Ep 14: The Body Knows: Trauma, Intuition & the Path Back to Yourself with Kirby Criddle

In this episode of Homestead & Heal, we sit down with Kirby Criddle, a spiritual teacher, writer, trauma integration specialist, intimacy educator, and hands-on, hands-in integrative pelvic care practitioner whose work is in service to the mystical and physical forces that bring your highest Self through to this world.

In this conversation, Kirby shares the many threads that have shaped her work- from growing up as a highly sensitive child with an intense spiritual inner world, to discovering language for what she was experiencing through Barbara Brennan’s Hands of Light, to finding refuge and expression through music.

We talk about her years as a touring musician, the decision to pause music after becoming a mother, and the unexpected path that unfolded when she opened a spiritual wellness center in 2019 -only to have the pandemic dramatically shift the direction of her work.

Kirby also opens up about her postpartum experience and the profound disconnection she felt from herself during that season. That chapter became a doorway into a deeper relationship with the body and eventually led her toward trauma integration work, pelvic care, and body-led healing.

She shares what she learned through training with Martin Bauduin, including the importance of listening beyond what the mind thinks should happen and allowing the body to reveal its own pace, wisdom, and direction.

Throughout the episode, we explore what it looks like to trust clinical intuition, stay in beginner’s mind, and resist the pressure to force transformation. Kirby speaks to the difference between chasing dramatic “quantum leaps” and allowing change to unfold through alignment, relationship, and deep listening.

Her relationship with land and nature is woven throughout the conversation as well. Kirby shares about life in Saskatoon, tending a large organic garden, experiencing loneliness and belonging, and serving as a forest chaplain along the city river. We talk about the way nature can mirror our own internal processes and what a garden can teach us about control, surrender, timing, death, and renewal.

Kirby also reflects on teachers, mentorship, and power — including what difficult teachers can reveal about our own discernment and the importance of learning to trust our own inner authority.

We also dive into the work she is offering now, including Vessel, her six-month program for women designed to deepen connection with the body, intuition, inner voice, and relationship with a higher power, as well as Naked Cake, a trauma integration circle.

This conversation is an exploration of what it means to come home to the body, trust what we sense, honor the full complexity of our experiences, and allow life to unfold from a place of deeper alignment rather than force.

In this episode, we explore:

• Kirby’s work in spiritual teaching, intimacy, trauma integration, and integrative pelvic care
• Her six-month women’s program, Vessel
• Spiritual sensitivity and perceiving energy as a child
• Discovering Hands of Light and finding validation for her experiences
• Music as a lifeline and her years as a touring musician
• Motherhood, postpartum disconnection, and pausing music
• Opening a spiritual wellness center in 2019
• How the pandemic redirected her work
• The influence of her ancestors and grandparents
• Trauma-informed touch and the realities of working with the body
• Learning to trust clinical intuition
• Alignment, beginner’s mind, and allowing the body to lead
• Why transformation doesn’t always need to happen quickly
• Gardening, control, surrender, and relationship with the land
• Kirby’s work as a forest chaplain
• The lessons that can come from difficult teachers
• Reclaiming self-trust and personal authority
• Vessel, Naked Cake, and Kirby’s current offerings

Connect with Kirby:
https://www.instagram.com/kirbycriddle

Connect with Lindsay & Scott: 

To learn more about our retreats: www.homesteadandheal.net

Connected with Lindsay: https://www.instagram.com/lindsaycourcelle/

Connect with Scott: https://www.instagram.com/alchemygardens/

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:02

Welcome to Homestead and Heal. I'm Scott.

SPEAKER_01 0:05

And I'm Lindsay, and we live with our three children on a farm in Vermont. Our lives revolve around growing food and medicine, working with the body, and trying every day to live in deeper relationship with the earth. And now we're welcoming guests to our farm for intimate retreats where they can slow down and feel deeply into this earth-body connection.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

This podcast is about remembering something many of us have forgotten: that we're not separate from the natural world. Our bodies are part of it. Our healing comes through it. And when we reconnect to both, our purpose often begins to reveal itself.

SPEAKER_01 0:40

Through conversations with herbalists, farmers, body workers, and people walking unconventional paths, we explore what it looks like to step outside the modern paradigm and build lives rooted in connection, healing, and reciprocity with the earth. Okay, welcome back to Homestead and Healed. Today we are here with dear Kirby, who I am so excited to speak with. I feel like I must have just come into relationship with you, Kirby, through Instagram and the fact that we both work with the female body, and I've just loved the perspectives that you've shared on the work that you do with women's bodies and in some of your program vessel, just your exploration of emotions. And I feel like we're kindred spirits in our work and what we want to bring to the human body. I think. I'm not entirely sure, but I'd love for you to just give a little introduction, tell, tell our listeners who you are and what your work and life and yeah, any aspect of your life you want to share.

SPEAKER_02 1:45

Sure. Thanks so much for having me. It's lovely to spend time with both of you and spend time in the ears of whoever's listening right now. Um so I live here in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, but I travel for work a bunch. I do a lot of different things. I have always done a lot of different things. I like variety, but for the last several years, probably for the last 20 to 21 years, I've been really interested in energy work. And not, and I know sometimes we say energy work and people have this idea of what it means. That's probably not what I mean by it. But energy work and trauma integration, the intersection between energy and flesh, the intersection between sexuality and spirituality. I work in the realms of energy, trauma integration. I'm a relationship coach, intimacy educator. I do women's pelvic floor bodywork. I technically can work with men as well, but typically I only take extreme cases. My really a lot of my focus is on women and supporting women. I do believe that men also need a lot of support in our culture, in our community. And I just don't always find myself equipped to provide that support beyond maybe relationship coaching, for example. Pretty much all the men I work with are attached to the women that I work with because I understand that if women that I work with are having better success in their relationships, everything's gonna go better.

