Fearlessly Feral Living!
Fearlessly Feral Living!
Authentically Speaking #2!
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
This is the second episode in a series of interviews with Cindy Hartzell, horsemanship and transformational coach. Today we are speaking about forgiveness.
Cindy's web site is Heart Soul Horsemanship
You can find more information about Fearlessly Feral here.
Welcome everybody to another episode of Fearlessly Feral Living, a podcast devoted to wonderful wild and woogie stuff. And today I have as my guest Cindy Hartzel for the second in our series, which we are now calling Authentically Speaking. So I'm broadcasting to you from the Woogie Ranch, and Cindy is coming to us from Genoa, Nevada. And my ranch is about 45 minutes south of Genoa, out near Topaz Lake, in case you're wondering where we are in the overall scheme of things. I'm out here in the back 40 of northwestern Nevada, where I'm a half an hour away from the nearest gas station and the nearest grocery store. And this is a podcast devoted to using new thought principles to ensure successful creative living. Fearlessly Feral is a focus ministry of Centers for Spiritual Living and is devoted to a vision of a world in which everyone lives fearlessly feral, or in other words, wild and free. We plan spirituality and psychology to work from the inside out to promote successful, wild and free living. And our mission is to provide a strong and unshakable foundation that works for long-term successful living. Our purpose is activating inner self-awareness to live unlimited lives. And we do this by talking about spiritual principles in practical ways so that they are applicable to everyday living. So today, the spiritual principle we are talking about is forgiveness. Are you ready for this? Forgiveness. When Cindy and I connected this morning via text, she said, remind me again of what the topic is. And I wrote back forgiveness. And she said, Oh, we could go really deep with that, and we could. So let we're going to see what happens here today because we kind of free flow on these things. But I want to start us off by saying a couple of things about forgiveness. First of all, yes, forgiveness is a spiritual practice, it's one of the most powerful spiritual practices that we can do in life. It is also one of the most difficult. I'm sure. I mean, I've said times when I wasn't able to forgive, and I've done my work and I've gotten to a point where I forgave because forgiveness is never ever ever about them. It's always about us. Forgiveness relieves us from the burden of carrying around that lack of forgiveness. For it's said that not forgiving is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die. And that's really how that works. So obviously, I'm a big advocate of forgiveness. And I have a list of promises because I believe in bribing people to do their spiritual practices. So, you know, if you're having a tough time forgiving, there's tools and tips and tricks that that we can share with you. But and Cindy's going to share with you about horses and forgiveness in a bit. I'm going to skip mine, but I want to promise you that what this is what will happen if and when you forgive. You'll get a feeling of joy in your life for no reason at all. Willy-nilly, just driving down the road, minding your own business, and all of a sudden you're feeling joyful. That's what happens when we forgive. We feel like a big weight has been lifted off our shoulders. We heal. Sometimes the healing is physical because lack of forgiveness for it affects us on all levels. Our body is a holistic machine. We've got the physical aspect, but we've also got the psychological and the emotional and even the spiritual aspect. And when we are not forgiving, it affects us on all levels. And sometimes it affects us physically. Sometimes it affects us mentally as well. But we experience healing when we forgive. And it happens instantly, just like that. I have forgiven and gotten relief instantly. It's miraculous the way it works. Forgiveness gives us the ability to live in the present rather than in the past. And I don't know about you, but I don't like living in the past. I find it very limiting. And forgiveness empowers us because we're no longer blaming someone else for our stuff. Instead, we're taking responsibility for our lives. So that's that's a deal about forgiveness. It is powerful. I love forgiveness. It's not easy to do. I usually need help when I have to work through something or someone that I need to forgive. But because I know what's on the other end, I always do it, I always get there. So I want to hear from Cindy, and I'm gonna read you her bio. This is Cindy Hartzell. She is a horsemanship and transformational coach. And I met her a little over a year ago, I think, when I contacted her and said, Will you come out to my neck of the woods and help me? And she said, Yeah. And we've been working together ever since. And just as an aside, in my memories feed today came up that she had me trotting in the round pen with my eyes closed on my horse. Oh wow. Wow, what an experience that was! And that took a lot of forgiveness, believe me, it took a lot of forgiveness for me to get there. And she helped me with that, and so did my horse. You know, it it really was a wonderful experience. So Cindy Hartzall has studied horsemanship for over 21 years. In 2018, she launched her Heart Soul Confidence-based horsemanship. She is a personal and professional transformational coach. She teaches horse clinics, workshops, retreats, and gives private lessons. In 2020, she created Pathway to True Unity online horsemanship program. She is EGA certified in 2004 and she became E3A certified in 2014. Cindy began working with wild mustangs in 2011 and managed a herd of 130 Nevada-rescued Mustangs for 18 months. She's the founder and president of Heart Soul Horses Helping Humans, Incorporated. That's a 501c3 nonprofit, by the way. Which means if you donate to her, it's tax deductible. Had to get that little plug in there. She is certified as an art of feminine presence level one teacher, a Reiki master teacher, an animal communicator, and co-owns a veterinary practice with her husband. It gives me great pleasure to introduce Cindy Hartzel once again for the second in our series of Authentically Speaking. And Cindy, I would like to start us off on forgiveness today by asking you, what can horses teach us about forgiveness?
