The Joyful Shaman
Talking About Practical Shamanism For Everyday Life! Sharing Stories Of Hope, Transformation, Meditation & Spiritual Connection With Laughter..And A Little Bit Of Cussin'. Hey Y'all! I'm The Joyful Shaman.
The Joyful Shaman
From Retreat to Reality: Navigating Life's Emotional Rollercoaster Part 1
Have you ever felt like you're on a never-ending rollercoaster, oscillating between moments of profound peace and chaotic reality? Join me, Naomi, as I share my recent journey to Santa Fe, New Mexico, where a transformative retreat with my business partner, Cassie, not only rekindled my passion for self-care but also brought clarity to my future aspirations. Surrounded by the enchanting Tusuke Pueblo Village, I reconnected with my shamanic roots and embraced the inclusive atmosphere of Santa Fe, which resonated deeply with my indigenous heritage. This experience reaffirmed my purpose as a healer and set the stage for a journey of personal and professional growth.
However, the serene tranquility of the retreat quickly faded upon returning home, revealing the stark contrast between the peaceful retreat and the chaotic energy of everyday life. From a sudden flare-up of knee pain symbolizing deeper emotional wounds, to a tense encounter on a flight back to Florida, these challenges tested my emotional resilience. Navigating this whirlwind of emotions amidst the political tensions and stressors of daily life was no small feat, but it highlighted the importance of maintaining personal growth and positivity in the face of adversity.
Back home, the complexities of family dynamics and financial struggles added layers of stress and introspection to my life. With my father's early onset dementia and a strained relationship with my sister, the holiday season became a time of reflection and transformation. Through bioidentical hormone replacement therapy and a healthier lifestyle, I sought to navigate these challenges while grappling with anxiety, sleep issues, and the financial burdens of supporting my family. Despite these hardships, I am committed to sharing words of encouragement, reminding you of your worth and potential, and emphasizing the temporary nature of tough times. Trust, surrender, and an open heart remain my guiding principles, and I am here to reassure you that you are not alone on this journey.
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Naomi@joyfulshaman.com
Thank You So Much For Supporting Me & Energetically…The Collective
Welcome back to another episode of the Joyful Shaman. I am Naomi, your host with the most, and I am so glad to be back after taking a little bit of a break to do some self-care and rest. This is gonna be a two-part episode because I wanna give you an update as to what's been going on in my life, why I needed the res, all these changes and upheavals, and then what's coming up for me in 2025. So part one, the last episode that I had uploaded, and I uploaded all of my episodes right before I went on to this retreat in Santa Fe, new Mexico, at the end of October with my business partner, cassie. So I did do a lot of work in a short amount of time so that I wouldn't have to worry about not having an episode on a weekly basis, even though I said I was going to try to do that. That didn't quite pan out, and so I went on this amazing, amazing retreat in Santa Fe, new Mexico, and I learned from my first time experience being out there that I motherfucking love Santa Fe like fucking love it so much I could totally see myself moving out there. I hope to move out there in the Southwest within the next year or so, but I love this fucking city. I get there. It's small, it's such a culturally diverse place. Inclusivity as being a person of indigenous origin and a minority being welcome and wanted in a community where it is part of the active culture was really, really healing for me.
Speaker 1:And the reason I went on this retreat with Cassie was number one to work through some mental blocks that I've been having about my business, my path as a shamanic healer and really like what do I want? What do I want for 2025? How can I create more structure in my life to get to the places that I want to be in, to create the life that I desire? Now don't get me wrong, I'm not questioning myself as a shaman or my spiritual path or anything like that, but I've just been having this mental block and emotional block of what's next for me and how do I create that path. And with my Capricorn moon, I am a logistical person. I have to put things together to make it make sense for me.
