Praxis
The podcast where practice makes purpose…
Praxis
The Practice of…Embracing Neurodivergence (with Daniela De Armas)
Daniela de Armas shares her journey as a Lucumi priestess, musician, and neurodivergent person diagnosed with ADHD at age 59. Her experiences reveal how finding authentic community and honouring our own natural rhythms creates purpose and stability in a challenging world.
In this episode we discuss how:
• The Lukumi tradition provides a lens through which Daniela views life, focusing on living well in the present
• Music has been integral to her identity since childhood, leading to the creation of multiple bands and a 20-year choir
• Late diagnosis of ADHD explained lifelong patterns of burnout, fatigue, and difficulty with conventional employment
• Success means enjoying the journey rather than focusing on external validation or financial rewards
• Building communities around her passions has been essential to finding connection and belonging
• Nature connection, particularly bird watching, provides healing and grounding for her sensitive nervous system
• Rest is viewed as revolutionary in a productivity-obsessed culture
• Compassionate approaches to practice allow for inconsistency while still moving forward
If you're interested in learning more about the Lukumi tradition, check out Daniela's book "The Lucumi Practitioner's Handbook," which also addresses neurodiversity and maintaining boundaries in spiritual communities. You can find her work at https://linktr.ee/orishasongandmore
Other resources mentioned in this episode:
https://www.adhdbabes.com/about-us
Welcome to Praxis, the podcast where practice makes purpose. I'm Mikey and I'll be interviewing people about the practices that reveal and create purpose in their lives. Welcome to Praxis. This is my second interview and I'm honored to have Daniela de Almas on with me today. She is a Lukumi priestess, which is an Afro-Cuban tradition with its roots in the Yoruba people of West Africa. She is a musician and an author, and the main focus of our conversation today is on neurodiversity, creativity and the importance of music and community. I hope you enjoy, daniela. Thank you so much for being a guest on my podcast. This is lovely to have you here. So you describe yourself as an Iyalorisha and a musician. For those who have never heard the term Iyalorisha, can you explain what it means and means to you specifically, and maybe even how it's linked to your work as a musician?
Speaker 2:Okay, so I'm a priestess Ia means mother and I practice, or I am kind of involved in a tradition which is the Lukumi tradition, which is the Cuban manifestation of the Orisha West African Orisha tradition. It's a specific way of life. Um, I don't necessarily call it um, uh, spirituality or even a religion, but I do call it. It's the lens through which I see my life and um, it's um, yeah, has its roots in yoruba, west africa. Yoruba, west africa great and and oh, oh yeah, sorry I didn't carry on.
Speaker 1:It's okay. How does it link to music?
Speaker 2:So yeah, so basically I was initiated as a priestess, so I'm kind of like an officiate really within that tradition. And then within my music, the last 20 years I've been involved in a project that I set up myself called the Lanzalucumi Choir, where we sing songs which are part of the tradition. It is a cultural expression of the tradition, though it's in a cultural context, but the roots of the songs that we sing comes from a living, breathing tradition, of which I am a priestess.
Speaker 1:That's amazing. I mean, there's so much there to unpack already. Yeah, when I think about practice and the things that people do, I love talking about the hero's journey and the. The start of the hero's journey is the call to adventure, which is a moment that kind of shifts the way we see ourselves, our path. What was your call to adventure? What sparked you on the path of lukumi or music, or even being? Neurodivergent any of those okay.
Speaker 2:So, um, I would, okay. So I would say that as music. As soon as I could walk, I could dance. As soon as I could speak, I could sing. I come from a musical family and I don't see it as a practice, I see it as part of me. I've never been without music and it's you know my expression, but it's also something that I connect to for lots of emotional reasons as well. So that's one thing.
Speaker 2:In terms of the involvement in the religion, I think that it was divine timing. I was going through quite a hard time and I've always struggled. I was going through quite a hard time and I've always struggled. I didn't know I was neurodiverse, but I've had a very difficult life emotionally, physically, and I couldn't quite put my path when I was living in Cuba and I was there studying for a PhD in music. So I wasn't really looking for it specifically, but I feel like I was chosen to follow this path and I ended up.