SPEAKER_02Well, first of all, thank you for um including me in this second of our series. This is a lot of fun. Um, what can horses teach us about forgiveness? Horses are masters at teaching us about so many life skills that we aren't even aware of often that helps us get along not only with ourselves, but in community, either family or our community we live in. Um horses live in the present moment. And so they do have trauma and they do have, you know, memory that they draw on based on a current experience that's happening in the moment, that it will often trigger in their memory bank. Do I have something to recall on that helps me to understand what might be happening and how I react or respond in this present moment? But they don't hold grudges. So as we show up and work with horses, rather we're mastering our horsemanship or we're doing an equine facilitated program where we're learning on-the-ground activities with them to help discover more about ourselves. Horses are intuitive, their survival depends on it because they live in a herd dynamic. And so they're very good at reading their herd members. And if you are doing something with a horse and you accidentally are too heavy with them, or you spook them, or you even hurt them, you know, like clipping them, you hurt them, or putting their bit in their mouth, you jab it in and bang their teeth. Or, you know, I mean, we do stuff. You tie them up to something, you didn't tie them correctly, something startled them, or they put their head down, got the rope over their ears, and would to put up, and you know, they're like, ah, and they freak out. We feel really bad. Most of us, most of the women I work with anyway, will feel extremely bad. But with their the horse's ability to read our intention and read our body language and feel where we're coming from, they know that we did not intentionally mean to startle them, hurt them, forget them, you know. So they're very forgiving about it. Whereas we tend to, when somebody does something that hurts our feelings or scares us or makes us feel unworthy, we tend to take it very, very personally. And because we've got that beautiful frontal lobe, we keep running it over and over and over again in our heads and our minds, and the mind's an amazing thing, but it does have its uh downside. When one of those is the mind can't tell if something is happening, happened an hour ago, three days ago, six years ago, right now, or may happen in the future. It thinks it's happening right now. So when we think about Karen forgot to call me, and here I am waiting for our lunch date, and find out on Facebook she's out gallopatting with somebody else. Now I feel really unimportant. And I, and this is a you know, a gentle, a gentle feeling like somebody did something to me. I'm gonna keep playing that over and playing that over and expecting a phone call and expecting an apology, and and maybe I won't accept it, or maybe I will accept it, but passively aggressively make her feel really bad for the fact that she just forgot, you know. Whereas horses, it happens as long as you're not ill-intentioned beating them or aggressively coming at them, they're like, whoa, that was scary. And then you go back to, yeah, ooh, my bad. Let's keep moving forward, they forgive you. So they're masters at teaching you how to forgive, and um not only do they show you how to forgive another, but they actually hold the space for you to forgive yourself, and that's one of the biggest things that I work with a lot of my clients who have done something unintentional because they didn't know, you know, the saying, you don't know what you don't know until you know it. Well, that's almost a golden rule with horses. And um, I have so many clients that keep beating themselves up for the fact that they tied their horse wrong, or they tied their horse and they came at them not thinking was something that spooked them, and the horse pulled back and broke their rope and maybe you know spooked off or whatever, put the saddle on not tight enough. We hold on to not forgiving ourselves, and then we bring that energy to the table, and the horse is like, what's wrong? You know, whereas if we could just be in the present moment with them when that moment of not forgiving ourselves for scaring or injuring or neglecting our horse, um, if we could just look in our horses' eyes and connect with them on that heart and soul level in that moment of feeling lack of forgiveness for ourselves, they will mirror for us that present moment, non-judgmental, unconditional acceptance that we can choose to embrace and try to forgive ourselves.
