It's all a bit disjointed - Nerissa T

In this episode artist Nerissa Tutiven, from New York talks openly about life experiences and two momentous divine connections and a spiritual awakening that has shaped her art. 

Knowing from the age of five that she wanted to be an illustrator, Nerissa shares her journey of creative expression and her sense of creative discovery while navigating through life. 

Offering a range of creative services this incredible energy paints stories revealing the divine feminine and is also looking to transition into an interpretive dancer. 

Guest: Nerissa Tutiven
Host: Urmi Raval 
Sound Editor: Maja Pronko 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:01

Welcome to Eternal Paradigm. Together, we're uncovering human experience by exploring physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual stories. With me, your host, Ermi Ravel. Welcome to the Creativity Series, where we explore creativity as a human experience. Hello, welcome to this episode of Eternal Paradigm. I hope you're enjoying your journey to find you. And this is the last episode in the creativity series. I have to say this series has been an absolute joy. It's been so delightful just to put together, prepare and connect and reach with some of the most amazing people. Thank you for your continued support and for listening. It really, really is. It astonishes me week by week as things develop and change how people how committed you are to listening and how phenomenal the guests are. As we head over into this episode, it's definitely an interesting episode. In this conversation, you'll hear me talking to professional creative Narissa Tutaben. And I really hope that you can listen to her story and hear where she's coming from, because I absolutely love was captivated. Nerissa is an incredible energy she really really speaks so openly and actually with so much depth and clarity of her feeling and experience about being in a place where she has always been allowed to creatively be And then what happened to her as the challenges of life expectation took over? I mean, she is in an incredibly different place right now. But as I was listening to her, I just remember feeling just absolutely captivated in her story and actually connected just so many things that came up for her because the things that come up for her are actually things that come up for all of us. Some of us on an everyday basis, some of us at key points and stages in our life. But ultimately, when it comes to connecting with yourself as a creative source, make sure you're open to that because that is is where the magic is. Remember, like Eternal Paradigm Podcast, follow on Instagram. Remember, there's the Facebook group. Come and join us. Enjoy the episode.

SPEAKER_01: 2:38

Yes, I am in the US, in New Jersey. I live about 15 minutes outside of lower Manhattan. I'm really happy to be here. I am a painter, most specifically an illustrator. I'm also a branding and chakra healing coach. That's also part of my spectrum of things that I do.

SPEAKER_00: 2:59

Thank you for adding that in because that's such a significant, almost like part of this puzzle of where you're at right now. So Cher Cher, what's happened in life? How did you become the illustrator that you are today? And everything that you just said, branding, chakra, to me, they're almost like different parts of who you are here. And I get that. But to someone who's possibly not so familiar with how does that happen to tell us?

SPEAKER_01: 3:28

Yeah, I was totally thinking about that before we connected when I was having lunch outside, that I really want to be able to connect with someone and resonate with someone who might be on a spiritual or more specifically creative journey, who is really looking for some sort of solace or anchor. I think... One good thing to hub on is that I studied at the University of the Arts in Philadelphia here in the U.S. I always knew from a young age that I wanted to be an artist. I most specifically, like I said earlier, wanted to be an illustrator. And I sort of made that connection through reading when I was younger and reading children's books and then basically asking, like, what is the name of the person that paints the pictures in the books? From that moment, I knew and decided, like, I want to be an illustrator. And then I attended university. And then my path just started to unravel through that. It was a lot of touch and go and feeling through. But essentially, I didn't start creating the content that I create now until I turned about 27 years old. And I'm 34 now.

SPEAKER_00: 4:43

When you said initially that you're 34, I still thought you were like in your 20s. You're probably like, what, 21, 22? And do you get that a lot? All the time. All the time.

SPEAKER_01: 4:53

Hey, it's flattering, right? I've finally begun to like it. Okay. Yeah, just in the last like two years. But my whole 20s was agonizing because I was in a way like not taken seriously just because I looked. So I felt through that my whole 20s. It was not as fun as people would think. It was almost like I had to prove that I was mature enough, which nine out of 10 times just still didn't transcend. I think because of my voice level. I don't know. But I'm finally enjoying it now. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 5:33

What you just said about your experience of having to feel your way through it in your 20s, that must have been, that's quite big because at that stage you're transitioning into adulthood and there's a lot of expectation there of what's expected of you. And yet you were already at that stage having this battle of expectation and reality and people's perception of you. That's quite a difficult space to be in.

