TrueLife - Rev. Dr. Jessica Rochester - Self Worth

Episode Date: April 4, 2025

One on One Video Call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_US🚨🚨Curious about the future of psychedelics? Imagine if Alan Watts started a secret society with Ram Dass and Hunter S. Thompson… now open the door. Use Promocode TRUELIFE for Get 25% off monthly or 30% off the annual plan For the first yearhttps://www.district216.com/Rev. Dr. Jessica Rochester is the Madrinha and President of Céu do Montréal, a Santo Daime (Ayahuasca) Church she founded in 1997 in Montréal, Canada.She is a transpersonal counselor, she trained in the work of Dr. Roberto Assagioli and trained with Dr. Stanislav Grof.She worked with Health Canada from 2000 until 2017 to achieve an Section 56 Exemption to import and serve the Santo DaimeSacrament (Ayahuasca).She is an ordained Interfaith Minister with a Doctorate in Divinity.From 1986 to 2018 she has been a workshop leader, teacher, and in private practice.She is the author of Ayahuasca Awakening A Guide to Self-Discovery, Self-Mastery and Self-Care, Volume One and Two.She continues to lecture on consciousness, non-ordinary states of consciousness, self-discovery, spiritual development, health and well-being and personal transformationhttps://www.revdrjessicarochester.com/https://psychedelicscene.com/2024/06/20/entheogens-psychedelics-nosc-and-the-search-for-wholeness/Self-importance is the veil that wraps the mind in illusions of grandeur—a kingdom built on shifting sands, where the ruler mistakes the walls for the world.Otherness is the doorway disguised as a stranger—an invitation to lose yourself in the eyes of another and find, at last, the ocean beyond the shore. One on One Video call W/George https://tidycal.com/georgepmonty/60-minute-meetingSupport the show:https://www.paypal.me/Truelifepodcast?locale.x=en_USCheck out our YouTube:https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLPzfOaFtA1hF8UhnuvOQnTgKcIYPI9Ni9&si=Jgg9ATGwzhzdmjkg

Darkness struck, a gut-punched theft, Sun ripped away, her health bereft. I roar at the void. This ain't just fate, a cosmic scam I spit my hate. The games rigged tight, shadows deal, blood on their hands, I'll never kneel. Yet in the rage, a crack ignites, occulted sparks cut through the nights. The scars my key, hermetic and stark. To see, to rise, I hunt in the dark, fumbling, fear. through ruins maze, lights my war cry, born from the blaze.

The poem is Angels with Rifles. The track, I Am Sorrow, I Am Lust by Codex Serafini, check out the entire song at the end of the cast. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back to the True Life podcast. I hope everybody's having a beautiful day. Hope the sun is shining and the birds are singing. I hope the wind is at your back. I have with me an incredible guest that we do an ongoing series. It's the one and only Reverend Dr. Jessica Rochester.

She's the Mahadrina and president of the Sioux de Montreal, a Santo Dime church. She founded in 1997 in Montreal, Canada. She's a transpersonal counselor. She trained in the work of Dr. Roberto Asagioli and trained with Dr. Stanislav Graf. She worked with Health Canada from 2000 until 2017 to achieve an... Section 56 exemption to import and serve the Santo Dimey Sacrament. She's an ordained interfaith minister with a doctorate in divinity. From 1986 to 2018, she has been a workshop leader, a teacher, and in private practice.

She's the author of Ayahuasca Awakening, a guide to self-discovery, self-care, volume one and two. She continues to lecture on consciousness, non-ordinary states of consciousness, self-discovery, spiritual development, health, well-being, and personal transformation and I am delighted to have you here today, Dr. Jessica. Thank you for being here. Well, it's always a pleasure to visit with you and on some level, never knowing where the conversation is going to wander off to because the topics that we choose are usually broad and deep. And so we try and find an entrance in to allow the conversation to the topic itself to have its own kind of life force, if you know what I'm trying to say. So the last time we were visiting last month, we talked about self-importance and

otherness. And I'll just in case people don't know what that is or didn't get a chance to listen to that podcast. I'll just, is it okay if I just took a couple of minutes? Because from there, we're going to jump into. What's the solution for that? What's the opposite side of the coin? What's the possibility beyond those things?

So, you know, I think we live in a, remember the me generation? Of course. Okay, it's not so long ago. And we're still in it. It's called by many, many different things. And, you know, to talk about this kind of paradigm of the self-awareness. and the self and how we experience ourselves. We need to look a little bit at the larger scale of things.

So where does self-importance come from? And it's a distortion of self-worth, self-esteem, healthy self-esteem, healthy self-worth, a sense of personal value just for being ourselves. And how does that morph into self-importance? And, you know, we talked a little bit about family. structure and belief systems and the power of society and to kind of lay such focus on materialism. I'm talking about our society, Western civilization, and how we're not doing a good service to the younger generations coming up by being so over-focused on materialism. So what we do and what you have and other kind of tickets of importance, okay, depending on society, you know, are overshadowing genuine self-worth and authenticity.

And so with the focus out there of what do I do and what do I have and am I in this high? hierarchy of importance. There's a hierarchy of importance in our society, right? There's certain people and there's certain positions and there's certain dues and halves that if you do that and you have that, that somehow automatically meets you kind of self-importance. And we touched on how, you know, we're not going to redo that show, but just to bring out a couple of points around it of how that can create for young,

children that can create, you know, a distortion, whether it's a social, cultural, family, religious. You know, God loves us best. Whoever it is that they believe that their God loves them best, okay? And all of these things can then create this deep sense of others. There's us and there's them. And somehow, instead of that being celebratory, there's us and there's them. And isn't that exciting and we can share and we can exchange and we can learn. Okay. Now I'm thinking of my children's nursery school, which was very much. Otherness is wonderful.

