Introduction

Transcript

Ashlie McDiarmid: 0:00

Hello there dear souls and thank you so much for tuning in to the very first episode for the podcast of Tea and Tombstones, a platform dedicated to meeting both the haunted and the hallowed through tarot and spiritual counsel. My name is Ashlie. I am the creator and wolf-child of this space and I welcome you here. This podcast is that a long time coming. It's been stewing inside of me for a long time, but if I'm being fully honest, I have been a little bit too much of a chicken shit to, um,to do it. But the other day I was pulling a card. I was pulling a card from The wild Unknown Archetypes deck, and I pulled the Box. The Box is a card that speaks to how we restrict ourselves, cover ourselves, hold ourselves through the walls, or the confinement of expectations, assumptions, conformity, societal pressure, and how can we release the box, move outside the box, and pull back the many layers of those themes. Pulling that card really resonated with me and for me about how the assumptions and the confinement that I was putting myself in with the podcast was leading me out of creation and into stagnation. I was waiting until I felt just completely ready, and the box that I was in will never allow me to feel fully ready because that's a little bit of a myth, so I sat with that card. I started pulling some other cards, and then I started looking at software and getting the podcast going, and that card really just spoke to me about how in order to move outside of the box and choose freedom it requires some bravery. And it also requires some trust that even if you don't feel ready, you are ready. And so that is the first step in initiation towards this podcast, and I'm really glad that it's happening. With this first episode, I intend to discuss a little bit about me and my background, talk about how Tea and Tombstones was created, and also talk about some themes that I would like to discuss here on the channel other than just tarot and spiritual stuff. I have some other themes that I would love to bring forth and mention as well. My first love lies in writing. Tea and Tombstones has been a long time in creation, but I was a writer first and I will always be a writer. I've been writing since I can hold a pen, and I graduated from the University of Northern Colorado with a degree in English- Liberal Arts with a focus in poetry, and that was in 2011. At the time, I really thought that I would go on to higher education, either earn a Master's or an MFA, and go on to maybe teach literature, teach creative writing, teach a poetry class, and that was not meant to be. Also in 2011 I was married. I had been dating a man for a few years, and this marriage was just bad from the start. It was, umm,... there wasn't any abuse, but there was deception. There wasn't any transparency. There was some issues with finances, and at the time, right as I was both married and trying to see if I could move towards my dream, which was higher education, I realized that the two would not meet. There was no way to merge them. The marriage was such that we could only see, as far as the day ahead. It was that unstable, and there was no ability to really plan and set aside time and finances and resources to move on to higher education. It was pretty much just need to get a place, need to get a job, and meet the physical needs that are here, present in this moment. And so I had to put my dream of higher education on hold, and sometimes that happens. Sometimes life pulls us, moves us, and makes us turn in a direction that we never saw coming, and I don't regret the situation that I was in because I learned so much. I was divorced in 2013. It was not a long marriage at all, and after I went through my divorce, which was one of the most painful and vulnerable spaces I think I have ever been in, I ended up taking a job at the Wild Animal Sanctuary, which if you are unfamiliar is a sanctuary, a nonprofit in Keensburg, Colorado for large carnivores, so the majority of the animals that are at this sanctuary are wolves, tigers, bears, lions. Pretty much large carnivores. They do have some other animals as well, but the large carnivores are their main focus. These animals come from both public and private hands, so public roadside shows, circuses, private hands, like people owning these animals as pets. And then they are rescued come to the sanctuary and get to live out their lives on large acreage habitats, doing nothing but just being what they were meant to be, which was a lion or a tiger, and obviously, they can't be released back to the wild because they've never been in the wild, but the sanctuary offers and tries to give them a life as close to what they would have in the wild. They're not forced to perform any tricks, do anything for food or attention. There's... there's none of that, so they just get to live out their lives. This space was incredibly healing for me. Going through the divorce and feeling that sense of vulnerability, I didn't know if I was going to be able to transcend this experience and find meaning in other things. I was just so wrapped up in my ego and my heart, and working at the Wild Animal Sanctuary truly bought brought me outside of my body. I was allowed to see these animals and, not obviously like in close quarters, but from the walkway, I could see these animals. I could hear the lions roar. I could hear the wolves howl, and I could see the bears playing, and it truly was just such a healing space for me. I got to speak to the visitors about the mission of the Wild Animal Sanctuary, which is to end the Captive Wildlife Crisis, which is basically a crisis just of these exotic animals being bred, being used in shows for entertainment, being in private hands as pets, and yet the numbers of these animals in the wild are actually dwindling, so our mission is to educate the public as to how they can help stop the spread of the captive breeding of these animals who do not belong in captivity. This job also really showed me and pulled me into a space where I recognized that I wanted a job, whatever my employment was, I wanted to be of service because that was how I healed. That was how I