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Your Bookshelf Is Your Grimoire · Romancing the Threshold

0:25
SPEAKER_00: Today's episode serves two parts.
0:28
One is the origin story of the name of this podcast,
0:33
Romancing the Threshold.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: But more importantly,
0:37
SPEAKER_00: my current focus in working with romance novels as shadow work,
0:42
SPEAKER_00: as medicine.
0:44
And the second part is to show you a little bit of what I've
0:48
discovered in doing
0:49
SPEAKER_00: this work with myself and what I want to share with you,
0:53
SPEAKER_00: the listener,
0:54
SPEAKER_00: the reader.
0:56
SPEAKER_00: So the story starts with once upon a time,
0:59
SPEAKER_00: about almost 20 years ago,
1:02
SPEAKER_00: I wrote my master's thesis called The Healing Power of Fluff.
1:07
SPEAKER_00: I know that was a serious thesis.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: I was graduating.
1:11
from Pacifica Graduate Institute with a master's in counseling
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psychology,
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SPEAKER_00: which had an emphasis on depth psychology,
1:19
SPEAKER_00: union psychology and all that.
1:22
SPEAKER_00: And in the beginning, I was actually supposed to be writing
1:26
about something quite serious I was about to weave my thesis my
1:30
original idea was
1:31
to weave astrology and depth psychology by working with the
1:37
archetype of Saturn and
1:39
clinical depression I know very heavy very serious and I was
1:44
completely stuck I
1:46
could not write a word of that thesis I couldn't read the books
1:51
I couldn't do the
1:52
SPEAKER_00: research I was so stuck and
1:54
And at some point,
1:57
kind of starting to get really anxious,
1:59
the clock was ticking.
2:01
SPEAKER_00: I had a dream.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: I had a dream that I was attending the wedding of Keira Knightley,
2:06
SPEAKER_00: the actress and some other actor.
2:09
SPEAKER_00: And the wedding was a beautiful pageantry.
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SPEAKER_00: And I was mesmerized with the beauty of it all.
2:16
And I just got to sit with that dream of what does that mean to
2:19
be witnessing such
2:21
SPEAKER_00: a beautiful wedding?
2:23
SPEAKER_00: And in working with that dream,
2:26
SPEAKER_00: to make a long story short,
2:27
SPEAKER_00: working with that dream,
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SPEAKER_00: I came to the realization I needed to change my thesis topic.
2:33
SPEAKER_00: And that was a huge, major left turn.
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SPEAKER_00: Everything was already set up for Saturn and depression.
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SPEAKER_00: And all of a sudden I had to come to my professors and say,
2:41
SPEAKER_00: hey,
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SPEAKER_00: I'm changing my topic,
2:43
SPEAKER_00: completely different thesis,
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SPEAKER_00: idea and strategy.
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SPEAKER_00: Thank God that they all said yes to it.
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And The Healing Power Fluff was born and it was about exploring
2:56
the heroine's quest
2:58
for love in romantic comedies and working with romantic
3:01
comedies as one would work
3:03
SPEAKER_00: with a dream.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: Because, you know, that's kind of like cinema therapy.
3:08
Whatever you watch,
3:09
you can work with that as you would work with your own personal
3:13
dream.
3:14
And I really feel like this is a wonderful kind of work and I
3:19
highly recommend it,
3:21
SPEAKER_00: especially if you're constantly watching the same thing.
3:24
SPEAKER_00: But I decided to write that thesis and I call it the healing power fluff,
3:29
because since the emphasis of my master's degree was around
3:33
depth psychology,
3:34
SPEAKER_00: everything,
3:34
SPEAKER_00: of course,
3:35
SPEAKER_00: very deep dealing with the unconscious.
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SPEAKER_00: It was kind of a joke that I started saying yes to the power of fluff.
3:42
And it all started with this joke between me and my classmates
3:45
that underneath all
3:47
SPEAKER_00: that depth,
3:48
SPEAKER_00: there was fluff and underneath the fluff,
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SPEAKER_00: there was depth.
3:52
SPEAKER_00: So I worked with the romantic comedies.
3:54
SPEAKER_00: I picked three of them to work with as if I was exploring a dream,
3:58
each one sort of setting the stage of where the heroine was in
4:02
her process of
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SPEAKER_00: development.
4:04
SPEAKER_00: I worked with Bridget Jones Diary, if you remember that one.
4:09
SPEAKER_00: The other one was called Something New.
4:11
SPEAKER_00: And the last one was one of my favorite movies.
4:13
SPEAKER_00: It still is called Under the Tuscan Sun.
4:17
SPEAKER_00: And I wrote the thesis.
4:20
SPEAKER_00: Part of the thesis process was to write.
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I wrote a fairy tale based on my own life,
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based on my own quest for romantic love.
4:30
And I got to illustrate that fairy tale,
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which was pivotal because it was the return.
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It was the thing that helped me return to making art again
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after 16 years of not
4:42
SPEAKER_00: drawing anything.
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Sort of shutting down that part of me,
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but with the thesis that came back.
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SPEAKER_00: But more importantly, working with the thesis, I didn't just write it.
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SPEAKER_00: I didn't do just a theory.
4:57
SPEAKER_00: After writing it, I lived it.
