meanings and messages of his books, The Endless Practice and Reduced to Joy. The Endless Practice explores how the soul works in the world, and how by engaging our soul in the world, we are shaped by the endless practice of becoming who we were born to be. Reduced to Joy is a book of poems about the nature of working with what we are given until it wears us through to joy. This is a special opportunity to come closer to your own soul. Don’t miss it.

Mark Nepo is an author, poet, philosopher and cancer survivor who, for the past thirty years, has been braving and showing us the path to the soul, to the practice of living in soul, while in body. His voice not only tell us but sings to us of the soul and its profound gravity of joy.  His books, Seven Thousand Ways to Listen; The Book of Awakening; Staying Awake: The Ordinary Art; Reduced to Joy and the Endless Practice have capture of world of people looking for meaning and the actual experience of life. They have been notice by Oprah Winfrey who has interviewed Nepo on Super Soul Sunday several times, and have won awards such as the 2012 Books for a Better Life Award.  Nepo is a man whose life and words demonstrate the essential meaning of life, and who teaches us all how to find it.

We have arrived at adolescence in our understanding of relationship—in other words, we have a long way to go. But, well, what do we expect? Only 150 years ago, marriages were often still arranged in first world countries. We arranged for a good dowry, good property, money, inheritance, prestige, even good teeth and good hips. So this thing of marrying someone we love is new, and we have only begun the work of understanding how to do it. But you know what happens typically in adolescence: we fall in love and out of love very quickly. Unfortunately, that’s still where we are with this new understanding of marriage. But actually that process for the adolescent teaches him or her something about relationship—and so we are likewise learning. What are we learning? Tune in to find out how to have a healthy, happy relationship.

One of the most difficult challenges of any relationship is communication. How do we say what we mean without lashing out, or hurting the ones we love the most? Unfortunately, we tend to go to the extremes on this one: We either shut-down, or we lash out. Neither of those two options work, however, to create the intimacy that a relationship needs to grow. Nancy Dreyfus has come to our aid here with a beautiful book, “Talk to Me Like I’m Someone You Love, Revised Edition: Relationship Repair in a Flash” (2013) containing a set flashcards that say precisely the right thing at precisely the right time. What a beautiful idea. Nancy is a Transpersonal Psychologist who works with many relationships on this very issue of communication, and came up with this idea for her clients. But now we can all benefit from it—so today we are going to be talking about the how-to of communicating at the most difficult times in relationship. You are not going to want to miss this one.

Nancy Dreyfus

Generally speaking, we think of morality as a good thing. People should, we think, honor certain codes of behavior in order to prove that they are good people, and in order to maintain order in the world. But what we don't commonly know is that morality can often be a poor substitute for authenticity. We don't know it, but we are commonly doing the right thing, instead of doing the true thing. Yep, that's right, there can be a big difference between what's right and what's true. And today's show is going to point out that difference, as well as explore how authenticity gets us closer to a true spirituality than does morality. Don't miss this important show.

Most of us have been raised to be good. We were to share, be kind, be loving, say thank you when we didn’t feel grateful, say I’m sorry when we weren’t, hug people we didn’t want to hug and say we loved people we didn’t even know, much less love. But the idea of goodness held a magical quality for most of us. We thought that IF we were good enough, THEN we would be worthy, we would be loved and we could finally rest secure. We assume, therefore, that being real means being less than good—and the magic will go away. We know we have thoughts and feelings that we would call "bad." So, if we are real, does that mean that we will turn mean or "bad?" And what about worthiness? Doesn't being good make us worthy? But being real doesn’t mean being bad, mean, unkind or unworthy. Being real means being genuine. And this show is not only going to clarify the difference but it will bring home the reasoning for why we can stop being good and start being real. It will reveal how we can begin to adopt and adjust to our genuine Self. Don’t miss it.

What we have heard and we’ve read in the Bible, well it ain’t necessarily so. So goes the old Porgy and Bess song. Perhaps they did not read Thomas Moore’s version, Gospel The Book of John, in which regardless of religion or atheism one discovers a deeper more meaningful spirituality hidden in the root meanings of the words used. Unfortunately, much of the work of John and others has been turned into moralistic dogma. But what we find in the root language is a more celebrative, deeply mystical and loving message. In Moore’s book we discover a different Jesus than the one described for us by earlier translations. This new rendition of Jesus is Dionysian in his urging us toward a full and meaningful celebration of living. He tells us that we are to remember who we are, and he guides us to that knowledge with his actions and words. Come learn of this new Jesus. See if you like him now.

