Latest / Project Emerald Collective / What if the answers you've been searching for have been underneath the noise all along?| Cass Taaffe
Transcript
- Eve: welcome everyone to the next edition of the Project Emerald podcast. My name's Eve McIntyre and I'm the founder of the Project Emerald Collective. More than a marketplace, we're a movement for women live ready to live more intentionally and take their power back and their agency and make those intentional choices with their time and their money and their energy to create a more meaningful life. Cass Taaffe: Okay. Okay. Eve: And I have the pleasure of speaking with Cass Taaffe today, Cass has travelled for fourteen months recently, walked two Caminos and has made that conscious decision to step away from everyday life and create something different. thank you. Cass Taaffe: Thank you Eve, I'm excited to be here. Eve: So I'd love you to start by telling us a little bit about yourself and the different hats that you wear. Cass Taaffe: Sure. So my name is Cass and a few years ago I hit the boggle button on my life. I don't know if people remember that game, Boggle, where there were dice underneath the dome and you hit the dome and everything sort of flew up in the air and where it landed then you had to make sense of it. So I hit the boggle button on my life a couple of years ago which resulted in me, as Eve mentioned, 14 months traveling around Europe. book ended with two Camino walks, which are very long walks across Spain. The different hats that I wear, am, at heart I am an empath. And that means that I feel things deeply. I read people in situations really quickly and I take on the energy of the space that I'm in. I had a 20 year corporate career in HR and I spent every day helping people through some of the hardest moments in their working life. And that meant, because I'm an empath working in HR, that I took on all of the emotions and the feelings and the energy and the spaces that I was in as my own when actually they weren't my own. So took on the energy of people, I took on the energy of workplaces. I am a Pilgrim twice over, and I have a love of travel as well. Eve: Yeah, great, thank you. And it's how did you come to have that awareness that you're an empath? Was that something that Cass Taaffe: It was, I actually thought everyone was the same as I am. I always thought that everyone felt the energy in a space and people's emotions. Like as soon as I walk into a room, can feel how people are feeling, whether they're in a good mood. when I used to lead my teams, I'd be able to walk into the office at the start of the day and know how everyone was feeling. And someone had had a rough night with their kids or their dog or. They had a huge meeting on that day. Instinctively, I would know it. And I thought that's how everyone operated, but it turns out they don't. And I think it was definitely on the Camino, I became very aware of it and I met a number of other empaths. There was one pilgrim in particular who, and we walked together for a full day and had this really deep conversation about being an empath and what that meant and how it can actually be a gift and how. how to harness the power of an empath and I guess use it to support ourselves and other people going forward. Eve: Yeah, right, interesting. I guess you can use it, you know, in a positive way if you've got those boundaries set up, but if you're unaware then it's just gonna be wearing you down. Cass Taaffe: Exactly. And I think in HR, because you take on Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: all of the emotions and the problems that the people in the Institute become my own problems and my boundaries weren't great. And so I got to the end of my corporate career in HR and I was completely burnt out because I hadn't realized what I was unconsciously doing or subconsciously doing, Eve: Yeah, absolutely. So, can you talk us through the two or three pivotal moments that have shaped your life to date? Cass Taaffe: Sure. I think the first pivotal moment was probably when I had a beautiful old dog. So after I hit the boggle button on my life, I quit my job. I did a three month road trip around New South Wales and Victoria I came back to Queensland to spend some time with my family. So I about six months with my family before I headed over to Europe. and I had to put my dog down. I had to put him to sleep. He was old. His health had been deteriorating for a while and I knew it was the right decision. It was really tough. The loss of a pet is, if anyone's experienced it, and many people have, it's really heartbreaking. So I grieved and went through the process and I knew it was the right thing. And as hard as it was, it opened up this level of freedom. that I hadn't experienced before, so I had no job. I had put what small amount of belongings I had in a little storage shed. And then with the passing of my dog, it was sad, but it brought this freedom that I could genuinely do whatever I wanted to do. And that then led to me making the decision to walk the Camino and staying in Europe and that whole adventure that I've been on. So that was a really pivotal decision. Obviously the decision to walk the Camino was a pivotal one. The Camino, I'm sure we'll talk a lot about Camino, but it is such an incredible gift to give yourself the space and time to walk across an entire nation. And I didn't know at the time what I was actually getting in myself in for. I had no plan to stay in Europe for 14 months. I had no plan to walk the second Camino. I just knew that after my career in HR, I'd been working in HR for 20 years and I looked at the next 20 years of my life and went, is this it? Is this really all there is? Am I gonna stay in this career? Is this the kind of life that I want? And I realized that I didn't. So I hit the bongle button and then came to the decision to walk the Camino without a plan, without knowing what I was actually, going to sign up for without knowing what the future would hold, but I knew deep down in my soul that the Camino was the right decision for me. And then the third pivotal moment was when I decided to undertake some yoga teacher training in Barcelona in August last year. Again, I didn't have a plan. I didn't know why I was signing up for yoga teacher training. Not really. It's not like I'm a daily yoga practitioner, but there was just this little, this little like, thought in the back of my mind, was like a little whisper, it's like, this could be something, this could be interesting. And so that was a pivotal moment in my life as well because it led me to the world of yoga, the philosophy of yoga, the beauty of yoga, that it's more than just the poses that we do on the map, that it's a way of living and it's a relationship that you have with yourself and the external world as well. Eve: And I love that you've just followed I guess that voice inside that is encouraging you along the way because that's so much of the unknown that you've been through, I guess. Like you've Cass Taaffe: Yeah. Eve: just, you know, left everything that you knew. Cass Taaffe: Yep, yep. And I trusted that I Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: would find what I was searching for. Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: It has continued to be the case with all of those pivotal moments, but then with other smaller decisions as well. And I think learning to trust myself and learning to trust that I know what's the right decision for me has been the whole point of this 14 months really. Eve: Mm hmm. Yeah, absolutely. Cass, what does living intentionally mean to you? Cass Taaffe: I think we all theoretically know what it means, but I think the difference is knowing it intellectually and then doing it practically in your life every single day. it's not the things like spend less time on your phone. All of those things help, I think there's no single formula for living intentionally. think for me, it means listening to myself, listening to my body, learning to trust and trusting that my body and my soul and my heart know what's right for me. And to be able to access that is for me to get quiet within myself. So internal quiet then allows... what is right for me to actually come up. So I have this internal committee in my mind, which I feel like some people might also have. You know, there's this constant debate going on between all of the committee members in your mind. And sometimes it's a quiet discussion and sometimes it's a loud raucous debate. And it's really hard to listen to yourself and to know what's right for you when they're having a debate. So living intentionally for me is... giving that internal committee a break, giving them a little recess and then allowing what's right for me to come up. Eve: Mm. I love that you've articulated that. fourteen months of travel and like doing the inner work, has led you to be able to think so clearly and reflect so articulately. So Cass Taaffe: Yeah, there was lot of time thinking, a lot of time walking, 800 kilometres twice, gives you a lot of space to think. Eve: why the Camino Cass? Cass Taaffe: so a very dear friend of mine walked the Camino pre-COVID and she loved it and she had a really wonderful experience. She's a beautiful human and the way she spoke about the Camino and about the time in nature and the connections you make with people piqued my interest when she did it. So the Camino de Santiago, for people who don't know what it is, or for anyone that doesn't know what it is, it's an ancient religious pilgrimage. you walk, so there's many different routes across Europe, most of them are in Spain and Portugal, and you walk the distance with the aim to get to the tomb of St. James in Santiago de Compostela in the western part of Spain. So there's multiple walks, you can choose where you start, how far you walk, where you want to stop, all those things. It's like a choose your own adventure. I love bushwalking, I love walking, I love being in nature. So for me, going and doing this, this walk, 800 kilometers, if you do some of the full walks there, they're about 800 kilometers. So for me, that sounded like an excellent idea. And so when I hit the bobble button on my life, had done the road trip, spent some time with my family, it was time for me to figure out what to do next. And Again, the Camino popped into my head. One of my counsellors had walked to the Camino. My parents had walked the Camino. And there were just a few people who sort of suggested maybe this is it. And as soon as I sort of wrapped my head around it, I knew it was the right decision. It was like a gift of time and space and being outside walking in nature. It's like all of the things that I love. And the idea was to go and find out what was right for me for the next stage of my life. Eve: Hmm, yeah, absolutely. So do you think you were running towards something or away from something or just following your curiosity? Cass Taaffe: I was probably doing all of that. was definitely, I don't know if I was running away or running towards something or maybe I don't even know if I was running at all. I knew that I was probably doing all of it, Eve. Eve: Hm. Cass Taaffe: I knew in my gut that I wanted to find out what was going to be right for me. Like I said, for this next stage of my life. and I had no plan. I think I booked the flight on my birthday in March and then I flew to Spain in April. So I had a month after I booked my flight, I then needed to get everything that I needed for the Camino. So I had no backpack, no shoes. I was very ill-prepared. I had no plan. did very little training. know, people plan for the Camino for years. They plan which route are they gonna walk. What backpack are they gonna buy? What shoes are they gonna buy? How many pairs of underwear will they take? How many changes of clothes? They buy all of this really lightweight Camino-friendly equipment to support them on the walk. they spend months and months training with their backpacks full of bricks. I think I bought my walking poles two days before I left. I've never used walking poles in my life. And I still didn't know how to use them on the first day of the Camino. I remember getting to the first hill and thinking, what am gonna do with these? and a pilgrim passed me and overtook me. I literally watched what he was doing with his poles. went, okay, that's how you use them. Okay, off we go. So I was very ill-prepared. And I think there was definitely, there was a lot of curiosity around what could this be? What is this going to hold for me? So while I was ill-prepared, I think it probably actually landed me in the very best place because I had no expectations, no preconceived notions of what it was gonna hold. and I could really just submerge myself into this beautiful experience at Issa Camino and make space within myself to receive whatever gifts it would present to me. Eve: Mm, sounds a lot like how I roll as well. Cass Taaffe: I think there was a fair bit of Aussie, you know the Aussie, she'll be right mate mentality. I was like, Eve: Mm. Yeah. Cass Taaffe: this? I can totally do this. can, yeah this is gonna be easy. It wasn't. Eve: No, never is. And you do often wish that you'd prepared a lot more. Yeah, Cass Taaffe: Just a little bit of preparation. Eve: absolutely. So what surprised you most about the Camino or the fourteen months or all of it? Cass Taaffe: the biggest thing that surprised me on the Camino