5:00
SPEAKER_00: I did everything I wrote.
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SPEAKER_00: I explored the dreams I had.
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SPEAKER_00: I explored the things I was watching.
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SPEAKER_00: I recreated a ritual to reconnect with my inner other.
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SPEAKER_00: And I got back to doing my artwork.
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SPEAKER_00: And about a year and a half later, I met my, who is now my husband.
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SPEAKER_00: And AKA, I found my romantic other.
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SPEAKER_00: And here's the interesting thing.
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SPEAKER_00: I dedicated that thesis to my mother.
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SPEAKER_00: My mother was, to me, the first person who read fairy tales.
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SPEAKER_00: She's the one who introduced to me the fairy tales,
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SPEAKER_00: gave me my first books,
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SPEAKER_00: helped me learn to love books and stories.
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SPEAKER_00: And now looking back after her death,
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it's interesting because in many ways I feel like she gave me
5:53
the medicine that
5:55
SPEAKER_00: But she was also the one in many ways who gave me the wound.
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SPEAKER_00: And she gave me this medicine to help heal the wound.
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SPEAKER_00: And now...
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SPEAKER_00: It's more than a year now that she's died.
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SPEAKER_00: I spent my last year in what I've been calling my cave year,
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SPEAKER_00: sort of healing from burnout,
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SPEAKER_00: from coaching.
6:16
SPEAKER_00: And also,
6:17
SPEAKER_00: you know,
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SPEAKER_00: dealing with the grief,
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SPEAKER_00: dealing with a very physical,
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SPEAKER_00: bureaucratic side of death,
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SPEAKER_00: which is dealing with one's state after they die.
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SPEAKER_00: And so that was my cave year.
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And the thing that stayed with me from that cave year that kind
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of was my lifeline
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SPEAKER_00: was reading romance novels,
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SPEAKER_00: something I didn't think I was going to do.
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SPEAKER_00: But by book 30 or book 50 that I was reading.
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SPEAKER_00: was reading, I thought, hmm, this has a resonance to something I know.
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SPEAKER_00: And I realized I was tapping back into my thesis.
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SPEAKER_00: The idea of working with something like it's a dream,
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SPEAKER_00: that there's more underneath the fluff than meets the eye.
7:02
SPEAKER_00: Except that instead of romantic comedies, I was reading romance novels.
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And I think this is important because when I look back at that,
7:13
I thought,
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oh,
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wow.
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SPEAKER_00: Like a full eclipse cycle, 18, 19 years later, here it comes back.
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SPEAKER_00: My thesis returns.
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SPEAKER_00: And now it's deepened.
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SPEAKER_00: It's expanded.
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SPEAKER_00: If the difference then,
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SPEAKER_00: I would say the difference between now and then is that back in 2007,
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SPEAKER_00: 2008,
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SPEAKER_00: when I was writing the thesis,
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SPEAKER_00: living the thesis,
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SPEAKER_00: I was looking for the beloved one out there,
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SPEAKER_00: the partner,
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SPEAKER_00: the romantic partner.
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SPEAKER_00: And...
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SPEAKER_00: Thank God I found them.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: And it's great.
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But now,
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you know,
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2025,
7:50
2026,
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it's not so much looking for the beloved out there at this
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point.
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SPEAKER_00: It's not about preparing to meet someone.
8:00
SPEAKER_00: It's about preparing to meet myself.
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The parts that I've hidden,
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the parts that I've dimmed down to keep the peace.
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SPEAKER_00: I had a complicated relationship with my mother.
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So in many ways,
8:13
her death set me free from those constraints of the
8:17
relationship.
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SPEAKER_00: But in reading those novels...
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SPEAKER_00: In a way, I feel like now it's the quest.
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SPEAKER_00: It's the heroine's quest.
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SPEAKER_00: Not so much to find the partner, but it's bigger.
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SPEAKER_00: It's about finding what is the desire that is mine.
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SPEAKER_00: Where do I want to go?
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SPEAKER_00: Where is my sovereignty as an individual, as a self?
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SPEAKER_00: And also in being able to claim the hidden parts of myself that,
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SPEAKER_00: like I said,
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SPEAKER_00: I dimmed down,
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SPEAKER_00: I hid away,
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SPEAKER_00: I've forgotten about it.
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So in essence,
8:53
the thesis was the original spell,
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the original romantic spell.
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SPEAKER_00: And now we're just at a deeper cauldron.
9:02
SPEAKER_00: We're going deeper into what I've been exploring with romance novels.
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SPEAKER_00: So here's the thing that I find interesting.
9:12
SPEAKER_00: In looking back in my life now,
9:14
SPEAKER_00: looking at all the things that I've written,
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looking at my book collection that I've been unpacking from the
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recent move I just
9:22
SPEAKER_00: had.
9:24
is that there's a through line to everything I've been
9:27
exploring in my life.
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SPEAKER_00: In many ways,
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I've always been interested in what is underneath what most
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people dismiss as not
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SPEAKER_00: important.
9:39
SPEAKER_00: It's a guilty pleasure.
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SPEAKER_00: It's just fluff.
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SPEAKER_00: It is minimal.
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SPEAKER_00: It is always just this thing I do on the side.
