Wild Souls

63. Navigating Modern Spirituality & Authentic Living w/ Jenna Smith

• Cat Mansfield • Episode 63

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Jenna Smith joins us to share her extraordinary journey from feeling out of place to becoming a beacon of transformation through the Re-Sourcing Method. Her story of resilience, from overcoming a traumatic car accident and a fibromyalgia diagnosis to finding healing through Reiki and indigenous medicine, offers a powerful testament to the human spirit's capacity for recovery + growth.

We navigate the concept of reality hacking, as Jenna enlightens us on the transformative power of ontological coaching. By shifting perspectives and challenging limiting beliefs, we learn how to embrace our roles as co-creators of our realities. Jenna's insights on integrating psychotherapy with intuitive energy work provide a roadmap for breaking free from the constraints of the analytical mind.

The episode also takes a critical look at contemporary spiritual trends and practices. From the pitfalls of modern spiritual movements to the profound lessons offered by sacred medicine, Jenna's wisdom urges us to approach our spiritual journeys with authenticity & discernment. She underscores the importance of embracing responsibility + self-care, emphasizing that true spiritual growth stems from patience and presence, not from the pursuit of instant gratification. 

Enjoy!

How to stay in touch with Jenna:

http://jennasmithcoaching.com/
https://www.instagram.com/adventuresinjennaland/

Interested in being a guest on the podcast? Send me a DM :)

Follow along on instagram <3

Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Holistic Hotties podcast. I'm your host, kat Mansfield. I'm a yoga and meditation teacher who's traveled around the world in search of all things healing and true. In searching for healing, in searching for truth, I uncovered the answers to all my ponderings. I grounded into peace amidst the chaos, I found myself. This podcast is about breathing life into who you already are. It's about remembering the truth of your power, the truth of your perfection. In each episode, we'll talk about the beliefs, the self-imposed limitations and the mindsets that are keeping us small, and how to cultivate safety in our bodies so that we can feel safe enough to be bigger, to take up more space and to truly and deeply love ourselves. On this journey together, day after day, we're choosing intention, we're choosing growth. We're choosing to dissolve our veils and breathe into our most authentic and thus most radiant selves. We're choosing to feel good naked let's dive in. To feel good naked let's dive in. Welcome back to another episode of Holistic Hotties.

Speaker 1:

This week, I'm talking to Jenna Smith. She is the creator of the resourcing method and provides a tangible framework for people to tune into their untapped resources in order to live a life of purpose with deep confidence and self-trust. Jenna has trained in spiritual psychotherapy, ontological coaching, peak performance, oneness, as well as shamanism and intuitive healing from Peru, india, africa, ireland and North America. Cutting through half-baked woo-woo and Rara self-development, jenna provides concrete, easy-to-learn tools for tangible results that last a lifetime. I loved having this conversation with Jenna. We talk about reality hacking. We riff on some of the trends within the spiritual development space and really dive into how to notice when we're operating from old adaptive strategies so that we can transition into creator mode more quickly and with more ease. Let's dive in. Hello Jenna, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today?

Speaker 2:

I'm good. As I just said, I'm in Canada. It's actually warm today, so I'm happy yeah.

Speaker 1:

I'm happy for you too. That's lovely. Well, let's dive right in. I'm excited for our conversation today. What I would love for us to start with is if you could paint a picture of just some of the fundamental moments on your journey that led to your spiritual awakening and really put you on this spiritual development path and in the spiritual world.

Speaker 2:

Awesome. I mean it is actually a big question. But the first part is I knew when I was a child something was wrong, like something was wrong with society. I would watch TV and I'd see people hurt animals and I was like what, why, I don't get it. But then I thought something was wrong with me because I was different than the rest of the world. So there was this internalized shame about that. So I just want to start off with that because I think other people might resonate with that, and I was always drawn to singing in nature and I feel like because I would take that time to like sing and be in nature that that helped keep my spirit in my body, so to speak, and um, which which helped me further on the path to answer your question, um, so I always had this knowing and I always knew to kind of follow the joy, follow that Ooh, I love animals, ooh, I love nature. I feel better, I feel more at home here.

Speaker 2:

And then there was like the real world school and all that kind of stuff Um and, uh, disney movies made more sense to me, um, but then I was like school and all that kind of stuff and Disney movies made more sense to me. But then I was in a car accident when I was 15. And before that we had some family trauma. I won't get into that, but my dad eventually went to jail and my brother was very volatile and so there was a lot to deal with and have that trauma responsive adaptation on a personality level. I am a trained therapist, if people don't know that already, so then that led responsive adaptation on a personality level.

Speaker 1:

I am a trained therapist.

Speaker 2:

If people don't know that already.

Speaker 2:

So then that led me to becoming a therapist. But after doing after the car accident, I remember the doctor saying well, you're just going to have chronic pain. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia, which is a chronic pain condition where you just like have generalized pain. It doesn't go away, your energy's low, and then your brain doesn't work as well because your energy's low and so, yeah, so it's like, oh well, you're just going to have this, take hot showers and stretch and eat. Well, like okay.

Speaker 2:

That led me to somehow seeking that something else was possible, and I think a lot of people also have that story. Something happened and they're like something else is possible here, which is your spirit talking to you, right. And that led me to Reiki through my friend in high school's dad, who was a healer, went to go see him. He mentioned the word Reiki and then went to go hang out with and the synchronicities were off the chain with them. I was a singer and so I was at the music store and random like this guy is not a spiritual guy was taking Reiki level one. This was, by the way, it's like years ago. I'm 42. This was when I was 15. Like this was not when Reiki was like on every thing it was not.