was how much I enjoyed staying at the albergues. So albergues are pilgrim specific hostels. Only pilgrims can stay at them. When you start the Camino you get given this little passport and each albergue you stop at will stamp your passport and you can get them stamped at cafes and bars along the way. and then when you get to Santiago you get a certificate of completion of the Camino. the albergues are only for pilgrims and they're very basic albergues so it's shared bunk accommodation, shared kitchen, shared bathrooms and you're essentially choosing to cohabitate with people that you've never met before, different people every night, new hostel every night for six weeks straight. And that might sound like some people's definition of hell. And I had thought, because I love a great hotel, I love a luxurious hotel, you lovely, fluffy bathrobes. And I thought, okay, well, when I choose to have a rest day and not say it in Elberg, I'll book myself a private room or a hotel, there'll be some luxury, I won't have to share a bathroom, I'll have real sheets, real towels, not my little microfiber, car chamois and the plastic sheets they give you. And I thought this is going to be excellent, I'm going to love this. And they were some of the loneliest nights I had on the Camino. I really missed the connection with people that you get at the albergues. You know, the smile that you have with someone who probably, who doesn't speak the same language as you when you're brushing your teeth, when you're making coffee in the morning, or you're chatting over what's your plan for the next day. Those connections and that interaction with people is something that I really missed. And... obviously cohabitating in a door room and there's lots of people snoring, I actually missed the noise, the snoring of the sleeping in an albergue. a hotel room is dead quiet. And having gone from spending every night with people in these loud communal places to being solo on my own, I actually missed the albergues and that really surprised me. Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: Another thing that surprised me, and this was on the Camino and also else throughout my whole travel is just how safe I felt. as a solo female. Eve: Mm-hmm. Cass Taaffe: Both Caminos I walked, I started solo, so I didn't plan to walk with anyone, I didn't have anyone with me. I met people along the way, but I felt so safe, particularly on Camino. It's this beautiful little bubble of pilgrims, and you're walking through small towns and big towns and industrial areas and remote villages and countryside and beaches, and I never felt unsafe for one moment. And that really surprised me about the Camino and also the travel that I had, but definitely the Camino, I never felt unsafe. I know the other thing that surprised me was the emotional magic of the Camino, I guess is the best way to describe it. We all know being out in nature makes us feel good and that walking makes us feel good. You kind of put those two elements together with a really long walk. with a bunch of people who are of the same mindset and have committed to doing this pilgrimage. It's not a holiday because you have to walk every day for as Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: many kilometres as you want. It's not a holiday, it's a pilgrimage. You get this deep connection with people so quickly on the Camino and there's this magic bubble that you stay in for as long as you're walking. And I wasn't expecting... I knew my dear friend had an incredible experience, but I wasn't expecting how magical the Camino would be. Eve: Mm. Yeah, that's so cool. how long did it take you? Cass Taaffe: Both walks took me six weeks. So the first walk that I did, excuse me, was the Camino del Norte, which is along the northern coast of Spain. And it's, I think, about 820 kilometers all up. And that took me six weeks. And then the second time I walked the Camino Frances, which is 780 kilometers, and that also took me six weeks. Eve: Yeah, right. Cass Taaffe: Yeah, some people do it in shorter. There are these... suggested stages in various guidebooks and different apps that you can get. And some people walk further and push themselves harder and stick to the defined stages. Eve: Mm-hmm. Cass Taaffe: It took me longer on both, both Caminos and I was very happy with the six weeks. Eve: Yeah, it's a lot of ground to cover. Yeah. What an achievement. What does walking all Cass Taaffe: It's a lot of fun to here. If walk across it, it's my country. Eve: day teach you that life doesn't, do you think? Cass Taaffe: I feel that the Camino is life just condensed into this little bubble of Caminoness. don't know if it teaches you anything that life doesn't teach you, but it's this incredible gift of time, space, walking. It almost strips back all of the noise of life. It strips out the noise of everyday life. But you still have to make decisions all day, every day. They're smaller decisions or similar decisions just on a smaller scale. it's life just in this little bubble. you still have to make decisions. It's simple, but there's still a lot of decisions to be made. It's like, how far am I gonna walk each day? Do I want to push myself or am I listening to my body and it's telling me that I need to have a shorter day? Which is exactly like life, know, how fast and how far am I going? Am I pushing myself and am I jamming my day full of meetings and activities and extracurricular activities and study and socialise? Or is my body telling me that I'm a little overwhelmed and maybe I need to have a quiet week or a quiet month? You know, do I want to stay at an albergue or do I want to... put myself into a private room, it's the same in life. Am I happy with what I've got in the space I'm living in at the moment or am I striving for something that is bigger and better and more luxurious and what's actually right for me in that decision? And on the Camino, do I wanna walk with people during the day or is today a day that I wanna walk solo? And it's the same in life. When I'm listening to myself, Do I need nourishment for myself and some time on my own to regather and sort of set myself up for the next, whatever's coming at me next in life? Or am I choosing to engage with people? Am I feeling really social? Or am I engaging with people and actually I'm really drained and that's not going to be a good use of my time? So I don't, for me it didn't necessarily teach me things that everyday life doesn't teach me, but it strips away all of the noise and you can make these decisions. from a quieter place, a simpler place, where all you have to do every day is throw in a backpack and walk. So you don't have to worry about rushing between jobs and daycare