25. Permission to Be Human: Confronting Humanity in a World of Ideology

My new poetry collection Milkweed is available now. Find the digital copy here!

https://stan.store/Morintune/p/get-milkweed-now

We are surrounded by pressure. A constant pressure to post the right opinion, to protest the right issue, and to position ourselves on the right side of history. But in all that noise, are we actually helping, or just performing? 

This episode poses a challenging question: What if our outrage is serving our own egos more than the people we claim to care about?

In this raw and intimate check-in, host David Morin speaks with his dear friend Sarah, who is deep into her "Year to Live" journey. Together, they explore the uncomfortable truth that our most human instincts include destruction just as much as creation. As David states, "Genocide is our birthright as much as writing a  poem." 

This conversation is not a call for inaction, but a radical invitation to purify the source of our engagement. To move from performative outrage to integrated compassion. It’s a look at why the most effective activism might be the quiet, internal work of healing ourselves.

Follow David on Instagram: @mor.intune

Work with David 1:1 | www.voiceguide.crd.co

Follow Sarah on Instagram: @vijisarah_learningtolovewell

Content note: This conversation contains challenging perspectives on activism, politics, and human nature. It's designed as a contemplative space for those ready to question conventional approaches to social change.

In this episode you will learn:

• Why our online outrage may be serving our egos more than the people we claim to help.
• The challenging idea that destruction is just as much a part of our humanity as creation.
• How confronting your own mortality can be the key to dissolving "us vs. them" thinking.
• The difference between performative action and the deeper work of integrated compassion.
• Why true change begins with radical self-honesty, not pointing fingers at others.
• The concept of Earth's "war consciousness" and how polarity shapes our human experience.
• Why true healing is the most potent and sustainable form of activism.
• How to find peace by learning to hold opposing truths in the same hand.

Journal Reflections From This Episode:

These aren't questions to answer quickly. They're invitations to sit with over the coming days. Take what resonates and leave what doesn't.

• What parts of yourself do you see in people you oppose politically?
• How has proximity or distance to death influenced your political engagement?
• How much of your activism do you feel is influenced by your tribe?
• Do you feel like there are more effective ways of encouraging compassion in our community, digitally or in person?

Timestamps:

00:00 Introduction: The Human Paradox
00:24 Ideologies and Entitlement
00:33 Forgiveness and Humanity
01:37 Radical Responsibility and Change
02:56 The Year to Live Journey
04:05 The Noise of Activism
05:00 A New Direction: Compassion and Humility
05:30 The Cycle of Outrage
05:52 The Power of Radical Honesty
06:23 The Conversation Begins
40:31 The Importance of Self-Healing
41:03 Embracing Uncomfortable Truths
41:19 Introducing 'Milkweed' Poetry Collection
43:03 The Cycle of Human Progress
46:53 Soul Contracts and Past Lives
56:05 The Role of Polarity in Life
01:00:42 Confronting Mortality
01:04:59 The Sacredness of Pleasure
01:12:11 Ancestral Connections and Plant Medicine
01:14:04 Final Reflections and Contemplations

Transcript

David: [00:00:00] The most human thing we can do is kill, just like we create.

we have gotten so obsessed with our ideologies and our entitlement. We have manipulated ourselves into believing that humans should behave one way.

You've already denied your humanity. This is our humanity in action, and we've denied that and we fooled ourselves into think this isn't human, when really this is exactly what humans do.

I am every bit as Donald Trump, as I am David Morin,

and for the people who don't want to see that part of themselves, they remove from it.

for two years you have been posting for another country to forgive another country. How many individuals have you forgiven in the last two years? Because that's what it's gonna take.

I'm not saying we don't do anything. I'm saying the conversation has to shift.

Sarah: How is this possible that as we are talking about death, my fear of death and everything that I had around death, why am I beginning to start feeling alive for the first time?

David: Mm, [00:01:00] yeah, I remember you saying that.

Sarah: Yeah, I remember.

David: What if The very privilege that allows us to debate the world's problems is also calling us to something deeper. We post, we protest, we position ourselves on the right side of every issue. But what if all that is just noise? What if it's serving our need to feel good about ourselves more than it's serving the people we claim to care about?

What if the most honest question isn't? How do we fix them, but how do we heal ourselves? I'm David Morin poet, death Doula and prison rehabilitation facilitator. My work has taken me into the space as most people avoid sitting with the dying. Working with those society has written off and writing poetry about the uncomfortable truths we'd rather not face.

It's taught me that true [00:02:00] change doesn't come from pointing fingers, but from radical self honesty, this is art to heart. Here we explore the art of /radical responsibility, /the art of looking in the mirror before pointing fingers, and the art of creating change that starts from the inside out. When a ship shifts course by just a few degrees over thousands of miles, it can end up on an entirely different continent.

What if our consciousness, our relationships, our world could end up somewhere entirely different with just a small shift in how we have these important conversations? The space is a chrysalis. A sanctuary for those brave enough to pause the external battle and begin the internal one. We don't promise to change the world.

We promise to help you change the lens through which you see it.

Today's episode is a powerful check-in with my dear friend Sarah. [00:03:00] Deep into her year to live journey that I am facilitating. The year to live is a mortality thought experiment, inspired by Steven Levi, the premise, how might you live the next year as if it were your last. Sarah and I have weekly calls guiding her through this process.

This call is the latest conversation we've had that was extremely potent. And relevant to today's issues that I had to share it immediately. The future episodes will kind of backtrack a little bit, so you can see how we led up to being able to stomach these kinds of conversations. When Sarah began this process, she was navigating the messy, often painful ending of a 25 year relationship and marriage, and stepping into a new uncertain chapter of her life as a mother and writer, while now also navigating a career transition.

What you're about to hear is not the beginning of her journey, but a testament to where this profound work can lead. We're starting here at this place of deep integration to show you what's [00:04:00] possible when you stretch the human spirit.

There's pressure today, isn't there a pressure to have an opinion to post the right thing, to show everyone you care? But in all that noise I have to wonder. Are we actually changing anything or are we just performing? Here's a hard pill to swallow.

Think of all of our activism and moral outrage over the last 15 years. Think of how much louder social media has gotten, how divisive society has become, and honestly, ask yourself. Is any of this working? Have any of our efforts gotten us closer to tangible solutions, or are we now just reaffirming our tribes?

Now let me be explicit. This episode is not about not acting and not caring. [00:05:00] It's about taking a second to pause and consider a new direction. One that is compassion centered, humility infused, and actually inclusive to everyone, not just those you agree with. I'm not here to say we shouldn't care about the world's issues or that we shouldn't act.

I'm saying we should act from a new place because the place we're acting from now is serving our tribe and our moral itch more than the people getting hurt. This outrage is not sustainable. Now, I don't have solutions for today's issues. I just see that our playbook isn't working, and if we keep using the same playbook, we'll be faced with more and more conflicts with the same lack of effective action and more outrage that leads to frankly nothing.

What if the most radical thing we could do wasn't to shout louder, but to listen deeper? To the parts of ourselves we've denied. [00:06:00] What if in that quiet space of radical honesty, we found a different kind of answer. Today's conversation is about that. It's about purifying the source of our engagement.

Moving from outrage to integrated compassion. Welcome to Art to Heart, a place to find the wisdom in the wound. And we'll get into the conversation next. This was a raw phone call that happened last minute, so uh, it won't be perfect quality, but this is a raw phone call and we're just talking from the hip.

Enjoy.

Go the most. Lemme talk to my fan. So there's not a lot of out outside noise. The most human thing we can do is kill, just like we create. Huh? What? What you see online, especially with ice. Now I know we're talking about Palestine and Gaza, but once it got closer to [00:07:00] home with ice mm-hmm.

