I think that one of the reasons I moved to Peru was because of the intimate relationship people have with Pachamama—Mother Earth. Here, pacha means realm, world, or dimension, and mama means mother.

She is the mother of this realm. This earth experience is the Realm of the Mother.

Over the years, I’ve come to realize that we are not separate from her at all. Every thread that keeps us alive for a material earth experience came from her. Every board in our home came from her trees. Every bite of food we take was grown from her soil, nourished by her water, and transformed into our physical bodies. The water moving through our veins was once rain, rivers, clouds, oceans, and tears. When we die, we return to her again. Matter does not disappear; it simply changes form. Energy does not disappear; it changes form too.

When I speak of Pachamama, Gaia, Mother Nature, or Mother Earth, I am speaking of this life-giving force that sustains all physical existence. She is not somewhere else. She is all around us, under our feet, and within us.

People want to connect to her and I respond, just see her.

My youngest son once told me, “Don’t tell me you love me. Tell me you see me.” I understood exactly what he meant. So many of us long to be seen, acknowledged, and recognized for who we are. I think the same is true of our relationship with the Earth. When we truly see her, we begin to recognize that she has been supporting us all along. Is this all love is, true recognition of what is?

I also want to acknowledge the fatherly force or energy. There would be no life here without the sun, without the breath, without light pouring down and becoming food, growth, and energy. For me, Creator has always been both masculine and feminine, heaven and earth, light and matter, spirit and form. Yet I find that many of us spend so much time looking outside ourselves for the sacred that we forget it is already here, moving through every breath, every leaf, every river, eery bite of food and every living thing.

Learning the Language of Nature

People often ask me how to hear the voice of Pachamama, and my answer is surprisingly simple. It begins with paying attention.

Before we can hear anything, there has to be a little quiet. A little noticing. A little listening. For me, learning the language of nature didn’t begin through books or formal study. It began through and as a relationship. Any good relationship means communing, listening and spending time together. The ancients spoke about God, Universe ones. “I honor all my relations”

I started paying attention to birds. I listened to their calls and noticed how each one seemed to have a different personality. Some were playful and social. Others were soft and gentle. Some felt bold and opinionated. I would whistle back to them, watch their behavior, and slowly get to know them. The same thing happened with plants. Rosemary would catch my attention, so I would smell it, learn about it, drink it as tea, and notice how it felt in my body. Then another plant would appear, and then another. Little by little, over years, I developed a vocabulary and understanding and it was through lived experience with the natural world.

The funny thing is that I approached my garden the same way. I never spent hours forcing it. I would pull a few weeds, water a thirsty plant, notice what preferred shade and what preferred sun. It wasn’t grand or dramatic. It was simply relationship. One interaction at a time. One observation at a time. One moment of curiosity at a time.

That is how we get to know anything we love.

When the Mountains Began to Speak

Living in the Sacred Valley and later in the jungle, I spent countless hours outside. I began paying attention to the mountains. In the Quechua tradition, each mountain is an Apu, a guardian spirit. Every mountain seemed to have its own feeling, personality, and medicine. Some were sharp and dramatic. Some were soft and rolling. Some felt masculine, others feminine. Some caught the light in a particular way that made them seem alive because they were. Constantly shifting and transforming through the cycles and days.

I would sit and watch them through the seasons. I noticed how different families cared for the land differently and how the atmosphere seemed to change from one place to another. Some places felt abundant, welcoming, and alive. Others felt exhausted, overworked, or depleted. I noticed how animals gathered in certain areas, how forests carried different moods, and how the quality of sound, light, and even the feeling in the air seemed to shift. I could see how our energy and how we cared for the land directly affected the feeling of that little patch.

The more time I spent in nature, the more sensitive I became to subtle things. Not because I had developed some magical ability, but because everything else had become quieter. When there are fewer distractions, fewer lights, fewer noises, and fewer thoughts competing for attention, you begin to notice what was always there. The sounds from nature are tuned to us and we to them. We evolved hand in hand with natural sounds and when we return to it, we hear more.

The Day I Heard Her Voice

One evening I was sitting on a mountain as the sun began to set, and I was overwhelmed with grief. I could see humanity taking and taking from the Earth—mining her, ripping her open, polluting her rivers, exhausting her soil, consuming without reciprocity. I felt the pain of it deeply. I sat there crying and apologizing.

“I’m so sorry.”

As the light faded, I watched the trees begin to droop and the landscape turn gray. I thought I was witnessing something dying. Then something unexpected happened.

I heard her.

Not through my ears, but within.

The voice felt warm, grandmotherly, loving, and slightly amused. She said, “Sweet girl, thank you for seeing me.”

The feeling was like arriving at the home of a grandmother who had been waiting patiently for you all along to visit. And she was ready and had been there all along with a cup of tea and a blanket. There was warmth, tenderness, and a deep sense of being welcomed home. Then she laughed.

Not at me, but with the affection of someone who has witnessed countless ages come and go.

She explained that her memory stretches far beyond ours. That she has seen civilizations rise and fall, forests grow and disappear and return again. Yes, humanity is struggling right now, but she knows how to regenerate. She knows how to heal. She knows how to begin again. She’s always there to remind us of that.

Then she told me something I have never forgotten.

“Take care of the part of me that is you.”

In that moment I realized something profound. I thought she was dying because I watched the trees lower themselves toward the night. But she wasn’t dying. She was resting because it was evening and the sun went down. She was following her natural cycle. She was reminding me that everything moves in seasons.

Returning to the Mother

Since then, I have come to see that nature is constantly teaching us. There is a season to plant, a season to grow, a season to harvest, and a season to rest. There is a season to create and a season to grieve. A season to move forward and a season to become still. Every voice and being is one that exists to reflect more of me back to center. The layers of what I’ve learned from nature… are limitless and ever changing.

The more I stop fighting those rhythms and allow myself to move with them, the easier life becomes. Not perfect, but more natural. I have more energy when energy is needed and more rest when rest is needed.

I think this is one reason so many people are being called back to nature. Not because nature is separate from us, but because it reminds us who we are as we are. Every healthy ecosystem has a place for every being. The tree, the bird, the fungus, the insect, the river. Each one contributes something essential. I believe people are the same. The baker, the teacher, the healer, the artist, the parent—each of us has gifts and a role to play that nourishes and supports the other in its own way.

For me, talking to Pachamama is not complicated. It is simply remembering that she is already here. In the bird call. In the rain. In the mountains. In our bodies. In the breath moving through our lungs.

We are not separate from her. We never were.

And perhaps hearing her voice begins the same way every relationship begins: by slowing down long enough to notice, listen, and remember. It’s to learn to say with depths more vast than oceans. I see you.

-

I think in these times as the balance of ways of being have been far out of alignment tilting to the masculine force for many eons… we now reach a point of reblancing as the mother/feminine rises to meet. It doesn’t bring down the yang/masculine. It meets it with love. May we listen to the feminine. the receptive, the nourishing, the complex, the multilayered, the interconnected, the cyclical, the darkness of her soil and the inner. . We listen to the quiet holding, the soothing, the beauty and the deep.

There was time I got stuck in a bloqueo in Bolivia on my sabbatical and solo travel quest in 2013.

I awoke freezing on a bus at 4 a.m. after a mostly sleepless night around curving mountain passes on crappy, unmaintained roads full of potholes. It was announced that the roads were closed, there was a massive (and common) strike, and we were told to get off and march into the city on foot with our packs.

It was uphill for miles. Blockades and strikes in Bolivia are wild. Miles of criss-crossing buses stopped on the road, blocking any entrance in or out of the city.

I was mopey. I was ridiculously cold and shivering. I pulled everything out of my bag and layered on three or four layers of clothing to stay warm that night. I was sleep deprived. My eyes burned. My back and legs hurt from being crunched into a small seat.

Within fifteen minutes into the long walk off road, I started crying.

I just couldn’t believe I got stuck in the high Andes on foot again. I couldn’t believe I had to trek into town with everything on my back. I couldn’t believe we were walking in the freezing, high-altitude mountains in the dark as the sun came up.

While I trudged and cried and felt bad for myself. I questioned what the hell I was doing traveling alone on local buses to remote areas as a 30 year old woman who used to have a life of comfort.

Then I looked over.

The Elderly Woman on the Hill

There was a woman walking up the hill about three times faster than me—just cruising along with a huge manta on her back—a locally made fabric bundle packed to the brim with her harvest. She was probably in her eighties.

What I had one day of experience walking was most likely her daily walk for her entire life. I saw her in well-worn, recycled tire sandals, heavy layers of brightly colored skirts, three pairs of socks and stockings. Head down. One foot in front of the other. As she had done every day to take her harvest into market. She had probably already been walking for miles.

She glanced over and saw my tears told me to be brave. “Sea valiente. Eres fuerte. Con fuerza mijia—You are strong, with strength my daughter” she said.

Here I was, an entitled traveller pouting because I had to walk up the hill once, when she walked every day. Yet she was being kind and encouraging to me.

I stopped crying. I stopped feeling bad for myself. I heard myself say: “Put on your big girl pants, Megan, and walk.” I’ll never forget that moment.

The Camino of Flowers

I remembered this story just yesterday as I was walking to my local mini grocery store up a beautiful dirt walkway called the Camino of Flowers.

It’s really stunning and pretty magical , and I walk it each day, multiple times a day with my boys running along side or solo when I go to work.

I’ll be real, there are some days I resent it. I’ll wish I had a car or a Vespa to save me some time, dust in my eyes, and backache. Being 5’1” sometimes I carry about 50% of my body weight and it’s a real task. It’s been 13 years walking and now with three little guys, it can get tiresome.

Yet most days I truly love it because I pass old adobe buildings and hanging vines covered in blooms with the sun shining through. Fresh air, the crunch under my feet— I love being outside instead of behind a pane of glass.

Bonus: I also get to see my favorite animal friend on the way, Fred Fluffy Ears, a young donkey I’ve watched grow up over this last year. He’s a darling, and it’s easily one of my favorite parts of the day. We hee-haw to each other, and he runs over to me for a nuzzle and a treat, like an old carrot or some wood sorrel that I pick.

What People Carry & Walking together.

On this walk, I saw a middle-aged neighbor carrying heavy bags, like most strong Peruvian women do. But she was also struggling with a rickety stroller on this narrow pathway of rocks, gravel, and dirt.

There wasn’t a baby inside. There was an eight-year-old girl who didn’t have the use of her legs. They didn’t have the money for a wheelchair, so she made do.

I never used a stroller for my three boys. I chose a baby carrier, sling, and wrap instead, carrying them until they were one or two years old, and then they walked too.

They learned on uneven paths and became quite adept, balanced, and strong at a young age.

A stroller felt completely impossible where we lived. We always lived closer to nature and farther out of town for the quiet and peace. I quickly learned that with stoney paths, a buggy was illogical.

But here was this mama struggling with a child, and it was her only option. To push her daughter along inclined and uneven rocky paths alone.

A Different Perspective

I was walking the same direction and simply asked, “Do you want a hand?”