and sports practice and going to the shops and birthday parties. All of that stripped away. it gives the internal committee a chance to have a break. And then you can actually listen to yourself about what's right for me on this day in the Camino. In Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: the Camino. Eve: Yeah. The power of getting quiet. Cass Taaffe: Mmm, and it's it's it sounds simple, but it's so it's so hard because the internal the internal committee is Doing its job. It has a job there. It its job is to keep you safe to take all of the facts and the information and process it and think about all of the possible outcomes and it's doing its job and they you know, they're having this debate with each other all the time and this person's saying one voice is saying this another voice is saying this another voice is saying this and it's really hard to in everyday life to hear your voice, what's right for you when you've got all of these committee members debating over the top of each other, bringing in all of their societal expectations and the things you think you should be doing and what's that person down the road doing and should I be applying for that job and do we have enough money and what are the kids gonna be doing? It's really hard to strip all of that noise away in everyday life and Camino gives you that ability to do that. Eve: What a gift. are there moments that you wanted to quit? Yeah. Cass Taaffe: Oh yeah, absolutely. Definitely. I think on the first Camino, definitely. The second Camino, I think because I'd had the experience of the first Camino, so I knew what I needed. I knew what was right for me and how to access that more easily. But on the first Camino, yes, there were definitely moments when I wanted to quit. think about four days in, I injured my knee quite badly. and I had to take a couple of days rest. And during that period, I definitely wanted to quit. And then I got really bad blisters about two weeks into the first Camino on both feet and they just kept building on each other. So I'd get a blister and then that would go away and then another one would come on top and another one and another one right until the very end of the Camino. So it was physically, it was very painful. And I definitely had thoughts of quitting. And my internal committee also had thoughts of quitting. I had all the voices, who do think you are? You're so ill prepared, you didn't even train. Can't believe you think you can do this. Just what, turn up here and walk 800 kilometres? Who do you think you are? You're way too, way too bolshy. And then there'd be another one saying, oh no, it's probably going to be okay. We just need to take it a little bit easy. We can do it, or we can just, maybe we just quietly exit from the commando. We don't have to tell anyone. We'll just, we'll just leave. We just don't need to go any further. Maybe we can't do this. And then other voices saying, you know, there's other people here who are overweight and really old and how come they can do it I can't, we're young, we're fit, we should be able to do this. And that happened quite frequently in the first, I'd say in the first month of the first Camino. And it would get to the point where the debate was so heated, the internal committee debate was so heated in my mind that I would get to the point where I would break and I would burst into tears. and I'd either be walking and crying or I'd sit down and cry or I'd just stop, stand there and my arms would be by my side with my poles dangling and I'd just cry. And some might consider these mini breakdowns and maybe they were. I know now, knowing how I operate and how my body operates, that that is the way, that is one way for me to break the internal committee's debate that's going on is to. is that I just, get to the stage where there's nothing for me to do and I just, break and I cry. And it's like, I can see the faces of the internal community. They're like, oh, I think we've got stupid. Eve: Yeah. Cass Taaffe: Oh, I think that's a bit much. I think we should take a break. And then it's like, okay, all right, well we can do this. And then my actual voice would come through and it's like, we just need to be in this together. I can do this. I know I can do this. Physically I can do this. Emotionally I can do this. Mentally I can do this. We just need to make it to the next town and then we'll sit down and we'll have a break and we'll reassess. Do we want to go to the town after that? And then when we get there, we'll sit down and recess. Do we want to go to the town after that? so I definitely wanted to quit and I felt very broken many times. But I, and I think the other thing is that there's that voice that says this is 800 kilometres. You have committed to walking 800 kilometres and you're physically broken. You can't go any further. It's like, well, if I try to think about walking 800 kilometres, I will definitely quit. Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: But if I think about walking to the next town and sitting down and having a break, I can do that. And then if I think about walking to the next town and commit to doing that, then I can do that. And it's like, just you can't think about the whole journey as a whole because it's too much. Just think about getting to the next town and then literally just put one foot in front of the other. That's literally all you need to do. You throw your bag on in the morning and you put one foot in front of the other. And that's all I had control over. And that was what helped me find my inner resilience, I guess, and the strength that I knew I had, Eve: Mm-hmm. Cass Taaffe: but struggled to access at different stages during the walk. And it just came down to literally one foot in front of the other, we can do this. Eve: Mm-hmm. Yeah, absolutely. what happened mentally after the first week, Cass? Cass Taaffe: Well, I would love to say that I became enlightened and all the answers to life came to me, but that didn't happen. After the first week, I was quite broken, but as the weeks went on and my physical body gained more strength, because you do become stronger as you walk the Camino, so even if you aren't at peak fitness when you get there, you will become stronger. The first couple of weeks are very painful. while you're getting used to walking with a pack with however many kilos, seven, eight, nine kilos in it, which doesn't sound like a lot, but it is a lot. So becoming physically stronger helped me emotionally. So I definitely didn't reach enlightenment. The internal committee was still having debates all the time. I was still engaging in that, but you, with time and with the everyday noise stripped away, It provides more