Speaker 2:

No, it was not popular. If anything, it was witchy and weird coming I'm in small town 8,000 people, which is similar to small towns in the States too. So I ended up being like, oh, what is this Reiki thing? That started me seeing that what I knew to be true was a thing which was really interesting, although simultaneously the woman was like I can help you, and I felt my shame of like, oh, what do you mean? I need help, you know I'm not broken. Like I don't need help, that hyper independence shame response. So Reiki led to me then meeting a shaman mentor while doing chair massage at a music festival while I was in school for music at York University in Toronto, and then that led me to learning indigenous medicine from different mentors no money exchange like actual legit mentors, just teaching me how to, how to find my center, how to shamanically journey. And then that just kept me. I can do.

Speaker 1:

There's so much more to say but then it was just a matter of I can hear my spirit more than my brain, than the noise, and then that informed the rest of my life and that's how I live my life right now back and it sounds like you just briefly touched on some of the many synchronicities that led you to you know Reiki, that led you to back to this inner knowing, and it's always interesting to look back on the journey and just have this kind of awe and wonder for every single interaction and serendipitous meeting and everything that was really just guiding you back to this place. It's really beautiful to hear.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, yeah, and then some of it's not beautiful, right, like some of it was like temper tantrum-y and frustrating and and and you know you can look back at it and see, see the beauty of those of those threads and led me to this career where I have a six-figure company working the hours I want to, working with my favorite clients who want to transform their relationship to reality, who want to be more their authentic selves, but really with a mixture of psychotherapy, the intuitive energy stuff, and eventually did ontological coach training, which is how you relate to reality, creates reality.

Speaker 2:

It's just cool that you can actually create your reality. I remember reading that when I was 16 and thinking that's ridiculous. But we truly are creators, you know. And to see that a part of that is that emotional diversity, like the ownership of I don't need to feel happy all the time to be okay, that I can actually be with all things, and that's the freedom and that is to me, an awakening of of sorts of like I'm not seeking something and making something wrong I'm able to be with all things totally the beauty in the spectrum of experience that is that you know, we get to experience as humans in these bodies.

Speaker 1:

So tell us a little bit more about your ontological training. And for anyone who doesn't know what that is, it's a study of existence. I had to look it up because, I was like what is that? No.

Speaker 2:

I had to Google it.

Speaker 1:

No, I had to Google it. I was like I had no idea. And so then, when I Googled it, I was like, interesting, tell me more.

Speaker 1:

And so that, in combination with I mean, I feel like we're all familiar with the idea of co-creating and we're co-creators, but really more so the idea of, like, reality hacking is what I'm so interested in, and and so, yeah, let's dive into, tell us more about your ontological training and then how, you know, we can start to really conceptualize the idea of reality hacking and become, you know, creators, like we say.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, oh, my God, I'm writing down little notes cause I don't want to forget certain things. So I able to walk both worlds was important to me. Um, right, yeah, and then there are professionals for that. So, um, I just kind of stayed in that lane and then that led me to I was pursuing something in the music industry and that agent introduced me to Hans Phillips, who was the ontological coach trainer, and he was in California at the time. They were three months into their training. All of this is important because of how it came to me. I got on the call on Skype and I was really nervous about it because back then video calling wasn't normal, which sounds ridiculous to say right now. It's like saying like, oh, you know, there's horse and buggies.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, pre-2020 though.

Speaker 2:

So funny. So he invited me into his ontological coach training, which I still did, I think six months into the training I still didn't know what that meant. I just knew it. I knew I could feel it was powerful. I could feel the idea of not just moving things around and sort of glorified babysitting do this, do that, don't do this, don't do that.

Speaker 2:

It's very mind like, stuck in the mind, still stuck in the constructs of your mind. And ontology is the ability to like, pull back, almost like in Star Trek or the Matrix. You could pull back. You see this whole hologram of like how you're relating to reality, the way you're seeing reality and how that is impacting your experience of reality. Not judgy, it's not about judgment, it's just about noticing and going oh okay, here's what's going on, in order to go back to creator mode. So that's where my spiritual background and my psychotherapy background was so helpful, because people that just do ontological coaching could be a little too heady, where they're looking at fixing things from the mind itself whereas actually want to fix it from the awareness, and then use the mind as a tool. How the tool it looks like this you would look at the symptoms, like the word choices. People are using, the behaviors they're doing. Again, not judgy, but just being like oh interesting, you said you wanted to do this, but then you didn't, instead of going. How do we make you do this? Why aren't you?

Speaker 2:

What is the relationship to this? What's the payoff? But I use my intuition a lot more. What's the payoff to not doing it? What's the risk to doing it? How you're relating to it? What's the impulse within you that is trying to protect you, which is the psychotherapy background. But then the ontological background is who do you need to become for this to be normal? And now you're created. That's the bio, that's the hacking reality. Hacking who do I need to become, which has also been called like quantum jumping or different things, where you're aware of the multi, the multiverse, the multidimensionality of reality, where you could pop into that reality now as creator mode. But what stops you is your humanness and your constructs and your beliefs in your mind, which keep you in a more dense reality as you experience it. So I know I just said a lot, but maybe reflect back to me what you heard and then we can go from there.

Speaker 1:

Okay, yeah, sorry, my internet just went up for a second, so you were saying you're popping back into that like creating mode, when you've moved out of the judgmental, analytical mind aspect the way I imagine it is you're just so interwoven in it like it's so a part of you. Your identity is so based on the cyclical nature of the way we behave and the way we interact with the world. So when we're able to, to transcend that which which I think is is something to dive into a lot more, because that ability to transcend it, it feels a lot like an arm wrestle where you're in that kind of struggle with somebody else in that arm wrestle or I guess, in this case, with yourself and then it reaches that point where it goes one way or that tipping point, one way or that tipping point. And I think a lot of this spiritual development in this work is to reach that tipping point.