Speaker 2:It was the beginning of my journey, really, and it's helped immensely in my quest for staying sane and staying alive.
Speaker 2:To be honest, it's been an amazing tool and I do see it as being a tool rather than a practice. It's a way of life. It's a lens, but it's also an empowering way of seeing the way that I live my life and how I can realign with my destiny. So it's always about you know finding your path and living the best life that you can in this time, because we only have one life. You know, we're not thinking about the afterlife and about rewards in heaven. Like a lot of other, maybe Abrahamic traditions, this is very much about living your life here and now, and when you have challenges to do with mental health or physical health or anything like this, it's such a big thing to find stability in your life and to live your life the best way that you can. So it really called to me this tradition and I ended up having a consultation and from there it just became a way of life and a way of seeing my life's journey.
Speaker 1:I feel like every answer you've given so far. There's about 20 different threads I could pull out.
Speaker 2:That's probably the neurodivergent self as well. I do tend to go off in in different ways and I love it, it's not very linear.
Speaker 1:I love it. I love it. So how does your neurodivergent diagnosis, how does it manifest in your life? If you don't mind me asking like what, what are the I don't want to say symptoms, because I don't think it's an illness, but what are the manifestations of it in your life?
Speaker 2:so I was only diagnosed three years ago, coming up to four years ago when I was 59. So, um, I've lived without knowing for a very long time, 59 years of my life. I wasn't, I didn't know what was going on. Um, sometimes I thought I had early onset dementia or I was going crazy. But also I had so many physical symptoms and I do think that in some ways it is a disability because it disables you from being able to do certain things. So I do feel sometimes that it's extremely challenging to live day by day in a normal way, to live day by day in a normal, normal way.
Speaker 2:I think, you know, we're very sensitive, we've got very sensitive minds and very sensitive bodies and all throughout my life I was always going to the doctor trying to find out what was wrong with me, and they could never find anything wrong with me. But basically what was going on was that, you know, my dopamine levels were so low that I could literally not get out of bed, I couldn't walk. That, you know, my dopamine levels were so low that I could literally not get out of bed, I couldn't walk. I, you know, sometimes I felt like I was um, uh, you know, my whole body was just not working as it should. So yeah, basically that that was kind of like a pattern and I also noticed the patterns of when I used to exert myself in terms of any events or a party, or even from when I was quite young, that I would fall, of not being able to function and overstimulated and that's a very big thing with me and not getting burnt out, because I've had cycles of burnout throughout my life and cycles of where I'm just not well enough to function properly.
Speaker 2:So my daily practice and I would say it's a daily practice is trying to stay alive and function in the best way that I can, that I can. And it's also a practice of trying to be non-judgmental with myself, because I tend to beat myself up a lot and I tend to say to myself come on, you can do this, and sometimes I can't do this and that's okay. And it's about being okay on a daily basis with whatever I'm at and however many spoons I have. Spoons is kind of a term that a lot of people use to describe energy levels.
Speaker 1:No, that's really good. I mean one of the things I think there must be a tension between having to live in a society that values certain ways of seeing success or they equate being productive with value. Um, how do you manage the tension with living in a society that perhaps doesn't accommodate people with um neurodivergence and also being successful in whatever way you define that? You know? Um, I know you said in the kind of pre-interview that you value self-care, rest and authenticity. How do you manage that?
Speaker 2:yeah in a society that doesn't value those things um, I think that I kind of realized that for me, living um living without kind of like expectations of success, was very important. So for me, the journey has always been more important than the end result. However, I'm very project based in what I do, so I do like to aim for something in order to get excited about it, to raise my dopamine about it. But actually when the project is finished, I don't see it as you know, whether it's successful or not. It's just about, for me, whether I've enjoyed the journey, and that's always been really important for me. But I think that's also inhibited me from working in kind of normal jobs, because I couldn't do, I couldn't do nine to five. I really, really tried and I really struggled with um you know all, all types of jobs, but mainly um routine nine to five. I'd feel like I was stuck in uh, you know, in a trap and um, you know that that made my life very difficult at times, and so I, kind of like um, started to follow my, to follow my dreams really without fear, which is probably not sensible but also very rewarding. So I've always worked in the field of music and some of the projects that I was involved in ended up being very, very successful and very um busy.