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SPEAKER_00: I've always been interested in those things,
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SPEAKER_00: the thing that is hidden right underneath our noses,
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SPEAKER_00: but we refuse to look at it because we don't think it's important.
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SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter.
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SPEAKER_00: It's not serious enough.
10:01
SPEAKER_00: I play the serious card pretty well.
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SPEAKER_00: As I've said before, I was a nonfiction reader for most of my life.
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SPEAKER_00: And me,
10:09
SPEAKER_00: who loves fairy tales and mythology,
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all of a sudden having to kind of give myself my own slap
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across my face to be
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SPEAKER_00: like,
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SPEAKER_00: oh,
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SPEAKER_00: my God,
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SPEAKER_00: romance novels is right here.
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SPEAKER_00: It's the modern fairy tales.
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SPEAKER_00: And the other thing I started noticing,
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SPEAKER_00: too,
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SPEAKER_00: as this past year,
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SPEAKER_00: as I started reading romance novels and talking to other folks,
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SPEAKER_00: mainly women in this case,
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SPEAKER_00: it's how much it's dismissed.
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SPEAKER_00: It's still dismissed even by the voracious reader of romance.
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SPEAKER_00: It's something one does to scape, to fantasize.
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SPEAKER_00: It is not taken as seriously.
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SPEAKER_00: It's a guilty pleasure.
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SPEAKER_00: It's scape-ism.
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SPEAKER_00: And I think those things, sure, there's a truth to that.
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But I think there's more because what I could see in my own
11:03
experience of reading
11:06
romance novels so focused in one year is that I noticed one
11:12
that there was a spark
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SPEAKER_00: in it that I was reading and feeling it.
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SPEAKER_00: It's like a live wire.
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SPEAKER_00: That was the lifeline I had.
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And I started noticing that I wasn't just reading the stories
11:25
for the sake of the story.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, are they fun?
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SPEAKER_00: Are they great?
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SPEAKER_00: You know, are the plot marks hitting?
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SPEAKER_00: Is the spice level good?
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SPEAKER_00: It wasn't just about that.
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I started noticing quickly that I was reflecting on what was
11:41
happening to me personally.
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SPEAKER_00: So right here you have two levels.
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SPEAKER_00: And this is the reason I think because of reading romance novels,
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SPEAKER_00: I got into thinking,
11:51
SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about this.
11:52
SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about the idea of how do we navigate change,
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SPEAKER_00: the threshold that I was in and still am,
12:00
SPEAKER_00: and we are culturally in together.
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SPEAKER_00: How do we approach change and
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But not just like bracing for the impact of change because fear
12:11
and doom and gloom
12:12
SPEAKER_00: is everywhere.
12:12
SPEAKER_00: So it's making us tense up.
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But I was thinking about how do we approach change and navigate
12:19
it with the curiosity of lovers.
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That's the idea of romancing the threshold of approaching
12:25
change however we do it.
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SPEAKER_00: But approaching as if we're doing it like it's a romance novel,
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SPEAKER_00: like how do we approach it with that curiosity of a lover?
12:36
SPEAKER_00: So that's one.
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That's kind of the origin,
12:39
the seed idea of the podcast,
12:41
which is still finding its own footing.
12:45
SPEAKER_00: And now, more importantly...
12:48
SPEAKER_00: How I want to work with romance novels,
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kind of bringing in everything that I have built in my life
12:54
with archetypal
12:55
SPEAKER_00: astrology,
12:57
SPEAKER_00: with depth psychology,
12:58
SPEAKER_00: a.k.a.
12:59
SPEAKER_00: union psychology, all my readings of mythology and fairy tales.
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SPEAKER_00: That's been years and years and years.
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Putting it all together into this sort of big salad and working
13:11
with now romance novels.
13:13
SPEAKER_00: That's the origin of the thesis.
13:15
SPEAKER_00: I was working with romantic comedies,
13:17
SPEAKER_00: which,
13:17
SPEAKER_00: by the way,
13:18
SPEAKER_00: it's,
13:19
SPEAKER_00: of course,
13:21
SPEAKER_00: a film genre that is also dismissed,
13:25
SPEAKER_00: much like romance novels are dismissed.
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SPEAKER_00: Not taken seriously.
13:31
SPEAKER_00: So going back to levels right here.
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SPEAKER_00: Level one, we read for the pleasure and the preference.
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SPEAKER_00: Right.
13:38
SPEAKER_00: So we read those books because we like it.
13:40
SPEAKER_00: We like it.
13:41
SPEAKER_00: Certain tropes.
13:42
SPEAKER_00: We prefer certain types of character.
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And when you ask someone,
13:46
oh,
13:46
you read that book,
13:47
what you're going to hear is,
13:49
I loved it.
13:49
SPEAKER_00: The spice was good.
13:51
SPEAKER_00: Oh, the hero, the heroine was, insert adjective.
13:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, no, no, no.
13:56
SPEAKER_00: I gave it three stars because the ending was rushed.
13:59
SPEAKER_00: So we stay on the plot.
14:02
SPEAKER_00: We stay on the story arc.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: This is the level of book reviews.
14:07
SPEAKER_00: This is the level of book talk.
