The Awakening: Returning to Yourself in a Loud World

What does it mean to return to yourself when life has gotten loud, heavy, and disconnected?

In this episode of Hold My Purse, Rho sits down with Susan Kacvinsky and Devon Cunningham, her partners in the upcoming The Awakening: Return to Self Retreat, for a powerful conversation about healing, truth, grief, sound healing, silence, and the journey back to yourself.

Together, they talk about what it looks like to sleepwalk through life shaped by survival mode, trauma, overgiving, and constant noise... and what it takes to wake up and come back home to who you really are.

This conversation explores:

• How old stories and conditioning can keep us disconnected
• Why healing happens in both the mind and the body
• How sound healing can support peace, release, and nervous system regulation
• Why silence and self-inquiry can reveal deeper truth
• How grief, sobriety, and awakening can become part of your transformation
• Why community matters when the world feels overwhelming

If you’ve been feeling emotionally tired, spiritually disconnected, or like you’ve lost touch with yourself, this episode is for you.

In this episode, you’ll hear about:

• Devon Cunningham’s journey through sobriety, grief, and sound healing
• Susan Kacvinsky’s insight on truth, silence, and living beyond your story
• Why choosing yourself is not selfish
• The Heart Behind The Awakening: Return to Self Retreat
• Details about the retreat happening on April 25 in Sherman Oaks

Join us for The Awakening: Return to Self Day Retreat: Saturday, April 25, 2026 in Sherman Oaks, CA. Seats are limited | Lunch is included | Tickets $155 including bank fees Learn more 

Connect with our guests:
 Susan Kacvinsky on her Substack
Devon Cunningham on her website Sacred Sounds by Devon
Instagram: Devon's Instagram

If this conversation resonates, make sure you subscribe, turn on notifications, and share this episode with someone who needs a reminder that returning to yourself is sacred work.

Email address: rho@hold-my-purse.com

Website: https://www.hold-my-purse.com/

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Transcript

Devon Cunningham (00:00)
I believe that once you really have that deep, deep, deep conversation within yourself and you surrender, you will be surprised how everything in the whole entire universe will show up and take you along your journey. You will actually start your yellow brick road, and you will be led to people, to places, and to things, with all your needs being met. It has to be an authentic surrender. You have to really mean it, and you have to really do it. You have to surrender.

Rho (00:35)
Hey, self-care warriors. Welcome back to Hold My Purse. I’m your host, Rho, and this show is all about unapologetically putting yourself first for peace of mind and to live your best life.

Now, if that’s the kind of conversation you’re into, go ahead and hit that subscribe button and turn your notifications on so you never miss an episode.

All right, so today, this is an especially important conversation for me. I’m sitting with Susan Kacvinsky and Devon Cunningham, my partners in the upcoming The Awakening: Return to Self day retreat, for a conversation about healing, the stories we carry, and what it really means to find your way back to yourself.

And before we get into it, here is a journal prompt that I want you to sit with as you listen:

Where in my life have I been disconnected from myself, and what would it look like to come back?

I’m offering this prompt because this conversation might help you notice where you’ve been needing more of your own care, truth, and attention.

All right, y’all, let’s get this party started.

So Susan and Devon, I am so happy to have you both here. We created The Awakening: Return to Self, a one-day retreat that’s designed to calm your nervous system, reconnect with your truth, and allow people to leave really feeling grounded and mentally clear.

And I really am excited to open up this conversation because I think the heart behind what we’re building is something that people are really, really craving right now.

And when we were ideating the name, we landed on The Awakening: Return to Self. There was a lot of intentionality and thought that we really put behind this name, and we really wanted something to be powerful.

When I think about returning to self, I think about coming back to who I was always meant to be. And somewhere along this journey called life, I got shaped by society, expectations, and just having to survive. And in that process, I believe I lost a big piece of myself.

So for me, returning to self is really about remembering who you are and becoming the person you maybe abandoned along the way.

So let’s start here. When each of you hear the phrase “return to self,” what does that mean to you personally?

I’ll start with you, Devon.

Devon Cunningham (03:23)
Is that with me? Okay.

So I’m Devon, everyone. I go by Sacred Sounds by Devon.

Back in 2017, I had a life-changing, or defining, moment, as some would call it, where I ended up at the crossroads of my life. And at that time, it was either go left or go right.

Now, looking back at that period of my life and all that I had been through—as a young adult being married and divorced, having kids, having businesses, and literally getting into a flow of life where you’re just functioning—you’re not taking care of yourself. You’re not looking within yourself. You’re giving to everybody else. And by that, I mean your family, your job, and anyone else you can give to. And you find yourself pretty depleted.

That’s where I can say, along the lines of awakening, that I really forgot who I was.

So when we get back to the phrase awakening, I feel like I had been sleepwalking and just functioning through my life until 2017.

With that defining moment, and now being nine years sober, I’ve become very, very clear and intentional about my life. There has just been so much growth and so much evolution.

For me, this has become a way of life—the work that I do. In 2019, I discovered gifts that I couldn’t, or wasn’t able to, find due to my sleepwalking. I ended up doing some beautiful work in Ecuador, which brought me back to self, to my awakening, and to the journey that I’m currently on with sound healing and all of the other organizations that I’m working with right now.

I’m allowing myself to shine a light to help people see their light, so that they can get on their journey to do their work.

That’s what awakening means to me.

