Plant Medicine for Grief and Healing with Teresa Yung

In this conversation, Teresa Yung shares her profound journey through grief and healing, exploring the impact of death on her life and work. As an activist and therapist in training, she discusses her experiences with plant medicine, the awakening process, and her role as a life doula. Teresa emphasizes the importance of self-discovery and the challenges faced in the healing journey, ultimately leading to a deeper understanding of life, death, and the infinite nature of the soul. In this conversation, Teresa Yung shares her insights on finding support during overwhelming times, the importance of community, and the healing power of plant medicine. She discusses the fear of death and the regrets that often accompany it, emphasizing the need to live life fully and authentically. The dialogue highlights the significance of vulnerability, asking for help, and being present in the moment.

Teresa's website - https://www.beautifulwisdom.us/

"Your task is not to seek for love but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it."

Chapters

• 0:00 Introduction to Teresa's Journey
• 2:55 The Impact of Death on Life
• 6:01 Awakening Through Grief
• 11:56 Current Work and Life as a Doula
• 17:57 Challenges in Healing and Self-Discovery
• 23:58 Understanding Death and the Infinite Soul
• 32:37 The Fear of Death and Regret
• 41:34 Living Life Fully and Authentically

Transcript

I can't tell you how many, you know, ceremonies that I have sat working with Ayahuasca to continually be brought back.Annalouiza (00:02.976)
Teresa is an activist for life, healing, and consciousness. She partners with master plant teachers and other plant teacher carriers to bring access to these deep teachings to those who seek them. She is also a therapist in training, currently pursuing her phd in psychology. She works with people 1-1 and in group settings, holding space for people to remember their true nature. Her teachers include Ayahuasca, Iboga, Wachuma, and Mushrooms. She uses presence, song and sound to guide people in their awakening journeys, remembering the wisdom of the heart, spirit., and the great mystery. 

Wakil (00:44.615)
We're so glad you're here. Teresa's work has centered around trauma, learning from different modalities and applying that to the 10 years of work she's done in the plant medicine space. Her own healing journey through grief and childhood sexual trauma led her to seek advanced healing modalities like yoga, meditation, and plant medicines. And they've changed her life. She believes that the time for the species to awaken is now and dedicates her life to that path. Oh so good. Welcome. Welcome, Teresa. We're glad you're here.

Annalouiza (01:18.762)
Welcome.

Wakil (01:23.003)
We like to just get started with the question about when you first became aware of death.

Teresa Yung (01:30.882)
Let's see. Death first came knocking at my door. I think I must've been 22. I was spending a couple months in Nepal and had a bit of a freak experience accident with someone drowning in the lake in Pokhara. And so that was really, really abrupt.

But I think that was the kind of the first knock of its awareness, but my deep, deep experience in relationship really started with it, I think when I was about 27. And the person that I was dating, who I had met at Burning Man, and he was on his way to come visit me in New York for a weekend that we had planned together, and he never made it there. 

He got in a motorcycle accident the day that he was supposed to arrive. And that was it. And that sent me clear right off onto the journey of a lifetime. It continues to be a journey of a lifetime. And it might have been the worst day of my life to the start of the best life I could live, actually.

So I have a lot of gratitude and thanks now after making such a deep journey with grief to understand.

Wakil (03:04.999)
Yeah, it's interesting how those kind of shocks can really be the beginning of a whole new way of being in the world.

Annalouiza (03:13.216)
Yeah, the awakening, right?

Teresa Yung (03:15.552)
Yeah. Yeah.

Wakil
It sounds like that's been true. yeah, no time left to mess around.

Teresa Yung
Hahaha!

Annalouiza (03:22.518)
So Theresa, how does death impact the story of who you are today?

Teresa Yung (03:30.998)
Yeah, wow. Well, you know, it's... It really is present in everything. It's present in my, how I speak. It's present in my actions. It's present in my work. It's present in my cosmology. It's present in my whole framework of now living. mean, before it happened, I really used to think that when you die, you die.