SPEAKER_00So you said a little earlier that horses will show us how to forgive. Can you give some specific examples about how a horse would show us that? Or like you just mentioned, okay, if I go out to see my horses and I connect with them and I look them in the eye, and I I actually do this a lot with my own horses. I'll go out just to hug them. And my mare, Annie, she lets me hug her as long as I want to hug her. Sonny, once in a while, will pull away, and when he does, I let him. Um, but I go out and I just hug on them and I bury my face in their neck, and I breathe in all that wonderful horse energy. And it's not always about self-forgiveness for me. Sometimes it's just about I just need a little break from life here, and I'm just gonna go out and do that and get that break with them and feel that that horsey love stuff going on. So, but if I go out and I'm working with my horse and I'm in a state where I have felt so let's use your example from earlier, and where um I was scheduled to meet up with somebody and they they they ghosted me, they just didn't even show up, and so I felt um neglected and ignored and less than and not very important in their life, and I was in a in a in a tizzy about it, not not really forgiven very much about that. If I go out and I work with my horse that day, and I've got these feelings going on, I know enough about it to know that the horse is going to sense it, they're gonna want to know what's going on with Karen over here. After that, how does the horse teach me to forgive? What happens there?
SPEAKER_02Well, in that particular situation versus you having done something with or to your horse that you feel guilty for, but in that particular situation where you're coming out feeling lesser than the horses live in that present moment, so they connect with you better if you're able to meet them in the present moment. Now, depending on the horse and their unique way of working with people, some horses will feel your energy of coming out and you're feeling um like you've got some particles, attention particles that are stuck on what had happened five minutes ago, an hour ago in the past. And if it's a nurturing horse who likes to comfort, they may come up to you and just really want to connect with you on that physical energetic level to just let you know you're loved. I mean, I don't know if you've ever had a horse, but I have uh Dakota here, and I used to have a big black magic as well, and RC used to do it as well. They will give me a full-on hug. I mean, they will position themselves to where I'm in their neck area and they will just hug me. And just that act of being hugged or nuzzled, you know, some of them will nuzzle, nuzzle, just that act puts me in the present moment and softens and and softens my heart, helps me to drop down into my heart, and when you drop down into your heart, it all of a sudden doesn't matter because you're in your heart, you're in the present moment, you're connecting with this soul who's saying, You matter, I love you, I want to connect and tactilely feel you. Then you have the other horse who may not be the cuddly warm kind of per horse. They're more like, yeah, if I don't have your full attention, you're not gonna get mine. You're gonna have to work a little bit harder. And so their gift is to trigger the already going on emotions that you are experiencing based on somebody else's behavior that didn't really have anything to do with you, but you've taken it very very personally, and so they're gonna mirror for you, yeah, I'm going over here and I'm gonna make you work to be with me. And so where the first one makes you feel good, yeah, the second one kind of makes you feel even worse, you know, for a moment, and then you kind of get angry and you may be a little bit more aggressive, or you may be like, fine, I don't want anything to do with you. And if you've been around horses long enough, or you're in an equine facilitated experiential session, you've got a coach who's coaching you through. Hey, what is that horse saying?
SPEAKER_01And and how could you maybe make yourself more inviting?
SPEAKER_02And what's being triggered inside of you that might show up in these other relationships, like the one with this person who most likely forgot you, maybe chose for whatever reason didn't want to do it, and it gives you the opportunity to kind of look within and realize that they're triggering things that probably happened to you at a very young age of being the last one picked to be on the team, or somebody had a slumber party and you weren't invited. You know, those kind of makes you feel excluded and unimportant. Whereas if you if let's go back to the horse, it's like goes to the opposite end of the corral because you may come in with like, we're gonna do this, and I don't care that they didn't want to have lunch, and you just got that energy of rah-rah rah. And they go to the other end of the corral by you stopping and going, Whoa, not you too. You know, you can take a couple deep breaths and go, okay. How can I show up in a way that they do want to maybe be with me? I really kind of need a horsey hug, you know, even though I'm not acting like it. So those are a couple, those are the opposite ends of the spectrum of how a horse might respond to you showing up in a place of not being forgiving.
