For the Love of Creatives

#051: What If Freedom Means Loving What You Love, No Matter Who Leaves With CarolLaine M. Garcia

• Maddox & Dwight • Episode 51

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What if the most honest version of you is the one you’ve been avoiding? We sit down with CarolLaine M. Garcia, PhD, coach, and self-proclaimed embodied liberation guide...whose life arcs from early loss and academic rigor to a radical creative rebirth that refuses to live in separate boxes. This conversation moves from hotel rooms and elite consulting perks to long pandemic walks where anger finally had space to breathe, and to a breeze that felt like ancestors saying, we’re with you.

CarolLaine takes us inside the year she read 135 books and why that avalanche of ideas wasn’t the finish line but the starting gun. Information shook her foundations; embodiment rebuilt them. She unpacked the difference between knowing and becoming through daily practices—morning pages, meditation, movement... that turned creativity into a living rhythm. The Artist’s Way gave language and structure to a truth she resisted: she isn’t just adjacent to art, she makes it. That shift challenged relationships, labels, and the quiet rules that tell women what makes them valuable.

We talk values—inner harmony, creativity, wisdom... and how they now shape every choice. CarolLaine explains why choosing a child-free life expanded her sense of legacy, how reconciling both colonized and colonizer ancestry in Portugal helped heal old fractures, and why she’s designing a three-year, decolonial “art school” for herself instead of chasing credentials. She’s learning watercolor, dreaming murals, practicing piano, and building systems that let her turn feeling into form. Expect candor, laughter, a few cage rattles, and a clear invitation: love what you love, even if it means shedding what doesn’t love you back.

If this story moved you, follow the show, share it with a friend who needs courage, and leave a review to help more creatives find us. What practice will you commit to this week to keep you honest with yourself?

CarolLaine's Profile
CarolLaine's Website

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SPEAKER_00:

Like, don't talk to me because I'm gonna be fucking more unstoppable, more of a force of nature. But it is so scary to me as I sit surrounded by like I took watercolor earlier this year and hardest classes that I've ever taken, PhD included, right? So as I'm in this tour by myself, my last day there, I had this thought like, I think I want to go to art school. And then I saw myself having a thought, and I'm like, that's so aggressive. Like, I don't want to actually go through art school, but I want the experience of art school. And so then I'm like, you know, continuing to go along in the tour, and I was like, what if as a creator, I created my own art school.

SPEAKER_03:

Hey, you're listening to for the Love of Creatives Podcast. This is Maddox. I'm joined by Dwight. Hello. We are the Connections and Community Guys. And today our guest is Caroline M. Garcia. Hello, Caroline. Hi. So glad to have you. So the listeners know we just met Caroline two days ago. We were at Creative Mornings and bumped into her, had a little conversation, and Dwight asked her if she'd like to be a guest on the podcast. And here she is. We don't know very much about her, but we've gotten just enough of a glimpse to know this is going to be a great story. So stay tuned. And here we go. I'm going to turn it over to you, Caroline, and let you tell our audience a little bit about who you are and what you're about.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. It's so great to be here in Dwight. Thank you again for your courage in approaching me. Dwight just rolled out to a conversation that I was in and introduced himself with a smiling face. And I so appreciate when people just roll up into a conversation. Like I'm always like, How did you, how did you do that? Like, what weren't you stressed? Like, weren't you anxious? Didn't you think that you might be rejected? So I really appreciate that. Um, you pulling me in in that way. Um, so I'm Doctora Caroline Garcia, and I created my own title because nothing that I had ever done in life felt like it fit me. Um, I'm a former consultant, I am a former strategist in corporate America. I followed the button-up road for 10 years, um, have a PhD in organizational psychology. And after a series of spiritual, feminine, cultural, a plethora of awakenings, I was like, I don't think that this is what I'm supposed to do with my life. I don't think this is the impact I'm supposed to make. I don't know what the impact is, but I have to go figure that out. Um, so when I started my journey, I was a joy coach and I went out into the community and I'm like, I'm gonna help people find joy in their lives. And the universe said, lol. And the journey that I've been on the last two and a half years, in combination with the creative awakening that I had, led me to call myself now an embodied liberation guide. And what that means is I teach liberation, not necessarily just through the mind. I teach it through energy. The chakras is one of my methods. I teach it through the spirit and I teach it through the body. Um, helping people to reclaim their bodies, their hearts, their minds, and their spirits so that they can befriend the unknown within them, which is where creativity and liberation lies. It is not from our persona, what we present to the world. It is from the fear that we have about who we might be, who we could be, who we have been. And I just help people to connect with those parts of themselves. So that shows up in keynotes and in retreats. It shows up in coaching and teaching in the community, um, just teaching people to see their shadow and befriend it and not destroy it for the purpose of learning how to coexist with everything that is on this planet, because I really want humanity to learn how to get along with itself. Um, so that's what I teach. And I'm happy to be here today.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, we're so glad that you agreed to join us. Uh, I know that this can be kind of a heavy lift for some people. A lot of people who, well, uh a lot of artists in particular are are not really um thrilled about talking about themselves. And, you know, this this is something I'm told that it's kind of a universal fear that people have public speaking. But uh I I think it's just like I approached you in in that setting where, you know, yeah, we I didn't know you from Adam, and you said something that perked my ears up. I I look at it like this. We're at something that's kind of a social event to go and and meet people. Well, if you don't do it, then you're kind of failing at it.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Right? Like what why'd you waste your time?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh well, and and I want to acknowledge Dwight because people don't realize this that haven't met him or don't know him, but he's a dyed-in-the-wool introvert. I mean, so so walking up to strangers and things like that is kind of against his his nature, but um he's become quite good at it. Better than me at it, really. You'll see me as the outgoing one, and he walks up to total strangers easy to find. I love it. So you said something a few minutes ago. First of all, I want to say I love your energy. I the minute I walked up and shook your hand, it was like, wow, you I can tell already you are a force of nature.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, you are a force of nature. So you talked about the awakening. And I I want to know, and I know our listeners want to know the nuts and bolts about that. How did it come about? What happened as you went through it? And then who were you? And what did you know when you got to the other side? And we can just do that layer, we'll just unpack that one layer at a time.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So I felt like for much of my life there were like these two versions of me. There was the version of me that everybody wanted me to be, followed all the rules, obedient, good woman, just like no hair out of place. There was that version of me. And then there was this wild, rambunctious, rebellious, fuck all of that side of me that was literally the antithesis of that other part. And because I've been studying psychology since I was 16 and philosophy, I thought I was having like a split personality, the beginning of a split personality. And I'm like, oh my God, I think I'm having a psychotic break. Like, what is happening? Because they were such opposing forces to me that I'm like, surely this cannot coexist in the same body. I must be developing two different personalities. Like, what do I do? And it was way back when I was getting my PhD after I had ended my engagement. So my father died when I was 21 after my first year of my PhD program. And when he died, my idea of marriage shattered because he was supposed to walk me down the aisle. And in my mind, at 21, if one thing is out of place, the whole thing is like thrown into chaos. So I'm like, well, if my father isn't gonna walk me down the aisle, am I walking down the aisle? And so within, so my father died July 13th. And within five months of him dying, I broke up with my ex-fiance that I had been with for six months. So that was the beginning of chaos. But it was like, I was almost going through an experience that like a 40-year-old woman would go through as a 22, I said 22-year-old. Like broken engagement, father has passed away, and I'm in a PhD program. So there were just so such grown experiences for a woman, a child, a young woman whose brain hadn't fully, you know, finished developing. Like, how do I coexist with this immense achievement and this immense grief at the same time? I had to show up to my PhD as perfect. And I entered my doctorate program with just a bachelor's degree. So I had never even had the rigor of a master's. I went straight in with a bachelor's and I was 20 years old. I couldn't even drink by the time I started my PhD program. Not until a month later. So it was just like so many things were happening. That was one of the first breaks. So I went to therapy at that point, and I just sort of kind of pretended like I could just forget that my father died. I could like forget my ex-fiance. I could just forget the version of me that had experienced all of that. And I just like fragmented. And that stayed like that for like 12 years. And then the pandemic came. And I couldn't escape anymore. I couldn't travel. That was my escape. I used to be one of those girlies who's like catch flights, not feelings. Well, there were no flights to catch. And it couldn't go anywhere. You couldn't even see your friends. I didn't want to risk killing anybody. So I didn't go out. And I was like going crazy, being with myself all the fucking time. And I'm like, I don't think I'm gonna survive this pandemic. Because at the time when I was doing research about it, I'm like, it takes typically 10 to 12 years to find a vaccine. I'm not gonna make it. I'm not gonna make it 10 years of this. And so I ended up buying a house in the in that period when the market crashed. Um, and then started building my home, which is like now like my cave, my woman's cave. Um, and so the first, I'll say this um, because I I don't want to tell you everything without, you know, conversation. So I'll say this second sort of pivotal moment for me, and then I'll turn it back over to y'all. So the first break after the pandemic, I remember I was so angry at my life. I was angry that my father died. I was angry at my relationships not having worked out. I was angry at the pandemic. I was angry that people still kept going out because I just wanted the pandemic to hurry up and finish. So I could go back to being normal, go back to traveling, go back to like forgetting what I was just finding. And people wouldn't fucking stay home. You know? And I'm like, why are you going to bars and restaurants and traveling? Like, if everyone would just stay home and follow the rules, then I could leave my house again, you know? And I remember one day I went out for a walk. It's like the only thing you could do, right? And I was like, I'm gonna walk until I stop being angry. And it was six and a half miles. I was so exhausted. So two hours later, I come home and I'm like, oof, I think I got some things to work out. And it was in one of those walks, like I would I would kind of start to replay my life story. I started to understand what had happened to me because now I had the space to just be with myself. And I started to get to know what is my chatter. And I started to see like how much resentment I had about my life. Um, and then one day on one of those walks, you know, I'd felt very alone in that time. One day, one of those walks, I felt this like I was thinking about life, and I felt this massive breeze come around me and just sort of envelop me and sort of like hug my skin. And it was the first time, and then I had this like immediate like thought vision before I knew what downloads were, what channeling was. Um, and the vision that came to mind is my father and my great aunt, who served as my grandmother figure to me, who also had passed away a couple of years after I finished my PhD. And there was this sense of, we're with you. And I was like, oh no, I'm having another psychotic break because this is this is not of this world. And that was when I started to realize there was more to life than just the material world. So I'll I'll pause there.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, we tend to look back at the pandemic as this really, really bad thing. And and this is a topic that we don't a conversation that we don't tend to have, but there were people that the pandemic brought immense gifts. You are describing immense gifts that came because you were forced to be with you. Yeah, I had immense gifts. I what I I had when the pandemic hit, less than 90 days earlier, I had retired from a 40-year career.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow.

SPEAKER_03:

And thought I wanted, knew just exactly what I wanted to do in my next stage. Well, during the pandemic, when I had time to just sit with me, I found out no, not so much. That's not what I want to do. And I don't know that I would have come to that if it hadn't been for all that time alone, locked in my house by myself. Um, there were many other things. I could go on and on, but this is today's your story. But I I just want to say, wow. Um we we do, we do need to give our all of us need to give ourselves an opportunity to look back on the pandemic and and look for the silver linings instead of demonizing it to to realize that there was some good shit that came out of that.

SPEAKER_04:

I just want to say my my heart goes out to you for having suffered so mildly before. I mean, to be as young as you were and to lose your father, that's uh that's intense, and to be going through a rigorous program like that where you're you're expected to perform, you're expected to produce.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And uh the weight that you were going through with um redefining even what things would look like. I mean, my goodness. I I applaud you for taking the the measured step of calling off the engagement um you know in the time that you did and without anyone getting hurt, because you were caring a lot, and I I guess the we're we're told to look at the gifts that come from everything. By the time the pandemic hit, you had been through it.