Speaker 1:

So much of it is to get us to that tipping point where we're actually able to be the observer, to step out and be like oh okay, I'm saying I'm going to make this change, I'm doing the affirmations, but the way that I'm energetically relating to this circumstance is the exact same that I've done it in the past, so no wonder nothing's changing. Like an affirmation isn't going to do anything, because the way that my vibration feels every time that I use my credit card is scarcity, you know, despite the fact that I'm using an affirmation every single day. Card is scarcity, you know, despite the fact that I'm using an affirmation every single day. So I would love to dive into that more practices that we can use to get to that tipping point.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I love that you're using the tipping point, so I'm going to add to that. So for people listening, um, just even the concept that, like you're not, this contracted reality of like and I'm speaking from coming from chronic pain, coming from family trauma, like coming from being 40,000 in debt after having a music degree, which was ridiculous.

Speaker 2:

I'm like now, how am I going to get a job which led to a personal training job which led to becoming a therapist, which led to, which led to so I'm not coming at it from some like special place, I've just gotten to the other side.

Speaker 2:

So one life is always going to teach you where you are with what you have. So any of the stuff that we're talking about you can start with the one nugget that lands for you, that makes sense to you, and then that will start building on itself. And once you start participating with reality, from just that one nugget and you repeat it and repeat it, and repeat it with curiosity, not expectation, like that's the thing. So what if I just started doing this one thing, one thing, one thing, that one thing is going to lead you to the next thing, just like how I said in my own life. So that's the one thing I would say is like a thing to do is to take whatever you've heard today that lands for you, that's your own inner wisdom, saying like that one or the one that you're most resistant to, it's like that one. We need to start doing this one thing, but it starts with noticing versus judging Noticing that you wake up late, not judging yourself for waking up late.

Speaker 2:

So, that intersection of the noticing is absolutely possible. Think about it being a narrator in your own life or like you know, those like Disney documentaries where they're like following animals and narrating what's happening. They're not necessarily saying it's good or bad, they're just narrating. So the more you can pull back and see yourself as like observing, because people will say observer and that it just doesn't make sense for people.

Speaker 2:

But if I say narrating it kind of yeah, I did this and then I didn't do that, then I had a nap and then I ate a carrot. I texted that. I texted that ex. You know what I mean, you know, and it's um, I did that, you know. And so a key component to ontology is responsibility and integrity. So I am responsible for my actions, I'm responsible for my thoughts. You're taking a hundred percent responsibility but also diffusing that judgment bomb, right, yeah?

Speaker 1:

No, I think that's it's so powerful when we are able to take responsibility. You know, it's so empowering for us to know that everything in our lives we're saying yes to Everything that we don't want in our life, we're saying yes to Everything that we love. That's in our life, we're saying yes to everything that we don't want in our life, we're saying yes to everything that we love. That's in our life we're saying yes to. So, and again, important in that is is moving into that space of curiosity and noticing.

Speaker 1:

And and what I've, I think, has helped me in moving to that place, is noticing, like, the sense of defeat that came with the awareness like, okay, I'm aware of having made the same, you know decision, or finding myself in the same pattern, thought pattern or behavior pattern, I'm aware that I'm here. But then, with that came this sense of um defeat and kind of like, oh, I've been doing it, like I have to start over. You know this kind of like, oh, I've been doing it, like I have to start over. You know this kind of like yeah, judgment, exactly, definitely judgment.

Speaker 1:

And so, instead just being like every moment is a whole opportunity to start over, it's like so much more hopeful and letting go of the like how long you've been doing it quote, unquote wrong. Like, oh, I've wasted all this time Like no such thing, because all of those moments got you to the point of where you have the awareness. So letting go of that like I've been doing it wrong for so long, quote, unquote and like actually this is the opportunity to change. It's like a completely different orientation. One's so heavy and deflating and one is so much lighter and more hopeful.

Speaker 2:

Yes, and from an ontological perspective, everything's a blank slate. So you? Don't even have to make it good Right, I don't. I don't call myself a story, it's. It's such a mind addiction to want to make something good. Well, here's why that worked out for me. Um, but you could just let it go and start now, which brings up a lot of energy, to be honest so much energy right. So instead of trying to make something that just is good, you can just go now. What? Now? What do I choose?

Speaker 1:

right, right. It's like exactly, I can see it in my like, visualize it so clearly. It's just like in this moment, everything in the past disappears and this is the opportunity to create into infinity and I think it also, yeah, yeah, and I think it also helps to kind of dissolve a horizontal timeline.

Speaker 1:

At least that helps for me in this conversation of like same thing, kind of thinking about all of the time in the past quote-unquote that you did it wrong, quote-unquote but like dissolving the horizontal timeline and just really being in the now and in the present and your choice to do something different now ripples into you know, all of oneness which is now like past and future is also a construct, you know so yeah, totally, it's hard to like really, let's bring it back down.

Speaker 2:

Your only job is to be you and be here.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, experiencing you being here totally like that like just demystify it all the other piece I wanted to say about.

Speaker 2:

The tipping point is that you can only move as fast as you've worked on your humanness. Your humanness has to be worked on and tamed, and what I mean by that is your, the way you think, your treatment of yourself. Do you treat yourself like your favorite pet, like, or is it also hard Like, or do you over treat or do you have this over responsible uber self-care thing, where if you don't do this and this and this and this, then you know so. People's humanness is their vessel of creator mode.

Speaker 2:

So if their, if their, relationship to that. So the fundamental aspect of ontology is also your relationship to reality. Your relationship to all things reveals your relationship to reality. So the most that you'll see is through your relationship to reality. So the most that you'll see is through your relationship to yourself. Because that's all here, right, it's not out there. It's not oneness, it's not timelines, it's like all here.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, especially if you've been in spiritual development for a while, you start to become a little bit attached to those self-care routines, whether it be your morning routine, whether it be your evening routine. And you know, I've really worked on implementing balance because I started to notice like there was a little bit of rigidity and a regimented attitude towards these practices, whether it be like my meditation practice, and if I missed it, there would be this element of like anxiety, in a way of like I'm going to, I'm not going to keep moving forward. It's this addiction to like the perception of spiritual development or or like evolution. And and so will you, yeah, just kind of expand on what's happening there and how we're relating to our humanness in that scenario.