Okay? Instead of otherness is scary and bad, we need to get rid of it. So how we embrace otherness as a culture will all stem back to what we've learned about ourselves as an individual, a family, a society, a culture, a tribe of Does this make some sense? Absolutely. Absolutely. Say something about that or before I can enjoy it on?

I do. I have a monitor here that I'm using and I someone just chimed in and they're they say, they talk about authority and they say, does rebellion against a corrupt system? We'll move on to that one in a minute. What do you think of the relationship? Was it drifting into political conversation? It was a little bit.

It was a little bit. So, I mean, if, if you. really want to, we could save some time later to look at politics and how politics can become a life force that can suck the energy out of everything or it can nourish, you know, so putting that on one side. Let's fly off to the burner for a minute. Yeah, we're going to carry on track for a while. Let's do it. And so we see that this, what could be nourishing self-worth actually isn't. And it's been nourishing self-importance. And one of the ways this has been happening is through what looks like it should have been a good thing.

And I think I kind of want to lay that one at Barbara Bush's feet because of the work she did, well-intentioned. I think really well-intentioned and had no idea. You know, it was sort of like, you know, what's that strangler weed that gets into people's gardens? And I think Morning Glory might be one version of it, but there's a few versions of it. And it goes underground, and it's really hard once you get it, because you just have to keep trying to cut it down and pull it off all your bushes and everything. Okay, what she didn't realize is what she was proposing, no matter how no child will be left behind. Every child is special. Every child is wonderful.

Well, yeah. And no, not at all. Okay. And that became like a belief system that became strangling and overwhelming instead of nourishing and supporting. Okay. And so this whole philosophy of you can do whatever you want and you can have whatever you want and you're special and you're wonderful and that somehow everybody should be giving you what you want without you having to work for it. And it's as if the whole, you know, the difficulties that people went through in the earlier part of the last century and two huge wars and major financial social depressions and recessions and all of those difficulties that people worked so hard to struggle out of where to get a college education with some marvelous, wonderful achievement. The whole family would celebrate just graduating. My school was a big deal. And so we can see how good, honest, hardworking people who worked hard to create a really,

solid life for themselves. And, you know, to put their feet down and to work hard and feel that all that hard work was going to be rewarded in some way. And to have that kind of, by the, the, the, last end of the last century to have it swept away by all of these new age fantasy ideas. And this new age fantasy has kind of again been like those strangling vines that take over everything. And I've had so many people say to me, but isn't it true? Isn't always kind of what I call new age fantasy?

Isn't it is it not true? is it not true? And I'm going, no, it's not true. You can't just think that you arrived on the planet and that you hear the distortion. Every child, I have children. You have children, right? We all individually think our children are wonderful. Of course, until they become teenagers. And that's a whole other story, right? But it's essential all those different stages and how we manage them. But to kind of objectify your children as something in such a way as that has been happening. Do you understand what I'm trying to convey here?

And then the ramifications of all of that. And people growing up in a society where they feel that they have the right to demand everything from everybody all the time, instead of living a life as a respecting, respectable individual, doing our own. best to contribute to a healthy life, having gratitude for what we've received, even some of the difficult things that there's always something important to learn in it, having respect for others, okay, and so we're shifting from self-importance and otherness now to what we're going to talk about today, which is self-worth, and instead of otherness, unity. kinship.

Name one thing that you're not related to. It's a trick question. Yeah. Yeah, the relationship is everything. There's something you can see in everything. I exist and all that exists. Say more. I think that the things that you see in the world are a reflection of yourself.

And that if you can find whatever it is, Like it was, if I look at a lamp, I realize that was made by somebody or someone was working a machine that made it and it provides me light. So I'm connected to everything around me. If I'm willing to take the time to do some hard thinking about how it was made, where it was made, the person that came up with the idea or, you know, the relationship that I have with my daughter influences everybody at her school. And that's a connection to everybody at her school that now I'm a part of. So in everything that we do and everything that we are, we're sending out reflections of ourselves. And I think that also has a lot to do with how we feel about relationships and otherness and respect and gratitude and the like. Yes, to everything you've said.

And so, you know, if we take, let's call it an indigenous or an older worldview or basic modern physics. because they say the same thing. So things that ancient traditions and indigenous traditions and ancient other traditions, spiritual traditions, philosophers, saints, seers all said the same thing that modern physics say, which is we're all connected. It's impossible for any person to say, well, we're just to be, because, first of all, we're connected to the planet and the world. planet and the atmosphere and we breathe, drink, and eat everything that Mother Nature provides

for the universe. If you look at, our planet is in a solar system. Without the sun, we don't exist. Without the moon, actually, we wouldn't exist. It's as simple as that. There'd be no tithes. There'd be, you know, the pull on it helps with our seasons. I mean, there's so much that is interconnected and interdependent one upon the other.

And so it varies in. Here's this what looks like complete chaos and is complete order at the same time. You know, chaos theory, right? So what looks chaotic to us, you know, imagine an ant. So who was it to describe it? It's like an ant walking across a very large patterned rug or carpet. The ant cannot discern the pattern in the carpet. It just looks like a chaotic series of threads, right?

Whereas us standing looking, we can see the beautiful patterns in the carpet. So it's all a matter of perspective. And the more self-important we feel, the smaller our worldview is. You notice those things go hand in hand. Me in my little narcissistic bubble, I'm so important. and I don't know what can you say about that except it's just a reality it's just you know it's like narcissism seems to be like a pandemic it's it's everywhere we turn these days and and and the only remedy

is authenticity the best that we can do each of us in our everyday life is to stay of Vendek to honor, you know, what, when I say self-worth, what do you think of? I think of vulnerability. I think of responsibility and integrity and something that I got from reading one of your books is grace. You know, I don't think we talk about that enough. It's, it's having the grace to realize that you're part of the whole thing. And that with, with that self-importance that I feel as being conditioned into us with some of the leadership and the education. We're missing that. We're missing dignity and grace when it comes to that, I think.

