Luminous Youth Podcast #1 - Eco-Somatic Learning with Brittany Jane Laidlaw

[00:00:03] Speaker A: Hello friends. Welcome to the Luminous Youth Podcast. We invite you to journey with us as we question what it is to embody our evolving humanity and to feel embedded within place based culture. In these times of change, how can we restore these ways of deep connection from within our homes and family collectives to create a deeper sense of belonging and ecological intimacy? We look, we look forward to exploring this with you all through the lens of education, human potential, cultural revitalization and parenting. We are standing upon Bundjalung country and we acknowledge the traditional ancestors of this land and all of the wisdom they carry, as well as the current traditional custodians and those emerging and all we have to learn from them and this beautiful and powerful country we find ourselves in. And now we invite you to take a moment, to close your eyes if you're not driving, to take a few intentional breaths, to consciously slow down and to open your heart and your consciousness. Let's imagine we are around a community fire. A fire lit with the intention of seeing beyond what exists now. Tales of our glorious future written within the smoke and the flames. A sacred fire. Each stick meaningfully placed to assist us in seeing how we can co create what happens next. In the great story of Earth and all her inhabitants. We are met there by those traveling this path alongside us who have given us their time and their deep ponderings. Around us there are many unseen beings supporting us in our exploration and heartfelt reweavings of life. We are supported and nourished by Earth below, stars above and all of the nature beings that exist alongside us, living their own lives with their own hopes and dreams. And we ask them to be with us, to help guide us. We invite our well and wise ancestors to the fire. We are braided together, standing tall, heads held high, deeply in tune with our creator heart, weaving a beautiful future for our children and descendants through the power of our loving, strong actions. Now together, Mojeo Svensketlo, Vala Keno May we spin this story powerfully into being in my mother tongue. Proto Celtic. [00:03:05] Speaker B: Welcome Luminous friends. Today we are here with an amazing, amazing woman. Her name is Brittany Jane Laidlaw and she is a somatic ecologist and a rewilding mentor with over 11 years of experience leading Embodied Nature Connection programs. She's currently completing a pioneering and very exciting PhD in ecosomatics where her research explores ways of relating and restoring living ecologies through the body. Her work has received numerous awards for its unique leadership, including the inaugural WESTPAC Future Leaders Award and the Prime Minister's Endeavour Award. Britt also holds a Master's in Environment in Somatic Ecology and various certificates in Nature Connection, Trauma, Informed Somatics and Permaculture. Today, Brit offers a range of programs that guide people through the Earth Framework. An experimental. No, it's experiential map. It's probably both. [00:04:17] Speaker C: It is kind of experimental, yes. [00:04:20] Speaker B: For conversing with the body, soul and nature. Based on her PhD research prior to this, Brit was the co founder of wildsong, a nature mentoring program for children and families where she shared ancestral skills, stories, music and movement as a catalyst for holistic wellbeing and cultural repair. And we have also been so blessed to be working with Britt over the last term in our Luminous Youth programs with our middle aged kids and our older kids. And we have just felt so deeply supported by her solid presence and her like deep wisdom. We've been so grateful. So welcome Britt. It's so good to finally be here chatting. [00:05:08] Speaker C: It's been a long time in the making and thank you for the beautiful introduction and it's been a huge blessing for me to be involved in what you're creating with Luminous Youth. I have just witnessed what you guys have been doing over the years and feel honored to be invited in. For me, that recreation of the village has been at the heart of really all that I have tried to do in the world. And so I'm just backing you and it's beautiful to be involved. [00:05:39] Speaker B: Thank you. So let's begin with what is ecosystematics for people who have no idea, who've never heard of it, which is probably a lot of people because it's a very new emerging discipline. So what is ecosymatics, Brit? [00:05:53] Speaker C: It is a very new discipline and I'm actually the only person in Australia who will have a doctorate in this at the time of recording. And very, very few people are researching eco sematics around the around the world at this stage. It's very limited in that academic setting, although people are starting to practice more and more. Just in the period of which I've been doing my PhD in this topic of the last four years, probably the last year, I've seen all of a sudden this explosion of people online talking about this topic and it's quite exciting that I've seen in reference in a lot of academic papers, people have referenced my description of what it is. So eco somatics as a field of knowledge and research and practice combines the fields of somatics and deep ecology. So deep ecology was invented or created based on this philosophy that we are Interconnected with all of life. It emerged out of what was called the shallow ecology movement, which is all about kind of eco efficiency in service to humans. And Arne Nace, I may mispronounce his name, decided to actually bring something forward to the academic space and the practice space that acknowledge actually there's an intrinsic value in the natural world beyond humans value. And there's actually a consciousness, like an animacy that we can connect in with. You know, the land isn't just a backdrop, it's this living world that we're connected to and we're part of this wider ecological web. So deep ecology is all about that. And then somatics is a field of knowledge which values the body as a source of knowing, a source of wisdom, and really like an innate intelligence that we all have, which we can orient our lives from, we can use it to guide ourselves. And the most basic example of that is our gut instinct. And so what eco somatics does is it brings these together and it says, all right, the way in which we understand and really importantly, practice our connection, our embodied connection with that web of life, with that consciousness. Animate. Ecology is through the body. It's through body, through the body, and it's always been through the body. Because if you look back at all Earth centric cultures, which is all of our ancestors, these practices of dance, song, ceremony are everywhere. There's no culture on Earth that exists that doesn't have that as kind of a core practice, or that we at least emerged from. And they weren't done for the sake of just our entertainment, although that's one factor. But they were our primary modalities of connection. And what I've really discovered, and something that's been exciting for me in my research recently, is this understanding that through listening to a lot of literature and reading that a lot of anthropologists and people studying these Earth centric cultures recognize that a lot of these cultures actually understand that humans are separate, which is something that shocked me. And they have this understanding that because of the way that our psyche is set up, because of the way our brain is, because of the capacity of our consciousness, there is a level of separation. We are different, you know, to the tree and to the river. However, we are separate and we're connected. And it's like the paradox of life, right, is that there's actually these two opposing truths. And I remember Carl Jung saying that's our greatest spiritual gift, gift is to be able to see and hold the paradox of life. And that's the paradox is that we're separate and we're connected. And the way in which we remember that connected part is through these practices, through these eco somatic practices which provide a medium that we experience that kind of conjunctive union called. Which is like that experience of oneness, basically, that experience oneness. And we kind of pulse in and out. And that's why these cultures that really we look to and like, wow, they have such a deep connection with the natural world, they have such a deep sense of village. It's because they had these practices which helped them pulse in and out of that sense of connectedness, that sense of oneness. So you never lost track of it. That's what eco semantics as a field is, is. And my research is kind of trying to evolve that, to explore something also called mythosomatics, which is a whole nother rabbit hole, but whole nother podcast. [00:10:39] Speaker B: So I'm hearing, I'm wondering. What I'd love to sort of segue to with that sort of understanding is it brings us to a sense of oneness and connectedness, also acknowledging that we are separate. And I guess with that separation comes the responsibility to contribute. [00:11:02] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:11:04] Speaker B: Which maybe we'll visit later on in the conversation. But so also that I imagine or I've experienced affects our health and our well being in a very real and tangible way, doesn't it? [00:11:18] Speaker C: Yes, absolutely. Mental, physical, spiritual health are all deeply affected. So I think the greatest plague, the greatest wound that we have, let's call it in modern culture, is this wound of separation, is that we only know ourselves as separate. We don't know ourselves as also connected. And when we only know ourselves as separate, we miss that experience of belonging, of unconditional belonging. Because when you enter into that state of connection, when you feel that almost like visceral felt sense that you are connected to this wider ecology that is part of you, you're part of a much bigger picture. You feel your belonging. It's not an idea that you like, oh yes, I know, everybody belongs. Like, no, you feel it and