SPEAKER_00 3:13

Yeah, that makes sense. And thanks for setting that too, that you recognize that men need support in the world we live in.

SPEAKER_02 3:20

Oh God, I love men. I'm so thankful for men. People can't see me right now, but it's making me a little weepy. Thank God for men and thank God for women. Thank God for everyone. That's really my belief and my experience that we all, every single one of us, has an integral part to play. We're not all gonna be a certain type of person. We're not all gonna fit a certain role, and we're not supposed to. Our job is to be the most maximized version of us, the truest version of us. You referenced Vessel earlier. So Vessel is a six-month women's program, and it is designed to do exactly that. Just to make each woman the most true version of herself, without as it's conditioning, without pressure, without just to be able to hear her own voice and connect to her own body on her own terms. And beyond that, connecting to that higher power, whatever you want to call it, right? I often don't like to choose a name because people get ideas about what that means. And again, just like the energy thing, it's probably not what you think it means.

SPEAKER_00 4:25

I don't even know what it means.

SPEAKER_02 4:27

I do use the word God because that's familiar to me. But I also understand that when I say God, people get all kinds of ideas and often miss the point. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 4:39

Yeah, and I think that we were just having a conversation about this higher power, and it's not gonna necessarily look the same way for everyone, but we're in that total agreement with you that yes, this there is this entity. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:53

Yeah, no, that's great and articulate. I appreciate that. One thing we always like to do is have people just give us an idea of where they are in the world, what's going on in the spot where you live. You we talked just briefly before this, and you mentioned being an avid gardener and actually designing your house smaller in order to maximize gardening space, which I'm immediately like, these are my people. That's that's how I feel too. But yeah, if you would tell us a little bit about where you're calling in from today and something that you're excited about in the natural world where you live.

SPEAKER_02 5:28

Oh, okay. There's so much to tell you about the natural world where I as many things as you want. I live in a relatively small city. I don't know exactly where other people live. It might seem big to some people, but I just got back from America and it's yeah, it's a small, it's a small city. And my husband and I did uh van camping/slash training trip to Santa Fe. So we drove from Saskatoon to Santa Fe and back. So we just got back yesterday. So nice. Really fun. But so I'm in Saskatoon right now. It's a city that has a river running through it, a river that is deeply meaningful to me. I'm in my home that my husband and I designed and built seven years ago. We chose this lot. Actually, I feel like this lot chose us. We were not intending to live over here. We thought that we were gonna live in the neighborhood we'd always lived in, the neighborhood our kids grew up in, where they were going to school. And we just couldn't quite seem to find the right thing. And then our realtor was like, okay, this lot is pretty much everything you want, even a little bigger, south facing on the corner. Just the gardening potential is wild and a fraction of the price of the neighborhood we wanted to be in. So it's like a no-brainer.

SPEAKER_04 6:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:39

So as I'm sitting here right now, it's Tuesday, July 21st. It's summer. It's unfortunately smoky outside. There are a lot of wildfires, but we've had a ton of rain this season. And so right now I am sitting amongst, obviously, I'm in my house, but in my garden, everything's so lush. The hoogle culture bed we have in the front, the mound, has two little mounds of oyster mushrooms that have just grown. Our hascaps are still somehow, I think because we had so much rain and not as much sun, they were delayed. So we're still eating hascaps off the bush. The strawberries are crazy right now. A lot of the caterpillars got the gooseberries, unfortunately. But the medicines are flourishing. We're having lilies bloom that have never bloomed before. Our broccoli went crazy. We just got purple broccoli this year too, and they weren't blooming before we left. But now we have gotten to eat them for the last couple meals. So it's very exciting. I work from home. My clinic is in my home space now, since some of my adult children have moved out of the house. And so we have more usable space in here for that kind of thing. But it's always so exciting to me to do this work in the summertime. In the spring, summer, fall. Winter is great too. Every season has its energy, but I'm sitting here and I can feel the buzz and the hum of the plants.

SPEAKER_04 7:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:00

Even though my house is made of metal. We have cord and steel siding, but I can feel the garden and my body as I'm sitting here right now talking to you. I'm sure you know what that's like.

SPEAKER_03 8:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:15

Totally. And yeah, I feel like we're in my kind of main office right now in a bigger town, Rutland. And I do have beautiful Linden tree out front. And there are some nice pretty trees around, but ginkgo across the road. Yep, ginkgo across the road. But compared to my the little office that I use that's really close to our house, which is really out in the country. Like I know what you mean about doing the work when you're surrounded by a landscape that feels really, yeah, just uh it's obviously alive, but it's like supportive and you're having energetic exchange with what's going on outside as well.

SPEAKER_02 8:52

It's such a different experience when you have the relationship with that land. It's your land, but you also belong to it. It just, it really does, it does different work. Yeah. Right? It does different things. I'm also the forest chaplain for uh quite a big section of land here that that runs the river here in the city. And so essentially what that means is just I'm the spiritual caretaker of that portion of land. And same thing. There's such a difference to when we first moved here, and I would walk that trail and I would notice the plants and all these different things. To now, it's yeah, there is a belonging. And I feel like in all of this loneliness that we keep hearing about and all of this isolation, certainly we need to get back to each other. We need to get off our screens and get back with each other, but we also need to get back into the natural world because yeah, even if a bunch of us get together and we're all depleted by our screens and we haven't rooted into the natural world, it's still gonna be difficult to access that intimacy that we're all looking for. Maybe we don't have language for it, but that's the box we need checked, right? That's what we need.