SPEAKER_01: 5:58

Yeah, you know what is interesting for me? I'm a Capricorn. And so it's said, like in one sort of aspect that Capricorn people are born older, and then slowly get younger in a sense of like, I guess the way that we show up in the world. And so my younger sister is now she's five years younger than me, will always say, when we were younger, your vocabulary and the way you were carrying yourself and everything, you were like a 30 year old person. And now I accredit this to my art experiences and upbringing. But she's like, now you're like 12 year old girl. I don't understand all these things. But when I learned that, I was like, okay, I do feel like this is kind of a quality about me in regards to how I exude energy and things like that. But yeah, just in like a three-dimensional world, being in my 20s was very difficult because of the way that I looked. And then also, I think at the same time, my intellect is still adult, is still very depth-y. But the way that I show up is more joyful and lighthearted. So that was like an aspect of it too. But I think right after university, when I started my first full-time job is when the tests started to happen. And that's where I had to prove myself and do different things to really be heard and understood, I guess.

SPEAKER_00: 7:35

Thank you for putting all of that into context. And I liked your use of the word depthy because I love the words because we spoke earlier and there was another brilliant word. Would you just share that word? Synchronosities.

SPEAKER_01: 7:49

I mean, this is genius. I was thinking about that just before too. Synchronistic. And I think the word that I'm like, Hubbing together, it's synchronistic and idiosyncrasies. So that shapes one word that I feel like would highlight these points in life where things line up.

SPEAKER_00: 8:11

I love putting words together, especially when you create them because they almost represent where you're at at certain points in your life. So I'm all for that. Moving on, you're in the world of work now. We're going back. You're in the world of work and you're navigating this new terrain, this existence of where you're at. What happened to you at that stage? Run me through what things were like when you were trailing along, doing everything that you do to be in the adult world. And then what happened?

SPEAKER_01: 8:42

So again, I grew up outside of New York City. I guess in the early 2000s is when I was in high school. And so our, a young person's perception of the next stage of adulthood and also a successful life is getting a very career centric corporate world job, being able to rent an apartment either in Manhattan or close to Manhattan and You know, this is the goal, the dream. And then having essentially, I like to say, like a sex in the city lifestyle, like Carrie Bradshaw, that was all of our dreams. That was essentially what we were aspiring to. So I went to art school in Philadelphia. I was very organized, very on top of my schoolwork and doing well and being very driven. And so once I graduated, also, it might be important to note that I was the only one of my peer groups who went to art school from high school, whereas all my other girlfriends and guy friends went to state schools or other big name schools here in the US, studied things like marketing or finance or even health and medical fields. So once we all graduated, then it was time to get our jobs done. Right after school, I signed up with a recruiter. My mother actually connected me with one and I signed up with them. And about three months after graduation, I was placed at my first job, got a full-time offer the October after graduation. That was interesting because I had also the summer prior interned in Manhattan at a fashion magazine. They're called Nylon. I don't know if you know them. They're very trendy and sort of indie, really cute magazine. So I had interned there, non-paid for free for the summer. That was like a huge thing for me. I was like, oh, I really want to work for a magazine, like amazing. Then being there, there was just one afternoon where my art director shared with me her website, which had a link to her resume, which I just checked out for fun and saw she had listed on there her in She was the art director for the graphic design web department at this very well-known magazine. And she wrote that she was making 32K annually here in the U.S. in New York City. I don't know if you know like right away what that equates, but it's not anywhere near enough to have a lifestyle here in New York in this area. Also, I graduated with a pretty hefty sum of student loans, about 90 grand. So I was just very anxious about that. And I wound up getting with the recruiter and then getting placed at my corporate job and then just stepping away from that option and then stepping into this option because it felt a little more grand. And then to say that, that was just what created the new framework of my life, which I was actually still in art. I was a commercial product designer. And then I just started to step into this framework of real world adulthood, earning a substantial income.

SPEAKER_00: 11:58

Just to reflect on what you've said is so important, right? Because you've talked about the salary, being able to survive on a salary, doing clearly what the person whose resume you checked out was doing what they love doing, right? But they love doing this, yet there's no value there. Yes. You can't survive on that. And that's a realization, right? It was definitely a double-edged sword

SPEAKER_01: 12:26

because... I was also raised to really play it safe and to just really have all of the things on paper and the visual things and all of that in place so that everything equates properly in the physical world. But in reflection, it also, I believe that that was just my mindset at the time. So maybe I could have made it work in a sense, but I guess I probably would have wound up staying home with my parents for like an extra four to five years. Whereas with the job that I chose, I was able to move out faster and have that lifestyle that I was wanting much earlier because I got my first apartment at 22 or 23. I

SPEAKER_00: 13:10

totally get that. And that makes sense for so many people. I want to fast forward almost. We have talked about the spiritual layer and this is a really important, big part of your journey. So what happened? What was your awakening experience and when did it happen? What culmination of things led you to that point?