Rho (05:27)
I love that.

Susan Kacvinsky (05:30)
I have kind of a similar take on this.

In 1997, after 10 years working in pastoral care and being a Science of Mind practitioner at Agape, and thinking I knew spirit, prayer, and who I was as a spiritual teacher and leader of retreats, I met a teacher who was so awake and so clear that just meeting her blew everything out.

All of a sudden, I realized it was all a thing I made up. It was all a story I made up about spiritual Susan and who she was and what she could do.

And within, I would say, a year of that meeting, I was out of every part of my life. That whole part of my life was over.

That night when I met her—and this happened in front of about 500 people—my heart was so open. I didn’t know who I was. And that was the blessing of no longer being certain that you know who you are, especially if who you are is coming from a story that you’re telling in your mind.

Under that spiritual Susan story was all the years and years and years of trauma: a profoundly dysfunctional childhood, alcoholism, violence, all kinds of things.

And when I woke up from that, an unraveling started—a process of unraveling—which took me away from being spiritual in any form. I became a high school teacher in the LA public school system, and I continued to go into silent retreat.

Because silence is where I found the truth. It’s not in the stories I’m telling. It’s not in the things I’m saying about you or anybody that I know, because all of that is just projection. It’s not my point of view.

And I started to see everything unravel. The more I went on silent retreat, the more those stories in my life unraveled, and I got to be with the real essence of people—who they really are—and who I really am.

From there, I did some plant medicine retreats, and that opened my heart further. It opened my understanding further. Then I went and got a couple of degrees and some academic learning and things like that.

But what I understood from the awakening was this: when I was walking around in my classroom, there was so much love for those children sometimes. I taught high school. At the end of my career, I taught continuation high school, so these were kids who were really traumatized, really hurt, falling through every crack.

There could be days when there was just so much love for them that I had to hide my eyes from them sometimes. And that overwhelming love, which I’ve come to understand now is joy—that joy is what I am. That’s what I awakened to.

And that’s what I want to provide: Who are you really? Who are you without your story? Who are you without your trauma? Who are you right now?

Because while it did involve a process of unraveling, it also didn’t. Because when I woke up and saw that, it was real and true, and nothing needed to be added. But then you’re still in your life. So how do you be still with the unraveling?

Rho (09:16)
Wow.

I love that, Susan, and it really brings me to something bigger too, because I think so many people are feeling disconnected right now. Life feels really loud, especially in this political environment we’re in, and people are carrying so much. There’s this sense that a lot of us are craving something deeper.

So from your perspective—and this question is for both of you—what do you think people are really craving when it comes to healing right now? What do you think is really driving this craving to heal and feel connected with yourself?

Devon Cunningham (09:59)
I can say that I believe people right now need to feel grounded, because there’s so much being thrown at us every single day—not just in your personal life, but in the world itself. The anxiety is off the charts for most people.

When you have anxiety and stress, and you couple that with not sleeping, and then couple that with uncertainty in the job market, uncertainty in the world, wars and rumors of wars, all the things that are happening simultaneously—how are people supposed to feel?

This is not normal, number one, to feel like you can’t breathe. People aren’t breathing. You’re literally walking around holding your breath, waiting for the next thing.

People want to exhale. People need a place where they can feel safe. People need a place where they can block out all of the exterior, and they need a place to go inside where they can pray, meditate, and really look and see.

And I say this a lot in my meditations: you’ve got to see what no longer serves you. You can run through your life with 10,000 extra pounds on your back and be trying to run a race. You’ve got to start assessing: What is it that I can delete? What no longer serves me? Where can I feel lighter? Where can I move differently?

Right now, intentionality in your life and the way that you’re moving through it is imperative.

So I believe people are looking for healing. They need a soft place to land, a safe, nurturing space to be in with like-minded individuals where the common goal is peace, healing, and getting tools to help navigate.

Rho (11:57)
Yeah, I agree with you. Susan, what are your thoughts? What do you think people are craving from healing?

Susan Kacvinsky (12:02)
I think since the world has gone crazy—and I would also point out that the world has always been crazy. At least not in my lifetime in the United States, it’s never been the thing that we’re fed. We’re fed this mythology of the United States, and it isn’t that for all people. It never has been.

But it is an escalation of the chaos and bad intentions. And I think flooding the zone is being done purposely. Part of the reason it’s being done purposely is because a population that’s terrified can be controlled.

So what people need, I think, is to wake up to the understanding of who they really are, to be able to drop down into that and hold calmness, because that’s what the entire culture needs—not just you and your family, though of course you and your family need that too.

You need to be able to hold the calm and the peace in your own heart. If you do that, and she does that, and she does that, and she does that, it creates a force that carries us. And it’s a force that you can tap into.

So I think what people need is tools, yes, but also awareness of how to tap into that level of peace and how to be that, because that’s your true nature. To be that peace and that calm.

And joy is radical. To be joy in this moment is a radical act. And to be able to do that, you connect with all the other people who are able to do that, and that lifts everything. It lifts the entire culture.

But it starts with you and your seat, your family, your life, your circumstances. It changes the way you react to the person coming at you. If you’re coming from a headspace, it might be something sharp. But if it’s coming from a heart space, it could come out as, “Let’s sit down and just talk.”

There’s a way that we can be the antidote, because community is the antidote to what’s happening now. The thing they can’t control is community—the caring community that loves.

