S2 Ep39. Walking Miracles: Healing, Awakening, and Transformation with Paula Rosenfeld

In this heartfelt and enlightening episode of ABWilson's Heart of the Matter podcast, host Aderonke Bademosi Wilson invites Paula Rosenfeld, a seasoned shamanic practitioner, spiritual empowerment and mindfulness coach, author and parent, to share her extraordinary journey. Paula opens up about her path to shamanic healing, a powerful ancient practice that works with spirit guides and energy healing to help heal trauma and restore wholeness.

Listeners will learn about Paula’s transformative experiences. From her first soul retrieval session to her evolution into a coach and Akashic record reader. She explains the spiritual dimensions she navigates and offers deep insights into awakening, self-awareness and living an authentic life guided by the heart over ego. Paula also shares candid reflections on her personal challenges, including her divorce and raising her daughter as a single mom and how these experiences fueled her growth and commitment to her spiritual work.

The conversation flows warmly into Paula’s self-care rituals like meditation and connection with nature, her proud milestones in a career spanning over three decades, and her enthusiasm for projects still to come including writing a spiritual autobiography. Throughout, Paula’s message is clear: healing is possible, spiritual connection enriches life and we are all walking miracles with unique gifts to share.

This episode invites listeners to explore alternative healing, embrace self-reflection and find hope even in difficult times. Paula’s stories of resilience, faith and heart-led living offer inspiration and practical wisdom for anyone seeking deeper meaning and empowerment.

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Transcript

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (00:01.516)
 Welcome to another edition of ABWilson's Heart of the Matter, a podcast that uses overwhelmingly positive questions to learn about our guests, where every episode uncovers extraordinary stories of triumph, growth, and empowerment. Hi, I'm Aderonke Bademosi Wilson. My guest on today's show is Paula Rosenfeld. She is a practitioner, author, parent. Paula, welcome to the show.

Paula Rosenfeld (00:33.305)
 Thank you, Aderonke. I'm delighted to be here.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (00:37.386)
 And Paula, please tell me about your descriptors. Let's start with practitioner. What kind of practitioner are you?

Paula Rosenfeld (00:46.017)
 I'm a shamanic practitioner. I'm a coach. I call myself a coaching spiritual empowerment and mindfulness coach. And I also do readings from the Akashic record. And yeah, so those are my truly main focus and what I've done the longest is shamanic healing.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (01:16.002)
 Tell me about that, what is that? What is shamanic healing?

Paula Rosenfeld (01:19.693)
 That is an ancient practice, thousands of years old, that comes from all parts of the world. And it's based on the belief that when people and animals have trauma, a part of their soul or spirit, or another word might be awareness, disconnects to survive the trauma. So it's a survival mechanism.
 And so as a shamanic practitioner, I basically am working with spirit guides, helping spirits, and I'm channeling the healing that they show me that they're doing. I'm not doing it, they're doing it. And then I work with my client to explain what healing occurred for them.
 So I'm a go-between spirit and humans or animals too.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (02:25.294)
 How did you get into this practice?

Paula Rosenfeld (02:29.503)
 I stumbled on it, literally. I was just drawn to it because I heard a... now pretty famous author and anthropologist, Alberto Villoldo is his name, was giving a talk on shamanism and a book he wrote about it at a local bookstore. This was 31 years ago. And I went to hear his talk and I was profoundly moved by it, felt an instant connection. So I had a session – shamanic healing, soul retrieval and extraction it's called. I had one done for myself and then I began to study it so I could be a practitioner of this very ancient form of energy healing.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (03:24.022)
 And how did it feel when you went through your first session for yourself? What did you feel? How did it change you?

Paula Rosenfeld (03:32.888)
 My gosh, you know. I had a sense of being more whole. So one session does not take care of a lifetime of trauma. It's not like people need a lot of sessions of it, but maybe at least a handful. Each session stands alone. So I can't tell you exactly how I felt. It was so very long ago. But in general, it's a sense of feeling more empowered, spiritually empowered, more authentically me, more self-aware and knowing I have value.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (04:24.694)
 Hmm.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (04:32.106)
 Now, can you work with people online or do you have to be in the same space with them?