SPEAKER_00 10:07

Totally. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

For sure. And I'm wondering if you could speak a little bit about just your childhood and the path you've been on that's led you to this work. Your maybe your first connections with earth or with body that you remember.

SPEAKER_02 10:25

Yeah, my my childhood was intense. I I don't want to go too terribly much into it because I don't want to make certain members of my family uncomfortable, but there's just a lot of difficulty. There was addictions, trauma, different things to navigate. But I think I don't want to, I don't know, sound like I'm trying to overlay this exceptionally positive thing over this. Yes, it was fucked up. Yes, it was there was a lot of difficulty to navigate. But I also feel so grateful because I don't think that I could do what I do if I hadn't had those experiences. The reason I'm so good at listening to the body and listening to energy is because I could train from a very young age to hear the words coming out of the adults around me's mouth and check it against the energy of in the room, check it against what their body language was saying, check it against what happened next.

SPEAKER_04 11:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:20

Right. That's a very specific kind of practice.

SPEAKER_04 11:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:24

And so my upbringing led me to and through that. I did also had a pretty traumatic birth, a tri a fairly traumatic emergence into the world. And and I think maybe just from then my brain didn't develop or desensitize or something the way other people's brains do. My whole life, I can see things and know things that I don't know why I see and know. And it used to get me in trouble as a kid. My parents, or like I remember my grandma being like, don't talk about that. People are gonna put you in the mental hospital. And then eventually I was like, Oh, I shouldn't talk about that. And then when I was 18, I was meeting my son's dad, who would become my son's dad, for the first time. We were working on a music project together, and he showed me the book Hands of Light by Barbara Brennan. I don't know if you're familiar, but I opened the pages, yeah, and I was like, that's what I see. You mean other people see that? You mean I'm not broken, you mean I'm not sick. And it just set me on this path of okay, so now all of those experiences have been validated, and what can I do with it? I now had a textbook in my hands that I could play with. And I'm in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan at this time, right? I've moved around a bit, I've experienced a few things, but fairly sheltered. Nobody was talking about this at the time that I knew of. And so yeah, it was really magical to me to have this book and then this this way of practicing. And I practiced the skills in the book, and my skills got stronger, and things just started lining up one after the other. And so I can't even remember exactly what your first question was. I guess tell us a little about your childhood and how you got into your work, and maybe that's it. I remember being a kid and seeing I had this particular connection with this willow tree. It was a weeping willow, and I just I just was obsessed with it. I just wanted to go over to it, touch it, read stories underneath it. Just we would always see it on a walk. My mom and I lived in this, like, she was a single parent at the time, and we lived in this low-income apartment building. And when we would walk to church or to a store, we would see it, and I would just like I just felt like I could feel it. And then the other thing is that she would take me to church and I would feel like I could feel God. Like as a child, as like very young. I didn't realize what a strange child I was until I had children of my own. But like I started, I could read at one and a half.

SPEAKER_00 14:00

Wow.

SPEAKER_02 14:01

Yeah, like that's weird, but like different. Yeah, it's different. Yeah, yeah.

unknown 14:07

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:07

What did like feeling God in church? Like what I'm just I'm curious, what was that experience like?

SPEAKER_02 14:15

I just felt like I could feel this opening in my body. This opening and this presence. And sometimes I would hear words, and sometimes I could feel the dissonance between what was being said about God and how God actually was. Sure. Yeah. You know, someone's like, oh, God's wrathful. No, God's jealous, no, no. That just was never my experience, never resonant. And so as I grew up, again, more weird stuff. Like my parents lived in a small town, and I was walking home from school by myself one day, as you do when you're in a small town because it's safe and whatever. And I heard people singing in the church, and I went in, and all these old ladies invited me to sing with them, and I did. And I'm a musician now, but at the time I didn't know I could sing. And so I was like the only kid in the choir routinely going to church by myself for a long time. My parents didn't come. I just I went to church on my own. That's fucking weird. That's weird. Is that how you know what I mean? But it's just, yeah, it's just like all these different things.

SPEAKER_01 15:27

I just want to interrupt really quick because I also it was maybe I don't know if it was as long of a stretch of time, but I also went to church alone growing up to sing. It was like, I don't know, maybe just over the course of a year that I did this, but I really feel like it was like very specifically to sing. And so I am curious because this is also something that Scott and I have talked about is like, and for me, part of my journey was there were times of like disconnection from my essence, like what you're describing, you lead women to find that like essence of who they are, where I like I stopped with music. Like I just I did not sing, did not play any sort of music. And I'm wondering about that for you. Have you had any, have you always carried music through your life, or were there periods where you were disconnected from that part of you?