Yes. We have a surplus of self-importance. And we have a surplus and self-importance. Another it is we are going to have a deficit. A deficit of dignity, grace, self-worth. And all we have to do is look. see how actions, words, and behaviors deteriorate on an entire social level when that is happening. We can look at countries or eras, periods of time, or countries, where the country itself

takes a position of honoring its citizens, ensuring that there is fairness and justice. and social services that accommodate, and sometimes other forces outside can take that over, right? But we see that, you know, if we look at the countries just listed as we're the healthiest and the most content are, are countries where that is in operation, where the individual self-worth of each person

is a considered part of the nation and how the nation organizes itself and its services, its education, its social services, its medical services. Now, anywhere you have too much self-importance on the part of government, politics, society, the very, very wealthy, for example, where you have that big distance between the very, very wealthy and poverty. and the kind of what we call what the middle class keeps getting kind of stretched or squeezed in between because that middle zone of people who are getting and going to work every day and paying their taxes end up carrying the load of just about everything now if you have a country where that is you know more civilization or an era where the country takes a great thing

your responsibility for that, then the country self works better because the people are more content and they're more happy. So everywhere you deny people, self-worth, where you don't value the people, you're going to have problems. It's not just you and me honoring ourselves. It requires our society to do the same, our culture and our society. there's an awakening that needs to happen in Western civilization. And maybe anthogenes and psychedelics are trying to do that.

Certainly the sacred plants that I work with, you know, that was one of the first messages that they gave me is that I had to take this home to wake people up. And I'm not, I have no investment in the healing and, you know, what it seems like a lot of the focus is. personal healing and personal trauma and stuff like that and I am not in any way diminishing that all of us have something that you know we would benefit from transforming and working with absolutely 100% but at the same time for too many people that's the end focus

it's just about me like personal healing whereas what the same what the plants told me and the Amazon forest was you need to wake people up. You need to awaken. You need to help people awaken their consciousness. And then people will take care of themselves and people will transform what needs to be transformed. So a big part of what's happening in N.P. Jensen's psychedelics and this movement has become narcissistic.

It's all about me and what I want. and what I'm going to do with these plants. And I'm going to do with these psychedelics and my big bad ideas about what should be happening. And there's, where's the dignity, where's the grace, where's the humbleness? That's another antidote to self-importance is humbleness. That's not something that is encouraged in our society, you know.

It's hard to be humble when you're the best. Yes, I know. When it's beautiful and I have so much. Right, right. Or when you have so little, and basically what you have is anger because your value is not being, you know, embraced in the culture in which you're living, you know. And for people who experience life feeling like a second class

or third class citizen because of whatever, the circumstances of their birth, a particular religion, a particular race, you know, name it. There's all kinds of ways to turn people into other. And so how do we re-embrace that? What would that look like if we were to decide as a society that every person in our culture and society has value in the word

and how can we respect that? And how can we support in our education systems and our social systems, the development of humbleness and grace and dignity and respect. What do you think? I think it comes down to community. I think you have to find ways to help others, and in doing so, you help yourself. But there's not, you know, I feel like in our society we have been taught that the almighty dollar and wealth is the ultimate form of authority. And when you have that lens to which you see the world, it becomes really difficult to have a community because of the hierarchy you talked about earlier.

Yes, and we have these false communities, these illusions, you know, all of these social media platforms that it makes it look like we have 3,000 friends. We don't have 3,000 friends. If we're lucky, we have a couple of good friends, if we're really lucky. And we work hard at nourishing those relationships. Right? That's true. Yeah. So you're saying the end of it is the solution is community, the community needs to take a long slow deep breath and say,

wait a minute, are we promoting self-importance and otherness? Or are we promoting self-worth, self-respect, respect for others, unity, harmony. What are we doing as a community, as a religious leader, as a political leader, what are we doing to promote that which is healthy,

that which will sustain a healthier, more content population, a healthier situation for nature, for community, for individuals? And what does that look like? I mean, how do we do it? I think that the only way is for,

it's an act of tragedy or trauma. Maybe not the only way, but it seems to me that it's in these times of humbleness, but more than that, like real life traumas that happen to you. I think that that is the only way you really begin to understand how important relationships and community are. because everything is stripped away. Like from my wife having cancer,

you know, my son died a while back. And while these events are incredibly tragic and they're heartfelt and they come with so much emotion, there is no other opportunity for growth like those situations. Like those situations present you with a test from the universe. Like what can you learn here? Can you be better from this? Here's an opportunity for you.

Let me see what you're capable of. And it's an interesting dynamic. and relationship to think that the most tragic event in your life can be the catalyst for the biggest growth in your life. And it's hard because you don't want to embrace it. But I think that there's a relationship there. A hundred percent. And again, I want to, you know, I've had three big losses, one, two, three in a row in the last three years since I'm thinking, okay, I don't break. It's just a little time to breathe and move through it, you know. And so, you know, my heart is with you in understanding the depth on the difficulty of the grieving process.