Speaker 2:So I formed um, a salsa band which was mainly women, in um about 1989 I think, and we went. We kind of were touring for about seven years. We played a lot of different festivals, we were on the big breakfast we did, we were gigging three to four times a week, um, and it started off really as a dream and it was really about, you know, performing in a start because I loved salsa. It was really all about, like I wanted to dress up and go on stage. That was about it, and you know I didn't really have that much experience in order to do the arrangement. So, you know it, it all seemed like a bit of a fluke.
Speaker 2:I put an advert out looking for musicians for a new salsa band and all of these women turned up and I think the thing about that was that you know there are so many great women musicians but it's still very much a male dominated field. So it wasn't that I was looking for women musicians. It's just that most of the musicians that came for the audition were women. So it just started off like that and then we started to rehearse on a regular basis and then we got a gig and then after that we started to work regularly all the time and that band lasted for about seven years and then I had another project which lasted another seven years, and it's always been.
Speaker 2:You know, what do I want to do? What's my passion? It's always been very much passion led and looking for something that excites me. So I think that for people specifically with ADHD and sometimes if you're on the autism spectrum and you have an intense special interest, sometimes that can work to benefit you. But for me it was never about success. I think it was always about, you know, the journey, the camaraderie with my bandmates, being on stage also was extremely exciting. But I can't lie after most small tours or sometimes after gigs, it would take me days to recover. I used to just really suffer from crushes and burnouts and you know, when I was younger I did kind of like and you know, when I was younger I did kind of like use alcohol to kind of cope with the strains of touring and the strains of socializing as well, because I was always, you know, with a lot of people all the time, which I actually find quite difficult on a day to day basis.
Speaker 2:I need a lot of alone time and a lot of rest, and I didn't know that then. So I was looking for coping strategies and some of them were not very healthy. So, yeah, and also, I've written a book and now that it's written, I'm like, oh okay. But you know, writing the journey was great, but whether it becomes successful or not has always been not as important to me.
Speaker 1:I think it's just about doing the thing rather than the end produce, and that probably doesn't fit very well into the kind of, like you know, capitalist, producing society so it sounds like what you're saying is it's not about having an end goal necessarily in mind when you start things, and possibly if you did have a goal in mind, it might limit what you achieved in the end. You know, with your band you didn't necessarily plan how many singers would be with you or what that would look like, but you just followed kind of your passion, as you say, and it evolved into something that maybe you didn't visualize or want necessarily in that form, but it became really successful it became very successful, but I think it was, um, because we were so many women, because we had a particular approach to the music.
Speaker 2:We weren't, um, maybe as technically great, but we were very, very fun. Um, but but it was never. You know, I never planned on it. It was, it was totally unplanned. I mean, I am a bit more planning conscious because I do realize that you do have to have some kind of like goals and objectives when you're doing anything. I mean, I'm with, I'm in my choir right now. It's been going for about 20 years and I do plan things like, you know, albums or, or a gig or something like that, and it does kind of like revolve around projects, because if I'm just doing it, just for I have to have something that excites me, something new and something that will motivate the group as well. So, yeah, in that way I do plan.
Speaker 1:I suppose what I'm hearing is correct me if, if I'm wrong, I don't think that you're doing the music in order to create an album, I think that you're, yes, using albums as a vehicle to explore music in exciting ways that make sense. Like I don't think yes, totally, you value having a number one album above. Yes, the process of making the music.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that is absolutely. Yeah, yeah, spot on. Yeah, you've hit the nail on the head there.
Speaker 1:And I also feel like it's so niche.
Speaker 2:Whatever I've been involved in has always been kind of marginal. I would be terrible as a pop singer or you know, writing hits or something like that. I just would not be very good. Um, if that was my goal, if my goal was to, you know, sell a lot of singles or that kind of thing and I don't have many expectations. I think I have, in a way, you know, low expectations because things have been quite hard for me anyway. So for me, I think, like my expectation is, are you having a good time?