SPEAKER_02 16:18

Yeah, I think as a child, until I was maybe 11 or 12. I didn't really know I could sing. We had this this one girl in school that always got the lead role in the Christmas concerts or Christmas pageants. And then in grade six, and it was like nobody would dare to audition because she was just gonna get it. And then in grade six, I dared and I got it. And everyone was flabbergasted. And then I was like, oh, maybe I can do this, and maybe I do performing and maybe maybe there were all there was all this possibility. And I think from then on, I just was bit. I loved music, I wrote songs, I played instruments, I taught myself to play. Also, I lived in a small town, so what else was I gonna do? It was very, we didn't have the internet yet. Like I'm old enough that we did not have internet yet. So I had hours and hours of practicing. And then I think as I got older, I started to take it more seriously. And yeah, when I was 14, someone from LA who was in Shania Twain's band at the time noticed me and wanted to take me and mold me and give me a career. And my parents said no. And thank God they did, because at the time I was like so angry, but obviously so impressionable. And then just as I grew, I just kept playing music. I toured until basically giving birth. I just played guitar side saddle on my big belly. And I because I think I just at some point I realized I need to do this to be healthy. But the other thing is, I don't think I had skills and tools well practiced then. Music was my only form of catharsis, music was my only form of transmuting emotion and energy that I that's what I would do to feel better. That's what I would do to work my shit out. But then once I started getting into trauma integration and learning new skills and tools, I didn't need to rely on it so heavily. But my first real break from music actually probably came when I had my daughter. So I have a son and a daughter biologically, and then I have three children who are also my children, but they're my husband's children. And I think that yeah, my first real break was like after I had Nivea, because she was a really tough baby. And that was so hard on me mentally. I completely did not know that it was gonna be so hard. And so when I went back, your first baby? She was my second baby. Okay, okay. Yeah, Micah was like more of a I don't know, predictable infant. So I could still play guitar and sing when he would nap. He would nap twice a day. It was like a lot easier. Yeah. And by the time I had just was inconsolable, cried a lot, was really difficult, barely slept, did not want to sleep, did not want to be off my body actually. No one else could touch her or hold her for a long time. It was just really intense. Now she's this angel child, so sweet. If someone could have just told me it would have turned out like that, I probably could have relaxed more. But hindsight always. But yeah, so then I continued playing. And then my career was always easy for me. Doors just opened for me musically. People wanted to take chances on me, invite me to do things. I think partly because I tried to be a kind person. I tried to make every space I was in better. I think a lot of musicians get a bad reputation for not being professional, not being on time, disrespecting the sound tech, all these things. And I just really strived to never do that. And then in 2019, my husband and I decided to open a multi-tradition spiritual practice and wellness center. And I was I still had my clinical practice. I was doing a lot of different things. And I was like, okay, I was like teaching yoga, I was doing all this stuff, and I was like, I can't do it all and parent and open this facility. So I'm just gonna put music down for a year because I feel like I'm well established enough that I can probably put it down. So I canceled my festival tour. I just was like, for one year, I'm gonna baby this business. So this is September 2019. And we opened September 2019. Actually, I guess it was February 2019 that I made the decision to put it down. But then by the time March 2020 rolled around, we all know what happened. And then it just seemed really difficult to go back because how could you tour? How could you do any of the things that gave you a livelihood? Right? You couldn't. And so I just didn't. And now I'm in that dip of, oh, I can tell I need to play, I need to sing, but I'm pretty busy with my clinical practice and really fulfilled by it and my teaching and all sorts of different things that now the practice is creating more space for that part.

SPEAKER_00 20:59

Do you get to play and sing at home? Is that fulfilling for you? Or is there a longing for being out there and sharing it more widely too?

SPEAKER_02 21:07

It's a little bit of both. I don't make a lot of time to do it at home, even.

unknown 21:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 21:12

And I ought to. And also because I don't, my voice doesn't work the way that it used to. But the other thing that I think is really important to name is that just in the spirit of honesty, I was writing songs that were telling me things that I wasn't ready to look at. That's more true of why I kinked the hose. I was like, oh, you're gonna be real fucking real with me. Oh, maybe I'm not ready to look at that right now. And I'd be like, oh, a different song? Try again. Nope, same fucking theme. Same theme. Oh, oh gosh. And but I have been playing, I have been writing more lately. Those themes are coming back, and I'm just just allowing them to percolate and work me. I think I'm 40 now, I have a lot more availability. My children are. Older, right? So there's a lot more flexibility, and probably my body's a lot more flexible. I'm more resourced. So I can handle a lot more of this stuff. What might have come up and freaked me out before? Now I can be curious about it. I can move with it. I can dance with it. I can spar with it, maybe even.

SPEAKER_00 22:18

How old are your kids, just out of curiosity?

SPEAKER_02 22:21

Yeah, 23, almost 21, and then 16, 16.

SPEAKER_03 22:26

Okay. Cool. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 22:28

Yeah. They're we always say we have two sets of fake twins. Yeah. Yeah. They grew up together. They've known each other for pretty much ever. Our families were friends before my husband and I got together. And for anyone listening, that's oh, what a fairy tale situation. It has been hard. Okay. It has been so hard. Um, it has been very wonderful, also, but it has been really hard. So please don't make a mistake about that. Or yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:53

No, no Brady Bunch situation happening.

SPEAKER_02 22:56

No, and even the Brady Bunch, like what happened when those kids like they made the script, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:03

So you did speak about your childhood and your family, but I'm wondering if you had any, I know you mentioned your grandmother. Did you have any connection to grandparents or even further back ancestors that that have, as you've honed your, I don't know, psychic or I'm not sure what you want to call your ability to see and hear or whatever that is. But do you feel like you you have those connections intact?

SPEAKER_02 23:31

I think so. Despite at the time, my grandma, like I don't even know if she would remember not understanding me at the time, but I was so close with her. When I was growing up, it was like my grandparents were also my parents. Gotcha. My mom and I lived at their farm when I was born, and they still had kids at home, kids in high school. So it was just this very it was my favorite place in the world, and I loved them. And my favorite thing always was if my mom and my grandparents could be in the same room and we could all be together. Love that. Yeah. So even though I didn't have a dad, had this really great foundation. People who loved me, people who spent time with me took care of me. Some of my best memories are just driving in the tractor with my grandpa or in the pickup truck, chewing juicy fruit, gardening with my grandma. My grandma was an avid gardener. Yeah, finding baby kitties in the barn, brushing the horses. Yeah, just wholesome, whatever. But I really think that stuff was it was so instrumental in growing my faith in myself. Even though there was still that, I don't know, lack of faith in what I would later understand are some of my gifts. I still felt like they had faith in me.