And I'm sure there are many people who still, who do believe that and who's to say, but deeply now for me, it sent me on a journey of trying to understand because at that moment I could not and would not believe that he was just gone. And that propelled me into reading everything I could find about, I started reading about near death experiences.

That helped to then bridge me into all these stories of what happens, what have people experienced when they have died, and opening up to so many of people's shared stories that they crossed over into another place, 

Annalouiza (04:52.224)
Mm-hmm.

Teresa Yung (05:04.34)
And they were reunited with their soul families, and they were experiencing the most blissful of love and understanding that this is where they came from. And then had a choice actually to come back with this understanding. And that just brought me to everything, mediums, healers, you know, I couldn't go back to the life that I was living in San Francisco, the work that I was doing at a startup. 

And, you know, I did the now typical thing, which is quit my job, do my yoga teacher training, which was mind blowing. I couldn't believe people have been sitting in. the trees trying to understand the cosmos since the beginning of time. And I left and I went to Bali and sought out as many different wisdom traditions like meditation and yoga, and plant medicines. And it just kept going from there. So truly everything that you see that I am now is built upon this foundation of this thing happening in my life.

Annalouiza (06:01.248)
Mm-hmm.

Wakil (06:02.167)
Uh-huh, yeah. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense, I think.

Teresa Yung (06:03.628)
Hahaha.

Annalouiza (06:04.02)
Yeah. It does. It's, it's as though you ran into a, a brick wall that you didn't understand was not even a brick, right? Like, it's just like you're stopped and it's like, what is this? And then, you know, you explore into that space. That's so, I mean, yeah, I'm so grateful for you for that. That happened actually.

Wakil (06:30.363)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (06:30.87)
Yeah. Yeah.

Wakil (06:34.776)
It seems like we hear this, and we had somebody on just a while back talking about her near-death experience, and exactly what, she had one long time ago before it was really well understood, and she couldn't tell anybody about it because she assumed that people would think she was crazy, or hearing voices, right? But she had that exact experience of being, basically saying, are you ready to go?

And there's this deep, deep feeling of complete love and acceptance. And then I love that. Do you remember this, Annalo uisa, where she said, again, she hears a voice and it says, really, are you ready to go? Because we don't have a lot of time here. Yeah. So she popped up. Yeah. Exactly.

Annalouiza (07:16.086)
She was on the river, right? She was like, what's happening? Yeah. But, know, again, that shifted her. Remember? I mean, it just completely changed her life. And just like Teresa, you know, it's like, it is that moment when, and I think a lot of folks who have been on our podcast with us and the conversations that Wakil have had over the years is like, yeah, that moment when you're so aware of the finite-ness of life and the richness of the learning that we have available in this moment, like why not wake up and actually engage, right?

Teresa Yung (07:54.048)
Yeah. And you know, it's interesting because I'll say it didn't happen just like that. I mean I think I went kicking and screaming, you know, in the moment that that news came through, which you just never expected to be that. You for me, I was ready to get on a plane. I had found a photo of the accident because once he hadn't showed up in New York, I started Googling, motorcycle accidents on 95. 

And I actually found a photo that someone had posted randomly on, I think, a random traffic website. And the headline was horrible. But somehow I traced it down, the username, the handle, and I also saw that the photo was a video reel, actually. And so I found that and it was... 

Yeah, took place over several hours across the day. you know, it was, was obviously very hard to see the markings of, the motorcycle that I knew so well, because we had spent a couple days motorcycling through Yosemite. Whole adventure, our whole relationship was something very mysterious. There was, it started, we went to Temple Burn together, which was hard because at the end we said, whatever happens with us, you let's promise that we'll be at Temple Bird together next year. And little did I know I would be at Temple Bird next year, but I would be mourning him. 

And we got, helicoptered off of Half Dome because these forest fires had broken out around us as we were hiking. And so that was crazy. The fires, the smoke. And, funnily enough, when I eventually went to a medium, to try and talk with him. One of the ways that she was getting images was of smoke. She was saying, does someone smoke? I was like, no, no one smokes. And then I realized, it's because our whole relationship has been surrounded by this transformative fiery energy. 