She nodded in disbelief and allowed me to push the rickety stroller over boulders and gravel, dirt roads and winding paths.

My normal ten-minute walk turned into thirty. As I slowly pushed, panting and breaking a sweat within minutes, the stroller continually got stuck. I had to lift, twist, and just keep pushing.

The mother kept asking if I wanted a break. But I knew her back ached. She still had heavy bags, and I was going the same way, for goodness’ sake.

Sometimes we lifted it together over an open water channel or a particularly large boulder where the wheels really jammed. Mostly, I just put my head down and pushed.

When we got to the top, I shared how to shake out her arms, lift her head and chest toward the sun, and take a big exhale so her body wouldn’t hurt quite so much.

She thanked me and gave blessings.

What I don’t understand is how many people would just walk by and let this mother carry this alone. But she seemed genuinely shocked that anyone would help her.

In many ways, I understand this. Many people just keep walking when they see someone struggle. Most don’t even see it.

What is the mother going to do—stop, cry, giveup? No.

You and your child need to get somewhere, so you put your head down and keep going. You put on those big girl pants.

I did my grocery shopping and carried my food home on my back like I do. Mentally, the day felt lighter than usual. Physically, my body was shaking, and my back and shoulders really hurt.

But I felt such gratitude that I have boys who can walk. And that I don’t have to push that stroller up and down mountains every day.

As I walked home, I thought about the old woman in Bolivia. About the harvest on her back. About the mother pushing her daughter up the gravely hill. About all the things we carry that no one sees. Some days life asks us to carry more than we think we can. And then somehow, one foot in front of the other, we do.

I realized the lesson was never really about carrying heavy things uphill. It was about the story I was telling myself while I carried them. The road didn’t change. The weight didn’t change. But my perspective did.

It’s easy to get lost in your own story and your own challenges.

But today I saw my own story (again) with fresh eyes.

And gratitude.

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After a long morning at home full of meltdowns, heartbreak, and trying to hold space for my own child, I stopped at the pharmacy.

My sensitive and beautiful middle son had spent much of the early day grieving for hours after a disappointing phone call with his dad. His dad hasn’t called and my boys for months haven’t wanted to talk much to their father even though the door is always open.

But Liam has been missing the jungle. Missing his dad. Angry that life wasn’t unfolding the way he wished it would. The call was another promise broken, more empty words and more breadcrumbs. There were tears, shouting, broken things, and long stretches of me sitting beside him saying, “I know it hurts. I’m here. I’m with you. You are allowed to be angry but we treat each other with kindness. I’m not leaving you. I’m not sending you away.”

He took most of his rage out on me and the home. I knew it wasn’t about us, but it was still hard. By the afternoon, I was unbelievably exhausted.

I went to town with my three boys to run a couple errands, but mostly to change scenery and vibe. We were there go to the bank, change some money, and get antiparasitics (common when you live in Peru) to do our biannual cleanse. Then we were going to the park to run.

The Boy at the Counter

When I popped into the shop I noticed a young American guy in his early 20s trying desperately to communicate with the pharmacist with google translate. He had a deep gash across his hand, swelling in his wrist, and blood still fresh on the wound. The pharmacist looked at me with desperate eyes and asked if I could translate. Of course.

I immediately felt into it and it was broken.

The story came out in rushed pieces. A motorcycle crash. Drinking. A fight. Trying to impress a girl. An attempt to get help at the hospital only to be turned away confused. He kept insisting he only needed strong painkillers to get through a flight back to the States the next morning. He said take care of it there.

I could feel he was scared and felt alone. I looked at his hand and thought, What you need is someone to care whether you make it home.

I couldn’t leave him there in that condition. So I spoke to the pharmacist to get the materials to get the wound clean and closed— antibacterials, gauze, butterfly bandages, and a good splint so his hand wouldn’t be permanently mangled. I didn’t want the wound to go septic in to the blood.

As we gathered supplies, cleaned the wound and got his hand stable, I asked him why he kept putting himself in these situations. The answer wasn’t really about motorcycles or alcohol. It wasn’t even about the broken hand. It felt deeper than that.

A Deeper Story

At one point he looked at me and said, “You care more than my mom.”

Everything underneath the story became visible.

Sometimes what looks like recklessness is grief. Sometimes what looks like self-destruction is a person trying to prove they matter. Sometimes people don’t know how to ask for love, so they ask for attention instead.

He told me he’d already broken twenty-seven bones. Twenty-seven. I remember looking at him and thinking that this wasn’t bad luck. This was a young man moving through the world as though his life wasn’t worth protecting. He lived as if he was trying to get attention and be seen. As he spoke I could see the whole story behind the words flash in my third eye.

Once he was sorted with a clean stable hand, I explained how to keep everything in tact without more damage until he could get home. Asked him some hard but caring questions and gave some sound motherly advice. Do not drink with painkillers. Keep it clean. Don’t move it around. Make wise choices.

But mostly, I wanted him to know that his life mattered. That he deserved care. That he deserved someone to look at him and say, “Hey, slow down. Pay attention. Take care of yourself. Your life is valuable. “

Why do you Care about me?

He kept asking. “Why do you care so much? Why are you helping me. My mom doesn’t even care this much. No one has ever helped me like this.” I just asked him if he needed a hug. He nodded and I hugged him long and hard. By the time we were done, he was crying in my arms as I whispered, “You are worthy of help, you are worthy of love” He wasn’t crying because of the pain in his hand, but because someone had finally stopped long enough to see him, hold him and help him through a hard moment.

I gave him my card and told me to send me a message if he needed anything.

As he was leaving, he pulled my boys aside.

“Your mom is amazing,” he told them. “Not everybody has a mom like this. Respect her. Listen to her. Seriously, You have a great mom. I wish you really knew.”

I couldn’t help but laugh at the timing.

Just a few hours earlier, one of my own children had been screaming that he hated me. He was running away to the jungle. He was angry and grieving and wishing life were different. He was hurting. I had spent the day reminding him, over and over, “I care. I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”

Then life placed this young man in my path.

A boy in a grown man’s body. Alone in a foreign country. Hurt. Lost. Making terrible decisions. Beneath all of it, carrying the same ache I had been witnessing in my own child all day long.

The details were different, but the question underneath felt the same.

*Does anybody care that I’m hurting?*

For all our complexity, maybe that question never really leaves us.

And sometimes what changes a life isn’t advice. It isn’t fixing the problem. It isn’t having the perfect words.

Sometimes it’s simply having someone stop, listen, look you in the eyes, and remind you that you matter.

I do this work because its my work to do and I don’t keep walking if I see someone hurting. Please support me and support your own healing

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I used to live in severe PTSD reaction, almost every day for decades. Now it shows up mostly as lower-level stress responses because I’ve spent years learning how to work with it and heal the inner layers that once held me captive.

For me, there were different levels of trigger responses, mostly because of the work I’ve done with these tools.

The lower-level ones look like anxiety, irritability, exhaustion, overthinking, or constantly scanning for problems.

The more severe ones were panic attacks, explosive rage, complete shutdown, living for months in a dissociated state without realizing it, or feeling like I was suddenly back inside an old experience instead of the present moment.

There was a time in my life when those severe reactions happened almost daily and I felt terrified and hopeless.

What feels remarkable to me now is that after years of doing this work, they became incredibly rare. For many years in the recent past, I didn’t experience any major episodes at all. During a recent period of intense stress and transition, I had two medium trigger events over the course of two years but was able to move through them with more ease and speed with the tools I had practiced.

That doesn’t feel like failure to me. It feels like evidence that healing is possible and I’ve come a long long way.

Triggers Can Be Healing

Triggers can be used as the most transformational time, but most people just want to get past them.

I found it’s the passing through with tools, a certain supportive and compassionate energy, and new practices that don’t just shut them down, but they become revelatory and deeply life shifting. I really believe it’s why I don’t get the rage attacks, total shutdown, or live months or years out of body.

Over the course of many years of therapy and healing modalities, I found some really powerful tools that helped walk me through it and not just control the trigger moments, but truly face and move what was underneath.

The tools below helped me move from surviving my triggers to understanding them, working with them, and eventually reducing their grip on my daily life. Make sure you read to the end because the last section is where the real healing comes.

Mid-Trigger Tools - in the moment.

HALT: Stop everything and check in if one of these needs, needs some care.

H — Hungry

Eat something and focus on the flavor, the sensation, and the process of chewing.

A — Angry

Go on a walk, throw some rocks, allow the anger to move through rather than suppress it.

L — Lonely

“I’m here with you, I’m with you through this, I got you, I’m not leaving you.” Reach out for help, don’t abandon yourself, Talk to God.

T — Tired

Take a nap or go to bed. Happens a lot late at night when it really is time to just rest.

Sensation Focus

Touch, Taste, Smell

Body awareness and redirecting energy from mental and thought processing to the physical to help ground. I used to always have soothing (lavendar, frankincense, geranium) essential oils put in my hands to take a few breaths. Or I’d have a stone and really focus on its texture, weight and color and feeling in my hands.

Its not about leaving the moment. its about tuning into the sensory body experience to ground into the moment rather than leave.

Smell, touch, tap, stomp feet, wiggle, go outside. Move and feel the wind, notice the texture of the clothing. anything to stay with yourself in the moment but realize you are hear and now in the present physically.

MMM Sound

Calming, soothing, grounding. Low and deep. This sound gives the body a safety and calming of the Maternal/Mama/Material world. Instantly helps with sleep, soothing the nervous system and grounding in a pleasurable and kind way. (it’s also an amazing way to help babies and children fall asleep)

Shake Therapy

Physiologically moves trapped adrenaline/cortisol from cells from previous trauma. Let the shaking move through the body. (There is an incredible study with lions and gazelles that shows that the elevated levels in the blood drop to nothing after a good shake. It the way to move fear and stress out of the body. If it gets caught within, it causes systemic inflammation.

Grounding, Wiggle in the Hips

Feel the butt and hips, the weight and the reconnection to the chair or couch (focuses on the root chakra/base/foundation so awareness comes down into our support system and base).

Post Trigger Tips

These are all integrative, real-time regulating forces. If you are already able to notice triggers, and move it to music, writing, or shifting thoughts, which would be the first step (good to stop the stress response and refocus the mind… But next we want to reconnect from being in the head and thoughts all the time, to using your entire system: The BODY. Which is why it’s all focused on the body.

Body Scan

Tune in and look through your body with your mind’s eye. See if there are areas that feel hot, pained, shaky, heavy, tight, weighted. This moves your energy and focus from only in the head or avoidance to staying with the sensation within the physical self.

Directed Breath

Breathe into the heart, solar plexus. Visualize: Expanding inhale in all directions. Loosening, softening exhale with visualization of melting or steaming off. Use this if something feels tight, heavy, or stuck when you can actually tune into how your body is feeling. This will quite literally start to lighten the area and will usually follow with some sort of release whather sigh, sweat, cries or some natural mechanism. that allows the heaviness to move.

Notice the State Change

After any of these practices, stop for a few breaths, scan and see if there is more heat, or shivers, or coolness, or lightness in the body. It brings an awareness shift that it works.