SPEAKER_00Thank you. And what I really like about these conversations that I've been having with Cindy is, you know, I'm a firm advocate of going within and looking at self. And really uh, in fact, I had a um a client call me earlier, and uh she was bothered by something out there. Someone, someone out there, something out there was bothering her. And you know, I found myself saying to her at one point, this has nothing to do with them. It has nothing to do with them. This has to do with you. This is a this is something that that is going on inside. And so when we're moving through life and we're we're interacting with these horses, and this is what I love about the horses because they will always take me back and and ask me to go within and look at myself and what am I feeling right here? What's really going on with me here today? If I'm not enjoying my time with my horse, it's I it's it's something for me to look at. And and I just absolutely love that. That's what I love about. Well, it's one of many things that I love about being with horses and riding them and doing all the other stuff that I get to do with them. But that one key thing is is wonderful, absolutely wonderful. So I wanted to talk a little bit about it seems like almost daily sometimes I encounter a situation where I need to stop and take a deep breath and forgive. Where where someone says something that makes me just go, oh, ow. And it's not directed toward me, but it's something that I consider to be so uh ignorant or so out there or so uh uh hateful or so something, and uh and it physic almost physically hurts, and it makes me kind of take a step back. These are not easy times for us right now. It is not easy. The last several years I've I've really had to dig deeper into my own practices to maintain and nurture and grow a measure of equanimity in the world, a measure of peace, so that I can operate and do what is mine to do in the world. And my horse, my horse has helped me to do that. Like I said earlier, you know, sometimes I can go out and just forget what's going on in the rest of the world for a little while and go out and be with them and do what it is that I'm I'm intending to do with them and forget about all of it and then feel a little bit better. And that helps me to forgive, and it helps me to maintain my own sense of balance and peace in the world when I'm witnessing a lot of really not good stuff going on around here. We're we're out of balance big time, especially here in this country. We are out of balance, and so from the point of view of a of a horsemanship coach, what can we do if we're having these kinds of problems and we're moving in the world and we're trying to respond better, we're trying to be more at peace, we're trying, we we know what is ours to do, like I know what's mine to do in the world. It's this work, it's fearlessly feral, it's it's uh it's facilitating so that people are able to go within and look at themselves and come out the other end more joyful than they were when when they entered into that dangerous neighborhood of the self. And and and and but but when we are bombided, bombarded day after day after day with this stuff that makes life so unpleasant sometimes, how do we deal with that? In terms of okay, what you know, we mentioned a little earlier about how sometimes if I'm feeling that way, and sometimes you too feeling that way, we just go out and and hug on the horses and love on the horses and let them hug on us back and love on us back. What else? How can we use horses to to help us navigate this this crazy world we find ourselves in right now?
SPEAKER_02There's so many things that you just said there that I would I really want to um respond to. So we're gonna start with the question of how do the horses help us, and then if I can articulate my thoughts and my practices, okay, good, both um as a horseman and as a spiritual being. Um, you know, because spiritual being a spiritual being, doing practicing your spirituality. We talked about this last time, but I think it's really worth repeating. Spirituality is not a religion.
SPEAKER_00You're right, it's not.
SPEAKER_02It is, it is, we are all spiritual beings. Spiritual is that energetic essence that's within us and around us that makes us each our own unique beings, but at the same time connects us, and there is no separation between us. And that's that's deep. Um, but spirituality or spiritual intelligence is the ability to behave with wisdom and compassion while maintaining inner peace, inner and outer peace, regardless of the circumstances.
SPEAKER_00Yes, and you and I have agreed on that before, yeah.
SPEAKER_02And that is so worthy, everyone listening, to really write it down and ponder it. I ponder it constantly. How does that apply? How does that apply? How does that apply? And isn't that a beautiful way of living and showing up in every aspect of your life? And horses are masters at that. That's where their ability to forgive shows up. So let's go back to how do we how do we engage and how do we forgive, especially in this world of so much chaos and turmoil right now? And how do the horses help? Well, the horses help me by understanding horses are herd animals. So when I step into a pen with one horse or five horse or 130 horses, there is a leader. And there's a there's a higher archie. There's more than one leader, but we're we're talking one leader, okay? And so when I step in there, I either become a part of the herd, I not either, I become a part of that herd, and every herd member, especially the alpha, is looking at me, feeling into me intuitively, instinctually, reading my body language, feeling my intention, and am I friend or foe? And if I'm friend, where do I fall into the pecking order? And so I am doing the same thing. I'm observing my group, and who is accepting of me? Who could give a shit? I mean, who could care less that I've walked in? And who is like, I got my eyes on you, you know, and who do I need to approach and show that I am a worthy leader? All right, I cannot go in and command respect and acceptance and compassion and did I say respect already? Um I have to go in there and I have to take ownership of myself. And I have to come through with pure intentions and a plan. And know that as I engage with them, and I might make a mistake and I might spook them, or they might do something that startles me in response. They go, What? You know, I have to take ownership of my space. And by engaging with them from those qualities, respect, compassion, integrity, inclusion, I show them that I am an asset and not a threat.