so you don't question it. So when we don't experience that, what we have is an epidemic of people who feel like they don't belong. And that if I've listened to so many stories in terms of people that are struggling with mental health, and it is over and over and over the exact same story. I'm not good enough. I don't belong. I'm the weird one. I'm the reject. Something wrong with me. There's something wrong with me is particularly prevalent in Women, I work with a lot of women. And so I'm sure this is prevalent elsewhere. But that's, it's a consistent theme of this story of I'm not good enough. And why does that even matter? It's because if I'm not good enough, then no one will love me, then I won't belong, then I'm nothing. There's no relationality. And we know ourselves through relationality. And so that's from a mental health perspective, like at the heart of it. And then from a physical perspective, our entire body was co evolved alongside the natural world. Like again, we're not separate from it. And so, you know, I remember reading this incredible study. The fact that our eyes co evolved with snakes, the capacity of our eyes to move so quickly as they do actually is our. A product of our evolution alongside snakes. So, and there's so many examples of that, like the way our mitochondria, our cells and what actually supports our cells to generate energy, which is like our life force, that we need to be exposed to the sun and to the natural light to do that. And so every physical system in our body is responding to the natural world, is influenced by the natural world. Everything from whether what the kind of water we're drinking, if we're exposed to sunlight, also if we. What kind of textures of the ground are we walking on will influence the way that our nerves develop. So at a physical sense of wellbeing, our exposure to the natural world is absolutely critical for all of our bodily systems to develop in a healthy, balanced way. There's no science that is saying that isn't the case. And so from that sense of the way that we know the animat ecology, it's also the way that we. So again from that kind of mental and physical, and I'm introducing the spiritual aspect is that we won't actually feel or even sense or even understand our relationship with the animate world, with the spirit of the land, unless we are sensitive, unless our body is attuned enough to be able to detect it. So if we are not outside exposing ourselves to the sensory environment, to the feeling the wind on our face, to feeling the difference of temperature and understanding knowing what time of day it is by the amount of light exposure in our eyes, if we're not having this embodied relationship to the natural world, our senses are dulled. Our senses are dulled. And the way that the land communicates with us, the animate language of the of the land, is sensory. It's sensory based. And so if we are not Essentially working that muscle. You could think it's like a muscle that you got to develop or a skill that you have to develop. If we aren't exercising that, we're going to be closed off to that conversation. And so from a spiritual perspective, it's no wonder why so many people feel isolated when our lives are mostly indoors and when. When we haven't trained our nervous system and our senses to be able to detect that language. And that's why you could have someone from an indigenous culture who is deeply immersed in these kinds of rituals, practices all these things in which their sensitivity is still totally online, which is, by the way, our human. It's our standard. That's not. That's not unusual. That's kind of like the baseline. You could have an indigenous person or someone who is practicing these skills really as a core part of their lifestyle walking down the road or walking on a bushwalk right next to someone who's from a modern, kind of more Western, I'd say, culture or who isn't practicing. Those who hasn't developed their sensitivity, they could be walking side by side down a bushwalk and have a radically different experience. And they're doing the exact same thing. So that's how it influences our health at those. Very multilayered. In those very multilayered ways. [00:16:54] Speaker B: Yeah. Amazing. So I'm smiling so big over here because it's just. Yes. Yeah. And so I'm so glad that that's where we went because it really informs a lot of how we create luminous youth and the programs we run. And the way I've parented my four children is just informed by that. So maybe we could visit, you know, say, put that there where their senses are being stimulated. They're online. Their son is kind of informing their circadian rhythms. They have their own personal one on one relationship with the animate world around them. It's not through a book or through like cerebral information. It's actually experiential as opposed to, as a society at the moment, what we offer youth. [00:17:56] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:17:56] Speaker B: What we offer them is five days a week from three, three or four years old, some earlier inside a lot of the time, like 90% of the time, learning with the left side of their brain. Very logical, very cerebral, very little experiential and also very little relevance. Like, it's not like what we do with life centric learning, where life informs what we learn, we learn through life. So it's always relevant. It's never not relevant. So children who live in that way, they will learn to read when they need to learn how to read because they want to read a certain book or they want to read the signs at the zoo or do you know what I mean? Like, it's always relevant to what they're doing. So there's never an abstract situation where they're learning history about the Vietnam War. Because you do that when you're 14. Because that's what the curriculum says. And it's this kind of really vague information. There's not that. But what, as a society we do offer children is that five days a week, six to eight hours a day, then they go home and do homework, they have assignments on the weekend or organized sport, which is also taking them outside that relational environment. It's sort of structured and predetermined. So can we like compare those two? Because I love how well you are able to visit those things. Like, I know it deep in my body. And it's how, it's what's, it's what's informed me for the last sort of 25 years. But like from your beautiful, like sort of deep understanding of the psychology and the somatics of that, what, what's the difference? Like what happens and what sort of human comes out of, you know, what, what's online in that kind of situation. And I know, yeah, I'll just leave it at that. [00:20:03] Speaker C: We have such a shared passion for this. That's wonderful. There was a study that I found radically interesting and very revealing around this exact topic. So there was a study done in the 1960s and it has been since updated as well. And it was a study that was performed for NASA. NASA enlisted two doctors called Dr. George Land and Dr. Beth Jarman and Garmin. And NASA wanted to know what is it that actually makes a genius? They wanted to understand what is the formula for divergent thinking, which is essentially creative thinking. It's thinking outside of the box. You know, we want to understand this because we want actually more creative people. We want people, you know, to be. Come and join us at NASA who we need, who need to think like that. And they developed this test to measure divergent thinking, to measure creativity. And what they found is when they did the test on 4 to 5 year olds, 98% of 4 to 5 year olds registered as geniuses at the genius level of creative and divergent thinking. [00:21:10] Speaker B: Just say that again. [00:21:11] Speaker C: Yeah. 98% of 4 to 4 to 5 year olds registered as geniuses. [00:21:19] Speaker B: Just let that sit for a minute. Yeah, 98%. I've got goosebumps. [00:21:25] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. And then it's Quite a sad story afterwards and very revealing because when they then measured 10 year olds, they noticed that it had declined to 30%. When they measured 15 year olds, it had declined to about 12%. And then when they finally measured 30 year olds, 30 to 31, 2% of our geniuses remaining. Now, what is it that interestingly occurs across most Western modern cultures at 4 to 5 years old? What is the thing, what is the thing that influences that? It's when they start school. [00:22:09] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. [00:22:12] Speaker C: And to let that fully sink in and let the grief of that, 98% of our young people, you know, and I, I personally think it's, you know, probably 100%. [00:22:24] Speaker B: Totally. Yes. [00:22:25] Speaker C: But on their measure, you know, on. [00:22:27] Speaker B: Their measure, a little bit of no. [00:22:30] Speaker C: Science, you've got to also account for anomalies and all the things. So you've got to. But I think, you know that in this particular context, 98%, and then they enter school and by the time they're 30, it's gone down to 2, 2%. That's the influence of school. And you know, I can sit here and say I don't actually think that school is working and things, and it sounds like an opinion, but this research shows. Yeah, no, we can measure that because the, what's the biggest factor influencing what happens to these young people? That's the year that they enter school most of the time. And obviously I want to be nuanced and say that there are other influences potentially to that, but that was, that was hugely revealing to me and really shocking and it stirred a lot of grief of just like, whoa, what have we done? And the thing that I want to say is that what we know about traditional schooling, well, that takes into account mainly traditional schooling where putting young people in a room in a kind of box space where they aren't exposed to the natural elements, they are forced to learn things that aren't relevant to them, that aren't relevant to their local ecology, to their real life experiences. And they are praised for convergent thinking, which is for thinking like everybody else. And not only are