Look at what’s happening in Minneapolis. What turns the tide? A loving community. Loving who you are is the cornerstone of that. Those people know who they are, and they know what’s important to them.

Rho (14:43)
And they showed the world, didn’t they? They were not playing. I love little Minneapolis.

Susan Kacvinsky (14:48)
They taught everybody what to do. And that’s what we need to do—go inside and find that love, and find that peace, and find that fierce.

Because one of the things I learned about leaving a spiritual community is that it isn’t all just these passive, sweet emotions. You can be strength too. You can be truth.

If you’re open and clear and awake, if what wants to come through you is “stop,” then you don’t have to go up in your head and say, “Should I say stop? That’s a little harsh.” You don’t have to have that whole conversation with yourself and lose the moment.

If you’re just open, what can come out of your mouth is, “This needs to stop now.” Or what can come out of your mouth is, “Let me love you.” It depends on the circumstance, but you’re not deciding. It comes through your open heart—the perfect response.

That’s what I call grace. But to get to that spontaneity, there has to be no story going on that says, “That’s not nice. I can’t say that.” You have to be able to come from your heart and say what’s there to be said.

And that’s awake. You’re awake if you can do that.

And then if you trust it, you know that if what comes out of your mouth is some prior conditioning and not the truth, then you can say, “I’m sorry, that was inappropriate.” And you can move on from there. You don’t have to be worried about everything.

Because in the moment, you have power to say yes, to say no, to say I’m sorry, to say let’s find a better way—whatever’s true.

Rho (16:35)
Wow, that is so powerful. I heard several things: truth, power, grace.

And I wonder, if we heal as a collective—and you talked about community—if we heal as a collective, could we really make strides and get past this moment in ways we couldn’t otherwise? But there are those that benefit from this division, so here we are.

Susan, you wrote something in the About section of your website that just hit me. You wrote, “If you knew big brassy me.” That line struck me because it speaks to how even the boldest part of you can still really get buried in life and fear and lack of safety, and it shapes your story.

Susan Kacvinsky (17:32)
Yeah. Conditioning. Especially as a woman in this culture, I was so conditioned because I am big and brassy. That’s the very first wing-clipping that takes place—from your mother saying, “That’s not very attractive.”

Rho (17:34)
Exactly. That’s what I’m saying. So how do those inherited stories—

Susan Kacvinsky (17:54)
How many times have you been told to smile more in your life?

Rho (17:57)
But how do those inherited stories—culturally, socially, from your mom, politically—how do they influence the way people relate to themselves and keep themselves from fully being who they are?

Susan Kacvinsky (18:13)
That’s the story, right? That’s the overlay.

So you’re putting a mental overlay on your experience by deciding, before something even comes out of your mouth, whether it’s acceptable or not. I call it the editor sometimes. There’s a little Susan up there on a hamster wheel deciding, “How will I be loved? How will I be okay?”

And it’s evaluating. It’s projection.

So I look at the thing you just did with your jaw and I go, “He’s mad at me. I’m in trouble.” And then we go back into that story. It’s all conditioning from childhood.

But when you wake up, that stuff unravels. And in my experience, it unravels through little experiences. Life gives you a gentle moment where you have an opportunity to do the thing the old way, or not do the thing the old way, or do it a new way, or not do the thing at all.

And then you get to see: if I don’t engage like that, everything changes. Everything is different.

And those recoveries—that’s grace too. It brings you those experiences one at a time, one after another.

Because there is no enlightenment, at least not that I’ve seen, where you’re no longer going to have trouble, where you’re no longer going to be human, where you’re no longer going to have a partner who did something that hurt you, or where you’re not going to do something that hurts other people.

So how do you be with all the mess of being human?

I think it’s by coming out of the story and being true to your own heart and saying what’s true and being open.

Rho (19:55)
And that’s part of what you’re going to do at the retreat, right? The self-inquiry. Can you kind of share what that is and what folks can expect from that?

Susan Kacvinsky (20:06)
The inquiry is: Who are you?

There’s a journaling way of doing that, where you sit down in the morning and write about what’s going on, what’s in your awareness, what’s bothering you, what you want—all the story. Then you skip a line and write, “Who am I?”

And stay with that. Who am I? Who am I? Who am I in the looking?

Another question is: What do you want?

Say you want money. Just be honest about it. I want money. I’ve never had money. I was poor for so long. Money was my thing for a long time.

Then ask: If you had money, what would it give you?

Rho (20:50)
Mmm. I say that all the time. Freedom.

Susan Kacvinsky (20:53)
Freedom, right? My answer to that question was safety, though. Because I grew up in domestic violence, what I wanted was safety.

So if I had all the money in the world, no one could hurt me. I’d be safe. I’d have my own house, my own stuff, enough money to pay my bills. If somebody wanted to sue me or do something, I could handle it.

So my meditation for a long time was: You are already safe.

And now it’s joy.

When I open my heart in the morning now, I’m the sky, and weather comes into it. Thunderstorms even come into it. But the thunderstorms move out, and the sky is not touched by the thunderstorm. The sky is still the sky, and the sky is joy.

And grief can come up. Whatever needs to come up in this moment, because we’re still human, can come up inside that sky, which is joy. Or maybe for you it’s peace. Maybe it’s beauty. Right action is a divine attribute too, which is what I think we need culturally—divine action.