SPEAKER_00:

I was I was done with life. Life had life to me. I was like, I've I'm 80 years old in terms of life experiences. Like, what else what else do you want to give me? Um, I didn't even realize I was it was challenging to go through what I went through. I just thought you're not doing it good enough. You should you should be over this.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, and this was a major contributor to you being a force of nature.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

You know our our greatest wounds sometimes become our our greatest gift. It takes a while for it to come full circle, you know, but you realize all of a sudden you are who you are because of those experiences. I have experiences that I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. But I wouldn't trade for them now either because I wouldn't be who I am if it had you would not be the Caroline sitting here having this conversation if you hadn't gone through the loss of your dad at an early age, the the rigors of a doctorate and everything else that you've listed.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I'm pretty I'm pretty impressed with that version of myself. Like I wouldn't do that today. Like if somebody was like, You're gonna get a PhD, I'm like, absolutely not. So it was just like amazing that I casually strolled into a PhD program that I didn't actually want to do. I wanted to just get a master's. A PhD felt like a little too hard. And I got a PhD because I got a fellowship. I it was I didn't have this like great desire to create knowledge or to be, I wanted to be a doctor because my father was a doctor. So there was that legacy. But like I like pass out when I see blood. So I knew that medical was not gonna be the route for me. Um, but I my PhD, like when people are like, Oh, why did you get your PhD? I'm like, because I got a scholarship. It wasn't, and I could. I was like, well, I never want to go back to school after I'm done. But it was just so wild to look at that version of myself, and I'm like, who gets a PhD just because they can? Like, that is not the activity that people are like, oh, well, just try it, you know, we'll see what happens. Um, so I have mad respect for that version of me now. But at the time, I didn't think I was good enough because I'm like, I'm doing something that no one in my family has done.

SPEAKER_04:

I I really want to pull on a thread. Uh seeing what you went through, you had to have built a community there. You had to have had uh advisors who believed in you and could pull you through when uh there's no way you kept under wraps that you you're dad had passed.

SPEAKER_00:

No, no, no.

SPEAKER_04:

So what what was that like to have someone to build that bridge to make it to where you could get get to the other side of that program and just life?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, um, my mom is a force of nature herself. So I get it from I have I come from two Tiro Blazers. Um, my mother, she actually has my original diploma. This diploma is a copy. She has the original one at her house, and she just when she has a vision, is locked. That's it. And so she wanted to, she dreamt about coming to the US when she was 11. Um, and come hell or high water, like she was gonna make it here. She's like, I want the next generation to be American, and it's it happened. Um, my brother's kids, some of them don't speak Spanish. Like that's how much Americanized they became. And so she, when she first came to the States, she was 35 and had two kids. Didn't she only had a traveler's visa, didn't speak a lick of English. And she was like, I don't know how, but I'm gonna figure it out. And this was pre-internet. So it wasn't like, you know, you could join a program on how to become a citizen, you know, she just thugged it out, like her and other family members. And so when I was in my doctorate program, I wanted to quit like every week. This wasn't like I was locked, I was not locked into the vision. I was like, I'm being forced to do this. This is bullshit. And I was consistently complaining about how much I hated research in my doctorate. Like to anybody who would be willing to listen, like I would actively tell my advisor, like, I hate research. And she's like, You're in a PhD program. I'm like, I hear what you're saying. But this still doesn't change the way I feel about what we know is happening. And I I knew that I was never gonna be an academic. It was too jargony for me. First of all, English is my second language, and PhD is a third language because the jargon that they use is insane. So I would go to class and I would read journal articles, and I'm like, I don't think I know English. Like, I don't know what that was, but I know I individually understand these words and I know they exist, but I don't know what the fuck this is. And so my mom was a primary person of like, you will regret it forever. And I would have. You will regret it forever if you if you quit, just keep going. She wouldn't necessarily tell me how to keep going. She would just tell me, keep going, figure it out. So then I'd, you know, started to um, we would have study groups, my classmates would have study groups. Um, I had at that point two sets of friends after I broke up with my ex-fiance. I had like my PhD friends and they kept me studious. And then I had like my party friends and they kept me grounded. So I was like Monday through Thursday. I like this is why I also thought I had a split personality. Monday through Thursday, I was Caroline. I was studious, I was paying attention, I was writing papers, I was like into the jargon. And then Thursday through Sunday, I was Maria, which is my middle name. And she was out here just living, like going to parties, getting drunk, making out with strangers, just being wild child. And Monday, I'm Caroline, and then Thursday, you know? And so, and then that was like one version of me. And then when I would go home, then there was another Caroline and Maria that was Dominican. And now I'm Caroline and Maria in Spanish. So it was just like so many things that I was juggling at the same time. And it so happened, and again, it wasn't something that I appreciated at the moment. But everybody around me was like pretty impressed by the way that I was able to be so studious and so fun. Because a lot of PhDs, like, they're not fun. They're not, they're so intellectualized that they're like, they don't know how to let loose. They they've become so competent, they've become incompetent and fun. Okay. Or they only know how to have fun at the conferences where they get, you know, drunk, and that's like their one escape of the year. I was escaping every week, you know? Um, so I I just was likable. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_03:

You had the best of all worlds, yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

I mean, I was 22. So I was living like a 22-year-old with a 40-year-old life experience.

SPEAKER_03:

You could transform yourself to be in whatever environment you found yourself. There's not a lot of people that can do that, Caroline. Yeah, not to the degree. And I and I also want to back up for a minute and say, okay, for English being your second language, your English is flawless.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you. I work on it.

SPEAKER_03:

Like, wow.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, and it I I think it's great that you could find a way to divide yourself. Well, to the point that you you were just suspecting that you had altars. So am I to take that um as a sign that you take integrity as as being something that's highly valued now?