they praised, but they are assessed on being like everybody else. They are marked. And if you, if you fall outside of the mark, then you are in a way shamed. It's like you didn't meet the standard and you're not perfect. And so when we think about this epidemic of like perfectionism, people terrified. I'd love to chat with you maybe later about this, this idea of like terror, of making mistakes. But that's, that's where it comes from is we're constantly assessed instead of learning by what's relevant to us. So that's one kind of model. Whereas if we allowed children to experience life learning, which if we look back again at all our ancestors and all the cultures that many still practice this, where a lot of the learning is done outdoors, there's still obviously some sun maybe indoors. But it's life based learning and what that's doing from the, from getting them outdoors, obviously we get all those health benefits of their bodies are starting to attune with the natural world and, and specifically our movement. So this is a big thing in eco somatics. Our movements, the way that we move our body shapes who we are, it shapes how we see the world, it shapes our worldview, it shapes our psyche, how we move completely shapes our identity. And at a most basic level, I'm going to give the example of a surfer is that if once you get on a surfboard, you can't just like say, oh, I know how to surf and think that you know how to surf and then identify as a surfer. It's through the movement of actually getting on a surfboard and paddling out and surfing waves and falling in love with the ocean and falling in love with the culture and that shapes your body to literally physically look like a surfer. You've got the tan skin or whatever, you've, you know, I'm speaking stereotypically. Yeah, but your body, your physicality actually is shaped by the movements that you make and the move and that the physicality that comes out of that influences your identity. I'll give another example of a bodybuilder. If you're in the gym lifting weights and then suddenly you start building this muscle, your physicality is going to influence who you think you are. Oh, I'm a muscly person then. Oh, that means this about me. That means that I can do this in my life. That means I have this capacity, that means I'm more attractive, whatever. It influences the entire way that we see ourselves and the world shaped by the movements that we make. So if we aren't allowing children to move by putting them in a chair and making them do stuff that they are not interested in. If we're doing that, what we're training their movements to be is rigid, contain, unable to be expressed. And that's going to influence their entire worldview. It's going to influence their entire sense of self. And I know this at a very practical level because I work with hundreds of women who are like, I feel like I can't express myself. I feel like there's this kind of wild part of me that feels like aged inside of this body and I don't know how to get it out. I feel so much shame and acceptance expressing it. I feel incredibly rigid. I feel like my life force is like, is dead inside. And again, I can't speak for everyone, but I can speak from women who are the byproduct of that of being having to sit down and just contain themselves and you know, stay in that form, be convergent. And so that has that kind of movement or lack of movement has influenced their worldview as that includes their view of themselves. So that's one aspect. The other thing that I will say that I'm a big passion for life based learning and that includes being outdoors and things is I personally at a spiritual level, believe that we are here as souls. Like we have a, where we have a soul. And that soul came down to earth to incarnate in this body, in this life, to have experiences and to learn. We're not here just to have to be cogs in a wheel and do the little hamster thing and get the success and then die. It's like, I personally, you know, I respect anybody else's spiritual beliefs, but I don't believe that's it. I believe that we're actually far bigger like the, it's a far bigger picture that we're actually participating in. And I believe that as that soul, we come down here, we incarnate and we have experiences in our lives that give us these profound soul lessons that support us to evolve, that support us to expand. Now what life learning does is that it leaves the door open for those experiences to meet us and those experiences that meet us when we're not forced to say no. This is the only experience that I'm willing to have. This is the only experience that I'm, you know, that I'm allowed to have. Because we're sitting in this classroom and it's relevant to me. When we have life centric learning, we're allowing life to meet us. And life will always meet us in the specific way and the specific way that we need to learn. And in doing that, we're getting our most effective and efficient kind of expansion. And again, I've seen the outcome of not doing that because I've met so many people, they're like a. So challenged when life does show up later in life and they're like, oh my God, I don't have any capacity to deal with this. I was not trained for this, which is real life shit, you know? [00:29:40] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, real life shit. [00:29:44] Speaker C: And the other side is like, I don't actually know how my soul communicates with me. People feel completely out of touch with that part of them themselves because they don't actually even know or can't. They aren't aware when it arrives right in front of their face because they've been trained to only look inside this little box and they miss the key signs. It's like life is showing up. And so often when I work with women in my eco somatic work, they'll come to me and they'll be like, oh, this is, you know, this is the challenge that I'm facing. I'm like, okay, let's understand, let's have a look at where else this shows up in your life. It's an energetic pattern. And all of these other places where it might be showing up which you might identify as a challenge or something uncomfortable, it's actually, those are the life lessons. That's life centric learning. Life is revealing to you over and over. There's a pattern here. And this is the opportunity for you to be educated in a way that's actually relevant to you and your soul's development. So that's for me, a side by side of the difference between what I believe and what the research is telling us is that more traditional schooling model of like sitting down, learning things that are not necessarily relevant to their local life versus more life centric learning that is, you know, out has lots of outdoor time and sees the being as a holistic being, treats, treats them at the soul level, really treats humans at a soul level. Not just, not just cogs in a machine, not just, well, these are the skills that you need to know. This is the stuff that you need to know to be a productive human in our economy. [00:31:27] Speaker B: Yes, so true. Yeah, so true. And I feel like it's also like, it's great to sort of add to this piece that it's considered so radical. Life centric learning, unschooling, homeschooling, it's considered so radical still, but it's actually, it's actually radical and very much an experiment. School like, school is actually this new, very, very new and a very, very tiny amount of time of humanity have we been doing school. So I think what's more radical is that sort of the school system, this is actually just going back to what we've done for thousands, if not millions of years. So and the, when you were talking about, you know, like the actions of our bodies I was just like. I closed my eyes and I think I wrote about this at one stage, but, like, I. I could imagine like a kid sitting still within the walls. And even the glass, even though if we've got light with the glass, the glass cuts out a lot of the spectrum of light that we need to be healthy and for our bodies to be in healthy kind of cycles. So they're kind of in this room and they're kind of doing this action or this action or this action. Like, that's the actions. They're very, like, mechanical. They're very, like, completely separate to the entire, like, teaming with life, communication happening all around them. They're completely ignoring that and just making these little micro movements. And then like, beside that, I imagine this child outside has come across a paw print of an animal that is just teeming with information around what that animal was doing. The energetics of the mood they're in, where they were going. Maybe there's a scat nearby and you're checking that out and there's this, like, this multidimensional communication happening and these, like, multilayered movements happening. And the two of them side by side always really brings me back to what we're doing. What we're really doing is we're creating a very mechanical way of our brain working, because it wasn't until we started using tools that we really created language. So it's really true that what we do with our hands really affects how we are in the world. And so, like, I think we've gone from doing all these different movements with our hands and our bodies to this. And I think it terrifies me, to be honest, to think what that does to our brain, to who we are as a species. I feel like, yeah, it's something to really sit with is the difference in the energetics between little micro mechanical movements and movements that are very much mirroring and communicating with the world, the beautiful animate world around us. And I have experienced firsthand over and over and over again for 22 years that actually life shows up so fully when you do. And I mean that from a perspective of a mum with just leading from her heart that said, you know, life, I want you to teach your children, my children. And. And so I always said to them, you've got two mums, you've got that mum, the big mum, the big mama. I feed you and I love you and I. I listen and. And obviously I help in this physical world, but there's also another being, there's another whatever you call it out There showing up and directing