SPEAKER_01 24:44

Yeah. And it was like protection just out of societal crushing or whatever you want to call it. Yeah. It wasn't like they didn't believe in you or something.

SPEAKER_02 24:53

It was just no.

SPEAKER_01 24:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 24:55

I I think they thought I was, I think they thought I was lying. They just, they were like, this is so fanciful. What? It's not possible. How is this a thing?

SPEAKER_01 25:02

And after you came more fully into those gifts, I and I don't know if your mom and your grandparents are living, but were they able to recognize and see that in you?

SPEAKER_02 25:13

Oh yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I actually just had my first time of working on my mom last year. And yeah, it was just so powerful. And she was like, oh, I didn't know you could do that. Just like a drastic reduction in pain, like all these different things. That maybe has been the most exciting part. And also, I think because my business is so varietal, right? It's not just one linear stream, it's all these different parts. Like I remember, I don't know, it was probably five, maybe more years ago. I was at a women's festival and I was talking about sex and how sex is everything. It's a mirror for everything. Everything shows up in that realm. And I remembered as I was on stage, there were like, I don't know, maybe 500 women I was talking to or something. And I remember being like, oh, yeah, my family could not fathom how this could be a job. They cannot fathom that people would be interested. And I was like, I'm just gonna need to stop and take a picture of all of you right now because I just need to show this to my family so that they know, yeah, this is important work. This is important work. And when you're building a body of work that doesn't exist, but you can so clearly see and feel that it fills the gaps that you were designed to fill, then how can you not how can you not show up for it? Right? I obviously are in the same vein.

SPEAKER_01 26:36

Yeah, I'm wondering if there are there any times when you felt more disconnected either from your body or from the earth or from the ancestors or from your purpose.

SPEAKER_02 26:49

Yeah, definitely postpartum when my daughter was such a struggle for sure. I think that was probably the first time that I felt that disconnect. I was having really bad panic attacks. I was I wasn't sleeping. And I also, for some reason, because I was having so much trouble stabilizing, I thought maybe I needed to do a cleanse. So I tried raw veganism. Oh. Yeah, it's not the time. It's not the time. Someone should have taken me by the shoulders and been like, what the fuck, Kirby? But I got a raw coach and like all this stuff. No, I crashed hard, so hard. It was wild. But I felt intensely disconnected. I felt like I couldn't even find God. I felt like God had abandoned me. And that was like it was really fucked up and really hard. One of the hardest times in my life. And I've been through, I've been through harder things, maybe, but it's just so much harder when you're going through something and you don't feel the support of the higher power. Right. In hindsight, I can see it was there. I can see it's just I wasn't able resourced enough to connect and take it in. But at the time, you probably could not convince me that I hadn't been abandoned.

SPEAKER_01 28:05

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, that and we were just speaking with another podcast guest about this being able to receive the gifts and know that it's there. Is that were you already doing kind of women's work at that time postpartum, or was that a big part of your path?

SPEAKER_02 28:24

I was, but it also shifted more fully because of that experience, because realizing how hard it was to get the help that I needed, to get the support that I needed. Yeah, that was like a huge indicator. And also, I think as time went on, as my daughter got older and I got a divorce from her father and just navigated my way in the world again. I had all these women coming to me. I'm sure you see this too, Lindsay. You'll have patterns, right? You'll be like, oh, I guess it's gallbladder week. I guess it's this month, I guess this is happening. There were all these women who had sexual trauma, wanted to move through it. And I was teaching them to de-armor themselves and maybe even teaching their partner if they were open to it. But in a lot of cases, I made a mistake there. I was like, if you have had a violation, a rupture, you're probably the safest person to touch your own body because you are in your body and you can go at your own pace and you can make sure you don't overstep. But also, no, you can't. Like we often need support, right? It's often very confronting to touch our own bodies, especially if it doesn't feel like our body belongs to us anymore, or maybe never did. Right. And also sometimes it's hard to stay in our body when we're doing that. Yeah, absolutely. Right. And sometimes the partner, though well-meaning, is the perpetrator. So, how can a partner release a tissue that they are complicit in causing the bracing of? So through that practice, I learned, because I just kept sending women home with homework and they kept coming back, being like, Can you do it? Can you do it? Can you just please do it for me? And I was like, No, no, I can't unless I get some sort of certification because it just feels too edgy. So then I looked into it and I found this amazing man, which surprises a lot of people, named Martin Baudouin. Are you familiar with Martin's work? I feel like you probably are. Yeah. And so I found his work and the rest is history. I grappled a little. I was like, oh, can I do this with a man? I don't know. But as soon as I met him, I was like, oh, yeah, literally, he has the clearest energy of any man that I've ever met. And it was so, and also just this brilliant wisdom. And I know lots of women who have done various trainings, who've trained with him and done other trainings, and they all say the same thing that it just his training is unmatched. He sees things that other people don't see. Yeah. Yeah. And so, yeah, so I did my 200 hour with him, and then I did advanced pelvic training with him. And then I could show up and serve these women. And Martin is also really amazing. I feel like probably for the last 10 years, a lot of the things that I've studied have not really been stuff that I've taken in so much as they've given me permission slips. I'm like, oh fuck this again. I was already seeing this in clinic and I was doubting it. But I am seeing the right thing. I am noticing this. You know, and even in advanced pelvic training, we were being taught these techniques. And I would, I could understand, I could write it down, I could practice. But then when it came time to trade sessions with each other, I couldn't get myself to do the practice because I'd be like, no, but this woman's body is asking for this thing and asking for these things. And I know I'm supposed to be trying to do this finite bit of body work, but this feels like it's not going to do anything. And I'm actually trying to do this other thing so that she can receive what she's actually here to receive. She can have a reduction in pain. She can open her life force. And Martin was like, Oh yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah, for sure. Practice these techniques, but also in these trading sessions, do what you do. He's like, You're working out here, right? The stuff I'm teaching is here. And hopefully people will get here. But you need to trust yourself. And to have a teacher say that that wasn't like, no, you're doing it wrong. Yoke yourself to this practice. But to be like, yeah, no, I see you and I trust you. I understand what you're doing and where you're going. Do that. That was so powerful for me. So powerful. And yeah. And I've gotten to get to know him since the training more. I've hosted him in Saskatoon before. I used to have a clinic a couple blocks away. And he came and used that workspace. And I just, yeah, I can't say enough good things. So if anyone is thinking about training, 100% will do my body work. Just yeah. I think he's changed a few things too to make it a little bit easier to do the modules. Because when you first go in, it's a lot of information. It's a lot. Yeah. And yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:06