Speaker 2:

Yeah. So the habits should come from a place of love. So love is unconditional and the condition of I didn't do this this one day is obviously a condition. And adding the judgment Now there are some things you know, like on my first rodeo, kundalini Yoga, we're like do this this many days, three minutes, do this, do that, the very protocol days. So let's pretend I'm not talking about those ones. Let's just talk about a regular routine where you're like, okay, I journal, I do this. You know there's like my one of my favorites are like morning pages and they're like done this much of a walk and I've like meditated. And you know there'll be the Dr Joe community where they like do their meditations and they're very like, you know, do it every day. Once your relationship to it starts to become one of you losing sense of your creator self, if I don't do this thing, I'm no longer a creator. That's where you should go, hmm.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that's a really interesting question because it's I guess you're just giving your power to these.

Speaker 2:

The thing.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, to the habits, to the meditation versus the like. I am the creator Always. These things like are supplemental.

Speaker 2:

That hone your creator self. So like for me, it's like singing, going for a walk in nature, weightlifting. Once you become a self-anthropologist long enough, whereas I mentioned, you're kind of watching yourself.

Speaker 2:

I call it become a self-anthropologist long enough where, as I mentioned, you're kind of watching yourself I call it being a self-anthropologist, where you look at yourself as like what's the best sleep schedule and that can change, that can change with rhythm, with. But I know things that work for me. So those, those behaviors are ways for me to be more me. They're not something I need to do so that See the difference. It's like this is going to help me be more me when I do my vocal exercises, because I'm a singer and being a singer is one of my highest expressions, whether I'm in a good mood or a bad mood. It's non-mood dependent. It makes me more me, right, every time. If I don't do it one day, I'm not no more me right.

Speaker 1:

I just haven't done it that day right, yeah, and it's a slippery slope to keep not doing it, but it's not um a death sentence to your, your growth and your expansion right and I think kind of getting to that point with in relationship with yourself where you trust that because I don't do it today, there's no risk of me never doing it again. You know, like I think at the beginning that's a thing or that that can feel more real of like, well, if I don't eat this healthy meal this one time, then I'll never eat healthily again. You know, I think that can be a like a logical fallacy that kind of takes hold in us versus, yeah, having that trust and relationship in yourself is like I I can just kind of be present and be with my family here, and if that means missing a day of meditation or missing a walk or missing singing, then I'll. I'll do it tomorrow or the next day, but it will never just not be a part of me, because you've like established awareness.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, yeah, you're're you. The thing makes you more you. If you don't do the thing, you're not no longer you. You know so like, the whole thing is being you, being authentic, being present, um, and not missing out on on life because you have a thing to do. Also, right, the rigidity.

Speaker 1:

That was such a good word, such a great word to describe that yeah, yeah, it's last comment on that just feels like it can be so easy to fall into the rigidity. That was such a good word, such a great word to describe that. Yeah, yeah, last comment on that. It just feels like it can be so easy to fall into the rigidity because these practices have helped so deeply, have transformed so deeply for so many of the people in my life, my life and my community. Myself these practices meditation, yoga, singing, journaling, whatever it is meditation I think I already said that double click on meditation, meditation to the nth degree.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

But, um, you know, when they've been so transformational it's, it can feel like this dependence and the rigidity can feel so easy. So also giving yourself grace in knowing that can be natural and then, like, that is a relationship that you develop between yourself and these practices, and it's always in flux as well.

Speaker 2:

Yes, yes, yes. And to come back to love and like oh, where am I being harsh with myself about this, where am I being rigid with myself about this? Oh great, that's good to notice. It's something you know the more you you become, that which you aren't comes up.

Speaker 2:

So, as I become more me and I'm doing the thing, and I'm doing the singer stuff and I'm out there singing. Oh my gosh, what are they going to think about me? Oh my gosh, maybe I'm too fat. Oh my gosh, what if I'm actually not good enough? What if I should just I don't know just give it up, like everything that needs to come up will come up. I'm not the first person who said that?

Speaker 2:

for sure. It's just a phenomenon. That's true of human beings, and all of those things are such cute little like warning signs that are trying to protect you from future pain that you don't need you protect you from future pain that you don't need. You don't need to let control you. You can notice them bubble up.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it brings you light and love and alive. Aliveness to me is one of my favorite words because it's so non religious or spiritual, it's just aliveness. It's like anyone can go. What brings me more aliveness?

Speaker 1:

And really tuning into the definition of that in your own body.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it's a feeling. Yeah, that doesn't require any belief system, and so, and I think your aliveness is your spirit talking to you and it speaks your language. You don't have to learn anything for aliveness to talk to you, you have to just pay attention to what brings you more aliveness, you know.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I'm curious what your perspective is on some of the kind of spiritual trends that are present in our world, just kind of bringing some Kind of unleashed yeah, totally yeah, bring it Just kind of. Yeah, I'm just curious what you think some of the biggest trends are that that aren't helping us in the spiritual world yeah, well, I mean judgment for sure.

Speaker 2:

So we'll just say that one in general when you're like I do this, so I'm better than you like, there's like there's definitely a spiritual superiority happening that yeah people should just be overarchingly aware of and like totally yeah, which is everyone?