SPEAKER_00:

Absolutely. I love the truth, and I love being in my truth. Um, and so that that made me feel, and all of these things, by the way, that I'm sharing with y'all, I've just had this realization this week. Because I've been working on my book for a decade, and I've been working with a book coach, and I was like, bro, do you know how hard it is to weave my story together in a cohesive way when there was like seven Carolines that I got to put together? It's the same story. Like, where were they, did they know each other? And so um figuring out how to weave them all together into a sense of self, like what I realized is why it felt so uncomfortable for me is because I felt like I was lying. I'm like, who I am here is wildly different than who I am here. And you think that I'm this respectable Dr. Garcia, and then Friday night I'm shaking my ass and hang like making out with some dude that I just met. Because I, when I broke up with my ex fiance, he's the only man I had ever kissed. And I will like create a goal out of whatever the fuck I want to. So I've created a goal that I was like, I want to make out with 25 people to so I can witness different kissing styles. And I met my goals, okay?

SPEAKER_03:

Congratulations. You know, what what you're describing is what I would call multifaceted, and that makes you extremely interesting.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you. Yes.

SPEAKER_03:

Let's talk about the awakening. We've got we've talked about what built up to the awakening. Let's talk about the awakening now.

SPEAKER_00:

Okay. Which one?

SPEAKER_03:

Well, whatever one you want to share. What whatever aspect of that you want to share.

SPEAKER_00:

Um, so when I was working at Deloitte's, I used to uh travel 80% of the time and I loved it. I was living this like high-flying lifestyle. I was getting all kinds of points and all kinds of reward systems, you know, being up to first class for the first time in my life and walking into spaces where typically only older white men were and just sitting down as a 32-year-old and be like, yeah, I belong here. Um, staying in five-star hotels that I didn't have to pay for, having a corporate car that I had like up to like a$200 a day limit on what I could eat. It was like incredible. I remember one time we went out to this restaurant in New York, um, and they had tableside cannoli where they would like literally fill the cannoli right next to you. And I fucking love cannoli. So I was like, oh my God, is this heaven? Like this, this was it's like a core memory of mine to have those kinds of experiences. And so life moved so fast. And I felt like I was disconnected from Dallas because I could only see my friends on the weekends, and I'd come home and I'd have to like unpack and and figure out, put some food in the fridge, but not too much food because I didn't want it to go bad. And then whatever friends I had, I had to see them on the weekend because I was gone. And it was so lonely, so lonely to like work all day and then go and stay in hotel rooms where you were anonymous every single week, you know? Like I literally, the airport, the airplane was my commute vehicle. I got so used to being at DFW, I just knew how to go into whatever gate, um, what the process was, what the system was, and all of that. And in 2019, um, I started reading again. So one of the uh like aftershocks of getting my doctorate was I didn't want to read at all. Period. I was like, I'm done with words and only read fiction if I read at all. And then after like 10 years, I started to miss it. And so I started to do, I was like, well, since I have to be uh working so much and I'm gone so much, and my the song that I would tell my mom is like Monday, you know, I'm texting her, I'm getting up three, four, five in the morning to catch the first flight, uh typically to go to Newark or San Francisco or whatever. And then I would always look forward to Thursday. So I was living this like rat racing where I was always like hating Mondays, looking forward to Thursday, hating Mondays, looking forward to Thursdays. I'd start dreading Monday on Sunday, and then Friday there was some relief, but then Saturday I wasn't fully enjoying because I was already thinking about Sunday, and then Sunday, you know, it was like this whole thing every single week. Didn't matter what project or what team or what it was. And so I started listening to audio books as a way of like buying time. I'm like, okay, well, you know, while I'm commuting, let me listen to books. And I remember I had listened to a book about death in 2019. And I can't tell you what was in that book, but I remember I remember how I felt when I was listening to the book, and it was like confronted. And then I started read, so I started reading in earnest at that point. So I think I read, I went, I read 10 books that year, and that was 2019. 2020, I read 44 books. 2021, I read 135 books, and that fucked me up. So my goal for 2021 was I'm gonna read as many books as my age. And at that point, I was gonna turn 35. So I was like, I'll read 35 books. That feels manageable. I just read 44 books the previous year, that's fine. Well, I had I had met the goal in February, and I was like, okay, well, my friend, and then I had seen something that somebody posted, like a mom of a friend of mine, she had two kids and she read like 116 books. And I had this sense of imposter syndrome about being a woman that wouldn't have kids, like refuse to have kids, and being like, I can't let moms beat me in anything because I don't have the excuse of not having enough time. So I can't, I can't get overweight. I can't like not be perfect because I have the time, you know? So if you're doing it with children and a husband, like I have no excuse, right? And so she read 116 books, and I was my first thought was like, that's dumb. Like, why would you read that many books? Right. And then I was like, wait, like, I think I'm gonna do that. And so I was like, what if I read a hundred books? And I'm like, that's not challenging enough. What if I read 135 books? And so my friend had put me onto this resource where you could like check out books. And I did the math, and I was like, in order to reach that goal, I would have to read this many books per month, which means I'd have to read this many books per week. And given that I had just read a ton of books in the last year and a half, I was like, I can do that. So I did. I committed to it. I was reading eight to 13 books a month. It was insane. I had limits on the length of books in order to be able to hit the threshold. I had like my entire week was laid out by Monday, and I had a certain threshold of pages that I had to read per day to keep it up. I would say no to all experiences that kept me out of reading. And I would spend hours reading every day, just in a book. And so like Monday through Wednesday, I'd read a book. Like Wednesday through Friday, I'd read a book. And like on the weekend, I would read a book. It was insane. And so I'm reading black authors, white authors, um, Hispanic authors, Indian authors, women, men, gay people, trans, like I'm reading so many different voices. Cause I later, at the other side of it, I dissected the diversity of the authorship. And it was incredibly diverse, not by design. I just would like, okay, I read a book by a white man, let me read a book by a black woman, and that's kind of how I made it up. So if you may imagine, like, you know, you read a book, a nonfiction book at that, it's transformative. You read 10, it's life-changing. You read 30, it's extraordinary. You read 135, you have now questioned everything that you've ever thought about, everything. And I was existing, I literally felt like my head was just on a swivel. And I was existing in this sort of nebulous form where I'm like, I don't even know what the fuck I believe anymore, but it it is everything and nothing at the same time. Um, and it's taken me since that time, so four years, to embody that. And that's why I call myself an embody liberation guide versus just a liberation guide, because I had to apply what I'd learn versus just know what I'd learned. Um, but that was the beginning, it was my mind that awakened first. My body followed much later, but it was my mind that awakened first. And then I learned I had a spirit, and I didn't know that. So now I had this sense of maybe everything is unfolding with purpose. And if everything is unfolding on purpose, why would my life have happened the way that it did? And that was the beginning of a different type of healing journey outside of therapy. In therapy, I made peace with what had happened. In my spirit, in my spiritual journey, I found purpose in it, and that's where I exist now.