transcended the pain and the grief and the stress of myself, and I was able to humbly surrender to this higher cause, and it was so moving for me, as I said. I ended up having to leave the sanctuary because the drive was about an hour and a half one way, so I was driving three hours a day and it was just starting to kind of wear on my car and me. So I ended up leaving that job, and then in 2014 I went to work at an office job and I thought that I was ready to go out meet friends, potentially start dating, but I wasn't in the space to actively be looking, and I ended up taking a job at a lawn mowing company and ended up finding...um...I ended up finding the love of my life there. I met a man that was also working there, Grizzly and we've been together ever since, and that was 2014, and so it was a very significant growth period. But it was also just very beautiful that love comes in when you're not expecting it. You're not seeking it, and that's okay that love is available and open when you are at your place of loving yourself, and it was a profound experience, obviously and I'm so happy that I have him in my life, and he's great. But I recognized that I wanted to go back and be of service again. I do believe that all jobs are of service, but I wanted to go and work with like nonprofits again. I was missing that connection to animals, to these higher causes so I took a job at a local cat shelter and it was here that I learned the tough, the hard way I should say, I learned the necessity of boundaries. I kept saying yes to these, uh, you know. I kept saying yes to everyone, to the managers and those that were in a position above me. I just kept saying yes because I wanted to be of service. Like I said, I wanted to be of value. I wanted to help in any way that I could. What ended up happening though, was that I really started to burn myself out. I really started to overdraw and overspend on my own energy because I just kept giving of myself that I wasn't taking the time to nourish and sustain and tend to myself and practice self care the way that I should have been. I ended up leaving that shelter and going to another one, but I was still fostering with the first one. So again, just saying yes, and yes, and yes, and at the second shelter was where I recognized that when we don't hold to boundaries, when we don't practice self care, we are so susceptible to burnout and I went through a significant period of burnout at the second shelter. My symptoms came out mostly physically. I just didn't have energy to do anything that I loved. I barely had energy some days to take a shower. I was just so fatigued, and I would love to talk about burnout here on the podcast as well. Burnout, compassion, fatigue, and boundaries are incredibly important and necessary themes in our lives, and yet, we are constantly asked or feel that we should just continue to overspend from our own energetic currency, and it can lead to the detriment of our energy and of ourselves and of our physical bodies if we do not take time to replenish that energetic currency within ourselves, in whatever way suits us, And especially I feel in, in America, there is this perception or this uh, this idea that if you're not working too hard then you're not working hard enough. That people are actually praised for working more than they want to, more than maybe they can, and I think that it's time to dispel some of that some, of that ideology. Now, if you love to just devote yourself to work and you love working 5060 hours, there is nothing wrong with that if it is a personal choice and a personal investment, but this feeling that we are not worthy enough, of value enough if we are not constantly saying yes, constantly being available, I think can lead to some... it can lead to some toxic results. Because like I said, for me, it was much more physical, but it took a while, it took a few months actually, to really recover from that. It was just a few months of just really recognizing that my body was not where it used to be. There was back pain, there was muscle pain, and it took a... it definitely took a few months of very intentional work to really get my body back to where I felt"normal". So that's another theme that I would love to talk about here: is how can we meet the burdens of the day, the causes that we want to serve, the people that we are around? How can we meet all of these external expectations or these external situations, but still be mindful of where our energetic currency is at and tend to ourselves so that we don't go through compassion fatigue, burnout, and that we can use boundaries as a way of practicing sacred love. This was right about the time that Tea and Tombstones started to kind of be created within myself. It wasn't a physical space yet. But like I said, I was fostering for the first local cat shelter while working out the second one, and we took in one little baby and he ended up not making it. He was very small, and it just crushed us. We were championing for this little guy like he was our own. We loved him, and losing him just brought a profound wave of grief as it should, and I recognized that in this space of grief that I was grieving a lot more than just this foster even though he was obviously front and center and my heart still clings to his memory in many ways, but I recognized that I was constantly transitioning and moving from space to space and saying yes to being of service because I did not want to do the hard work of sitting with myself. I did not want to take the time to confront my shadow, and my expression, and my needs. I felt that by tuning into the external world, I could silence the internal voice and the internal emotions and this profound period of grief really brought that front and center and I couldn't pivot anymore. I couldn't turn to another cause. I couldn't be of service to someone else. I had to stop and just be with my emotions with my grief with my expression, and it was incredibly hard as grief always is, but I also recognized that I have not allowed myself, to in many ways, to feel and to these spaces, authentically. I obviously would reflect on my feelings and I would consider ways I could grow as a person, but