Paula Rosenfeld (04:39.37)
 No, I'd say the majority of my work is online. I use Zoom. I also see local people one day a week. I'll see clients in person. But the rest of the time, I'm working with people from all over the world. I've had many people outside the U.S. that I've worked with and in the U.S. So, yeah. It's, I'm working beyond time and space. So we don't have to be physically present. I'm working in another dimension.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (05:26.028)
 And so from where you sit and from your practice, how many dimensions are there?

Paula Rosenfeld (05:33.014)
 I have no idea. I think infinite. You know, in shamanism, we tend to work in some areas that have sort of globally been agreed upon, and they call it the upper world, the middle world and the lower world. But there are other dimensions, there's a dimension of the void, which is before creation. There's dimensions of life after death, the destiny of the soul. There's dimensions of in-between lives.
 So, but generally, you know, I'm working—the middle world is like the earth, but the invisible realms of the earth. The spirit guides associated with flowers or other people like fancifully called leprechauns or, you know, little people or invisible people, invisible beings. That's a better word for it. It's very mysterious. It's something I couldn't make up really. And I'm a channel for helping spirits so that I can translate this to the best of my ability to others. Translate the healing like—

Paula Rosenfeld (07:22.711)
 For instance, someone may come to me with a trauma. Perhaps she was in a car accident when she was five, or perhaps she had suffered physical, emotional, sexual abuse. I'm working with people who have had all kinds of traumas, from little traumas to big traumas.
 And so I'm working to bring back parts of their awareness, as I said, that disconnected so that they can be returned to wholeness.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (08:00.748)
 Hmm. And once people are—sorry, go ahead.

Paula Rosenfeld (08:04.641)
 I was just going to say, and I don't have to know why these parts have left where they are. I just can retrieve them.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (08:17.282)
 Did this take a lot of training on your part? What does training look like is maybe what I should ask.

Paula Rosenfeld (08:28.793)
 Training looks like shamanic journeys so that I can have direct experiences of what I'm being trained on. Most of my training in soul retrieval happened from Sandra Ingerman. Sandra's a very, very well-known author and shaman. And she…
 So, you know, I studied with her, I studied with some other shamans, and generally the whole idea of a shamanic journey is to have a direct experience of spirit, of non-ordinary reality. And
 So a shamanic journey is a form of meditation. It's generally done to either rhythmic patterns of drumming or rattling. And it puts the brain in a slightly altered state.

You know, from a normal brain state, like the one we're in as we are talking to alpha which is like right before sleep or theta is deep, deep sleep. It's a different brain wave pattern. And when we leave our ordinary way of viewing reality,

Paula Rosenfeld (10:08.0)
 It's because our brain is opening up to other dimensions which are revealed through these other brain states. So all humans have this potential. Everyone does. And most people don't even know what it is.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (10:19.919)
 Hmm.

Paula Rosenfeld (10:33.514)
 I didn't know what it was until I heard Alberto Villoldo speak about it in that bookstore 31 years ago or more. It turns out it's centuries old from all parts of the world that have had their unique form of shamanism.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (10:56.731)
 And you mentioned readings and I didn't quite catch the word. You said you also do readings from—

Paula Rosenfeld (11:05.212)
 Akashic record. So sure, the Akashic record is a vibrational record of each individual's soul.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (11:07.599)
 Tell me about that.

Paula Rosenfeld (11:22.016)
 So it exists—no, energy is neither created nor destroyed. I think Albert Einstein probably said that. Science knows that. So there is a record of everything that has happened to everyone through different lifetimes. And through my work, I've come to absolutely believe in reincarnation.
 I've seen it over and over in my work. I often bring back past life's soul parts for people and animals.
 And anyway, so all this is living vibrationally. And again, I was trained to be able to work with helping spirits or the guides of the Akashic Record to allow this information to come through me. So when I gave an Akashic Record reading, I asked people to prepare questions. And then I open their Akashic record with a prayer, tune in and download information for them to answer their questions.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (12:45.955)
 So you said you believe in reincarnation. Does the person that you're working with have to believe that as well if they're going back to look at their Akashic records?