I started seeing a lot more posts that said Don't lose your humanity. Don't lose your humanity. Don't lose your humanity. Okay? But what the mass has wrong is that you've already denied your humanity. This is our humanity in action, and we've denied that and we fooled ourselves into think this isn't human, when really basically all of human nature and history shows us that this is exactly what humans do.

And so we have gotten so obsessed with our ideologies and our entitlement. Like you just said, every human deserves a good death bull fucking shit right now. I like that. I like you have the privilege of having a good death, of being able to, and if you have the privilege, then it's your duty to honor that and enjoy that because that is what, can I pause you for a second?

Human species? Yes, go ahead. [00:08:00]

Sarah: Define privilege.

David: I think that is the privilege, like the, your privilege of us traveling the PI think it's the privilege that our life is not at threat. You know, if you have the safety and security of going home, of getting food and not worrying about being bombed, you have the privilege, right? And so all of the noise from social media of everyone who says life should be some other way, that's all coming from privilege. And so I think what the most you can do is to embrace it, enjoy it, and not just enjoy it. I'm not saying like you enjoy and not care about what's going on, but in that regard, we've become so obsessed with ideologies, right?

Politics, liberalism, maga, all these are different ideologies. And especially like with woke culture now and cancel culture, we have manipulated ourselves [00:09:00] into believing that humans should behave one way. And in doing that, we have left no room to accept. The nature of our humanity is, and the nature of our humanity is that we're fucking animals.

We are animals with smarter brains. And everything that we see that we hate ourselves doing is what we do. And it is who we are, right? I am every bit as Donald Trump, as I am David Morin,

and for the people who don't want to see that part of themselves, they remove them from it. Say, no, I am good. You are bad. You need to stop this from happening, right? Something I've wanted to post but haven't had the like, the courage to do it specifically with Palestine is to call out the people who've done nothing but post about it all day every day, right?

It's like, for two years you have been posting for another country to forgive another country. How many [00:10:00] individuals have you forgiven in the last two years? Because that's what it's gonna take.

Sarah: Mm. Right. Oh, man. Right, right.

David: I had, I had a friend during the, during the fires in la they posted on their story.

Do you know the actor James Woods?

Sarah: Uh, no.

David: He's a very conservative actor, um, Zionist. Okay. He's very pro, he's very loud about being pro-Israel. Okay. And he, they, they had a clip on him, on Fox News. His house was burning and they interviewed him and he was crying. Right. And my friend posted very liberal. He posted on their story, him crying, and they said, and I hope your next house burns down too, right?

Hmm.

Sarah: And

David: I responded and I was like, damn, dude. And they're like every monster who wants genocide deserves to burn. And in my head I was like, okay, so what Israel wants for Palestine, you want for this man?

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: And you don't see anything wrong with that. [00:11:00] Mm-hmm. Can't you see that's what they're doing.

Right, exactly. Can't you see that's how justified they also feel.

Sarah: No, I I, I hear that. I, I, it's a cycle that repeats itself in this, it is individual level, like at the own core. They cannot even embody that, integrate it at their own home, their own, you know, their own world. And it's so easy and, and yeah. I mean, I, I 150% hear that and see that.

But yet, like you, we all, we are all one. Like I, yeah, right. Donald Trump. I see myself as Donald Trump. I see myself as part of like all these crazy radical theories. And because I do see myself, I think we also have. Yeah, we're savage animals, but we have evolved to become more, I think what defines us from like Savage, like from other animals is that we are able to evolve and become compassionate, right?

David: Yeah. We can, we can rewire our [00:12:00] brain. We have the power to exactly our brain.

Sarah: And so is it not a human obligation, a human being obligation itself? Because we have evolved, because we have, we are able to rewire and able to have the capacity to have compassion and to, um, I don't know, like I just feel like we do have some sense of, um, a more responsive responsibility within ourself.

Like I, myself know, like this healing work man, like these triggers that I have, these, these, um, everything that I'm dealing with right now. I mean, you know my story so far. Yeah. Um, and at the same time, like. My heart breaks for any other, not just like Gaza, but any other families or nations or community that deals with immense suffering because I've been part of that where I was hungry at one point.

I grew up in immigrant family, parents struggling parents dealing with discrimination, [00:13:00] racism then, and religion also as a woman. I have a little bit. I, I, it's not what I, what I experienced at their level, but I, I got a taste a crumb of a little bit and I can't imagine, like, I only got a crumb.

They have a big slice of cake of this, you know, this. I mean, why, why? Just to live, just to eat, just to be safe. That's a privilege. It makes me, this is injustice. Like, no, it should be every human has a right, every animal has a right. They feel safe. They can go anywhere, get their food and, and sleep safely, and know that one day their time will come and get eaten by another predator.

But like, that's a fact of life. But the, but they're, but shouldn't humans have more, shouldn't like, I, I don't know. It just, um,

David: I, I hear you. And I'm not saying we don't do anything. I'm saying the conversation has to shift. Right. Okay. If this is what you, if this is what humans do, I'm not saying I'm enabling that, but let's stop calling it a lot of character [00:14:00] deficiencies.

Let's stop saying these are lack of judgments and let's stop saying mm-hmm. That these are evil people we're separate from, right. It's like, Hey, this is what we do. Mm-hmm. Genocide is our birthright as much as writing a fucking poem.

Sarah: Hmm. Right. That, that is so hard for me to digest. But it's true. Like it's true.

I I it's true to its core. Like it's so true, but it's so hard to digest, but it's so true. It's hard to, to digest,

David: but it's, it's easier for you to digest because of the work you've been doing. That's what I'm saying, like in, in this mortality work you've been doing. Because when we confront death that's the biggest us versus them life versus death.

Sarah: Right.

David: Right. And when you can confront your own death long enough, it dissolved, it slowly dissolves and breaks away the separateness.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: And so once you come out on the other side of this chapter of diving so deep into it, all of the lines are gonna blur. You're not gonna see the world in a binary anymore.

Sarah: [00:15:00] Oh my goodness. David, like, you, you, you named it like, it's so funny 'cause um, the past week. As I come to the other side of death and integrating this and it's even in my dreams, even in my waking world, my sleeping world now, I can't even tell the difference between my dream world and my physical world.

Like it is. It really changed the shift. I don't know. It, it changed the shift how I, I I see life. How, you know what I mean? It, I don't know if it's a different lens, but, and at at one point I'm thinking, you know what? The dream world is more the real world. Like this is, I don't know, I'm all getting into the matrix, but it really, um, there's something about

eating death every day, like having, like embracing death, like, like being reborn every day. Dying every day, and being reborn. I every day, you know, like right now. Our conversation is gonna die. Like this memory [00:16:00] we have is, it's, it, it's, it's gonna fade and then it's a cycle. It's gonna die, and then we'll be reborn again the next day or the next time I see you.

Like, everything has its own cycle. Everything has come to the end and then it comes to reborn. Like, I just, I don't know, but, um, sorry, I'm, I'm going like into different depths, but, um, but it, it really does shift everything. And because it turned up, turned everything upside down, I see things differently and, my lines are now blurred.

Like things that I thought was not important. It's like, is that really important? Like it's getting more simplified. It's everything's getting more simple. More simple. And to the point I'm like, I have nothing left. Like, how more simple can I go? You know? How many more layers can I shed? How many more?

David: I, I resonate with that. Like, at first I was kind of turned off by this, 'cause I thought it was negative, but like I, I've had so much shedding that I no longer resonate with my lineage, with my ethnicity. With [00:17:00] my ethnicity. Hmm. With my identity of my upbringing, of being a Mexican American and, and like coming from Mexico and having ancestors in the Aztec Kingdom, it's like, wow, I didn't know that.