Speaker 1:And Cassie, you know I love her so much but she is a mother of three children and has not had a vacation or time away from her kids in nine years since she had them and I felt that this would be a good getaway to go together and enjoy something together and be closer as business partners and as longtime friends. And so when she said yes early on in the summer to go, I was so excited. So it had been like a countdown for us to attend this retreat, so I was really excited when I got there. We both are very much bohemian wild spirit souls and we are, and we wanted to just simply be present, be present in sacred land, be present with the small group of women it was eight of us that were going to this house in Tusuke Pueblo Village, so up on the mountains, and you know we were. I had no expectations, honestly. I just really wanted a motherfucking vacation.
Speaker 1:I invented two other retreats. One was an experience that I had and I'm just going to leave it at that. The other one was super transformative, powerful. I did a lot of healing work in the summer in Tulum and then New Mexico. I just needed a fucking break. I have not had like a true vacation in probably seven years and I it's been well overdue and I just wasn't in the financial position to do that. I really wasn't in the financial position to do that this year. But you know, I just I just took a chance and I said you know, if I'm going to go somewhere and enjoy myself, I want to do some healing work too.
Speaker 1:So we get to New Mexico. It's a five day, four night trip and Cassie and I are loving it. Coming from fucking Florida where it is so damn hot to a place where it is fifties and sixties, I am thriving. I am thriving. I love cold weather very much and she was just over the moon, just being with the mountains, seeing that desert landscape. There was just something magical about being there as soon as we walked out of that little regional airport, just seeing the Adobe style buildings. Everything's so historical there, it's like the wild west and I don't know. It just brought back this feeling of nostalgia and comfort for me and I was like I am home very much and we wait for our ride. And it's actually the retreat host who come and picks us up from the airport and another woman that was attending and we go immediately into the downtown area into one of the best Mexican restaurants that I've been in in a long time. It's called Pascual's. If you have been to Santa Fe or are going, I highly, highly recommend.
Speaker 1:And we had a late brunch and it was delicious, and we were just walking around a little bit. We went to our Airbnb, which was this beautiful, beautiful, spiritual, shamanic house. As soon as you walked in, all of the artwork, all of the pottery, the jewelry that represented so many indigenous tribes all over the world and the careful selection of shamanic and spiritual items everywhere, I knew this house was a fucking magical house and I was so grateful to be there up on this mountain, staring across the ridge, staring at the desert landscape, and I just was so grateful. So we had a magical time. You know, there was some work. We did a lot of meditation, a lot of journeying, and for me, I was just in this stillness. I was just in this stillness. I had not felt stillness, the feeling of happiness, the feeling of home, the feeling of connection to the universe and to the land, ever in my life, not until I was in that house, sitting up on that mountain, staring out of these huge open windows, with these beautiful panoramic views, that in my heart, I was like this is my work, this is where I should be, this is what I need, this is my medicine, and so I was just completely present in New Mexico. Cassie did a lot of profound work for herself and I was so honored and privileged to be able to be a witness to her journey and for her to do the work that she needed to do.
Speaker 1:And you know, we did some shopping. We ate amazing food. The people there are so incredibly nice. We bought a shit ton of jewelry. Cassie and I are enablers of each other when it comes to jewelry, art, food and memorable experiences. We will never say like, are you sure? Maybe you should think about that before you do it. Like we see it. I'm like do it, do it, screaming across like the parking lot, do it. You know, if we're holding up something, I'm like, oh, this piece of jewelry is $500. And I'm like buy it. And we did, we bought the jewelry. Jewelry is $500. And I'm like buy it. And we did, we bought the jewelry.
Speaker 1:I had a backpack that I carry to all my retreats with all my ceremonial things, because I always bring my altar with me, a special cloth with my totem animals, my oracle cards, my crystals, and I set it up there, you know, to honor my ancestors. Why not? This is profoundly shamanic land. I am going to bring my stuff. Well, that backpack ended up being all the foods that we bought from the farmer's market there. So much pottery, so much jewelry, crystals it was so heavy plus smaller instruments that I brought because I always travel with my sacred instruments in case I'm called to do a little bit of sound healing. So, overall, a super phenomenal trip.