SPEAKER_01: 13:34

Well, it was really magical. It also had a lot to do with my grandmother. I was raised in New Jersey and My dad is an immigrant and my mom is first generation. Half of my family is from Ecuador. The other half is from Puerto Rico with New York City in between. I guess it's important to say that my father's side of the family very much grew up in the Christian Protestant church within Ecuador, which is a little bit small, I believe, because I believe the main religious group in Ecuador, well, it's definitely half and half. because there's an amazing indigenous community there. But in regards to the more city-centric communities and blended communities, it's, I believe, Catholicism. And then my mother was raised in the Catholic Church as a Puerto Rican woman growing up in New York, New Jersey. So I had these leitmotifs in my background of Christianity and very, I want to say strong Christianity, but not, what's the word, fanatic. Just very healthy and wholesome and good to a sense. But that was my family lineage, that whole history. So I grew up here in New Jersey and I was brought up with the tradition and custom to go to church every Sunday. So that was my life from birth till about 19, once I went to university. I don't want to speak for everyone, but I think a lot of people wind up going away to college and just totally forgetting everything of their childhood and then just deeply immersing themselves in this new experience and these new friends and just All these new things that give them a wider or different sense of the world. So that was my college experience. And like I said, I went to school in a city in Philadelphia. So it was like very cultural, lots to look at, lots to learn from. That experience was just very learning and inspired and very, very open and free. So then once I graduated and moved back to New Jersey, I started to then move into this period, like I'm describing to you, this very corporate experience, this very organized young professional experience, this is where I started to lose myself a little bit, which I guess is kind of ironic because I had this structure. But then at the same time, I was completely losing my soul, which I feel like is like that thing that happens, not for everyone, clearly, but that thing that can happen when you have a corporate job. Yes, I get you. So my story culminates when I wound up moving out of that experience and into a new experience which looked like a few things. I think like we were talking earlier that it's important for me to know my dark night of the soul because that's what happened towards the tail end of my corporate experience that then eventually led to my awakening experience.

SPEAKER_00: 16:36

I love the fact that you're describing all of this and the language you're using is the dark and the light and the dense and heavy and I feel like I'm going on this journey with you and i feel like i've either been there or i connect with it so much will you share the details of your awakening experience because it's a process and when it happens it's i i can't even think of words right now to describe it so so take me with you what happened

SPEAKER_01: 17:07

Yeah, my heart is beating fast just thinking about it. But I'm definitely grateful for this, to be able to share it in this context. I guess the spiritual awakening and spiritual journey began with first an uncomfortability. At around 22, 23, I started getting these pains in my body that were not your typical muscle pains or joint pains anymore. It was specifically pains in my heart and then sometimes in my stomach. But I think the telltale sign was in my heart. So how it started to look was that it felt like there was a gaping hole in my chest. It was almost as if like wind could pass through it. So I was 22 and I was raised just like very 90s, very Spice Girls, very just like having fun and pop girl and putting on your makeup. And my upbringing was not very like Let's contemplate the world and think about where our emotions come from and what Plato wrote in the Grecian era. There was not, unfortunately, that much depth of, I don't know, integrity in the conversations I was having with my peers when I was younger, unfortunately. And so I wound up having these feelings and just being very like, I don't know what's happening anymore. So my coworkers and peers at the time were like, oh, you should go get it checked out. So they were also like, oh, we have good health insurance. Maybe you should go see a psychiatrist, get your blood work checked, all of the things that someone would do if they were sick or experiencing pain. So I stepped into that world and I started to see a psychiatrist. I got examined for ADD. It was very disjointed. A lot of my coworkers were like, oh, well, you know, maybe you're experiencing this or maybe you're experiencing that and just giving me some sort of like opinions and advice. Then I think it's super important to highlight that this was about my second year into my professional job. I began a relationship. That was a very grounded and serious relationship. That was also very much in the direction of marriage and all the things that come with dating somebody that you love in your 20s. A lot of integration with our families, going to visit his family, learning more about his culture, really beautiful things. Also, then what came with that was learning how to or trying to manage the full-time career, which also came with a full-time apartment and a full-time car, and then also this relationship and this new family. And then I think it's important to note that I didn't get to say in our previous conversation that But I had also started an art collective with two of my fellow co-workers who had also studied and majored in illustration. We were all women and we had these very advantageous goals and dreams of just wanting to continue creating art. Not continue, but essentially be the artists that we, I guess, wanted to be, which were painters and gallery artists. just a lot of grassroots things like showing at art fairs and traveling and really living a grassroots artist's life. So I was wearing these three hats and living these three lives and just essentially exploring these different things. I think that that was sort of an issue. because I didn't know how to navigate all three. And then this was also a learning experience because then I had to learn a lot about prioritizing, which I think can be super ambiguous for women because of the way that we are brought up and shown, especially coming out of the previous generations, baby boomers and our grandparents and everything like that. So this lesson of prioritizing is what led to my dark night of the soul because I didn't know how to prioritize. And honestly, I think because of my age and because of where I was at, I believed that my prioritization should be on my boyfriend. That led to me losing my job. Excuse me. I feel indigestion in my heart.