And 100% how do we, how do we go through these very difficult experiences and how do we allow transformation to occur? Because it's always there waiting for us to open to it. Yeah. You know. And so you're seeing trauma. And yes, I think that trauma and difficulty, hard times, can be a difficult but worthwhile challenge to temper us, to refine us. And that can happen as an individual, as a family, as a society, as a nation, you know, in which challenges that go larger than just individual

complication together in a way that they didn't realize they weren't together until the challenge comes along. And these things are deep and sometimes they take a long time. It's not a quick, momentary thing, you know. And I mean, we wish it was sometimes I'd just snap this and get through the other side you know, like a Star Trek thing beating me up Scotty

from here to there wouldn't that be marvelous? And that's not life. Life just smiles and says, yeah, sorry, we got to live this one out. Yeah.

You know? And you might recall I tell the story of Jonah and the whale, which is a really wonderful mythological story. And it really, you know, here's this poor man who gets given a task and absolutely doesn't want to do it, right? I mean, how many times in life does it look like life and or spirit is giving us a task and we're going, oh man, not bad, anything but that, okay? And yet it just keeps showing in front of us that they're going to do this. There's Jonah because I can get away from this, right, and jumps on a ship and then a storm comes up and everybody's going, who did what, that we're being punished? And Jonah says, twas I, and flings himself over the side of the ship and gets swallowed by a whale.

Okay, now, did it happen? Is it real? I have no idea. I wasn't there. But it's a fabulous story. Okay. And so stories talk to us. Right? So, you know, here he is in the belly of the whale and or three days and, you know, that mystical, mythical three day experience, you know. Jesus from, you know, we're coming heading into Easter. So the story of Jesus and his death and then three days in the underworld and then rises at the end up to the day. This is so, it goes way, way deeper that story of transformation. You know, look at the life of Mithras, who is almost identical to what Jesus went from. So you can see how all these profound, deep stories in the human experience repeat themselves in slightly different versions.

And so where is poor old Jonah spat up on what beach exactly where he was running away from? You know, and that's the piece. It's when we avoid doing that which is right, that which is that has grace that has dignity that has rightness that has justice when we step into it

and say okay this is really hard and I kind of sort of really don't want to do it but I know it's the right next step then good comes from that when we try to avoid it there's suffering there's always suffering when we go into denial

when we try to avoid Let's see what this is. This entitled Selfish Thought Process Amy Narcissism has also handicapped our ability to think, yes, and plan multi-generationality. Yes, thank you. Good comment. It absolutely has. And so it gets in the way of everything. So when our focus gets into the bubble. and everything that we think we want

that's so important to us and we have to have it. And then the level of competition that comes in, you know, because the folks next door got a new car. Well, we need a new car.

There's all the definitely sins, you know, covetousness. Okay? I want a new car. I want a bigger house. I want a bigger house. Whatever. the story is. So how do we find joy in every day life? How do we, what does self-worth look like? Okay.

How do you know you've got it? How do you know the difference between self-importance and self-worth? Can we talk about that for a minute? Yeah, I would love to. It seems like a slippery slope on some level. Say more. Well, at least I can only speak from my, experience, but it seems to me that the things are intertwined on some level, like the things that allow us to feel important should be the things that are worthy of importance. But they're not on some level. Like we spoke about, like the keeping up with the Joneses or, you know, I don't have that much money in my bank account or this person has more than me. So I think maybe the the difference between self-worth and self-importance is your philosophy about scarcity.

Like maybe scarcity is involved in there. When you have a scarcity mindset, you tend to gravitate towards self-importance. But when you have an abundance mindset, like, and you realize how much you have. And that goes back to my earlier comment where you have to lose everything to really understand what you have. You have your relationships. You have the ability to talk to people and make them feel good. You have the ability to look really hard at what you have and feel grateful for it.

I think that there's that mindset in between those two. So, yes, it's kind of a continuum. Yeah, I like that. It's a continuum where there's a balanced place in the middle. Let's call that healthy self-esteem, healthy self-worth. Okay. And then it can go too far to one extreme and it becomes self-rength. and it becomes self-importance.

Yeah. Right? But if it goes too far in the other direction, it becomes self-hatred. Now, self-hatred and self-importance are often connected. I know, I know that sounds very bizarre. But they often are. It's how the psyche works. And neither of those, you know, polarized positions,

are going to lead to a healthy, fulfilling life. So finding our way back to what the Buddha called the middle way, the balanced way, the way that's in tune, not too tight, not too loose. So what does self-worth look like? Well, it looks a lot like self-respect, you know, the four pillars of self-care and soul, self-awareness, self-love, self-respect, self-responsibility. And so awareness, the ground foundation basis, is an awareness.

That needs to be the important first step to become aware of. Why am I hating myself? Why am I mean to myself? Why do I put myself down? Why am I so hard and critical on myself? Why am I doing? Why do I always do a self-mit wrong? this is really common too

and then the ballardy is I deserve everything it should just land in my hand I'm so special and wonderful and everybody should be going to blank giving me what I want making sure I'm happy

and then the really distorted one is the power distortion where everyone should be scared of me we can see that in like tiptators and the petty tyrants of the world where other people's fear they feed on it it gives them a sense of power I heard a story recently about a woman was sharing with me about a social friend and I said I think the problem is this you know this person likes it when people who scared of her and she collects the ones who are scared of her and the people who are in that

click let's say need to ask themselves what are we doing here you know why am i why am i in this situation where i am serving somebody who i am frightened of why i am giving my power my willpower my personal power over to somebody. What is that about? So there's you, you don't get one without the other, you know? And the more you, the more a person is evil and it's a very powerful energetic dynamic. People can do it without saying hardly anything. You probably, you know, think about when you're in school, you might have noticed a teacher.