The Real Healing

The CLEANSE — The True Healing of Tuning In:
Learning the Letting Go

The purpose of this work is to move eventually be able to sit with the memory that is in the physical cells so the cells can flush what they’ve been holding for so long.

As you bring attention, awareness, and care into the body again, it will start to ASK for things so the next steps are listen, allow and support.

“I need to rest, I need to shake, I need to feel. I need to move. I need to burp.”

The body is wise. It will show you pain you didn’t realize you trapped inside, repressed, or numbed. Many emotions will surface as the body is recognized and remembered because that is how trauma is stored. Many times people don’t even know they are numb. When we start to feel it many things will pop to the surface.

Once the body is recognized, it will begin to POUR out to clean itself. This is the hard part, because the snot, the shame, the tears, the shakes, the rage, the pouring out poop, and the sweats are real. And this is when people tend to panic. I’m in pain! What did you do to me? Nothing my love. Your body is now self cleaning as it was meant to because its alive again.

This is also when people freak out and go to meds that will stop the pour out, numb it, block in and shut it down again to find later.

So please stay with it. And give yourself a ton of grace and extra moments when things are surfacing to be seen.

This clean-out can show up as:

• mucous/cough

• tears

• rage

• sweating

• monster nasty poops (let them out — don’t take anti-diarrheal to trap that gross in the body), but drink a ton of fluids to rehydrate

• stank farts

• twitching/shaking

• pain

• total exhaustion

• and a number of big feelies or nasty things that want to leave your body

The trauma/stress/repression gets literally trapped energy and inflammation releasing in the exact way the body was designed to purify, let go, and clean itself, but we learned subconsciously that those things were weak or unacceptable in the moment.

The Big Feels

Most of our life has been lived not even realizing we are avoiding discomforts, pains and hurts. To sit and allow the feeling means it doesn’t shoot out when we least expect, controlling us or harming ourself and those around us. Sitting with both the physical sensation and the emotional feels, while listening to what the inner track is telling us it the spot to transmute it. It’s inside the thing we were terrified of feeling. Then we go still. and watch it.

The Judgment Layer

It’s important that now we allow these natural processes to fulfill themselves to clean out the body of accumulated toxins, inflammation, and trapped emotions. They need space and they need compassion to go out.

Judgments may arise (”get over it,” “don’t be a baby,” “you look ridiculous” “you are disgusting”). Old things we might have heard when we were kids and our bodies got shut down with outside judgements.

Soothe them and sit with it to reassure yourself. This is how the body cleans out and lets go. Sit with deep compassion and love, saying:

“I’m sorry you went through that. I’m sorry it hurt so bad. I’m sorry it was unjust. I’m here with you. I won’t abandon you through this. I won’t hurt you more or judge you or criticize you through this. You are safe now to feel.”

The Memory

When we allow ourselves to sit and clean out. We also may have memories pop in through this. The fun part is to watch the memory play out again as a witness/observer now that it doesn’t hijack our entire body and stress response. When we allow the memory to play out like a movie we can start to see why it happened, what we didn’t deserve, what we learn from it. But to let the body do its nasty thing is a step we need to pass through so the reaction isn’t filtering or limiting the ability to rewatch the story play out.

Eventually: Getting Ahead of It instead of reacting to it.

Start to track those triggers.

• OH, when everyone talks at once, I feel ____ in my body.

• OH, when I’m overtired, my body starts to shut down because a need isn’t met.

• OH, when I’m hungry, I get really angry and snappy.

• OH, when I smell a specific thing, I feel like I’m back in that old house where I wasn’t safe.

We can be more preemptive to fulfill those needs so our body doesn’t go into a stress zone where being triggered happens unexpectedly and we feel out of control or damage ourselves or our relationships. We also start to notice and see what’s healthy and whats not, what we deserve and what we don’t. and how to create healthier environments to hold us.

And finally The Addiction Layer

One part that is important is not to judge this part.

When our stability and safety has been threatened, and the emotions/pain/feelings feel so overwhelming that we want to make disappear, and there is a part that thinks this memory or sesation will kill us.

Most if not all addictions stem from this- avoiding and resisting the difficult past. And it’s why those who have been through the most trauma have co issues with addiction both affecting our Root Chakra

Most people who don’t use this progress will want to wiggle out of it: So they either go to dissociation (checked out like they are numbly moving through life), attack and control, or addictions on some level to ease the pain.

But then takes us go into the shame spiral of doom.

Some grace to move more gently. Don’t cut whatever thing has been helping you do your life stuff. Most people set an impossible goal, fail and then go into shame spiral. Or they try to cut it without working through the root issue and it just shape shifts into something else or takes people into a 6 month depression. So move gracefully, with discernment, and little by little. Things we don’t resist and fight have space to dissolve with love.

The safety foundation and then easing out once other tools are established can keep you from going into deep chasm.

If the addiction is so damaging that it has to be cut, make sure you have full support of community and mental health resources.

It’s really important to get these tools and information into more peoples’ hands so they don’t feel helpless, hopeless or think something is wrong with them. I thought for a long time all I could do was just manage the damage. But truly, these layers and in this way guides through a very systematic uncovering that can and will heal the original wound.

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I heard a passage from the Gospel of Thomas recently. It’s one of the disappeared texts from the time of Jesus that talks about our divinity coming from within. The Romans and the Council that edited the bible didn’t love it, or the hidden texts of Mary Magdelene who was rebranded a prostitute.

If you bring forth what is within you, it will save you. If you do not have it within you to bring forth, that which you lack will destroy you.

*gospel of thomas

I’m sharing a tender things that were seemingly mundane and personal, and bit more real time. This happened only couple of weeks ago.

Creative stream of consciousness. Self-reflective and purgative. Being real with what exists as it is. Hard to look at, but better to be honest and see. Then there are choices and actions and new layers of responsibility. But that’s what I’m here for.

A least

I realized lately how much of my life became built around “at least.”

At least we aren’t in the jungle anymore.
At least their dad isn’t screaming, disappearing or throwing things at the boys.
At least I have some help with childcare.
At least homeschool basics happened today.
At least the boys are fed.
At least we have beds and clothes and shoes.
At least they are safe.

And there was gratitude in that. Real gratitude.

But I also realized something else.

I don’t want “at least.”

I want to feel well. Thriving. Fulfilled. At ease with myself. I don’t want the minimum basic requirements for life on this earth to take every ounce of my energy to maintain. Sometimes it feels debilitating to realize how much effort, work, endurance, and pushing it has taken just to arrive at baseline safety.

I’ve been working through emotions and old beliefs around these ideas to see what was under them.

The thing that cracked this open was a mango smoothie.

Such a simple thing.

The textures. The loudness of the blender. The sharp knives. The sliminess, slipperiness and stickiness. The little pieces shooting out onto the counter. The cleanup. The smells layering on top of each other.

Liam had been asking for one and I realized I’d been putting it off because of my physical and mental discomfort around doing it. I didn’t even fully know that I was overwhelmed by those things.

I showed up for it anyway.

But this time I stopped pretending I was okay.

My body started shaking and twitching while I made it. From the outside it probably looked ridiculous, insane or dramatic. But from the inside it felt like decades of holding tension in my body finally being allowed to move with eh discomfort. Old fears of being in the kitchen just being felt.

I realized how much energy I had spent my whole life trying to appear normal. Trying to override sensitivity. Trying to force myself through things that genuinely overwhelmed my nervous system.

And I was horrible to myself about it for most of my life.

Because cooking wasn’t just cooking to me.

Cooking became motherhood. Nourishment. The heart of the home. Safety. Love. Stability. If I struggled with feeding my children, I made it mean something terrible about me. What kind of mother struggles to make a smoothie? Why was something like this so hard for me? Why did noise and texture and chaos affect me this much? Cooking was my failure as a woman, cooking gave me flashbacks trauma.

I carried so much shame around it. I’ve been genuinely embarrassed about how such basic, practical things feel hard to me.

At the same time, this same nervous system is also where my gifts come from. The sensitivity that gets overwhelmed by sound and smell and layered stimulation is also the sensitivity that notices subtle emotional shifts instantly. It’s part of my intuition. My creativity. My pattern recognition. My empathy. My ability to read energy, people, tension, nuance, unspoken things. My ability to be the healer and psychic person that I am.

I spent years trying to become less sensitive without realizing sensitivity itself was never the enemy.

The mirror

Liam was sitting there struggling with homeschool at the same time. ADHD. Dyslexia. Sensory overwhelm. Flipping numbers around and wanting to give up. Feeling enraged and resistant. And I suddenly realized I could see him with compassion but I couldn’t see myself that way.

I’ve been trained for forty years that things are “Simple.” “Basic.” “Just do it Megan.” “Drama queen.” “It’s not that hard.” “God what is wrong with you?”

But what if it actually was hard for my nervous system? What if it was hard on his? I could see him so clearly but myself, less.

Not impossible. Not hopeless. But genuinely difficult.

So instead of pretending, I told him the truth.

I said, “This mango smoothie is hard for me. I get overwhelmed by the noise and the sliminess. There is real part of me that wants to avoid it. But I love you and I want us to eat and drink well. So I’m gonna do my best. Thank you for your patience.”

And then I asked him why he kept showing up for homeschool even when it was hard.

He said, “So I can function in this world and survive my life.”

And I said, “Oh sweet boy, Yes. that. We practice these tasks so things get easier.”

It ended up being the easiest homeschool day we’d had in a long time. Because I got real with myself instead of judged. I saw his struggle with fresh eyes. I saw we weren’t so different.

The Little Girl, My Inner Child

That hit me deeply.

I realized how hard I had been on the little girl inside me who hated loud kitchens and sticky hands and echoing noise and layered smells and sudden stimulation. The little girl who wanted quiet and low stimulus and space to breathe. The little girl who learned very early that overwhelm wasn’t acceptable.

I also realized how much of my suicidal ideation began in babyhood and childhood in chaotic homes. There was a moment in meditation where I heard internally, “save me, save me, save me,” over and over while tears streamed down my face, as memories of horror flashed simultaneously through my minds eye. And then another voice: “The stars will guide you home.”

The Difference Between Rescue and Support

I realized that as a baby and small child, wanting someone to save me made sense. I didn’t have mobility. Rights. Agency. Protection. I was dependent on adults around me. I couldn’t get away from the noise and chaos on my own.

But now as an adult, something is changing.

I’m learning the difference between waiting for rescue and allowing support.

Those are not the same thing. I’m rewriting old agreements and vows in real time.

I can ask for help now. I can create environments that fit my nervous system better. I can stop forcing myself into constant overstimulation and then hating myself for reacting to it. I can stop believing that suffering is proof of goodness.

I keep thinking about Alex sleeping outside on the patio under the stars with his little lantern so he can read in peace. About wanting forts and treehouses and separate rooms for the boys where they can work quietly on their projects and regulate themselves. About sacred privacy. About how different each of us are. I want more space for my boys to be able to have their own area that is theirs.