Paula Rosenfeld (12:58.385)
 That's a little hard to answer because I think if someone has a strong disbelief in it, they're not going to contact me. Honestly.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (13:09.079)
 Yeah, very nice.

Paula Rosenfeld (13:11.181)
 You know, the people who come to me for Akashic Record readings or shamanic soul retrieval and extraction are open to something alternative helping them. They may not have a definitive viewpoint on past lives, but they would not generally say they didn't. I think.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (13:35.279)
 Hmm.

Paula Rosenfeld (13:37.207)
 You know, if someone feels very strongly against past lives or energy healing, they could reject the healing. Their mind would shut it down.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (13:49.519)
 Mm.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (13:53.999)
 Paula, thank you. I've learned so much. And we haven't even gotten to the questions.

Paula Rosenfeld (14:01.709)
 There's a lot to it, sure.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (14:02.115)
 Wow, thank you. Another descriptor that you used is parent. Tell me about being a parent.

Paula Rosenfeld (14:11.513)
 Well, my daughter is now 37 and being a parent never stops. It's a very special, powerful relationship. So, yeah, my daughter and I have been through a lot together. She was almost three when my husband and I got divorced, her dad.
 So she's had her journey and she has had to put up with a mom like me, not your average kind of mom, to be honest. But she's turned out wonderfully. She lives in Colorado and she's a psychotherapist. So.
 Some of what I do regarding turning within, looking within for answers has rubbed off, I'd say.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (15:09.517)
 Hmm, and being an author?

Paula Rosenfeld (15:14.649)
 So many things in my life have just unfolded as I've gotten more and more aligned with the truth of who I am. And I was very fortunate in that I knew someone who knew a publisher who was looking for a book to be written about two people who were my teachers in India. And for a time I had studied in India with these avatars, they're named Sri Yama and Sri Bhagavan. And they founded the Oneness Movement in India from in the late 1980s that began to emerge. So because I had studied with them, I wrote this book.
 It was quite a challenge. I had a six-month deadline from the publisher to write it. And I interviewed a lot of people who had been participating in the avatars' teachings and practices and receiving energy transmissions known as Diksha. And I interviewed them. And so it's a book about what it is like, what your life is like when you're leading an awakened life.

Paula Rosenfeld (16:42.592)
 I wrote that in 2015.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (16:48.943)
 And what did you learn? Like, I'm curious now, what are some of the things that people shared with you once you have an awakened life? But before that, what is an awakened life?

Paula Rosenfeld (17:00.013)
 Well, an awakened life is largely about self-awareness. Being aware of what's going on within you and your connection to the divine, the higher self that is a part of all of us, which is a part of the all that is. And so when your reference for your choices and your behavior is all based on what's going on within in your heart. It's about having an open heart and not being ego-driven, ego residing sort of in the mind, ego being a whole different force that most everyone is plagued by. Ego shows up as that chatter in your mind telling you this isn't right, that person isn't good for you, stay away from that. Ego is all about protecting the self and that's self with a small s. Capital S self is the higher self and that's related to your heart. So awakening is shifting the center of your awareness from your mind to your heart and having a blossoming of your heart, an opening of the heart with compassion, with forgiveness, with wisdom, deep wisdom. That's our birthright.
 Most people aren't paying attention to their heart or what's going on with them. Most people in today's world are busy trying to escape negative feelings, trying to calculate, plan, strategize from their ego.

Paula Rosenfeld (19:11.993)
 And so a lot of the world problems are because of that. Honestly, in our country, in the U.S., there is a very big force now for putting down wokeness. Maybe you've heard about that. I'm afraid I fall in that camp.
 And being awakened is centuries old, the concept, the practice. You go back to Buddha, to the great avatars in all parts of the world that speak from spiritual truth, which is that we are all one.
 And we are one big heart, in fact. And the rest is ego.
 Truly the mind should serve the heart. The mind has brilliance. The mind carries out a lot of things for us, but when the mind is serving the ego, it's all gonna be self-protective. When the mind serves the heart, it's serving the greater good. So that's sort of an example of... or a piece, a small piece of being awakened, but it's also, you know, feeling one with the all that is.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (20:47.907)
 Thank you, Paula. Wow.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (20:52.921)
 So, let's go into the questions. I would like our listeners to learn a little bit more about you. Please share three interesting things about yourself that our listeners may not know and your friends will be surprised to learn.