You really liked it when she or he, you know, the students were scared of her and gave them a sense of power, right? Now, a certain healthy, small, after fear is kind of good, okay? You know, it's like, oh, if I don't do my homework. Okay, so a certain amount of it, is, you know, it's kind of good. is kind of almost healthy and normal. But that's a very small dose of it, okay? It's connected to respect, and it's connected to respecting authority and understanding authority and understanding the place

that it has in the order of things, okay? But it shouldn't be like scary, scary, right? It shouldn't be. And we can see that everywhere in society, where people will use money and some form of importance, whether it's because they're a rock star or, you know, some kind of figurehead of some kind. They will use that to have an entourage. And the entourage has to be the yes, yes, yes, people and be agreeing with and they're always building the person's sense of. self-importance. But what happens if

people wake up and say the emperor has no clothes? Then what happens? I think that that's the path to awakening. I think more people need to find the courage to do it. Yes. Yes.

And whether it's on a social level, I mean, these things happen in religious centers. Sure. where a authority figure, a leader in a religious order, will instill some kind of power and fear over their congregation. And they will use that. This was a very old technique in Christianity. The priests and the cardinals and the bishops and the pope had so much power that whatever they said, people felt that they had to do.

until there was kind of a cultural and social awakening. And we can see around the world that there are still some traditions that hold that kind of power over people, and yet the people are giving them the power. At the same time, it's a very fascinating dynamic. And authentic self-worth is that which we, ask ourselves. You know, now you can understand in the years of the Inquisition that you kind of had to go along

and do lip service to a certain degree to the local religion. Otherwise, you'd find your possessions taken and you'd be on the torture rack, right? And so I'm not talking about that. We understand why people had to go along with things because in those eras, you know, and still in some parts of the world, that can happen. you know, you don't get to leave the religion, you do, you know, you get shot. I mean, it's incredible within the same age, those things can still be happening. And so that's when religions and their authority figures are filled with self-importance.

They do not value and respect the self-worth of the people in their congregations. Because if they did, they would value and respect their lives. They would value and respect their willpower. Their willpower to choose. To say, yes, I love this religion and I'm going to follow it. Or you know what? Not for me. Yeah.

So the willpower and the freedom to choose can only happen when we're in a situation where our self-worth is acknowledged and recognized. the worth of each person and on the life that they are living. And that has to still exist within fair and reasonable laws. Okay. I'm not for lawlessness at all. And fair and reasonable justice and laws for all that we're all beholden to. They need to be fair and respectful and recognize the first.

value of each person and individual self-worth and community worth and social work. This is, yeah, that's making some sense. Yeah, absolutely. I can't help but think of the contagious nature of self-worth, too. Like when you see someone stand up for what they believe in, it inspires you to do it too. It inspires you to question the authority. It really, it's the light. You know, we speak often about the light.

And when you see the light in someone else, it's almost like you're kindling it from another flame. Something erupts in you. And you're like, wait a minute. I have this too. I felt that exact same thing. That's why they get rid of all the troublemakers and all the people. Hey, they get rid of this guy. He's contagious.

He wants to think for himself. Claritin Colestis has a beautiful paper. I made it referred to it before. I think it's entitled. You can easily Google it and find it. Clarisopin Coliscius. She wrote a wonderful book called Women Who Run with the Wolves, which I think absolutely everyone should read

because it's just marvelous. And she wrote a paper called letter to a young man in Trouble Times, something like that, okay? I may not have it 100% accurately. And she says it pretty much what you've said about catching fire, catching light, about it being contagious.

And she describes it like they're kind of on a ship and they're sailing through all of this trouble and they're just sending light to everybody and the people who are floating out in the ocean lost, they're flinging a life safety to cling on to it, pull yourself in, you know, get on the ship of light and go forward, and those who don't want, okay, good luck, you know. You have to want it to get on that ship of light, okay?

You have to want to pull yourself in. You have to want to stand up and say the emperor has no close. if they want to stand up and say this rule is not fear to all you have to stand up and say this is what's real and important and sometimes we just need to live it sometimes our calling isn't to stand up and write letters to our MP and etc and etc

that those are very important callings you know I've worked with many 40 years you work with people you get to hear lots of stories and see lots of things. I've had so many people who've had that calming, whether it's to serve the environment, whether it's to go into politics and become their local member of parliament, to serve to make sure that that light is being illuminated, that some authenticity and goodness is, is, is going to manifest in the little corner of the planet they feel they've got to plant themselves and shine.

And now just shining in our own home, our own neighborhood with our neighbors, with where we go to our bank and our grocery store and, you know, our pharmacy, and being able to be light and to demonstrate to make sure that when we're walking along the street you're driving our car is that how we are behaving ourselves is one in which we are acknowledging the worth and the humanity and the individuality of each person. Do we slide through stop sighing, honking and giving our extended middle finger to the pedestrians? How often do we see that? Okay, Quebec drivers are notorious. For a while, I lived in Portugal.

Same thing. I think that that driving is universal. I don't think any one country can take ownership of it, you know? So, where did we stop? It's a stop sign. You know, please go ahead. Yeah. With a smile on our face, you know, please, you know, go ahead.

So in all the little small daily encounters that we have with people walking your dog and, you know, holding the door for us. I mean, I make people laugh, mostly young men. Because there's less public manners than there used to be. I was raised where you had public manners. I mean, he had family manners. Okay. And then there was public manners, how you behaved in public. And, you know, not disturbing people and respectful and pulling the floor for somebody's older if you're on the bus.

And there's a pregnant up or an older person and you're a younger person. You put up and you're given their seat. Your seat, you know, this was public. This was drilled in. Okay, I was born in England, so it was even more so British manners, you know. so much fattest got lost. You know, I walk along the street. I'm a walker and I love walking.