Wakil (09:49.479)
Mm-hmm

Annalouiza (09:54.464)
fire.

Wakil (10:06.491)
Mmm.

Annalouiza (10:06.528)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (10:08.854)
But when the call came in and the news landed, I actually, didn't have the verbiage for it at the time, but I left my body. I could feel, you know, at that point, I didn't understand, but I was above my body. I was not connected anymore and I could hear myself. I could hear myself crying and I just thought to myself down there, yes, you know, just, just cry. 

But it took many, many years. It felt like someone had taken me, you know, plucked me out of my body and put me on this other path. And I was no longer connected to the first 27 years of my life. 

Wakil (10:35.184)
Mm.

Teresa Yung (10:39.094)
And as I started down on this next parallel path, it took me a lot of years to slowly come back to myself. was like, you know, my heart was quite literally felt shattered into millions of pieces and I had to go through and I had to pick up each part and examine it and because I had so little, little like life energy left in me, I couldn't choose to carry out at all. 

So I had to choose which ones and, and it wasn't, it really took me a lot of years to, little by little have these realizations and deep life lessons of, and why do we choose life? You know, why? And to come actually to this word that I really love, I really love these Japanese words that carry deep meanings, eugen, E-U-G-E-N, that is something around the ineffable quality of the awe.

Wakil (11:19.685)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (11:38.228)
... of life, you we go into this awe and you just become speechless. There's no words for that great mystery that is all around us. But it took me a lot of meditation, 10 Vipassana, 10 day retreats. I can't tell you how many ceremonies I have sat with Ayuasca.

Wakil (11:39.559)
Hmm.

Annalouiza (12:07.488)
Mm-hmm.

Teresa Yung (12:07.682)
To the ineffable, to this deep sense of the silence. And in that understand, this is why we choose to live life, even though there can be so much suffering and so much death and so much grief.

Annalouiza (12:23.101)
Mm-hmm.

Wakil (12:23.759)
Yeah, yeah, really beautifully put. Thank you. Yeah, that sense that there's work, that there's something we're here to do, you know, that that's why we keep coming back and yeah. Well, that's a good segue into tell us more about what your current work is and role in life and how that maybe reflects this journey you've been on.
 
Teresa Yung (12:49.568)
Yeah, wow. I never would have thought I would have landed here. If you would have told my 20-some-year-old self that was working at a tech startup and just moved from Maryland, 

Wakil (13:01.211)
Ha ha ha.

Teresa Yung (13:18.848)
Working in the government, I would have thought you're crazy. Yeah, I work at this beautiful intersection, really of, you know, I see it as In some sense, wanting to shepherd like love and life and light, you know, that's what I think therapists do. That's what people who work with plant medicines do. It really is like taking a role of wanting to create some sort of container for some sort of process. 

And that process is really being a mirror and being a mirror by asking really good questions for people to see. And for me, it feels like I'm playing chess all the time. It's like, there, there's some, one of the gifts for me is being able to really track deeply, what's happening inside someone. And there's such a multiplicity, that's happening. I mean not just 20 parts, but so many parts...

Annalouiza (13:55.761)
Mm-hmm.

Teresa Yung (14:17.928)
... and the relationships to parts and those parts have beliefs and stories and experiences and then not to mention, you know, our ancestors. And this, you know, I'm not yet, I'm not a licensed therapist, but essentially what I do is therapy in one walk of my life. 

And then another walk, it's, as a sharer of different plant medicines. And I share that in different ways. I either work and organize with my teachers, with other plant medicine stewards, or I facilitate spaces myself, either one-on-one or in groups. that, you know, therapy, facilitation, ceremonial work, all of that for me wraps up into someone who is, it's also almost like life duolaiing, know, how to hold someone to you know, either do the healing or the integration or the releasing or coming to terms with the true vitality that is within them, their true essence. Some people could call that spirit, some people could call that soul, some people could just call that their life force. 

But I really see, you know, in this work of healing, it's not about taking care of illness which is what so much unfortunately of our current systems and modalities do. We see it as taking care of illness. For me, it's seeing life. It's seeing the divine. It's seeing love. And when we see that in each other, it also becomes aware of it in itself and sometimes in places that have forgotten that.