SPEAKER_00: 21:42

Absolutely fine. Thank you for sharing that. I know it's not easy. And I was actually kind of like wiping tears away from my eyes because I'm really... you know, there's so much there, so much again, because you bring up like, as women, how we're taught to prioritize and prioritization is loaded with culture, cultural ideologies. And there are so many different, you know, it's like, but you must do this. It's what a good woman does. It's how you show up. And And so much gets lost in that, yeah? And you're already wearing these three hats and yet you have to try and navigate you and what seems to feel natural to do, which is your creative expression. Oh gosh. Oh, I could just like, oh, honestly. So in terms of where you were at now, at this point that you've taken us to, what happened then?

SPEAKER_01: 22:41

Yeah, so I also, I think, I definitely lived a very colorful life. And I definitely lived probably a few layers, one layer of a sex in the city life, one layer of if anyone listening is familiar with the show Girls from HBO, which is very focused on Brooklyn culture and Manhattan and that sort of like not having emotions and being very not considerate of other people's feelings. And then also just being very about trends and going out and the scene and rock music and all that. And all of that, that was another layer that was woven into my life. And then also the super like indie rock culture, which was amazing. Also very like smoking a lot of cannabis, which is amazing and I condone, but that was like a huge aspect. Going to festivals, the whole like beginning of the new age festival life. And so it was sort of these three different threads that were like a huge part of my cultural life. So what happened was about three years into the relationship now and about three years into my career, I was still experiencing visceral pains. So I came to a place where I decided to do LSD and it was actually my second time, but I was in a place where, well, I had actually lost my job and this was the year 2000. which I believe I've heard from people was like a huge year for people waking up. I know a lot of people woke up around this time of all different ages. It was like, I think there was something astro wise that happened also. Yes. In March of 2013, I got called down to human resources and I lost my job. Then I was still with my boyfriend at the time and still had my friends at the time. And I had moved home back with my family. I had ended my lease on my apartment. Also, my grandfather passed away. It was like a very odd, awkward, weird time in my life. I wish I could say it was very emotional, but it was more like strange for me. It was like I was walking in this gray world. And I know a lot of people say that, but it was very much like that. Like it was a gray world. Then I was so like, I had no answers. None of my friends could tell me why I had this gaping hole feeling in my chest. None of my family could really advise me on what to do about my relationship because they're very much like they want me and my sister And they want us to make our own decisions. They want us to just sort of come to these places for ourselves. But I think what they don't know is that we actually do look to them and in a sense do want that guidance. So because none of my family members were really saying, oh, you should marry him or, oh, you shouldn't marry him or, oh, you should move in with him or, oh, you shouldn't move in with him. I was really like, well, I don't know what to do. And my friend has this LSD here at her awesome Brooklyn apartment. I just lost my job. I'm going to just do LSD and see what happens. So I did LSD that day. This is about a month after I had been let go, lost my job. Oh, also important to note, I wound up breaking up with my boyfriend that morning. And it was sort of like this two night journey where we went to a concert together as a group. And we were all there at this electronic music concert. And these feelings in my body just kept accentuating and accentuating and accentuating. I think by the end of that day, I was literally shaking. I remember that trying to fall asleep that night and just thinking of all these weird things in my head. Like I was hearing animal sounds and there was like a lot of cat sounds, which was really weird. And I think another thing I wanted to note to you, Ermi, was that the evening before this, what I'm about to talk about, and I do believe this was the highlight of this experience, was that I had this very eerie dream where And I don't want to scare anyone who may wind up having this experience because now I know in Native American culture that animals are very significant, especially to the spiritual journey. But I had this dream that this big black crow came down and went to attack me. I was in my physical body, like I was in my bed. I wasn't outside or anything in a different world. And then there was a black cat next to me. And this crow came down, went to attack me, but then attacked this black cat that was laying next to me. Then as I was between sleeping and waking, I went to reach for it. And I feel like this was a layer of dreaming that I could talk about more later, but very visceral, right? And I go and I take the crow and I pull the crow off of the cat. And then there's all these feathers over me. And then I wake up and I'm in my bed and I'm panting. So the following evening, we go to the concert. I'm experiencing these things. That evening, I go to sleep, all these sounds. And then that's the morning that I wake up. I break up with my boyfriend. I'm standing there with one of my best friends in Brooklyn. And we wind up finding the LSD that we had hidden for another festival and ingesting it.