Wow. I was striving towards so much and they're still a part of me and they inform David, but at the end of the day, I see myself as a human first. Like we are all humans together. And so it's, it's impossible for me to accept the US versus them narrative now. And I think that's what's like, so annoying.

Some people just can't fathom that that's where I'm at.

Sarah: I hear you.

David: I don't know, but I see, I see myself in everyone now. I think ultimately that's what death showed to me. It's like you are everyone and everyone is you.

Sarah: Oh my God. That's something Al would say. Al always says that every time. It's like, Sarah, I am you.

I'm like, okay, Al,

David: I can hear you say that.

Sarah: Oh my God. I'm like, it's, we're all, we're everyone. I am the tree Sarah. I'm like, okay, Al. [00:18:00] But, um, but no, he's right.

David: And so that's what I'm saying. I'm not saying we can't do anything. I just don't want to participate in what the modern conversation is because all it is is self perpetuating.

Sarah: I 150% align with that. And um, and I think as we're talking about this, this really,, yeah, like. What social people that pose, like what do you do in your life, kind of at the church? Like you preach it. Yeah. Well look at your life. Like are you really in line with that? Are you breathing it? And I can't be this part of this community if you don't believe in your own, if you don't walk, you talk, you talk or walk, preach what you walk, you know?

What's that phrase that's

David: 100% it,

Sarah: the preach what you talk or whatever. And that I'd rather go to hell if than go to church. I mean, I'd rather go to hell. Seriously. I'd rather be, I'd rather go to

David: hell than go to your heaven.

Sarah: Yes. Yeah.

David: And yeah, the new our, our new politics, our new, uh, political system, [00:19:00] our society, it's become just as dogmatic.

We left church, but we brought the dogma with us.

Sarah: Hmm. And so now

David: social media it's, it's, it's all performative. Mm-hmm. I, I laugh so much. I'll see people posting about Palestine and then they'll post a meme and then they'll post dinner. It's like, what the fuck are you doing?

You know? I know what I mean. And I know that they're trying their best and they're doing what they know they, they, they should be doing. But it's like, how far have humans come for you to accept my one second post as me, like going to the cause that's so lazy.

Sarah: But David, I, I have a, but David, I had this aha moment, but what if Instagram or social media,

but what if, you know how you say we're, we're Donald Trump or this, but what if we're also Instagram? What if we're also social media?

David: We are, [00:20:00] it highlights us, like, I think. It, it just like how they say money just makes you become more of who you were before.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. I

David: think the same thing. Social media is just highlighting those parts of us, and it's highlighting our, it's exploiting our tribalism, and that's why it's become so performative because people, people don't care about the cause as much as they care about the people in their tribe caring about the same cause.

Mm-hmm. Okay. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like, it's like half the people who are posting every day, I actually want, it's like, what have you done for them, for these people, rather than mm-hmm. Sharing, yes, you wanna get more people out there, but in, in the decisive platform that is Instagram, how many people are changing their minds any day, every day?

You know what I mean? I agree. It's, it's become an echo chamber. All you're doing is letting your tribe know. Yes, I still believe this. Yes, I still believe this. Yes, I'm still with you. Yes. I'm still like

Sarah: a political stance. Right? Yeah. Lemme [00:21:00] make it look,

David: but it, it's like that, that serves you more than it does the conflict.

Mm.

Sarah: I remember. I mean, I would break it down more into like a real situation. Um, the school that my kids go to is like a Upper East Side school mostly. It's mostly, you know, wealthy people. And there's this wealthy family. There's two actually wealthy families and both white and one of them like host a, um, Christmas, like, you know, Christmas organized nonprofit like service for like children who are lower, lower economics, like live in like government housing.

So they do like party, give them like all the presents that they need, give them a good dinner. And I was there, I was at a, um, an after hour, like it was a happy hour at her house. And one of the girl lady, her name is Victoria and she's like. I don't like what you do. She's like, what do you mean? I'm, I'm Christian for the church.

This is what our church does every year. We serve this family, serve this [00:22:00] like government housing. And she's all, and she's like, well, I don't even like your language. You play this white hero, you only save them once a year. What about every day? Do you welcome them your own home? Would you, what about next weekend?

What about the weekend after that? Why only once a year? And, um, I love this woman from naming it. She's like, I'm a white woman and I'm calling myself out too. Why are we doing this once a year? Like, why were we playing this white savior? Like, if we really wanna change the world, then we need our community as much as they need us.

Like we're not there to stay, then we, we need each other. Like we need to change the shift that we're higher and better and I. And I grew up with that world where, yeah, like when I used to serve a volunteer, I always felt like, oh, like I'm coming from this higher power.

Like I can help and save you by giving my time. You know? Even though at that time I didn't think it that way, but really when I let down, when I stripped down all my ego, I was the one being [00:23:00] saved. Although they had less, you know, they didn't have as much as I did. They didn't have this brighter, you know, okay.

The bright future. But they had the life that I want to live. They were so, they was just free being themselves, free in the community, free being barefoot free of having the simplicity. And like social media. I see myself in that, that person that's posting, you know?

And I, and it's, it's a, it's, it's a reminder. Like what I could become, you know? And I just don't wanna, and this is why I, um, I struggle. Like, I don't wanna be that person, but I do wanna be that person that, that wanna give back. 'cause I too wasn't that same place. I too have seen it. I too have felt it. And you're right, like it starts within ourselves with our own mortality.

Like with our own family, with our own parents, with our own friendships. You know, it starts own with, with our

David: own, our own neighbors, our own community, our own

Sarah: neighbors. You are right man. I missed that weekly talk. It was so good. But um, [00:24:00]

David: yeah, thanks for sharing that and something else. And a lot of people don't want to accept like, oh, how was just loving my neighbor gonna help with fucking.

A genocide. Mm-hmm. You know what I mean? Right. Or with ice. But a lot of that comes from us not wanting to acknowledge our, what is our contribution to the current events. Right. And I'll use ICE as an example. Right. And I'll use Trump as an example.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

But everyone obviously like is, is quick to scapegoat Trump and white people, right?

Mm-hmm. But I, I don't see anyone on the left side acknowledge that we have openly made it acceptable, reinforced, and expected to publicly show your disdain for white people.

Hmm.

David: That's the new virtue signaling, right?

Sarah: Mm. Mm-hmm. And

David: it's like, okay, we've been shitting on people for, we've been [00:25:00] shitting on white people for like the last 15 years.

And that's how Trump won. If we never mm-hmm. If we never mm-hmm. Built into that narrative, white people would have never felt the need to be like, oh my gosh, they're excluding us. They're excluding us.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: We gave birth to that.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. And then it happened,

David: and we dig our heels into it deeper.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: And so it's like, everyone always wants to be like, oh man, history's repeating itself. History's repeating itself. History's repeating itself. Yeah. Because these are patterns and we're not fucking learning. These aren't like just new evil people taking the reigns. We have birthed this too. We have like elicited this to come out too.

What, what is our part in this?

And so yeah, if, if you can love a neighbor more and show a neighbor more, and like, not hate people. Just because there's skin color in your community, [00:26:00] more, like you don't think that's gonna help dissolve some of the hardness. Right. And the, the reason I say it, and I have so much conviction is in it is because I see it firsthand.

I feel it firsthand in my, in my work in prison. I just, I feel hearts dissolve and I see these shells hardened and I see these lines blurb between right or wrong. Mm-hmm. And all these volunteers who come in to meet my students, they're changed forever. They're never gonna see right verse wrong the same again.

And you have to be willing to look at what you hate in order to overcome it. But right now people just want to hate things deeper rather than see themselves in it.