The more your awareness is on who you really are, the bigger your sky gets.

So I could be walking around a high school classroom and have a 17-year-old boy who doesn’t trust me for any number of reasons, and he can look at me and say the nastiest thing, and I can sit down beside him and say, “Honey, what’s wrong?”

Because he said it to joy. He didn’t say it to some woman who’s afraid of him, who wants to control him. But why do we want to control other people? Because we’re afraid.

Tell me what hurts your heart this morning, please.

Rho (23:01)
That’s so good. That’s so powerful.

We think about stories as what we’re carrying, but healing is also in the body, right? It doesn’t live only in our minds. It lives in our body and our minds.

And that brings me to you, Devon. For someone who’s never experienced a sound healing before, what actually happens in the body and the mind during a sound bowl experience, and what makes it such a powerful tool for healing?

Devon Cunningham (23:38)
There are many, many things that happen in the mind and body during a sound bowl healing. A lot of it is totally your experience, because everybody’s experience within a sound bowl healing or sound bath healing—they go by both—is different. No two people are going to have the same experience.

It’s a journey. It’s an individual journey of one’s life, and it’s all about you.

Because in the silence of the meditation, the only thing you’re listening to is the divine frequency and vibration of the sound bowls. And divine wisdom, divine guidance, knowledge—answers—can come in those sessions.

You’re beginning to cleanse and clear your spiritual tools. Your main chakras are being affected by the frequency. And by “affected,” I mean it’s allowing energy that’s been stuck to move through the body, through the cells, releasing anxiety and tension.

It gives you such a deep sense of relaxation that you have no choice but to become peaceful.

A lot of thoughts come up—thoughts you probably forgot you had. Memories from two or three years ago, things you either chose to forget or chose to push down because it was too painful to look at. Or sometimes it’s just a beautiful thought that comes up that becomes a tool to help you deal with whatever situation is happening in your life right now.

Now I can tell you the basics: it’s going to reduce stress and tension within the body. It’s going to help you relax deeper. You’re going to have a better night’s rest.

But what’s really happening is that you’re being connected back to Source, back to the universe, back to your ancestors, back to your angel guides, your spirit guides—basically the whole universe.

Rho (25:37)
There’s a whole lot going on, a lot of connection.

Susan Kacvinsky (25:54)
The universe is chiming in.

Devon Cunningham (25:57)
Confirmation.

It’s always trying to get your attention, but you can’t hear it because you’re being distracted. Distracted by your job, your family, maybe drinking. I know I was distracted all my life by too much wine. Too much wine. I was a binge drinker.

I had very stressful situations taking place in every area of my life. And because I didn’t know of a tool—I’ve always been very spiritual. I believe in God. I believe in Jesus. I believe in Buddhism. I believe in Christianity. I believe in Catholicism. There are so many things about religion that I’ve taken with me. I don’t resonate with all of it, but I’ve taken what works for me and what feels good to my soul and combined that into who I am and the work that I do.

I allow people to come in and bring what their beliefs are, because sound healing is not about a religious practice. I want to say that. It’s not going to change your belief system. It’s not going to make you believe the bowls are your source.

The bowls are a tool. They can be added in to give you peace of mind so that you can remember to pray.

People are forgetting to even pray when they wake up. They’re forgetting to pray when they go to sleep because they’re so distracted and stressed. We run through our lives. We get up in the morning, run through the day, come home, deal with family or whatever we’re dealing with, pass out, wake up, and jump right back on the hamster wheel.

Life is going. And you’re running through it. Look how fast these years are going by, because we’re not stopping to smell the roses. We’re not present.

That was the biggest thing that was so magnificent for me when I went through my sobriety journey. I was present for the first time that I could remember since I was a kid. That was so joyous to me.

I’ll never forget—I was in the mountains of Ecuador, and it was a beautiful day. I came out of our cabin to go to a sweat lodge, and I remember standing in the middle of this beautiful mountain and looking around. The clouds were coming through, everything was so green, and it was beauty I hadn’t stopped to take in.

And I was like, my God, I’m alive.

Prior to that trip to Ecuador—and also through a few healing journeys here in the States with some amazing shamans here and in Ecuador—they really put me back in touch with Source. They gave me my life back. I remembered who I was. I remembered the gift that I have.

And that’s another thing I want to say about gifts. All of us—everyone within the sound of my voice—you have an amazing gift. Whether you’re choosing to use it or not is a different thing.

Through meditation, through prayer, through putting the distractions of life to the side and giving yourself a chance to even think clearly, you’d be surprised at the things that’ll come up about yourself.

You’re magnificent as well, and you were put on this earth especially for a time like this to shine your light. You are here to bring peace and joy and harmony onto this planet right now.

It’s free will. I chose to do my work. And through that choice, it put me into sound healing, which was a gift that I had. I am the daughter of a musician, and I am the daughter of my mother, who recently passed, who was an amazing woman. She was a writer, an actress, an educator, and so much more. I’m still finding out things about her as I go through boxes. That woman had more certificates than I ever knew.

So I encourage you to do your work. If you can’t meditate, if you can’t go be in community, at least when you come home from work and you’re stressed out and can’t think straight, before you turn on the TV, turn off the phone. If you have to go into a bathroom or a closet and shut off the light, do that. Honor yourself so that you can remember why you are here.

Rho (30:23)
That’s so powerful.