you and putting stuff in your lap and. Yeah. And so do you imagine how much. [00:35:37] Speaker C: More capacity we would have as adults as well, to be able to meet that mother life when sometimes the hard lessons come from life as mother? Could you imagine our capacity to be able to meet that if we had the practice all throughout our childhood, which is ultimately when our brains develop? It's like, totally. [00:35:59] Speaker B: And our capacity as mothers is nourished. Because, you know, I'm. I'm. I feel like I'm. I'm kind of making this up as I go. Really, I have been making this up as I go, but I know that when I'm in tune and I'm working in that way that I just described, like, I'm like, really? Like, oh, like, spirit. What. What is it that the kids need to know? You know, how can I bring this to them? Or it'll just show up. And I. I see it because I'm on, you know, like, I see it and I'm like, oh. And we go in that direction and, oh, let's go out to the backyard. And there's, you know, a goanna vomiting up bones and feathers, and I'm like, oh, my God, let's check it out. And then we reset. You know what I mean? Like, when you're on. Actually so much more supported, and it's so much less draining as a mother. And so I don't have all the answers because I often feel very drained. But I can tell you that that's one little part that I have found to be true, is that when we are really, like, sharing this mothering journey with the great mother and the great. I got reminded in a. In a. In a meditation the other night that there's also the grandfathers, but you know, these beautiful beings that are around us that we're supported. And so it's not all on our shoulders, you know, and it's so much more inspiring and magical. So many more synchronicities happen. We feel in the flow. Our children pick up on that. So then they're in the flow. They see that they can manifest out of nothing because it just. It happens. But you've got to jump off that cliff, you know, you've got to take. You've got to take those risks and. And trust something invisible, I think, for those things to happen. So there's two ways I'd love to go from here and I guess reflect. [00:37:55] Speaker C: Something that was just written them down. [00:37:57] Speaker B: So they won't disappear out of my brain. [00:38:00] Speaker C: That's like Me too, go off on tangents is that I want to. I want to pick up on that thread of it sounds. It may be confronting. But I think a lot of us feel drained, mothers included, because we know deep down that there's something off like that, like being, you know, this structure, the way that we do schooling, certain things. And I think that's also something is like, that being drained is actually trying to tell us something. It's like when we're in alignment. Yeah, we can be tired, but we feel that energetic life force behind us. Like, you'll support it. And so I think that sense of like, oh, my God, the narrative of, yeah, of course, like motherhood is. Has its challenges. It's life meeting you, it's all those things. But I personally think that that, like, additional. Oh, my God, this is terrible. I have to say. It's like, oh, we actually know that's actually our bodies trying to tell us that something's out of alignment here. And I think that's across the board. It's not just that topic. The other thing that I wanted to say is I personally think that I hope it's quicker than I think it will be. But I imagine we'll look back sometime in the future and it'll be like looking back on when we used to let pregnant women smoke and be like, oh, that's totally fine. And now we're like, wow, that was really ridiculous. Like, what were we thinking? And same thing with, like, when, when it was totally fine to just like, put a child in a bed and let them scream the whole night away and be like, no, we're training them to. We're training them to settle themselves. And now all the science has told us, no, actually, they need the nurturance. They need connection. That's actually not beneficial. And the reason why they go to sleep so quickly after that is because they completely disassociate. And so we know that and this is the evolution of things that we started to study. And so I think we're going to look back on this experience of our schooling and the way that we do that and look back and be like, whoa, what were we thinking? That was a bit crazy. And we'll come back to some of these, those ancient threads that you talked about, because what I think we'll learn and we'll realize is there's a very, very big difference between intellect and intelligence. Very big difference between intellect and intelligence. Intellect is very mind centric or egocentric, and it perpetuates that narrative that we are separate and not connected. And so if we have an education that doesn't allow our, that doesn't really feed and nourish our whole selves and we're sat down and we're forced to learn all that stuff, it's feeding our intellect. And what it's telling us is you are your intellect, you are your mind, you are assessed by your mind. And it has us overly identify with that part of ourselves. And again, I've worked with so many, so many people that are like, I just feel so stuck in my head, I can't get out of my head. And it's like, well that's because you were absolutely trained to be there. In fact you were assessed on your capacity to be there and how well it performed. Whereas in intelligence, intelligence arises through following our curiosity. Intelligence arises through allowing ourselves to learn and develop those embodied experiences through following what's of interest to us. And ironically, intelligence doesn't develop as a one way street, it branches. It's like when we develop an embodied experience of something, we start seeing the relationship threads that it has to everything else. And so the goanna vomiting is like, yeah, interests you in the goanna but it's also like what animal was it eating? And then where does that animal, where does that actually, actually animal was. Where is that from? Let's follow the track. And all the way that the intelligence develops is as like a branch of knowledge instead of this one track, this one thing I have to know that has us so centered on one outcome which is, you know, how well does our mind perform? How intellectual can we be? [00:42:14] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. And there's, there's actually a really amazing body of work which you probably have read from Ian McGilchrist. [00:42:23] Speaker C: Oh yes, the brain. Right brain. [00:42:26] Speaker B: Like really intense his reading. But like there's this like movie that someone made that's like maybe an hour, an hour and a half long and it kind of encapsulates the left brain, right brain. I feel like it's, it's a really good layman's way of understanding intellect and intelligence. They obviously call it something different. But for me when I watched I was like, that's really clever. Like that's just a, a way of simply describing if we, if we go too far down the intellect, what it does and, and what it's done throughout history. It's, it's, he's kind of placed it through historical events and it's really fascinating. [00:43:01] Speaker C: But shame mind or equal either that's like the Internet. The intellect isn't bad either. That's Also, no. Chuck the intellect out. Chuck the mind. It's. It's bringing it back to that exact thing that we spoke about at the beginning, is being able to hold both. Yes. Like our capacity to be. To the. For us to be mind and body and for us to be separate and connected. [00:43:23] Speaker B: Yeah. And like masculine, feminine, yin yang. Like, it's the balance really, that we're trying not so far in this direction that it. The other side is suffering. Yeah. So. So there's two things I just want to. Like, as I'm aware of the time this. Well, there's 50 things, but. Okay, so one thread is that when we start walking down this path as parents or even carers or educators, like, I work with parents, I work with teachers, and everything in between that. And one thing that I see is when you start walking down this path, and I experienced this myself, there's grief. So there's quite a gut wrenching grief of like, it touches on what you said of this, knowing that things aren't right. And then when you start sort of really walking down that path, realizing just how not right it is, and. And the overwhelming sensation of that and then the grief for maybe your inner child or what. What. For me, it, like the. The journey really started after I'd like, had my first child and he was sort of one. And so like, the grief that came up for me in that little starting period was like, what have I done? What have I done to my baby, who I love more than anything else in the world? And so I wonder if you've got any kind of. Obviously that is big. Like, it's quite hard to be with, but I do feel like it's so common that it would be worth touching on. What. How would you speak to that in this setting? Obviously this isn't like a setting where you'd go deeply into that, but how would you speak to that in this kind of podcast setting, this conversational setting of how we. We as parents, as carers, as teachers who've dedicated their whole life to this way of being, and then go, that's why it felt off. Or like now I have to sit with my own childhood, with the last 20 years of my career and how, like just that initial. Like, oh, like how. [00:45:40] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:45:40] Speaker B: How would you speak to that? How can we be with what being courageous enough to change and listen to that. This is off. How can we be with the uncomfortable feelings that come up with alongside the hope and the excitement? [00:45:55] Speaker C: Grief is our ticket home. Yeah, I've discovered that it is. There is actually no way to escape it. And this came up in my research, interestingly, it actually caught me by surprise, is that grief is the thing that opens our heart enough to another possibility. And there's no. There's no. [00:46:19] Speaker B: I'm not crying. [00:46:22] Speaker C: It's true. It's. It's the thing. It's. It has enough weight to. To