Living on top of each other has had a toll. I realized how important and restorative it was for me to have my own room that I had a respite from the noise and screaming and could get immersed in whatever creative project grabbed my fancy.

Flow Areas + Grow Areas

We all have flow areas (areas that come easy) and grow areas (things that feel difficult, clumsy or take more effort) It’s important I can acknowledge and show grace for both.

I could get a 5 on AP Calc with a 4.2 grade point average, graduate magna cum laude from USC on a full scholarship, pick up dance combinations instantly, and still struggle daily with time management, overwhelm, noise, cooking, and basic repetitive tasks.

For a long time my brain couldn’t make sense that my one level of intelligence didn’t translate to life needs.

For years I hated myself for that. The world told me to get it together, it was so easy (for them)

Stopping the War

I realize the point isn’t becoming perfect at everything. That is unreasonable.

Maybe the point is understanding ourselves honestly enough to build lives with more fit, more compassion, more support, more truth.

The old agreement to suffer silently or need to feel saved feels old now.

The old agreement to want to disappear feels old too.

The healing isn’t becoming less sensitive… it’s finally stopping the war against ourselves for being exactly as sensitive as we are.

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There are many times I doubt… the seeds I’ve planted both literally and metaphorically. That pause during the rooting, when the human eyes don’t know, “Is the potential I scattered and haphazardly watered, real?”

My garden giggled at me with all of its color.

Cast into the earth,
the sacred womb.

Sure, I checked them
a million times
and saw there was no progress
for what felt like
forever.

To my eyes,
it looked dead.

As the seed had to
explode underground,
and the roots slowly
crept down into the darkness
of rich, life-filled soil
to anchor and nourish
unseen.

Sure, I doubted
and impatiently checked,
as some withered in the sun,
not made for the heat.

Others stunted
in the shadows
and rotted where
there was no light.

But after time.
Yes, love,
after time,
the rooted ones
started to reach upwards

with slow and careful unfurling
of tender stems

until there was an explosion
of fiery color.

Saying…

“Why did you doubt us?”
they chuckle, as flowers do.

(And yes, I did doubt.)

“Am I not a good gardener
and tender of the land?
Is the soil too hard?
Did I plant them too late?”

But “No!” they said.

“I simply followed
the cycle of life,
the mystery you
seek to understand.

And when it was
in right timing,

I cheerfully say hello.
I was there all along,
in the potential
you knew was within me
all along.

Silly girl.”

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Feeling to Heal

I’ve been speaking lately on really finding new layers of the depth of emotions that haven’t been able to move through my system until recently. It has truly enlivened me and lit a new spark inside as I spent the time to sit in the depths of my feelies. In the moment it sucked.

Some days it felt self-interested or unproductive to just sit in meditation for hours while sobbing and shaking from rage… Yet now, as I come out of the waves, I feel more me than I have in a long time, as if the heaviness I subconsciously held blocked the light and force of love and authenticity within me.

That said, I think this messy witnessing is so important for people from the story side. AND the validation within our modern science-backed world helps this idea land.

Here is very real and data-backed research on our tears. They physiologically clean our system from stress chemicals while using our natural chemistry to ease and heal pain within.

I talk a lot about tears being cathartic and self-cleaning.

Truly, we feel to heal. Feel to heal!

———

The Wisdom Within Tears

YOUR TEARS CONTAIN A NATURAL PAINKILLER 6 TIMES STRONGER THAN MORPHINE. AND YOU WERE TRAINED TO HOLD THEM BACK.

In 2006, researchers at the Pasteur Institute in Paris discovered a molecule in human tears called leucine-enkephalin. It is an endogenous (made within) opioid. Your body manufactures it. It binds to the same receptors as morphine. It is six times more potent.

Every time you cry, your body is not breaking down. It is self-soothing the pain.

Dr. William Frey at the University of Minnesota proved that emotional tears have a completely different chemical composition than reflex tears. When you cry from cutting an onion, the tears are mostly water. When you cry from grief, stress, or pain, the tears contain cortisol, adrenaline, prolactin, and leucine-enkephalin.

Your body is literally flushing stress hormones out through your eyes and replacing them with its own painkiller. It is a clean-out.

This natural painkiller has no negative side effects. It’s made by you, for you, much like endorphins (“inner morphine”). So it heals us and eases pain, creating inner safety.

It’s innate medicine and self-knowing… all we have to do is let it flow.

People who cry regularly have lower blood pressure, lower cortisol levels, and stronger immune function than those who suppress tears. This has been measured.

Men are told crying is weakness. Women are told it is emotional instability. Children are told to stop. Why were we societally pressured to hold them back?

An entire species trained to suppress the one biological mechanism designed to flush poison and stress chemicals from the body and replaced instead it with synthetic meds with so many side effects—numbing all levels while the poison remains.

You have nature’s wisdom behind your eyes. It activates automatically when you need it most. It costs nothing. It requires no prescription. And for your entire life, you were told to shut it off.

The next time your body tells you to cry, let it. It knows exactly what it is doing.

I work with a lot of men and women equally. And when I talk about self-cleaning processes, many men say, “I have no problem burping and farting,” while most women say, “Crying comes easy.”

I find men accessing the depth of grief and sadness beyond anger can be a challenge, while for women, letting go of anxiety held in the stomach seems trickier.

Such an interesting pattern to observe. Reach out if you are feeling something stuck.

—

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I posted this quick note about emerging from a challenging time to go on a beautiful hike. I’m sharing a bit deeper in the post.

This month has been intense. Hard. Some tower moments, some hard choices, some deep losses, some financial shocks. Looking at moments that, from my human eyes, feel impossible. My caretaker of the boys stepping out for a new career. Facing schools, paperwork, looking at getting a “real” job again after being out of the game. Waiting. Not moving out of a place of panic and trigger.

Trying to gain clarity before I have it doesn’t work. Facing choices: A possible move while more expenses pile up. And boys that deserve the world but are learning about patience, energy input, and how to never let go of their dreams while facing a momma that says, “We can’t yet, and your hopes and dreams are important.” Some days, not knowing how to move. Facing some things that felt unbelievable. Not moving from this place. But instead that is clarified. How to get there?

I chose very intentionally to allow myself to feel everything. This hasn’t been easy.

Rage, Grief, and the Urge to Burn It Down

I’ve been feeling rage. Enormous burn-it-all-down, threatening-to-give-up, explosive fits of rage.

My usual pattern would be to internalize it and identify with it. Beat myself up over past choices and areas where I could have, should have. But no more shoulds. No more self-harm.

I considered externalizing it. Being mad at the world that pays for coffees every day or expensive healthcare that adds up over time to the tens, if not hundreds, of thousands, while I ask for 200 and the world scoffs or resents the exchange, even when their hearing came back and the tools were provided to make sure the ears never ring or close again.

I might be mad that I’m somehow in-between the system, where I can’t get support from a partner, a parent, or a system that I live outside of but still pay into. Yeah, it sucks. I can acknowledge things out of my control and how I might seek to control and want to change them. I can ask were my power truly lies to put new actions in

Internalize, Externalize, or Sit With It?

Internalize or externalize? Or just be with it. Presence in the wriggling, raging discomfort.

I just felt it. Shaking, terrifying rage that shook me through my bones. I punched, I screamed. I let it shake through me. Then I cried oceans of grief. Snotty, pouring-out grief. Day after day after day… Then I sat. Empty. Not knowing what to feel but empty. Just witnessing it with compassion.

Learning to Sit

I’m learning to sit longer and more frequently in real time. Asking for the space from my boys to not make it about anyone else. Not take it out on anyone. Not blame the circumstances. Just let it ride as it is.

It’s taking time, even after all the work, to be aware. To regulate. Now it’s time to allow the deeper stuff. The harder stuff. This layer that I found was physically painful. It was emotionally overwhelming. To just face the resistance and the desire to throw it somewhere else. Just face it head first.

And I’m still here. Sure, I wanted it to go faster or be fine when I wasn’t. Then I allowed that too.

I don’t want this rage to shoot out when I least expect it or hurt the people I love. So I let it sit and burn it self out.

Letting the False Burn

Kali asks us to allow whatever is false to burn. To purify.

And while I sit, I hold this truth: joy, love, and peace are right there with me. Witnessing it as I make space for it. To flow in. To be as it always was. I know control isn’t part of the equation to allow love and God in.

I allow my higher self to guide it. But man, ouch. I won’t say I have become this purified thing with perfect clarity. I’m still here in the embers burning and sparking. But here I am.

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A woman, a young mother, was shrieking and sobbing in pain on the streets of my little town—hunched over and shaking, with tears streaming down her face. Four elder women around her, trying to comfort her.

I had my arms full of heavy bags from the market and my three boys with me. We were looking for a mototaxi to pick us up after some errands.

I asked my boys, “Can we stop to help?” (They know the work I do.)

They said yes. They waited patiently on the street corner as cars zoomed by.

I asked her and the elder women, “Can I help? I’m here. I’m a curandera.”

I helped her breathe and move the energy and light to the pain. Open it up, exhale… over and over again. As I brought my hand to her shoulder and moved energy in, she winced. Fifteen minutes passed as I opened her hands and arms…

I asked her, “Can you feel it draining down?”

“Yes,” she responded. “Yes.”

She sighed. She stopped wincing and sat upright after being completely hunched over.

Only Love, Only Prayer

The ladies nearby were chattering with stress and concern. I looked up at them and said, “No. No. You pray and visualize the light of God entering her. Do not bring that stress to her. Only love, only prayer.”

They nodded. They prayed. A crowd started forming.

She exhaled deeper. She felt it shift. She stopped screaming. She told me, “It’s feeling better.”

Then she wept and said, “Enough. Thank you.”

She was sitting upright. She was a little less in pain.

I told her to continue with the breath of life and soften her body. She had a huge lump in her chest and shoulder from carrying so much — night feedings, a new baby, old grief. It reduced to about half.

The Ride to the Park

I walked away, grabbed my bags and my boys, and we went to the park.

My boys said to me, as we were crammed into the mototaxi/tuk tuk, “Wow. She was feeling better. She looked better. I’m glad we stopped. She stopped screaming. Why didn’t she know how to move it, Momma?”

I told them, “Not everyone has a momma who knows how the body heals, sweet ones.”

They responded, “Everyone should know how to heal their body.”

I told them, “I agree. That’s why I do what I do. Can you imagine the world without pain?”

They nodded.

Another Afternoon

The boys don’t always understand why I do what I do, and why they don’t have a normal momma that works a job and has money to do all the things. They don’t understand why I come home smelling off or feeling strange.

They asked if I was paid.

I said, “No, not this time, but it will come back around.”

My eldest son said, “We were supposed to help. That’s why we walked down the block, isn’t it?”

I nodded. “You’re right.”

Sometimes I don’t know why I do what I do, but her face shifting, her screams subsiding, and her ability to sit up was beautiful. My boys being able to witness a more extreme case was helpful for their understanding of our life.

When we arrived at the park, I asked for 10 minutes of silence to clear my energy. (I could feel all the pain in her body.)

They nodded and said, “Of course.”