Annalouiza (16:13.13)
Mm-hmm.

Wakil (16:30.023)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (16:30.218)
And so really it's helping people to remember and to come back into their own truth and their own life and choosing that.

Wakil (16:40.688)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Teresa Yung (16:41.814)
probably pretty ambiguous.

Annalouiza (16:42.065)
One now.

Wakil (16:44.433)
Hahaha

Annalouiza (16:45.002)
It's not ambiguous, it's not, it's not, you know, it's, interesting because we're just chatting yesterday about the meaning of doula and you know, there's this component of caregiving caretaking somebody, whether it be after they've given birth or as they're transitioning into death. And you just said that you are a life doula. 

Wakil (17:06.533)
Love that.

Annalouiza (17:13.77)
And I really appreciate that because, I think that there's so many of us who have needed people who can reflect back the possibility of life in its completeness or 
possibilities. And you know, so many of us have forgotten for a time what that is. And so you show up to shepherd love life and light is amazing. 

So in that beautiful tagline that you got, what are the challenges that you are met with when people are saying they want to do the work, but maybe they're clinging to an aspect that's, you know, maybe, or I don't know. What's the challenge in your work?

Teresa Yung (17:57.102)
Interesting. Yeah, that's a really good question. I mean, I feel like I could go on all of the typical ways of like the society that we live in and our values are messed up and my gosh, look at these companies and technology, but you know, yes, there are aspects of our culture and systems and institutions that, can make it hard and feel very backwards. 

Wakil (18:34.352)
Mm-hmm.

Annalouiza (18:37.504)
Yes.

Teresa Yung (18:41.09)
And you know I would say that what I see, the biggest challenge is ourselves.

What I have come to find in all the people that I've worked with and witnessed is underneath all of the other parts, and the hurts and the pains and the experiences and the trauma is usually there is a part in ourselves that is doing the very thing that we believe other people are doing, but it is doing to ourselves. You know, it is holding the shame. It is holding the abuse. 

There is somehow, there's a part that has learned that it has to do that for some sort of healing or protective or protecting some sort of hurt mechanism. And it's not an easy thing. When people just say, out of your own way 

Wakil (19:34.139)
Haha.

Teresa Yung (19:39.766)
Or let it go or surrender, I really don't want to belittle at all. Sometimes those are the hardest. And I was actually just working with someone and something I saw was, know, loving, allowing love, allowing someone to love you, allowing yourself to love yourself can be the most terrifying thing, really quite abjectly terrifying. 

And so this work is not light work. It's not hard work. And choosing life is by way of trillions of deaths. There are trillions of deaths. And perhaps the biggest one that people have heard of is this ego death. And what is that really? And I don't believe we're here to kill our egos off with the head. 

Wakil (20:28.135)
Ha ha

Teresa Yung (20:34.206)
However, we are here to come into right relationship with the ego. And sometimes coming into right relationship with the ego is perhaps for it to, for you to be willing to let it die. And I think it's, and I've experienced that in bits and pieces here and there, but it was really not about its death. It was about me saying yes and laying it down and saying, okay, you know. I release this, whatever this is, show me. I am willing for that to go. And I saw the hand ungrasping of the stories and the identity and the me, the my, and when that goes, something else comes. And then you have a different relationship, but we still have, we have to be here in our identity.

It's also fun to tell stories. Who am I now? What am I today? But so I think the thing that we come into is ourselves, which is why people are quite terrified to do a meditation retreat. They're terrified to sit with some of these medicines that their work is to look deeply inside the self. And also that is where liberation does come.

Annalouiza (22:05.406)
Yeah, and just to tie this back to our death-centric podcast, you know, it's very similar, right? Like being afraid to contend with the end of the physical life is terrifying for so many people because it becomes then it's an arduous task to look internally and say, is this really who I want to be in this moment and continue this way till the end of this era, right? 

Wakil (22:40.666)
Mm-hmm.