alter something. It. Anyone who's experienced immense grief know that it changes us. There's no going back after that, experiencing that kind of grief. And that's the. That's the wave. That's the kind of tidal wave that we need to steer the ship in a different direction. Grief is our ticket home. When I did my eco somatic research project for my master, sorry, my PhD, part of that was dancing the mythologies of place. Because when I spoke about mythosomatics, it understands that the animate land isn't just conscious for no reason. It's actually full of stories. It's. The land is animated by mythologies, by the mythologies of place. And that's what we were dancing when we were dancing all these ecosystem attic rituals and things. We were dancing those stories. And when I was dancing this story, I picked a story from my ancestry, the myth of the selkie. And I spent the first, probably 25 to 30 minutes weeping. And it came from nowhere. It came from the depths of me. And it was like the most ancient grief. And then what on what unfurled, what opened in, that was then suddenly I felt life start to move me again. It was like the grief was the force, the only force that was strong enough to break the dam. So that force, that animate force of life which I describe as soul, I call soul. The. The unique expression of the anima mundi. The anima mundi is the world soul. You might want to call that universe God, Shakti, whatever name you want to put it for. That kind of. That life force that animates everything I call our soul is. It's the unique expression that God, universe, animal, wundi moves through you. And grief is the only force that had the capacity to open the floodgates. So I could feel it again moving through me. Because life puts all this shit on top and we can't feel it anymore. And I personally. That's why grief is the ticket home, because it's the only. It's the only thing that is able to bust through it so we can feel it again. And from that, this entire incredible ritual dance experience unfurled. And I wasn't leading that from my mind. My mind was like not even present. I was completely moving from my body. I was guided intuitively. I was having this conversation with these animate beings. I was like, whoa. Like my eyesight even changed at one point. I was, it was incredible. And was having this participatory process with these birds. And this might sound a bit far out, but this is. So this is one of my teachers, Josh Schrei from the Emerald Podcast. He has an amazing episode called like this Animism. Seeing this animate force and participating is normative consciousness. It's been our normal consciousness and worldview for 99.99% of our human history. And so this might sound strange, but this idea of what we're living in now is far stranger. Far, oh stranger. So I personally know through my embodied experience and also just, you know, not just that, but through, through what I've read through what the data is showing is that grief is the ticket home. It's not something to be avoided. It's letting. It's when we let ourselves be opened by the grief. Like let our heart be broken open because it's the only thing strong enough to break it open enough to love again, to experience that love again, to realize that it's not just love wasn't only available in that thing that you're attached to that now has to change. It's actually available everywhere and particularly in the natural world, you know, where we're home. So that's what I will say is that just shifting that perception of grief as being something that's bad, that we want to avoid, that's hard. It's like. No, it's actually the most beautiful catalyst for where we need to move now as a culture. [00:50:57] Speaker A: Life centric learning is a way of life. It is a worldview with ancestral connection, scientific backing and practical implementations. And it draws its inspiration from a revitalized future. If you feel called to experience, expand your ideas around what education truly is and how we can tend to the soul or the hearth of the family while keeping each person's true essence intact. You are invited to consider a one to one familial wisdom session. A personal exploration around the practicalities of how life centric learning can look within your family constellation. For more information, visit luminousyouth.org. [00:51:44] Speaker B: So beautiful. I feel like I, yeah, had a little cry to myself. Then I feel like I'm, I'm at this, I'm at this juncture in my parenting where my three older kids are older, you know, one's overseas, one's living away. Finished his apprenticeship and starting his career, and the other one has just got his license and he's off. You know, he's the third, so he's like an adult. And I wasn't quite ready for the wave of grief that has hit me. And I am simultaneously so happy for them. And this is the moment, you know, like, this is. I know that my parenting doesn't stop at all, but I really understood what you said in that I have found by feeling those waves of grief and by having times where I do cry, I move, I write, I walk, I go up into the bush and feel all the feelings, because there's a lot of shame around feeling grief for your children getting older. I often, if I try and express that to people, they're like, oh, let them go. And of course I'm letting them go. I've. I've. I've let them live a free life from day dot. But there's a grief in them actually stepping away into this. Into this culture and out from underneath my little wings. And there's such an extreme, exquisite, painful beauty in that ending that I feel is so important to be felt and experienced so that, like you said, it can shape me into the mother I need to be to adults. [00:53:36] Speaker C: Yeah. [00:53:37] Speaker B: Because it's a completely different type of mothering that they need now. And our society will say they don't need. They don't need mothering. And I. And I guess what it is is that society doesn't understand what kind of support we actually do need as adults. And it's obviously very different to what a child needs. If I. If I kept mothering in that way, it would. It would either ruin our relationship or would impede their growth. But I feel like those. Those concentric circles of support really break down as children become adults. And I feel like that's another fracturing and fragmenting in our world. So I really get what you mean. That. That feeling so that you are able to change into what's needed for this new story, for this new chapter in any journey. For me, that's what's happening for me in this moment. But there's been many of those, and there will be many more of those. And so, yeah, creating the space to allow it to change, it was just so beautiful. And. And what. One of the things that's come up for me during that time, which is the other thing I wanted to speak to, is mistakes. You know, I love our conversations around mistakes because our. I feel like they are. They're just such valuable learning. Like, there's so. I don't know, for me, I look at when someone makes a mistake and there's such a beauty in it. There's such a vulnerability in it. And if, and if, and if we could be held in that vulnerability of our mistakes, this immense learning in that vulnerable, soft, open, like, kind of uncomfortable feeling that comes up when we have made a mistake. And so I notice in the schooling system and in the parenting, the mainstream parenting ways, it's like, how do we avoid mistakes? Mistakes. Mistakes must be avoided at all costs. And if they happen, don't talk about it. Yeah, like, let's just brush it over and maybe like, you know, in adult world, there's like this whole cancel culture in school. It's like, well, you got a D, you better improve. There's not like, wow, it seems like you're not understanding this or maybe not enjoying this. We work together. Do you even want to be doing this? You know what I mean? Like in adult world, someone makes a mistake and they're cast out of the thing with no hands of support and guidance. And it's just so dysfunctional in a moment where there could be so much functionality, there could be so much learning and deep connection and even tighter bonds woven through repair. And I know that we kind of love chatting about. I'd love you to bring your ecosystematic, your experiential words to this topic. [00:56:49] Speaker C: Perfect. And I want to track back just real quickly because you mentioned something that was so poignant, is that we can't talk about rites of passage without talking about grief. They go hand in hand because rites of passage are inherently about death as much as they are about rebirth. And so grief is such an essential part of a rite of passage, which ultimately is just a transition from one life stage to another, a transition from one model of culture to another, a transition from one way of being to another. And grief is always involved because it's the. It's the door that. It's the way that the portal is opened to the next stage. You know, that's. That's how it happens. So I want to. I'm mentioning that because if there are moms listening, it's like the grief is actually supporting your child because you're opening the door for them to then walk through into the next phase of their life. Actually an essential part of the process. And your body remembers that. Your body remembers that because again, we've had those rites of passages in our lineage for 99.99% of human history. And it's only in this modern blip that we haven't had those. And they're still occurring. And your body actually knows that they're still occurring. It's a whole nother tangent. That's why I think a lot of young teenagers feel so drawn to risky behavior and things that. And threaten their life because they're wanting to die. Their child, the child expression of themselves is wanting to die. And they want to transition to this more adult part of themselves. And so they're wanting to kill off that part. That's why I think a lot of young people have suicidal ideation. So I wanted to just tap back into that bit real quickly. Is that the grief is actually like a. It's the, it's the, it's the boat that we jump into to travel there now. Mistakes. Oh, my