I wasn't willing to sit with some of these harder parts of myself or my life and really look at them in a way that I could transcend them. I thought that the change, or the act of being of service to someone else or something else would just transcend me automatically, and in a way, I was using being of service as a crutch and I decided that I was going to start a blog and just talk about these feelings. At this time, I wasn't writing as much as I wanted to, and like I said, at the beginning, writing was my first love. And so by not writing, I was missing and at and at a loss for the one, the one activity, the one thing in my life that allows me to express and confront myself, which is writing. And so I wasn't writing and I decided that maybe if I started a blog, I would be a little bit more beholden to finding the words that were that were stirring within me because the blog would be public. There might be, you know, people that felt the same way. And so I decided to start a blog called Tea and Tombstones and I really wanted this blog to be a place where I could discuss the spectrum of emotions and energies and thoughts that reside within us. The tea is the comforting, the known, and the tea leaves, is everything that comes forth from the altar of the earth, and at that same altar of the earth, the tombstones is everything that is lowered and released, and said goodbye to and remembered in many, many ways. And it is on this spectrum that all things are possible. So I started this blog to discuss the spectrum of energy, and I wasn't using the blog. I still could not find within me the space to go deep into that sovereign cavern of myself and pull out the narrative that needed to be spoken. And I just felt at a loss. I didn't know what to do, and I could feel my spirit just grasping and was just desperately needing something. And so I decided that if I can't write, then I'm going to learn something. That I'm going to take my time, take my energy, and invest it into something new, something that I could learn of, be a student of again, and so I decided to learn tarot. At the end of 2016, I received, um I asked for a tarot deck for Christmas, and I was gifted The Wild Unknown, and that deck, and just the gift of tarot, which I thought would just be a mere hobby, just something to learn to give me something to do was one of the most profound gifts I have ever received in my life because tarot was the one thing that allowed me to sit with myself, reflect and go into that sovereign cavern that I had been avoiding pretty much my whole life in many ways. Some ways, more so than others. It allowed me to just sit with myself purely, authentically, and it was the most beautiful... one of the most beautiful experiences I've ever gone through. It was like someone had zippered up my spine and I was looking up and looking out for the first time. It was just so profound, and once I started learning the tarot I realized that this was where I needed to be. This was my calling. This was everything that I needed, but couldn't vocalize at the time and I knew that if I could help and offer that same level of energy that the tarot brought me to even one other person, my energy would not be wasted, and so I ended up going through Biddy Tarot certification. I do understand and know that tarot certification is often a controversial topic, and it's something that I would really like to discuss here on the channel. I really went through it because I thrive being a formal student. That is just my background, is in education, and I love being a student. I actually love getting the homework and having the deadlines and the expectations. I really um, I really thrive in those situations when I have these expectations and these tasks that I need to complete and so my experience with Biddy Tarot's certification was nothing but positive. I really thrived going through that process. After the Biddy Tarot certification, I also decided to go to a local community college and enroll in their Holistic Health, now their Integrative Health. It's the same degree, it's just a different name, and I wanted that to also better serve my clients and myself and that is actually what I am finishing come spring. I will be completely done with all of my teachings that, or all of my classes, I should say, and again, it was a very positive and profound experience and it just really layered what I can offer and how I can grow as a reader and just as a person wanting to show up in this space purely, authentically, and of service to others. I decided to keep the name Tea and Tombstones. Once I realized I wanted to have a website and once I wanted to write spreads, offer spreads, and spiritual counsel for others, I actually decided to keep the name Tea and Tombstones because again, it represents that energy of everything that comes forth into bloom and everything that is lowered and....excuse the plane.... but I decided to keep the name Tea and Tombstones because it really honored that spectrum of energy and that is how I show up for the tarot and how I hope the tarot, with all of its beautiful and profound invitations, shows up for me, that it offers that energetic spectrum and how we can meet all the possibilities with intention and with mindfulness and with the force of our will and with beautiful conviction to show up for our truth and to do good for the world. That is truly how I want to show up each and every day and though I am not perfect, it is something that I hold very dear, even on the days that I am unable or just cannot show up in, in that capacity. I think that's where I wish to end this. I think I've said everything I need to say. Thank you so much for listening. If you have any feedback or topics you would like for me to discuss you can reach me at teaandtombstones@gmail.com. You can also go to my website, teaandtombstones.com. All of that will be in the show notes, and if you would like to work with me I would be honored. You can find all of my spreads on my website as well. And thank you again so much for listening. This is been a long time coming and I am so glad that it's it's here and it's being birthed into creation now, so thank you so much. Bye. bye