137 ~ What Are Your Questions About Desire?

Desire can feel crystal clear in your head and completely impossible in your body. That tension is what we’re naming out loud here, because “trust yourself” doesn’t help much when fear shows up at the exact same time as the thing you want.

We talk about what seems missing in the market around desire and personal growth: the bridge between desire and daily life. Not just big concepts from psychology or spirituality, but the lived experience of wanting something while craving safety, feeling your nervous system shut down, or mistaking anxiety for a sign to push harder. We also touch the parts people skip: what rejection does to our desire, how unmet needs shape what we chase, and why receiving and holding what we want is its own practice.

Then we bring you into what’s next for Desire as Medicine. We’re building a new desire series with guests and real stories, and we want your help shaping it. 

What would you ask if you were interviewing someone about desire? 

What else do you want to know about desire? 

For example, maybe you want to know how people close the gap between wanting and having? - but that question is broad

We want to get your deep down questions answered; so please send us your questions! 

We even riff on potentially having a recorded “desire panel” driven by listener questions, because community wisdom can reveal what no single book can.

Listen now, then subscribe and share this with a friend who’s ready to live by desire. Please send us your juiciest desire questions. 

What do you most want to know about desire?

Transcript

Meet The Hosts And The Mission

SPEAKER_01 0:07

Welcome to Desire is Medicine. We are two very different women living a life led by desire, inviting you into our world.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

I'm Brenda. I'm a devoted practitioner to being my fully expressed true self in my daily life, motherhood, relationships, and my business. Desire has taken me on quite a ride, and every day I practice listening to and following the voice within. I'm a middle school teacher, turned coach and guide of the feminine.

SPEAKER_01 0:36

And I'm Catherine, devoted to living my life as the truest and hopefully the highest version of me. I don't have children, I've never been married, I've spent equal parts of my life in corporate as in some down and low shady spaces. I was the epitome of Tired and Wired, and my path led me to explore desire. I'm a coach, guide, energy worker, and a forever student.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Even after decades of inner work, we are humble beginners, on the mat, still exploring, always curious. We believe that listening to and following the nudge of desire is a deep spiritual practice that helps us grow.

Asking For Listener Help

What Desire Books Miss In Practice

The New Desire Series And Guests

SPEAKER_01 1:12

On the Desire is Medicine podcast, we talk to each other, we interview people we know and love about the practice of desire, bringing in a very important piece that is often overlooked: being responsible for our desire. Welcome back, family, friends, listeners. Brenda and I are here ready to talk to you about desire and something specifically on desire. And we're here to ask you for your help. But um bump. On what? Don't worry, we're not gonna ask you to record us or create reels or anything like that. Although that would be fun. Definitely let us know if you're down for that. If you want to play with us, but we've been thinking about desire from the vantage point of what's actually missing in the market. There are books on desire. A lot of them cover like theory from the per psychological perspective. Some of them cover like intuition and spirituality, some cover sexuality and desire, like the polarities. What I can see right now is sort of, oh, I don't really think a lot of people talk about the bridge between what we want, like our desires, and the daily life or the pressure of daily living. Like if you're in a course or you have a one-to-one coach, you have a therapist, you have a group, I think you can sort of massage out desire a little bit better than other places. Why is that? You're sort of it's sort of contained. You talk to these people daily about your desires, what you want, you're constantly sort of up-leveling. It's in the environment. But when you're not there and you're scrolling, or you're just chatty, chatty with the neighbor, just daily life conversation, it's sort of trust yourself or follow your desire. But are we really talking about what it sounds like or feels like when you feel desire, but you have fear at the same time? So you don't do anything? Or you want something, but you also want safety, and that safety is not letting you go. Similar to what I just said. Brenda and I definitely talk about this, but is it in a book? I don't really know. Like, has somebody written about it? When people say, follow your desire, are we talking about what happens when your body shuts down? Like your nervous system just can't. And you want to override it. Like you hear the compliment and you're like, oh, thanks. And you want to just zoom by. Or when you're super anxious and you think, oh, this must be go time. I have a lot of energy in my body. This means I need to go get something. And it's just anxiousness, like it's just anxiety. Maybe you're just not regulated. Maybe it's not inspiration to act. Maybe it means something needs to be addressed. Brenda and I definitely talk about desire and consequence, like what it actually means to go for what you want. We talk about desire from the digestion location. Like, is it digested, not digested? People aren't, we're not often talking about like what didn't happen when we didn't get our desires met, but we've talked about it on the podcast. We've talked about like what it feels like when desires are rejected. When you tell someone you want something and they're like, nope, that is a no for you. We talk about how when we're not getting our needs met, right? It influences our desires, what we want. We talk about receiving. Like a lot of us talk about out in the world, they're constantly talking about get what you want, get what you want. And we talk about like what happens when it's time to hold it. Like, what is holding it actually look like? We talk about desire and relationships. It's really easy to romanticize desire and relationship. But I think it's harder to look at desire when you're talking like long-term relationship. Desire versus projection or expectation. And what it looks like to want something and have it not destabilize your relationship. Like, I want this, but he or he or she doesn't want to give it to me. That's it, I'm out. I'm out of here. What is it like to build towards that desire that you want? Like, how does desire actually work in lived experience? What is a real mechanism of it? Brenda and I have done um like the self-love series, which was really like the best. We've done embodiment series, we've done series, different series along the way, and this is our next series. We are bringing you in on the ride. We have a list of guests lined up. They don't know yet, but they will be knowing, and we will be inviting them to talk about these things. Like things like when do you feel the most connected to your desire? And I can go into all the questions that we're gonna ask, but we wanted to turn to you and ask you, what would you want to know if you were the person interviewing the guest, if you were the person looking for the book, like what questions do you actually have around desire? I know what Brenda and I want to talk about. I want to talk about like, is there anything that you've been chasing since you were a little kid? Like things like that. What comes up for you, Brenda, when you think about desire?