Sarah: And I think that's also tied with their mortality of death, like death people, I think there's a connection too, when you cannot, when you have fear of death, didn't have fear of life, like [00:27:00] you wanna control life, you wanna, like there was this, um, I don't know if this is like a, a psychologist and he was saying that he studied different powers of different histories and um, like example Trump and, when they don't accept death.

Right. Um, they realized that, people tend to make more drastic decisions, radical decisions. People that fear death make more, you know, radical decision. And he did a social experiment and different groups of people. And, um, and a lot of it's because of fear of death. Like, maybe the way they invest, the way they make, or they vote for certain radical things is because they fear that they want to control, they want power, they want money, they want, um, I have to show you the, I have to share you this book, this uh, psychologist that did, the social experiment.

But yeah, I'd love to hear it sounds like religion too.

Yeah, yeah, religion too. Like it was so funny, [00:28:00] I had this aha moment that, I mean, right now I'm not identified as a political party, but I'm definitely, I think I'm a socialist at heart. But I realize like my ex, he is like nothing wrong. I come from very strong Republican family, but Sam, he is Republican.

You know what happened? I dunno if I told you this. We were in the subway and then this. Unwell Unhoused woman was approached me and she was, you know, a a little agitated, a little distressed, and I was with my kids and I was, you know, I was asking her like, how can I help you? What do you need? Usually I keep like snacks or dollar bills on my bags.

I could just hand it out. And then while I was talking to her, my ex Sam started screaming Police, police.

Oh.

And I was, I looked at him and I was like, trying to tell him to stop, but, but instead of helping me or trying to escalate [00:29:00] situation, he walked away with my kids and I screaming police in the most defile, most uncompassionate way.

And I was like, oh my God, you need to stop. So finally he stopped. I gave him this slow, I, I was trying to mouth him to stop and, and I saw so many things. I saw one. The dignity of a woman of this unhoused, unwell person, the way she was treated by Sam, talking like she was a filthy animal. Two, the fact that he, uh, put us at risk with her kids, you know, that yelling could have escalated her, triggered her or something.

Three, um, the way that he could have, have com compassionate and, and helped my kids. And I, instead he walked away from a situation , but copped out calling police instead of like trying to figure out how he could be there for us. And. It shook our family to the [00:30:00] court, especially my oldest one.

My oldest one was like, dad, how could you, if you knew mom was in this situation, if you, if you honestly felt she wasn't safe, if you honestly felt somebody needed help, why didn't you help first? Why didn't you step in and help first before screaming police, there was no police dad. We were in the subway.

Why didn't you use? And, you know, and he was just like, just like, well, like I, that's what I felt I was supposed to do. But dad, if you really cared enough, you would've stepped in. I mean, it was like,

David: but I'm just like a reckoning.

Sarah: Yeah. But I'm just thinking about humanity. When, when we're confronted by like this type of circumstances, um, you are right some, it just, sometimes it's easier to post and rather than dealing it hand, you know, on hand and dealing it face to face, and rather than doing the di, the work.

Kneeling down and putting a hand and hearts out. How can I serve you? But it's so much easier to post [00:31:00] and feel good

David: and, and to also, and this is where I lean in any situation and people don't like it, but like to also have grace and compassion for Sam, that that was his gut reaction. Like, okay, yes. How unfortunate that that was someone's first instinct.

They see someone in help and their first instinct is to shield themselves from it and to reinforce whatever belief that they have inside them that mm-hmm. That you're above them.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: You know what I mean? And so it's like, right. No, I hear you. If that's where people are operating from, and I don't wanna compare Sam this, but more like the belief, that strict belief, right?

Mm-hmm. That's essentially what Zionists are.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And

David: the more that you just call them wrong and racist and evil, is that gonna reach them,

Sarah: right?

David: Or is that gonna make things worse?

Sarah: Right.

David: You know? No, you're

Sarah: right.

David: And so that's why I, that's why like, [00:32:00] love really is everything. If you can just hold someone with compassion, let them be human and understand the context in which they're operating from, you know, like I, I try to have grace here for Jewish people because mm-hmm.

Everyone is so quick to, to make fun of the way that they scream antisemitism for everything.

Sarah: Right. Right. And

David: it's like, oh, like, like what gave you that? Right. Or whatever. Right. And it's like, well, we don't know what it's like for ourselves to be on high alert to be looking at like, to, for our whole body at its core to be on high alert to see if we're being excluded.

We don't know what that's like. They come from a lineage and lineage and lineage of being moved and moved and moved and outted and outted and outted. And so of course we're not gonna understand what they mean when they wanna scream antisemitism [00:33:00] right away. Right. You know what I mean? And I'm, and again, I'm not saying, I'm not saying all this excuses it,

Sarah: right.

David: It, it, but it can inform the way we operate and it can inform the way we choose to have conversations. And what is the new productive dialogue? I saw a, um, right, there's a documentary on HBOI think it's, if, if it might be Planet Earth or something similar. Don't, don't quote me on that, but in one of the episodes it talks about mycelium.

Are you aware of mycelium?

Sarah: Um, enlightened me Sounds familiar. Mycelium is like,

David: mycelium is what grows mushrooms.

Sarah: Oh, yes. Okay.

David: But mycelium is like an underground network. Like if, if I understand correctly, you can't see mycelium with the naked eye, but it's inherent in everything. Like it's down into the roots, into the soil.

Mycelium is [00:34:00] just a part of everything, and it's a conscious being. It's a conscious entity.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: Does that make sense?

Sarah: Yeah. Yeah. I get it. Mm-hmm.

David: So mycelium, so it showed, it showed this documentary in a jungle that, um, when new plants start growing, that they fight for sunlight.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Right?

David: So if there's like these three or four plants that are growing in the same direction and the same place, they will essentially kind of go at war with each other for sunlight, right? They're fighting for the resources, for the sunlight. And if, if a plant. It gets too much of the sunlight and the other plants can't get any in return.

Like mycelium is aware of this. It's like connected to everything Mycelium is. Then like, nah, this plant needs to be checked. It'll send an army of ant to it to start trimming it down.

Sarah: Really?

David: Yes. It'll set, [00:35:00] it'll literally send an army of ants to go trim it down. Wow. And the ants start going to town on it.

And then the, the plant eventually figures out that the ants are against it. So then it develops its toxins to poison the ants. Right. And then it poisons the ants. The ants figure it out and they, they damage enough of that plant and then they just move on and they basically, they end up taking just a little piece of all these dominating ants.

Basically it's a tithe.

Sarah: Wow.

David: Wow. You know what I mean? And so what I took from that. Is what I've heard in the spirituality context before. But that earth has a war consciousness, right? Like say as a soul, it's like, Hey, you wanna go to earth? Earth is beautiful. It's got the most pristine views you will ever see as a human.

But one of the rules there, it's, it's dominated and operated by war [00:36:00] consciousness.

Sarah: Hmm.

David: It's like, okay, but you, but you can have the brain to transcend it, right? And that explains to us versus them. And so it's like, Hey, this is just the way we are. Like I said earlier, this is just the way we are, rather than you being on your high ass chair that you're not like this.

How about you just bring yourself down and then we can have a new conversation. Imagine the public dialogue if it's like, Hey, this is what humans do, this is what we're always gonna do.

Sarah: Right.

David: What can we do about this rather than send everyone to prison, rather than cancel everyone rather than alienate everyone rather than like hold true to these systems and identities and, and all of that, you know what I mean?

Sarah: Right.

David: And so, and it, it, it only ultimately comes to the mirror of yourself. Like once you can accept [00:37:00] all those ugly parts of yourself, you no longer have a need to point them out. 'cause the only reason you need to point them out is because you deny them in yourself. Right.