I sat there, relieving myself of what I took on.

Then we played.

Another afternoon.

I meditated constantly about going back to a job this month. To support my boys, yet my calling calls. Help me keep going.

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Many times, adoptees are given only one side of the adoption story. You were chosen, you are loved, you are our family now. It is beautiful. You are lucky. Imagine growing up in an orphanage. You have it better than others.

While this storyline is indeed true on one level, there are many layers, experiences and perspectives that fill out the whole story. Some of those other sides are not as easy to look at.

They include the feeling of loss — of identity, culture, family — as well as the feeling of being misunderstood or seeming out of place. Beneath the nice part of the story, there can be unseen wounds that may include pain and intense, unresolved grief.

In more recent years, the greater conversation around adoption has been more widely discussed and accepted. But just 20-30 years ago, this was not necessarily the case. Many adoptees felt they needed to nod and repeat, “Yes, I’m so lucky. I have a family.”

In looking back at my full adoption story — a story that includes the trauma and pain of being a baby who went through an enormous upheaval and loss — I have discovered both gifts and lessons. But to truly receive the gifts and lessons of this very particular and unique journey, I have needed to reframe the story, process the hurts and, yes, even heal the old and primal wounds.

One aspect of the healing I’ve explored for many years is the loss of my biological mother and starting to see that our broken blood connection left me with many complex feelings around motherhood. A great book that helped me dive into this concept is called “The Primal Wound,” which lays out the subconscious layers of hurt that a child might experience when separated from their mother at a young age. It can create life patterns and behaviors around trust, intimacy and identity that can show up in the form of not having close relationships with women, feeling betrayals in relationships and overall reactions around trust.

A Complex Relationship Rooted in Loss

I had three mother figures in the first few years of my life — my biological mother, my foster mother and my adoptive mother, all before I turned 2. I realize that in looking back, missing out on bonding, intimacy and trust with my biological mother — who is meant to be our first model of unconditional love — was quite real to me. I ended up feeling that the idea or title of “Mother” was forced upon me in an unnatural way, and left me feeling, well, really messed up. Motherhood and family felt broken and confusing to me even with everyone telling me it was all okay, that I was loved and I was their daughter.

One mother left me on a train with an elderly woman and got off at the next stop. The foster mother was a temporary bond that had taken me out of the orphanage. The final mother was introduced to me after a long airplane ride, gave me McDonald’s fries as I landed and said, “I’m your mom now” with a hug. She looked nothing like me, and I’m sure her presence was unfamiliar and even at the age of 2, something felt off.

My adoptive mom and I have since had a profoundly complex relationship that is hard to sum into these words. Our relationship went through chapters of closeness, chapters of allowing me to be in a home with abusive tendencies, chapters of her not being in my life by my choice, and finally a chapter of creating a more secure relationship based on a foundation of trust, reciprocity, raw honesty and meeting me as I am with new boundaries. I’m grateful for the journey we’ve taken and where we stand now.

However, with mother figures coming and going at such a crucial time of bonding, no wonder I had a hard time trusting women in my life. No wonder I assumed people would all leave me at some point or feel like there was somehow something wrong with me or something that would make them want to leave. No wonder there were triggers hidden along the path of making female friends, or becoming a mom. No wonder I pushed people’s boundaries forcefully as a way to see if they would leave.

There were certainly many positives that I felt as well. I felt grateful I had a family. I felt chosen and loved and was told it consistently. I knew that my adoptive parents were my real family. It just didn’t take away from my feelings of confusion or that I didn’t quite fit in with my family or local community. I wondered if I could further understand my pain and trauma — hand in hand with feeling gratitude and even normalcy in the upbringing I had and especially the relationship I had with my mom. I desired to search for meaning in all the things I felt that seemed so contradictory.

I spent time wondering what our relationship would be like if my mom and I had the same mannerisms or sense of humor, similar interests or even a face that mirrored mine even a little bit. Those were things I’d never have and so I had to process that grief and allow myself to miss something I wasn’t sure I even knew or understood.

Discovering the Momma Energy

I currently live connected to an indigenous community in Peru called the “Qeros” who quite literally raise kids more collectively. Their belief is that all mothers have momma energy and can fill mother roles for each other’s children. It is a role rather than a single identity saved for a biological mother alone. They actually call all woman “Mami” and all men “Papi” as a reflection of this cultural interaction. This helped me expand my notion of Mom — that it could be an energy rather than a responsibility put on a single biological mother.

Now I look back and I can see that through adoption, my idea of family had the opportunity to expand. In my adulthood, a few decades into my life and years into my healing process, I started to explore the idea of family as more than just my immediate named parents and brother — the titles given as defaults. I looked for kinship ties in my friendships and mentorships through the years. I started to recognize that I looked for mother figures and momma energy in places outside of my adoptive mother, who I very much consider to be my one and only Mom now.

The Women Who Mothered Me

I remember a teacher who lit up my passions for cultures and languages in 6th grade, Ms. Hossler, a woman who relished living outside of the box in my tiny, fundamentalist, conservative town. A traveler and artist, she showed me a different way of exploring the world with her immersive teaching style as she’d bring food and music into the classroom to share her enthusiasm for the world. Her laughter, child-like boldness and joy in sharing was infectious.

I remember meeting a friend’s mother, Mrs. Thompson, whose kids were all so uniquely different, yet they went on vacations together and authentically enjoyed each other’s company. This blew me away because I didn’t sense any jealousy, comparison or competition between her very eclectic mix of kids. I asked her one day, “What is your advice for mothers to help their kids grow to care for each other and love each other like yours?” She responded with, “I have only felt like there is one thing I live by regarding motherhood — that my job is to help my kids become the most authentic version of themselves and support their gifts to do just that.” Her simple yet profound statement floored me and is a cornerstone of my parenting.

I remember another teacher who observed and celebrated my creativity and academic achievement as my art teacher throughout high school, Mrs. Williams. Her kids all went to Ivy League schools and she believed in me, that I too could get into any school if I just applied. She thought I would be able to figure out how to fund it myself. I felt truly seen and supported in my gifts. I grew up thinking I’d have to go to a community college or trade school because I knew anything else was financially out of range for my hard-working, working-class parents.

She singled me out and brought in applications for top universities across the country. She paid for my very expensive-at-the-time application fees, and she sent me to the counselor’s office (years before the internet) to help me find and apply for every scholarship I could get my hands on. She left her office hours open to support me through the application process. I was able to get into a top-tier private university and have my entire tuition and living expenses paid for. To go to university across the country in L.A. was all of the sudden an open door, when it seemed like an impossibility just a year prior.

I remember a friend and fellow mother hugging me close as I cried in a public cafe, quietly whispering to me, “It’s okay to cry. This too shall pass. I’m here.” This was the exact thing that helped me be able to feel my emotions, feel validated and find motherly love in a loving and nurturing peer.

These were just some of the many women who showed me the range and depth of what being a mother and supportive woman in “mother energy” could be. Example by example of kindness, insight and authenticity started to heal my own disappointments, pain and trauma around motherhood. I started to zoom out as I looked back at the guardian angels and examples that gave me a bigger picture of how to be a mother. And that it wasn’t even a role that would have been filled by one single human being.

Expanding the Meaning of Family

I saw that putting pressure on any single mom wasn’t necessarily fair. Each of my mother figures was born in a different world, raised by specific experiences and did the best they could based on what they knew. Each person that came into my life was a gift and a learning in how multifaceted we can be.

I was shown that familial energy doesn’t have to be placed on one human just because of a title, identity or tie.

Once I could see this bigger picture, the wounds and expectations I had experienced started to fall by the wayside — alleviating my hurts and suffering in my adoption story. I could see that I might never have looked towards other women and moms for mothering had I not had this wound from the beginning of my life. That fractured part of myself started to become whole again as I learned to trust others and become a more well-rounded person through many observations of maternal bonding. This search only happened because of the pain I felt from being adopted.

Sharing Motherhood

I have kids now, 3 little boys ages 10, 9 and 6. Within our community, my kids have access to friendships of many kinds with people from all around the world. Sometimes we have guests who live with us for months and end up taking on maternal roles for my boys. At different points, the boys have all accidentally called their older woman friends “Mama.” Almost always, the women sharply turn their eyes to me as if to say, “Are you offended? Are you upset that your child would call me mother, even as a mistake?”

I consistently respond with the same, “I think it’s amazing that I can share this role of motherhood with you. They will always know that I bore them and I’m here as their mom for them every day. But I’m so grateful you have been so nurturing and mothering to my boys that they would consider you a mama too. I have no problem sharing the role because I’ve benefited from many maternal people and mama care in my life. The role of mom doesn’t have to be held on the shoulders of a single person.”

Maybe we don’t need to hold ownership of these titles so fearfully. I know my biological mom bore me and gave me many of her traits and held me to her breast the first days of my life. I know my foster mom cared for me, giving me more individual attention that benefited my health and mental well-being rather than leaving me in a huge group where I might have gotten lost in the shuffle. I recognize that my “real” mom, my adoptive mom, was the one to stay up late with me, hold me while I was sick, show up at every dance performance and be there as my mom every day. Each additional mother figure, whether teacher, friend or guardian angel who showed up with maternal/momma energy support, deepened my idea of what motherhood could be. They are all my mothers and guides. I wouldn’t be the same person without any of them.

I also realize that this idea of motherhood is infinite, and I’ve benefited from knowing women who hold this nurturing way of seeing that maybe my named — but also very real — mom wasn’t able to do day in and day out. I’ve even learned lessons from Mother Earth and her ability to renew, transmute and give all of herself without needing to get credit. This Mom role is a big idea to fill and maybe we can share the responsibility a bit more than we once thought. I’m grateful for the path I took as an orphan and adoptee to be able to zoom out and have so much new awareness of its possibilities all because of the pain and loss I experienced.

I believe that we can honor and grieve the pains and the hurts that we experienced deeply. I also believe that if we search for meaning in the story, we can uncover innumerable gifts of compassion and depth when we can see the light as well. No longer do I see the adoption reality as this OR that, but it can truly be this AND that. It can be both painful and beautiful if we can feel, explore, zoom out, reframe and keep growing.

Motherhood can be complex.

(I wrote this piece in 2022 for an adoption blog but wanted to share how my perspective of “mother” was formed over the years and with the experience of being an adoptee)

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The Wanderer: Entering with Humility

The deeper feeling running through this whole hexagram is really about how we enter life itself. The Wanderer carries this energy of curiosity, humility, observation, and presence. Not rushing in assuming we already understand everything, but allowing ourselves to learn the rhythms of a place, a person, a relationship, a community before trying to shape it. There’s wisdom in slowing down enough to listen first.

Participation Instead of Domination

I’ve seen this so clearly living in Peru. The people who arrive trying to immediately fix, improve, or impose their worldview onto everything around them often create friction, even when their intentions are good. Meanwhile, the people who arrive open-hearted, observant, and genuinely grateful tend to receive so much more. They build relationships first. They take time to understand the history, the culture, the pacing, the deeper reasons things are done the way they are done. They participate instead of dominate.