Speaker 2:If you're not give up, like you know, if you're not, if you're suffering, don't do it. That's, that's the bottom line. If I'm having a good time, I will carry on doing it, and for me, if my dopamine, if I'm not excited about something, I literally cannot do it physically. That's what happens, I think, with my, my body and my mind.
Speaker 1:I mean I think that's probably true of a lot of creative people that if they're not finding joy in whatever they're doing, then it's not sustainable in the long run. Because that has to be your fuel in order to create. Because if you're motivated by money or by fame or these things.
Speaker 1:That these external markers of success. I don't think that's sustainable in the long run. I think you need those that internal, intrinsically motivated things to keep you going, like your passion, the joy of creating um, you know, you mentioned in your pre-interview a questionnaire about singing makes you feel connected to your authentic self and I think they are kind of deeper wells to draw from than being motivated by money or fame, I suppose.
Speaker 2:um definitely you know most musicians would say it's um, it's a calling rather than um a job, if you like, because it is so difficult to make your living as a creative or as a as a musician, and unless you're Beyonce or something like that it's it's very difficult to keep going and most performers I know also teach because you can't sustain your.
Speaker 2:Your life can't be sustained by gigs alone, and it also gets to the point sometimes where it's difficult to to gig because it's it's tiring, or to tour constantly it's it's very tiring you mentioned earlier on that you in the past were looking for maybe unhealthy ways to manage your dopamine levels and to manage your neurodiversity.
Speaker 1:What, what? What coping mechanisms?
Speaker 2:do you do? Do you use now've been working hard before my diagnosis to work out what works for me in life, without having that knowledge. But now that I have that knowledge, I think mainly what I'm trying to do is to be compassionate to myself. I know you did a questionnaire and compassion was very low on what they wanted you to talk about. But I think for a lot of neurodivergence, because burnout is a real thing, overstimulation is a real thing, you know emotional exhaustion over socialising all of those things are real concerns and I think that you know even going on public transport if I go on public transport I probably need a whole day to rest afterwards because it's so overstimulating and I just do find that certain things really trigger my, my body and my mind. I can't function very well afterwards.
Speaker 2:So basically, my philosophy I you know this is my own philosophy is trying to take things day by day. I do try and get outside. One of the things that I like to do is going to listen to birds right now, because it's springtime and I've become obsessed by the different calls, the different bird calls. So I'm going out and listening to different birds and seeing if I can recognize the calls and things like that, or looking, you know, very purposefully at nature. I do love walking, um, and I like walking in nature. That, to me, is very nourishing and in a way, it is mindfulness, because you're focusing on. You know, what differences can you see in nature? What? What is blooming today? You know what? What's different today than it then was yesterday? Um, those little differences in nature really call to me.
Speaker 2:Um, so for me, those little things are very important, um, and also the bigger picture and connecting you, maybe, with the divine through nature, um, especially in these times where you know the world is a troubled and hateful place, and you know, for me to be able to disconnect from that and connect with nature, and, you know, mother nature, that mother nature and the planet will be here long, long after we are. And I think we, you know, I think that we're a very destructive species, but I do believe that the planet will survive. Um, but I always, you know, pay homage to the planet and homage to mother earth and, you know, go out there and experience nature. I think that's my number one In terms of exercise. You know I do like to exercise and I do, I think, you know, the thing that worked for me was short bouts of exercise rather than long sustained of exercise. Rather, than long sustained.
Speaker 2:Um, like you know, I can't do running, for example, I can't do anything that requires too much stamina, because I get over tired, I get very, very exhausted. Um, I did find that I really enjoyed weights, but also I find routine very difficult. So once I've got into a routine, if I get bored, there is a real danger of me losing interest in that particular exercise. And when I tell you I've been through everything, every type of exercise you can imagine, in my while, and then I have to find something else which nourishes me. But the things that keep constant in my life are most definitely walking in nature. You know, walking is amazing if you can do, you know your steps every day if it's good weather.