I'm wondering kind of what you feel most excited about in your work and practice right now, since I know you have such a huge variety of things that you bring.

SPEAKER_02 33:17

I don't even know if I could choose any one thing. I think the thing that I'm most excited about is finding alignment in every single situation. Striking the right balance, getting out of my own way. I really strive to come to every session, whether it's a workshop, whether it's teaching, whether it's a session, whatever it is, to just come with a beginner's mind and know that I don't know and that I don't have to know because that person's body knows, or God knows, I need to be a good listener. Yeah. Right? There are so many times I will come and a person will tell me all these things and I'll make a mental map. And I'd be like, and then if I've leaved my mental map, I'd be like, oh, we should probably do this technique and then this thing and release this and tonify this and blah blah blah. It's not fucking right. Because when you ask the body, is like, no, do this and everything else will resolve. The body is so wise, right? And then also, then once you start looking at the body as an extension of nature, the wisdom is there, the medicine is there. Right? We still we still need support. We still need to interrelate, we still need to inter be, right? We need each other, right? Because if we could do this ourselves, we would have done it already. Yeah. Right? We would already be done. So there's a significance there. There's that alignment is how do we be in right relationship in whatever moment we find ourselves in? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:54

That's great.

SPEAKER_02 34:55

Even the crunchy ones, right? Even the crunchy ones, even the gritty ones. I think a lot of times in our culture, or maybe just at this time, people make assumptions. I know I certainly used to. If it doesn't feel good, then it must not be right. If it doesn't feel good, it must be wrong. No, absolutely not, because that's how we grow. Same thing. If it's not a fuck yes, it's a no. No, there's a fuck maybe. There absolutely is a fuck maybe. There's a lot of fuck maybe. Right. And it's just our willingness to find that alignment instead of trying to elicit a particular thing that we think is supposed to happen, but is actually so short-sighted.

SPEAKER_00 35:34

And maybe have the willingness to let that process unfold at whatever pace it needs to, and just be with it and not have to know today or move on it today, whatever.

SPEAKER_02 35:47

Yeah, because the thing is, a quantum leap is sure, we there's some manipulation and not in the bad way, but there's we have some influence. Certainly. We have the ability to cultivate, we have the ability to play with time, to play with energy, but not everybody should. What? Yeah. Like when we talk about quantum leaps, you have to understand, you make a quantum leap, you did not take the path of gaining all the resources and information that you would need to stand there. So you're gonna find yourself an alien and be like, I don't recognize any of this. Yeah, of course you don't. And then you have to fast track your understanding, which some people are very comfortable with. And some people that will cause a fucking breakdown.

SPEAKER_01 36:32

I can absolutely relate to what you're saying, or just I think that's a great piece of advice. And yeah, just I feel like I'm in a little bit of a season of actually just listening and making decisions that my conscious brain is like, what the fuck are you doing? And I'm like, I am listening. I don't even know exactly what I'm listening to, but I'm doing the things that I'm drawn and guided towards. And yeah, just have that curiosity on the other side of what will be there for me or what lessons will appear. And again, like in hindsight. Like, what will I see in hindsight about this whole situation or whatever it is.

SPEAKER_02 37:15

Yeah. And that's such a valuable experience to have, to put yourself in the position of being able to have that and witness yourself through that. Because it's only through the hindsight and having had experiences like that that I can trust it so well. Yeah. God has played with me this whole time. God has really conspired to make me learn this lesson. And before I knew what was going on, I hated it. I was like, what is happening to me? Why? And now I'm like, oh, I was growing a muscle. I was growing, I was attaining a skill. Right. That deep listening, that doesn't mean that I am constantly trusting, by the way. Sometimes I am like, like this morning, I'm like, what the fuck? You know what I mean? But there is also, it gets easier the more we practice. There is also a trust.

SPEAKER_00 38:08

Yeah, like you're describing like trust in that knowing. You have the intellectual part that's saying, oh, this is the practice, like making the mental map of what people tell you and being like, oh, this is what I need to work on, and then showing up there and being like, but I know that's not what's gonna like really get to it. We talked about this earlier with I guess about me doing that on the farm. And like sometimes it takes me forever to plant trees because I have these trees and it's such a big consideration for me because they're gonna be so big and so long-lived. And I want to do it right and I'll think a lot about where it's gonna go. And then sometimes I'll decide and then I'll show up with my shovel in the tree, and I was just like, no, this doesn't go here. This isn't gonna go here. So maybe it sits in the pot for another year. But I like the idea of like it sounds like you being able to grow into trusting that part of yourself in the realm of the work that you're doing to be able to just have that knowing. That's just always interesting to me when people get to that point of thinking outside the box and being able to just really trust, trust their knowing. It's an amazing skill.