And so, I don't have an answer of what we should do instead, I guess it is love just to have grace and forgive each other and love each other. But I know that I don't wanna participate on what today's approach is, you know, and like I'm seeing more and more people now posting like, oh man, if, if you've never posted once about Palestine and Gaza, I don't wanna associate with you.

I don't wanna work with you.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. And it's like,

David: okay, what does that do for Palestine? Is that that serving Palestine or is that serving you?

Sarah: Right. Right. I I, and I like that the fact that you derived that. I don't have an answer, but I think we should have more conversations, [00:38:00] like start talking about it instead of like, pointing out, judging each other.

You know, like I think a lot of these fears, a lot of these actions has happened because maybe perhaps they're not being heard, maybe they feel like they're put in a circle. I don't know, whatever. Like, even like Sam, like the way that he reacted, like. If I had the, the emotional bandwidth at that time to have a conversation, say, Hey, but hey dude, like, I'm curious, like, what was going in your heart and your process through that?

Like, what led me to that? Nothing wrong. Nothing but nothing, you know, like, no judgment here, but just curious what was, you know, I mean, I don't know, like, it just, but it, sometimes it's so hard for me to have compassion for those who have many privileges on the plate because I feel like they don't deserve to have that privilege.

'cause they have so many privileges when the people that they, um, hurt don't have as much privilege, [00:39:00] much space. They, they, they take a lot of space and that and that. That's my issue. My issue is, do I wanna give you more a platform to understand you when you have so many privileges, so much, and when you take up so much space and.

You know, as you know, he looks like a white person, like a white male and who's a doctor. Like, do I wanna give you that space, like, um, to have that conversation to talk when there's other people that are just trying to come above waters and don't have the space? I don't know, but I, but as, yeah,

David: it's interesting because even, even then, by walking away from that, you're giving them more space inherently.

Sarah: Hmm. You know? Hmm. You got me. Ah, you did.

David: And, you know, I had a conversation with, with, with the similar, or with one of the same friends about this, you know, like we are quick to want to shit on and bring a privileged person's world [00:40:00] tumbling down, and we want them to have a reckoning and we want them to be ashamed of themselves, but we don't wanna be there with them as the world's falling.

We want them to suffer through it. We don't wanna hold them as they're falling. We don't wanna hold them with understanding and help them see things the way we are. It's like, no, it's, it's your job to dissolve and ruins and to hate that entire process. And it's like, who is that serving still? Right. You know what I mean?

And so, yeah. And that's why healing is the biggest thing you can do for humanity, focusing on yourself. Because the more you focus on yourself, the more parts of yourself you shed, and the more parts of yourself that you shed mm-hmm. Is the more intimate you become with the deeper, mostly hidden parts of yourself and the more parts of yourself that you can see, the more you see yourself in others, rather than hiding away from [00:41:00] it.

I wanna pause here for a moment. If what we just shared felt challenging or uncomfortable, I want you to know that's exactly where the deepest work happens. They say you can only meet someone else as deeply as you've met yourself. And what Sarah and I are sharing with you today didn't come easy. It came from years of being willing to look at the parts of ourselves that we'd rather ignore and deny my poetry collection milkweed.

It is my journey of accepting these hard truths one poem at a time. It's me going into the depths of what I hid for so long, my addictions, my self abandonment, my patterns of giving myself away while avoiding my own heart. Each poem is a reckoning with the ways I hurt myself rather than face the truth of who I was from learning, I was a poet during a darkness retreat to porn addiction and struggles with food. This collection chronicles the messy, uncomfortable work of [00:42:00] transformation. It's about confronting your mortality, reclaiming your own voice, and learning to love the parts of yourself You've been taught to hate. If you're feeling stirred up by this conversation, if you're recognizing patterns of self abandonment, or ways you've been avoiding your own depths, these poems might feel like a companion on that journey.

You can find the digital copy of Milkweed available in the show notes. A final edition and physical copy are coming very soon. This book is designed for moments when you need something that meets you where you are. Thank you.

Sarah: 150% agree. And I feel like sometimes like. In my heart. I know what you say is true, you know, but I'm thinking in my head, there's gotta be more. But that's it. But that, but you hit it dead. Right on. Like, it starts with myself giving myself compassion. It starts with, with Sam giving him self compassion. You know what I mean?

Mm-hmm. Like, and I feel like, no, there's gotta be something. Or maybe I [00:43:00] can, maybe I can do something else. Maybe I can build an organization, maybe I can like do this. You know? But you really, it's like the key thing is, um, it's within you or else history continues to start repeating itself over and over and over again

David: when you have an individual, when you see an individual who has the same situation happen over and over and over, and over and over again.

Mm-hmm. Right? It's like, hey, these are all opportunities and invitations for you to learn your pattern and to overcome it.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: Right, right. That is exactly what's happening on like the human species scale. Mm-hmm. It's like the same patterns keep reemerging over and over and over and over and over, and I would say we're progressing.

People don't wanna see it, but we're progressing. Humans have come a long way. The human species, [00:44:00] right. Back in the day, my a my, my ancestors in the Aztec Kingdom, they would raid villages, destroy an entire community, kill half of them, imprison half of them, bring them all back to their home and offer them sacrifices.

And what's ICE doing now? They're not burning down communities. They're, they're taking the father figures away from the communities and they're tearing families apart, but we're still respecting life. We're not killing them. We're we're, we're sending them somewhere else, which sucks, but it's like, Hey, you just can't be here, but you can still like, be alive.

Talk to your family. You can still have a relationship with them. You can still be your own person. Is it ideal? No. Is it progress? Fuck. Yeah, it's progress.

Sarah: That's a horrible [00:45:00] progress. We can do better than that. Come on. Well, it takes

David: time.

Sarah: It's like saying like, someone being an abusive relationship. Well, at least he didn't throw me in the wall. He just slapped me in the face. Well,

David: no, I'm talking about like the human patterns in as in a general,

Sarah: right? I mean, I know what you're saying. I, I just, I'm just so like, God, can't we humans move on a little faster?

You know what I mean? I'm like, dang. Um, but

David: again, that's ideology getting in the way of nature.

Sarah: Hmm. But you know, David, like, maybe that's more like, no, not westernized. I mean, when I was in Ethiopia, there was really, it's, it's everywhere, all around the world, depending, it doesn't even matter if it's like westernized or like, or socioeconomic, that every culture, every country has this type of pattern, like this, like this, this, this destructive pattern, this ego pattern, [00:46:00] like killing and like, but, um, but you're right.

Maybe, I mean, sometimes at the end of the day I'm like, man, maybe let, let, let's, I guess we're so savage, let it the best wins, I guess. Like hunger games,

David: it's not even made the best wins. And I mean, it's so I know, I don't know, like,

Sarah: and again, I didn't mean it that way, but,

David: and I want to, I, I wanna own this here too.

Like me saying these things, me having these opinions and these beliefs, it comes from my privilege of having the safety to explore them. Right. So if, if you have the privilege of your life not being in imminent danger, it's your fucking duty to explore your inner world and your thoughts so that you can help take consciousness to where it needs to go, right?

And not keep us back. And I think what a lot, I think this is where I probably lose people. And what gives me, I guess, some comfort in all of these is that I don't view this life as [00:47:00] our only life. And I view our souls in this cosmic scale and timeline that like we come here many times and we all come here to explore every angle.

We come here to explore everything, you know? So like the people that we villainize for having all of this privilege, it's like you said earlier, it's like you don't deserve it or what? Like why do you have all this privilege? And it's like, hey, who the fuck knew what the, where they were in their previous life?