Speaker 1:

is just a caveat. I also think that's part of the journey, so like if you're there, I've definitely been there, and I sometimes even find myself there now, like it's, it's a coming in and out, of, and again, bring that awareness and the non-judgment to it of like, oh wow, I just genuinely think I'm better than them, because I meditate, like that's not it, you know, like that's the opposite of what I'm trying to do here. So, and almost like making it a bit for yourself.

Speaker 2:

So anyway, I just Make it funny. Make it funny. Yeah, totally Don't be down on yourself. I laugh at myself all the time. It's, I think, one of the when we look at the word spiritual awakening, when you can laugh at yourself and your ridiculousness and like my selfish self and my bitchy self. He should be. He should know who I am Like. Who is he Like? Dating has been one of my biggest spiritual teachers lately. I freaking love it. I'm writing a book about it now because I just didn't know I had to.

Speaker 2:

I was like this is so cool, this is what. I'm learning, but a lot of it was just by being able to laugh at myself and all the different ways I showed up but then also lean into the powerful ways, but anyway. So the spiritual trends I see that are issues, but of course it's all fine, is like plant medicine for sure. So I have a journey with shamanism that's very authentic. My mentors found me.

Speaker 2:

I didn't go seeking something out, not that I'm better, just saying there's an authenticity in those traditions that are oral traditions, that are something you're taught by a mentor. It isn't like this course you go take, or it isn't this like one ceremony you do this one time and then you know, we all can access spirit. We all can access the energy of psilocybin or the energy of mother ayahuasca at any time. That's actually what's true. You can shamanically journey to any of those frequencies. Now they're not special and over there they are sacred. So there's a convergence of a lack of reverence for the origin and the medicine keepers. That is annoying to me. And then, as a white woman who has been trained in shamanic principles, I'm very careful about overusing those terms or whatnot, because I'm just like you know what?

Speaker 2:

I'm not going to call myself a shaman, the way I would. Don Benito, who lives in the mountains, who is that? He is that His DNA, his ancestors like he? Is that? Now, my ancestors Irish, everything like I do have medicine like witchy pagan, that kind of medicine in my blood and in my DNA. So there's a, there's a lack of reverence, um, and there's this, and there's this drunkenness of give me the thing that will get me the thing.

Speaker 1:

Yes, yes.

Speaker 2:

And fast, and you could learn how to connect to spirit now. No, it's not sexy.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, totally. I've spoken about this for years as well too. There's just this unintegrated aspect of like I'll just have the spiritual awakening without any of the foundational practices, and not only is it like it's a lack of reverence, but not only is it that it's like I'll just have the spiritual awakening without any of the foundational practices, and and not only is it like it's a lack of reverence, but not only is it that it's like it can be dangerous. It can be dangerous to not have the toolkit to integrate those experiences in that, in that opening. You know it's, it can be dangerous.

Speaker 2:

So yeah, like how to feel feelings like as a mental health professional. It's like how to feel feelings like as a mental health professional. It's like how to feel feelings is like I teach something called the resourcing method and it's how to feel your feelings, how to use your feelings, how to process them throughout your body, how to manage your mind, how to connect to your spirit, how to get into the heart space and know that there's a hurt space. And once you know all that professional, human stuff, then you can amplify. But whatever you're going to go, do you're going to amplify what is?

Speaker 1:

Yes, If no one's telling you that uh-oh.

Speaker 2:

Totally. If there's no modality that creates a sense of internal safety, no matter what you experience within any sort of medicine journey, then scary.

Speaker 1:

Scary, because you just don't know what the medicine needs to show you, what is waiting, what needs to be healed, what needs to show you what is waiting, what needs to be healed, what needs to be, what needs to move through you. And you know, even like ancestral stuff, right, right. And without that ability to be like, okay, no matter what happens, I have my breath, I have, you know, I have the connection to life force, energy through this breath and this body and I'm safe Without that. It's like, you know, it's a Russian roulette.

Speaker 2:

I could go in many different directions. And what's beautiful is that medicine.

Speaker 2:

The medicine kind of like the sun. The sun doesn't care if you sit without sunscreen in Mexico for 12 hours, like it'll just do its thing, like it's just going to do what it does. So there's no, it's. I love. So eventually worked with plant medicines, but it just deepened what I already knew. I just deepened into a deeper oneness state. I just deepened into oh shit, there's some old grief there, had this like exorcism of grief. But if I didn't know how to feel feelings that would have felt crazy. I would have felt like I was dying.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I knew I wasn't because I'm like I kind of know what this is, I know what's happening. There's a familiarity of my own emotional landscape that came from this to this, to this, to this. But I think when people try to skip steps so all of it when they try to skip steps, whether it's cold, plunging or like water fast, and all of these could be great, but it's the, it's the obsessive obsession, yeah, and just in the instant.

Speaker 1:

Gratification everywhere in our society. It's just like our main value is like how fast can we get there? How instantly can I be spiritually awakened?

Speaker 2:

Well, if you're doing it from the. So what I feel like is most people aren't online, they're not here, they're in their thoughts programs. What do? What will people think? They're rushing? They're just, they're just they're just heads on.

Speaker 2:

They're just go, go, go, go, they're not, they're on their phone, they're like most people aren't here. Go, go, go, they're not, they're on their phone, they're like those people aren't here. So the beginning of a spiritual practice is essentially to try to get you here, to bring you back online and as you get back online, so doing from being is a concept I talk about. So, like you want to do from the place of being, you can't actually get to being from doing the busyness and this and that being cause it's already here. There's no doing needed there. And it's that paradox that messes with people that are mind dominant. I call it mind dominance. You have to tame and train the mind. Um, the mind dominance is is transactional. Uh, that three, three dimensional timeline, Um it, everything's contracted down, there's a rush and you're going to run out of time and it's two steps forward. It's a terrible place to live from.

