S1 EP6: Who stays when you change

When you begin walking between worlds, honouring both your visible life and your deeper, spiritual one, relationships change.

In this episode of School of Shamanism, Giada speaks honestly about one of the most painful and liberating parts of the path: what happens to friendships, family ties, and romantic relationships when you start taking your inner work seriously.

As you grow, your priorities shift. What you tolerate changes. Conversations that once felt easy can begin to feel draining, and people who once knew you well may struggle to recognise who you are becoming. Some relationships deepen, others pause, and some fall away entirely, often without warning.

Giada reflects on grief, loneliness, and the exhaustion of constantly translating yourself, while also naming the relief that comes when you finally stop shrinking or explaining who you are. She explores the importance of respecting different timings, releasing the need to convert others, and finding, or building, community where all parts of you are welcome.

This episode is an invitation to let go with love, to stay rooted in integrity, and to trust that the connections meant for this version of you will find their way.

You are not meant to walk this path alone.

Connect with Giada Gaslini:

• Website: www.schoolofshamanism.co.uk
• Instagram: @‌schoolofshamanism
• Facebook: School of Shamanism
• Youtube: School of Shamanism

About the Host

Originally hailing from the vibrant city of Milan, I’ve spent the past two decades traversing the globe in a quest for spiritual and personal growth and combined with 25 years of international corporate work experience. From navigating the vast landscapes of Australia in a campervan to finding tranquility living in a Buddhist monastery in Nepal, my journey is nothing short of extraordinary. Along the way, I’ve delved deep into Buddhist teachings, yoga, and shamanism, becoming Shamanic Teacher,  Forest Therapy Guide, Esoteric Numerologist, Shamanic and Integral Yoga Teacher and Ikigai Coach. In 2013 I settled in Edinburgh, where  I founded the Art and Spirituality Centre, a social enterprise and the School of Shamanism, where I passionately help others on their own transformative journeys.