As both of you were talking, I always feel like there’s a reason people get into this kind of work. Something kind of calls them to step into it.

I know for me, that moment was when I realized I wasn’t feeling any real joy. So I was happy to hear you talk about joy, Susan. I just wasn’t feeling it. I was working jobs that depleted me, dating emotionally unavailable men, and I realized I had completely abandoned parts of myself trying to fit into a society that told me how it should look.

So it was a culmination of all these things.

Both of you kind of said it a little bit, but I’d love for you to share: what was the moment that you realized you needed to reconnect with yourself in a deeper way?

Susan Kacvinsky (31:24)
I can tell you mine precisely.

I was 28, maybe 29, right around my Saturn return, when I dated a man and moved across the country with him. I grew up in New England and moved to Los Angeles with this man—the man of my dreams. The kind of connection where I used to tell my high school girls, “If you have that connection with a man, go lock yourself in a closet really fast. Don’t come out until you’re sane.”

So I moved all the way across the country with him. My father died when I was 17, and this man played out that experience for me again in such detail that it was like it was happening again.

Because I didn’t feel it at the time when my father died. I didn’t even cry. I was so bound up in everything that I would not feel it. And that’s where the body comes in, and all that Devon is talking about with the healing that happens in the body. I was terrified of what was in my body.

But I also couldn’t deny that my past kept repeating itself. I kept finding myself in the Groundhog Day of my past.

There was a moment where he had an affair with a woman back in Boston, and he was just gone from my life. Like he died. And I still have never seen him again. He died and went back to Boston. You’re not going to run into him at the grocery store, not through friends, nowhere. He’s gone.

And I remember sitting on the porch going, all right, I get it. Every man I date turns into my father. And every time I’m in this circumstance, I end up in this moment right here where there’s an ocean of grief.

I was having dreams of tsunamis coming and crashing into me. Because that’s how much emotion was being denied. My body was basically just a transportation device for my head.

And I said, I’m willing to heal it. It has to be coming from me, because it can’t be coming from them. It’s perfectly my past to be coming from them, so it’s got to be me. There’s nothing else it can be.

So let’s heal it.

And I remember feeling that “Okay, here we go” kind of energy take me up on it. I think that initial willingness to feel my feelings, to reconnect with my body, to heal the past—that’s what it was—took me at my deepest intention.

And since I was on my knees, my intention was as deep as it comes. Because I don’t want to live here anymore. If this is what it’s going to be—not only did I have that childhood, but I have to live through it again and again and again, and I can’t get out of it, and I can’t wake up—it’s like being in a nightmare. And if that’s what it is to be here, I don’t want to be here anymore.

Rho (34:39)
Gosh. I remember feeling that way too at one point. Like, beam me up, Scotty.

Susan Kacvinsky (34:42)
Yeah. And that’s when it started.

I sat down and did a meditation—just a “Help me, please” meditation. And I saw, in my mind’s eye—and I’d never had a vision before, never had a visual, had no experience with visualization—I saw this raw wood door frame suspended in space. The door was open.

I zoomed up to the door, and this voice said, “Are you sure?”

And something deeper than my personality said yes.

And then I was through the door, sitting there going, “What just happened? What did I agree to?” And that started everything. Just like a moment.

Rho (35:28)
What about you, Devon? What was that moment?

Devon Cunningham (35:31)
Oh man, the moment for me was... by that time, I think it was 2016. That was when I was getting pretty tired of my life, and I was really getting sick of the drinking.

I had a very stressful job. I don’t know if anybody’s ever had a job where you get off work and you’re so stressed out you’re like, “I need a glass of wine.” And then that turns into a couple. Then you’ve got to function and get up the next day and go deal with the same craziness. I worked many hours, sometimes six days a week. That’s hard. That’s a hard life.

I remember in 2016 saying, “I’ve got to stop. I’ve got to figure out something else to do besides this drinking.”

But I couldn’t really stop because the stress never stopped, so it became a repetitive cycle. But I was sick of it.

And although in 2016 I did very well—I think I only drank maybe three times that whole year—into the next year, that last time I drank, I ended up getting a DUI that night.

I did not crash into anybody. I did not kill anybody or myself. It was just one of those random things that happened.

And I have to tell you, the officers that found me inebriated—believe me, the night they found me was not the worst night they could have found me. I’m ashamed to say how many times I drank and drove.

Rho (37:37)
Me too. I’m surprised I’m even alive. My ex-husband and I used to do shots of tequila and drive. And we’re like, how are we alive? That was nothing but God.

Devon Cunningham (37:49)
Yes. That was God’s grace.

But I’m going to tell you, when the universe conspires to use you—many are called, but the chosen are few. I was called in 2017 to do this work. That was my calling.

Those beautiful officers—I believe they caught me because I needed to get fast-tracked. The world was changing.

I’ll never forget, I was in that situation for 12 hours, and it was a Friday. Imagine that. I could have been there until Monday. Talk about finding Jesus real quick. I was like, “Please let me out.”

And at hour 11 and a half, I prayed.

Here’s the craziest thing: prior to this happening, I did not care if I woke up or not. I was so over my life. I would say, “If I wake up tomorrow, I wake up. If I don’t, fine.” My last kid was finishing college. I lived on my own for the first time ever. And I was just over it. I was like, now what?

So I kind of put that prayer out there, and then I got hit with this.