SPEAKER_04:

That's amazing. And I have to say that I have to applaud the tenacity that it takes to reach a goal, um, to set a really high one in the in the first place, and to make it happen. And at the same time, to acknowledge that going through something that intense, doing something that's that big of a trial, uh the only way that it's meaningful and the way that it works is that you have time to step back and absorb and fully embody the the whole thing, because otherwise, all that you're doing is continuing to continuing to apply more abuse after a certain point.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I I think you need to do a little research with Guinness Book of World Records and see if there's a place in there for you.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, it was it was I I couldn't even keep that up now. Like I have no desire to, but there was just this undeniable hunger to understand existence. I was reading about trauma and psychology and spirituality and emotions, but I was also reading about quantum physics and astrophysics and time and human history and different cultures. And I was like, what the fuck is all of this? What is this planet? Why are we here as a species? Why did humans evolve? What is time? Why do we come to form? Why are we born? Why do we die? What is death? Like, I was not understandable by most people around me for a long time because they would be like, How's the weather? And I'm like, What is time? And they're like, What the fuck? Like, I'm like, Why are you asking me about the weather? I want to know why do we know what time is? Like, where does it come from?

SPEAKER_03:

All that ruined superficial conversations for you.

SPEAKER_00:

I I can't. I ended up losing. I mean, I can talk through this later, but I, you know, when I first started to become a coach, like I said, I started out like saying I was gonna be a joy coach. And I knew that coaching was about transformation, but I actually didn't understand the difference between information and transformation. I literally had to Google the words like, what is information? What is transformation? Because to me, I had learned so much. And I'm like, well, as a coach, I'm just gonna tell you things. Oh, you want to learn about meditation? I write a book about meditation. Let me tell you about it, you know? And not realizing that I would then become this person who had to embody. I don't have to tell you about meditation. I can, I can show you what two years of daily meditation is like. I'm not gonna tell you about it. I'm showing you. I can tell you about journaling, or I can show you the 30 journals that I have and how that's helped transform my relationship with myself, you know? And so I didn't understand what transformation meant. And I thought that, you know, manifestation and vision planning and all of that was just like you, you, you just have these ideas, you want them, and then you just get them, but you don't necessarily have to change, nor does your environment have to change. But I realized that once you realize that you are created in love, and that was something that took me so long. Like you're created in love, therefore, in order to love what you love, what you desire, to like be securely attached to your desires, you have to let go of people, places, and things that don't love you loving what you love.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes. Very well said. Yeah, and that's I that hits squarely on uh a huge, a huge point where um a lot of people find themselves in the place where they think that they have to do what it is to please others and they miss out. You know, we a lot of us come to this realization later in life that if we can just go really deep on the things that light us up, that it's going to serve as a beacon for others who are drawn to those same things.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I've summed that up in a phrase. They're either you're either my people or you're not. You know, and the way I determine that is right out of the bat, I just get vulnerable. And it either makes them want to come and sit right next to me or it makes them scream and run in the opposite direction. And it's it's a beautiful thing, but yes, what what you just said is a yes, yes, yes.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I how did you word it? Well, say it again. I I want to hear that again.

SPEAKER_00:

I said something along these, I was like, I wrote like an excerpt of what I said. Um, transformation is you have to shed people, places, and things that don't love you loving what you love.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes. Oh my gosh, that is brilliant. That needs to be a meme. That needs to be plotted your book.

SPEAKER_02:

I just made it up.

SPEAKER_03:

That that is that's yeah, that's spot on.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00:

And I think the other side of it too is like when people don't love you loving what you love, is because they don't love what they love yet.

SPEAKER_03:

Yes.

SPEAKER_00:

And so you trigger them with that. They they either have to do something about it and they they're not ready to, they're not capable of yet, whatever. And so they react by repelling you.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

So the awakening. Now, now we've kind of covered that. Unless there's something you want to add, is there something you want to add about the awakening, or did that pretty much cover it?

SPEAKER_00:

I I'll add one more piece connected to my father that was like the most massive turning point that came as a result of then my creative awakening, because that part was missing. So I had had my spiritual awakening, I'd had an intellectual awakening. By the way, I didn't realize I was smart until I had read those books. And I remember, I remember like four months into my 135 book journey, and I was telling my mom, I'm like, mommy, I think I'm smart. And she's like, I got on. So, like when you got the PhD, that that wasn't the clue for you. And I was like, it wasn't.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, we're always clueless. All of us are mostly clueless to see who we are. We're the last to figure it out, usually.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, she's like, we really are. She's like, I don't get out of my face. Like, I don't even want to talk to you. So up until this point, it it kind of the way that I can describe it is like imagine that you have been told that the only meal that exists is like scrambled eggs and toast. And that's all you've eaten, that's all you've seen people around you eat, scrambled eggs and toasts, scrambled eggs and toasts. And then you get exposed to like culinary school and and you did you go to like different supermarkets. Because, you know, there are some parts of the world where, you know, we can go to a supermarket and pretty much get whatever we want to at will. But there's a lot of places in the world where that is not the reality, you know? And so not only do you go to culinary school and you get exposed to these different chefs, but then you go to these like Costco's and Sam's clubs of the world, and you're like, oh my God, there's like endless ingredients here. But that's where you stop, right? So that's where I was when I was, you know, doing all of that reading and spiritual awakening and intellectual awakening. I had gone to these places, but what I didn't believe yet was that I was a chef. So I had seen that other people can make different creations besides eggs and toast, but I didn't think that I could because I'm not a creative. I'm just a thinker. I am just someone that can admire someone's casserole, but I can't create my own thing. And so the artist's way then came online. So I have a friend of mine who I did my yoga teacher uh training with eight years ago, which was after one of my seven near death experiences that I've had, because that's also a whole other thing. And when we did that program, they assigned us to like somebody as a buddy, and she was my OMI. You know, OM is a symbol of the universe, and she was my OMI, and she still stayed my OMI, and we're such an unlikely best friendship because she is like seven years younger than me, white woman from Missouri. Like we would never meet out in the wild, kind of thing. She has a completely different job trajectory than I do. We have completely different friends, but we just like fell in love with each other, and she's like one of my soulmates. And over our relationship, friendship, she never had gifted me anything up until this particular year. And so she's like, I don't know why, but like I saw this book and I want to give it to you for your birthday. And I was like, okay. That year I had decided to go for my to my first writer's retreat because I was like, I'm ready to write this book. So I'm ready to start investing in, you know, my creativity. And the day before I left, we went to this meditation together and she gave me The Artist's Way. And she's like, I don't know if you have this book, if you've heard about it. I actually did have it in my um ebooks, but I just hadn't gotten to it yet. And so I was going to this writer's retreat because there was a particular author that was going to be there. Her name is Alex L, and she was the first black woman that I saw healing. And I was like, oh shit, it's possible. And when I so we flew out, I was in Santa Fe, New Mexico, which is its own like portal of healing and art. I'd never been to Santa Fe. It's the smallest airport I've ever been to in my entire life. And I get there and I'm one of those people that like, I make a plan, I don't know the details. I show up and I'm like, where am I staying? So like I'm in my phone, like checking like, where is the address for the place I'm going to to take this Uber to? And I happen to look at the schedule, and I see Julia Cameron is gonna be at this retreat. And I was like, that name is familiar. Where have I seen that? And I'm like, then I Google and I'm like, artist way, and I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? I'm gonna see this author that like wrote this book that my friend gave me, which I did not have, by the way. So I couldn't get signed. And I saw Julia Cameron, she's she's like 175 years old at this point. Um, but I saw her, and she has written like so many books, and like I'm in a room full of people from 18 to like 75 who just been wanting to write a book their whole lives and like haven't been able to do it. And I'm like, I'm not making it to 70, still saying that I want to write a fucking book. Like, I gotta get this out of the way now, right? And she's talking about like I went to the bathroom at some point, I come back, she's talking about these morning pages. And I'm like, what the fuck is she talking about? She's talking about artist days. And I'm like, what is she talking about? No idea, but I'm you know, taking notes or whatever. So that retreat experience comes and goes. That was in September of 2023. And I read the first chapter of the book, and she says, like, you're gonna have to confront a lot of yourself through this journey. And I was like, Well, I'm not ready for that. So let me put this book away. And then last year, at the Creative Arts Center where I now teach, I was part of their newsletter because I took a drawing class several years ago, and they were like, free community gathering for artists way. And I was like, oh, I'll do free right now. I just left my job, so I had time because the class was like at a very inconvenient time. It was like Thursday at 1 p.m., you know. So, like you, you you either have no job, you're retired, or you're an entrepreneur. That's the only way you're making it to this class, right? And I fit all of those. And so my classmates were all retirees like me. You know, they were like 65-year-old white women and men, and then there was me. And um seven of us started and two of us finished, and I was one of those. And so through the artist way experience, one of the things that she has is like like write a letter to God and like while you're mad. And so I was like walking one day and I was like, why am I mad at God? And I was like, I know exactly why the fuck I'm mad at God, my father. Why the fuck did you go? You shouldn't have left when you did. You should have, you, you shouldn't have had me as old as you did, because you was 57 when I was born. I'm like, why would you decide to bring me into the world so ancient when you knew you weren't gonna be here for most of it? That was like not fair. And so, as part of the journey, of course, she makes you like write a letter to the God that will let you create. And there was like so much stuff that came out of like why I wasn't creating anymore. And I started to see myself as a creative for the first time. I started to write a letter of forgiveness to God. I started to ask the question of maybe his death happened exactly when it needed to. And that was I don't transformational doesn't even be it's not a big enough word for what that experience was. It was when I feel like I actually started being alive.

SPEAKER_03:

Maybe transcendent?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, self-transcendence.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. And I'm I've just been a different woman since then because I see myself as a creative in every space of my being. Like I just center my life around my art. My life is my art now. Um and that was I think the most potent um multi-layered awakening that I had was realizing, you know, going back to the example of like the chef and the food and stuff, is like realizing I can cook something different. And not just cook something different in a small space, I can build systems. And later through the years, when I decided to call myself an embodied liberations guide, and I said, you know what my version of a free world looks like existing outside of white supremacy, colonization, unconscious capitalism, patriarchy, and now religion. That's what freedom looks like to me. And I'm gonna be part of that. So not just disrupting a specific space. I go into every space with the intention that I'm gonna say some disruptive shit. I'm gonna say something that hasn't been said. I'm gonna make you know that I had am multifaceted. I'm not gonna hide any aspect of myself, and then I'm gonna leave. And like that's my networking.

SPEAKER_03:

I like to rattle cages a little bit, so I get it completely. So, okay, now we you've had the creative awakening. You've had the spiritual awakening, now the creative awake awakening. And so what did things start to, by the way? I I I took a group through the artist way probably 25 years ago. We did it over a period of weeks, and I don't remember very much about it other than that it was just amazing at the time.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

