Find Your Lady Tribe

Transformative Grace - Forgiveness as a Path to Lifelong Vitality and Contentment

• Brenda Billings Ridgley • Season 3 • Episode 5

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Have you ever wondered if there's a secret ingredient to a longer, more vibrant life? Bobbye Farino, a healer who turned her traumatic past into a beacon of hope, joins us to reveal how forgiveness could very well be that elusive elixir. Grudges and resentment might not just weigh down our hearts, but also our lifespans, and Farino's transformation from a 17-year-old victim to a source of light and guidance is nothing short of inspiring. Through her story, we dissect the surprising health benefits of letting go, the art of living in the moment, and the profound connection between grace and life fulfillment.

But what about those personal battles we face within ourselves? The second chapter of our discussion shifts the focus to the powerful act of self-forgiveness. We'll walk you through actionable strategies to shed layers of guilt and embrace a truer, more compassionate self-concept. It's here we also draw wisdom from remarkable figures like Dr. Ruth Eger and the Dalai Lama, who teach us that peace starts from within. Our conversation is a reminder that to forgive is not just an act of kindness towards others, but a transformative gift to ourselves, and a step towards a more harmonious world. Join us and unlock the doors to a liberating journey of forgiveness, connection, and self-discovery.

Connect with Bobbye on Facebook ~ https://www.facebook.com/bobbye.farino

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Speaker 1:

Welcome back, beautiful souls, to another season of Find your Lady Tribe. My name is Brenda Ridgely, your host. You know there's a certain kind of magic that happens when women of a certain age come together. We've weathered some storms, discovered our strengths and are ready to tap into the wisdom we've accumulated to create our next big thing. This season we're diving deep into the wall spring of longevity. We'll explore how to nurture our minds, bodies and spirits so we can not only live longer but live vibrantly. Whether you're dreaming of traveling, starting a creative pursuit, building an empire or even saving the world Yep, that's right, saving the world. This season is your guide to building the foundation for a life filled with purpose, joy and an unstoppable sense of self. So grab your cup of tea, settle in and get ready to be inspired. But before we get started, I want to remind you to subscribe. Give us a thumbs up if you're enjoying the show and share it with your fellow midlife goddesses. Together, let's create a wave of empowered women who are redefining what it means to age gracefully, powerfully and with a whole lot of Lady Tribe spirit.

Speaker 1:

Hello everybody and welcome to the Find your Lady Tribe podcast. This is season three and I'm so excited to be talking all about longevity. We are living longer these days and, as midlife women, we want to make the most of it right. So I'm talking to experts in all different kinds of areas of longevity research and development and I just am thrilled with the conversations we've been having. And today I'm really, really excited and interested to be featuring an incredible woman who has gone through a lot, and I can't wait for you to hear her story.

Speaker 1:

Her name is Bobbi Farino and Bobbi, at the age of 17, was brutally gang raped. She was just an innocent, naive little girl really, and believed in the good in people, and she chose to make a conscious decision at the time to forgive those who had hurt her. It was her act of forgiveness that her deepest and most profound service as a healer was born, that her deepest and most profound service as a healer was born. Her own journey of forgiveness has changed her life in ways that she could never have even imagined, and she recognizes every day that experience offers her the opportunity to learn a deeper compassion, an expanded gratitude for life and the preciousness of helping others heal. She believes that forgiveness is the antidote for all ailments. Bobby, I am just so excited to have you today.

Speaker 2:

Thanks, I'm so excited to be here.

Speaker 1:

Yes, it's funny because when I first was looking for guests for this longevity season and we corresponded a little bit and I read what you were all about, I thought I'm not sure this is a fit in longevity. But then, honestly, I think it was just a couple weeks later I really got to thinking about it and I thought you know what People who hold on to grudges and and lack forgiveness and have resentment in their lives and in their gut and in their bodies, that can kill you. Yes, right, it creates cancer. So I reached back out to you, bobbi, and I said let's do this thing, right. Yeah? So, bobbi, would you just share with us a little bit more about you and tell us why you do what you do?

Speaker 2:

My whole life I've always been able to feel where other people are or or kind of see. Some people call me a psychic or an intuitive or a medium, whatever they call me, ever since I was a child. I never labeled it, I just thought everybody was like me. So I would find I would have all this information about people coming in and I had had this enormous compassion, which my family used to ridicule me for because my parents, because I always understood that a murderer was acting out not acting out of love for his victim, because he wasn't acting out of love for himself. So I understood that intrinsically and from there I began studying, studying tarot. I began doing all these different things, I taught tarot, I did all these classes in different healing modalities and but always it was very easy for me to forgive all my life, and I've just been doing it ever since.