While I was in there, I literally went down my whole timeline. All the way back to the first time I ever had a drink. I didn’t know at the time that I was going to be having ayahuasca journeys shortly after this, but I was being prepared for them. Because that’s what an ayahuasca journey is. It’s a journey of going back on your timeline to see why you do certain things and how you can become better from what you’re being shown.

So I prayed, “Please, if you just let me out, I’ll never do this again, and I will turn my life over, and I’ll never have another drink.”

And literally 10 minutes after I prayed that prayer, I was being released.

I got home and cried all night. I was embarrassed. I was ashamed. I hid from my friends for a long time because they wanted to go out drinking, and I was like, nope, can’t do that.

I didn’t want to go out. I didn’t want to drink. I didn’t want to be around anybody, because at that point I had been sequestered. So now you can really look at your life.

At the beginning of 2019, I went on my first healing journey with a friend to really look deeper within my life, which led me on about six or seven more ayahuasca journeys. And at that point, I wasn’t afraid to look inside myself anymore, because I needed to.

Like Susan was saying, with men in that department—I was married, divorced, married, divorced, in another relationship. Same man, different pants.

Susan Kacvinsky (41:09)
I call him the man with a thousand faces. Daddy with a thousand faces, actually.

Rho (41:18)
But what’s crazy is, we have these stories, and I feel like those stories are why we came together for this retreat.

When we first started talking about it, I remember thinking, okay, The Awakening: Return to Self. What about that vision really resonated with each of you, and why did it feel important to say yes to this?

Devon Cunningham (41:27)
I’ll tell you, I literally have walked the journey and returned to my true self, my authentic self. Now I am doing the work.

I’ve always been very spiritual, even as a young child. I love God. I love everything that helps you become a better self.

It’s so funny—lot of things offend a lot of people. But you know what offends me? Mean people. Mean people offend me.

Why are we mean? We don’t have to be mean.

And I’m going to share this quickly.

I recently lost my mom, about six months ago now. Then I lost a dear cousin who was more like a sister. Both of their deaths affected me in two different ways.

And grief—this is something I’ve integrated into my sound healings—people need tools for how to move through grief and understand it.

I’m not teaching something I don’t know anything about. This is my walk. This is what I’m learning through my mother’s passing, through being in hospice with her, through literally walking her home on that journey.

Her passing in my arms gave me a death and a rebirth at the same time.

Her death immobilized me for a moment because it was so much. You don’t realize how much you love someone until that happens.

And I encourage people who aren’t getting along with their moms, or have something going on—be patient. I’m so glad I was patient with my mom in the end, because I was with her for seven years, and I’m so grateful for that journey. I learned so much. Healed so much. She healed as well because we had conversations that would have never happened otherwise.

I’m at peace now. I wasn’t at peace when she passed, because who wants their mother to pass away? I was not ready for that. My mother was supposed to be with me forever. She was my rock. My person I could call any day, any time.

But I’m so grateful that I went home to help her on that journey. Because as time goes on and grief begins to lighten its grip, I see so many blessings and lessons. And I still feel very connected to her essence, even now, six months later.

My cousin’s passing was so abrupt that it jolted me back into my life. I talked to her one hour, and then two hours later she had passed. It was unexpected.

And what I got from her passing was this: we do not know the day, the hour, nor the time. You can be so happy and be gone five minutes later.

So what that said to me was, you have got to live right now. Because this is the only time that we have. Every day you wake up, if you’re still here on this earth, that’s your day to do it better, to make a difference, to live your dreams.

So into the work that I’m bringing to the people who come to my sessions or this retreat—if you have grief on your heart, I am here to be a beacon of hope. We are here to be a beacon of hope, because you have your own journey that you contracted to be here for in such a time as this.

We’re here to help you move forward, honor your grief, honor the ones who have passed on, and live full, live big, live with joy, live your life, live your purpose.

Rho (46:35)
Amen to that. Susan, what about you? What about the vision resonated with you, and why did it feel important to say yes to this?

Susan Kacvinsky (46:45)
Because awakening is everything.

In my own life, it was a death and a rebirth for me. And that’s why I was so terrified of it, because something in me knew: you’re going to have to die. Who you think you are is going to have to die.

And the terrifying thing about that was that it was true. You have to die to who you think you are in order to be who you really are.

And it brings me back to that saying I said to you the other day, Rho: If you die before you die, then when you die, you won’t have to die.

So if you’re awake in your heart, that death and rebirth can be terrifying. Maybe it doesn’t have to be. But if you come from trauma like I do, it can be.

And I think in this culture, in the United States, most of us carry trauma. I’d say all of us carry trauma, though maybe there’s a lucky one.

If you’re coming from trauma—and this is a very cruel culture—then it is a death of the old self and a rebirth of the real self.

And it is awakening up.

My God, the morning after I was touched by this awakening, everything sparkled. Every sound, every bird, every single thing. It’s what people describe when they get a diagnosis and suddenly realize how precious life is.

That was the rebirth.

Then comes the how. I used to say to my teacher, “How do you stop? How do you stop?” And she’d say, “There is no how. You just stop.”

If you’re clenching your fist, stop clenching. Just stop clenching.

And what’s yours will come to you. It’s amazing how it comes to you. And what’s not yours is going to leave. Bless it on its way out.

Mean people are hurt people. There’s a way to love that hurtness. I’ve seen the meanness in my own heart. I’ve had moments.