And I live in a very kind of residential area. So there's lots of people walking and walking their dogs and stuff like that. And it's so interesting to see how younger people just simply haven't been taught public manners. And when they have been, you know, when a younger person, The door open for me. I look at them and I smile and I say, thank you and please tell your mom that she did a great job of bringing you. They all crack up and say, yeah, okay, I'll tell her.

Because that's where it comes from. Mom and dad have to teach you. The same way Mama Cheetah has to teach her cubs how to hunt and she won't leave them until she sees, okay, you brought one down. Now you know what to do. Now I can say, like I see you on the Savannah some other time. But human parents aren't necessarily doing that this last few generations. They feel the need to give the children everything, do everything for their children.

What do they call them, helicopter parents? Well, how is that teaching your children to survive? How is that teaching your total responsibility? And do they have a sense of healthy self-worth? Or is it moving in one of the directions to the other extreme? What do you think? I think it's, I think it's not only parents, but it's the society itself that's changed. Like, it's so, maybe the ideas of like no fault divorce and maybe that is similar to like a helicopter parent and like, okay, I just can't do it anymore.

So I'm not going to do it. And the actions that we do as parents in society are in fact the habits of the children in the future. whether it's we give our kid everything or we decide to just i'm going to get out of this relationship because it doesn't work like we're teaching the next generation like you don't have to do the work you don't have to work hard it'll just come to you this kind of echoes what we were saying and so i i see it i see it i think it slipped as far as it's going to go i i see the people i talk to me oh yeah your mouth gone seeer i sure hope so I'm praying that this is why.

I think it is. I think it is. It is going to take something. If people aren't paying attention to the forest fires and the floods and the tornadoes and storms and that if these things aren't waking us up, what's it going to take to wake us up? I think the next generation has figured out that what we've been, the institutions, the society has applied an incredible layer of fear and it's in everything it's in all the advertising it's in all the tv shows there's violence and all this stuff there say more what you mean about that the fear what i i think for

maybe since after world war two we slid into this idea of that the best way to sell something is through fear and that has become the go-to slogan that has become the go-to motif the go-to myth is that be fearful and we're sliding out of that like i see it in my my daughter and i see it in her generation. Like, they can smell like that fear and be like, I don't want any part of this. I'm not going to do. I don't believe that. And they, in my opinion, are evolving past that.

Like, you can only be applied so much pressure before you learn how to overcome it. The same way water overflows obstacles. I think this next generation is overflowing the obstacle of fear. And we're starting to see people branch out. Like, there's people are moving away from these preconceived roles of you can be a doctor. You can be a lawyer. As long as you stay in these boxes, you can do whatever you. want. But I'm seeing a burgeoning fire of intelligence and creativity with a lot with the large

language models, with the NFTs and this new technology. I think the children are going to embrace it in a way that the last generation cannot understand. You know, they said there's a great quote that says, whoever invents the technology is probably the worst person to tell you how it's going to end up. And I think this next generation is like, hey, thanks for all this. Thank you, but no, thank you. We don't want that. We're going to do it this way. So I do think we're at a bottom. And I see so much inspiration around me and so many young kids creating things and doing things. I never thought possible.

And I think that that's the antidote. I think that that's where we are. Interesting. Interesting because we're watching a lot of the kind of structures, social structures and political structures, shaking. moving. And there's those of us who heal a lot of good and positive things can come from this because every time there's a big shaking like this, it's the opportunity for good. But there's always going to be areas where it goes too tight, you know.

Or people can go too loose. It can go too tight. And it's how do you find the value and the goodness of it? And one thing that does happen is every time society or culture goes too tight, there's going to be something that breaks like, look at the 50s, how tight they were, the 40s and the 50s. You know, after the second row four, everything blew open and then the next thing, you know, the 60s and the 70s happened, everything went way too loose. And so it had to come back into, you know, and it continues to swing back and forth like this. hopefully we'll have a little hiatus where things are in balance for a while, you know, and whatever that is going to look like, because it's still very much in the process of evolving,

you know, and we don't really know what that's going to look like. And the younger generations always need to carry the edge of the frontier and create. If they're wise, they carry the wisdom of those who've gone before them. They stand on the shoulders of the giants in whatever field. You know, they take the wisdom, they take the perennial philosophies, the truths. They take what works and tinker with it to make it a slightly newer model perhaps. You know, but they don't. But they don't throw anything out.

And so it's interesting. It's a really interesting time. Yeah. So let's talk a little bit more about unity. Okay. From, you know, to carry our conversation from self-importance and otherness and self-worth. I think we've wandered around self-worth and how self-worth reflects itself in society and religious tradition. and cultures and things like that.

And it's up for each of us to define and decide what is important, what does have worth, what does have true value. And there will always be people who will focus value on money and power and what money and power bring you. There's always going to be that. The same way more than 2,000 years ago, Jesus said, the four will always be amongst us. Now he was being prophetic.

The four will always be amongst us. So we'll be ill. So we'll, you know, that he, even back then, he could see that the wealthy are not going to share their wealth. Very few will. You know, look at the work Gandhi did. Of walking the continent.

He walked the continent and sat down, with individual landowners, could you just give a small little part of your land, just not one little corner of your land, right? At the largest transfer of land in the history of the human experience, one man walking the land,

sitting down face to face with people and trying to help them understand the value of sharing, the value of giving, individual people, that little bit of land that they could grow a crop on and feed their family. If they could grow a little extra, they could take it to market. And then how the whole culture would prosper. Instead of the wealthy owning everything and the poor always struggling to make hands meet.