I I I and I have hung on to the book and here a couple of years ago, bought a workbook. They now she's produced a workbook, and I thought about maybe maybe leading a class or two. I I love to do stuff like that. Um it's a game changer. It's definitely a game changer. So let's talk for a minute because we're we're starting to get close to the end of our time. Let's talk about our our third leg of what we bring about on every conversation, and that is now the awakening is behind you, and you are becoming someone that you've never been before. Let's talk about that becoming, what that looks like, and and can you specifically tell us who it is, not what it is. There's a those are two different conversations, but who it is that you're becoming. And and I'm gonna clarify because I asked this to somebody the other day, and they didn't, I didn't clarify it. And and what you're becoming is an external thing. I'm becoming an artist, I'm becoming a whatever, you know. Who you're becoming is an internal thing. And Dwight touched on it a few minutes ago when he talked about integrity. And so our our who are we becoming to me is the foundation. It comes first, it's what informs what we are becoming. That's my take, that's my download. But I'm wanting to kind of explore who it is that you're becoming, what your clarity is on that, and and it's that inside thing, those character traits and values and things that we really want to lean into because that's how we see ourselves. Yeah. You know, and I just I'm gonna say this probably on every episode. You know, people out there listening, we get to be anybody we want to be. And we get to show up in the world any way we want to show up. Quit saying this is the hand that I got dealt and I have to fucking deal with it. Quit saying that. It that is a lie. You're lying to yourself, you're lying to everybody around you. It is not the truth. The truth is you can be anybody you want to be. It's an internal thing, it is something that cannot be taken away from you.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

So I'll turn it over to you now.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So I'll start with, since you mentioned values, I'll start with the three values that I centered myself around. And I've done a ton of values work, it's just part of being an entrepreneur, right? Like they always, what are your core values? What are your core values? And people typically think about their the values of their business as if it's a separate entity. For me, I knew that my business was going to be an extension of me. But in order for it to be an extension of me, I have to know what the me is for it to be extended, right? And so I did um earlier in the summer, I did this like entrepreneur program, and they had a different set of values than I had seen. Um, or the conglomeration of it was just like slightly different than what I'm typically used to. And they force you to pick three. And I had had seven, and then I have I evolved that from four conglomerates that each have four. Cause I'm like a lit, I'm like a what are the the Russian dolls or whatever? Like I'm a one, four values isn't sufficient for me. I need those four values to have 12 values underneath them because I'm embodying, you know, all of them. But my three that I think really represent my multifacetedness and the way that I'm approaching my life now are inner harmony, creativity, and wisdom. And so for me, creativity is the bridge between the inner harmony and the wisdom. Because it means that I'm not just being wise for myself. I am sharing that with others through everything that I do, whether I speak with my energy, with my style, with my post, with the color that I choose, with everything. I I it is intentional. I move with, I pay attention to myself and everything that I do. Um, versus people that exist, like, oh, I don't know why I did this. I don't know why I chose this, I don't know why I wore this. Like, I know why I chose the things that I chose, and I'm into the energy of what I'm sharing, very intentional around sharing my space and energy with people that are open to me because I enjoy myself so thoroughly that I don't, yes.

SPEAKER_03:

I want to stop for a second and just go back to what you said a moment ago, and that is you are very intentional about all of that because all of that is an extension of you. It tells the world who you are.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And when we don't get that, we put all kinds of crazy shit out there that's telling the world things about us that may or may not be accurate. Right.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. So I'll say one thing that I think is a pivotal piece of how these values show up for me. Because I, you know, started off the conversation talking about like what it is that I do, and that's more of the external, right? Like, what do I do in my business? How do I show up? That's all external. We're talking about values, but what is what was imperative as part of this creative awakening is that, and how the systems fit in is that so I, on top of all that reading and stuff that I was doing, I decided to be child free four years ago. My my four-year anniversary is actually tomorrow of when I got sterilized by choice. I'd never been pregnant, never desired to be pregnant. And it's the best decision of my life because I feel like when I woke up, I was like, oh, I'm finally free to do whatever the fuck I want to and not be worried about getting pregnant for like the next 15 years or more. I didn't want to wait to menopause to like be free because I didn't know if I was gonna make it to menopause. So I was like, I want to be free like today. And so while it was liberating on one hand to not worry about pregnancy, which is a constant worry that women have from the moment we get our periods, it's just and you're sexual and you're not married, you're always thinking about, am I pregnant? Like it is insidious how much you fucking think about it. Like your period becomes, when you're not trying to be pregnant, a respite, a reminder, like, oh, made it this time. And then if you're on birth control, then it causes a different type of dissociation with your body because you don't see your body in cycles anymore. So when I when I liberated myself on that one side, there was also now space for me to observe the fact that because I wasn't gonna produce children, I felt inherently unworthy as a creator because I'm not creating the things that people say I'm I'm supposed to create, which is human life. So I have a dead womb. My sacral chakra is done. I cannot create. I don't have the capacity, the desire. Like, there's many orthodox ways of thinking that say that as a woman who will not marry, because I'm marriage-free, like, and I'm very adamant about that, who will not marry and who will not reproduce, that I'm worthless, that I have no purpose. And even if people don't say that to me, I see it being said. I see it, you know, being shared in, you know, different social media groups and stuff. And so, how can I not see that and be that and not think that you're talking about people like me?

SPEAKER_03:

This this comes back to they're not my people.

SPEAKER_00:

Right. Yeah, right. And so as part of this creative reclamation, I had to realize that I had not just the capacity to be a creative, but immense capacity to be creative in every way. And that is one of the gifts that the artist way gave me. And I know that there's a bunch of creativity books, and not everybody rocks with the artist way. I'm a cult leader for it because it transforms me. Um, but for me, inner harmony, back to the point that you had said earlier, Dwight, is like me being connected to my truth at all times. And that's why I have creative practices. I think a lot of times we think about creativity as like when the spark hits me, and it's like you need to be working with your creativity. I do morning pages every single day. I meditate every single day. I move my body almost every single day. Like I am constantly in relationship with my body, with my spirit, with my mind. I know what I'm thinking, I know what I'm feeling, I know what I'm doing, and it's I'm attuned to myself. You cannot have inner harmony without self-attunment because what are you harmonizing? And so when you have that attunement, it allows you to be intentional with your creativity. It allows you to be intentional with what you think needs to exist outside of you. I'm very legacy-oriented despite being child-free, because my legacy is every single moment, every interaction that someone has. And sometimes people are not the better for knowing me because I trigger people too, and I'm okay with that.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Well, that's triggering them is not always a bad thing.