Speaker 2:

And now I coach others into letting go. And look, you're talking about longevity here. If we want to have longevity in our lives, well, we better start with now, because now is the only moment we have. Tomorrow isn't here, it's not a reality, neither is the past. So we have this pregnant, beautiful moment, pregnant with possibility to live in, to enjoy, to exist. It simplifies our life to be in rhythm with our bodies and our breath and our heart.

Speaker 2:

And that's how I'm living my life and helping those people who are ready to shift and let go just as I do. Yeah, sometimes it takes work, but I mean for me, I don't understand why it happens so easily. I just know that it's a gift to me and I'm grateful for that. And that's kind of how I'm living my life.

Speaker 1:

Well, that's really fabulous. And you think, and I think back to you as a 17 year old what do you think it was in you that allowed you to really approach that in such a wise way, kind of old soul mentality? How did that happen?

Speaker 2:

Grace, just grace. It's the only thing I can absolutely attribute it to, because I'm no different than anyone. None of us on here are different from one another. It's only the mind that thinks itself different and creates separation. But if we don't listen to that voice, we understand, we're all connected and at 17, I don't understand I just was able to, and out of that horror that I endured, and I've just begun to share this with people I've never spoken about it openly to um, to people, except as of lately and there was one thing that occurred that I want to share because, um, it's very, very deeply, deeply personal and hope I hope that this is not offensive to anyone.

Speaker 2:

I don't think it will be it was, um, there was one man who couldn't do it and he exhibited kindness toward me and he couldn't do it and when I was thanking him because I was like out of my mind, of course, and he put his hand, like this, over my lips and said, please be quiet, and I understood in that moment he wanted his friends to think he was doing it, but he couldn't, he was in conflict. I can hardly talk about that without crying because I I had, in that moment, I had so much compassion for this person. I had so much compassion. I I can't even believe, in the midst of that, that I had this compassion for him. And then I felt this love for him and it was. It was the most extraordinary experience, you know, and I still keep it in my heart.

Speaker 1:

Sounds to me almost inhuman to be able to maybe in a way you were a little outside of yourself, no idea and and perhaps also a little grateful even in that moment for that small act of compassion on his part absolutely, absolutely, and I and I just felt such, not only the gratitude that was present within me, but such a compassion and understanding.

Speaker 2:

I was very different from my family. I actually remember thinking for the first thought. It was the first thought that I can ever recall thinking, and it was what am I doing in this family? And not like what am I doing in this family, it's like what am I doing in this family. I was unlike everyone in my family. Nobody could figure me out.

Speaker 1:

Well, every family has one, it seems. Bobbi, that's me.

Speaker 2:

I was the black sheep, the innovative one, the creator of every kind of mayhem, but all the time I didn't know I was seeking myself, because what we seek outside is a temporary fix. It's never going to. It will satisfy us, but it won't content us, it won't fulfill us. We have what we need to be fulfilled and these are all things that that I'm always learning all along my path, every day, and I'm so grateful to be able to myself, I mean. And nowadays, when I make a mistake and that inner critic comes in and wants to label us as stupid, foolish, inefficient, you know, unintelligent, whatever it wants to say, we can say no and I do, and I say no, and, as you and I know, I forgave myself, even this morning for a little mix-up and I just sat there quietly and forgave myself, and that that, immediately, that forgiveness, nixes all that inner turmoil it's like magic.

Speaker 2:

It's like magic, but we have to be willing yeah, yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1:

I mean, you can like, like I said in the intro, you can actually feel that resentment in your body. Yeah, you know that it is working against you. Can you expand on the health benefits of forgiveness or the reverse? You know what can happen if you don't forgive of the reverse.

Speaker 2:

You know what can happen if you don't forgive Absolutely One of the things that resentment can create is cancer. Cancer is an eating away of the self and most people are not understanding this, they're not hip to this information, they don't know about this and I'm here to help educate them and tell them. And resentment, you know, I liken it to a balloon with a pinprick hole. You cannot see that air leaking out of that balloon, but that balloon, all the while is deflating until there's nothing. It is so the same with our energy and we don't see it leaking out. But when we don't forgive and we hold on, we have this element of some kind of hatred or resentment inside of us. So we're harboring something that's detrimental, unhealthy and doesn't feel good. Even if we're not present to it, if we're not consciously acknowledging it, it's still doing it because we operate what is it? 98%, 97% from subconscious belief. So we need to change those. Forgiveness is one way to let go and let all the power of this amazing, amazing life, let that power of that life flow through us, cleaning and clearing everything.