Speaker 2:

It makes people really shitty and it makes me a grumpy person. It makes other people grumpy, but when we're thriving, we're in touch with our aliveness and our nature and presence and there's nowhere to be. It's just like what am I subscribing? I call it subscribing. What am I subscribing to? Right now Does favorite things to say to clients. Like just just take the thought that you're thinking and participating with, with your attention. Just is this thought generative?

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, right, and then that awareness will come online.

Speaker 1:

Totally. That's a you know, know, simple practice that can be pivotal in your day, and you know what you create just do that. Yeah, yeah, totally okay, I'd love to that tangent about plant medicine. Are there any other trends that you want to debunk before we move on?

Speaker 2:

yeah, I know right um um, I also do, and I also do plant medicine but anyway, like I mean, I mean I don't. I only do it if I'm called to. Uh, animal, anyway, I do some interspecies, animal stuff. That's just coming up. But any other trends, you know? I've been so unplugged like that I don't even know what people are over attaching to these days. Um well, I get asked all the time have you heard of this, have you heard of that?

Speaker 1:

I'm like I'm good, and if I heard it again and again and, again, that's life talking to me.

Speaker 2:

I'm going to pay attention. I'm playing a lot with like sacred sexuality lately. I don't think it's obsessive. I think people oh, I could, I mean. What I am finding really funny is people's misunderstanding of, like the sub-DOM dynamic. And, like a lot of people, are just like we think Dom is controlling Right and like, oh, it's about being in this like amazing position of leading Totally. Because you have this understanding of that other dynamic. Yes, and both dynamics are powerful.

Speaker 1:

Right, yeah, it's a. That's been interesting Totally. I see that being really interesting because Dom has definitely been like one dimensionally translated for us, like you said, where it's just like control or power, when I'm the powerful right, when it's actually this beautiful, like holding space.

Speaker 1:

I mean, I see it as just like total masculine energy, without genderfying. That, yeah, the embodiment and just like, yeah, just like mountain energy of you know, strong sturdiness, like holding the space and container, and then it creates a space for the opposite of water and fluidity and total, yeah, total surrender.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so that's been interesting to watch general, the general public, have such a gross misunderstanding of it and then just talking to people with curiosity and be like what does that mean to you? And hearing the answer. I'm like, okay, we're not going to do this, but cool yeah totally.

Speaker 1:

Totally.

Speaker 2:

You know. So that's been. You know, sacred sexuality, I find is another opportunity for more deepening of pleasure. But there's just, it's just riddled with all sorts of other just people's agenda and lack of understanding. And then someone popping up their own shop of like I am this, I'm like discernment. I have to say. My biggest thing is that what I want for everybody is to just self-trust and discernment. And and how do I feel around this person?

Speaker 1:

Yes, how do.

Speaker 2:

I feel saying yes to this thing or not now. How does the person respond when I say not now?

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Cause like, definitely pay attention to that, totally Finding your own barometer again and trusting it and not, and you won't miss out, will tell you you will not miss out if you pause yeah, like in this way.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think that's such a beautiful wish for everyone, that that honing of each individual's discernment, because your radar is so finely tuned to pick up on any sort of misalignment, yeah, and, and you know on that end.

Speaker 1:

And then also like coherence and truth and alignment on the other end, like you will naturally know when something's a little off. And then when someone is like a genuine, you know, healer from the space of like I'm here to serve and whatever they're offering, if it's for you, at that time you'll know if it's, if it's right. And and I think when we just kind of wrap up that tangent about spiritual trends which I just really need to satiate a curiosity there, but to wrap that up, it really does come back to to honing that discernment. Because I heard someone talking about just like the spiritual development world recently and they were saying like in comparison to psychotherapy and just you know the lineage of study in that realm, like the spiritual development world is like the wild west still, like there's just so little regulation, there's so little, you know, anyone can kind of just say that they are a coach. Anyone can say that they're right.

Speaker 1:

Anyone can say that they're, you know.

Speaker 2:

I just heard somebody tell me about it was a student of theirs that self proclaimed that they were a Peru. And I went to Peru and studied Peruvian shamanism with Peruvian shamans and I'm not like I'm a Peruvian shaman, I would never do that. But this person seemed to think because they did a two-hour course, they didn't even go to Peru. I'm just like, yes, what is going through your?

Speaker 1:

brain to claim that right and again.

Speaker 2:

so just the discernment piece, and I don't want to like poo-p yeah.

Speaker 1:

And I think when you're in this virtual development world and you see a lot of that going on, it can be frustrating because when somebody is seeking a healer or a coach, you're in a very vulnerable space because you're most likely at a transition point or, you know, in a place that's very difficult to navigate on your own, and so you're seeking help and you're in a very vulnerable place. And so when I think I just want to clarify neither of us are coming from a place of judgment, it's just more of an observation of like. Right now, where we are in the spiritual world, it is like the Wild West and it does take a laser focus and discernment. When you're working with somebody or following somebody on Instagram or deciding to believe something that you read, especially on social media, it's so anyone can say anything, anything.

Speaker 2:

They can say anything. They could say I'm trained in psychotherapy but I, ethically, am not a registered psychotherapist anymore because I wasn't able to do ontological coaching and energy work. But I am very specific to say I'm still trained in psychotherapy but I'm not a registered psychotherapist. And then there's like therapists that are just going to stay heady and then don't know how to do the trauma work and they don't know how to do the spiritual stuff. So, just like in my own story not like everyone should be like me, but in my own story I found who I needed when I needed, when I needed it, and then I found what I needed when I needed it, even if I didn't know it existed. I didn't know what ontological coaching was, I didn't. I didn't even want to go to Peru.

Speaker 2:

When I went to Peru I was annoyed that I felt called to go to Peru. I was just like, oh, this is such an annoying expensive thing. It's so, in the way, like I actually didn't want to go, I was called to go. And so your journey, like life, is going to teach you and so if you feel like someone has the answers for you, that's the place to pay attention to. If someone else has the special key you know you should.