Paula Rosenfeld (21:13.784)
 Well, my friends may or may not be this surprised to learn that I was a spiritual geek from the get-go. Like in high school when everyone else was joining clubs and participating in athletics, I was going to the school library to read sacred texts, spiritual writings like the Bhagavad Gita, which is an ancient spiritual scripture from the Hindu religion. So anyway, I was a quiet little spiritualist, spiritual geek. And then another thing was, not surprisingly along those lines, I had a spontaneous mystical experience when I was about 17 or 18 maybe. I had this mystical experience that totally impacted my understanding of life and death. I had gone to the beach near my house on Lake Michigan, one of the big Great Lakes in the Midwest of the U.S. I'd gone to that beach one snowy winter night in December with my boyfriend and he was taking photos.
 Paula Rosenfeld (22:31.109)
 I wandered off to a different part of the beach and I was just looking at big mounds of snow and then all of a sudden everything seemed to stand still, like time stood still. And I went into a freeze frame. There was no sound. I was totally unaware of my surroundings and this sort of insight, a big insight, a powerful insight dropped into me. And that was that I was like a drop of water in this big lake. I was also the wave that comes to shore, that rises up and comes to shore. And then I would be returned to the water, to the oneness of the water as source. So it was a big experience of oneness in a very, for me at that time, life-changing sort of event. And I wrote about it. And it ended really quickly, probably within a couple minutes, I heard my boyfriend's voice. And I lurched back into reality. And I was back on that beach.
 But it was a little way, a little heightened experience of truth. That's how I perceived it. So that was the second time, or the second thing that I want to share. And then the third thing I'll share is a whole other side of me during those high school years, which was incredibly shy and insecure.
 Paula Rosenfeld (24:38.681)
 I felt something was wrong with me, like I was defective in some way, that I wasn't normal, I wasn't like other people. And I happened to have a big nose, I would say, a nose I inherited from my dad. It looked very much like his. And my parents assumed I was self-conscious about it.
 I was just self-conscious about everything, I think. But my mother came to me and said, would you like a nose job? So I said, sure. So I had my bump removed from my nose. And so that to me was sort of the epitome of cluelessness. Because even as these mystical experiences were opening up for me, there I was totally concerned about how I looked. And I tried for the next decade at least to be valued and approved of for my looks. Till finally I got it. It's not about how you look, it's who you are on the inside. But.
 You know, I laugh about that now, but you couldn't pay me to go back to my teens and twenties.
 That also opened me up to a lot of compassion. It's what a lot of people struggle with in this day and age. We're exposed to images of models and actresses and actors. It's all about how sexy you are, how you look, how much the opposite sex desires you. So I was caught up in that.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (26:29.551)
 Mm, Paula, thank you. I just want to go back to what you referred to as your spontaneous mystical experience. Have you had more since or is that the only one that you've had?

Paula Rosenfeld (26:44.441)
 I have had many now, you know, in the shamanic journey, in the oneness work, the meditations. I kind of view life as very miraculous when we stop and turn within. We are walking miracles.
 And I've grown into a mature focus on helping people to awaken to the oneness that unites us all.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (27:40.089)
 Thank you, Paula. Can you tell us about a recent accomplishment or success that you're particularly proud of?

Paula Rosenfeld (27:50.17)
 Well, I'm really proud of my 31 years as a shamanic practitioner and Akashic record reader and coach. I just feel that it's been a hard journey.
 When I started, very, very few people were tuned in to alternative healing. It was just sort of getting off its feet. Starting my practice in 1994, 31 years ago, it was an uphill climb. And now, you know, life has come really pretty far.
 I don't have to get completely shocked or puzzled looks when I tell people what I do. Most of the time they don't understand. But if I say it's like Reiki, people get that because that's more in the common domain now. So I'm proud of that.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (29:07.183)
 Please tell us about a time when you made a difference in another's life. What were the circumstances? Paint a picture for me.