Speaker 1:I think it's definitely one of the best exercises you can do uh, just walking yeah and I love that. Um, you mentioned about listening to the birds and again, that's that's music. That's another way that music is yeah um, important in your life.
Speaker 1:Um, you mentioned earlier on about how the world is a hateful place and you know, I feel like the past five, six, seven years have been brutal on everyone. Um, yeah, and I know you've got a very strong sense of justice and advocacy, especially with your online presence. You're, you know, very vocal anti-racist. Um, I don't know, you advocate for other causes as well. Does your neurodivergence play a role in that, in terms of how you see the world?
Speaker 2:you know, I don't think that you can also uh categorize neurodiverse people as a monolith, because that's also not true?
Speaker 2:yeah, absolutely, um, and I'm sure there's some undesirable adhd's and undesirable um people on the autistic spectrum who are just assholes, sorry and uh, but you know, I I don't know I've always been something, someone that's very passionate about justice and about people not suffering and about humanitarian things, and I do believe that every single person on this planet deserves to have a reasonable life, and that's not what's happening. You know, that's not what's happening at the moment and, in particular, right now, I feel so strongly about what's happening in Gaza and to the Palestinians, which has been the case for so many decades now, and what I just find extraordinary is that I thought by now that the world's leaders would do something, and it's just not being done. It's, you know, the tide isn't turning yet, um, and I find that very upsetting and, and if anything, I think it's.
Speaker 1:I feel like world governments are going even more right wing as time goes on and even more fascistic is that the right word? More into fascism, which I don't know. I don't know what the solution is really. It's very difficult.
Speaker 2:I do believe I mean, I don't know whether I'm right in this, but I do believe that when there is change and when people's way of lives are threatened, they become more extreme is the only democracy in the Middle East, for example, and you know the fact that it is an apartheid state, but it's been always an ally of you know places like the UK and most of the European countries and America, and we've always seen not me personally, but the.
Speaker 2:You know, the world leaders have always seen Israel as being an ally, and now that we can see what it's doing very brutally, it's becoming more extreme and they want to silence the voices and I feel like anybody that is not aware of what's going on there really needs to wake up, because if our leaders allow that to happen there, they can allow that to happen anywhere. I really truly believe that the majority of the people in this country do not want to spend money on arms. Like for what? Defending what? Like? Our rights are being diminished by the day, so why do we want to spend billions on defence and I think that idea of nation states? People are waking up to the fact that this is no way to live. You know, I think, since the pandemic there's been more consciousness about rest and the value of rest, the value of not working, living to work.
Speaker 1:I mean in your questionnaire. You said that rest is a revolutionary act.
Speaker 2:Yes, I do believe that.
Speaker 1:Can you expand on that a little bit?
Speaker 2:Because I think it challenges the idea that you have to work your bones off for society, you know. I think that if you're tired, you should be able to rest. I think that everybody at school or work, if they do not feel well, you know, if they feel that they're over work, then they just have to have time off and they have to go home, rest, have a rest day, go to bed, have a nap. I believe all of these things challenge the way that it's supposed to be and I really believe that.