Speaker 2:

I have seen, I've worked with people. I've seen cancer gone. I remember working with somebody on. It was a friend of my daughter's, I believe, and she had cancer and I just was working with her with my hands above her body and she said she felt like she says oh my God, and her body kind of jumped a little off the bed and she said I feel like some something's in me grabbing me and taking this out and releasing it, and after that she didn't have cancer. So I see firsthand and this is not about oh, how great a healer I am, this is about how great people are that they want to heal. I just have so much admiration for them Then their lives are able to flow much easier. There's no resistance. When we're in resistance to anything, we're in resistance to everything because, we're in resistance, so that's where we're coming from.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, and absolutely. Just think about this. Ladies out there listening when you are holding on to something and maybe it comes and goes, but when you are reminded of that thing that you're holding on to that, maybe you know it's comes and goes, but when it, when you are reminded of that thing that you're holding on to, that resentment, that hurt where you were done, you know done wrong, or if you feel like what, that didn't go the way it, should you, all those emotions come right back.

Speaker 2:

Like that, like you, you're bringing the past into the present yes, yes, and I love when it's put that way, because that's exactly the way it is.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and why do that to yourself? It really, truly is a gift to yourself to find ways and strategies to let these things go. Hey, lady, just wanted to take a moment and interrupt right now in the middle of the show to ask you to subscribe. Yes, press that button right now. This show is all about you, the midlife woman. Let's do this thing together. So join us, subscribe now. So that's what Bobby's here for today. So, bobby, what kind of strategies do you have for us to set forward from today on an issue, maybe, that we are floundering with?

Speaker 2:

So one of my very favorite exercises. I love this. I think this is just so magical is, first off, people need to begin with forgiving themselves, even for the resentment they hold within, because that forgiving is like like a bomb to that feeling inside. That forgiving is a big release. And I tell people to work with forgiveness for themselves first, because I find that a lot of people, a lot of clients that I deal with, they hold grudges against themselves as well or they criticize themselves and they're in judgment because they're not letting go and forgiving. So I advise them and sometimes I'll walk them through this.

Speaker 2:

It's surprising how many people feel awkward first doing this and then they get used to it. But to stand in front of a mirror and look into the mirror and love yourself, just say I love and I forgive myself for anything that I deem that I did wrong, anything that I perceive I did wrong or anything I actually did wrong, and then to get rid of the word wrong, because it's not that we did something wrong. We made a decision. Whatever that decision was, wherever we were coming from, it's a decision. That's all it is, and we can go back. Sometimes we can change that decision or we can choose to let go. But when we start recognizing to forgive ourselves, we begin to experience the fullness of our being, because there's nothing being held back by that guilt and resentment. This is a really powerful tool to use. I also will have people write it out, because when you write something, you can say it at the same time. I forgive myself, I accept myself exactly as I am, whole and complete. And when you write it, you're engaging your physical senses, you're looking at it, you're hearing it because you're speaking it. So all of you is engaged in that. And I tell people to do this repetitively until they're clear and just keep going with it and get help. If you need help, don't be afraid to ask for help. And these are just some simple methods of forgiveness to do. Read books on forgiveness, just simple little exercises.

Speaker 2:

Every day, use an affirmation I'm whole and complete just as I am. I'm a love-filled human being. God created me to be perfect. And, and I tell people, don't be distracted by what you hear. The words you hear in your mind. It may sound like your voice, but it's not. If it leads you astray, it's another little thing I do. If it doesn't feel good, see it as a red light, stop, just stop, and then move into a green light area and ask yourself is this true of me? Is this absolutely irrevocably true of me?

Speaker 2:

If you're criticizing yourself, of course it's not. It's a moment in time, that's all it is. It's a you can change it at your whim, in an instant, in an instant. It doesn't take long to do it, and I know when, when we're in a place of darkness and we're hurting our bodies by criticizing ourselves, depleting our life force, possibly eating the wrong foods. I'm a big advocate of eating raw. I do eat some cooked food, but I don't eat meat, fish, dairy eggs. I don't eat any of that stuff I eat so simply. I want my life to be simple so that it's easy for me to access my power. You know we're given this breath and who thinks about it?

Speaker 1:

Oh yeah, I breathe.

Speaker 2:

The breath is holy. The breath is the connection to the source. So when we're not listening to this, we can be here, and when we make decisions based on clarity, then we can forgive ourselves, we can change our diet, we can get involved in things that take our minds away from negativity. It is not a difficult task to do. The difficulty is in the decision, is making the decision.

Speaker 1:

I feel like a great starting point would be something like I now know better, Now I can do better.