Paula Rosenfeld (29:16.181)
 Okay, so again, I kind of feel like my work is a blessing. And almost all the sessions have some form of amazing synchronicity, or, you know, miraculous insight that opens up. But I will give you an example from one of my clients who—
 It was such a clear-cut event that neither she nor I could deny how actively Spirit was trying to get through to her. So she was, we had had a few sessions of the shamanic work.
 She was still going through some stuff in her life. She had come originally to me to heal some childhood stuff, but also she really wanted a stronger spiritual connection. And so she was driving along in her car one day and going through kind of a tough little period of time and was remembering a song that she had loved, that she used to listen to when she was, I guess, younger, a song that was about encouragement and staying with it, persevering. And so she was singing that song to herself. And then all of a sudden, as she's driving, the tollway transponder on her windshield—
 I don't know if you know what that is, but it gives you free access to the tollway and then you pay for it later. Anyway, it was stuck to the windshield and then all of a sudden the transponder became unstuck. It fell off the windshield at a certain trajectory so that it turned on her radio.

Paula Rosenfeld (31:23.019)
 And when the radio came on, the song that was playing was the song she had been singing to herself.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (31:33.252)
 Wow.

Paula Rosenfeld (31:33.389)
 Now what are the chances, right? What are the chances? So from that point on, she had a much stronger understanding of how spirit was with her and her life continued to change. Her job developed in an extraordinary way and her job is still evolving. She's doing a lot more work that's authentic to her and her gifts and her interest, and did a lot of healing with the childhood stuff. So there you have it. I mean, grateful. I'm grateful. She's grateful. Yeah, this work can change lives.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (32:27.619)
 Given the story that you've just told, what were the key strengths and qualities you relied on to make a difference?

Paula Rosenfeld (32:36.334)
 Well, I would say that my work asks me to have a lot of faith, just as much as it asks my clients to have faith. In every session, I have to have faith that spirit will do for my clients what they need.
 And I have to have faith that I can be what's known in shamanism as a hollow bone.
 It's like a clear channel, a clear channel for the divine, for spirit, whatever you want to call it.
 And there's many names for it, by the way. I call it spirit or the divine. Many people call it God, universe, love.
 All that is, there's so many names for it. Angels, you know, whatever your name is for it. It's something far greater than what we are.

Paula Rosenfeld (33:47.002)
 For living a life of the mind. Anyway, spirit's asking me to have faith that I can do this, that I can be a channel, that I can express to my clients in a way that they understand what healing was done for them or what guidance they're being given. So.
 Having faith is a big thing. Also, I strive to be authentic and full of integrity. And I kind of feel as a practitioner like myself, all you really have is your integrity. Because people do take a leap of faith to have these services.
 Trust that they're going to be given what they need and want.

Paula Rosenfeld (34:49.003)
 So, and maybe one more thing that I would say about a skill is that it's taken years to cultivate and will never end. And that's being able to surrender to a power greater.
 Surrender control, let go of control, let go is maybe an easier word for people to understand. A lot of people have a lot of fear about the word surrender, but it's about letting go of the grip of the mind. And so I have to let go to allowing a much higher perspective and a higher vibrational energy to move through me.
 Does that make sense?

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (35:41.271)
 Mm-hmm, it does. Thank you. Thank you. This is super interesting.

Paula Rosenfeld (35:44.205)
 Okay.

Paula Rosenfeld (35:49.561)
 Okay.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (35:52.121)
 Can you recall a situation where you overcame a challenge that led to personal growth? What did you learn from that experience?