Speaker 1:

You should feel like, ooh, this feels like this is a yes for me you know so um you know, I think final point on that, and then I'm going to, we're going to move on. But I think the other thing that goes with that, and even in the trends, is kind of this guru culture, which I do think we're moving out of, but it's still, it's still it's still there I feel like it'll probably always be there.

Speaker 1:

But but this you know, pedestalizing of a single individual, your guru, quote, unquote, and, like you said, this one individual who has all of the answers, all of the keys to your peace, to your happiness, to your confidence, insert, fill in the blank. That's definitely a red flag. It's a red flag but it's the individual claiming to do that. But also, if it's in us that we are so desperate of assigning that power to somebody else, it's a childlike thing.

Speaker 2:

You do it for me, mom.

Speaker 1:

You make my sandwich.

Speaker 2:

I don't like. I had to get over that where I thought that you know, when I worked with my first shamanic teacher, I thought I'd lie. I lie on the table and you, you fix me Right From like having chronic pain at 15. So I've been to all these healers you lie down and they work on you. And this now responsibility to participate in my healing journey requires maturity. It does, and a lot of people don't want to grow themselves up and feel those feelings of whether they didn't have that when they grew up. Like whatever, whatever those emotions are. A lot of people don't want to grow themselves up, but it's so cool too, because then you can create the world that that inner child wants.

Speaker 1:

That's what you miss.

Speaker 2:

That's what they miss. Like, oh, I want this person to give it to me. It's like, no, you get to give it to you, you get to create this space where now I live near the lake, in the woods, I have my own place, I have my own studio. Like if I was to talk to 16 year old Jenna, I'd be like, hey girl, like look what's. Look what you're going to do for yourself by taking responsibility, by showing up for yourself, by doing unsexy things that wouldn't be considered spiritual. Your relationship to yourself and what matters to you is spiritual, like it's. It's, that's sacred.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you know don't take, don't get rigid, yeah, but the small little things are how present you are If you have a kid or a dog or a cat or your mom, like how present are you to these people? Like that's spiritual Totally. I think we try to make everything special and oh, that person can talk to angels. I'm like I could do a bunch of cool spiritual stuff I could levitate if I want, bitch, but it doesn't matter because we're supposed to be humans experiencing and so if you're missing out on that by trying to ascend to the 11th dimension and become a unicorn, I don't know. Also, no judgment to that, but is that why you became you on the planet?

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I think just giving yourself the opportunity to like really allow for the definition of spirituality to be so tangible and so simple of like presence, of of, you know, just being fully with whoever you're with in that moment, being fully with yourself in that moment and just holding space for exactly how that is, without trying to manipulate the reality. You know, just presence, yeah, just being. You know. You can turn the definition of spirituality into so many other things, we can take it to many other places, but what it boils down to if you just let it be simple and just wanted like an applicable definition to your everyday from the moment you wake up is presence.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and the opposite, because it's helpful for people to see things in the opposite. So I was dating someone who was like a very thinky thinky person and he and I said, do you believe in magic? And one of our early like dating questions. And he's like no, I believe in science. Dah dah, dah, dah dah. And he's like no, I believe in science. Da, da, da, da da. So he's this brain head, idea personality trucking through life in a meat suit and he's, and then he's gonna die. And I'm like I don't know if this is gonna work yeah, I don't.

Speaker 1:

I wouldn't even be able to make it through a conversation and just like how?

Speaker 2:

I live will not make any sense to you. Yeah, totally.

Speaker 1:

Oh no, I was saying the same thing. I'm like, even just the way I speak, like on the date, just the jargon I used, he would be like I he'd probably think the same thing. It's not going to work, yeah.

Speaker 2:

Like who are you and what and what? And like how did we get mad I? But to just like bring it down, the contrast is being so in your personality, in your role, in your race, in your geography, in the size of your body, that you're just so, you're so constructed down into that that, if you aren't, that you're dead, you cease to exist. That's absence of spirit.

Speaker 1:

I would call that yeah. Yeah, that's helpful to juxtapose. So what I really want to we've had I don't even know how time's gone so quickly, but I would love for you to tell us and walk us through what you mentioned briefly, your resourcing method. So, yeah, yeah, let's just, let's dive in there, let's go from there.

Speaker 2:

Cool yeah. So after doing all these trainings, it originally started as me calling it you are the manual, because I worked with a lot of seekers in the beginning and I myself was a seeker. It's like no, you are the manual, you have a body, you have a heart, you have emotions, you can connect to spirit. And then it turned into the resourcing method, because your resources need to match your challenge in order for life to flow.

Speaker 2:

What happens with like a trauma response or any sort of defense mechanism response, it's when your resources don't match your challenge. So you create. So you have to have a survival response over-controlling overdoing perfectionism. You're have a survival response over controlling overdoing perfectionism. You're in the survival response. But when you can, when your resources can match your challenge, now you can go back into thriving, back into creator. So, um, so what I teach people is easy I've tested this for 15 years now like easy ways to connect body, easy ways to understand that, easy ways to get that online, the difference between your heart space and your heart space and this access portal to your spirit, um, how to start to clear off the receivers of your mind by taming and training it in ways that are easy.

Speaker 2:

And, um, anyone can do them, like kids have done them, lawyers have done them, accountants have done them. Anyone from any walk of life has been able to apply these principles to start to find their way back to who they really are. And they will say things like oh, I've always known this and this is me, I've always been this. And then they get to grow who they really are and their resources continue to grow, and then they get to be more of who they are and their resources continue to grow.