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Transcript

Giada 0:00

Some connections deepen while some others fade and some fall away completely. And nobody really can tell you how to prepare for this moment. Welcome back to the School of Shamanismo Mangiada, and this is Season 1, Walking Between Worlds. In the first solo episode, I share my story: how I held a corporate career and spiritual life at the same time for over two decades, and what it really means to walk between two situations, two worlds in your life. In the second solo episode, we got practical, so energy management, daily rituals, boundaries, working with natural cycles instead of just against them. Today I want to talk about something that doesn't get discussed enough. Something that can be one of the most painful, but also one of the most liberating parts of our journey. The topic is relationships. Because when you start walking between worlds, when you start honoring that quieter, deeper part of yourselves, then things shift. Not just inside you, but also around you. So the people in your life start to feel different. Some connections deepen while some others fade and some fall away completely. And nobody really can tell you how to prepare for this moment. You just change inside yourself and everything around you changes at the same time. So when you commit to your own growth, when you start taking your soul work in a serious way, you change. What you're willing to tolerate and accept shifts. And the people around you notice that. Sometimes they are curious, sometimes they are supported, but sometimes they feel uncomfortable because they think that you are not giving them enough attention. And your change holds up a mirror to their own life. And not everyone wants to have a look at this mirror. And you may find that conversation that used to feel normal now feel shallow. And that people you used to spend hours with now drain you in minutes. And suddenly you are the weird one. Suddenly, in your family, your friend group, you talk about energy, intuition and spirits and shamanism. What is actually really is shamanism? And you feel alone because they don't understand you anymore. Um they think that you have changed and they will address that. And of course you have changed, but they have they have changed too. And the people who fall away, it's not something that you normally expect because it's maybe they have they have been friends forever for your own life. You grew up with these people, you shared everything with them, but your past, your journeys diverged at some point, and so you kept growing and maybe in a direction that they didn't understand. And slowly the calls with them become less frequent. You are not keeping this relationship anymore, or they are not. Sometimes they are members of your family, the people that were around you, they have this fixed idea of who you are, and they can't accept this new version of you. Um, because in their mind you will always be the we one, the little one, the whatever definition they have given to you. And uh, this also involves partners, very romantic relationships. Um, they will they were built on a version of you that no longer exists. And when you start walking between walls, you need someone who can hold space for all of you, for the you that is in the transition, not just the practical visible you, but also the invisible part of you, the mystical part of you. And not every relationship can stretch that far. So letting go of this connection is very hard. And even when you know it's right, even when you feel that the release, there is always this sort of sadness because it's a death, it's the end of something that truly mattered in your life. And the people that decide to stay, and because not everyone, of course, falls away, some people stay, and often they are not who you expected either. They are the ones who might not fully understand what you do, but they respect it, they just be over there, they ask questions, uh, real questions, they try to be open to the new idea of you, they hold space for your weirdness without the needing of fixing or explaining that that much. And sometimes it's the old friend who surprise you because they change with you along the way, they take the opportunity to change themselves, and maybe sometimes they join you on the journey somehow in their own way. Sometimes you have new people around you who speak your new language, who see you really for the new vision, for the new identity that you have. They don't need to translate yourself, and maybe you find the deepest connection with these new people that become soul friends because they are on a similar journey, maybe not necessarily the same one, but a similar one. Maybe you are in a practice, maybe you are like I am in the shamanic practice, and you find similar people that are in another spiritual path, but they share the same thirst for knowledge. And at some point, of course, there is this relief because you stop translating yourself. Um, and it's something that takes a while. It actually took me several years in order to which I always sometimes feel when I'm in some environments, I always need to translate what I'm doing. I'm uh running a place that is called after spirituality, and then I need to always explain the spiritualities. I always say it's well-being. But sometimes I say, for me it's not actually well-being, it's more than that, it's the journey of the soul. And sometimes I say, This is what I am, I'm wearing my three hats, um, and I don't need to fit necessarily according to the person that is in front of me. Because otherwise, this work every time is exhausting. You just have to be really honest. Because maybe sometimes you're I actually have a person and you present yourself with one hat, with one world, and actually, that person needs one of the other worlds that you are walking into, that they are always the real parts of you. So you don't need everyone, and also you don't need to be everyone to understand you and to understand everyone. And also, in another element in relationship-holding space for others, um, because it's it's easy to get frustrated with the people who don't get it, and um to to think that um someone is on their own path and they um you don't need to be there waiting, they have their own timing. And just because someone isn't where you are doesn't mean that they are there less than you. It just means that they are somewhere else, that some relationships need to end, some others need to be on a pause, on a break, because they need to develop their own way. And in the meantime, you keep doing your own stuff. So you keep walking your own path with integrity. And not trying to convert anyone, I've discovered the news, this new world, now you need to be with me. You need to actually to be in the same path. No, just simply respect exactly where they are and where you are. And then another element of this relationship is building community. Because if you're walking between worlds, you need a community, not a huge one, even just a few people around you, but you need someone who is on the same page. Because this past can be sometimes isolating. You are navigating things that most people don't, that the people that are in the matrix don't, they don't believe in what you do, they don't want to talk about, especially all the times when you talk about the hot topics, death, spirits. So find your own people, find your own tribe, whatever you want to call it. Because they are there, they are in circles, they are in workshops, they are in places where you also you might not expect, you might find them sometimes also in a corporate meeting. Who knows? You just connect and click with the soul that is in front of you, and that's why I create this call of shamanism. Because I know how much it matters to have a space where you don't have to explain yourself, where you can just be all of the parts of you, both worlds, and be met with understanding. So you are not meant to walk these paths alone. So, relationships are of course one of the hardest parts of this walking in between worlds, because there is a loss, there is a grief, there is the loneliness of being misunderstood, but they are also this incredible gifts, the connections that remain, the new ones that come in come in on board that are deeper, real, but sometimes better than what you have before, without saying what is bad, what is good, better for yourself in that specific moment. And just let go of all the others with love, with gratitude, but just let go, let them go and stay open to who is coming in. Because your people are out there, they are looking for you too. And so it's a mutual uh um search that we are going through.