Annalouiza (22:56.918)
And it's scary and it's maddening for some, right? So I think that this work feels very much like the spiral, right? It's all connected. We're doing small deaths in our breath. We're doing small deaths in our body. We're doing small deaths as an identity. We're doing small deaths in our, 

Teresa Yung (23:05.226)
Orgasm. So they say.

Wakil (23:06.663)
Yeah.

Annalouiza
You know, containment. Yeah, exactly. All of these. And at the end of the day, it's like there's, there's another small death when we just die, right? So, I think it is really beautifully connected to the, you know, we're in service to living, having conversations about death is in service to life.

Wakil (23:26.895)
Yeah, and finding and I love that Teresa, the idea that finding a way to be in acceptance of all of those little parts of yourself that you're letting go. And like you said, laying it down, being able to lay it down, open your hands and say, I'm willing to let this go. Let's see what comes next. That's the kind of radical acceptance place to be in, which also comes up a lot when we're talking about end of life, you can we be in a radical space of radical acceptance that this is what's going on?

Teresa Yung (23:58.997)
Yeah, you know, I think a tricky question, of course, is the biggest question of life, which is what happens when we die. And I think people are really afraid. Some cultures can be afraid to talk about it, not all cultures, actually. And there is something for, you know, Western cultures, I think, to look at, though, you know, in the US, we are such a melting pot. So it's hard to even say that.

But you know, I believe our soul is infinite and that we continue to have many iterations all at the same time, all at once, before and after that our ancestors continued to live on in us. And we see this in the study of epigenetics, you know, 

Wakil (24:49.563)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (25:00.192)
And quite literally we were present in our mom's belly and her eggs were present when she was born in her mother. so we were quite literally a part of our grandmother. And so I think, you know, asking ourselves to come into new relationship with, or at least to just evaluate our beliefs around death is a really big first step. And I have a lot to thank for these plant medicines because, know, some really brings you out of just having a very like human centric experience of life.

Wakil (25:22.535)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (25:29.066)
And that in and of itself is really helpful in this inquiry.

Wakil (25:33.903)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. So with the challenges you've talked about and life in general, what kind of things do help you feel supported? What kind of things, practices or whatever, that help you carry on through life, know, carry on when it's overwhelming?

Teresa Yung (25:53.334)
Yeah, which life is for sure. It would be, I mean, one, again, I feel like I'm just a broken record when it comes to this. My friends know me for this, but these master plant teachers are, they are truly here at a time to help us deeply. And it is, you know, one of my reasons of being on earth is to help to create more access to those who that calls to them. 

But it's not, there's a whole thing of just all the teachings that they bring that are out of this world. mean, the ancient wisdom that these plants carry is we are students for life. I'm in honor and everance and in service to them for life. But these practices that have existed for thousands and thousands of years, well beyond Western medicine as we see it, I mean, these are the traditional ancient medicines that have been proven for so long. Within them, they hold the things that are keys to happiness in life and support and wellness. I mean, even just the basic things that you'll see, which is community, gathering in community, praying in community, healing in community, laughing in community, dancing and singing. I mean, just those five, I think, are pillars to support and to health. How often are people doing that these days? You know, there's a lot of other movements that have spun up to try and capture one or the other.

These practices that I sit in, it's all of it. It's grieving, it's living, it's sobbing, it's transformation, it's helping, it's healing. I always say that when I watch people come up to the altar to receive the medicine, I'm witnessing the peak of humanity 

Wakil (28:05.894)
Mm.

Teresa Yung (28:14.75)
Because it's everything. It's courage, it's vulnerability, it's strength, it's sadness, it's the unknown, it's surrender.

It is so beautiful to witness. then together, everyone is called to help. Someone's having a hard time. People are just up and helping. That doesn't happen. I don't see that happening out on the streets. It's rare these days for neighbors to bring around cookies anymore. 

Wakil (28:38.319)
Yeah. Ha ha ha

Teresa Yung (28:43.828)
For support, it's the reason I go back to this is also for my own support, you know, to be able to receive these practices, but also to be supported by my friends, by my community. They will laugh because even after all these years of my work in this, I, for the first time, asked for help. 