Paula Rosenfeld (36:01.572)
 Well, I would say this experience was my initiation into doing the work I do. And it was a doozy. It was so, so hard.
 Ugh, I realized.
 At some point during my marriage that we had many difficulties and after my daughter was born the differences between us became very, very clear.
 My ex-husband was not spiritual, neither was the family I grew up in, my birth family. So really, I had no one that was, no one close to me that I was resonating with. And when my daughter was born, it completely broke open my heart. I felt tremendous joy in giving birth to her, having this beautiful baby, becoming a mother was a very spiritually powerful experience for me. And it really woke me up to the extent that I realized when she was about two and a half that I could not—

Paula Rosenfeld (37:23.324)
 be my authentic self within that marriage. And at that point I had stopped working as a realtor. I don't know if I mentioned I was a realtor.
 Starting at about age 30 and when I met her dad, I was selling real estate because I didn't know what to do with myself after I graduated college. I had a degree in English lit because I love to read and write and yet that was not very marketable. So I went from job to job trying to find myself and I just kind of fell into selling real estate. And it turned out, oddly, I was quite good at it and I did well financially. However, in selling real estate, I had sort of put my spirituality into remission, is how I think about it, sort of pushed it under and took on a cloak, a cloak, you know, a personality of being a realtor. I took on a cloak of being a wife. I wanted to be normal, quote, normal.
 Because I felt I had never fit in exactly very well. I didn't have an idea of who I was and what I was supposed to do in life. I didn't have a purpose. Then I had my daughter and everything exploded open. So I could not go back to selling real estate after she was born because your schedule is so erratic and nights and weekends. So when I got divorced,

Paula Rosenfeld (39:11.066)
 I knew I would have to find something else to do and I had no idea what that was going to be. I basically took a huge leap. I knew I couldn't stay in the marriage. I didn't know how I was going to be able to leave the marriage exactly and support my daughter and me. But I made this very wrenching decision that I would go ahead and I took the leap.
 And spirit caught me. I fell into serendipitously someone who suggested I check out being a massage therapist. I got trained for that. I loved it. I could be a single mom and also work out of my home doing massage therapy and work a couple days at a Holistic Center when my daughter was in school. So getting a start as a massage therapist opened me up to the world of energy healing. And I studied Reiki and other forms of energy healing. And that's when I discovered shamanism, as I told you earlier at that bookstore talk. And that completely altered my course and helped me heal hugely from my own traumas from my life. Anyway, one more opportunity dropped in that was to write the book, you know, because my path had been very varied in the healers, many different kinds of healing that I was studying and I had gone to India and incorporated a lot of that into my healing work.

Paula Rosenfeld (41:09.854)
 So yeah, I had to take a leap and spirit caught me and the rest is history. Did I grow from it? Absolutely. I had no choice. I had no choice. And I'm so grateful that as hard as that decision was and that challenge of being a single mom working in a field that was pretty much off the beaten track. Somehow I came through it and my daughter turned out just fine.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (41:53.473)
 You are listening to A.B. Wilson's Heart of the Matter podcast.
 Welcome back to A.B. Rosenfeld's Heart of the Matter. My guest today is Paula Rosenfeld. Paula, we've talked about your shamanic journey, the work that you do. We've talked about what led you to this path. We've also talked about a little about raising your daughter and the pride that you feel having accomplished that.
 What self-care practices or strategies help you to sustain your energy and motivation while navigating your journey?

Paula Rosenfeld (42:40.666)
 I think meditation is crucial for me and I recommend it for everyone. I rely on a daily meditation in which I ground myself in the earth, you know, connecting with the earth so that I can stay present on earth and feel I belong here. I ground myself in the energies of the cosmos, you know, of the all that is, so I feel connected to the divine and I connect myself to my heart so that I'm leading with my heart open. And I call that connecting all of that connecting with my higher self. So I rely on that every day. I start my day with that and sometimes end my day with that as well. I also view my body as the temple of my soul. So I'm very mindful of what I eat. I try and eat mainly organic foods. I exercise. I've got a dog that keeps me really busy.
 Three walks a day. So I get my walking in and at night, I have a little habit of working with isometric, you know, stretch bands and doing exercises to strengthen muscles and flexibility. So that's, you know, that's the backbone of my life and keeps me grounded and connected for the most part.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (44:22.431)
 How long do you tend to meditate for in the morning?