So I think we're, you know, me, I'm hoping for another gandie on the horizon, another Martin Luther King, you know, even a mother tree. wouldn't be too bad. But, you know, there needs to be some people showing up with a big light and a big call to bring enough of the human. And let's just talk about our, you know, Canada and the USA. If we can, if our continent could have enough people who are willing to focus on unity instead of otherness, unity. and finding a balance in all of those little challenges that turn into big challenges, you know. And so if there's enough people who are willing to hold that light and diminish otherness and shine a light on unity,

how can we see the commonality in the human species? How can we see that we share more than is different? We all breathe the same air, we drink the same water, we laugh under the same sun, we love our children, the family dog. That there's, we share everything in the end. And the things that are different, the language we speak, the form of deity that we love, worship hollow, a set of principles that we hold dear,

the color of our skin or ice, our hair, you know, which songs we sing. That's just the wonderful infinite diversity, right? Yes, and, yes, but what's the difference between diversity and inequality? I think that that's where things get messy. Like, that's an interesting concept. That's a whole conversation.

Diversity and equality or inequality? Inequality. Like if I have 10 cups and each of those cups is filled to a level of different levels, is that a diverse group of cups or is that an unequal? Is that inequality? Is that diversity or inequality? Okay. So let's use nature because I love nature.

Me too. I think nature is in this lifetime a huge teacher for me. And I read like National Geographic and I almost don't watch TV. But when I do, I force myself to watch the news, try at least once a day. And not every day. Sometimes I go, no, no, no. And I turn it back over to PBS or BBC Earth, my favorite, where I get to just watch wonderful shows on the cosmos and the universe and nature and things like that, right?

So let's talk about nature. So let's say you go for a walk in the forest and you see. a butterfly and you see a bird singing and hear a bird singing in a tree and you see some ants walking and a file along the trail that you're following are they equal are they diverse are they unequal are they they're different yeah okay so human beings are different too right we're different we are different right right and but that doesn't mean that we we need to be in equal, unequal. It's true, but you can't, like, let's say we walk into this patch of the forest and there's

all these birds and we're like, wait a minute, there's not enough birds on this side. Let's take some of these birds and put them over here. Those birds don't want to be over there. They're over in this industry. Why would we do that? We do it all the time with taking tax money or we are taking things out of one environment and putting it into another environment that it may not belong in. and it doesn't thrive there.

Okay, I'm not following you. We're talking about birds bees. Now we're talking about people and we're talking about tax money. Okay, you lost me between the people or the tax money. Okay, let's take it back to what's the difference between individuality, diversity, and equality. Is there a difference between individuality, diversity, and equality? because how I see it is that we are all each unique individuals.

We're like snowflakes, okay? Each one of us, even identical twins, have differences. Right. Okay, so every human being, okay, has their own uniqueness, and that is on a biological, biochemical level, anatomical, biological, biochemical, okay? That's why there's a range in, let's say, the iron in your blood.

Okay, there's a range. There's not one number. There's between this number and this is normal and average. There's no right shoe size. There's zero to size 20 or something, okay? You can say the average shoe size in Canada is a size seven and a half or something, but that's going to be way too small for a lot of people. That's going to be way too big for some people.

So we have our individuality. And that's important to note that we have this. And we have it on a level of character, on a level of karma, on a level of abilities. Nobody has the exact same abilities as somebody else has. You know, Poverati's Poverati. Sorry. Stand aside everybody else.

Yes. Great voices. and somebody will come along who has possibly a much better voice, right? But in the meantime, we each have abilities that are slightly distinct, one from the other. You know, two people can play the piano. Maybe they even play the same, but it's going to be a lot of different on how they play black man off or chokan or something or booby-wie, you know, it's going to be different a little bit. And this is, for me, this is the diversity.

The individuality of each person. And we have the way we wear our clothes and we have the language we speak. So you and I are speaking English. I am actually speaking a different English from what you're speaking. I am speaking a British Canadian accent English. And I will use words in a certain way that is inherent to my British-Canadian experience. whereas you have a much more kind of curricular American accent. And so specific to the area where you grew up,

it's not a New York accent or a Texas accent, for example, but it's more belonging to where you were educated, et cetera. So this, for me, is diversity. Okay, it's diversity in, you know, the clothes we choose, the music we listen, to the careers we choose, all of this is a reflection of our individuality. And all of that is a complex combination of personal and individual characteristics with our spirituality and our, let's call it karma.

Do we each have a mission in life? Do we each have a calling? Are we just here to have fun? Are we here to explore? Or are we here to do something? We came here to do something very specific. Maybe develop ourselves in a certain way. Maybe with a specific mission to accomplish something, you know?

Before Einstein set off for planet Earth, do you think he thought, hmm, I think I'm going there to do something pretty significant. I don't know. Who knows? It's the great mystery. So for me, that's diversity is a manifestation of our individuality in its wonderful, eclectic combination of all the things that factor in to make us a person. Now, equality, for me, is something quite different. Equality is something that we should all experience.

and it is the rule of law. It is the rule of law, equal rights. Now, I know that, you know, our structure in Canada, our government and our rules and laws are somewhat different from how they are in the United States. I know we shouldn't do politics, but I have to say that I'm so glad that our parliamentary system could never give the amount of people,

power to one person the way your system does and I say that with the greatest respect to all the wonderful people in your country who I know and love and care about and wish only the best. But I'm glad I live in a country where one person can never have that level of power. There's so many checks and balances in place that it's just not possible for one person to make decisions such as it look like they're being made not just in our country but in many other countries, not alone, there's many other countries where that happens, where one individual is able to have the power to make enormous decisions that affect not only their country but other countries. So some countries that can't happen because of the

system that is in place. And so in Canada, we have a charter of rights and freedoms, and it says we're all equal under the law. We all have equal rights. We all have an equal right to education, to health care, to justice, to their equal rights. Is equality something different? There's a lot there to think about. I think we're going to table that for an entirely different conversation. What is equality? Okay.