space. to find your true voice and to find what is right for you. And there's a real meditative element to walking, to having your feet connect with the ground. And, you know, some days when I wasn't a huge amount of pain, I had these blisters that were, I couldn't talk to anyone for the first hour of the walk while the painkillers kicked in. And when I could actually breathe without wincing every step, when I was in that... really painful place I would literally just walk look down at my feet just go step step one foot in front of the other left right I had a few different mantras that would go through my head just to get me through the first hour of pain and it becomes really meditative walking non-stop every day or walking however many kilometers with the goal of just reaching the next town. So the the space within myself and the giving this committee a break became easier and quicker for me to access. And the stillness in my mind brought peace within my body and then peace within my mind. And then you have these beautiful, incredible, amazing moments where you might walk into a field and there's no one in the road in front of you and there's beautiful green on either side and the skies are brilliant blue and you just. and the tears would come again because it's this beautiful moment of elation. Or you might stop in a town and meet with a pilgrim. And the presence that you have by giving your brain a break or your internal committee a break, gives you access to be present in the moment. And then the connection that you have with yourself, the connection that you have with nature and the connection that you make with people when you're in that. in that space. It's so incredible and amazing and deep and genuine and it's just the most beautiful moment. Eve: Yeah. And what and did it change over time? Like what happened in the second week? Cass Taaffe: The second week, I was less broken than the first week. Yes, it did change. I also think on the first Camino, I was a bit like a deer in headlights. Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: So I was so ill prepared and hadn't really read any blogs. And, you know, I had some apps that I was looking at. So I knew where I was going, but I didn't really know what it was going to be like or what it was going to be or how would I find my way the first week I was literally like a deer in headlights. was like, what is this? What have I signed up for? And even on the first day that I started walking the Camino, I wasn't expecting like a big banner that said Camino walkers through here or a marching band or you know, a big banner that says, go cast, you could do this. But I thought there would be something more than these little painted yellow arrows on a sign or on the side of the pavement. they're just what I just had no idea what I was in for. And I think in the second week I became more comfortable in the day to day machinations of the Camino. And then the third week everything got a little bit easier. And then in the fourth week outside of the blisters, I knew what I was doing. I had a lot more confidence in myself to be able to find an albergue, book the albergue, make sure I had enough food, make sure I had enough water that I was going in the toilet frequently enough. You know, it takes a little while to get into the swing of walking between 20 and 30 kilometres every day. So I think I was becoming more comfortable with the process of the Camino or the machinations of the Camino it was becoming easier to access that quiet inside my mind. I was building more confidence in myself to be able to talk to people. know, every pilgrim that you meet is a complete stranger and they have no connection to you. So your confidence builds in the daily decisions that you have to make. There's constant daily decisions and they're not huge life-changing decisions, but they are necessary decisions so that you can make it to the next town and to the Elbow game. Do you have enough sunscreen and have you put on the decisions that you think about all day? They are small decisions, but... They're never ending. you do, I was, there was definitely decision fatigue at the end of the six weeks. I had both Caminos and actually at the end of the 14 months traveling through Europe, I had decision fatigue. It's never-ending decision fatigue. And this internal committee has been on overdrive. And yeah, like I said, each week of the Camino, even though the decisions don't stop, you become more practiced at making them and you make them in shorter space of time. And it just gives that internal committee break that they can just go and have a coffee and you can just enjoy the beauty of where you are walking across this incredible country with amazing people from all different walks of life. So I guess I found my groove a bit more after each week. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. Cass Taaffe: And in my opinion I was a pro. Eve: you would have come a long way in the decision yeah, all Cass Taaffe: Absolutely. Yeah. Eve: the decision making process. So Cass Taaffe: Uh-huh. Eve: did the simplicity of the actual of you know, living so simply and your backpack, did that become freeing for you? Cass Taaffe: Yes, it really did. It definitely became freeing. think... The simplicity is in the daily process, I guess. know, you've got nothing on, all the things you have with you are on your backpack, but that's it, you have nothing else. You don't have to think about anything else. you wake up, all of the decisions aside, you literally just wake up, throw all your things into a backpack, put it on your back and you walk. And there is real freedom in that. In that, I guess, in... stripping away that external noise of everyday life and all the external pressures and the external expectations and all the things you think you should be doing, all of that gets stripped away in Camino and all you have to worry about is yourself and your backpack. And because all of that external noise is stripped away, like I mentioned, and you're having this beautiful experience walking in Spain, which is an incredible country, and it's The scenery is beautiful and the people are beautiful and the food is beautiful and the language is beautiful and all these people that you meet are beautiful. And it becomes really freeing that all you have to think about is what do I want to do? What do I want to do today? And particularly for me walking solo, I only had to think about myself. I didn't have to consult with other people that... I had started and intended to walk the Camino with. It was just me and all I had to worry about was the very basic machinations of getting through the day and then the next day and the next day and it does become really freeing. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. So the how did your relationship with time change then? Cass Taaffe: Yes, my relationship with time changed where I guess I realized that I wasn't experiencing time or the things that were happening in real time. Like I'd spent, so anyone who's worked in corporate space or anyone who's lived over the last 20, 40 years, we're constantly trying to optimize our time and get more out of our time and make the best use of our time. So much so that I think we actually, well know for me, can only speak for myself, but I stopped enjoying and experiencing time because I have always had this, constant debate in my head about am I making the best use of my time? Am I maximizing this opportunity? What else do I have to do? And I had this experience on the second Camino. So. On the first Camino, I would take a rest day, which is essentially a day where you stay in the same town for two nights. And instead of walking to the next town, you just stay in the same town and then you have a rest day. But I was finding that I was still walking 15 to 20 kilometres on my rest days to make the most of the town that I was in. And I stayed in some incredible towns in Bilbao in Spain and had a day there exploring the Guggenheim and seeing the beautiful city. But they weren't really rest days and they actually weren't helping. me rest my body so that could continue on. So on the second Camino I decided on my rest days I would genuinely rest. So there's always a cathedral or a church in the town that you're staying in. So my plan for my rest days was that I would visit the cathedral and I would have a massage. And the massage was to give myself some time to rest and to have someone else care for me. And so the first massage that I booked myself in for was in the town called Leon in in Spain and it's got a beautiful cathedral so I booked my cathedral trip and I booked a massage and I went for the massage and I was lying on the massage table and this list, this internal committee was having this debate or they were constantly talking about all the other things, the things that I should have been doing. Have I eaten and it's crazy to think about this but I feel like I hope you all have better massage experiences, but I feel like other people might have done this as well. You're constantly running through things in your head while you're lying on a massage table. Have I eaten enough today? Have I booked my cathedral ticket? What time's the massage going to end so then I can get to the cathedral afterwards? Should I eat before the cathedral or after the cathedral? Should I take myself out to lunch or should I take myself out for dinner? Do I have all the band-aids that I need for my walk tomorrow? How far am going to walk tomorrow? Where am going to stay tomorrow night? I asked the massage therapist to do this hug because I know that's what you should do. It's good for your muscles. But she seems to be struggling a bit. Should I tell her that she can go softer? she's lifted up my arms. Should I maybe try and help her by lifting up my hand? I probably should have taken my ring off of my necklaces and my bracelet. Should I do that now? And then my brain just yelled, stop, stop, stop what you're doing. This is outrageous. You have gifted yourself some time for yourself. for someone else to care for you for an hour and you are shooting all over yourself. You should be doing this, you should be doing that, you should be doing this. And it was like my body literally said stop. It yelled at me, stop. My brain literally yelled stop. So I think we, in terms of time, we spend so much energy trying to make the most of the time we have and squeezing every single little last minute out and. then I think for me, I was losing the experience. So was losing the experience of being on a massage table and having a lovely massage. So there's many examples like that, yeah, it's this quieting or giving the internal committee a break just allows you to just relax and take a breath and enjoy the time that you are, trying to maximise all of the time that we have, we should just be enjoying what we're actually doing in that moment. And like I can feel the whole of my body relax and when I give this internal committee a break, it's like everything just goes, oh, that's right, it doesn't need to be like this, it doesn't need to be like this all the time, it can be like this. Eve: Mm. So true. What are the conversations that stayed with you? Cass Taaffe: Yeah, there were so many incredible people and everyone comes from such a different background and different walks of life and you don't know who you're going to meet in a day. I think the conversations that stayed with me were the ones that I was genuinely present for. And so there were, I guess, two types of conversations that I had. The ones where I was genuinely present and then there were the ones where I was similar to the massage table where I was thinking about all of the other things that were running through my head at the same time that I was trying to have a conversation with a person and not genuinely connecting with that person. Nothing to do with that person. Everyone that walks the Camino is there for their own reason and beautiful reasons. So it's nothing to do with the other person. It's just that there's so much other stuff running through. my brain, the internal committee was on overdrive again, that I couldn't actually be present and connect with the person. there is a magic to the Camino when you find someone who walks at the same pace as you, who... is equal in the giving and taking of energy and information and it's like this reciprocity, this synchronicity that you find with a few people and they become the most magical conversation. So I found that connection with a few people on both caminos where it is genuinely this... invigorating and soul-filling and heart-joyous conversation. And it could be about something really deep and meaningful, and it could be about something quite light and surface-level, but the content of the conversation doesn't matter. It's the energy in which you're both engaging in that conversation that makes these conversations so special and those connections so special. And I know that these are friendships that I will have that will last forever. Eve: Yeah, incredible. You don't get yeah, because you don't get those opportunities generally in everyday life. So another key Cass Taaffe: No, no, because there's always so much noise and activity going on in people's brains in these to-do lists and these literally internal committees going constantly on both sides. It's so hard to that away and the Camino provides that gift constantly. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. So coming home from something like so significant, like such a journey, how has it changed you? Cass Taaffe: when I first left, I thought it would be a transformational journey and I would come back this changed person, you know, that's who I was and this is who I am now. But that didn't happen. I'm still me. I know how to access my true self, what's right for me. I know how to access that now. And I consciously choose to do that on a much more frequent basis. I very much feel things in my body. So I know that when my stomach tightens or my lower back is tense or my shoulders are tense or my throat and chest feel constricted, that whatever I'm doing isn't feeding me. It's not bringing joy to my life. It's not the right decision for me. I feel in my body very much what is right for me and what's not right for me. But before I left on my 14 month journey, was still, those things were still happening in my body. I just wasn't listening to them. I just overrode them all the time because this is what I should be doing. This is what, you know, this is what my job expects of me. This is blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Coming back, if I don't listen to my body, I'll end up in the same place I was before, burnt out, exhausted, questioning what I'm doing with the rest of my life. And while I haven't changed per se, I am now more in tune with myself and I know what's right for myself and I know how to access that quicker and easier to help lead me in a direction that I know is right for me in the future. Eve: Hmm. Yeah, so powerful. So and what no longer fits have you found? Cass Taaffe: what no longer fits. I would say allowing my energy to be drained in spaces that are not reciprocated, So as I mentioned, I'm an empath. So I feel things deeply and fully and quickly and take on a lot of emotions and things that are happening in space. So I read energy and I can feel people's energy. operating. So I choose where I spend my energy now on activities with people. What no longer fits is me just giving away my energy. And that's not to say that I'm not a giver, because I am, and that I'm not willing to invest in people or places or things or activities. I definitely am. I'm just more mindful now of what my body tells me before I get to the burnout stage, before I get to the frustration stage, before I get to the breaking down and crying stage. Eve: Mm-hmm. Yeah, beautiful. Cass Taaffe: Definitely. Yeah, so I spend my time more wisely on things that I know are right for me and that will give me that reciprocal energy exchange and that I will come away from things feeling not drained and exhausted and overwhelmed, but that I will feel energized and at least that there's been some give and take between the situation and myself. And it's definitely changed my relationship with money. everything is quite reasonably priced. And it reminds me of when I used to travel Southeast Asia in my 20s. You do everything on a shoestring budget. You didn't overspend anywhere. And the Camino is the same. that you can have such a rich experience for very little money. Eve: Mm. Yeah, absolutely. So if we're thinking about if life's like the Camino, you know, philosophically, what does taking one conscious step at a time really mean? Cass Taaffe: For me, it's all about listening to my body. So Eve: Mm-hmm. Cass Taaffe: my body tells me what is the right decision. taking one conscious step at a time is listening to my body. Taking a pause before I make a decision, whether it's a big decision or a small decision, letting it sit in my body for a while before I commit to something. listening to my body and knowing that I know what is right for me. The other thing is giving that internal committee a break so that your true self can speak up and say what, or give you some guidance, whether it's a little whisper or a thought that pops into your head one morning. And then you follow that thought down that path and see where it leads, or you listen to the whisper and maybe it leads you to walking a Camino, or maybe it doesn't lead you to walking a Camino. if I think back right to the start before I even went overseas. there was just that little whisper of the Camino and it's led me on this incredible journey. I had a thought one morning, I was in Europe, I was in Ireland and I had the whole of August last year free. I didn't have any commitments and I wanted to do something in August. And August is peak tourist season in Europe. Everything's fully booked, frightfully expensive. And I woke up one morning, because I'd been struggling to do... decide what to do with this thought in my head, maybe I'll go and do a yoga retreat. And like I said at the start of the interview, I'm not a daily yoga practitioner. it sounds amazing but it just popped into my head one morning and I was like, I might explore that a bit further. So the yoga retreats in Europe in August are, also frightfully expensive, same as everything else. And then somehow my search led me to yoga teacher training. And it's not something that's been on my bucket list. I've never aspired to be a yoga teacher, but there was something that piqued my interest enough to explore it a little bit further. Anyway, I was exploring and I found a course that met all of my requirements and I thought, maybe I'll give this a go. And then other thought popped into my head that went, wow, you're middle-aged, you've quit your job, you've packed up and moved out of your life, and now you're gonna become a yoga teacher? Such a cliche, that's so pathetic. The world does not need another yoga teacher. That exact thought went through my head. The world does not need another yoga teacher, and you're a cliche. And I went, oh, okay, that's interesting. And then, I sat with it for a while and even though there was that doubt and that negative voice in my head, over time that quietened and I thought, well, why don't I just give it a go? What have I got to lose? At the very least, I go and practice yoga for three and a half weeks and then off I go into my life and we never speak about this again. So I booked the course, flew to Spain, turned up to day one of the yoga teacher training and instantly felt inadequate for the company that I was in. Everyone was in their 20s and 30s, I'm in my early 40s. They're all daily yoga practitioners. I haven't practiced yoga for, I don't know, years. Can't even remember the last time I was on the mat. And I felt so out of place and out of my depth and like a middle-aged cliche. Anyway, it came time to introducing ourselves and everyone was like, you know, I practiced yoga for 65 hours a day and I've been doing it for 25 years and