That same lesson showed up years ago when I worked at a restaurant as a teenager. A new manager came in from outside the company with genuinely strong ideas, but she entered trying to prove herself before building trust. She didn’t ask enough questions or take time to understand the team dynamic before pushing changes. People resisted her, not necessarily because the ideas were bad, but because the foundation underneath them hadn’t been built yet.

Later she came to me crying, asking why no one liked her or listened to her ideas. And honestly, I think that happens to so many people. We mistake force for confidence, when often true confidence is quiet enough to observe first.

Trust Before Influence

That’s what this hexagram keeps returning to: trust before influence. Relationship before instruction. Listening before explaining. The most secure people don’t need to immediately establish dominance in every room they enter. They can sit back, learn, notice patterns, and stay open-minded long enough to understand the landscape around them. There’s always something to learn from other people, even when we disagree with them.

And this doesn’t just apply to travel or work environments. It’s about how we move through conflict, relationships, new beginnings, abundance, and life itself. We can get defensive and slip into survival mode very quickly, especially when disappointed or misunderstood. But this sign asks us to stay open-hearted instead of immediately armoring up.

To say, “I hear where you’re coming from,” before trying to prove our point. To remain curious enough to recognize that people usually have reasons for why they think the way they do.

Moving Through Life Like a Traveler

There’s also a beautiful reminder in this hexagram: here that conflict becomes a prison when we drag it out too long. Clean up misunderstandings. Be honest with your agreements. Don’t let resentment calcify. Staying rooted in humility, generosity, modesty, and right conduct keeps us connected to that deeper current moving through everything.

And maybe that’s the real abundance being spoken about here. Not just material success or opportunity, but the ability to move through life with openness instead of domination. To inspire instead of overpower. To collaborate instead of control. To carry yourself like a traveler in a sacred place—aware, curious, respectful, present, and grateful to be learning at all.

A photo of life as the wanderer from 2013

We are entering a new reality and it was important I share this hexagram that helps establish this foundational idea when starting something new.

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The Body Remembers

As I touched my liver (representative of anger), I almost gasped for breath. It wasn’t controlled or planned, it was like my body reacted before I could even think about it.

Because the solar plexus is also the area that got crushed during the binding of women, through many centuries of corset wearing that compressed the power center and the ability to breathe. Women were so weak and so faint for so many generations, and we never really questioned why.

As I touched that liver spot, I felt myself almost come up for breath in this gaspy, almost wailing way. There feels like there’s deep sadness under anger, and I could feel it moving. Usually anger is the first response, it rises quickly and protects, but underneath it there is something much deeper. There is grief for what has been lost, what has been forgotten, what has been betrayed and put aside within the feminine parts of ourself, the receptive parts.

Fear, Anger, and the Breath

Inner Power: It’s all connected through this center of the body, the diaphragm, the solar plexus, the breath itself. The kidneys which are near by metabolize and purify fear, and fear drains our power in subtle ways, like being scared to say the hard things or to fully stand in ourselves. The liver holds and transforms rage and anger, and both of these energies live right in this central core space. The second we begin to face fear and anger, and we oxygenate the system by expanding the breath, more power comes into us.

It’s not abstract, it’s physical. We can literally breathe more deeply, and that changes everything. Breath becomes the pump that moves blood, energy, and life through the system. When breath expands, the entire body begins to open, soften, and move again. When it’s restricted, everything tightens and holds. And guess what? The second you breathe more fully, you have more energy/more power to do stuff.

Expanding the Power Center

I’ve been feeling into this solar plexus activation by breathing directly into it. There’s a breath I love, something I call the “grab more breath,” and it’s simple but powerful. Most people are operating with a very limited breath, just a few seconds, shallow and constricted without realizing it. So this practice starts by taking a deep inhale and filling the lungs completely.

At the very top of that inhale, you pause and grab more. And when you think you’ve reached your limit, you grab more again. And even when it feels like there’s nothing left, you gently pull in just a little more air. What starts to happen is that your lung capacity, right over the diaphragm and solar plexus, begins to increase.

Reclaiming Capacity

You begin to feel that you can hold more, expand more, and access more space in the body. This is the power center, and especially for women, there is a kind of generational muscle memory of constriction here. After centuries of restricted breath and a more recent disconnection from the natural rhythms of walking, harvesting, and working with the body, this expansion has to be rebuilt consciously. The diaphragm has to be invited to expand in all directions again.

So you take in as much air as you can, until you feel like you’re going to burst, and then you take in just a little more. Over time, this stretches your capacity and increases how much breath you can take in naturally each day. That increased oxygen begins to pump through your entire system, revitalizing, soothing the nervous system, and moving through every cell. It regenerates, it clears, and it brings things back into flow.

When breath is limited, everything can catch and tighten, both physically and emotionally. So instead of overcomplicating it, I often just say to notice where your current capacity is. Then gently, without force, push past that edge just a little bit. That small expansion, done consistently, is where real change begins.

Notice how much more breath you take in after stretching this muscle. Notice how much more energy you have.

Notice the relationship about unexpressed/unresolved emotions; fear, grief and anger centers along with the center of the diaphragm which expands to bring more oxygen into your body. After doing this expansive stretching “grab more” breath to rise past what you thought was your full lung capacity. It may bring up big emotions. Sit with them with patience and grace. Listen to what they need to be able to feel safe again.

*Note: for ladies the corset changed forms with the bra. Loosen it. Take it off when you can. Notice that Huge exhale and relief at the end of the day when you let the ladies loose.

*Note for Men: this “grab more” breath works for you. The power dynamics and how power is rightly used is a big theme for men and being able to move anger and fear out through physical movement is important for you. Men don’t express and release emotions in the same way as woman. Notice what your rage is telling you to unlock personal power.

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I was shaking uncontrollably. My back felt like there was a heavy, painful plate like on it armor but crushing me. I was so exhausted and in physical pain after sharing and instead of meditating for clarity, I curled into a fetal position with cold feet, scanning my body, asking God what was going on, asking for the answer to come through my dream so I could sleep.

My dreams are a bit like teleportation. I can sense and feel everything lucidly as If I’m reliving it.

And it did come to me. Clarity

I woke from a horrific dream that didn’t feel like just a dream. It felt like a reliving of a horrific betrayal of everyone I’d ever known and loved turning on me and burnin me alive.

It started in childhood, where my gifts began coming through and people would come to me in secret, just like they always have, sharing things they wouldn’t admit publicly. It wasn’t something I tried to do, it just happened. People came to ask things of me. But in the dream, everything twisted. I was also being abused in a basement, mostly by all of the people in the house, and somehow it all got turned on me. I started to share the abuses that happened in the dark, while at the same time taking care of those who would come to me for counsel and healing.

My family switched and put on mask became the likable ones, the “good” ones, and I became the problem.

The whole town, neighbors church got involved. Gossip spread. Anger grew. Everyone takings sides with the abusers and me being labeled the crazy one.

It turned into a deadly mob.

People I knew, all those people who had come to me for help over the years, turned with mob like- pitchfork energy, and my whole body cringed at the horror of being seen as the crazy one while the truth was so blatantly being ignored. Even my mom, who knew, stayed silent. The worst part wasn’t even the threat of being burned alive—it was watching people lie so easily, knowing the truth, and still choosing the lie. Watching how quickly a crowd can be whipped into frenzy, how power and likability override truth. Seeing all of the people who’d come to me desperate for help, paying me nothing and sharing their darkest secrets saw it as an opportunity for their secrets to burn with me. No one stood up for me. Not one.

I could feel my body reacting in the dream—shaking, hunched, stuttering, trying to explain myself, trying to survive. And that response only made them scream “crazy” louder. What felt like my body betraying me was actually a trauma response, but in that environment it sealed the narrative against me. I remember being told to pull it together or I would be killed, so I split. I hid a part of myself so deeply to survive. I locked her away. And then they killed me anyways. Neighbors, friends, clergy people who all had on their masks and their stories. Total betrayal.

That same hunched back, that same shaking, came back in my body after the live.

It was like a replay of many lifetimes. Being the one people go to in the dark, bringing their deepest pain, their secrets, their shame. And then in the light, they turn away, deny it, or worse—join the mob. The seer, the healer, the one who holds it all becomes the threat. The mirror no one wants to look at. The one who must be hidden, exiled, or destroyed so the truth doesn’t surface.

I saw a vision of the witch in the woods. The medicine woman with her garden, the gypsy in her caravan that could escape in the night. All living just outside of town. People sneaking to her at night with eggs or scraps to pay in trinkets and leftovers, never wanting to be seen, never truly paying, but needing her. And then shunning her in daylight. I saw how these women became large, burdened, filled with what others dropped on them, cast out because they carried too much truth. I saw how often they had to move, never able to root, never safe.

And I felt it all in my body.

The betrayal. The confusion. The injustice. The fear. The grief.

I saw one woman in the crowd who knew I was innocent. She had been used the same way—people dumping their heaviness on her—and her body reflected it. Tumors, weight, distortion. No one would listen to her either. She knew the truth, and they drowned her.

I remember the crowd turning and feeling searing heat as I burned and asking God to forgive them in their blindness.

And then just as quickly as the mob rose, they dropped it. Their eyes went blank. They moved on to the next drama. It was almost more shocking than the violence—the emptiness, the lack of awareness. The way people can become an unthinking hoard and then just… forget.

I woke up in terror, screaming, my body still shaking. And then I heard the song Blackbird playing in my head. Over and over. The birds came to me in the morning, almost like a softening, like something coming to lighten the heart after such a heavy remembering. I cried—deep, healthy tears.

Because the clarity came with it.

I could see why sharing even a small piece of my experiences—things I’ve kept close to my skin for decades, sacred moments, visions, synchronicities, things I’ve only told one or two people—would trigger such a deep somatic response. I’ve done gridwork that brought ten thousand dragonflies swarming from temples, moments that felt like being welcomed home by something ancient and vast. And still, it never felt extraordinary to me. It just was.

But when I heard, “share your extraordinary life,” something in me resisted. Not mentally, but in my body. Now I understand why.

There is a memory, a pattern, across lifetimes, of what happens when the seer speaks.

Being called crazy. Being silenced. Being turned on. Fearing for my life. Being made into the problem so that others can avoid their own truth. Because if you are silenced, those who abuse, those who lie, those who hide, can continue without consequence.

And yet this is a different time.

I prayed for protection. For forgiveness, because truly, many do not know what they are doing. I prayed for justice that does not turn into vengeance, because I’ve seen how easily that cycle continues. I could feel the part of me that was angry, vengeful, raw, finally coming into the light. She’s been hidden for a long time. She’s hurting. She needs rest.

There is something almost cosmic in it—the absurdity, the intensity, the pattern repeating until it is seen clearly. The laughter that comes with seeing it all, the kind that can sound like a witch’s cackle to those not ready to understand.

People say, “share your gifts, it’s so beautiful,” but so few truly see what that process asks of someone. So few understand the weight of it, the history of it, the body remembering what it has lived through.

It gives me compassion for myself. For the hesitation. For the fear. For the way my body responded.