SPEAKER_00:

Right.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah. I mean, there's a place for you in this world. There are people that need to be triggered. Yes. And legacy is about what you leave behind. Legacy and people that think that's children, please, that's so limiting. Yeah. I can never ever have a baby and still leave an immense legacy.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I I think it's great that you are you champion all of the great things that Julie Cameron's putting out there, particularly the artist way. But I I also uh think that we would be remiss if we didn't acknowledge uh some of the ways that you're bringing forth uh some of the subtext and what Argaret Atwood was putting out in The Handmaid's Tale. Um and and I guess by way of the reverse of the the world that she created, but I know that for some people, even though uh it it may be that they were being hit on the head with it, they they just failed to see it. For some people, that is some fever wet dream.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

But you know, by some definitions, what you described, um making it to where you have a dead womb, uh, the patriarchal definition of a woman, it's in the word. It is it is part of it. Uh I'm glad that you are a fully free female presenting person of your own right, and you're calling your own shots.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

And I'm glad that you can serve as a model for others that this is the way it can be done.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

This is a recipe you can follow.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Your entire story is very inspiring. And and you know, and we're and we're aware that it all it hasn't all been pretty and it all hasn't been perfect. There's been some really, really challenging things, and you've gotten down in the weeds and the dirt to get to where you are today. And you're not done being in the weeds and the dirt because are we ever?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. You know, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Uh this has been a magical hour.

SPEAKER_00:

Same. And we didn't even talk about the things that we said we were going to talk about when we first started.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, and I think that things unfold kind of the way they need to unfold. I just thought about that. I thought, well, you know, we were gonna kind of cover this. And it's okay because maybe it doesn't have to be a one and done. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And um there's there's a reason it went the way it went, and it and it was truly a very inspiring story. Thank you. Very grateful that you have come and blessed us and our listeners with your story because I I mean, come on, you know, uh immigrant comes to the United States and you have done great things. You you have set a pace to show people what's possible. People who oftentimes are prone to believe that it's not possible because of who they are or where they're from or or the color of their skin. It's all just bullshit.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, and there'll be some people that will resent you for popping that bubble. There'll be some people that will resent you for taking away their excuse for not being all that they can be.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

And that's okay. That's where they are.

SPEAKER_04:

As Mel Robin says, let them.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Let them.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah. Wait, uh before we end, though, I want to add one more thing that is a representation of the other side of my creative awakening that um I'm saying out loud too as accountability. Um so for my birthday in September, I went to Portugal with my mom. We have some Portuguese heritage in our very mixed race bag of colonized history, it's being from Dominican Republic. And part of my purpose going is I exist with colonizer and colonized blood in my ancestry. And I can't, like, I speak two colonizer languages, English and Spanish, you know? And I I, as a truth teller to myself, I don't like deny that those are my root systems. But I have also challenged my ancestors because you can talk back to your ancestors, by the way. I have challenged my ancestors that they have to repair their ruptures to on the other side, because I can't carry all that shit. I got stuff to do over here. And part of that trip was to reconcile how I can be both colonizer and colonize and be connected. That fracture that I felt long ago when my father died and felt like I had these split personalities, like that fracture was exacerbated, like over the years, of seeing how many different things coexist within me and how the fuck do I put this in the same container? And so that was like the initial purpose behind that trip. But on the other side, so my mom and I were there together for eight days. On the ninth day, I was there by myself. And one of my favorite things to do in my travels is I do graffiti and mural hunting. I photograph them. A lot of these pieces that are behind me are pieces that I have photographed in my travels around the world. And they are all very significant to me in very significant ways. And so one of my dreams is to be a muralist, right? And painting to me is the most terrifying thing because I'm like, if I could turn my feelings into color, oh my God. Like, don't talk to me because I'm gonna be fucking more unstoppable, more of a force of nature. But it is so scary to me as I sit surrounded by like I took watercolor earlier this year and hardest classes that I've ever taken, PhD included, right? So as I'm in this tour by myself, my last day there, I had this thought, like, I think I want to go to art school. And then I saw myself having a thought, and I'm like, that's so aggressive. Like, I don't want to actually go through art school, but I want the experience of art school. And so then I'm like, you know, continuing to go along in the tour, and I was like, what if as a creator, I created my own art school, like a decolonial mix of both in-person and online capacities to learn the theory and the application of different mediums of painting. And I just designed like a three-year curriculum for myself because I know I can reach goals, right? I know I can design things. And I want the experience to your point, Maddox, not because I want to be paid for my paintings, although that will happen, but because I want to be able to be like, I'm about to make this painting of this thing that I have in my head, and then I'm gonna go kill it on the piano because I'm also taking piano classes now. And I like also had this like dream over the weekend of like one of these days, I'm just gonna roll up to North Park, play the piano, kill it, and then just walk away. Like, that's kind of one of the things that I want to be able to do. And so I have like a rough draft of that outline of this art school curriculum. And I'm going to follow it. And that is what has become possible for me when I allowed myself to be a PhD who had lived this very full life already, but also allow myself to be an artist in the way that I want to, and know that I don't have to go to art school to be an artist. And that, you know, we live in a world where we have so many, so much information accessible and available to us that that is available to us. You know, like you can be that audacious and be like, you know what? I'm gonna become an artist, I'm gonna take myself through art school just because I can. And I will design my life around that as I'm playing the piano, as I'm writing my book, as I'm hosting retreats, as I'm teaching, as I'm coaching, because I don't have kids and I don't have a husband, so I can. I have time of the gift of time. Um, so I wanted to share that because it is one of the most outrageous ideas that I've had, and I'm really excited about it.

SPEAKER_03:

And so you should be. I think it's brilliant. You know, I also think that if we knew how few really accomplished artists actually have art degrees, we would be shocked. How few.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, that is but one path. And uh the other side of that is we would also be shocked by how many um art school graduates are doing anything but yes, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

Corporate jobs, yes. Yeah, okay, we've got to wrap, but this was absolutely fabulous. Thank you. Thank you, thank you.

SPEAKER_00:

Thank you for this magnificent conversation. I'm really glad we made space for it today.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, me too.