I think as a culture, we have a lot of narcissism. Right now, the narcissism is in charge. And that’s what we need to wake up from. It’s trauma that creates narcissism, and the willingness to suffer our own death and rebirth into joy.

And then from there, you create your life, and every single thing that you touch is blessed.

Devon Cunningham (50:04)
And I say that too, because you can tell someone all day long what they should do, but I don’t even tell anyone how to do anything anymore. It’s about leading by example. Live your life. Do what’s right to you. You’ll touch more people by the way you move forward in your life and by the way you lead through your life.

Susan Kacvinsky (50:30)
If you’re surrendered, the places you go are the places that need you. You’re led to the places and people that need you, and that you need too.

You’re born with a gift. You need to give it. Everything that you give comes through you first. So if you’re giving love, it has to come through you. That means you’re living inside love.

And that’s the best there is. That’s it. That’s what you want. And every single person can be that.

Rho (51:19)
For me, it’s always been love. I remember years ago, when I opened up my Twitter profile and it had that little “about you” section, I wrote: “I want to live my life with peace of mind, clarity, and laughter.” That was it. That’s all I needed.

Quick question, because I know we’re getting close to time, but I have a few questions left. What do you hope people get when they walk away from this event? What do you want them to walk away with?

Susan Kacvinsky (52:01)
I want people to walk away with a way for them to be in the heart all the time.

If you set your heart open in the morning to be whatever quality you know yourself to be—mine is joy—then through your whole day, it’s joy that meets you wherever you go.

So I want people to have the ability to do that. To rest in their heart and be what they really are, and see how it changes everything. See how it changes the world.

Rho (52:36)
I love that. And Devon, what are your thoughts?

Devon Cunningham (52:39)
I want people to feel grounded. I want them to feel lighter. I want them to walk out of the event feeling hopeful.

I want them to have joy in a place they may have forgotten it was there. I want them to have that moment where they can say, “You know what? I choose joy. I choose peace.”

And lastly, I want them to come away from there choosing themselves.

Rho (53:07)
That’s the most important part, right?

One of the things that we decided when we created this is that: no phones. No phone container. Why do you think it’s important for people to truly disconnect from the noise for that time?

Devon Cunningham (53:22)
It goes back to what I said earlier: distractions.

Whenever you get into an environment, the noises come from everywhere. It never fails me. Helicopters decide to circle around the building, all of that.

We want people to keep their phones on silent. We’re not going to take your phones away, but—

Susan Kacvinsky (53:52)
No, but we’re going to pinky swear that you don’t look at it all day.

Rho (53:57)
That’ll be part of the commitment and agreement up front.

Susan Kacvinsky (54:02)
And if you can’t do that, then let’s look at why you can’t go a whole day without looking at your phone.

Because for me, that phone is like—what’s it going to do? You can be in the most open-hearted space, and then you pull out your phone and you’re back in the story. You’re back in the false narrative. You’re back in the busyness. Or you’re back in an addiction, because for most people, a phone is an addiction.

Whatever it is to you, you could just put it away for one whole day.

And I think that’s part of being on retreat. We’re going to a beautiful location out in nature, and you can disconnect from your phone for a day. Not even 24 hours. A day.

Rho (54:50)
Seven hours. We just want seven hours.

Susan Kacvinsky (54:57)
You’re yourself, and you’re not in your phone. You are not in there. Gazing into that mirror—it’s a projection mirror. So if you’re gazing into that mirror, you’re not being yourself.

Rho (55:08)
Amen to that.

That’s actually a good segue to this question: what do you want people to know about beginning the journey back to themselves?

Susan Kacvinsky (55:18)
I’d say that most people have already started. Most people are not aware that they’ve already started.

The sound bowls are so beautiful. I go every week to sound bowls with Devon. Every single week I’m there with my bells on. And I know my true self. I live in my true self. I’m not in my story all the time anymore. But those 45 or 50 minutes with Devon when she’s playing are some of the deepest meditations I have.

The other is singing. You can’t be in your mind and singing at the same time. It just does not happen. That’s why chanting is such a big part of so many spiritual traditions.

To be able to let go, you’ve probably already started.

Because this huge thing is happening, not just in the United States but all over. We’re in what the Greeks called the apocalypse—the revealing.

You think you understand the banking system? Here’s a glimpse. You think you understand education? Look, all these kids can’t read. The church? Look.

So yes, we’re in that, and it’s terrible, and it’s also an opportunity.

The message has gone out already. So most people who are attracted to a retreat called The Awakening: Return to Self have probably already started on the journey.

So let’s give you the tools so you can keep going, so you don’t lose heart, so you can connect with everybody else, because this is happening everywhere.

And that we join together in this awakening, because the world is awakening. That’s the opportunity.

The danger is that we fall back asleep.

Rho (57:16)
No, we can’t do that.

Devon Cunningham (57:21)
Once you’re awake, you never can go back. It’s like The Matrix—the red pill, the blue pill.

Susan Kacvinsky (57:27)
Right, but it’s also like drinking. You can stop, but you can also relapse.

So we want to give people the tools so they can stay in the awakening, stay in the joy, because that’s what’s required right now—that people stay grounded in joy, even though the world is going crazy.

That you can be centered in your heart and go, “Yep, they did it again.”

Rho (57:38)
The tools. Yep.