14:09
SPEAKER_00: This is the hashtag book Instagram.
14:12
SPEAKER_00: This is fun.
14:13
SPEAKER_00: It's the foundation of everything, right?
14:16
SPEAKER_00: We do it for the pleasure.
14:17
SPEAKER_00: We do it if we go through it, if we like it or not.
14:22
SPEAKER_00: If we don't like it, we drop it.
14:24
SPEAKER_00: This is that first level that I would say is when the
14:27
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I want to read this.
14:29
SPEAKER_00: This cover looks good.
14:31
SPEAKER_00: I like this kind of trope.
14:33
SPEAKER_00: I like the texture of the cover.
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SPEAKER_00: It is that sort of more physical side of the reading.
14:40
SPEAKER_00: There's a sense of pleasure reading for the pleasure of it.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: The second level, it brings in the personal psychology.
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SPEAKER_00: So this is when you're reading the book and you're starting to think,
14:53
SPEAKER_00: why is this book activating me?
14:58
SPEAKER_00: Why do I like this and don't like that?
15:02
SPEAKER_00: Where are my triggers?
15:04
SPEAKER_00: And this is the part where you're reading it and you think,
15:08
SPEAKER_00: wow,
15:08
SPEAKER_00: why do I read so many books that are enemies to lovers?
15:12
SPEAKER_00: Or why do I like cowboy books?
15:14
SPEAKER_00: Or why do I really prefer a good thriller slash romance?
15:20
SPEAKER_00: And this is when you start looking at your own life,
15:24
SPEAKER_00: what you're going through and thinking,
15:27
SPEAKER_00: what is this book affecting?
15:28
SPEAKER_00: How is it affecting me?
15:31
SPEAKER_00: And I started noticing that,
15:33
SPEAKER_00: especially when I would pick any book,
15:36
SPEAKER_00: read the synopsis and be like,
15:38
SPEAKER_00: OK,
15:38
SPEAKER_00: fair enough.
15:38
SPEAKER_00: This sounds good.
15:39
SPEAKER_00: Personally, I love enemies to lovers trope.
15:43
And so if there was sort of beauty and the beast kind of vibe
15:46
and enemies to lovers,
15:47
sign me up.
15:48
SPEAKER_00: I'm reading it.
15:50
SPEAKER_00: And if you add a castle to it, that's the cherry on the sundae.
15:54
SPEAKER_00: So I would read those, read the synopsis, start reading.
15:57
SPEAKER_00: And then I was like,
15:58
SPEAKER_00: wow,
15:59
SPEAKER_00: this book is talking about grief,
16:01
SPEAKER_00: which side note,
16:02
so many books about romance talk very deeply and actually quite
16:07
well about grief.
16:09
And I would see books that were talking about very challenging
16:12
relationships with
16:13
SPEAKER_00: the mother figure,
16:14
SPEAKER_00: sometimes with the father figure.
16:16
And what I thought was interesting is that a lot of times this
16:19
was not in the synopsis.
16:22
SPEAKER_00: I wouldn't even see this really in the book reviews.
16:25
But as I was reading it,
16:26
I was like,
16:26
wow,
16:27
this is really hitting me right where I need it.
16:32
And I started thinking,
16:33
wow,
16:34
it's not so much that I am choosing the book.
16:37
SPEAKER_00: It's almost like the book is choosing me or we're choosing each other.
16:42
SPEAKER_00: And I found that really interesting.
16:44
This is the level two of reading where I was like,
16:46
OK,
16:47
how is this book affecting me?
16:50
SPEAKER_00: What is it showing me?
16:52
SPEAKER_00: Where in my life there's a resonance to this story?
16:55
SPEAKER_00: Right.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: And I think this is really important.
16:59
And I think a lot of people do get to this level of reading
17:02
where they look at it
17:03
SPEAKER_00: and they think,
17:04
SPEAKER_00: oh.
17:05
SPEAKER_00: Why is this affecting me?
17:07
SPEAKER_00: And that's why people will write in their reviews,
17:10
SPEAKER_00: oh,
17:10
SPEAKER_00: this book destroyed me or this book really made me cry.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: I shed tears.
17:15
SPEAKER_00: But I am actually more curious to like, why the tears?
17:19
SPEAKER_00: Why the certain sort of rage against the book or why the sort of loyal,
17:26
SPEAKER_00: loyal love to that book or a certain series?
17:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: And so I think this is important to look at.
17:32
SPEAKER_00: And of course,
17:33
SPEAKER_00: I guess I cannot take my therapeutic training hat off,
17:38
SPEAKER_00: is to look at what did the book find within my psyche or vice versa,
17:45
SPEAKER_00: that I haven't been able to name it yet consciously,
17:48
SPEAKER_00: but through the story of
17:50
SPEAKER_00: Something is being worked through.
17:53
SPEAKER_00: This is the idea where stories are healing.
17:57
SPEAKER_00: Stories fulfill something that is quite personal, right?
18:02
SPEAKER_00: So you could talk to someone about a certain character, a certain book...
18:07
SPEAKER_00: It's not going to be always the same resonance at all,
18:10
SPEAKER_00: perhaps none,
18:12
SPEAKER_00: because your personal psychology,
18:14
SPEAKER_00: what you're going through is metabolizing the story of the book,
18:20
SPEAKER_00: right?