Thomas Moore is the author of the number one New York Times bestseller Care of the Soul. He has written twenty-five other books about bringing soul to personal life and culture, deepening spirituality, humanizing medicine, finding meaningful work, imagining sexuality with soul and doing religion in a fresh way. In his youth he was a Catholic monk and studied music composition. He has a Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Syracuse University and was a university professor for a number of years. He is also a psychotherapist influenced mainly by C. G. Jung and James Hillman. As a Gospel theologian and a non-aligned theologian, he has published his translation of the New Testament Gospels, Writing in the Sand: Jesus Spirituality and the Soul of the Gospels, and The Soul of Christmas.

This show is a rerun, but the truths haven't changed.

We live in a social environment now in which hate is overt, active and visible. Not so very long ago, in fact, hate was hidden, covert, and only active in a passive/aggressive fashion. But there are many people out there today who are trying to tell us that hate is a good thing. That it is even a Christian thing. That, of course, we hate, for how could we feel any other way toward people of other races, other cultures, other skin colors and other sexual orientations, and gender identities. But hate is a response to fear. And fear is a response to ignorance. There is so much that we fear that we really have no reason to fear. So what do we do with all of this? We learn to find the love beneath the hate. This show is going to show us just how we can do that. Don't miss this important discussion.

THE most important thing we can come to know in life is who we really are. But most of us have not been taught to know that person. Yes, we can look in the mirror and see ourselves, but most of us are looking at ourselves through what we perceive to be the image others have of us. Indeed, most of us have introjected a projection placed upon us by parents, and later others, who unconsciously need us to carry their projections for them. And since, as very young children, we need so badly to belong in our families of orgin, we just as unconsciously take on the roles that have been assigned to us in this way. In fact, because of this innate need to belong, we have no capacity to say "no" to these projections. And so, we identify with the roles we have introjected. But who are we really? Many of us do not even begin to ask that question until we have encountered a circumstance so difficult that the old way of living just cannot be lived any longer. And then we say, "I don't even know who I am anymore." But it is possible to come to know your authentic Self. And that's what we will be talking about today. Don't miss it. 

The terms spiritual abuse have, thus far, only been used to describe how Christian leaders abuse church members. But spiritual abuse runs far deeper and wider than can be described by any one religion. Spiritual abuse is abuse of the human spirit. While it's true that your spirit--your soul--can't really be damaged, it's also true that you can be split off from any conscious awareness of your spirit--and that's what spiritual abuse does. It is possible to live a life complete bereft of any conscious awareness of one's own spirit. That's what spiritual abuse can do. It can happen in any religion, in the spiritual but not religious population, in New Age followers, in New Thought followers, in the Human Potential Movement, and in our homes, in our schools and in our workplaces. Anywhere there is spirit there can be abuse of that spirit. But it can also be healed. Let's talk about it--it's time.

Caroline Myss comes again to the Authentic Living Show to bring her own understanding of intimate conversations with the Divine. Revealing her own personal struggles and enlightenment, she discusses her book: Intimate Conversations with the Divine.

Caroline Myss is a five-time New York Times bestselling author and internationally renowned speaker in the fields of human consciousness, spirituality and mysticism, health, energy medicine, and the science of medical intuition. Caroline established her own educational institute in 2003, CMED (Caroline Myss Education), which offers a diverse array of programs devoted to personal development and draws students from all over the world. In addition to hosting a weekly radio show on the Hay House network, Caroline maintains a rigorous international workshop and lecture schedule. Caroline developed the field of Energy Anatomy, a science that correlates specific emotional/psychological/physical/spiritual stress patterns with diseases, about which she and Norman Shealy, M.D., Ph.D., published the book: “The Creation of Health,”  In all, she has published over 36 audiobooks, videos or print books. Her latest book, “Intimate Conversations with the Divine” is the subject of today’s show. 

Meagan O’Nan is one of those people who has a story to tell, a story that allows us to see the person behind the label. Her book is called Courage and she tells us that agreeing to disagree is no longer enough. Gay rights is just one of the many areas of bias and discrimination that run rampant through our country, and our world. Today we open the door to a further discussion.