goodness. We could talk at the minutes about this. I think mistakes are a critical part of passage in themselves. Mistakes are a rite of passage because what also a rite of passage is about. They're about maturity. They're a maturing, maturing process as individuals, as we, you know, fumble our way through life. My partner calls it the evolutionary fumble, which I love his expression when we bump into stuff and when we argue and we're like, oh, that was a bit silly. And he's like, oh, this is. It's just the evolutionary fumble, babe. And mistakes are like that. They're our evolutionary fumble. And they are our rite of passage that supports us to mature. Any culture that doesn't have a level of acceptance for the fact that humans literally learn through mistake making through fumbling will remain immature forever. I wrote a piece about this once of like that our level of maturity can be gauged with our level of acceptance for mistake making, for be able to. Because it's ultimately a reflection of can we hold all parts of ourselves? And when we hold all parts of ourselves, that's what it means to be an integrated human. What it means if you're an integrated human, we would say, that's a mature human. And so when we make a mistake, what it does is it provides the very unique opportunity to actually learn what it is to take responsibility. Not saying that, oh, you just get off for your mistakes. It provides an opportunity to go, oh, man, I actually stuffed up there. And our natural human inclination, because we have a very sensitive heart, our natural human inclination is to remediate that. Now what we've invented instead of that is shame and guilt and said, no, this is bad. Instead of allowing a human natural response when we hurt another, our natural response is, oh, I'm sorry, how can I fix this how can we repair? The only reason I believe that doesn't happen is because we've been raised in a culture. Whereas if you admit that you've done something wrong, then everyone's like, see how bad you are. You're going to be punished, punished, Punished for doing something wrong. Even if you admit it and even if you want to try and repair, you're going to be punished. And so, you know, if we look at, if we look at the history of where that comes from in schooling, there's that whole thing of being marked and assessed based on how perfect you can be. And there's again, we trace back to the fact that if we had life centric learning that was outdoors, that was eco somatic based, what we're constantly doing is having lots of a little mini micro mistakes from people stumbling and tripping and, and learning as we go. And that may include little challenges that we face in life as they show up. Like, I'm sure that you experience those as adults. [01:02:04] Speaker B: And what we see in luminous youth with our little groups when they make mistakes and we circle up and we talk about it and we don't use words so that, don't use names so that we don't shame the person. We just talk about the experience and how open a kid to that. [01:02:20] Speaker C: Yeah, absolutely. And we trust that they're like, that they're learning experiences. Whereas in, if we, if we limit. Oh, and sorry, I was getting. No, it's all right, it's all right. What that allows us to do is it allows us to meet all parts of ourselves because we often mirror our environment. So whatever we're in environment, as much as our movement shapes who we are, our environment shapes who we are. And so we are, we are mirroring creatures. If you look to all traditional dances, most of them are movements that mirror animals. And that mirroring is a product of our, the way our brains are shaped, we have something called mirror neurons which actually inform how our brains are shaped, how our bodies are shaped, how our worldviews are shaped. When we mirror the movements of our parents, that's how we learn how to talk and walk and things. So we're doing that mirroring at an ecological level. So when those ancient cultures were embodying the landscape through their movements, they were developing a deep sense of connectivity. And they were also in that process mirroring the diversity of self. They were meeting all different parts of the ecology and that allowed them that had the capacity develop the capacity to be with and hold all parts of themselves. And so you meet the part of you, when you're doing like, outdoor eco, somatic life learning, you're meeting the part of you that wants to perform in front of others and jump off the ledge. And then you're also meeting the parts that's a bit shy and a bit like, oh my God, I hurt myself and now I actually have a lot of emotion to express. Or you're meeting all these aspects of yourself. So you can hold the fact that you're not just one singular identity. You are a rain. You're an I call. You're an ecology in itself. Whereas what that more traditional schooling model does is it says, this is the only way that you can be. This is the only. This is the only thing that is accepted way of being part of you that is accepted. And it breeds this sense of if I'm anything but that, but that, then I'm not perfect. And what we have, when people have a wound around having to be perfect, around not all parts of them being accepted, then that's where we see cancel culture. Because if somebody has a wound around having to be perfect, they're going to project that on someone else. And it's like, well, if I can't, if all parts of me aren't welcome, then all parts of you sure as hell aren't welcome. And I can't be with that because I can't be with it in myself because it got shamed and punished in myself. So, you know, it's. The roots are really interesting of how they lead back to the way that we spend our childhood, how we were enabled to be an this ecological being that we are versus this very. This very rigid, controlled pain version of ourselves, which is actually contributing to a lot of social dysfunction. That's what I wanted to say about mistakes. It's like it's. It may sound simple, but it's actually far bigger than we think because again, when we're treated as that ecological being, that's when we're able to integrate. We're integrated humans. When we can hold space for all parts of ourselves. And being integrated is what it is to be mature. You know, we can. We can hold space for the fact that we might not agree with someone, but we can respect their opinion, we can respect their religion, we can hold space for the different cultures or whatever. And we are certainly not seeing that now. We're seeing more and more and more polarization. And that simply comes from our inability to be able to hold space for all parts of ourselves. And. Yeah, yeah. [01:06:22] Speaker B: And I think. I think the world is Actually, you know, the world out there is actually giving us so many opportunities to learn that one. [01:06:31] Speaker C: Totally. [01:06:32] Speaker B: You know what I mean? Like, it's just like, there's another one, there's another one, there's another one. And like, obviously it will take us a bit to kind of. To work that out, but I. Yeah, there is so much polarization, which is such a, like, profound opportunity for us to be with all of these uncomfortable parts of ourselves. Because it is uncomfortable. It can be uncomfortable. Like, I know during COVID and things like that, it was really uncomfortable. But that's the point. [01:06:57] Speaker C: Hey, can we. Can we. Can we hold space for those parts without making any bad or wrong? Because that entire language of wrong, bad, that's again, a product of the mind, a product, the ego, a product of the education system. [01:07:13] Speaker B: Yeah, that idea that there's a right. [01:07:16] Speaker C: Way and there's a wrong way. [01:07:17] Speaker B: Yeah, it's. It's. It's. Yeah, yeah. Yep. [01:07:22] Speaker C: Yes. Yes. [01:07:26] Speaker B: I wanted to, like, speak to just very quickly before we wind up. We begin to wind up is when you brought in rites of passage. I feel like there's this just this little. I feel like as the western culture. So when I speak about, like, you know, society, I just mean, like westernized society. And I think we've kind of all gone, oh, rites of passage. We need to do rites of passage. And so we create a weekend or like a week long thing where we go and we do our rites of passage. And I totally did that for my daughter when she started to bleed. Of course we celebrate changes. And I also feel like. And I just would love to sort of start planting seeds because it's something I think about a lot is that actually there's a lot more to it. That's like one little piece of the puzzle, actually. We don't create lives of rites of passage. We. Life does that life create. Oh, like, okay, so you finished grade 12. So we're going to do a rite of passage. You know, like, we. We're not that powerful actually, like, we are. Life will present us with the rite of passage. What we can do and what we endeavor to do with luminous youth is create tools and skills and points of connection through story, through song, through fire. [01:09:06] Speaker C: Through. [01:09:08] Speaker B: Gatherings and literal tools of how to and strategies of how to be with the moments that life presents us with a rite of passage. When we do start to bleed, when we do make a monumental mistake, when our children do start to leave home, when our baby becomes a toddler. Do you know what I mean? There's Thousands of rites of passage. And we can be in different aspects of like 30 rites of passage at the same time. We can be in the beginning of one, we can be coming out of another. We can, it's not so linear. And I think we like to linearize things, which I get, because then we feel kind of in control and, and there's a beauty to that. Like, I totally get it. And I just, I just feel like it's a bit messier than that. Like it's, it is so true. [01:09:56] Speaker C: A lot of teenagers kind of push back and they're like, oh, I have to go to some weird weekend. And like some, you know, some are super into it and really excited to be celebrated. But what you just shared so reminds me of like that just the real messy process of it. I'm reminded of what Dr. Miriam Rose