Wakil (29:13.415)
hmm

Teresa Yung (29:13.506)
We often tell people there are five words, you know, to use, bucket, blanket, tissue, water, and help. and that it's so important to be able to let someone know. And I have struggled with it for the longest time. I didn't feel I've received the support that I needed to in childhood. And so I learned to maybe suppress vocalizing because it was too painful to not have it, 

Annalouiza (29:31.267)
need

Teresa Yung (29:43.17)
Yes. And for the first time I said help and the whole room laughed because they knew how much I struggle with it. And they came. And that has opened up a whole level of healing and healthy interdependence with one another because we're not here to do it alone. 

Wakil (29:54.747)
Mm-hmm.

Teresa Yung (30:12.716)
So that in and of itself, the ability to say help, like your question, and ask for a blanket, ask for a tissue, ask for financial support, ask for... people to come and help by doing their own work, know, having your own boundaries. You know, all of these just come in the form of understanding what it is that you need. And our ability to help to know what we need is hard. And then our ability to vocalize it is hard. And our ability to express it and open up yourself to vulnerability is hard. But these three things on the occasion, I've spent a lot of time trying to figure out and we'll continue practicing for life.

Wakil (30:42.503)
Yes. Yeah.

Annalouiza (30:44.318)
Yeah, we all will. But again, you know, you're so on point for me. I have my next question, but I'm going to come up with a follow up, you know, because it seems like asking for help being vulnerable to expressing your need. Like socially, emotionally, physically, it's such an American paradigm, right? You don't do that.

You do not ever ask for help, which is why we're kind of in a situation here where people need to be almost. I mean, I need to be. Find my way into supportive community so that I can do my work because it's scary if I have to go somewhere where I'll have to ask for something and be looked at like, how could you possibly need anything? You know, how could you possibly want to talk about death? How could you possibly want to talk about life is not just the grind, right? So, I love that asking for help. I mean, again, because we're a death podcast, it's like ask for help in having a conversation. If your family's not the right one to talk to, there are people out in the world, you you're going to be out in the world helping support as a psychologist. Like you can hold space for folks who have questions and concerns around any number of small deaths. Right. And it's okay to ask for help. I struggle with that. It's, you know, again, you know, childhood trauma brings you to this place where

Teresa Yung (32:05.154)
Yeah.

Annalouiza (32:07.818)
you shouldn't be asking for help because it either is looked down upon or is never actually given freely. And so, you know, that builds you up for a life of just, you know, kind of just clenching your, your fists and just going for it alone. And again, plants don't do that. They live, you know, they connect, 

Wakil (32:26.701)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung (32:37.066)
Yeah.

Annalouiza (32:37.33)
You know, we shouldn't be doing that. It's so anyhow, I, I appreciate that as you're,
has that. okay, so and do you have any fears about the end of your physical life?

Teresa Yung (32:47.432)
Ooh, what a great question. my gosh. Let me try and really tune into what the real response would be the thing that's coming to mind right now, which thank you. Alastair is, the partner's name, passed away on the motorcycle. He had this very annoying quote, that he had on his website.

Wakil (33:17.445)
Ha.

Annalouiza (33:20.438)
Ha ha

Teresa Yung (33:29.706)
And, you know, it became even more annoying after he died. but this quote was Death is temporary. Regret is forever.

Wakil (33:31.601)
Hmm.

Teresa Yung (33:32.894)
And God, that was so annoying, especially when you're grieving. I'm like, what are you talking about? Death is for sure permanent. You are gone. That pisses me off. And in so many years of thinking so much about his death and every year I revisit our messages, and it's both like a masochist practice, but you know I try and...

Wakil (33:35.708)
Hahaha

Annalouiza (34:03.102)
It's all about bearing witness though. You're bearing witness to who he was and who you were at that moment too.

Wakil (34:08.209)
Yeah, yeah.

Teresa Yung (34:08.318)
Yes, my gosh, thank you so much for saying that, I think because some people wouldn't understand it that way and that's exactly what it is. I always, I try and look and I try and learn what's something new that I've missed. And this year on the 10th, it's actually was the 10th year anniversary on October 15th of this year. 