Speaker 2:I mean, I love a nap what is this life if all of your life is is just working for the, the man, as they say in school of rock, which is one of my it's one of my favorite films.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, yeah, great film. Um. Just a few things I want to kind of start to wind down the interview with um yeah the importance of community. So we've we've spoken about advocacy for kind of the global human community. Um, yeah, I want to talk more about personal communities, how? How has a community of um either fellow musicians, um spiritual community or people with neurodivergence, how has being part of community helped you? Helped you to frame your understanding of your identity, of your neurodiversity?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think for me, community and finding a community has always been really important, because I feel like when I was young, I was, I felt very lonely and I felt very isolated and I didn't feel like I fitted in anyway, which I think is a common experience for a lot of people who are neurodiverse You're always, you know, worried you're doing the wrong thing and you know you're not sure how to behave, and, um, I found it very difficult. I was, um, very much a loner at school and um, and at university I was, I was very much, you know, a person that was looking for a community but never found, never found my tribe for years and years. And um, I feel like, um, you know, with the music I had several tribes. You know, some of the people that I've worked with, like 30, almost 40 years ago, are still friends of mine and even though I don't see them on a daily basis, they're still people I would consider as part of that community, part the, the music community, the latin music community, um, so I have, like, I would say that I have several tribes that I've kind of like almost created as well. I think you know the choir, um, that community is something that I hold very dear to me and, um, I was the initiator of the choir. I feel like I've always been looking for that sense of community and by doing so, like you know, forming a band, it's always been, I've always been at the forefront of organizing my own communities because, quite honestly, if I didn't do that, I would be on my own. I'm just trying to try to find my people, trying to find people to collaborate with, and and that's the case, I think, in my spiritual life or in my life as a godmother as well as that, you know, the people that I mentor, I would say, are amazing people and, you know, even though I'm directing them in a way or I'm mentoring them in a way, they're also feeding me community and I think that that's been very much an important part of my life for the last 19 years or so.
Speaker 2:And, in terms of neurodiversity, I've realized that we collect each other. So, you know, people are drawn to people that they feel comfortable with, and I think the most that I felt comfortable is with people that are also neurodiverse, like in terms of not having to mask or be anybody else. It's very easy to be who I am around people that also are very similar to me, but I've also, you know, been online and kind of hooked up, if you like, with other people through um. You know that have got nothing to do with my musician life or my religious life and um. That's also been really nice to hook up with people that are neurodiverse and um talking about their different struggles and stuff. I found it very, very useful because I can't believe that I was, you know, going through all of this for so long on my own. Like you know, the struggles that you go through are quite unique, I think, and to be able to discuss that with other people has been amazing really and I think it's incredible.
Speaker 1:You know, you've managed to hold together a choir, I just say, for 20 years, I mean yeah, I don't know any other, definitely not any other choir, but any other kind of group organization that lasts that long, you know. So it's real testament to your drive, your passion, your creativity and your desire for that community, to to hold all that together. Um, if you this is a bit of a, I suppose, a cliche question, but if you could go back to your younger self, yeah, and give them a message, what would you? What would you say?
Speaker 2:I think it is you're not alone. I think that I spent so much time on my own and I still. I really love being on my own. That's the thing me too.
Speaker 1:I love it.
Speaker 2:I mean, I am a homebody. I really love being on my own now, but for so many years I just craved um company and being with others and just a feeling of being at home and being with people that understood you. And I would have said you know there are. I would have said to my younger self you are not alone, but you're not alone in so many different ways, like you're not alone because there are people like you. You're not alone because you have your ancestors to talk to and I do talk to my ancestors. You, you're not alone because you have your ancestors to talk to and I do talk to my ancestors.
Speaker 2:Uh, you're not alone because you know you are part of a bigger entity and when I'm out there, you know, with the birds, I feel very at home and I feel like I'm not alone and that almost that they're speaking to me and I also, you know those types of things and I just feel like I wish that I could have comforted myself in a way, because I did fight, I did struggle a lot with um social interaction and with keeping friends at that point in time when I was, when I was young, you know, when I was a primary and then secondary school, and I got into so much trouble because I just couldn't, I couldn't find the right people and I was just making so many because I just couldn't, I couldn't find the right people and I was just making so many mistakes and hanging out with the wrong crowd and, you know, getting used by people and you're pleasing people because you, you know you want to be liked and now I'm just like, you are who you are and you are loved and that's great.
Speaker 2:It's a great feeling to uh feel the love from people, to be honest, because I didn't have that growing up. So, yeah, that's lovely.
Speaker 1:I would say that's really nice. What one thing I've found is, um, as I've gotten a little bit older, is that I value alone time a lot more so yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm definitely an extrovert, I love being with other people and I love going out and I love socializing and stuff. But I love just coming home and just being in the quiet on my own um. Even if a weekend, I make sure I have a few hours on my own um on Saturday and Sunday, just to kind of reset my energy levels a little bit definitely, and I think for me, um, because sometimes, as much as I love all of my communities, um, I do get very tired of social interactions.