Speaker 2:

And so I forgive myself.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so I forgive myself. What about when, when you feel wrong, it's been done to you something that you just can't let go of, that someone else has put to you? You, what are your strategies for that?

Speaker 2:

for myself. I just I just forgive. I don't know how it works. It's, it's like grace, it's just a part of my being, for whatever reason. But sometimes people will say to me well, I'm not ready to forgive, and I translate that for them that means I'm not forgiving, that's all it means, because there's no point where you're really ready. It's a decision. It's like you don't look at the food in front of you and you're hungry and say, but I'm not ready yet. No, you dive in and you eat. You make a decision, you make a choice.

Speaker 2:

So the strategies that I use and I'm trying to think of a well, something did just recently happen to me, my sister recently. Well, she basically just owned me because she doesn't agree with some things that I've said. So I had to let that be and she said some extremely hurtful things to me. But I really deeply love her, so I just let go of it, I just let go. And a big help in letting go is to say, well, there's nothing I can do about it right now. There's nothing I can do. So you kind of relax into that. Okay, you accept that there's nothing I can do, and so you kind of relax into that. Okay, you accept that there's nothing I can do, and then you let go.

Speaker 1:

That's letting go in itself. It's especially difficult when it's family, I'm sure it can be. Another thing that comes to mind for me when I feel like I'm being mistreated or whatnot, I have to remind myself it's not about me. What they say do is really has nothing to do with me.

Speaker 2:

And when we look at it that way, brenda, it all is about self-concept. Forgiveness relates to self-concept because as we forgive and let go, our self-concept becomes clear and true. Otherwise, we're running around with concepts and beliefs all day that really don't match who we are but deplete us. And I recently read something by Dr Ruth Eger, e-g-e-r. She's incredible. She's 90 years old and she was a survivor of Auschwitz concentration camp and saw her whole family murdered and gassed. And she's all about forgiveness.

Speaker 2:

And I saw an interview of her grandson with her and he said to her well, how do you forgive? You know, how do you forgive someone who hurt you? And because she said she even has compassion for Hitler, which I know most people would be horrified to hear. But she said I have compassion because I understand, I know that he was severely beaten by his father throughout his childhood, severely beaten. So she said I do have compassion. And she said to me when her grandson asked her that question how do you forgive? She said, and and I just started crying when I heard this she said I forgive myself for judging them and I just thought that was incredibly beautiful to look to yourself first, you know why.

Speaker 2:

All the answers we ever need in our life are already contained right inside of us. We are fully equipped.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. I've been reading a lot of the Dalai Lama's works lately. He's huge on compassion and he's like, if nothing else, just go down to our basic I am human, you are human, they are human, we are the same and absolutely try to approach from that perspective on. We're not always perfect, we don't always do the right things, and we're not. We don't even really know what the intentions were. A lot of times we assume, we make assumptions, which is another no nono, making assumptions about what people are thinking or doing or saying about you. What other people think about you is none of your business.

Speaker 2:

If you live your life that way, it's a lot easier right to just brush things off right and how can you have a relationship with somebody when you're in constant, when you're looking at it from a lens of they're judging me, because then that stifles your relationship with them, because, look at where you're coming from, you're seeing through a lens of unforgiveness, you're seeing through a lens of feeling like you're being judged.

Speaker 2:

You know, another great tactic to do a little simple thing to do is I had this really beautiful little box and I took little slips of paper that I cut and I wrote these beautiful things about myself and these beautiful affirmations and I just put them all in there and then every day or every couple of days, I would choose one and I would repeat that all day long and live inside of the energy of that, and I'd I'd stick it up on a mirror which I'm fond of doing and and look at it. So there's many, many things that we can do to change how we're feeling, so that we understand forgiveness is a choice. It's not that we're stuck with it. I mean, look, if I can forgive what I went through and if Dr Ruth Eager can forgive what I went through, and if Dr Ruth Eager can forgive what she went through, anybody can forgive. Any one of us can forgive.

Speaker 1:

Oh, absolutely so, Bobby, can you send us off with just a few, one or two things if someone is struggling with forgiveness and they have that awful feeling that that comes back whenever they think of it. One or two or three things just to snap out of it and get in the present moment.

Speaker 2:

One of the best things I know to snap out of that immediately sit down, quiet yourself. You can meditate, if you can I meditate regularly for 50 years now and if they can't do that, refocus yourself into remembering an experience that you had that was beautiful for you, because instantly you're transported. That's an immediate change and that's an aid to changing our consciousness like that. Sometimes we can do this when we're anywhere. One day I was in the grocery store and I saw someone, a woman, and she was just flipping out on her child and I could have judged her, like what is wrong with her? I mean, oh my God, look at her, she's screaming. But I didn't. I understood how overburdened she was and how I mean she was fried, and you could see she was fried and I wanted to go and offer her help.