SPEAKER_01And if any of them challenge me, I can take it personally, and I can have my feelings hurt, and I can come from a place of fear of I'll show you.
SPEAKER_02And that might create that dynamic of needing to have some forgiveness. Either they need to forgive me for like raw from fear, or I need to forgive them for their rah from fear, right? They're gonna challenge me if their safety is feeling threatened. So, where am I going with all this? Good question. Where I'm going with all of this is no matter where we are engaging with another, we cannot change that other. They have their story, they have their who they are based on their past experiences, whether it's a horse or whether it's a human. And if they have been made to conform and acquiesce by fear and force and aggression, they're gonna come out with that kind of demeanor of, oh, I love I I I love this one, just kidding. Don't tread on me, yeah. You know, that's like raw. And it's like, whoa, being able to see beyond that facade and understand that that is a wounded being. The only reason you're gonna come out with don't tread on me is because you personally have been violated. And violated to me may mean something entirely different to you. Violated to one horse may mean something entirely to another, where the other one is like, serious, Joe? That upset you? That scared you? You're gonna go hide in the shelter over that, you know. So we we don't we don't walk in another's shoes. So all we can do is take accountability for how we show up. So dealing in this world of chaos and a lot of um fear-based control, and each man for himself um attitude is coming from that place of fear, and so when I encounter a horse or encounter somebody who is just being mean, you know, just being rude, I have a choice, I can feel what they're bringing up inside of me, and I've got my traumas, just like the next. And I have my unconscious triggers where I will be in full-blown fear, which puts me either in retreat or you know, defend. Um, and it can catch me. Sorry, I can't use that arm and I can't snap with this hand, it can catch me like off guard, and I will be like full blown in that reactive mode before I go, whoa, how'd that happen? But by taking accountability for myself and recognizing that that person's behavior, even though it's being thrown my way, is not really, really, really, really about me. And I may have behaved poorly that triggered that behavior, and I need to take accountability for that. But by looking at them and seeing deeper than what the behavior is, allows me to forgive that behavior, and when I can go into that place of not judging and forgiving them for I don't know what their past is, and the past could be 10 minutes ago. Somebody could have totally violated them in mentally, emotionally, or physically. I don't know that, or it could have been six months ago or six years ago, you know, that that happened. I don't know, but I can check in with my own body, get in my own core, and go, this is not about me. And instead of taking a defense approach, I'm gonna open my heart and forgive them for that. And in that moment of forgiveness, I am reclaiming my personal power, and from that place of reclaiming, then I can show up in the way in the world in the way that I would love to see others show up. So it goes back to that ripple effect, that drop, that one raindrop in the ocean changes the volume of the ocean.
SPEAKER_01Or that one drop of toxic dirty water changes the volume.
SPEAKER_02I choose to be a pure raindrop, but it takes being willing to take deep breaths in every single moment and checking into your own being, mentally, emotionally, physically, spiritually, we have physiological nervous system reactions to other people's behaviors and stimuluses in our environment that we may not be aware of. But the more that we do our own practice of being who I want to be and choosing love over fear, forgiveness begins. Your heart opens and you learn to forgive others, but kind of has to start with forgiving yourself. Like I may have an interaction with a horse or another human being where it went south really, really fast, and I'm pissed and I'm hurt, and they're pissed and they're hurt, and we'll use the analogy of we're both going to opposite ends of the corral, yeah, you know, with our butts to each other, like well, I have to be willing to be in the present moment, take some deep breaths, and ask what contribution did I make to that whole shit show?
SPEAKER_01How did I intentionally or not intentionally influence that outcome because I can't change them?