Maybe they do deserve this privilege. Mm-hmm. You know, and on the flip side, what if the people who grew up in the worst conditions, what if they were the super privileged ass person in the life before and now they're just learning the opposite side?

Sarah: I, I a hundred percent agree. Like, I, can I ask you a question? I'm so curious. Yeah. Where you believe [00:48:00] in like, because, uh, like this past life, like it's, it's so beautiful. I'm, I'm just entering that. Like, I, that's something you've always like, believed in or something that's new. Like, um, um,

David: no. I've believed like it's been a new belief like in the last three or four years I've picked it up.

Oh,

Sarah: okay.

David: Yeah. It's the idea of soul contracts.

Sarah: Ah, okay. I've heard of that. I've, I've seen a lot of Instagram. But it's funny 'cause David, I believe that as a kid. I had so many deju moment moments as a kid, and those, the stuff you talk about, I, it is something that it, it feels home to me. It feels natural.

Like it's Yeah. Yeah.

David: It might be a truth. It might be a truth you relate to. Then

Sarah: I, maybe, I don't know, but I know, but I'm just saying like, um, yeah, I, and I, and, and a lot of these memories are not popping up now just, I just find it my like, so crazy. And then, and I find it in my kids too, like they'll stay saying, I'm like, whoa, whoa.

But, um, but it's [00:49:00] beautiful. I mean, having that perspective just expands. It's expand the heart even more.

David: It has to. Right, right. You know, and I think the thing that first caught me onto it, and that really struck a chord with me, we might have talked about this before, is, but in high school and for several years I was volunteering with, um, at summer camps for youth uhhuh with neuromuscular disorders.

You know, and I went for several consecutive years, and each year I would see these kids get progressively worse and worse and worse. Right? Like they'll be running around in the first year I go, and then they come back later and like they're walking and they need some crutches. And the next year they're in a chair getting pushed around and they can walk here and there.

And then the next year they're in a fucking motor chair and they can't get out anymore. Right? Right. And then a few years later, some of them die. And I had such a hard time coming to terms with that. It's like, why the hell? I'll say, what kind of life is it for a kid to come [00:50:00] on this planet and to lose bodily function slowly and to die a slow, agonizing, painful death.

I was like, what does that serve? What kind of God would do that? Right, right, right. And then when I heard of the idea of soul contracts, my definition of compassion and of courage. And love went through the roof because those people, all those kids that I met, the ones who I got to know, they, they really were like, there was a, an energy about them.

They were like the, like sages, you know? They were like the most courageous, brave souls I've ever met. They carried that kind of aura with them, and when I heard of this thing of soul contracts, I, it entered my mind the possibility of like, holy shit, what if a soul signed up to live that [00:51:00] life and knew that they would be going through all of this and do it so that they can be an opportunity and an invitation for other people in their life to learn grace, and to learn compassion, and to learn love.

Right? What if he's like, and if you're choosing your family members too, that's the other part of it. You're choosing who's gonna be in your family. You're choosing who you're gonna marry, you're choosing who's your kids. And you, it's like you guys come together as souls before being born. And you're like, what are the biggest lessons our souls need to transcend?

How can we help each other do that? And if one of them is compassion and one of them is patience and being present in the moment, and if someone decides like, okay, I'm gonna live with this terminal illness and it's gonna be so hard on you and it's gonna be so hard on the family, but I'm gonna bring us so much joy and so much presence, and then when I die, you are gonna have like the most richest life you've ever [00:52:00] lived as a soul.

Like I will do that and sign up for that for 15 years, for 20 years, if that's what you can have.

Sarah: Who knows. Beautiful.

David: Yeah. Who knows. And on the flip side, I have heard that

that there will be souls who like, like, like in the masses, who will agree to like, kind of die together in certain events to help raise the vibration of, of the, of the masses, right?

Mm-hmm. So if, if like all these people, I've never heard that people are gonna die in a flood, or if all these people are gonna die in an earthquake or something, it's like, how can we, how can all, how can our deaths help bring them more into life into the present.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Right?

David: So it's like, that's why, that's what brought off the earlier conversation.

It's like the most thing you can do about protesting people dying is come to terms with your own death.

Sarah: Hmm.

David: What if all of these people dying is like, what if, what if the undercut in invitation is? [00:53:00] Are you enjoying your life? Are you present to your life? Why are you outraged at my life ending if you're not even in touch with yours?

Sarah: Hmm

hmm.

That, you know, that was a, basically my talk at my grief death cafe, I mean, death cafe last month. Like the essence of that, what we were talking about, like, um, I was at the end of the session, you know, the, the girl, the woman was like the one that had the most questions about afraid of dying. The, the not being able to control her death, not knowing when she would die, how she'll die.

Her loved ones will die. You know what I mean? Like how will happen. Um, and then at the end of the session, she said, Sarah. How is this possible that as we are talking about death, like my fear of death and everything that I had around [00:54:00] death, why am I beginning to start feeling alive for the first time?

David: Mm, yeah, I remember you saying that.

Sarah: Yeah, I remember. And I really like, really, I really integrated that like, like we fear death because we forget that we're dying. You know, and then, and once we can do that, once we integrate death in our lives, then we can really, really begin to live, really learn to really love an open heart and to expand, you know?

And also it's like so cliche and spiritual, but really, I mean, and, and I get that. That's my, my challenge is to learn how to expand and to have grace with Sam, even when he's at, not at his best self. But this is the opportunity for me to. Practice loving and open heart and compassion. , You know, if I feel for the genocide around the world, or the pain and the suffering, I really need to also be compassionate in my own inner term, moral [00:55:00] in my life, you know?

But, um, but somehow I dissociated that like, oh no, this is different. No, they're all the same. At the end of the day, soul is a soul. It's the same.

David: Mm. Soul is a soul. And like for someone to be so lost in hate, it's like that deserves compassion because that is, I don't know. I want, I wanna believe that that soul did not come here to experience that.

Mm-hmm. And again, maybe he did, but when you look at things on the soul realm, and you look at earth, right? Like Earth has this war consciousness that we talked about, and it's mm-hmm. The rules of life here are polarity.

Sarah: Mm-hmm. Up,

David: up, down, left, right, night, day, good, evil, slim moon. Mm-hmm. War peace. And that's why like mm-hmm.

All of the sages of the, of every generation have said like, this is all an illusion. This is all an illusion. This is all an[00:56:00]

like, just,

Sarah: oh man, that's, that's so, ugh. But you know what, when you say polarity, it touched me in a way because I've been dealing with that, um, you know, like sun moon, like, good, bad, like the opposite, black, white, whatever. But, um, you know, I was thinking about the polarities of like what I've been going through in my life and I I was walking down my neighborhood and I was thinking about my.

My friend Sarah, who's a birth doula, and she wants to collaborate me as a death doula, like do something together to bring birth and death together. And, um, and I said, let me think about it. Let me think about it. I just, I just wanna feel your vibe. I don't know. Let me, but as I was thinking about it, David, a two feathers flew down mm-hmm.

On the street and it was a black feather and a white feather.

I was like, oh, fucking God, could you not be any more clear? And I was like, no way, man. No way. So [00:57:00] I took a picture of it, it's just like, whatever. I was so freaked out by it. 'cause I was just thinking about how could two opposite end, what, what would it look like to put it together? Like just imagine it, and then just fucking two feathers.

And then David, it happened again this morning. As I was walking back from the gym, I was just thinking about. How, you know, integrating both polarity, this is, we all, we need both sides. We need that to, um, come to circle. We, I was thinking like, why is it so important? Why do I need that? And then another feather came, and this time was half black, half white.