blah, blah. That's not actually what they said. Anyway, it got to me and I was like, I'm Cass, I'm from Australia and I actually don't know why I'm here. I woke up with a thought one morning to practice some yoga and this is where I find myself. I don't know if I want to teach yoga, but I'm here and I'm really nervous. And that was my introduction to what actually became an incredible three and a half weeks. We practiced yoga every day, we learned the philosophies, we had amazing teachers. And there was one special guest teacher who came in and gave us a course, a couple of hours on yin yoga. And yin yoga is completely different to every other type of yoga. It's about finding stillness within your body and your mind. You hold poses for between three and five minutes with props so that you can actually fully get into the pose and find some resistance and then you melt through that resistance and then you find another level of resistance. It's a very challenging. type of yoga, but when she was, when our teacher was describing it and we went through a practice, everything in my body just screamed yes. The way it screamed no on the massage table, it screamed yes to me in this Yin Yoga session. And it was only three hours, but it lit me up so much that I knew that this was something that I wanted to explore further. So I have attended three more Yin Yoga training sessions with the same teacher in Barcelona when I was, throughout my 14 months. And it's a real passion that I have. And it is the same lessons from the Camino in yoga. It's about coming back to yourself through your body, whether that's walking in meditative style or just walking on the Camino or sitting in a yoga pose for an hour. It is the same process to come back to yourself through your body. It's just incredible. Eve: How awesome. I don't think you're a cliche. Well the world does need more yoga teachers, by the way. Cass Taaffe: Yeah, thank you. I figured that out, but it took a little while to get that, I don't know what that negative voice was in the internal committee, but they've been banished from the committee from here on in. But it Eve: Good. Cass Taaffe: was genuinely the first thought that popped into my head. You are a cliche. You're a middle-aged woman going through a midlife crisis. and you're going to be a yoga teacher. great. Eve: Okay. Cass Taaffe: But that voice is gone, but thank you. I appreciate it. Eve: Mm, gosh. I think we all have those moments and those voices. So yeah, you're not alone. Cass Taaffe: Yeah, no, definitely not alone. I know this is a very safe and understanding audience for sure. Eve: Mm, yeah, absolutely. That's the kind of women that we're attracting. why do you think so many women are craving simplicity, Cass? Cass Taaffe: women are so amazing. We are so incredible. We are so capable. We're so competent. We hold so much for ourselves. We hold so much for each other. We support, we do all of this for ourselves, our friends, our family, our workplaces, the communities that we're in. but we are overwhelmed completely all the time. And I know because I was there a couple of years ago and I was completely burnt out. And I think we crave simplicity because we have so much running through our heads all the time, consciously and subconsciously. And I think we are craving simplicity, not from a let's go take a spa day and that's gonna fix all of the problems. even though a spa day is amazing, but I think we crave the simplicity within ourselves, within our minds, within our bodies. And I think that's the simplicity that we're craving, is to pause, even momentarily, just pause everything else, pause that internal committee, pause everything that, all of that everyday noise, and to be able to come back to ourselves. Eve: Yeah, absolutely. And that's the theory, I guess, behind the Project Emerald Collective and you know, just bringing that awareness, but also the community and support to make that change. Cass Taaffe: Yeah, yeah. And I think it's a wonderful thing that you're doing creating this community I'm just a normal human. I haven't done anything extraordinary. I've just given myself permission and I've gifted myself time and space. And the more people that you see doing it, like we're all here for the same reason. We all want the same thing. And you bring me. community together and helping to say here's another example of someone finding Eve: Mm. Cass Taaffe: simplicity and freedom in their life and here's another example and maybe this might inspire you or maybe this might inspire you. Eve: Yeah, different women and different conversations will resonate with different audience members, but that's the beauty of bringing such varied stories together. is. Cass Taaffe: Yeah, absolutely. Eve: So what advice would you give to your younger self? Cass Taaffe: Hmm to my younger self I would say life is a roller coaster and there will be moments of elation when you are throwing your hands in the air with joy and glee and then there's going to be moments where you're like white knuckling the safety harness but that everything will pass. And then joy will come and then fear will come and then joy will come and fear will come and all of that. I would also say to my younger self that you already know what's right for you. You just need to trust yourself. Listen to your body. Your body knows what's right. You know what's right for you. Listen to yourself. Just be kind. You are a beautiful human. We're all beautiful humans, just be really kind to yourself. Eve: Yeah, that's beautiful. And what does taking your power back mean to you? Cass Taaffe: Taking your power back to me means something quieter and more internal than maybe the words might suggest to some people. for me, it's a quieter internal process. It means pausing before I react. It means taking time to breathe. It means listening to my body. It means quietening the internal committee so that I can actually feel in my body what's right for me. listen to myself. Along the same lines, would say finding a moment of quiet. I can feel it in my body right now. So however you can find a moment of quiet to listen to your body and to listen to yourself to know what's actually right for yourself. before you make a decision, about anything, whether it's what you eat for breakfast or what clothes you wear or which way you drive to work. Pause, take a breath and then listen to the actual voice that comes up and you'll know when it's you talking or whether it's one of the members of the internal committee having their say, whatever debate they're having, because it will feel right. For me, I feel it in my body. So one conscious choice, I think, is just pausing and breathing before you make a decision.