Yeah, and you know, it's really quite crazy how even though it's been 10 years, it can feel so it's so still there. I've done so much healing and yet it's so deep in my heart. But this just, that lesson was romance and love. He was very romantic. He really was like a servant to love. And I hope it's okay that I am going to share this, but he really fondly spoke about how he learned this from his parents and how they were a model for him.

Annalouiza (34:51.126)
Mmm.

Teresa Yung (35:03.586)
And how to really show up for love. And he always said that flowers were never for special occasions. They were just because flowers, you know, that you just give them just because. He did send me flowers with a card that said just because, no name signature, and I knew it him. So he had that quote, you know, death is temporary, regret is forever.

And I think that is it. I don't think people are afraid of death because I think on some deep level, we know that we are returning to something absolutely greater than we could even understand, know, eugen. Like I feel like we do, we feel it inside of us. But what we are afraid of is the regret of the things that we will no longer get to do in this life.

Wakil (35:59.153)
Yeah, yeah.

Teresa Yung (36:00.354)
And those aren't just the big things. They're actually not the big things. It's not did I run this company and did I make this money. It's did I really be with the smell of the trees? 

Wakil (36:17.755)
Mm.

Teresa Yung (36:28.818)
Did I really take in the dappling of light through the leaves? Did I really feel the mist of the waves? Did I really be with each other in love and deep presence. Did I really laugh? I really learn all the things that this unique planet has to teach us? It's so unique. And when we are no longer here, that will be the regret, the fear that we didn't do those things. And so when you ask me that, I will 100 % miss those things. The smell of the autumn leaves. I love it so much. This is why my hair is this color because I love the fall leaves so much. 

Annalouiza (37:06.666)
I love it. I love all, I love the sounds every single year. like, Yeah.

Wakil (37:07.055)
Yeah.

Teresa Yung
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

Wakil (37:13.147)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, all those things beautifully said.

Teresa Yung (37:24.074)
So I, but I'm at a point in my life where I'm really proud. I'm really, really proud and I am so lucky to have had these experiences and I'll be living my service in Dharma. And so I'm so proud. I've done the healing. think I've done, you know, tended to the karma that I needed to tend to. And now it's about, you know, being in as much service as I can. 

And I truly, I do feel like I live life to this point where I try and be very, very present. And my teachers keep coming back to this lesson of it's now, it's about being present. And what are you going to do with God consciousness when you still have to wash the dishes? Will you be with the dishes? So yeah.

Annalouiza (38:05.677)
God, yeah.

Wakil (38:01.787)
Right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So true, so true, so well said. Yeah. Yeah.
 
Teresa Yung (38:15.158)
What about you all? I guess just, you know, share that question back to you if I know that's untraditional, but I'd be curious to know.

Wakil (38:21.127)
Well, it's true. I think that we've heard this from others and I think we all always agree that we want to make sure that, I mean, the thing that frightens us is that we will not have told people we love them, you know, that we will not complete that circle of love and care and service that we know is what we're here for. Or that, you know, that, I mean, some people worry about being in pain or whatever, but
I think that's when it comes up most, is that sense of just not having accomplished that or not having been present and done the work that you know is what you're here for. 

But that also makes it makes a difference whether you've done that work that you've talked about to really recognize that that is what we're here for. Some people might say, I would regret not becoming the CEO. So, but you know, it's the same, it's different for everybody. But that would be probably my answer as well. think, Annalouiza, what do you think?

Annalouiza (39:27.7)
Well, you know, I mean, since I met you, I've been like, I've been moaning that I want to go home. Like I'm always, I'm very death-forward in my life, much to my children's chagrin. Yeah. But here's the thing. I had, I've had multiple like death, near-death experiences, I think. And the last one that happened was when my children who are now 18 and 15, they were very young and I had this very lucid dream and in it, the divine just said, let's go. We're ready. Are you ready to come home now? Cause you've been asking. And I had this moment when I was like, yeah, wait, wait, wait. And, and I said, and I literally said like, there will be no one else to tell this story and I need to share this story. And are you sure? And I was like, and I thought about the kids. I'm like, they need to know the story and and then I just kind of had to wake up, right. And like, I'm like, what did I just do? Like I want to go home. 