Speaker 2:I think it's more when I'm with people that I don't know, because I, you know, probably making a lot of effort, whereas when people that I do know, I'm just me, um, but I do need recovery time and that's something that I program into my life I rest a lot of alone time and a lot of rest time, and yeah you know, I do feel that when you have a sensitive body and a sensitive mind, as a lot of neurodiverse people have, your mind and your body will just say go and lie down, go and watch these centers, go, go and do something, mind mind numbingly.
Speaker 2:You know something that you don't have to think about. Just go and rest because, yeah, you need that and we need that. We need those moments of being alone and being able to rest and just chill yeah, I agree um.
Speaker 1:Are there any resources like uh books or uh websites, anything that you would recommend to people who are on a similar sort of path, or even people just interested in learning more about different, um neurodivergent people?
Speaker 2:I um really believe that sheila hansen, she has these groups um that you can pay however much you can afford I think, it's sheilahansencom, um, she's got adhd or she doesn't have autism, but she works with people that have autism and lots of different types of neurodiversities and she sets up 10-week coaching courses and they're really good.
Speaker 2:They're really really good and I completed I think it was a 10-week course for all DHT people and they were from all over the world, Very, very good. And there's also ADHD Babes for Black ADHD Women and there's a lot going on. I think you have to know where to look for the help, but that's also a very good resource. Also, there's Attitude. I have sent you the link. Yeah.
Speaker 1:I'll put the links in the kind of show notes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that has free web webinars and has so much really great information and it's very good also for parents that have neurodiverse children, um, that they don't know how to cope with because they haven't been taught what they need to look out for. There's a lot of help on that particular website and publication and it's free. All of their webinars are free. Seed Talks are also very good. They have a lot of different courses you can do and talks that you can go to, and one of the talks that I went to it was so great because it was like it said it started at 7.30, but actually it started like quarter past eight because they knew everybody would be a bit late because of time blindness and they kind of programmed that in. So it was a very relaxed kind of like. I was panicking to get there, as I usually do, but like when I got there it didn't start on time and everybody was kind of like you know, waiting for the late comers and there was no pressure. So I really appreciated that in a way.
Speaker 1:I mean, I suppose that's one way. Sorry, go on.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:I was just going to say that, that I suppose that's one way that um society as a whole doesn't accommodate people with, uh, neurodiversities, because we know we're so rigid in terms of our time keeping in things. But I love that they built in that 45 minute buffer because they knew that the people showing up might not arrive on time.
Speaker 2:I think that's such a compassionate way to plan things, you know, yeah, yeah, I wish they told us, though, because I was panicking though I, because I have like trauma about time keeping because I always used to be late and now I'm terribly early, like now I'm just I'm so worried about being late that often I'm just ridiculously early so I can never be on the spot.
Speaker 2:But yeah, and in terms of the religion, I have got a book out. If anybody's interested in the Lukumi path, I have a book out which is the Lukumi Practitioner's Handbook, which is all about being safe whilst following that path, if that is your chosen path. But it's also a book which looks at things like neurodiversity and it looks at you know, being aware when you're joining communities and how to be safe, because I think that's also a problem when you don't understand your own boundaries and you are so eager to fit in somewhere, um, that sometimes you let things slide.
Speaker 2:So you know it's. It's really a book about, you know, joining any type of community and being safe within that community and I'll put a link to your, to your book in, uh, in the show notes as well.
Speaker 1:I've read your book and I loved it, um, and so actually thank you. I mean, your writing is beautiful, but it's also a beautiful physical book, like, yeah, the artwork is gorgeous, um, it's just a real, like sumptuous book to read. I loved it, um, and I I really enjoyed your words. There's one one, one bit that really stuck out to me is, um, you talked about, after the, the main lockdowns of pandemic. You loved being able to just hear the birds sing in the morning and you kind of missed that.