SPEAKER_02I can't go to them and go, you hurt my feelings, and you need to say you're sorry, so that I feel better. That's not their job. It's my job to go, how did I contribute to that? And first, I have to forgive myself for that poor behavior, that moment of weakness, which we all have, because there's no such thing as perfect, especially if you're living in the present moment and you're dealing with all the chaos in the world. So, first I have to stop and take accountability, and it's hard to take accountability when I'm not willing to go. I screwed up and all right, I I screwed up, I'm human. Now it's my job to go to them and say, I screwed up. This is what I did, and I'm sorry for it, without the expectation of them coming back and saying, Yes, I screwed up too. Because that's not like you opened with that's not what forgiveness is all about, yeah. And it doesn't mean that I am accepting their poor behavior, it just means that I'm taking ownership for my contribution, and depending on how they're able to respond, I might set up a new kind of boundary with them.
SPEAKER_01But the bottom line is I can only be responsible for me.
SPEAKER_00So does that answer your questions? Yes, it does, and and I'm so what I heard you say about your practices to do this was that you paused, you might breathe a bit, uh, you go within, you remember that it's not about them, it's about me, and you ask yourself, okay, what is mine to do here, and what is not mine to do here, and you take responsibility for your actions and your your thoughts and your consciousness, because that that's what it is to me, consciousness, and and thus you feel empowered, and then we can when we feel empowered, we move out in the world more confidently, and and then and then that last piece, once we get ourselves back on track, we go to them and we say, I screwed up, I screwed up, and and identify so much with all of that the reason. I love having these conversations with Cindy is that she speaks the same language as me, only in different words. Yeah, she speaks the same language only in different words. I started realizing a little while back that Cindy was kind of new thought, but she didn't really know she was new thought. And because we do, we speak, and she might be thinking of me, well, she's um, you know, whatever it is she is, but but in in we speak the same language, it just has different words to it, and all of this stuff, these practices that Cindy just spoke of, pausing when we're upset, trying to catch ourselves before we do something idiotic. By the way, it's okay to swear on this program. Um before we stir up the shit, you know, trying to catch ourselves before we get into trouble behind a reaction as opposed to a well-thought-out response. And and then stepping back and saying, I forgive myself, yeah, I'm human. What's going on with this here? How can I, you know, what what triggered me? Why did it trigger me? And how can I take care of that in a compassionate way and being kind to ourselves and thus being kind to others? And because I I really believe we can't be kind to others unless we're also kind to ourselves. How we're treating other people is exactly how we are treating ourselves. That's that's the law of attraction and action right there. And and then, you know, we pause, and then for me, there's other things I do as well. Um, and I think Cindy does this too, but you know, I meditate and I get in touch with that. I was having a conversation. I got a massage this morning, and I was having a conversation with my massage therapist because she said she listened to my very first podcast, in which I kind of describe, give an overview of, you know, what is this thing called new thought? What is this teaching called science of mind that I teach, that I advocate, that I live, that I love so much. And she said, I said, what did you think of it? And she said, Well, it was interesting.
SPEAKER_02And don't you love that response?