UNKNOWN: 28:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 28:27

After that moment and after that experience, I basically with my best friend wound up going on this super zany carousel, like Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory kind of experience. That was essentially a full day in Brooklyn of just traveling all over and taking taxi cabs and then like finally coming home and making food and stuff. I think I was about 24 or 5 at the time. We chose to do that. We put on big sunglasses. And then we went off for this hike through the city. This was very important because this is what essentially broke me. And so this, I believe, was the beginning of my spiritual awakening. I think I used to reflect on it also like the... I guess, I mean, I am an artist and so like sometimes it can be like so dramatic with the things I write. But I used to write in my sketchbook like the end of an era, like this was the end of an era. And so I was in my 20s. It was sort of like this 20 to 25 period was dissipating. And so what happened that day is we ingested the LSD and then we went for a walk. We went to an ice cream shop that was really, really delicious. And then we sat outside. We're sitting on this cement bench. It's like the middle of spring. It was honestly around this time. I think it was like March though. We're sitting there and we're like laying down. My friend Christine, she starts philosophizing like, imagine if our best friend Jeremy passed away. So I'm just laying there and I'm literally like, I have no idea. Like I can't even imagine that. And then she starts really feeling the emotions and she starts crying. And I just remember thinking like, I'm fucked up I can't feel anything and that's like our we're like a triad us three like that was one of our best best friends and so then we're laying there and again this is my friend Christine's maybe sixth or seventh trip so she was more accustomed to it than me so anyway sort of like taking it back we're laying there in front of this sculpture like this statue and In Manhattan, and I'm sure in London the same, there's many pop-up architectures and art installations that will just come for a few months and be in the city. And so this was an installation of three women, three figures. They were all... believe the sculptor was African American. So the women were very motherly, very warm and loving. Like this was the type of female that this artist had chosen to portray. They were in these very stoic poses where I believe like one was meditating, one was holding a child, another one was in the stoic goddess pose, like African goddesses. And so I'm laying there. I think I thought several things like, One, I was, this is amazing. And then two, I was like, I feel so disconnected from this. I was like, I don't even know how to really, it felt very beautiful, but very separate. So this was my acknowledgement at the time. And then we went on to grab a cab and go into Prospect Park and just go find a sunny place to sit and like be hippies together. So we did that. And as we're in the park, it's sort of in and out of shade and the wind is blowing. And it's one of those like beginning of spring days, late afternoon. And my friend Christine, and she just looks at me. And she's like, embraces me and she goes, I love you. And she's just pouring all of this love on me. She's just like the sweetest thing ever, even though she is also very like boss style and hardcore, but she's just pouring all these emotions on me. And I am just like, I don't know what you're saying. I literally can't even receive you. And I'm just like, broken. You know, when you're on LSD, it's like you can't really have this moment of like, well, this is how I feel and be very grounded. It's just kind of like you experience these emotions and you're either super happy or like super freaking out. And so that happened. And I was just like this ice cold person. And then in that moment, I remember my friend, she just pulled back and then she was like so sad. I believe this was the first time that I had visuals on LSD. So in that moment, what I saw was her crying and melting. It was all black. She has black hair, but it was like all black hair. And then it was her mascara was just like running down her face. And it was just when you think of a movie and it's very intense and like it was just so I literally just saw all of her feelings. So then in that moment, I believe that was my first being able to see through the veil. And I was just like, wow, I really hurt her. And then also just recognizing all these things like I can't feel sad about my friend Jeremy. I can't receive this love. I can't emulate this love. And so then it was just a lot of that. Then after that, we walked back home to her apartment. We're walking through the city. Thank God she was a more experienced hallucinogenic user because she was like holding my hand and she was like, don't worry, we're going to get to my apartment. I'm going to make food. You know, it's going to be okay. And then she's just like, don't worry about it. And so we get there, we go to her cute little like, you know, we're in our 20s. She has like the cutest little apartment. And we go there and I crawl up into a ball on her bed and she starts making ramen. Then I remember watching this movie, which was actually really funny because it was Big Fish. It's like this super whimsical, heady comedy that is like very rooted in like, nostalgia and nonfiction. That genre is like, I'm not as immersed in it, but it's an incredible film. It's all about storytelling. Longer story short, my parents had to come pick me up in Brooklyn. I could barely speak and all these things that were sort of the aftermath of me breaking out of this really serious relationship that I was in and also transcending from having the full-time job with all the things to having like at the time what felt like nothing and just this very desolate part of my life. So yeah, they came to pick me up and then I went home. And then I began this year-long process of being in and out of therapy and taking at least six different narcotics, like psychiatric medication. Drugs.