I'm just like, what the fuck? Like, what is the universe trying to tell me? You know? But, um, I took a picture of it, so now I'm taking pictures of any black and white feather that I see. But, um,

David: well, I, I wanna finish that thought though. You said, why do we need the other

Sarah: Yeah.

David: And you touched on that with death.

Mm-hmm. One be, well, the, the closer you come to terms with death, [00:58:00] the more death informs life.

Sarah: Mm.

David: Yes. And so we need the other, yes. I think, like, I think we, we come from heaven, we come from unconditional love. We come here to experience polarity, to experience mm-hmm. The opposite. Mm-hmm. So that we can find ourselves within it.

Sarah: Mm.

David: And it's, it's meeting in the middle. It's, it's, it's like our, our individual life is a constant going from one polar opposite to the other until we find our way in the middle. And that's what's also happening on like, a global scale. Wow. And that, that's, that's why the politics are the way it is too.

You know? It's like, okay, we went from like super conservative, anti-gay knowing, doing anything, okay. Mm-hmm. We came to the other side, like very progressive, we went all the way to the other side and now like, it's checking us back into a middle.

It's like, okay, we went too far.

Sarah: Mm-hmm.

David: Now how can we come back? Mm-hmm. And find a way in the middle. [00:59:00] And I think people don't like hearing that, but like, it's just like life. Life and Earth has its own checks and balances. Consciousness has its own checks and balances,

Sarah: right? Ah, this is like now going into another deep thought.

You know, I heard this quote somewhere. It said something about, I don't know where I heard it, but I'm probably gonna kill the quote. But something that we talked about is, um, like they were saying that, um, as humans, like we, we have so much regrets, right?, At the end of life, we have like this fear, like, did I tell someone I love, did I do this?

Did I like do enough? But more so did I like connect with a loved ones, spend time with loved ones, right? Or take risk. But, um, but this person said death also shines. How did you say, death Shines and Light. I lemme, I wrote it somewhere. Hold on.

Uh, okay. Often the fear isn't of death itself, but of [01:00:00] dying with regrets. The fear of having missed something essential, not fully loved or lived half asleep, death shines a light on how we've been living, and I like that last line. Like death shines on a light. How we've been living, like the way that we view death is the way that we view life.

The way if you live in death and fear, we're gonna live in life and fear. If you live in death and like bitterness, angerness, then we're gonna live in life. Like, and you what the polarity like these two have to come in terms like, if, if we can embrace and open ourselves to death and, and, and, and find love in it, then we can also open and expand and love in our hearts.

I guess the bottom line is the polarity. Like, dang it, we need the other. And, you know, and I wanna,

David: I wanna bring home the, the previous point you were saying right now, um, because I, I don't, I don't know, I think I've said this a couple times in the year to live group.

Yes. I haven't explained it enough, but like, that's why I believe with so much that like confronting your mortality is like the most important work you [01:01:00] can do for the human species and for human consciousness. And because of that quote that you said, I believe that too. And I've tried saying that into different ways, but like mm-hmm.

Sarah: Yeah. You're

David: not afraid of death. Like, we think we're afraid of death, but we're not. What we're afraid of is how death makes us feel and everything of those unresolved parts of our lives. Mm-hmm. And so that's why I said in the beginning of the phone call, like I think we have ourselves confused and we have things twisted when we are advocating for other, like when, when we are advocating in outrage because other people are dying, it's like, yes, I hear you, but where's that outrage coming from?

Are you like actually mad that these people are dying? Or are you mad that death is a part of life? Hmm, which one is it? And where is this coming from? Because I think like 80, you have like 95% ignorance, fueling this outrage. And we can't [01:02:00] go anywhere unless, unless we look under the surface.

Sarah: You are so right.

I think like.

I think, you know, I was talking to a friend and I was like, we're all gonna die. Like, why are we still, it's like, you know, we accept people being born. Like, yeah, this person can have birth. Like we, it's a fact of life. Like, why can't we accept death as a fact of life? And then we're so consumed with our energy and time and whatever about dying and death.

But, you know, and I was thinking, why can't we put that same energy in, you know, in living our life. Mm-hmm. Like right now, the midlife, the in between, like, we're all gonna be born, we're all born, we're all gonna die. That's a fact. That's a human. That's, that's, that's two things we have in common. Mm-hmm. As humans.

The in between. Why can't we put the same energy, the same focus, and this, and this is where I am in life right now. Like. The in between. Like, this matters [01:03:00] more than being, than dying, than, you know, my death will come, like the in between, like having three girls is just highlights, motivates me to be a human, better human being.

Like to leave this planet in a better place, to leave a legacy for them to carry it on to the next legacy, whatever it is. Nothing. I don't want them to be great in a way. Like, oh, the career be successful. I just want them to know like that you're loved. That's it. That's it. I don't care if they're gonna be like, I always tell my kid, if you're gonna be homeless to be a kind homeless person, try not take a too space, don't be, um, extreme.

Just, just try to be good too. Even your homeless, homeless people are gracious at giving back. They will, they will give what they have too. I've seen it and witnessed it too, you know, like I, I just, I just like, ugh. It's the in between right now. I'm just so like. It is scary to live in the [01:04:00] in-between. I don't know.

I'll be vulnerable. I'm scared with the in-between. David, I'm scared. I'm, I'm leaving this marriage of 20 years. My kids will be impacted by this dec, by this decision. I am starting, I don't know, a career. I don't even know how this gonna like, make income. Like I could be, I could go back to nursing and make more money, but I know that's not my calling, but I know it's a safe thing.

I'm just so stuck. Like, how do I trust myself? Like, um, how do I like, integrate every day with just being enough each day, you know? But, um, and still find joy and pleasure as, as a human being.

Hmm.

Um, and that is every woman's guilt. I don't know if, if your girlfriend ever like expressed like joy and pleasure as a mother, it's such a. So hard to embrace, so hard to accept without shame, without guilt. But, [01:05:00] um, and this is a message I wanna come across, like, pleasure is sacred. Like pleasure is part of the, of loving yourself.

It's part of loving humanity. If be, find sacredness in that and find, you know, whatever. As a woman especially, I think a lot of it's is blocked, we're taught like I I, my God, like mine is blocked. And I finally was able to release some of it. I'm like, fuck. Like I didn't know they're connected with the spiritual, with spirituality.

I had no idea. I'm 44 years old and I'm just realizing this now.

David: Realizing what exactly

Sarah: that, um, that like, pleasure is sacred. The pleasure is holy. That's pleasure. It's Godlike gift to, um, to connect with him. Like I didn't realize like just some.

Like being, like as a sexual person. I, I think also, um, being sexual I think the world would be in a better place too. [01:06:00] Seriously, like you think of all these repressed people, it's because they're not connected. Also a part of the sexual part. Th this is also ha is part of, um, living.

Living is also embracing the sexual part. It's also embracing how beautiful it is and how God divine it is. I think we put that in a box somewhere. Like, oh, that's just what, no, like, it's time to let it rise and say, this is beautiful. This is good.

David: Yeah. I used to date someone, she was a very sexual person.

Like you could just tell she had a, she had a craving for it. She felt free in it, but like she shamed that part of herself so much. And like she put limits to how far we would go with each other because of that shame. Mm-hmm. Even though she craved it so much and like she shamed that part of herself that craved it and it's like, like, this is pleasure, this is joy.

Like this is, this is why we wanted a human body so we could enjoy this. [01:07:00]

Sarah: I mean, exactly. I mean is, you know, when I was in Europe, David, like my two friends, oh my gosh, I have this crazy story to tell you. So when I went to security, I had a carry on bag. Right? Of course I bring my toys, like, come on. Like, so, but France, man, they are like cruel.