And it gives me clarity.

Because being honest, being sane, being willing to speak about what is actually happening beneath the surface—this has always been dangerous work.

But I know more now.

And I am still here.

*there were hundreds of thousands of woman burned all over europe and the americas over the years for seeing too much.

People still come to me with questions, in my real life and online, throughout my life…“Can I just pick your brain, can I glean from your experience? What are your thoughts on, I have this issue, can I just bounce something off of you?

Always in private messages or in a corner of town unheard. I get thousands of messages. I can no longer give all of this without reciprocal and balanced exchange so that I can provide for my family. Many people assume spiritual gifts should be given out in service to the world. I thought the same until I was emptied. Now if people want my time, it must be in the light and with a balanced agreement

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Watch the story time Live

It became a movement yet It wasn’t really him who started the movement. Alone he would have just been the crazy guy. It was the first couple of people who joined him. The ones who made him not look alone. It felt awkward at the beginning, painfully even… people watching from a distance. Then enough people came in, which shifted everything. Suddenly, it wasn’t weird—it was permission. And then the momentum came and every one started dancing.

That’s how movements actually happen. One person sticks their neck out, sure. But it’s the people who come alongside them—the ones who say, I see you, I’m in, You aren’t alone—that make it real. I’ve always loved those people. The wing people. The ones who give just enough wind under someone’s wings to help them lift.

Talking Each Other Up ( the traditional wingman)

In my 20s in Los Angeles, before swipeable apps, dating looked different. We met people in real life—bars, restaurants, random gatherings. And I learned quickly how awkward it felt to talk about yourself. Listing your accomplishments, trying to sound impressive—it rarely landed well. It came off as self-involved, egotistical, annoying or forced.

So we did something different. We talked each other up. We called it winging.

“Oh, this is my friend Katie—we went to USC together, she’s hilarious, she introduced me to this amazing yoga class.”
Or, “She couldn’t come last night—she’s working in marketing with Apple and had a last-minute meeting.”
Or, “This is Alessa—we take dance classes together, she just got back from Mammoth, and she somehow always finds the best taco spots.”

We’d share stories, highlight each other’s strengths, let someone be seen through someone else’s eyes. It felt natural. It felt generous. And honestly, it worked.

I really started to ponder the importance of the role of wing person over decades.

Now lets consider about how it applies to how things function today.

The Power of the Boost

We’re in a system where the biggest voices are backed by massive budgets. Millions of dollars behind a product, a book, a trend. Entire teams optimizing reach, working algorithms, placing content exactly where it will perform best. It’s strategic. It’s engineered.

And then there’s everyone else.

Trying to share something meaningful—a story, a product, an idea—can feel like shouting into the abyss. Post by post, like by like, hoping something catches enough traction to reach beyond your immediate circle. Even incredibly talented people—writers, creators, artists, healers—struggle to get their work seen because the infrastructure around them just isn’t there.

Being the first to crazy dance

I’ve spent a lot of my life being that first person out on the outskirts flailing my arms, (the weirdo) or second person for others.

Helping organic farmers who grew incredible food but didn’t have the language or tools to reach a wider market. Bringing volunteers into the fields so people could feel what it actually takes to grow food without pesticides—bent over in the sun, pulling weeds by hand. That kind of experience changes how you value something.

I’ve helped quietly raise funds for communities after devastating loss. Shared stories for people across the world who lost everything and needed a way to begin again. Being the first in a new cafe. Sharing my friends small business posts. Small boosts. Sometimes invisible. But they mattered.

Recently, I heard about someone, John Rinaldo, building a library for writers—a place where authors can support each other, share work, get purchases, and create something lasting outside the endless scroll. A place where a book doesn’t disappear in a feed after 24 hours.

That kind of work is deeply needed and I immediately wanted to to make sure it became more visible within the reach I had.

Because at some point, you run out of ways to promote yourself to your own circle. You don’t want to keep saying, “Hey, look at me.” But when someone else says, “This mattered to me,” it lands differently. It carries weight.

We need more of that.

We need people who say:
“This book changed me.”
“This work shifted something in my life.”
“I’ve been watching this person, and what they’re doing is real.”

Not out of obligation or performance—but because it’s true.

And yes, if we’re honest, we want that in return too. But that’s the nature of it. What we put out tends to come back. Maybe not immediately. Maybe not directly. But it moves.

And it comes back around

I’ve seen that in my own life over and over again.

The woman I gave a free session to years ago showed up recently with bags of clothes that helped my boys through an entire season. The farmers I supported brought me food when I needed it most. Ten kilos of vegetables, week after week. It was never my intention to get by giving. Its simply a karmic law. What we put out comes back around to bless when given freely and with love.

Sometimes it takes years. Sometimes it comes from unexpected places. But it comes.

When you zoom out, you can see the pattern. It becomes a kind of ecosystem. A quiet reciprocity that builds over time.

And yet, I still see so many people trying to do everything alone.

I’ve worked with small business owners for years—helping with design, marketing, communication. And behind the scenes, it’s a lot. Accounting, operations, posting, backend systems, outreach. It’s endless. Most people don’t realize what it actually takes to get something off the ground.

And most don’t make it.

Not because they aren’t talented—but because they’re trying to carry everything themselves in a world designed for scale, teams, and capital.

So maybe the answer isn’t doing it alone. Maybe it’s remembering something much simpler. We need more wing people. People who stand next to the one dancing alone and say, Yeah, this looks ridiculous—but also kind of amazing. I’m in.

People who amplify, who share, who point and say, Look at this.

Because most of us don’t have millions of dollars behind us. But we do have each other. And that, when used well, is its own kind of force.

Some of my favorite wing people here on substack to connect with.

- beyond the therapy room.

-inner rewilding

- the mindful writer

- inspired grief recovery.

- the elegant bohemian life

- loving yourself is key

- Inspired Poems

- potter poems

- incredible poet. professional encourager.

LOVE YOU GUYS> TOGETHER WE RISE

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I am lucky. Yes, there has been luck along the road.

And it was a choice.

A conscious one. And many choices that followed. It was saying goodbye to so many comfortable knowns. So much momentum to build a career that I was proud of, and yet so disgusted by at the same time. It was saying no to a life that would have seemed ideal to many.

For what? For my values.

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A small gesture that took me to my past.

Two days ago, I did what I could to help a new friend here in Peru who I met in a cafe—an Israeli man who moved, like many, in these recent times. He was looking for full stack dev work and automation. I couldn’t directly help him because I’ve been out of the game for 13 years now. But I suggested that I could connect on LinkedIn so he had my Rolodex one degree away instead of five.

It gave him access and visibility to a tech world I used to play in. Just by connecting to the network, the access to jobs and posts would be in the US corporate and tech world, where he didn’t have experience or contacts. It was one little click to accept his friend request.

I scrolled through my connections. Disney Imagineers, VPs and CEOs of enormous corporations and funded tech companies, PhDs, TV producers, casting agents, VPs of luxury diamonds, corporate lawyers, and stage builders for Taylor Swift, creative directors of enormous brands, professors at Ivy Leagues. People I worked with, went to school with, and partied with in my old life. Now I don’t know if any of them would remember me. It’s been a decade or two since sharing a beer, a class, or a project together. I saw a flash of that old life—a closet full of fancy clothes and stacks of in-season shoes, with a parking spot with my name on it.

I paused. I felt a small gut punch. Wow Megan, you could definitely have financial stability right now.

The jobs I left behind when I moved to Peru were CCO for a funded tech company, VP of Google Creative, and VP of Product at Etsy. And instead, I chose to work in a small, locally owned hostel in Peru, clean out toilet trash, and book people’s stays.

Then another series of choices, like running a small guest home, moving often, and studying and practicing ancient methodologies. Then moving to the jungle to live on five dollars a day and carry buckets of water. Finally, reemerging a single mother, to find a middle way that has the means for me to care for my boys and do it alone.

Now I have no car. I haven’t driven for 13 years. I own two pairs of shoes and wear secondhand clothes that don’t quite fit me, that were donated this year by a friend who knew I had nothing warm after living in the jungle. My boys now each have a pair of sneakers and a pair of boots. It took me time to budget and save for them.

It’s been 13 years. I chose simplicity, nature, family. I chose my freedom, my values, and my heart. Those trade offs were not so easy.

Between Worlds

I have a friend on Substack, a man who grew up in the mountains of a developing nation. He dropped me a line today to share that he finished his memoir and wanted to check in on my heart. We connected originally because he saw the nature photos I post and told me it reminded me of his childhood.

He wrote something recently, which made me weep:

“We climbed trees, picked their fruit,
sat on the branches with our legs swinging,
high above everything.

We didn’t need gods. The world around us was holy enough.

From sunrise to sunset, we never stopped,
a glass of water, a loaf of bread – that was all we needed.”
-AHMAD SHAH KARIMI

I hope my boys feel this way about their very simple yet nature immersed childhood.

My boys and I spend a lot of time on the mountains and in the forest— almost all of the time outside.

Since coming back to society, they’ve been called “feral, half-savage, wildings, Tarzan and Mogli”

They’ve realized that they have a middle perspective between the kids at camp from the States that have every new tech device, fancy clean shoes, rooms filled with toys, and make 50 dollars a week with no chores. Meanwhile, they make 1 sol (33 c) for taking out the compost, another 1 sol for putting in laundry, and another 1 sol for doing dishes.

Considering their best friend in the jungle had zero toys and ate corn for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, they now find themselves living between worlds.

We talk a lot about the varying ways of living and beliefs on planet earth.

Sometimes they feel jealous or angry, sometimes they feel sad, and yet they always bring extra snacks and give away their toys and special marbles to the kids that have none.

I truly hope that my choices bless and make their world more full. I want them to have means and experiences in the world and at the same time I am grateful that I was able to give them the experience of the fully glory of beautiful, lush nature—swimming in ponds, digging holes, building castles with stones and sticks that they found, and just running around filthy. I know that they relished the freedom and space of the jungle, and I try so hard to make sure they still have that fresh air and freedom even in the confines of a life back in town.

What Kind of World

It was a strange contrast this week to review the old life I came from and where many of those friends are now… running the world and not thinking much about money or where things come from. It was stark.

What drives me nuts is how much the world was willing to pay me for moving pixels, telling stories of corporate culture, and encouraging consumption and addiction on every level. Now that I share nature—and our nature—and our ability to heal, it’s a harder sell to get people to take a chance that a 7 dollar video, less than a bottle of painkillers, can actually heal arthritis rather than numb it. It is truly the simple things that heal and bring us back to love and peace.

I feel like the world I left was a mad one, and being more part of the quiet of nature— and a simple life of a village in the mountains was sane.

And at the end and through this journey, I hope to create a different world altogether. One that values humanity and the land where we walk. One where kids can run around free, dangle from trees, drink from streams, and truly see the value in many things—not just the dollars or the new toy or game. One where we all learn we can heal our bodies, minds, and emotions with caretaking and listening. One where we come together and lift each other up rather than tear each other down.