SPEAKER_00: 35:50

I like that. Yeah, just drugs.

SPEAKER_01: 35:52

I definitely associate the word drugs with synthetics. So that's what this period of my life was. LSD is definitely in that category, but I guess we could also say like Western medicine drugs. This was that whole stage of my life.

SPEAKER_00: 36:07

What happened to your creative expression at that point? Because now, like you said, you're very rooted in your spiritual practice and you're such a Oh, I honestly, you're a butterfly. You are just, you have this incredible lightness and floatiness around you. And when you're telling this experience of your life, even though you're telling it to me and I can feel it because I am that person, I can feel energies. Ultimately, your essence is so, it's just colourful and pure and I love it. Absolutely love it. So tell me what was happening because all your life you had always been doing things in some sort of creative way. So what happened at that point?

SPEAKER_01: 36:55

I am the person that does not make art from a negative place. So I'm sort of the polar opposite to like the Edgar Allen Poe, et cetera, et cetera, like my life is miserable artist, which a lot of people were like, oh, you're depressed, just make art. This is gonna be the best start of your life. Why aren't you lean on that tool that you have? And for this year and a half, It was like the worst for me. It was literally like walking through a world that was completely black and white with shades of gray. Literally just like... And I don't know if you've experienced this type of depression, and I know that you have gone in and out of your stages, but it was like being so isolated from everyone else mentally. It's like you're a different person. It's like you're like an alien in another world. And even no matter how much people will tell you like, oh, you're so amazing or like, oh, you're going to be fine or whatever. Oh, you're so young. This is just a stage. I couldn't receive that. I couldn't receive that at all. I was like, my life is over. I'm a piece of shit. I'm just like the worst. That's what began. I had two suicide attempts at that time. And the main reason was because I thought that I had ruined my life. And I think coming from a place where from an early age, I felt, oh, I'm this creative and I'm going to do all these things. Also, I think when I was younger, I was like, oh, I'm going to be the woman that gets this really great job and then gets all her friends hired. And I'm going to break the chains and be that person that just CEO dreams, has a company, gets all her college mates hired, creates this really awesome sort of freedom dynamic. That was always my thoughts like from childhood to college up until that time period so when this happened where I lost my job I didn't even really touch upon my grandpa was in the hospital and he passed away right at that time it was actually right before the LSD trip and then I just realized that I was like super unhappy in this relationship I think my main internal dialogue was like I failed I I failed my friends. I failed my family. I failed myself. I had accomplished nothing. This was all of the dialogue in my head. So then I think at the worst point, it was I had gone out and bought a bottle of pesticide. And so thankfully, I didn't go into the no self-mutilation or anything too, I don't know, masculine. But it came to a point about maybe six or nine months out of that LSD experience where I was just like, I don't want to do this anymore. And I had tried before to come back and be myself again. I had gotten this part-time job at a yoga studio. I was doing volunteer work. I was working with two of my friends doing creative projects and painting. I was painting. And thank God for my friends at the time, because they were literally like, come over, we're going to paint. Let's do this. And they definitely, as hard as it was for them, because I know they definitely went through something too, because they could tell I was like not all there. They definitely kept me afloat. And so yeah, Through all that, it was just like, I didn't know how to feel better for me. I was like, I don't know how to feel better. Like, I don't know what to do. And I was like, nothing is the answer. So I actually, I guess I could laugh about it now, but I wound up getting fired from the yoga studio. And actually, I wasn't even getting paid. It was one of those Dharma exchanges. Yeah. I think there's another word for it, but you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_00: 40:55

Yeah, I got you. Yes. And so you're there, you're almost like volunteering, right? Yes.