18:21
SPEAKER_00: So that's level two.
18:23
SPEAKER_00: And I think that in book clubs,
18:26
SPEAKER_00: which is great that there are more book clubs exploding,
18:33
SPEAKER_00: if you will,
18:34
SPEAKER_00: popping up everywhere.
18:35
SPEAKER_00: It's great.
18:35
But I think in a lot of these book clubs,
18:38
it's safer to stay in level one.
18:40
SPEAKER_00: We talk about the plot.
18:42
SPEAKER_00: We talk about what worked in the plot for us or not.
18:45
SPEAKER_00: And we stay in that level one.
18:47
SPEAKER_00: It is a little harder.
18:49
You have to create a safer container to be able to get to level
18:54
two where we get to
18:56
SPEAKER_00: talk about why did this story affect me in a deeper level.
19:02
SPEAKER_00: And of course,
19:02
SPEAKER_00: that's where I'm already interested in that level because,
19:07
SPEAKER_00: well,
19:07
SPEAKER_00: it's the background of my work.
19:10
SPEAKER_00: But there is a third level.
19:12
SPEAKER_00: And I like to think of the third level as the collective dream.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: So perhaps this third level is the one that is the biggest,
19:23
SPEAKER_00: the strangest,
19:25
and the one that I'm not going to go in depth talking about it
19:28
in this episode
19:30
because I want to talk more about it in my Forbidden Doors
19:34
six-week intensive
19:35
SPEAKER_00: around romance novels as medicine.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: And the idea here is that the third level is that
19:42
SPEAKER_00: The question started coming to me when I was reading.
19:45
SPEAKER_00: If so many people, millions of people reading these stories
19:51
Something is being processed,
19:53
is being metabolized through these stories.
19:59
SPEAKER_00: And I think it's two levels.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: One, it's the cultural element.
20:01
SPEAKER_00: Why are these stories popping up?
20:03
SPEAKER_00: Certain tropes,
20:04
certain subgenres of romance are popping up at this moment
20:09
right now in our
20:10
SPEAKER_00: culture.
20:11
SPEAKER_00: So for an example, dark romance surging in the romance book sections is
20:19
SPEAKER_00: Well,
20:19
SPEAKER_00: right in time with our culture,
20:22
SPEAKER_00: doing a lot of things against women's sovereignty,
20:25
SPEAKER_00: women's rights.
20:28
Or we can think about monster romances where the hero,
20:31
if you will,
20:32
domain.
20:34
SPEAKER_00: Love attraction stays monstrous.
20:36
SPEAKER_00: What is that about?
20:38
SPEAKER_00: The monster is no longer transforming into a handsome prince.
20:42
SPEAKER_00: He stays monstrous.
20:44
SPEAKER_00: It's the inner beauty.
20:45
SPEAKER_00: It's the inner dynamic between the characters that is valued.
20:49
SPEAKER_00: It's not the external appearance.
20:52
SPEAKER_00: And what is that about?
20:53
SPEAKER_00: Women collectively choosing the beast over the prince.
20:56
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
20:57
SPEAKER_00: I think it goes beyond the social media question,
21:01
SPEAKER_00: you know,
21:01
SPEAKER_00: would you go for a bear or would you go for a man?
21:05
SPEAKER_00: So the level three explores romance as a cultural dream.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: So one,
21:11
you get to look at what is happening in the culture that is
21:16
allowing these types of
21:17
SPEAKER_00: stories to gain even more ground and
21:20
SPEAKER_00: And also in some ways,
21:21
I think there's a collective dream when we are reading these
21:25
books and we are in
21:26
SPEAKER_00: it.
21:27
SPEAKER_00: Something is getting to be practiced.
21:29
SPEAKER_00: It's kind of like a rehearsal, like people do visualizations, right?
21:33
SPEAKER_00: Before you do a race or a game,
21:35
you think you envision yourself doing something to win or
21:40
achieve your goals.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes I think the romance books are kind of doing the same thing.
21:45
SPEAKER_00: But like I said, this is something I would like to flesh out a bit more.
21:51
SPEAKER_00: During the six-week intensive of My Forbidden Doors.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: But for now, this is where I want you to think about when you're reading.
22:00
And this,
22:00
while I'm talking about romance novels,
22:03
think about your general reading.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: Think about, especially if it's stories.
22:08
SPEAKER_00: Let's stay with fiction in this case.
22:11
SPEAKER_00: What is it about the stories?
22:13
SPEAKER_00: The level one.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: What?
22:14
SPEAKER_00: What is your body doing?
22:16
SPEAKER_00: What's the reaction of when you read them?
22:19
SPEAKER_00: Why do you grab that book?
22:20
SPEAKER_00: Is it the cover?
22:21
SPEAKER_00: Is it the plot?
22:22
SPEAKER_00: Is it both?
22:23
SPEAKER_00: What is it telling you?
22:24
SPEAKER_00: What's the information you're gathering?
22:27
SPEAKER_00: Then, of course, it's how do you feel about that book?
22:31
SPEAKER_00: How do you feel about the story?
22:32
SPEAKER_00: Does it make you feel something?