It hasn’t been an easy path. Yet I’m still here, in the garden where I planted the seeds I harvested from the path. And they flowered. Yes, after a season. They flowered. And that wasn’t luck. It was a choice. to plant, weed, and water. To create my own little world of beauty.

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Someone posted that they were launching a “good neighbor” campaign with documentary style film and social media to support communication and connection within local communities. I sent him the link to the community Facebook post I wrote years ago and said, “Amazing initiative. Let me know if you want to work together. This is really important to me.”

He responded that the post was a big source for starting the project.

Wow. I was floored. I had never met the guy.

Sometimes I don’t know why I share.

I really question it. Yes, I like to write—I’ll always write for me—but why do I feel the need to share? Some days I truly feel like giving up because it just feels like it goes out into the abyss. It’s a lot of work to post, publish, and engage, and mostly it just feels vulnerable to share publicly.

But then moments like this happen. Small, fleeting—five seconds of a day where someone says what I wrote meant something to them. Something that moved them.

They often come on the days I’m asking, Will anyone ever take this seriously? This is innate wisdom of the body—why would it matter to share? What is the point exactly?

And then a message comes. Always at the right time.

Someone says they’re sleeping again after years of insomnia. Or their psoriasis healed from the guidance. Or they can hear better from the breathing and touch points I shared. Or they were inspired to create something of their own from words I threw out there.

These moments land deeply for me. They help me keep going.

I don’t need external validation to write. I’ll always do that. But to structure, edit, and share—that’s the hard part for me.

So I was really grateful to receive that message today. That something I wrote years ago moved someone to create something real, tangible, and engaging—something that brings people together to build community in respectful ways. I’m excited that these ideas can live beyond a single post.

A Small Call to Action

If someone has positively affected your life—tell them.

I find that the people who quietly encourage, especially in the darker hours, are like guardian angels. A small spark of hope can go a long way in a dim moment.

(A huge thank you to for always encouraging me to keep writing, and to and for being early and steady beacons of hope, inspiration, and encouragement here.)

Staying the Course

I’ve noticed I don’t always get quick results. I’m aiming for something lasting—in my life, in my relationships, in my finances.

But writing and sharing feels meaningful. It has been the most consistent thread through my life.

So I keep going.

When Things Stall

In some personal areas, things have stalled or fallen through this year.

Many things I hoped would give my family a more stable foundation shifted in the last month. It felt like getting the wind knocked out of me just as I was starting to find my footing.

A job came out of nowhere and then fell through just as quickly—something that would have covered our monthly expenses. Funding that would have helped put my boys in a school aligned with their needs and abilities was taken off the table. I hoped for more time to exhale from the constant daily tasks—scrubbing potatoes caked in dirt, hanging laundry outside on the line so I found new babysitter came and then went just as quickly. My substack readership has flatlined and then substantially dropped after working on building it up to support me and my family.

I’ve been feeling a bit knocked around. Like—what am I supposed to focus on?

This year I’ve bobbled, experimented, tried stuff and done my best to manage many moving pieces. I’ve learned through it. I’ve been strengthened through it. And I keep hearing the same message:

Keep going.
Simplify.
But keep going.

So these small moments—a message from a stranger—feel meaningful.

I’ve really been considering closing down my Substack page during the last month. But something about this moment has me rethinking. You really never know when something you write is meaningful to someone.

Here was the Facebook post about expat living in Peru. But I actually think they are things that can bring back our humanity in very universal ways.

On Community, Ayni, and Building Bridges in Peru

This post is about exchange, ayni, participation, and relationship. It’s about bridges and trust. (written for the Sacred Valley Community)

Many of us come here from outside—called for different reasons. To be closer to nature, to experience something simpler, to live in a place that has been held as sacred for generations. This land has offered many of us healing, beauty, and a deeper connection to the Earth—something preserved by our campesino, earth-caretaking neighbors.

Over the years, I’ve seen many complaints publicly—about how things don’t work, chemicals being sprayed, landlord interactions, farming practices, water usage, things moving slowly, and noise.

I get it. These frustrations can be valid. I understand them.

But I also hope we can remember that the slowness here comes from a culture that, for a long time, was not oriented around extraction or constant growth. There wasn’t the same fast-paced competition or opportunistic mindset many of us were raised in.

There is also a long history here—colonial systems, lack of access to education and resources, and global dynamics that have shaped what we see today.

A little context can create more understanding—and hopefully more compassion.

Below are some things I’ve learned over the years to build friendships. Take what resonates, leave what doesn’t.

✨Say Buenos Días / Buenas Tardes

• Make eye contact. Acknowledge people.

• Rather than walking into a shop and immediately asking “how much?” or just browsing, start with a simple greeting. “Buenos días.”

• If it’s the wrong time of day, you might even be corrected—but that’s part of it. It shows presence and awareness.

• In Quechua, there is a deeper layer to this. The idea of recognizing another person fully—seeing them as you, and you as them. A simple greeting carries that.

• Not saying anything can come across as closed off or dismissive.

✨Learn Spanish (and if you can, Quechua)

• Language is one of the biggest bridges.

• Even a few words a day builds connection. It shows effort, respect, and willingness to meet people where they are.

• There’s also deep wisdom embedded in language. In Quechua, ñawi doesn’t just mean “eye”—it can also mean portal, vortex, where waters meet.

• In Spanish, there are different forms of “to be”—temporary states versus permanent being. That alone changes how you think.

✨Offer a Ride

• If you are driving and someone is walking in the same direction, offer a ride.

• It used to be very common here. People from here all know what it’s like to walk long distances, carry heavy loads, get covered in dust or mud.

• It makes no sense to pass someone with an empty seat. So many people here simply cannot afford personal transportation and their backs hurt.

✨Walk More

• Walk to connect. To meditate.

• With the land, the plants, the bugs. To people. To yourself.

• Walking slows you down. You make eye contact. You notice things. You become aware of what you carry—physically and otherwise.

• There were very few cars here not that long ago. Less noise, less exhaust, more presence.

• It also brings a natural sense of gratitude for transport when you do use it.'

✨Listen and Observe

• Notice how people speak.

• In many local spaces, voices are quiet—almost a whisper. When one person raises their voice, the whole environment shifts.

• In contrast, many western spaces feel loud, almost like shouting.

• Try lowering your voice in public places. See how it affects the space—and your own nervous system.

• You may even start hearing more subtle sounds and feelings.

✨Slow Down

• On the road, yes—but also in how you move through life.

• Walk slower. Wait your turn. Don’t rush past people or interrupt.

• If your casera is helping someone else, let her finish.

• It’s a slower-paced culture. I sometimes call it “rooted, potato energy.” There’s a steadiness to it.

• A lot of the rush has been brought in from outside.

✨Te Invito (it’s on me)

• It’s a gifting culture.

• If you go to someone’s house, bring something small—fruit, bread, something to share.

• Sometimes it means offering to pay for a tea, a meal, or a drink.

• For holidays, it might be simple staples—rice, sugar, condensed milk.

• A Peruvian grandmother once told me: “It’s okay to have more than others, but it’s what you share that brings love. it also means your neighbors wont want to steal from you later.”

✨Small Talk Matters

• Learn people’s names. Their kids’ names. Their birthdays.

• Talk about the weather.

• These small details build real relationships. There’s a level of humanity here that opens doors when you engage with it.

• People will ask about your life—where you’re from, if you have kids, if you have a partner. It’s a common curiosity and way to connect.

• This is a community-centered culture.

✨Learn the Unspoken Rules

• There are many customs you won’t know unless you ask but don’t just assume.

• Around work, construction, birthdays, godparent roles, water, food.

• For example, providing lunch or drinks during a workday can change how a project flows.

• The more local relationships you build, the more you can learn what’s appropriate abd expeced.

✨Don’t Overpay Out of Guilt

• Know the market price.

• Overpaying can feel generous, but it can also create very fast inflation and make things harder for locals over time.

✨Try to Understand Before Judging

• If there’s trust, people are open to new ideas—but not when they feel judged.

• You may see things that could be improved. Compost instead of burning, natural pest control instead of chemicals. Western education has been focused on efficiencies, details and different ways of problem solving. AND There are also many many things we can learn here.

• But context and connection matters.

• Telling someone their pot is toxic the first time you meet them, when they earn very little and can’t replace it won’t create change—it creates distance and resentment.

✨Help Where You Can

• This doesn’t have to be money.

• It can be helping someone into a shared van, carrying a bag, giving up your seat, helping load something for a short while.

• Hard work and a helping hand is respected in the country side.

• It can be offering your skills—technology, organization, language—to support local projects and efforts.

Be the Bridge

If you want to see change, be the change.

I’ve seen a lot of criticism and frustration. But what actually shifts things is living differently—being kind, being open, building trust.

The Sacred Valley has changed with the influx of westerners and modern ideals. More consumption, more drinking, more trash, more noise, more separation and walls

But there is still so much wisdom, generosity, and depth here. It is a gift to live here.

A small challenge: try living on a local budget. Really understand what things cost relative to income here. It changes your perspective quickly. An example because many westerners don’t realize how much money they have. It’s easy to say, “Wow, that marker pack is so cheap.” But do the math:

A 6 sol marker pack is 20% of a 30 sol daily income. If you are making $70k a year, that would make that same marker pack about $55 if you were spending the same percentage of your income.

Consider what it means to have been born into a country that gives you access to resources, money, and information. Not all exchange rates are the same. Not all things are valued in the same way.

There is always exchange. Always something to learn.

I love you. I’m glad you’re here.

Let’s build bridges together.

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The rustle, the crackle, the whisper, the roar. The wind has spoken to me throughout my life—in whispers and tickles telling me to be quiet and listen, in a electrifying shock up my spine to tell me to pay attention, in a roar raging through to tell me it was time for a change.

The I Ching says that wind is a powerful force that, if moved in a constant direction, can move the landscape of the earth. But if blown around in wild gusts, it can stir up storms and chaos. What is it to harness and channel the wind? It is the only invisible element that speaks through material.

The Breath (wind) Remembers

Our breath sustains us and animates our life—a powerful but subtle force right under the nose. But too many times, in the hustle and bustle of life, we forget to breathe. We hold. We forget that we can live without food for over a month. Without water, we can survive a week, but without air, we perish in minutes.

Expansive, invigorating and full. Breathe now. 3-5 times Exhale like a sigh. Pump your system alive.

Our lives are shaped by the changing forces of the universe. For me, wind has taught me to remember, and to come back to the basics—to breathe each day, to be back in the moment, to be present for the here and now, for that is all that really exists.

We’ve all hopefully read the studies, about how a few breathes turn off the survival brain quite literally, reset the nervous system. But more than that…

Listen. Listen to your chills—that wind up the spine that helps me to remember who I am by reconnecting to my instincts, my inner voice, my heart. It has never guided me incorrectly. That shiver. That was the wisdom I started everything with—to hear and feel intuition as I stumbled, tripped, and ran, singing and dancing through the wild adventure of deep trauma, abandonment, twists ad turns, and finally remembering my worth and authenticity in a world full of contradictions.

Remember, friends. Keep breathing.