talks about. She is the person, incredible first nations woman here in Australia who bought this concept of didiri to the wider conversation. And she has a piece, you can look it up when she's speaking about didiri and the way that it works is the deep listening. That's what it kind of translates roughly to this deep wellspring. And she says, we don't, we're not in a rush. We don't actually have to do things at a particular time. Or we listen, we listen and we listen and we wait until we're told. We wait until we get the message to do ceremony. We wait until we get the message to move on. It's all listening. And so I remember the same thing, learning from when I was in Mirawan country, from one of the elders there, Arnie, Edna, and she was saying, you know, we always look to what, the star constellation. We wait for a particular constellation to be overhead before we do a ceremony. And that's eco guided rites of passage. That's actually listening to life. And then life is saying, okay, it's now and it's again being responding to what's naturally emerging, what's showing up as like, okay, that's, that's not even planned. It's like, oh, okay, maybe I've seen the butterfly. And that is a representative of this particular ancestor or this animate being or this family member. Oh, that means, that means we've got to gather and we've got to have this conversation now because that life is showing us that that's something that's necessary. And that's really like if we want to peel it back. What were the rites of passage in service to? It's not just the maturing of Humans, from that individual perspective, the whole point of a rite of passage is every rite of passage that we transition through, we come home deeper and deeper, and we come home to our place in the ecology. And that includes responsibility. You know, with every rite of passage, we get a greater responsibility to the place, to country or to the ecology that we belong. We get a greater responsibility to the collective, whether that be our family or to the wider collective. And so that's what they're really orienting. They don't really have value unless they have that quality to them. You know, I think about when. When young men like the. The vision quest, which is kind of more of a popularized rite of passage now that has become kind of taken up by the Western world. Vision quest is going out four days, four nights, fasting to receive a vision. And it was originally just a men's ceremony, so it wasn't actually designed for women. And ironically, they modeled that ceremony off women, what women naturally experience over four days of their first bleed. But the whole purpose of that, for men to go out is that they developed a relationship with the land. So when they came back, they had a. They had a new level of responsibility to the land. [01:13:21] Speaker B: Yeah. [01:13:22] Speaker C: Like, if that. If our rites of passage aren't appear, like, you know, attending to those parts, like, I understand. It's like we're in the evolutionary fumble. [01:13:32] Speaker B: Yeah. We are a big one. And that's what I mean. Like, there's. It's. No, no. Like, obviously we still do what we've already done. That's beautiful. The celebration. But I think. I think. I think sometimes the teenagers push against because they can feel it's off. They can feel it's not the whole story. And they can feel not much actually does change after that in how society teaches. Treats them. And I was just trying to think when you were speaking. Yeah. Someone said to me, and I just. It just really stuck with me is every time you quest or you go through some massive rite of passage, you deep, more deeply know, like, what your contribution is to the world. And that's what it's all about, is what's your contribution? What's your contribution? You know? Yeah. Where. Yeah. So bringing that into, like, what both of us are passionate about more generally, which is cultural repair. You do amazing work with women. You're bringing this. I got a little sneak peek of new, exciting and not even just exciting, but really unique opportunities for women to. To dive deeper into everything that we've spoken about and more and to get a, you know, a deeper understanding and actually Experience a lot of what we've spoken about and more. And the. The real guts of luminous youth is, is born from this, this deep yearning that came through a rite of passage for me that I just feel good. I feel like alive. I feel energized by weaving cultural repair. I'm a weaver and, and cultural repair is my, you know, where. What I want to weave. And so because I'm a mum of four, I felt really drawn to slowly, slowly, slowly, slowly chipping away, doing little bits towards. I don't have a grandiose vision. I just chip away with the children who are in our little community. And obviously that's going to expand with our online stuff that we've got coming up. But all of it comes back to cultural repair, bringing us back to what it is to be a human. What is it that brings us back to our true humanity? And that's expressed with luminous youth through children and their parents. And reading your stuff, I just got this really beautiful like, understanding that you're really bringing that to women as a. Yeah, just reminding us of the full range of like vast. All of the elements of what it is to be a human woman. It's totally embedded in our amazing world. So I just love to hear about, just in general, like what it is you bring to cultural, like what moves you about cultural repairs and then how you're honing that at the moment, how that's expressing at the moment. Because I feel like people like us and like so many others, I think a lot of cultural repairers and weavers are born right now obviously. And then we all have this little, like a little thread that we're weaving. So as a vast topic. And then how are you weaving that at the moment? [01:17:30] Speaker C: Yeah, beautiful. Thank you for asking that question and how I weave it. The thing that I am most passionate about is having people's soul landed and activated and expressed in their body and what that looks like. When you said those rites of passage, you know, the. You went through them and they bring bring forward more clarity around our contribution to the world. I couldn't agree more. But the thing that I want to identify there is that our contribution to the world isn't always translated as what we do, the job that we have, it's the frequency that we emit. And so I actually believe that our soul is. Could be even more simplified as just saying our most authentic self. Because when we're our most authentic self, when we remove all the layers of the stuff that's been on top, the conditioning, the programming, the making Small, all the things that we chatted about, all of the taming of self. When we peel back all of those layers, well, layer by layer over time, chipping away like you said, and we come back to that core essence of who we are, which is our most authentic self. It's who we were, who we were born as, ironically. And, and that self that we get to, that's where soul is just pulsing through us. That's where we feel it, that's where we're expressing it. And that can be in the work that we do. But truly what it's really about, what the biggest gift that we can really make in the world is, that translates to a frequency. We end up resonating in a frequency. And frequency is far more effective because it can reach people without even working with the one to one. You know, our frequency is something that shifts our entire, the entire functioning of our consciousness on this planet. And so what I'm really excited about and the work that I do is I support women to be able to go through that process of peeling back all the layers. And I do that really consciously and guided by the pattern language of nature. So the earth framework which you spoke about at the beginning in my intro was the framework that I developed through my own journey of the soul tugging at my ankles and my life falling apart and having one of those rupture moments that I'm sure we all have that brings us into that point of grief that opens up us enough to listen. And it was a 10 year process of trying to understand what my soul was trying to tell me in that place. Because everything looked good on paper. I was the, you know, I had all the perfect things that I was supposed to do. All those checkboxes that school told me and all the life told me. It's like this is where you gotta be, this is where you. This is. And then you'll be rewarded with happiness. And I was like, I am on the carpet ball of my eyes out, like what's wrong? And. And I started to. That's when I started my own unraveling process and unlearning process. And in those 10 years, I through life experience, through like exploring modalities, but also through my master's degree and now my PhD, I came to learn this pattern language that I could read in mythology and in nature. And I started to see, well, we are bodies of nature. And the sun, the moon, the flowers, the trees, they are all also bodies of nature. And what is some of these patterns that I can observe in the way that Those bodies of nature have this life force, their soul, pulsing through them and that I could actually copy. And I mapped that out and I. What, what emerged was this kind of. I don't want to say step by step formula because I also want to acknowledge that it doesn't always happen in a linear way, but it gives us a sense of a map. And that map, as I started to practice it, is the map how we come home. Because we can talk about, you know, this is where we need to get to. This is, you know, this is, this is the ideal. But it's like, well, how the hell do we get from here to there? And how do we do that? Honors the way that our body was designed as an ecological being and the way that it works. And there's clues for how that's done in nature and in myth. And so that's where the Earth Framework was born, to support people in that untaming process. Layer by layer. Each of the Earth is an acronym. Each letter stands for a stage of the process until we come to that place where we can feel soul alive in our body, where we're resonating