Maybe we can de-stress in these times by turning down the volume of the terrible news we are getting almost daily. But the answer to real peace runs deeper than that.  Many of us have heard that what is happening “out there” is “just an illusion." But is it?  Perhaps, since we are living here on planet earth we need to consider having at least one foot here, even as the other is walking in another dimension. The answer here is to step into truth. To step into the truth of our nature. To step into the truth of the power and presence of who we truly are. To learn to trust the process of divinization that is always a part of our unfolding evolution. Tune in to this important message to learn how to find peace in the time of turmoil.

Most of us were taught that we were supposed to love all people, right? But what does that mean when it comes to those difficult people in our lives? Are we meant to pretend that we “love” them when we really just wish they would go away and leave us alone? How are we to deal with this? Well, there are lots of ways we do deal with difficult people. Some of those are healthy ways of dealing and others, not so much. Today we will not only discover some of the unhealthy ways of dealing, but we are going to talk about some practical and healthy ways of dealing with the difficult people in your life. You don’t want to miss this one.

Today we are talking to Dr. Don St. John, author of the book “Healing the Wounds of Childhood,” as this is one of the most important of all of the subjects we could discuss. Very often it is these wounds that keep us trapped, even as we are striving to get past them in some kind of way. How do we grow into our full potential while these wounds remain yet unhealed? How do we increase our ability to receive and absorb love, enjoy more life-giving love connections, deal more effectively with stress and improve our resilience and health all while expanding our sense of who we are? These questions and more will be answered during today’s show. Don’t miss it.

Don St John, Ph.D., is a Psychotherapist, Somatic-Relational Teacher, Coach, Public Speaker and Author. He is an Authorized Continuum Movement Teacher and a Hellerwork Structural Integration Practitioner and Trainer. He has taught classes and given presentations in several states in the US, Canada, New Zealand, and Brazil.  His book, Healing the Wounds of Childhood is based both in his own personal work, learning to walk the walk he talks, and in his work as a psychotherapist.

Why do all the great spiritual leaders down through history and even of the present teach of silence and stillness? Why is silence even a thing? Aren't we supposed to be working hard, striving after a righteous life? Aren't we supposed to be working hard to serve our brothers and sisters? Aren't we supposed to be doing the work of growing at all times? Why do they talk about stillness, about silence, about effortless effort? Well, perhaps it is because silence or stillness is the answer to everything. Maybe it is possible that our effort, our work, our doing could be the result of silence, of stilless. Don't miss this important message. 

John Povlovitz comes to the Authentic Living show today to remind us of what could be the 11th commandment: “Thou shalt not be horrible.” He wants us to imagine what the world would look like if we all obeyed that command. He reminds us that the way we treat others is the most tangible and meaningful expression of our belief system. And he’s come here today to talk about his book: “If God is Love Don’t be a Jerk: Finding a Faith that Makes Us Better Humans.” In today’s world, where we see professed Christians carrying signs with Bible verses on them into the fray of an insurrection right along with Nazis and White Supremacists, one has to wonder what is happening to Christianity. John is going to tell us both what is happening and what we can do about it. Be here for this.

Author of the book, IF GOD IS LOVE DON'T BE A JERK: Finding A Faith That Makes Us Better Humans (Westminster John Knox) John Pavlovitz is a pastor, writer, and activist from Wake Forest, North Carolina. He’s spent nearly three decades teaching, studying, dissecting, deconstructing, and reconstructing the Christian faith. Committed to equality, diversity, and justice, John aims to teach a single, elemental truth: Faith in a supernatural being should make you a better human being. His blog, Stuff That Needs to Be Said, recently surpassed one hundred million views, and his previous books include A Bigger Table, Hope and Other Superpowers, and Low.

Dr. Lindsay Gibson comes to us today to bring us some of her expertise on the subject of surviving and thriving even though one was raised by immature parents. The central challenge of our adult lives is unloosening the toxic ties in which we were bound by immature parents. In fact, I would say that we do not mature into adulthood ourselves until we can heal from the wounds and the distortions of reality presented to us by immature parents. Somehow this wound becomes the pathway to freedom, hope and authenticity when we can begin the process of recovery. Dr. Gibson is going to talk to us today about her latest book, “Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents.” Don’t miss it.