All right, so on my show I always like to ask this one question to my guests, because my show is all about self-care and self-love.

So this is for both of you: if you had to create a law around self-care and self-love that everyone had to follow, what would it be and why?

Susan Kacvinsky (58:18)
Tell the truth.

Even if it hurts. Especially if it hurts. Especially if you’re terrified to tell it and your whole body is trembling from the neck down, but you’ve got this thing you need to say and you know it might hurt somebody, or you’ve got all these stories going on in your mind about what’s going to happen if you tell the truth—tell it anyway.

And I have two, sorry, I’m breaking the rules. The other one is: the only prayer you need is, I’m willing to feel this.

Whatever this is, I’m willing to feel this.

And then just be still and feel it. You’d be surprised—it doesn’t last as long as your brain tells you it will. Your brain will say, “It’s always going to be forever and I’ll always feel this bad.” Don’t listen to that. It’s not true.

Rho (59:21)
I love that. Devon?

Devon Cunningham (59:24)
Oh, I got two.

Number one would be surrender. I believe that once you really have that deep, deep, deep conversation within yourself and you surrender, you will be surprised how everything in the whole entire universe will show up and take you along your journey. You will start your yellow brick road, and you will be led to people, places, and things, with all your needs being met.

It has to be an authentic surrender. You have to really mean it. You have to really do it. You have to surrender.

The next one is to honor yourself.

Because when you honor yourself, you won’t be with certain people, places, and things. You will hold yourself in your highest regard. You will put God first in your life, and you will begin to go inside so that you can be co-creating with your God-self and bring what’s happening inside out into the physical.

It will allow you to tap into your gift, tap into Source, and be a beautiful example of whatever your gift is on this path.

Rho (1:00:38)
Beautiful. Well, this has been such a great conversation. I want to make sure everyone knows how to find you. So where can people connect with you?

Susan Kacvinsky (1:00:49)
I write on Substack. It’s SusanKacvinsky.com. If you Google my name, you’ll find it.

Devon Cunningham (1:00:56)
And you can find me at Sacred Sounds by Devon—website and Instagram, Sacred Sounds by Devon.

Rho (1:01:04)
I love it. I love it.

I’m so excited for this retreat, y’all. April 25. As you can tell, we put our heart into this, and the intentionality and our hope is that you walk away feeling returned to yourself.

Thank you both so much for hopping on this conversation. This felt so honest and grounded and loving. It was just needed. And I’m so grateful for both of you for joining me on this journey.

We’ve got our North Star that we’re working toward, and we just want to help people. So thank you so much, and thank you for everything that you do in the world. I really appreciate you.

Devon Cunningham (1:01:47)
Thank you for all the work you’re doing in this world too, to both of you, and for you out there—come and join us at this beautiful location in Sherman Oaks, California. It’s going to be on April 25 from 9 to 4.

You’ll have a full day of amazing facilitators. Some of it will be silent with Susan, and she has a whole morning planned for you with journaling. We also have Raven Jasmine, who’s going to be leading yoga and breathwork. Then we’re going to be having sound healing, and we’re also going to be having pranic healing with Terry Huberman, who is amazing.

So there’ll be a lot of cord-cutting and energy healing and moving the body and breathing deeper and going into silence. Silence is the best way for you to hear all the things that you need to hear—from this world, from the universe.

So you’re going to be connected, grounded, and walking away with a different perspective on your life.

And you also get lunch.

Blessings, everyone.

Rho (1:02:53)
My goodness, what an amazing conversation.

And honestly, what stays with me the most is the reminder that returning to yourself isn’t about becoming somebody new. It’s about peeling back the noise, the stories, the survival patterns, the grief, the pressure—and finding your way back to what’s already been there.

And that’s your truth, your peace, your joy, your self.

That’s what made this conversation so powerful. Susan spoke to the unraveling—the courage it takes to tell the truth and let the false parts fall away. And Devon brought us back to the body, to the breath, to the healing that happens when you finally let yourself be still long enough to listen.

This is real work. It’s sacred work.

And maybe that’s where your own awakening begins too. Not in having all the answers. Not in fixing everything at once. But in simply noticing where you’ve drifted away from yourself and choosing, little by little, to come back.

And friends, that’s exactly why we created The Awakening: Return to Self retreat.

If you’ve been craving a space to breathe, to reset, to reconnect, and to be poured into, we would love to have you join us on Saturday, April 25, in Sherman Oaks. This retreat was created with so much care, so much intention, and honestly, so much love. And we really believe it’s going to be a powerful experience for the people who join us.

I’ll leave the registration link in the show notes below, so please be sure to take a look. And if you have any questions, please feel free to reach out.

Now, if this episode met you where you are today and you felt moved, make sure you subscribe to Hold My Purse and turn on those notifications so you don’t miss the next episode. And as always, feel free to share it with a friend who may need a reminder that they need to come back to themselves.

All right, let’s ground this episode with an affirmation. Let’s take a deep breath.

I am allowed to slow down.
 I am allowed to return to myself.
 I trust that what is meant for me will meet me in my healing.

My God, that’s so deep.

All right, y’all. Until next time, my fabulous friends, my self-care warriors, be gentle with yourself. There is nothing weak about choosing peace, and there is nothing selfish about coming home to you.

Stay aligned, stay unbothered, and hold your own damn purse.

Peace.

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