SPEAKER_00 7:12

I love to hear people's stories around desire. There's so much learning in stories. And I am so excited to have this list of guests come on to share their desire stories, which is ultimately what they're doing. They're sharing what they learned. I want to know what people learned about desire. Like, where did you go for your desire? And maybe it felt out of reach. And and inside of that gap, like, how how did you do that? Like, how do you get from something that's just a desire, something that you want when it feels kind of impossible? Now I can answer that for myself. I feel like we talk about that all the time. Like we literally talk about that all the time. I could write a book on it. And I want to hear people talk about it more. I want to have guests on to talk about how do they go for that thing that's really feels unreachable. And then if you got it, then what? And if you didn't, then what? What what are the lessons that you learned? What did you learn about yourself? What did you learn about yourself? And what did you learn about desire? That's really cool. There's so much in there to learn, and I'm really excited about it.

SPEAKER_01 8:40

How do we feel about our guests giving us questions?

SPEAKER_00 8:44

Giving you mean our listeners or our guests? Well, our guests might be listeners. I feel great about it. I love questions. I'm a I'm a manifesting generator in human design, so I'm a responder. So I love questions. I have something to respond to, and it gets really juicy. We've had so many great guests on already, and I'm really looking forward to the next lineup. And I'm also really excited to hear from our listeners what do they want to know about desire from other people? And you could say, well, I don't know who the people are, so I don't know what questions to ask. Yes, maybe that a little bit, okay, but we're not telling you, number one. And you're just gonna have to receive, be open to what we offer you. This is a great opportunity for you to ask yourself, where do you get tripped up with desire? And that actually tells you what you want to know from other people.

Your Questions As A Desire Panel

SPEAKER_01 9:42

Yeah, I would add, yes, I think people can tell us what they still want to know about desire. I think that's a great marker, like for the podcast for us to see what really hasn't been answered yet. Like so we can be with that and we'll know the guest enough to know, oh, this question is great for that person. Look at it. I just had a vision. Like if you're listening to this and you're saying, Oh, I would love to know this about desire, think of it as Brenda and I are creating the panelists and you're asking the panelists the question. And we, you ask the panel, and then we'll say, Oh, uh, panelist number seven, can you please answer this one? I think that's a great way to visualize it. It's your contribution to the podcast. If you're enjoying it, we want to be able to get the questions answered that you're looking to get answered. And maybe we are the best to answer it. If that's the case, we'll do an episode. Maybe we'll ask a panelist, maybe we'll do both. But I think this is a great way for us to leverage both the guests and listeners and ourselves, and we can really create something I think really juicy, fruitful, and giving. And currently it's a public podcast. So we get to have it and create it however we want. And it's public.

SPEAKER_00 11:05

Yes, it is. And this is so fun to talk about. It's so fun to bring our listeners along for the ride because we're really just demonstrating desire in real time, right? Like nothing's happened yet. We don't, we don't have things on the calendar yet with people. We have our list, we know we want to ask, we'll probably add to that. But our listeners get to feel us in our desire right now. Like right now, we're not in action. We're in the sitting in the desire, we're in the visioning. Just like Walt Disney, he had a dis he had a vision room where the only thing his employees could do was vision what was possible. So, what is possible? What do you want to know? And in the vision room, according to Walt Disney, there was no such thing as reality, no problems. There was another room for that where you would say, well, this wouldn't work because of that. And if we did this, we have to do that. But this is the vision room that we're in right now, the desire room. So we really want to ask you without any limitations, what do you want to know? It's a great way to get your questions answered and be anonymous.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

Right. I'm so curious to know what people want to know. And if the questions are super juicy, like maybe we'll tip our tip. We will pick like top five. And maybe every guest gets to answer the question. I don't know. I know I have a desire. I think Brenda and I have done a great job at delivering the podcast. We've been super consistent. We have not missed a week yet. There has been a time that on some weeks we've delivered two podcasts that week. I feel super committed to the podcast. And I've been feeling into what would I love to do next? And I would love to do a desire series. There have been other series that I wanted to do, but this feels like what's up next. We've been talking about desire for over two years. We're a hundred plus episodes. My goodness, we're like halfway of year three. We are in season three plus, like almost at season four. What? What? What? And I would love to really tackle this now, especially since I had the experience with the self-love series and the embodiment series where I felt so much more freedom and just such a deeper bone understanding of it.