Speaker 1:I was ready to come home because I had been sleeping on a trundle bed and that fucked up my back I'm not going to lie and I was like goddamn, I'm tired of eating beans. My bowels, my body, I need to go home. But it was such a profound shift for me in a subtle way it wasn't a very pronounced way of being like in my face like my other two retreats that I had attended where we did huge transformational, push beyond your boundaries work. This was subtle. It was when we did a breathwork journey on the Friday that it was a different style of breathing for me. It was the first time I've ever done a breathwork journey where I did not see an animal, a spirit guide, zero visualizations, but my body.
Speaker 1:I was so conscious of what it felt like in my body, the energy moving through my body, that it almost scared me and after that I just kind of in the void for a little bit and just really being present and I got super crystal clear I love working with Cassie. She is a wonderful healer in her own path and so I knew I want to continue my work here in Lakeland for whatever time is left, and I didn't want to be Sutton on wellness, I wanted to just now incorporate everything and be the joyful shaman and I really want to carry that as my own entity, as my own business, and support Cassie as her own business, separate but together. And so I expressed that to her and you know we, we, we understood that and so, you know, coming back to Florida, it was bittersweet, you know it was. It was hard to leave these, these people, and we made connections, really deep connections, with our casita roommate. We slept in a different beautiful casita and our roommate was from up north and, you know, super sweet person and you know we all follow each other on social media and stuff and see what we're doing and everything. And so we're coming back and as soon as we land in Florida, this reoccurring pain that I have in my right knee, as soon as I stood up from my seat, started immediately hurting again, like it felt like my knee was going to explode, like it was so painful All my hamstrings, muscles of the back of my knee like totally get jacked up and just flare up.
Speaker 1:This happened after I came back from North Carolina for the first retreat. Immediately happened when I got to Chicago on an overnight flight from Mexico before I flew back to Florida, and then as soon as I landed in Florida, I stood up getting ready to walk out to the aisle with Cassie the lineup before we get off the plane and I'm like fuck my life, my knee is hurting again. And when you experience pain in your knee, it is related to fear, fear of moving forward, and it's something that is a deep, deep wounding with me because of things that have happened in my life, with my business, my personal relationships, my relationship with my family. It's just, it was a point. That spirit was like you need to recognize that these are going to be some areas of healing for you post-retreat. And I was like okay, all right, I'm awake. I'm aware. Well, lo and behold on the fucking plane wake. I'm aware. Well, lo and behold, on the fucking plane.
Speaker 1:There was a woman that was across from us in the aisle that, unfortunately, was suffering from some mental health issues at that moment and she was on the ground in her aisle and no one had sat next to her. She was the only person in her aisle. So she got to fly from Dallas to Tampa with two empty seats, which is extremely rare, and she was like banging her hand on the ground. And you can hear below the plane that they've already opened up the cargo door and they're starting to unload all of the luggage and I thought this woman was looking for something. So I'm watching her but I can't get like close to her because I'm in a tight line.
Speaker 1:She starts panicking, she starts being loud, she starts aggressively speaking to another woman on the plane Like she is wanting to get off the plane. Why? Because she thinks that she hears babies screaming in the cargo of the plane and is freaking the fuck out and wants to get off the plane. Think, jesus, that the plane obviously is freaking the fuck out and wants to get off the plane. Thank Jesus that the plane obviously had stopped. We were not in the air, we were not moving, but she pushed her way out onto me and almost clocked my face with her big, oversized carry-on bag and I mean it would have been bad, I would have probably been concussed. And she tries to open up the emergency door, which is right in front of us. So we're all like, no, no, no, no, no, please stop, please stop. And she's like I want to get off this fucking plane. Let me off this plane. And I'm just standing here like why the fuck am I here? Why the fuck am I back in Florida? What is this showing me? What is this showing me Like? Right now, this is testing my limits. My knees in pain, my back's in pain, I have to walk all flared up like this, and now this woman is having a complete meltdown in front of me and I am just like great, this is the energy that we are fucking in, you know.