Speaker 2:

I love to do this with people, but in a situation like that people can sometimes be offended. Don't tell me how to treat my child or whatever. So I didn't. But I blessed her, as I do Everybody, I see. I just silently give a blessing to all my friends, my loved ones, everybody, and you can also. If you know a book that's great, that has uplifted you, just read a passage from it. Go on and read something online. The key to this is do you want to help yourself? That's the key. The key is our willingness. If we don't have willingness, it's like if you don't eat if you're not willing to eat, you'll starve to death so make the decision, so make the decision.

Speaker 2:

Just ask yourself how would and and imagine how would I feel if I didn't carry this darkness inside of me and I was just this light-filled, magical being. That's how I look at myself, because that's how I am in my life and with everybody we can have that freedom. The freedom exists inside. And I also wanted to add there's a website that I use all the time because it's profound. It's about a speaker named Prem Rawat and it's a website called I the lowercase, I the letter four, and enjoycom. And his words of wisdom are amazing, and many times if I'm feeling low or I'm feeling something, first I might sit with that feeling to allow myself to process it, and then other times I go right on there and I read, because his words are about us. It's about who we are inside of us and what's available to us inside of us.

Speaker 2:

In inner peace. We're not going to be in world peace. We have to be in personal inner peace first. And when we hold on to unforgiveness, resentment and grievances, we are not one with ourselves, we're one with something that's negative, that doesn't.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. I'm right there with you, bobby, so tell us how do we connect with you, how do we find you out there? I'm just on.

Speaker 2:

Facebook. I don't even have a website anymore. I'm on Facebook. I you know. I will offer a free call with me and to anybody who wants to connect with me on Facebook, just shoot. Shoot me out a message, we'll connect. Wonderful wonderful.

Speaker 1:

So my final question for this show is always how do you tribe? And what I mean when I say that I love to help women make connections of support, build their tribe of support. So a tribe is not this clique of women who go clubbing or whatever. A tribe is the two to five people in your life that know you, know your life and support you and love you. And how you tribe is how do you keep growing those connections? How do you tribe?

Speaker 2:

Bobbi, this is a great question. When I knew that you were going to ask that, I just got really excited. I am so blessed.

Speaker 2:

In my life, brenda, I stay connected with the most incredibly wonderful, beautiful, wise, fun-loving, intelligent women. I mean, they're just extraordinary women. Some of them are on here now with me and some I may not see frequently, but I never do lose touch with them forever, and one of them lives right around the corner from me, so oftentimes I just run over to their house or drive over in the evening and we watch a series on TV, and I feel so privileged to do this. You know, like I can, we always joke with each other. We can never leave the neighborhood, you know, and at one point I almost sold my house and I thought, oh no, wait a minute, we can never leave the neighborhood. And at one point I almost sold my house and I thought, oh no, wait a minute, I can't do this, and I just decided not to do it. These are some of the most special and incredible and I mean incredible women that I know. Their hearts are a thousand times bigger than they are, and so I'm fed all this love. I feel such a gratitude in my life. You know, I've seen where I've posted. One person has read it. No person has read it. A lot of people have read it. It doesn't make a difference, you just keep loving.

Speaker 2:

I have a friend who used to live closer to me. She now lives a little bit of a distance from me, so it's a longer car ride. We stay connected. I spent the entire day with her yesterday. I stay connected through media. I stay connected by phone. I stay connected physically. I make it a point to stay connected because if we don't connect and we don't we sit and don't do anything. Of course we're not going to be happy people, because we have to be alive. We have to take this life that is flowing through us and express it and then give back to ourselves by doing things that are joyful and uplifting for us. Tribe is important. Those are our peeps, they're important. Those are the people we love. Those are our girlfriends, our best girlfriends. Yes, love it. Oh.

Speaker 1:

I love it, bobby. It's been fantastic visiting with you today and I am just grateful for our time together and the tribe that you brought with you. I always wrap up with sharing when three or more gather we are a tribe.

Speaker 2:

We are a tribe and I want to mention your newsletter because I love that. It's not as you said, it's not inundating, it's it's brief, but but it's. It's a very cool newsletter and I think you guys should go on it and I'll you know. We can give you the information or or I can send it to you or whatever. But she has a great little newsletter and it's all about girlfriends. It's fun. It's about women.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for that plug, bobby. I appreciate you so much. All right, well, have a wonderful day and until next time.

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Brenda Billings Ridgley

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