Lindsay C. Gibson holds both a masters and doctoral degree in clinical psychology. She has been a psychotherapist for over thirty-five years, working in both public and private practice. In the past, Dr. Gibson has served as an adjunct assistant professor for the Virginia Consortium Program in Clinical Psychology, teaching doctoral students clinical theory and psychotherapy techniques. She specializes in working with adults on personal growth and dealing with emotionally immature family members. Dr. Gibson is the author of four books: Who You Were Meant to Be, Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents, Recovering from Emotionally Immature Parents, and Self-Care for Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents. She has also written a monthly column on well-being for Tidewater Women and Tidewater Family magazines for over twenty years. Her website is available at www.drlindsaygibson.com. Dr. Gibson lives and works in Virginia Beach, Virginia.

We are so happy to have Dr. E back again to the Authentic Living show to talk to us about her third part in the Sounds True online event series, The Dangerous Old Women, entitled The Joyous Body. We do tend to either focus wholly on the body as image, or leave it out entirely from our conscious experience until it acts up. And we rarely if ever think of the body as a repository of joy. It’s a work horse to be whipped into shape, or it’s just a ball and chain we carry around that sometimes gets us into trouble. But what if the body were incrementally tied into the soul? If that were true, wouldn’t we want to do more with it than just keep it enslaved to the ego? If you don’t quite know what to do with this material essence of who you are, this show is for you. Or, if you struggle with body issues of any kind—this show is for you too. Come learn from one of the world’s most profound keepers of wisdom what gifts your body has to give to you.

Clarissa Pinkola Estés, PhD, is an internationally recognized scholar, award-winning poet, diplomate senior Jungian psychoanalyst, and cantadora (keeper of the old stories in the Latina tradition). She is the author of the bestselling book Women Who Run with the Wolves (Ballantine 1992, 1995), which sold over a million copies, the multi-volume audio series The Dangerous Old Woman (Sounds True, 2010, 2011), and the topic for today, from that series, The Joyous Body.  For more information about the author, please visit http://www.clarissapinkolaestes.com.

How did you grow up? Did you grow in a sea of toxicity, where parents were abusive, immature, addicted and/or emotionally or physically unavailable? Were they ambivalent toward you, being kind and considerate one minute and unkind, inappropriate or abusive the next? What did you learn about life and about yourself from that formative period in your life? What did you learn about religion and/or about spirituality? How has that period of time impacted your spiritual experience today? Are there ways that you still struggle with spirituality because of those early experiences? Or perhaps you are unable to have spiritual experiences at all because of those early experiences? This show will be an exploration of the impact of toxic parents on spirituality. Don’t miss it.

The afterlife is one of, rather, THE biggest mystery of life here on plane earth. Most of us are curious about it, and have serious questions about what will happen after death. Well today we have some answers as explained by our guest today, medium Hollister Rand. Do you have questions? Wouldn’t you like to know? Well, Hollister Rand has written the book, “Everything You Wanted to Know About the Afterlife, But Were Afraid to Ask.” And she asks and answers some of those questions. Don’t miss this unique opportunity.

Hollister Rand is an internationally renowned medium known for her extraordinarily detailed work. Hollister's first book, I'm Not Dead, I'm Different, was released by Harper Collins. Her award winning book Everything You Wanted to Know About the Afterlife but Were Afraid to Ask, was published by Beyond Words/Simon & Schuster in May 2020. Her TV and radio appearances include Oxygen's Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood, SiriusXM's The Seance with John Edward, Coast to Coast with George Noory, KOST FM's Angels in Waiting, and KBIG FM's Radio Medium.

Since the beginning of time, it seems, we have thought that we had to fight the good fight. We had to fight for good over evil. And so many a person has spent a lifetime trying to discern the difference between the two and trying to err on the side of goodness. But what if you knew that that very battle is doing more harm than good? What if you knew that the battle between good and evil is actually preventing your wholeness? But, you say, how can we stop the battle—won’t evil just take over? That’s what we fear, isn’t it? Yet those who have managed to establish wholeness no longer fight any battles between good and evil—rather they have integrated all aspects of self. Want to know more? Tune in.

How did you grow up? Did you grow in a sea of toxicity, where parents were abusive, immature, addicted and/or emotionally or physically unavailable? What did you learn about life and about yourself from that formative period in your life? What did you learn about religion and/or about spirituality? How has that period of time impacted your spiritual experience today? Are there ways that you still struggle with spirituality because of those early experiences? Or perhaps you are unable to have spiritual experiences at all because of those early experiences? This show will be an exploration of the impact of toxic parents on spirituality. Don’t miss it.