Speaker 1:So it's the beginning of November, cassie and I, we get in our car, we're stuck in two and a half hours in traffic in Tampa on I-4 and 275, one of the most dangerous highways in the United States. And this is obviously before the elections. And, of course, we see all of the super conservative flags everywhere, you know, giant flags waving over the interstate and the highways that these big corporate companies have paid to put out and, um, you know I don't talk politics on here and I'm very middle of the road, um, but I just didn't want to be in that energy. So I'm sitting just fuming internally in Cassie's car and she's, you know, upset. She's not super road ragey, but she's like, oh, my God, this sucks. You know, we're both in this energy of like this is not the way we want to come home.
Speaker 1:And if you've ever attended a retreat, once you leave that container in that space, if you've had a magical, amazing, transformative time, reality is going to be a punch in the mouth when you come back to energies that you can't control, to people that you can't control, to situations that you can't control, it sucks so hard because you're trying to just come back into that and you've already shifted your energy to the highest level, to the highest vibration, cleared so much shit, and now you're like, oh, I'm back in demon world, I'm back with people, bullshit, I'm back with all of the other crap that is not in my highest joy and I have to deal with it. So my energy started like that and by the time she took me home and I get to my front door, I am like furious, like I'm hungry. I'm very tired. I had to get up, you know, at 5 am and now it's 7 pm Eastern time, so I've been up and you know I was just. I was happy to see my family, but I wasn't sure how I was going to be received, because my energy has shifted and my mother and my sister are very, very sensitive to my energy.
Speaker 1:After I do breath work, anytime I do any type of profound healing stuff, they get really irritated with me. Why? Because their fucking inner demons don't like it and it's a disruption for them. I get it, I totally get it. So I'm banging on the door. My dad opens the door and he's like, oh, where have you been? And I'm like I've been gone for a week and it was sad because I was like my father didn't even know I was gone for a week. And, to kindly remind you, my dad has early onset dementia, so I can't hold it against him. You know he lives in his own world.
Speaker 1:And so I get in the house and you know my sister's awake. She's in my mother's room Prior to me attending the retreat in New Mexico. I've not been speaking to my mother because of some shit that went down a couple of weeks ago and I needed to protect my peace. So I go to my room and I'm just like throw my shit on my bed and I'm just like I'm so fucking tired. So I start taking out gifts and things because I figured, let me take out my stuff, gifts and things. Because I figured, let me take out my stuff, let me, you know, gift it to my family, let me just share with them. And, um, you know, I come out, my dad's in his normal routine of watching the news on loop and watching sports and stuff, like lying down on the on the couch, and I bring him a shirt that I got him and some other cute things. I got him this beautiful, delicious chocolate from an amazing chocolate house that's in Santa Fe and you know he was really appreciative.
Speaker 1:And I was trying to talk to my sister, you know, and she was just very dismissive of me. Like she was just like I don't give a fuck. You know, like, okay, you're here, I don't care, like can I talk to you later? And I'm just like, okay, cool, I bought you like a whole bunch of shit because I was really excited and it's Christmas coming up and you know I wanted to get you some special stuff. You know I just wanted to share that moment with my sister but it was totally ignored and dismissed by my family and that really sucked for me. Like that just really put me in a spiral. That night I think of just exhaustion and hunger and just like I don't want to be here. This shit already happened on the plane. I'm not being made to feel welcomed by my family. You know, I got to get on Uber Eats and order some food and eat quietly in my room because that's just the way it is. So I mean, I did give my sister my stuff and you know that I got her and she really liked it. And you know it's not about the things, it was just I just wanted to say hello and see how she was and you know, try to get my spirits up, but that didn't happen.