Is a butterfly equal to an elephant? Is an elephant equal to a snow leopard? Is a snow leopard equal to an apple tree? Is an apple tree equal to Ignatius Rock? Is, okay? Or is equality a concept that humans have developed for themselves? I think it's a concept that we don't thoroughly understand. And we don't have the language to really have a meaningful dialogue about it.

like the idea of equality, I love it. And I love the way that you framed it. And like the individual has their idea of what equality is. But each person lives in their own sort of reality. And their reality is reality, even though it's not reality and actuality. So there's, unless people really sat down and defined what they're talking about and all their terms, the ideas of equality are trying to legislate values or equality is, it seems to me to be a beautiful idea that can't really find its way unless everybody agrees on it.

And there's no way to get everybody to agree. So you have to do it on an individual basis. Like everybody has to have their vision of what it is. And sometimes it gets messy. Oh, definitely. If humans are involved, it will always be messed. It's so true. Because humans are involved.

And the next thing you know, you want a few people who are bloated up with self-importance. There we go. Right back to it. In charge of the show. And, you know, and that their definition of it, which serves for pocket. Yes. Yes. It's going to be the one that is going to prevail.

And so let's table equality for its own. Let's respect equality. Yes. It's such an important topic that we reserve space where we have promised to talk about trust. and respect so I think that those three things work very nicely together equality trust and respect hold hands on this one I think I love it okay well we're coming towards the end of the of the show let's just do a wrap up on talking about self-importance and otherness and then we we swung in the other direction

Okay, about self-worth and how we as individuals need to first find it ourselves, and that needs to be a deep internal experience. And we need to cast out any belief systems that we have that are in the way of us valuing ourselves. But valuing ourselves does not mean bloating up with an evil and self-importance and lording it over others and power differentials and things like that. Self-worth must include unity in which we value the worth of all things. That means valuing nature, not just taking nature as a commodity to serve human beings. This is a huge distortion of original teachings.

guardians of the earth means guardians of the earth it doesn't mean enslaving the earth it does not mean mistreating the earth guardian means holding precious so if we take that as a good example of what creation hoped for us that we would be guardians of the earth then we would be protecting it, we would be honoring it,

we would be valuing the worth of our planet, we would be valuing the worth of the creatures, the cosmos and everything in it. So unity, recognizing that otherness is part of human experience and that it will always be there, and how do we not get caught up in it? Because we will, it's sticky. It's sticky and tricky.

It's all around us, and it's so easy before we know it, and then we're in otherness. Okay. And so it's awareness, awareness, awareness. Uh-oh, I'm in otherness again. Okay. So back into unity. Back into unity. And there is this awareness of the need to find a balance in all things that we do.

and in the more true authentic self-worth that we experience, the more we value our strengths, our qualities, the more we have gratitude for the life that we've been given, all the good things are in it, the more we reach into grace and dignity for the trials and the challenges, because they will come. Buddha said no one escapes illness or suffering. He nailed it, got it down, good and strong, and it's a reality.

And the only way to go through is grace and dignity, right? And so we arrive at unity. The universe and I are one. You know, again, another, I guess it's getting close to Easter. I'm thinking more about it. He's a great teacher. Jesus was a great consciousness teacher. However, you are people listening, however, whatever, whatever you're,

relationship and your belief system around him and his life is for me he was a great consciousness teacher who was trying to wake people up to the injustices within the social system of his time the errors that people were making that they didn't need to you know and he was trying to wake everybody up and perhaps the most profound thing that he had to say about unity was this. God and I are one. You and I are one. You and God are one. That's it. Sums it all up. Unity. On that note, always a pleasure. I love talking to you. I really enjoy all our conversations and I feel like I get to walk away with a lot to think about it. And for anybody within the sound of my voice, the conversations we're doing here are awesome and amazing. But if

really want to go into depth in some of these things that Dr. Jessica has had a tremendous experience, and you should get her books, Iowaska Awakening's, volumes one and two, and their guidebooks. So you don't necessarily have to read them all the way through. You can find something in each chapter. I like to go through and highlight them, and I find myself revisiting them all the time. Like, I keep finding new things in there, and I'm very grateful that. I know you've got a new website up where people can go and purchase the book there, or find it in any of your favorite retailers.

But there are tremendous books. I can't say it enough, ladies and gentlemen. Go down and check out the books. They'll all be in the show notes. And I look forward to our next conversation, Dr. Jessica. Thank you so much for being here, all the things that you're doing to help people. My great pleasure. And I also have on my website for those of you are interested.

I have lots of publications and links to many podcasts, a few of them with you. and but lots of publications that are free for educational purposes. You had a recent article out too, didn't you in a magazine? Yes, I think it was second to science. Yes, yes, it was. I think I'm not sure if I have to update my website. I'm missing a couple of links from you so that I can add them. Yes.

It came from a post that I did on LinkedIn that turned up. to be three posts that I then put together and then pre-posted because I've never had posts go viral like they did. And it was, please do not call yourself a healer. And then connected with the psychedelic science magazine folks liked that. And I said, well, do I'm in writing to an article? So then as I thought about it, I changed it a little bit. So it's anthages, psychedelics, and non-odinary states of consciousness, I think, and something. And I outline guidelines for the seeker and risks and benefits and for the guides.

And so they should be available on my website, but I'll go and check. Otherwise, people go on my LinkedIn page and find it through my posts. Okay, ladies and gentlemen, I hope you have a beautiful day, and I hope you enjoyed the conversation as much as we did. And I hope you, that's it. That's all I got for today, ladies and gentlemen. and hope you have a beautiful day. Aloha.