What do we actually mean when we talk about love?

My guest, Dr. Colleen Quinn, defines love not simply as something we feel, but as an action, one that serves the greater good while also including ourselves.

That idea became a thread throughout our conversation.

Colleen is a mystic and transpersonal, trauma-informed psychologist whose understanding of psychology, consciousness, and healing has been shaped not only by her clinical training, but by two near-death experiences and her own deeply personal journey through grief and awakening.

We talk about the death of her younger brother and the complicated grief that followed, the beliefs she carried about what it meant to continue living and experiencing joy without him, and how her relationship with that loss eventually began to change.

From there, we explore love, sovereignty, boundaries, surrender, breathwork, the nervous system, and the relationship between our psychological and spiritual selves.

In this episode, we explore:

• What it means to think of psychology as the study of the soul
• Colleen's definition of love as an action
• Why boundaries and sovereignty can be expressions of love
• Her experiences with grief and the loss of her younger brother
• The meaning Colleen has made from her two near-death experiences
• How our relationship with a traumatic experience can change over time
• The role of breathwork in Colleen's personal and professional life
• Ego, control, and the practice of surrender
• Where the nervous system and the spiritual self may intersect
• What it means to bring conscious awareness to our breath
• Finding meaning in difficult experiences without expecting life to be free from pain
• Love as a spiritual practice rather than simply an emotion

Colleen and I also explore places where psychological and spiritual frameworks don't always fit neatly together - and why I think there's value in staying curious rather than needing to have all of the answers.

One thing I appreciated about this conversation is that Colleen doesn't describe awakening as arriving at some final destination. She talks about it as an ongoing process of noticing, surrendering, learning, and choosing how she wants to meet her life.

And perhaps that's one of the questions this conversation leaves us with:

What might it look like to let love lead—not only in how we relate to others, but in how we relate to ourselves?

Connect with Dr. Colleen Quinn

Insta: essence_merging
Bluesky: essencemerging
Facebook: Essence- Merging
YouTube: Essence Merging - Colleen Quinn PhD
Steps to Integrative Breathwork video: https://youtu.be/HiHkw_9UiVo?si=UDLiyUZCzN-KfI2O
Link to buy Essence Merging Book: https://a.co/d/09bOvw36

Colleen's newly released book, Essence Merging, chronicles her personal journey of awakening and explores her work with breathwork, Internal Family Systems, Somatic Experiencing, and her own spiritual experiences.

Visit Colleen's website for her free Nine Simple Steps to Awakening, information about her work, and links to her YouTube channel and other resources.

www.essencemerging.com 

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Until next time.  Stay Curious.

You can find Jodi Silverman, LCSW at
www.therachihealing.com
www.journeywithkindredsouls.com

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