SPEAKER_02 39:20

I think that knowing grows in the garden, though. If you spend enough time in the garden, you realize the gardener is not the boss. Nature is.

SPEAKER_04 39:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 39:27

And you can cry all you want that it's not a carrot year, but it was a squash year, it was a broccoli year, it was a this. And then maybe next year will be a carrot year and it won't be that. And we didn't get to be the boss of that thing. And we also didn't need to because look how fantastic things worked out when we didn't just meddle and freak out and impose our will upon nature, when we worked with nature, right? The fact that you're not planting that tree where you're insisting it goes because the land is reflecting back to you. This is not its home. Yeah, it does not belong here.

SPEAKER_04 39:59

Right.

SPEAKER_02 39:59

Right. That's an example of that right relationship, of that alignment that I believe we all have. And if we don't feel it, it would be good to seek it out.

SPEAKER_04 40:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 40:09

Because that's just another, that's just another frame of the same thing, of the thing that guides you to create something new in business, to start a new project, to have another child, to all these things, to work out your family trauma, right? All these different things to connect you to your ancestors, to connect you to your own path forward, because you are your own ancestor also in the movie. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:34

We have a farmer mentor who talks about this sort of thing of just like farming an amazing, an amazing tool to help you to understand just how little control that we really do. You know, like just if you have the illusion that you're going to control your life and the outcomes, farming is a good way to help teach you. That's just total bullshit.

SPEAKER_02 40:56

Yeah. Like there are pockets where you have some influence, but it's it's I guess it would be like paradoxical in nature or something. I don't even know if that's the right term, but sometimes multiple things are happening at the same time. Right. You think you're learning this lesson, but actually you're also learning this lesson and maybe this one too. Like a little deeper.

SPEAKER_04 41:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 41:15

Right. I've written songs, like all of my songs, I don't work hard on my songs. They all come through in like 10 minutes or less. And I know that's crazy and also sounds unfair because lots of people work really hard. And truthfully, I probably am in a season of my life where I'm gonna learn to work on a song, right? Before I'd be like, oh, it's not coming, I'm gonna give up. Fuck it. Now I'm gonna learn what it's like to revisit something and refine it. And I think that's great. But because those things all came through, like I used to think, oh, this is a message for someone else. This is some something for someone else. And then later, or I would be like, oh, I think it's about this, right? I'm writing because I'm frustrated about this situation with this person. And then a few years go by and I'm like, I was also telling myself this. Holy shit, I couldn't even see it at the time. It's like return on investment over and over. Right. And I think that's also if we look at our life with that lens, life will speak to us in that way. Oh, you made that choice because this, but also this. That happened to you and taught you this, but also this. Right. There's a lot of discourse about teachers and probably and coaches, and there probably always has been. But I think we're in, I don't know, like a very a kind of stunted, kind of afraid culture, right? Like women are taking risks and they're like, I don't have to be perfect, but at the same time, they're demonized for not being perfect. It's this weird kind of push-pull. And and I think we forget that just because something happens that we don't like doesn't mean it's not necessary. And also sometimes the most skillful teacher will poke you in a way that you are not expecting, and that will be such a blossom for you. A couple of years ago, I was working with this woman who is very well known for being really harsh, really intense. And I don't work with her anymore. But at the time I was drawn to her harshness because I felt like I needed someone to back me. I needed someone who was more harsh and more powerful than me because I didn't feel like I had anyone in my corner. And I learned through that situation that I was actually trying to avoid growing my own power, I was trying to use her power to avoid having to grow my own back. I was like, oh, if she can stand at my back, then I don't have to do the work of shoring up in myself. And at the time, I probably didn't have the capacity. So, you know, I understand why I did that, but one day we were on a call. There were like hundreds of people on the call, and I shared a piece of my heart with her, and she made it we hadn't met yet. I think this is our first time working together. And she made this judgment, and it was scathing, and it was in front of all these people, and I watched myself shrink, but. Simultaneously go, she's wrong. She's projecting on me right now. I knew that, but I also was like scared of her. I didn't want to get in an argument. So I just shrunk a little bit. I was like, that didn't go all the way in, but it was the start actually of me growing my backbone that moment because I that called the necessity forth. And so I've talked about that other times. I'm like, bad teaching is the gift that keeps on giving. Because how do I actually know that was bad teaching? Because that was actually so skillful. It got the outcome. Yeah. I know what you're like. I was there trying to get access to my own power that I did not know how to get. I was looking for her to show me a roadmap. And she was like, Yeah, you can't just make me do it for you. Boof. And it caused me to grow in this way. And for that, I am so grateful. And so when people slag her and go, oh, she's traumatizing all this stuff. I'm like, not that I want to be like, is she though? But I'm also like, but what about the other thing? And how many things in life can we take that view? What else is going on here? Because there is no singular event. There is no, it's only this way. There's always so many layers of activity and information. So which one are you going to pluck out? What meaning are you going to make? How are you going to apply it? In the way that only you can. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 45:29

Yeah, that's such an important piece, I feel like. For sure. This has been amazing talking with you. We have a couple more questions. One is best advice that you wish you would have received earlier on your path.