22:34
SPEAKER_00: Does it give you a little, ooh, something is happening?
22:39
SPEAKER_00: So this is the level one.
22:41
SPEAKER_00: And here's where actually I want to invite you.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: I jumped ahead a little bit here.
22:45
SPEAKER_00: This is actually where I invite you.
22:46
SPEAKER_00: Look at what you're reading.
22:48
SPEAKER_00: Do it tonight.
22:49
SPEAKER_00: Whatever book you're reading, grab it.
22:52
SPEAKER_00: This is a practice.
22:53
SPEAKER_00: And ask yourself, level one, what is my body doing?
22:56
SPEAKER_00: What's my reaction to this story?
22:59
SPEAKER_00: Do I feel excited?
23:00
SPEAKER_00: Do I feel flaccid?
23:03
SPEAKER_00: Do I feel sort of emotional?
23:06
Even when I sort of shut the book because it annoys me,
23:08
what is it about that?
23:10
SPEAKER_00: That's a huge piece of information.
23:13
SPEAKER_00: And just notice how your body reacts.
23:16
SPEAKER_00: What are the thoughts and feelings?
23:17
SPEAKER_00: What's the motivation?
23:19
SPEAKER_00: None of this is frivolous.
23:21
Everything here is sort of like that first breadcrumb that if
23:24
you keep following,
23:25
SPEAKER_00: it's going to lead you to some interesting places.
23:28
SPEAKER_00: Then the level two is the second question.
23:31
SPEAKER_00: What is it about this story right now that mirrors something in my life,
23:36
SPEAKER_00: a certain phase you're going through,
23:38
SPEAKER_00: right?
23:39
SPEAKER_00: So you look at it.
23:41
What was it about this kind of plot,
23:43
this kind of book that attracted you?
23:47
SPEAKER_00: Or perhaps you had a resistance to it.
23:51
SPEAKER_00: And that resistance is important as well.
23:53
Sometimes I think the resistance is even more important than
23:56
the sort of the flow of it.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: What is it about this world building?
24:00
What is it about this place,
24:02
this type of story that is giving you something?
24:06
SPEAKER_00: Is it hitting on something that's actual in your life that's happening?
24:10
SPEAKER_00: Or is it hitting on something that you're hungry for?
24:13
SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's even better.
24:14
SPEAKER_00: What is it that you're hungry for?
24:16
SPEAKER_00: Think about that.
24:18
You know,
24:19
sit with that story,
24:20
that book and say,
24:21
hmm,
24:22
why is this hitting me right now?
24:24
Or if you're kind of reading several books pretty quickly and
24:28
they all have a
24:29
SPEAKER_00: similar theme,
24:30
SPEAKER_00: similar trope,
24:32
SPEAKER_00: then the question is even more potent.
24:35
What about these books are showing you something that your
24:38
psyche is working on?
24:40
SPEAKER_00: And what is it?
24:42
SPEAKER_00: Sit with that.
24:43
SPEAKER_00: And if you like to journal, that's a good journal exercise.
24:47
Now,
24:48
the level three,
24:48
if you want to go there,
24:50
I would invite you to ask yourself,
24:53
why now?
24:54
SPEAKER_00: Why this story right now?
24:56
SPEAKER_00: You know, you're not the only one reading this book.
24:58
SPEAKER_00: So zoom out.
25:00
SPEAKER_00: Why is it perhaps thousands of people were reading this kind of book?
25:04
So for many,
25:05
many women reading this kind of book,
25:07
what is what is the medicine in this book?
25:10
SPEAKER_00: Yes,
25:11
SPEAKER_00: you can say,
25:12
SPEAKER_00: sure,
25:12
sometimes the marketing is so good that a lot of people are
25:15
going to buy the book.
25:16
But it's beyond the marketing because no matter how good the
25:19
marketing is,
25:21
SPEAKER_00: if it doesn't hit that archetypal chord...
25:24
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter how good the marketing is.
25:27
SPEAKER_00: The marketing is good, but it has to hit that archetypal chord.
25:32
SPEAKER_00: And if a book is all over the place,
25:34
SPEAKER_00: everybody's reading it,
25:35
SPEAKER_00: something about that is hitting on a collective experience.
25:40
SPEAKER_00: And that's my invitation to you to think about what do you see?
25:45
SPEAKER_00: What do you notice?
25:47
What is that book,
25:48
that kind of story or that series saying about the collective
25:51
moment?
25:53
Now,
25:53
if you don't come up with anything,
25:54
that's totally fine,
25:55
perfectly healthy and normal.
25:59
SPEAKER_00: But I want you to think about it.
26:01
SPEAKER_00: It's like it's not just a guilty pleasure.
26:03
SPEAKER_00: It is something bigger.
26:05
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to sit with that question if that resonates with you.
26:09
SPEAKER_00: What is it about that that's hitting the nerve collectively right now?
26:15
SPEAKER_00: And perhaps why?
26:17
SPEAKER_00: So I invite you to do these tonight.
26:19
SPEAKER_00: Just pick up whatever you're reading,
26:21
SPEAKER_00: maybe or the last book you just read that really stayed with you,
26:25
SPEAKER_00: and do these questions.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: Level one, what is this?