SPEAKER_00 13:37

Yeah. We also did a sisterhood series.

SPEAKER_01 13:40

Oh my goodness, sisterhood. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:42

Yeah. That was really great too. It was. It's a great way to go deep on a topic, and we're really excited about that. We're really excited to go deep into desire, which is kind of funny. It's kind of funny because that's literally all.

SPEAKER_01 13:59

I'm so excited to leverage our guests around desire. I'm so excited to see just what the co-op, what the community has to say on the subject. And when I think of like Desire Map, uh Daniela Port, right? She wrote a book on desire. And there are other books, but what is missing from all of that? And can we leverage our community and bring it into the conversation? Maybe, maybe not.

Desire That Lifts Everyone

SPEAKER_00 14:32

Maybe there's also nothing like hearing the stories, hearing the teachings on a podcast. Like there's a time and a place for a book. I love books. And there's a time and a place for a podcast. And it's really juicy for us to be sitting here talking about desire every week, and then to have the guests on and talk about that. And I have to also say something that I got really excited about when you were talking before. I had a desire pop up.

unknown 15:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:02

Wow. Yes. So, oh, my feet just got hot. When you were talking before, and you were giving the example about the panel and who do you want to ask this question to? I had got this desire to have a panel, a desire panel. Now, we don't have to do anything with this desire. This is just us demonstrating desire in real time, people. I'm expressing this desire that dropped into my body. I could see it like a panel, and it would be recorded and it would be an episode. Is that exciting?

SPEAKER_01 15:37

It is exciting. It actually had me remember one of the reasons why I even went down the path of desire. One of my desires, big desires, was to leave people better than I found them. One of our mentors said that, and I was like, I am in. Many, many decades ago, when I was in my teens, I saw a lot of unhappy people, a lot of unhappy, obligation-filled, martyred, etc. And I just didn't know that life could feel this good. And I just want to share this.

Fear And Letting Go Of Control

SPEAKER_00 16:34

That's really beautiful. The other teaching that I love that is in line with what you just said is that when a woman has her desire, everyone around her has more. And this is a perfect example of that. It really is. Because we have this desire, we're putting it into action, and we all want to learn more. I vision a world where women are more attuned to their desires, where women are going after their desire and supporting each other in it and bringing the people around them on the ride, bringing their partners on, teaching their kids about desire and how to be attuned to your desire. When to sit with it, when to act, when to receive, when to pause, when to put it down, all the things, all the things. Really excited about that. We hope that your wheels are spinning. I just had fear pop up. Oh my goodness, what is it?

SPEAKER_01 17:39

You know, you and I are so good at recording. And if something goes badly, like we toss it, we've never had to actually toss a podcast with a guest.

SPEAKER_00 17:48

No, we didn't. We haven't done that.

SPEAKER_01 17:50

And right now it's like, oh, what happens if we have a podcast with a guest? I mean, and I'm saying I'm sharing this because that's what happens when your desire, when you're sharing your desires, like all the fears start to pop up. And I could easily be like, well, I don't want to toss podcasts with a guest. Now I have to make sure that all the guests that are on, I love them, or I have to make sure that all the guests that are on speak exactly. And I am like, no, no, that would be too controlling. I have to leave space for God in miracles. Like, I just don't know, right? You can't control all the pieces and parts. I cannot make it foolproof. Failure is eminent.

Email Us Your Questions And Desires

SPEAKER_00 18:35

It's not even any fun to control all the pieces. Leaving space for God in miracles. Yeah. Magic, money, and miracles. I'm down for it. I am down for it. And listeners, we hope you're down for it. We hope that as we're talking right now, this kind of feels like a radio show. I love it. We hope that your wheels are spinning. And please, please, please email us.

SPEAKER_01 18:59

Please text us. Yes. And if you are not on our email list, like get on the list so that you can hear for both of us. You can hear about the weekly episodes. And that would be a great place to just hit reply and let us know what you're thinking, what you want to know more about. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:13

We really want to know. And don't judge your questions. Don't say, uh, that's not a good one. It's not important. It really is true that if you're thinking something or you want to know something, somebody else wants it to know it too. It's in the field. So send us your questions. We're so excited. And your desires. What do you think about my panel idea? Listeners. That's a good one for listeners to answer.

SPEAKER_01 19:46

Send us your questions first. Then you can tell us about your panel guests. You know what? We they can send us the questions. We're going to curate questions. We're going to curate the things that people want to know. And then we'll have the people on as guests. And then the listeners can help us pick the panelists. Oh, that's so fun. So fun. Thank you so much, everyone, for joining us today. We were so excited to share this next, I don't know, layer season of the show with you. Let you know what's been brewing over here and share this desire in real time. And nothing's been created yet, so we'll see. Thank you so much for joining us. Bye for now.

SPEAKER_00 20:31

Thank you for joining us on the Desire is Medicine podcast.

SPEAKER_01 20:34

Desire invites us to be honest, loving, and deeply intimate with ourselves and others. You can find our handles in the show notes. We'd love to hear from you.