SPEAKER_02 45:44

Oh to trust myself. I've spent so much time knowing things, not knowing why I know them, second guessing myself, and also looking for validation in the people around me as my own certainty. Certainly we have to, we live in community. We I'm not the boss of everything, right? I do need to have discernment. I do need to check myself against other people all the time. But I don't need to let their misunderstanding or their inability to see what I see be the determinant of whether or not I believe in what I see. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:25

I love that. That was perfectly well. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 46:28

I have the most wild, beautiful career. 20 years ago, I could not have fathomed. If you had told me I would be doing what I'm doing, I could not figure out how I was ever going to get from there to here. I would have been like, no, you obviously have me mistaken with someone else. There's no fucking way. No, it's not possible. And I feel so fortunate because I get to live a life where I'm never dreading going to work. I'm just so grateful for every client I get to work with. I have clients all over the world. I've had clients all over the world for several years. And it's just crazy to me. As much as I'm like, oh, social media is so stressful, it also brings so much. I wouldn't have met you if it wasn't for Instagram. No, absolutely. I don't even know you, but I love you so much. It's weird. You're just like, I don't know you, but I know you're my people. And how fabulous. And thank God for Instagram for that. Because when I know that you are doing the work that you're doing and that you are doing the work that you're doing, you probably can't tell I'm looking at each of you, but that makes me feel so much less alone in the world. That makes me feel braver to take risks, to try things, to follow the call of my heart because I know you're doing it too. And because we're talking about it. If I didn't know you existed, I would probably be like quietly afraid to talk about anything.

SPEAKER_00 47:53

Sure, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 47:55

And sometimes we're doing the same work and sometimes we're not doing the same work. But ultimately, if we're call following the call of our heart, we're doing the same thing. Right? I'm doing what I'm supposed to do. You're doing what you're supposed to do.

SPEAKER_00 48:06

Totally. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 48:07

Yes, 100%. So that's so important. And I, if I had known that, but also if I had known that, like maybe it wouldn't have been as hard won. Maybe it wouldn't be as bone-shatteringly beautiful. So yeah, but still, that is what I wish that someone would have told me for sure.

SPEAKER_00 48:24

That's great.

SPEAKER_01 48:25

Yeah, thank you. Thank you for asking.

SPEAKER_00 48:26

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 48:27

Okay. And just last thing is where can people find you? We know you're in Saskatoon. Where can people find you online? What else do you want to share about your work? Anything?

SPEAKER_02 48:37

Sure. Yeah. So Instagram is probably the easiest way. I, as we have talked about many times, I am not a tech savvy person. Um, I'm a one-woman show. I don't have a VA or anything yet. I probably should get one, but I can't even fathom how that would work. I need to do more research. I don't know. But you can find me on Instagram. That's predominantly the place where I talk about things, I post things, there's information there. I run programs from time to time. I don't have anything evergreen at the moment. I feel like I should, but I also feel like that'll come when it comes. I really like live teaching. Right now we are in month four of my program Vessel, which you are just about to teach in, which is very exciting. We just had David Bedrick teach last week. It was especially cool because I didn't realize that David had moved out of Santa Fe. So I was like, oh my gosh, I'm gonna be in Santa Fe. Maybe we can meet up and actually do the class in person. But he's not in Santa Fe anymore, but that's okay. Um but yeah, so vessel will run again later in the year, I think. The other thing is I don't have a business plan because I just do what I'm told. I look for that alignment. And when I run a program, it's not because I put it on a calendar, it's because the hand that guides me said, okay, you're gonna do it now. The last time I ran vessel was three years ago. And then I didn't run it for three years because I'm not the boss. And I know that that frustrates people sometimes because they're like, oh, I missed the last vessel cohort. Do it again so I can do it. And I'm like, I'm so sorry. I have no idea. You mean when's the next time you're gonna run something?

SPEAKER_01 50:11

I'm like, maybe next year, but I really have no idea.

SPEAKER_02 50:16

Yeah, maybe never. I'm not sure. It just depends. There might be other things. One other thing that I absolutely love and cherish is I run this women's circle called Naked Cake. So yes, we do get naked. Yes, we do eat cake. It's a trauma integration circle, but those are predominant parts of it. And it's joyful, it's emotional. We do some real gritty work, but it is powerful. It's really amazing. And I travel and take that with me. So if you're curious about bringing it to your community, please reach out, ask questions. Great. Yeah, I'm getting sexy how about that. Sounds great. And then also, so I see people in my home clinic, but I also travel to treat people all the time. People bring me out to places for retreats or they gather a group of women who all want to receive work. So then I go to a place and I treat a bunch of women. It just depends how it works out. But I am open to travel. My children are older now. It's a little bit easier for me to do that. And I love it. It's interesting.

SPEAKER_00 51:15

We'll have to get you out to Vermont sometime.

SPEAKER_02 51:17

Yes. Oh, I want to visit your farm so bad. Yeah, it's on my, it's on my and my husband's list. I was like, look at this. And he's oh my gosh, we have to go. Yeah. That would be fun.

SPEAKER_00 51:26

And I don't think, did you say what where to find you on Instagram? Is it you maybe are Criddle?

SPEAKER_01 51:32

Yeah, it's at Kirby Criddle.

SPEAKER_00 51:33

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 51:34

And we'll have the we'll have the link in the show notes. Okay. Okay. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with us and just sharing all of your beauty and wisdom and openness. And I do feel that heart resonance. And it's just really special to connect with you. So likewise.

SPEAKER_00 51:53

So nice to meet you and talk with you. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 51:56

Yeah. Thank you so much. This has been such a highlight of my day, highlight of my month. So thank you for the important work that you're doing and just being wonderful. I don't know. It's really great.

SPEAKER_01 52:08

Thanks. Thank you for listening to this episode of Homestead and Heal. If you loved it, please help us spread the word by subscribing to this podcast and leaving us a review. For more information about our work, visit homesteadandheal.net.

SPEAKER_00 52:22

We're wishing you the life of your dreams, one that feels deeply rooted, fully alive, and connected to the earth beneath your feet.