Speaker 2:

So that's why I created the resourcing method, because, no matter whatever degree of expression, you're going to need more resources for that challenge. You're going to need to grow. But it all starts with how you connect your body, how you connect your heart, how you manage your mind, and so yeah, that's, and so it's a course, but it's also so there's a do it yourself course. But then there's also just upcoming is going to be a group coaching. We're going to walk everyone through it together, which I'm a little more excited about, because everyone can see how they the same tools, the same principles. I practiced them for years. They're very simple, but they're so powerful because they get you back to you.

Speaker 1:

And will you dive a little bit more into the heart space versus the hurt space? I love that and and you mentioned it, like in your very beginning of our conversation, in your own journey just some of the adaptations, so some of the ways that, when we're operating from our hurt space, maybe some of the most common adaptations that you see your clients embodying. Yeah, let's start with that one.

Speaker 2:

The most common are perfectionist people, pleaser, overdoer, control, overthinking, and then some imposter syndrome. You know which? I which, by the way, to me imposter syndrome is shame with good PR, shame with good PR.

Speaker 1:

It's the feeling that you're.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, it just sounds sexier to say you have imposter syndrome than you have shame issues. I feel inherently unworthy. Isn't sexy to say but oh, yeah, I have imposter syndrome. People will put that on LinkedIn and have no issues. It's so funny. To me it means that you don't feel good enough. It's the same thing, Totally yeah. So the path to healing it is the same of like knowing you can't earn worth. You're already inherently good enough, but now what do you want to do? Right, so like that, that difference. Um, those are some. Those are the biggest defense mechanisms that are then celebrated as success modalities, Like oh, you're so effective.

Speaker 2:

Oh, you're so successful and it's celebrated and so it's really hard to transform it because it's brought people attention. So the hurt space is the residue of unfelt feelings that haven't been given the resources and haven't been given full presence. That would naturally transmute on their own, just like digesting your lunch. It's a natural healing mechanism, the emotional self. But when it's shoved down because the mind thinks it's too much or it's an actual trauma and it is too much and you do need to be in denial to move on. But what happens in our society is we don't take the time to heal and we just keep trying. Hence those survive, like the success metrics. Right, like go better, keep going, keep tracking. Just forget it. Just it's fine, you know it's not fine, it's going to catch up with you.

Speaker 2:

You're going to have like all this baggage and trying to run full tilt and it's weighing you down and it's exhausting you and it's robbing you of joy and strangling all the fun. But the heart space is a non-duality space. It's already whole and complete. It is you in wholeness. There's no duality meaning there's no good or bad. So in like, ooh, that's bad, I feel bad. It's like make it go away. I can't be with that.

Speaker 2:

The heart space is all love, nothing's bad, all love. And that, if we can, what I call it in the book I wrote, that's coming, is you. If you turn up the lantern to that heart space, you can feel it, everyone can feel it, everyone can access it, even if there's a lot of sit on it and a lot in your hurt space. You turn up the dial on that which is a lot of spiritual training, that which isn't, you will fall away. The debris will actually burn off from turning that heart space up. But most people will never get there because they get to the hurt space and they go. Yeah, don't realize that big reservoir of the resource they need is there. So those are those principles, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Beautiful and I. What comes up for me is, you know, just noticing my own people pleasing tendencies, or I've done a lot of healing around perfectionism, right, and I guess one of the things that I'm definitely working on in my practice now is is using my you know nervous system as the first sign of awareness or kind of like the first alarm of when I'm entering into these adaptive modes, you know, minute after like, for example, like a social gathering, like taking a minute or two minutes after, and like closing my eyes and tuning into my nervous system and just kind of going back through the experience and like was I regulated? Was I or was I like hyper vigilant? Was I totally turned on and turned up to make sure that everyone's okay? Very much like middle child adaptive stuff for me. So bringing it down to like a little bit more of these tangible principles is just tuning into your nervous system.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Feel, yeah. So another one would be the nervous system thing. I think people are misunderstanding what that means. It's just like, right, Notice, feel, notice, feel, come, come in feel. You can't feel and think at the same time. You have to feel isn't thinking feel. And so I would just bring that all the way down and just be like just feel, feel and notice, and then, yes, that's your nervous system and all those things. But I think that's been misunderstood by a lot of people. But the the there is a journey to go on that to really understand that regulated system of feeling safe.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and kind of like we've talked about this whole conversation bringing that nonjudgmental, compassionate awareness to that moment of noticing your nervous system or feeling right grounded, but instead of judging the fact that you showed up as a people, pleaser coming back and being like, okay, back into your heart space.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, back into your heart space start again and just like yeah, and really like okay, I'm still it's, I'm healing, I'm still healing that and it's and it's okay.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's okay and it's a protective mechanism, like, or it's just a habit.

Speaker 2:

I was just like, oh, I was just like literally, oops, I flew into good girl, I flew into control man. Listen to me.

Speaker 1:

Just come back faster. Yeah, totally, that's what it is. It's like with all of this practice and all this awareness and feeling it's, the rebound is so much faster. It's like you notice you're out here so much sooner and the ability to come back to center is so much faster, like your resilience to authenticity is just turned up. Come back faster.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's it. The goal isn't to be perfect, it's to come back faster.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, beautiful. Well, I've so loved this conversation. Will you please tell my audience how they can find you, how they can work with you, some of the ways that they can keep up with you?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I mean everything will be on jennasmithcoachingcom and I'm also on Instagram. I do little videos at Adventures in Jenna Land, so everything you need will be there the resourcing method, all of that, and then speak engagements coming up and the yeah, um, some meditations on their journal prompts are on there to download.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, lovely. Well, I will have all of those links in the show notes and thank you again for your time. Thank you for your presence in this conversation. Thank you so much for listening. I hope you enjoyed that episode and if there's anybody in the community that you think would benefit, it means so much to me if you sent this their way, and I'll be back next week with another episode.