Speaker 1:Well, since the beginning of November, I have fallen into a deep, deep spiral of anxiety and depression and deep introspection and anger and frustration, and it's been really hard. I'm not going to lie, I'm still in it and I'm trying to navigate and not repeat the same cycles. I'm trying to go in the flow of transformation and not be so combative against it. I'm also trying to let go of old mindsets from the past, working on self-confidence, working on self-doubt, working on being seen, working on believing that the things that I want to accomplish and do can't happen. So a lot of things got stirred up in a subtle way but in a deep way. So I've been working and navigating through that.
Speaker 1:But it took me about the entire month of November until the beginning of December to finally integrate back into reality. I didn't want to go to work. I didn't want to see fucking clients. I was like no, I just want to sleep all the time and just not deal with shit, and I was just trying to process my thoughts and my feelings and how I want to move forward. I've also started a bioidentical hormone replacement therapy and I started working out and that really helped me a lot to just getting active, eating super clean, cleaning up my diet, getting my adjustments, fixing my low back pain, fixing my sciatica, moving my body and then being on progesterone and estrogen, which hasn't been in my body in 17 years. That's been a journey too.
Speaker 1:I've been feeling good overall, a lot calmer, I'm able to process better, but I cannot, cannot sleep. I have not slept well in eight weeks. So if this podcast sounds like a little aggressive or a little crazy, you know I'm sitting here at midnight on my bed speaking into my microphone because I can't fucking sleep and I take about 10 different supplements to sleep and my brain wants to stay up till 5 am, and so that exacerbates my anxiety and my depressive feelings as well. So I have not had the desire or the motivation to do podcasting for several weeks. I always say like I'm going to do it today, I'm going to do it today, I'm going to do it today, and I don't and I don't, and that's okay. You know we're in the holiday season.
Speaker 1:It's a much slower time in my business, which is a big trigger for me. Financial instability is one of my deepest triggers alongside my family, and so I was just been. It's been hard, it was good in Santa Fe. I come back to Florida and I'm like fuck my life so hard. I hate this, I hate being here, all of this. I'm just like what the fuck am I doing? How do I shift this? And so I've been navigating these feelings of anger and sadness and withdrawal and just acceptance and making a plan for the future. Plus, my HRT program just started, like six weeks ago. I'm sure things are going to have to get adjusted in January when I do new blood work again, but it's, it's been a wild journey and so I'm, and that's where I'm at, you know, and Cassie and I, when we came back, we work inside of our friend's chiropractic office, who's been kind and gracious to allow us to work in a room that he has because he's not quite ready to bring in an x-ray machine for no rent, for no rent, and it's been a huge blessing.
Speaker 1:Well, I think Cassie was still in her heavy energies in her own way, and the election time was really scary for her. Me, I just kind of disconnect from all of that. I don't really feed into all of that. I'm just like it is what it is Intuitively, spiritually, I knew the way it was going to go, because that's the way it needed to go to usher in the age of Aquarius, with astrology and everything else that's been pointed and all practices and beliefs of the shift in humanity that's going to happen over the next 20 years. This was a huge moment for our country and for people living in this country. That just needed to happen.
Speaker 1:Well, cassie didn't see it that way and we didn't talk about it, but unfortunately my friend, the doctor whose office we work in, is quite conservative and made some comments, not to gloat or anything like that, but made some comments that really affected Cassie. And she was like I want to leave the office, I want to move and I want to leave the office and, honestly, I'm to leave the office, I want to move and I want to leave the office and, honestly, I'm not prepared for that. I'm not in a financial place that I want to do that. And then part two I'm going to talk about some new plans that I've already taken out in motion, that I am so excited to start, and I've already started, and I'll share all of that in part two. But I am not ready to leave the office and in the midst of me trying to make myself feel better, not knowing how to tell Cassie I don't want to fucking move. We have something great and I want to stay here. I don't want to pay rent. I don't want to pay rent because of where I want to go. I'm trying to save my money because I want to move. Cassie knows I want to leave Florida.