at that frequency, and where we become the gift that we were designed to be for the planet. [01:22:28] Speaker B: Amazing. [01:22:29] Speaker C: I call that our wild self. That's, you know, I, I call that really reclaiming our wildness, the full ecology of self. And our wildness is our most untamed, natural, authentic version of ourselves. So that's what I support women to do. [01:22:45] Speaker B: Great. And I've listened to you speak to that and it's. Yeah, it's. It's profound and it's so all encompassing and like a container almost to, like a cocoon to transform in. [01:23:01] Speaker C: It is. It is. It's totally like that. It's like there's definitely a point where we, you know, where we have that disillusion inside of the crystal. [01:23:10] Speaker B: Yeah, we're like mush. [01:23:13] Speaker C: We're all mushy. [01:23:15] Speaker B: Process stage four together. [01:23:18] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah. [01:23:20] Speaker B: I'd love to finish off with just like a question that came to me then. I hope I'm not putting you on the spot. Well, I am, but I will. I would just love to ask you what it is because you've had so much experience with Wild Song and how beautiful and amazing and successful that was. So many of our local families, you know, attended and. And were a part of that. And now you're with luminous use. And that's kind of a continuation, I guess, of that same sort of thing. And I'm wondering what it is, what it is that you've noticed and what it is that you're getting out of working within our al cocoon of. Of children, of working with children. Obviously I work with the, the parents separately but like Brit's just been, you know, doing two and three days a week with. With the kids out. Out on country. Yeah. Experiencing our culture. [01:24:28] Speaker C: So. [01:24:28] Speaker B: Yeah, I just, I'd love. I'd love your. I'd love you to share from your perspective. [01:24:32] Speaker C: Yeah, beautiful. I've loved actually learning some of the creative things and almost like cultural. What is it called when you kind of the ways of doing things. I can't think of the word right now. Wild Song. When I started it, it was very nature connection, almost Bushcraft skill focus in that way. But we had an underpinning of rapport based relating and a lot of empathic relating essentially to. So that was a big, big theme. And so it's been so beautiful to come to Luminous Youth. And there's more. There's a diversity in terms of that whole human of, you know, you've got the craft and then you've got the poor storytelling, which is always beautiful. And what I have, what I've observed in myself is what I can say is that I have experienced my own little wave of grief when I first started back working with Luminous Youth. Because when I. When I wrapped up Wild Song, it was one of the most beautiful chapters of my life. And it was in the storm of all the COVID era and I. I moved interstate and it just. For whatever reason, life just had a plan for it. And that was at the plan had it wrap up a number of years ago. And I was at peace with it because I've just got familiar with meeting life and meeting that invitation to let things go, if they meant to let go. But what occurred for me when I came back to Luminous Youth and saw the influence of these young people, the influence of the work that you're doing and also actually meeting some of the young people that I've worked with. And so I've known them for the last kind of four or five years when they came to Wildsong. And now I see them further developed in the work that you're doing at Luminous Youth. I hit my own wall of grief of like, oh my God. I actually see, you know, the impact, the lasting impact that we were doing. And that's been such a treasure for me because it's opened my heart to possibility that I'd kind of, I think in naturally, when we experience a loss in our lives, there's a part of us that closes off, that doesn't want to experience and that might even happen unconsciously. And so coming back and working at luminous youth, I realized it's like, oh, wow. I don't think I've fully let myself grieve this in that way because I'm meeting it again as I'm seeing the ripples of this work long term. And it's, that's why I'm just so honored to see how you are carrying that over Terminator. You're wanting to over long term and wanting to share that now with the world is like, I couldn't be more supportive of that. It's just beautiful. And it's like, reminded me of like, wow, this is so powerful. The other thing that I also want to say is just that I've observed that I deeply appreciate is like, I teach at university now and so, you know, I've lectured students who are second years teaching a bunch of second year students in sustainability. And you know, I would pose a question to this class full of 20, 20 year olds, you know, like 18 to 30 year olds often, and they look back at me like a deer in the headlights and really challenged by me asking a question and wanting to engage and wanting to get them to go outside to reflect on something and then come back and talk about it. And, and I was really shocked actually with the lack of capacity of people to do that. And then I go and spend a Tuesday with our group of 11 or 10 to 14 year olds and the level of dialogue around really complex topics blew me away. I was like, wow, the capacity of these 14 year olds, 13 year olds, far out. The capacity of these like 20 year olds to the degree where it was so, it was so stark. I was, I was shocked. And I was also, it was just living evidence for me. I was like, wow, this, you know, say what you will about it being an alternative path, a different path or whatever, but if we're talking about actually supporting our young people to be whole, embodied, incredibly intelligent and impactful humans in the world, I've seen no greater example than that, than the work that you're doing and it feels an honor to be part of it. And I've got evidence of that now. I can say someone who's taught university students, it's like, it's like pulling teeth comparatively and with all compassion to the people, you know, from all walks of life that I meet there. But yeah, that's why it's like, oh gosh. And it allowed me to meet my grief in Terms of, oh wow, what system have I actually been investing in recently? And, and that's okay to question that. I think it's healthy because we have these little moments in our life which kind of go actually what's important here. Bring it back, you know. So, yeah, thank you. That's what Luminous youth has done for me as a, as a person. [01:29:52] Speaker B: Thanks, Britt. Receiving that. [01:29:56] Speaker C: So. [01:29:57] Speaker B: Wow. So deeply because I, I like, I, I just want to honor here, us, us like me, you, Paul, and our ability to come together and share and create and give to that thread altogether because I feel like that's a trick, that's a tricky, a tricky road to walk. And I feel like our big hearts and our love and respect for each other has just made it even more powerful. And I'm so grateful for you for showing up in that way open hearted and courageous and fully like solid. Just I'm here. It's just, it's so rare and I'm just, I'm so grateful and so I, yeah, I just really want to acknowledge that about you and when you're in like, and when you're, you're doing something, you're fully there and you're fully present and yeah, I feel that. [01:31:04] Speaker C: I think it's probably also my, my passion for just spiritual development because there ain't no more spiritual personal development than working with young people. And I mean that in the best way. It's like they will reveal to us all of this other conditioning, all these spots that we weren't allowed to be expressed that we, you know, had to shut down or whatever. And that's that they're our greatest healers in that way because they reveal to us what it actually means to be human. And that's totally true. [01:31:33] Speaker B: Like, I'll happily tell a story to women, but I am so terrified to. [01:31:37] Speaker C: Tell a story. [01:31:44] Speaker B: Because they're going to tell me the truth. [01:31:46] Speaker C: They're just honest. [01:31:47] Speaker B: Yeah. Thank you so much, Brit. That's like, oh, so, so rich. And I can already, like, I'm already thinking, oh my God, we didn't even cover myth and all the other aspects of our like of you, of your amazing work and what we're feeling passionate about. So I, I hope that we can organize a part two and delve into the, all of the other beauty and richness that we bring and that you bring and. Yeah. Thank you so much, Brit. Thank you so much. And I will obviously add links and all the things underneath. Underneath. What's the, what's the. Just if people who are more audio. What's the website that they can get in touch with your latest work? Yeah, obviously Instagram and Facebook and all of that. [01:32:39] Speaker C: Yeah. So my full name brittanyjaneladelaw.com that's two T's. And so if you look up Brittany Jane Laidlaw, you'll see my offerings there. I'm just about to launch at the time of recording this new membership for women and also on the horizon, an ecosystematic course which will be like anyone can join that. So that's open to everybody. And then more things on the horizon. Post PhD. I'm in the last chapter of my PhD so just chipping away. We just chip away at these things. [01:33:16] Speaker B: We are. [01:33:17] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. But they're the things that if people want to connect, that's a beautiful way to connect is a website and you'll see those, those ways to engage at the minute. And depending on when you, when you listen to this, there may be more on the horizon as well. [01:33:32] Speaker B: Amazing. Thank you so much, Brittany. [01:33:34] Speaker C: Thank you. Always a pleasure. Love, love, love chatting with you. [01:33:39] Speaker A: Thank you for joining us today. For more inspiration, nourishment and learning, please Visit [email protected] Mo Yeo Herbo Serrasto crido quo laoja com adribo May you trust the longing of your heart to lead you home. Prayer words in my ancestral mother tongue Proto-Celtic.