SPEAKER_00But I love it when it came. It was interesting. And so we talked a little bit further, and she said she really liked the concept of oneness about how we're all connected on very deep levels. And and and then we talked about how different, how how different we all are, which is so wonderful, that we each have this thing that gives us strength and power and the ability to go within and feel safe while we're doing it and examine this stuff that's going on. And and you know, she she has a name for it. She she she and and it's not a it's not an it with her, it's a them. There's bunches of them for her. For me, it's an energy force. It's an energy force, and and this is this is and I'm with it, and it's with me, and I'm part of it, and it's part of me, and that's how I do this thing. And so we had a wonderful conversation during parts of the massage when I wasn't zoning out, because I zone out during massage a lot. And and it's this kind of thing, I think, that that helps us when we're talking about forgiveness, whether you work with horses or not. Always, and Cindy repeated it, we always have to go within and look at our own selves with compassion and gentleness and kindness and unconditional love. And then and and assess and remember who and what we are. You know, we're spiritual beings here with a very human part of us, a very human aspect. And and yeah, sometimes we do screw up, sometimes we do screw up, and we get to forgive that piece about ourselves, and in forgiving ourselves, we also get to forgive others.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I love I love the saying that we are perfectly imperfect because that's the truth, you know. I mean, every gemstone is different, every rock and tree, I mean, every elevus are different, and there is no such thing as perfection because who gets to decide what perfect is? What are the I mean, who gets to sit or sit down and say, all right, this is the guidelines in which you have to be in order to become perfect? I mean, that's not that's not that's not real. Yeah, and I have found that the thoughts that we continuously play in our mind becomes our reality, becomes our belief system, becomes what we see the world through. And if we're constantly criticizing ourselves because we're trying to be perfect and we we can't seem to ever reach it, and because we're constantly judging and criticizing and falling short of our own expectations, then that's kind of the filter in which we're seeing everything around us. Our house isn't perfect, our clothes aren't perfect, our children aren't perfect, our partners aren't perfect, the world's not perfect because we don't feel perfect. And so, like you were saying, you know, we can't we can't extend, and you didn't say it in this way, you can't extend to another that which you're not willing to give yourself. So if I'm constantly criticizing and condemning and judging, then I'm constantly comparing to everybody else because those that are doing it better than me, do I aspire to be like them? Well, not through those lenses. I I criticize them, I find something to judge because then I can feel at least a little bit closer to their level, you know, or watching somebody else and totally picking them apart. Well, that elevates me and justifies my inagadequacies because I'm not living up to this stupid delusional idea of perfect. So, yes, the only thing that we have control over in this world is our mind and our choices. And I should sit down and really figure this out someday, but several times a day we come to that proverbial why in the road called choice. And really, it's only two choices. There may seem like there's a lot of different options, but there's really only two choices. Do I choose to respond and make my decisions from my heart and compassion and love? Or do I choose to make it from my head and my ego and my fear? And you come to that why in the road, and and this is what I'm thinking, I need to someday sit down and kind of play with. How many times an hour do you come to that proverbial why? How many times an hour, how many times a day?
SPEAKER_01A lot, you know, a lot.
SPEAKER_02Yes, and the more that you check in with your body and take a nice deep breath and realize I think I said this in our last talk, is our body strives for homeostasis, it strives for balance, and that balance is peace, inner peace, outer peace. And the more that you take time to pause and breathe, which grounds you and puts you in your body and out of your head, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, the more that your body goes, ha. And the more that you do that, the more that you change your nervous system to where it wants to be out of adrenaline, fight or flight panic state, and into that place of parasympathetic homeostasis. And then the more that you start to do it. So I'm gonna end my long blah blah blah blah blah by saying, How do you forgive? You start by making the choice to spend more time consciously in your body, in the present moment, being empowered for the amazing being that you are, and when you do that, everyone around you and everything around you becomes beautiful.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's a that just gave me the chills. That's a perfect ending. Yes, thank you very much, Cindy. You do you realize we've been talking for an hour here? Oh my gosh, we did it again. We talked for an hour. Yay! Yay! This is so much fun because you know we have purposely not really structured these talks. We just pick a topic and then we dive right in. And and before we know it, there's an hour, and that's about the length, the limit for a podcast format. So um thank you, thank you, thank you for wisdom and your your willingness to to co co do whatever it is we're doing here today. And I really appreciate it, and I'm looking forward to more. Next time, I think we're gonna talk about um inclusion. Was is that what's up next?
SPEAKER_02Perfect. Yeah, we get to we get to decide. Yes.
SPEAKER_00I think next time we'll be talking about inclusion and diversity. And I've been collecting little bits and pieces there for to talk about, which is how it works in my world when I decide I'm gonna talk about a topic, then all of a sudden all these things start popping up about said topic. So we'll talk about that next time. It's not on any set schedule, it's basically when she and I can get together. And so I have my little closing here. I want to give you Cindy's website, first of all. It's heartsoulhorsemanship.com. Once again, heartsoulhorsemanship.com. My website is fearlesslyferal.org. And it's fearlesslyferal.org. And I really thank you for joining us today. Fearlessly Feral Living is a focused ministry for centers for spiritual living. And that's it. That's it. We are complete.
SPEAKER_02Thank you so much, Karen. It's it's an honor to be to be having this amazing chat, authentic talk with you.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, authentically speaking. We were kicking around the name the other day. We came up with authentically speaking. So there we go.
SPEAKER_02Yes, yes. Thank you. Thank you. I look forward to next time.
SPEAKER_00Me too.