Speaker 1:And so I said, okay, yeah, let's take a look. You know, she went and saw an office that I knew was not going to be the right fit and she just had to see it for herself. But there is a historical home in my community that my friend, who a longtime client was closing her law practice and needed to sublease part of the house, and it's been a longtime dream of mine. We actually worked with a professional realtor for over a year to try to move in to one of these over 120-year-old historic homes, and it's impossible unless someone leaves or a business leaves and it's leased, or the person dies or it gets sold. It's just extremely hard and rare to get into these spaces. So I had let go of that.
Speaker 1:Well, the opportunity came back and I reached out to my friend and I said, hey, cassie and I are looking for a new place to go, and you know, is that room still available? It's a conference room on the ground floor of a two-story bungalow craftsman. And she's like, yeah, it is. And I was just in the moment excited and didn't think things through and didn't tell Cassie, maybe we should go check out the house again and make sure it's going to work for our needs. Then I was great, I'm going to talk to Cassie and then I'm pretty sure we're going to sign the lease and that happened relatively quickly and easy, no issues there, you know.
Speaker 1:And then I started to have some doubts of like what the fuck am I really getting myself into. Like my business has slowly begun I don't want to say crumble, but it's starting to really, really really get small. In Lakeland I stopped doing public massage therapy in November. I have only a handful of private massage therapy clients that I chose that are in alignment with me, and then no one is booking energy healing. I have tried for over three years to really get energy healing to go and it's just not consistent for me. It's not consistent. There is not enough demand in Lakeland to have it be consistent work, whether it's cost or interest or a combination of both. It's just not sustainable.
Speaker 1:And so I went from earning so much money to be able to pay all my bills, all the business expenses, pay down my debt, to now having, since November, starting to put things back on credit cards again, repeating the cycle and less and less people coming, and it's been really scary for me. So when I made that decision with Cassie, I was like fuck, you're repeating the cycle again, you are jumping the gun. This is a negative coping mechanism that you recognize that you're doing that isn't serving you. And yeah, I signed the lease and we gave our money. You know we gave a security deposit and we gave first month rent and you know we're slated to move into the house. I'm going to start next week and then at the end of January, end of December, beginning of January, we should be in the new house, and so this is the state that I am in, and so I am having to work through intense fears right now of the past.
Speaker 1:November was not the best month financially. I scraped by. December is worse. I did not work for almost two weeks, and that's never happened in my almost 20 years of being a licensed body worker. So much so that I had to open up one more massage, my shamanic healing massage, to the public, because I'm like, if this is what I'm known for and I have to keep doing this to get to where I'm at like, at least let me do the one massage that I actually like doing, you know, and no bites.
Speaker 1:And I guess it's not so much of an issue for Cassie because she's married and there's another income in her home. It's a big issue for me as a single person that has to help their parents financially because you owe them a lot of money from past ventures, and it's trying not to put themselves into massive amounts of debt again at the end of the year and starting the new year like that. So I'm in the fire. I am in the fucking furnace right now in my mind, in my spirit, in my heart, and it's been really hard for me to regulate, and doing this podcast tonight is a way for me to regulate.
Speaker 1:So if this is one of those one-off episodes where you're like, fuck, you know, even healers have a hard time and need to express it, then let that be that episode.
Speaker 1:But that's where I'm at and I'm going to stop here because I want to collect my thoughts and then I'm going to continue part two with a more positive and upbeat things, but also the reality of stuff continuing in the lessons that I'm learning and the different things that I'm trying to do to help me find balance again.
Speaker 1:But if you are listening to this trust that you are an amazing human being, you are a beautiful soul, you have a purpose, there is a destiny for you, you create the reality that you want and you can achieve anything, even when you are experiencing dark nights of the soul, upheaval, change, transformation, transitions like myself. It is all temporary, but it is all meant to elevate you and take you and align you to where you need to be. So, as hard as it is for me right now to trust and surrender trust and surrender of what's happening in your life, what has happened and what's coming for you Keep your heart open and know that you are not alone in the walk and that you always have a friend here with me. If you need someone to talk to reach out to me. My contact information's in this podcast. But until we meet again, be well, sat Nam friend.