SPEAKER_01: 41:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 41:02

And you got to a point where even at that stage, was it because of the internal dialogue and because you were feeling the gravity of this, that even through this, even though you were giving, it just didn't make sense. It didn't connect because the alignment wasn't there. Yeah.

UNKNOWN: 41:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 41:19

definitely I know what you mean when you say you laugh about it now it's not because you're going oh it was a funny stage in my life but it's because you're able to sit here and reflect and go aha this is why yeah

SPEAKER_01: 41:33

I mean, like, I was just doing all of these things to get back on the horse, I guess, in regards to my career. And I'm a Capricorn and Capricorns are really, career is like sort of their main thing. And I was at the point, as depressed as I was, I was still doing things and going for it. And I had updated my resumes and I was actually cold calling people and even going to companies and leaving my resume with the secretary and all this stuff and the thing was and I think this is what will like tie it all together is that the universe was like you are not going back into a corporate job you are just like it's like wall up and then it was like probably you need to figure this out because you need to get better but you need to really connect with that on your own you need to find your own way and that's what I kept like fucking up yeah

SPEAKER_00: 42:32

It's amazing how the universe was giving you these signs, but at that point, at that stage when you're doing what you do as a high functioning depressive person, right?

SPEAKER_01: 42:45

Yes, that's the best way to categorize it. I totally get it. So a year and a half out, I moved to Jersey City and I'm still with my partner at the time. And we get this super cute apartment in downtown Jersey City. And all of the things start lining up again and lining up in the divine way, you know, like alignment. And what happened was we found This apartment that was in the same exact neighborhood that my grandmother lived in. My grandmother lives in Florida now and she was like East Coast to San Francisco to Florida. She lived a very diverse life. And so, but long story short, we find this apartment right in the heart of the neighborhood where my grandma and grandpa grew up. My grandma was hardcore Catholic and my father is Protestant from Ecuador, which is like kind of a unicorn. But my father is Protestant. And so my mom essentially pulled away from the Catholic Church. And my sister and I were raised in this very no imagery sort of Christianity environment. So meaning like no saints, no stained glass windows, no ideation about Mary like at all. It was like Mary was just like in the background. She birthed Jesus and like that was it. And so this was sort of the thing that I was immersed at in growing up. So we find this apartment. I'm still in and out of shadows. I'm really still in the dark. But then... I had chosen to stay with my partner at the time, which was pretty shitty on my end, but also in reflection, I think I would not have gotten through it without him. And he really kept me grounded during the time. And he was a good person. We just weren't aligning properly. But so we're living together and I'm still having ideation at the time of suicidality. And one afternoon while he's at work, I go for a walk and I have my sketchbook and I'm drawing and And it's all a credit to my friends for keeping me up with my art. I honestly, if it weren't for them, I might have not been doing art at the time. And so I have my sketchbook and I'm going for a walk through this neighborhood. I walk upon the cathedral that my grandma used to go to. That was her church, you know, that was her like grandma Sundays. You know, she was a mom at the time, but that was like her place. So I'm standing outside of it. And I literally had like, you know, When you see a horror movie and you see those cathedrals and there's like a crow outside and it's like, like that was typically my response to any Catholic church ever because I was raised outside of the Catholic church. And because Mary was like such this no-no and it was just like every horror movie depiction, like that was my preconceived emotions about cathedrals. So anyway, but this is during the day on a sunny afternoon. I think it was like spring or summer. I'm with my sketchbook and I find myself outside of the church. And I'm like, I'm just going to sit here in the courtyard and I'm just going to like be. And I'm unemployed at the time and there's no one around. And it's just a very peaceful afternoon, like a three o'clock. And so I'm doing these sketches and then I decide to go inside and And then I was going to yoga at the time and I was going to a local studio and I was starting to have these breakthroughs and I was starting to have these glimpses of like, okay, maybe you can go on from here. And so with this afternoon, I was like all the things like I had just described and I'm like, I'm just going to go inside, go on one of those benches, be like those old little grandmas, you know, do some things and just like see what happens. and just sort of explore and so I do that and then I start to have all of these awakenings and it's like all of these not visuals yet but just like these deep knowings that I feel like especially women find it was like I have been here before and my friends have been here before and like everything is like I just started to see all the alignments in my relationships All these things with my sister and one of my friends having like the same birthday, like they're a few days apart. Other things like alignments, I think is the best way to describe it. And just all these things and And then I was just overcome with this feeling of, wow, we've all been here before. And some of us are even reincarnations of really amazing people, you know, philosophers, writers, advocates, all the things. And so I'm having these visceral experiences and I'm in the cathedral. And I actually had my Jesus experience before, but this was different. This was my Mary experience. And so I'm feeling all these things. And then I go up and I walk to the front of the church. And instead of going to the center, to the right, I go to the left. And that's where the Mother Mary statue is. And I'm finally not scared of it. And I'm finally like, okay, maybe there is something here, you know, things like that. And then there was this alignment to when I was in Brooklyn and I was in front of those statues. And I'm there and I'm feeling all these things and I wind up very classically kneeling down and just really, really releasing and really, really letting go and giving it up. And as I'm there completely alone with no one in the cathedral, I'm crying and all these tears are spilling on the marble floor. And in that moment, this bright, streaming thick light comes down from from the stained glass window, bright green, like green, not white, not gold, not yellow. And it goes right into my puddle. And I'm like, I had just learned about the chakras. And I was like, like, I was like, thank you. Like, It was just totally like, I was just like, there is a God. Oh my God. I am just like, like, it was amazing. And for me in that experience, what that meant for me was that all is one. All is tied together. All is this one being, this one entity. And it was just like, Mary energy like shined down on me, but like essentially what it was, was heart energy. It was just pure love, you know? And then just in that moment, Just of that simple thing, it was like, bam. I lost my suicidality. I lost all the negative thoughts. I broke up with my boyfriend a few weeks later. All these things just because of that light and just because of that color. Color is amazing. Oh,