Paula Rosenfeld (44:26.616)
 You know, it's pretty quick, like 10 minutes. One blessing of my work is that I'm in a meditation when I'm doing it. So on the days I'm working, I'm mainly in a form of meditation. Shamanic journeying is a form of meditation, reading the Akashic records. I go into a meditation coaching. I want to be sure I'm spiritually aligned and focused and clear. So I often do a little meditation prep before I coach as well. So yeah, it's a challenge to be a human now. And I think all of us really need some form of self-referencing to survive in the chaos that's going on nowadays.
 And meditation is a really good method. There's other methods. You know, I like tapping too. EFT, I don't know if you're familiar with that, yeah. And breath work and chanting. There's so many beautiful methods of staying spiritually connected and grounded.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (45:40.271)
 Hmm.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (45:58.617)
 How might sharing your experiences of success and growth create a positive ripple effect in your family, community, the world?

Paula Rosenfeld (46:08.718)
 Well, I do try and share my experiences with my family members to a limited extent. Like I said, they're either agnostic or atheist or something. However, my daughter did turn out to be a therapist, so she got the value of looking within.
 My close friends generally are like me, so we support each other and our work ripples out. I definitely believe the ripple effect is working because of the fact in my own career, it became much more acceptable to be seeking alternative therapies. And the young people nowadays are very, very interested for the most part in expanding their consciousness and exploring alternative therapies or complementary atherod, complementary sources of healing to medicine. I have to be careful and say what I do is not medical help, it's not psychological help, it's spiritual help. It's spiritual healing. And I would never say don't follow medical advice, I would not say that. But spirituality, spiritual healing—

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (47:25.487)
 Hmm.

Paula Rosenfeld (47:49.837)
 Works to heal the spiritual roots of issues that have developed into perhaps physical or psychological problems.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (48:20.345)
 Thank you, Paula. Thank you for sharing. What exciting opportunities do you see on the horizon? How do these opportunities align with your passions and aspirations?

Paula Rosenfeld (48:33.402)
 Well, I'm 72 and nowhere near retiring. I have lots of projects I'd like to bring forward. My passion is working individually with people, but I also periodically facilitate shamanic journey circles and coaching circles on various topics. There's an endless amount of topics that I could be helping to facilitate. I also would love to write or finish writing another book that I've been working on for many years because I am not disciplined in writing, I'm afraid. Just being honest. So this book is dragged on for many years and I would love to finish it in the next year or so. And it's different than the other book I wrote. It's more of a spiritual autobiography with fantasy sort of mixed in.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (49:37.945)
 Hmm.

Paula Rosenfeld (49:41.129)
 So it's challenging me and I'm excited about still having that project in the wings.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (49:50.191)
 Well, I'm going to encourage you to finish the book. A writer once said, write every day. If you're a writer, write every day. So a page a day, a word a day, a sentence a day, paragraph, so you can get it finished and published.

Paula Rosenfeld (50:08.462)
 You are absolutely right. I know that. Do I do it? Not always, no. I go through spells. Anyway.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (50:12.692)
 Hahaha!

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (50:20.633)
 Paula, what brings you joy?

Paula Rosenfeld (50:23.642)
 The biggest thing that brings me joy is nature. I love, I love oceans, lakes, rivers, mountains, fields, forest preserves.
 I try and get out in nature, do it with the dog. It's part of my plan and having a dog gets me outside three times a day. But I've been very blessed that I've gotten to travel a lot to places with a lot of beautiful natural beauty. My daughter lives in Colorado, so there's the mountains there. We met up, she and I met up in Hawaii last spring and spent a week on the ocean surrounded by mountains and I was in heaven. So yeah, nature has always been a great form of joy for me.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (51:23.243)
 And we're nearing the end of our conversation. What book recommendation do you have? It can be a book that you've read or written recently or something that has stayed with you over the years.