26:29
SPEAKER_00: How does this book affect me now?
26:31
SPEAKER_00: What is it about it?
26:32
SPEAKER_00: What is it, the plot?
26:34
SPEAKER_00: How does it make my body feel the reactions I have with the book?
26:38
Then level two,
26:39
how does this story resonate with what's happening in my own
26:42
life?
26:43
SPEAKER_00: And then level three, how is this playing out with the collective?
26:48
So I think that matters as a reading exercise to help us move
26:53
from the idea of
26:54
consuming or just plain entertaining and really engaging and
27:01
relating to the thing.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: It's the collective dream, right?
27:05
SPEAKER_00: You're in it.
27:06
SPEAKER_00: You're not just passively ingesting the story.
27:11
SPEAKER_00: You're metabolizing the story.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: The story is walking through you.
27:17
SPEAKER_00: Not that everybody has to do this.
27:19
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes you just want to read for the good plot.
27:23
SPEAKER_00: But I feel it's like food.
27:27
If you chew it better,
27:28
if you have better ingredients,
27:31
it is more nutritious for your body.
27:34
SPEAKER_00: And so when you're reading,
27:35
SPEAKER_00: if you're not just consuming it,
27:37
SPEAKER_00: but you're really working with it in these three levels,
27:40
SPEAKER_00: maybe just the first two levels is totally fine.
27:43
It is already helping you have your reading be much more
27:47
nutritious for your psyche
27:49
SPEAKER_00: and as well for the collective.
27:52
SPEAKER_00: Because what happens to you, you are not like Las Vegas.
27:56
SPEAKER_00: What happens with you stays in Vegas or stays just with you.
28:00
It always spreads and ripples out in ways that you have no idea
28:05
how that works,
28:06
but it does.
28:07
SPEAKER_00: Well, look at me.
28:09
SPEAKER_00: I was just reading my books,
28:10
SPEAKER_00: thought that it's just me in my cave here,
28:13
but this has already inspired me to work with romance novels in
28:16
a very different
28:17
SPEAKER_00: way and to bring in everything that I know that I've worked with,
28:21
SPEAKER_00: astrology,
28:22
SPEAKER_00: coaching,
28:23
SPEAKER_00: depth psychology,
28:24
SPEAKER_00: all and throwing in,
28:26
SPEAKER_00: now mixing it all up with romance.
28:28
SPEAKER_00: Doesn't stay with me.
28:30
SPEAKER_00: It moves forward.
28:32
SPEAKER_00: This is why I think it's so important because from a
28:37
SPEAKER_00: Collective aspect,
28:39
SPEAKER_00: if we zoom out right now and look at what's happening in the world,
28:45
SPEAKER_00: it's easy to say,
28:47
SPEAKER_00: and very,
28:48
SPEAKER_00: I think you can't argue with that,
28:50
SPEAKER_00: really,
28:51
SPEAKER_00: that we are living through a collective threshold,
28:55
SPEAKER_00: right?
28:55
SPEAKER_00: The old structures, political, social, relational, are all...
29:01
SPEAKER_00: They're crumbling.
29:02
SPEAKER_00: They're just not giving us the same pep that they used to before.
29:08
SPEAKER_00: And the new ones, they aren't fully yet fleshed out either.
29:11
SPEAKER_00: They're seeds of them.
29:14
SPEAKER_00: They're starting to sprout, but they're not quite fully there.
29:17
SPEAKER_00: So collectively, we are in this in-between space, in this liminal space.
29:23
SPEAKER_00: And what I see a lot is, and it has its place.
29:27
SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying it doesn't, but it has its place.
29:30
SPEAKER_00: The official sort of prescription for these moments is resistance.
29:35
SPEAKER_00: Stay informed.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: Stay outraged.
29:37
SPEAKER_00: Stay vigilant.
29:39
SPEAKER_00: Do scroll so you don't miss anything.
29:41
SPEAKER_00: Fight back.
29:42
SPEAKER_00: And I think it has its place.
29:44
SPEAKER_00: It does have its place.
29:45
SPEAKER_00: It is a certain kind of impulse.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: And some days I feel that way.
29:49
SPEAKER_00: But...
29:51
I have not spent pretty much my lifetime inside mythology and
29:56
fairy tales and
29:57
thinking about stories to see that resistance alone just keeps
30:03
us at a war of
30:04
SPEAKER_00: attrition.
30:05
SPEAKER_00: Everything that defines us is in the opposition that we're fighting.
30:10
SPEAKER_00: So whatever we're fighting, they seem to have the control of the energy.
30:14
SPEAKER_00: They set the agenda.
30:16
SPEAKER_00: And what I've noticed in stories,
30:18
SPEAKER_00: both the fairy tales,
30:19
SPEAKER_00: the myths,
30:20
SPEAKER_00: and now the romance novels,
30:21
SPEAKER_00: is that something has to be done differently.
30:24
SPEAKER_00: And it is not resistance.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: It's actually metabolizing.
30:28
SPEAKER_00: It is not ignoring the darkness, but taking it in, transforming.
30:32
SPEAKER_00: There's a certain kind of alchemy.
30:33
SPEAKER_00: It's breaking it down.