SPEAKER_00: 49:50

yes. Color is amazing.

SPEAKER_01: 49:53

So then a few days prior is when I had started painting in acrylics again and when I had started painting on canvas. which is something I hadn't done in about six or seven years. And I was really exploring. I got really into just listening to music while I painted, which is something I had never done before. I was like a very structured, like kind of just came from a non-psychedelic family. So art for me was more like someone doing math, like homework. And so I had really discovered, oh, I can paint to music. I can stand up and I can paint very free form. And so I had started doing that around, this was 2014. I started having these experiences within my painting where Jesus moments started coming to me. And it was like, I was painting very figuratively, which is something that is in my work now. I paint primarily stories of people and experiences That's sort of the main thread in my artwork. And in this moment, at this time, I would paint figures and not too often, but I would get messages. There was this one painting where I was painting a nude figure. And I had this download to like go up to the painting and like really see it. And this sounds weird, but I had a lighter with me because we had candles and we also would smoke cannabis from time to time and had a lighter. And in that moment, like I got this message to hold the lighter up to the canvas and it wasn't a benevolent voice or anything. It's just like a download. And so I do this and as I do it, And this is a huge part of my path. But this light shines up from the flame, goes straight up. And also, this is in the womb space of the woman I was painting. And so it goes straight up, then across, which is like not physically possible, right? But anything is possible, especially in 2021. Right? And so it just takes that shape. And I'm like, wow, because I had also been studying Ayurveda and I was really at this time learning about the gut biodome and how our gut is our second brain, maybe even more so important. And I was so immersed in that. For me, like this was very significant to say Christ is inside of us. This energy, this like creation energy, is in our wombs and that's where the light is and it was just so intense that's what has driven my art and that is what all of this work is about now it's about reminding us of who we are and this light we have inside of us also how to deal with these tragedies and like how to really recognize that it happens to a lot of people also just this power that we wield and how we can use it and And my paintings vary from moments of realization to moments of power. And this is the thread in my artwork. This was all started from these two experiences. It's just been this miraculous journey ever since.

SPEAKER_00: 53:17

Thank you for listening to this episode of Eternal Paradigm. I'd like to take this opportunity just to remind you that your comments, your feedback, and your listenership is incredibly valued.