Speaker 2:Um, yeah, you know, yeah, yeah, even now there's there's always because I've been out in the garden like, uh, recording the birds, and you know, sometimes it's very hard to hear because you've got like so and so drilling down the road and so and so doing this, you know traffic such a lot of traffic. There's yeah, there's noise everywhere, and it's very hard to tune into nature sometimes when there's always a backdrop of of noise. Um, but yeah, I did appreciate nature at that time. It it was the thing that kept me sane.
Speaker 1:Yeah during the pandemic. I agree, um, just to kind of uh wrap up, is there anything that you want to talk about that I haven't brought up or that hasn't been mentioned so far? Um, that you want to highlight or talk about?
Speaker 2:yeah, I just, I just wanted to kind of reassure people that practice doesn't have to be linear and it doesn't have to be every day, and that you know, I think that we have a tendency to beat ourselves up if we can't stick to a routine, whereas that, whereas you know, people like me sometimes find routine very difficult to stick to. But I think that for me, I've learned that you don't have to stick to a routine, but you also, you don't have to give up Um, because before I'd be like oh no, that's gone out the window. My 10,000 steps, I missed a couple of days, so I can't do it anymore. Now I'm like, okay, you missed those days, but you can start again tomorrow. So I'm I, I I do kind of like try and talk myself out of giving up, and I think it's really important for neurodiverse people who find um either routine important, so important that they get very stressed out if they miss a day, for example, or if they find routine very boring.
Speaker 1:I think there's different ways of approaching practice and it doesn't have to be an everyday thing you know, I would I agree and I think it's a I came up with the like what I call the five pillars of practice, and and two of them are compassion and discipline and, I think, striking the balance between those two. So you're not being too compassionate with yourself that you just never try, but you're also not being too disciplined, that you're rigid and in the end doesn't serve you like, um, you know, sometimes if I um, if I don't practice, or you know, if I don't meditate one day, or if I maybe eat rubbish food one day, I don't think, oh, that's it, I'm never gonna practice, ever again.
Speaker 1:I just think all the tomorrow's, and if tomorrow's a new day, and there's an analogy where, um, if you drop your phone on the floor, you don't suddenly just smash it with your foot, do you pick it up again? Yeah and just you know. You, you can look after it. I don't know if that analogy makes sense or not, um it kind of does.
Speaker 2:But I think that we've got I think that neurodiverse people have got more of a tendency to sabotage um, because, also, we sometimes suffer from um paralysis as well. It's like you want to do the thing but you can't do the thing. You want to go out and do the exercise, but something's stopping you from doing that, and, um, I just want to, yeah, maybe just tell people to live, live day by day rather than and not to beat yourself up if you don't do things, and just trying your best.
Speaker 2:you know you, you just, you just have to do the best that you can, and it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if you can't be consistent.
Speaker 2:I mean like I belong to a group of women that do exercise and I'm just forever dropping off the, the bandwagon. Well, whatever you call it, I can't seem to keep going every single day and sometimes I'm just like, is this group for me? But then I just do think that, you know, if I didn't have the group, I might just, I might just give up completely. So it is a way of keeping me, you know, a little bit accountable and to try, and, you know, do exercise because exercise is good for you, it is a healthy way of raising your dopamine. I just feel like sometimes we have to find different strategies because we do get bored and we do hate routine. We have to find, we have to find different ways of coping. But yeah, the thing is not to give up and just to keep going every day and just see what your body needs.
Speaker 1:Well, thank you so much. I think we will leave it there. That is, honestly, I feel like I could have talked to you for another hour or so and there's so many threads that I didn't pull out. But thank you very much for your time. Um, it was really really interesting discussion, um, and, yeah, I think that people who listen will find it fascinating and very useful.
Speaker 2:So, thank you very much I hope they do and I hope I haven't repeated myself too much.
Speaker 1:No, no, don't worry. Don't worry at all, it's been lovely.
Speaker 2:Okay, all right then.
Speaker 1:Thank you very much. Thank you so much. Thank you for listening to my interview with Daniela de Armas. I hope you found it interesting, useful, and I will post all the links to resources that Daniela mentioned in the show notes. And, as ever, you can find me at praxis underscore podcast on Instagram, and I'd love to have feedback, questions and any other suggestions for podcast episodes. See you next time.