Paula Rosenfeld (51:40.572)
 Well, the first book, I have a couple I can mention. The first one is just—I don't know if you can see it. It's called Soul Retrieval, Mending the Fragmented Self by Sandra Ingerman. She was my original shamanic teacher. I still take classes and events. I go to events with her. This book has been translated into many languages. It's kind of a landmark book on shamanic soul retrieval and extraction.
 I recommend it to my clients and anyone else who wants to read more about what this ancient form of healing is all about. Another book, if I might mention another, okay. Michael Singer's work has had a huge impact on me. He wrote The Untethered Soul.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (52:32.612)
 Yeah, go ahead.

Paula Rosenfeld (52:46.139)
 The Journey Beyond Yourself. Michael Singer is a number one New York Times bestseller, completely about awakening, freeing yourself from the prison of the mind. He had a very personal journey of awakening that he shares. It's a great book.
 And then of course, I'll just throw out the title of my own book just in case anyone wants to check out more about Diksha. So Diksha is an energy transmission. And as I mentioned, it first appeared in India through these avatars that I've studied with Sri Yama and Sri Bhagavan. And my book is called The Oneness Blessing, How Diksha Can Help You Become Your Authentic Self, Heal Your Relationships, and Transform the World.

Paula Rosenfeld (53:52.47)
 So I talked a little about that book and how I interviewed awakened people. So I just have to warn anyone who does want to read that. I wrote it in 2015 and all the websites in there are no longer correct because the organization reorganized itself.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (53:56.793)
 Mm-hmm.

Paula Rosenfeld (54:14.863)
 You know how technology is, those things do change. So anyway, the book still says a lot about leading an awakened life. So those. Yeah, it's called From the Heart Center dot com. From theheartcenter dot com.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (54:26.517)
 And do you have a website?

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (54:40.463)
 Okay, I'll put it on the website so people can find you and together with your book recommendations, I'll make sure that people can get in contact.

Paula Rosenfeld (54:51.535)
 Thank you. Yeah. Thank you so much.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (54:59.449)
 Paula, is there anything else? Do you have any final thoughts?

Paula Rosenfeld (55:04.059)
 Yes, I would love to say to people, do not give up on yourself and don't give up on this crazy world. Yes, we have really terrible challenges right now all over the world and it's never been more important to look within yourself, to heal your own wounds, to see your own conditioning that's come through ancestors and religion and society, and free yourself where your conditioning and when your conditioning is limiting you. Because when you can do that, and this is what Michael Singer talks about when he says the untethered soul, untethered from the mind. When you can do that, you're able to live an authentic life and bring forth your own unique, authentic gifts and talents. And because of that ripple effect, it will change the world. So don't give up and ask for help and support. We all need each other. We need each other when we're feeling stuck or lonely or just blocked in any way from living our best life and really reaching for our potential. So ask for help if you need that. Your potential really matters.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (56:45.967)
 Paula, thank you. Thank you for sharing. As I said earlier, I've learned a lot. There's a lot of things I didn't know. And you've helped educate not just me, but anybody who listens to this conversation. And if they're even more curious, they'll be able to get in contact with you and understand more about the work that you are doing and maybe even get healing for themselves. So I just want to go over a few points that I made on what I call appreciation nuggets. And based on some of the things I heard you say, that you are a channel for helping spirits to translate the healing to others.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (57:49.389)
 The mind should serve the heart, is serving the greater good.

Paula Rosenfeld (57:56.997)
 Yes.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (58:00.331)
 It is not about how you look, but who you are on the inside. You also said we are walking miracles and the work that you are doing can, does and will change lives.

Paula Rosenfeld (58:17.179)
 Thank you.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (58:17.711)
 Paula, thank you for your time today. I appreciate you joining me on A.B. Rosenfeld's Heart of the Matter, a podcast dedicated to asking overwhelmingly positive questions as we uncover incredible stories and wisdom of people you may know. Paula Rosenfeld, thank you so much.

Paula Rosenfeld (58:41.167)
 Thank you, Aderonke. What a pleasure to be here. Thank you.

Aderonke Bademosi Wilson (58:46.383)
 Thank you.