Okay. So I forget that. Like, I forget it's electronics. I'm thinking it's gonna pa like it's no problem. So the guy was like, you have an electronics in your backpack, and I, I carry light. I had a backpack that was it, like a big, you know, traveling backpack. And I'm like, ah, I think I just have a curling iron, my laptop.

So I took it out and I kept going in and out, in and out and he's like, there's another electronic in there. I'm like, I don't know what's in there. So they opened my luggage and they pulled out my, my backpack and pulled out this pouch and I'm like, oh shit, it's my vibrator. I was like, and he unzipped it and I'm like, I have two choices at this [01:08:00] moment.

I could either be shamed and be like, oh my God, it is so embarrassing. Or I can rise and own it like a motherfucker.

And he looked at me, he pulled it out. I'm like, yep. Yeah, yeah, that's, yeah, that I forgot about that most important piece. Like, yep. I'm like, you don't wanna touch that. I'm like, dang it, I have to stare. Like, he touched it and he, and he, oh my God. And then he pulled up my lou. It was like, oh shit.

And, and it wasn't mean discreet that instead, and he like pulled it out. So next time it needs to be in his Ziploc bag. I'm like, okay, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. And I'm like, mercy coop.

David: Well, they have gloves anyway, don't they?

Sarah: They do, but he was like, I don't know if he expected it. He just, it was so funny. I was like, oh my God.

Like this is my opportunity to like own it.

Oh my gosh.

So, oh my god, my girlfriend's like, you brought a vibrator. I'm like, you didn't like, no. I'm like, what's wrong with you? Yeah. Hell yeah. We have our own bedroom. [01:09:00] Why not? Let's go find one. You know, they're just like, oh my God. But, um, but I mean, like even the farmer's market, I was like flirting with the cheese guy and the fruit guy.

The, the fruits and cheese were so sensual. I was like, oh my God, this is amazing. Like, I mean, it doesn't have to be a sexual act, but just like life itself could be sensual and pleasurable. Like, you know what I mean? So,

So I think something is shifting in me like this part of like telling all women, like, dude, like this is beautiful.

Don't be ashamed by it. Just don't be ashamed. Like, like just touching a fruit. Like, I think like my friend's, like, Sarah, you're touching it way too much. I'm like, stop it. Like this fruit, it looks so good. It's, just think everything's so essential and beautiful. And it was so funny 'cause like, I would, I always walk naked in the house and they're like, oh my God, Sarah, we didn't know you were like that.

But by the end of the week, David, they were naked to you. And we were laughing so hard. Like at one point they're like, fuck it. I'm like, see, it feels so good. See

David: in Europe. [01:10:00]

Sarah: Yeah, in Europe. That's awesome. I mean, in the house. Yeah. And, and, and we were topless at the beach. I like if this grandma can like, wear her gold topless with boobs sagging on the floor.

I can own it too. Okay. I'm gonna like, um, but, um, I love it, but there's something freeing about it, about being human, about being a woman, but or about being a man. Like, just being this basic, like, just like, just being your own skin, being comfortable, your own skin. Even though if you're not in the best shape or you have like extra, like, like I have all these wrinkles and like, like scar marks my C-section.

I didn't give a shit. I was like, I don't care. These are my battle wounds that I survived. I'm alive, you know. But, I do have to go, but I'm just so glad. Like we just like gotta catch up and like talk about deep stuff. Deep shit. That's so, um, it's been in my dreams, David. Isn't it crazy? All this has been in my dreams like this past month.

David: I believe it, it sounds like you're primed for it. And I guess like just the parting thought to have is we may never find a, [01:11:00] a like underlying piece that makes everything okay, but what we did in this conversation is we held both ends, both sides of anything in the same hand. And when you can find a way to do that, peace somehow introduces itself into the room.

Mm,

Sarah: yes. I love that. That's so, that's so beautiful. I think I sometimes, I, I, I, I'm so in vain, I finding peace such a vein of like, then at least this purpose itself. I think for me is right now, right here where I'm at, is coming at peace with no answer, coming at peace as it is.

David: Yeah. I mean, and that's integration.

So it's like, it's like, don't confuse our integration for being complicit. Mm-hmm. You don't, don't confuse my silence for ignorance. Sometimes there's just silence and integration. [01:12:00]

Sarah: Mm. Yeah. I, I think, ah, that's so great. You know, I've been, have this integration in my dream. Like I hear these, I don't know if it's ancest ancestral, like.

My ancestral mothers or grandmothers, but they've been calling me David. I don't know what I told them. I'm like, what the fuck? Why are you calling me? Like, I don't know what to do. Like, I'm here. Like, in my dream I'm talking to them. I don't, first I said, no, I don't wanna talk to you. I'm scared. Please, I'm scared.

They were scaring me. And so finally, I, I, I got my courage. They came a couple times in my dream. I said, okay, I, what are your intentions? I don't know. Mm-hmm. Like what to do. And they haven't they, this sounds so crazy. I don't know. My brain is like, what the fuck is going on, Sarah? It said to come meet them, not verbatim, but like.

The energy, the spirit was saying, come meet us in plant medicine. I was like, what? Like, why can't you meet me the dream? Why do I need to go to plant medicine? [01:13:00] Mm. I've never, ever done plant medicine my whole life. I don't know what have you.

David: No, I have not.

Sarah: Uh, I haven't either. But, um, anyways, I just thought, I'm just, just letting it simmer.

But I'm just thinking more about the conversations with these women. Like they were in my ancestral lineage. I don't know. Like, I just, I finally said, okay, I am listening, but it's been a month, but I'm just, that was it. That's, that's the last thing I heard from 'em. Wow. The energy. Like just, but um, there's,

David: um, you can, there's like a lower world meditation so you can do too.

That's how I met my ancestors without plant medicine.

Sarah: Lower world meditation,

David: lower world. Yes. It's a, okay. It's a shamonic journey. There's lower world, middle world and upper world, and lower World is kind of like where all your ancestors can be found from what I understand.

Sarah: Okay. Alright. I'll look into that.

David: Yeah,

Sarah: I'm just like, am I hormonal? What's going on? But, okay, I'll check it out. Alright

David: dude, have a great rest of your day. Thanks for checking in.

Sarah: Wishing you a [01:14:00] wonderful day today. Thank

David: you, you too. Bye bye.

Sarah: Bye.

David: Thank you for spending this time in the chrysalis with us. If anything in today's conversation felt challenging, just let it be. There are no easy answers here. The invitation is simply to notice. Notice where you feel the need to judge. Notice where you feel the need to point fingers. Notice where you might be denying a part of yourself and see if you can offer that place.

Just a little bit of grace. Congratulations. This is the work. Take a breath. Feel your feet on the ground. You are here now in this life, in your body. All the polarities of the world exist inside of you right here, right now. And the more you [01:15:00] can make peace with them here, the more peace you'll bring to everything and every one you touch.

Remember? The work isn't to become perfect. It's to become whole.

If today's conversation stirred something in you, my poetry collection milkweed is available in the show notes. Until next time, be gentle with yourselves and each other as if the world depends on it, because it does.

And lastly, before you go back into your day, I wanna leave you with some contemplations or journal reflections if that's your thing. These aren't questions to answer quickly. They're invitations to sit with over the coming days. Take what resonates, leave, what doesn't. I'm gonna give you four questions here.

What parts of yourself do you see in people you oppose politically? [01:16:00] How has proximity or distance to death influenced your political engagement? How much of your activism do you feel is influenced by your tribe?

Do you feel like there are more effective ways of encouraging compassion in our community, digitally or in person?

These are also in the show notes, let these simmer, there's no rush to have answers. Sometimes, most times, I'd probably say 99% of the time, the questions themselves are the work. The questions are the answers. Until next time, be gentle with yourselves and each other .