So I am not afraid of my body ending this moment here on this plane. I do think about living my life to its fullest and it's been a lot more recently that I have these moments when I think, if I were dying tomorrow, would I wash these dishes?

Wakil (40:55.213)
Hahaha!

Annalouiza (40:56.014)
Because I've spent so much time like as a single mom like taking care of house stuff that I don't get to do much for me, but you know, I think it's all in service to the story. So I just want to make sure that the story gets told and then I can go home. That's all

Wakil (41:16.199)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, beautiful. But we are getting up to the end of the time. So I wanted to make sure we check in with you. Is there anything you wish we'd had asked you about? Or is there anything you'd like to share about how people could be in touch with you or anything like that?

Teresa Yung (41:34.152)
Yeah, thank you. Let's see. One thing that would be so great to be asked is, well, what do you want at your funeral? That's an interesting question. And I will say, okay, yeah, my funeral is what I would want now, you know?

Wakil (41:50.652)
There you go. Yeah. We ask everybody.

Teresa Yung (42:01.278)
I would ask, and I did ask a roommate of mine to throw me a funeral for my birthday one year, and it was very interesting and very fun. So that's a fun thing to ask for. 

But you know, to, to say the things, and this is so cliche, but say the things, do the things, let yourself get caught up in the small things, and also put it again in context with the big things. It's a pendulum swinging of that. And yeah, I would tell people, my favorite thing is to be in ceremony with people. It is like my favorite place on earth to be. I love to be in witness of such magic and miracle and transformation.

And the selfish part of it for myself is to then be able to witness someone's life go from here they were before and here they are after. And for the majority of it, it is that it is more laughter, it is more love, it is more life being lived. And that is a gift to myself to be able to be a part of it. So people can get in touch with me. I don't use it. I haven't updated it much, but I'll just share it. My website right now is beautifulwisdom.us.

And it kind of talks about working with trauma and how I can work with people in trauma. That's a way to get in touch. They can also find me on socials. I'm sometimes on Instagram. My handle is T with Reese, T-E-A with Reese, R-E-E-S-E, which is what some people call me. Otherwise, my wish for people is to be open-minded and know that what you wish to see for your life is quite possible. And we are very, very supported in this time. 

And if something calls to you, something different calls to you, take the step to, you don't necessarily have to know what you need help with, but you can ask the universe and you can ask others, help me to understand what I need help with. And the answers will come. Yeah.

Annalouiza (44:06.774)
Absolutely. Yes.

Wakil (44:08.593)
Yeah, yes, beautifully said. Thank you. Well, it's really appreciate you being here. And you did send us a quote. Would you like to read that? Or do you want one of us to as the final thing? Okay. 

Teresa Yung (44:19.116)
Sure, you can feel free.

Wakil
Annalouiza, do you want to read that?

Annalouiza (44:23.712)
Sure.

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. Why don't you read it again, Wakil?

Teresa Yung (44:36.578)
Mm-hmm.

Wakil (44:39.345)
Okay, and tell us quickly, Theresa, where that comes from.

Teresa Yung (44:43.298)
That comes from, and I haven't done this yet, I've read through some of it, but it comes from the Course in Miracles.

Wakil (44:50.149)
Yeah, okay, great. Okay, 
Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.

Teresa Yung (45:03.286)
And I guess I'll just add in to remember that that is actually what you are already.

Wakil (45:10.193)
Yeah, yeah. Beautifully, so beautiful.

Annalouiza (45:12.086)
Beautiful. Thank you so much, Theresa.

Teresa Yung (45:14.24)
Thank you. Thank you both of you so much for this time and conversation. My heart is feeling so full and connected and grateful.

Annalouiza (45:21.782)
Yay!

Wakil (45:22.725)
Yeah, well, I hope to see you meet you in person someday. That would be fun. And thank you for your work.