30:36
SPEAKER_00: And so everything that is extracting right now that they want,
30:41
SPEAKER_00: they're extracting things out of us.
30:44
SPEAKER_00: But we're not giving enough time to metabolize things.
30:48
SPEAKER_00: We're not giving enough time to grieve.
30:51
SPEAKER_00: Right.
30:52
And so I think there's a lot of material inside all of us and
30:56
within the collective
30:57
that needs to be metabolized and needs to be transformed into
31:03
something that's
31:04
SPEAKER_00: actually going to nourish us.
31:05
SPEAKER_00: That's what the alchemist did.
31:07
SPEAKER_00: Right.
31:08
SPEAKER_00: And fairy tales do.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: And mythology does.
31:11
SPEAKER_00: Right.
31:12
And I feel that because there's so many people reading romance
31:18
novels and it is
31:19
SPEAKER_00: dismissed as fluff,
31:22
SPEAKER_00: escapism,
31:25
I feel like we're not tapping into the nutritious medicine that
31:30
it's offering us.
31:31
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not saying that there aren't problems with the romance genre.
31:36
SPEAKER_00: There's, of course, problematics.
31:38
SPEAKER_00: But if we allow it...
31:41
SPEAKER_00: If we stay there, we're going to stay in that argument.
31:43
But what I'm inviting us to do is to go under and see what is
31:48
nutritional for us.
31:51
SPEAKER_00: That's the level one.
31:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay, stay in the plot.
31:53
SPEAKER_00: Level two, how is it affecting me?
31:56
SPEAKER_00: But level three, it's where the collector is digesting it, right?
32:01
SPEAKER_00: So I think that's an important element.
32:03
SPEAKER_00: We're not in these stories, right?
32:08
What I really think is one aspect of its healing point is
32:13
there's a coming together.
32:15
SPEAKER_00: Parts come together.
32:17
SPEAKER_00: That's the so-called happy ending.
32:19
SPEAKER_00: It is a union of the opposites.
32:22
SPEAKER_00: And this merging, this metabolizing together gives us a third option.
32:27
SPEAKER_00: And I think this is the power of romance.
32:30
SPEAKER_00: I think it is the largest selling genre, you know, by far.
32:36
SPEAKER_00: Because it's doing something, that it's doing it underneath the radar.
32:41
Because it's overwhelmingly written by women,
32:44
for women,
32:45
and it centers on women's desire.
32:48
And I think that's an interesting point because it's the
32:50
medicine that's working
32:52
SPEAKER_00: under the radar.
32:54
SPEAKER_00: And that's the thing we need to hold on to.
32:58
We live in this culture that teaches us systematically to
33:02
distrust our desire,
33:04
SPEAKER_00: to distrust our pleasure,
33:06
SPEAKER_00: to forego our bodies,
33:08
SPEAKER_00: definitely to forego our rage.
33:11
SPEAKER_00: And romance is a space where that is permitted.
33:14
SPEAKER_00: It's not just permitted.
33:15
SPEAKER_00: It's actually celebrated.
33:17
SPEAKER_00: It drives the story.
33:19
SPEAKER_00: And that's not fluff.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: That is so not fluff.
33:22
SPEAKER_00: That is so not escapism at all, right?
33:26
So what I would invite you to do is to think about your reading
33:30
as you're not just
33:32
SPEAKER_00: consuming it,
33:34
SPEAKER_00: you're metabolizing it.
33:35
SPEAKER_00: And when you do that,
33:37
SPEAKER_00: not only do you gain a lot more for yourself,
33:40
SPEAKER_00: you help the collective as well.
33:43
And another point here about that I've been thinking a lot
33:46
about romance novels,
33:49
SPEAKER_00: one of its core elements,
33:51
SPEAKER_00: not in every plot,
33:52
SPEAKER_00: but it's there.
33:54
SPEAKER_00: It is the idea of sovereignty, of being sovereign.
33:58
SPEAKER_00: One that knows oneself,
34:00
SPEAKER_00: that is in touch with one's desires,
34:03
SPEAKER_00: with one's wants and intentions and sense of purpose.
34:09
SPEAKER_00: And that's an important element.
34:10
SPEAKER_00: This is a compass.
34:11
SPEAKER_00: This is a very powerful compass.
34:13
SPEAKER_00: So I want you to think about your bookshelf.
34:17
SPEAKER_00: Your to-be-read pile.
34:19
SPEAKER_00: It is not a guilty pleasure.
34:21
SPEAKER_00: That is your grimoire.
34:22
SPEAKER_00: That is your magical spell book.
34:26
And I want you to learn how to read it if you haven't been
34:30
doing that already.
34:32
So if anything that I've talked to you about today in this
34:36
episode is resonating
34:39
SPEAKER_00: and you want to go,
34:40
SPEAKER_00: first of all,
34:41
SPEAKER_00: I invite you to practice those three levels if you can do that.
34:44
SPEAKER_00: Do it tonight.
34:46
SPEAKER_00: This is where I want to invite you to come check out my Forbidden Doors.
34:51
SPEAKER_00: So what is Forbidden Doors?
34:53
SPEAKER_00: Forbidden Doors is where your reading life becomes your map.
34:58
SPEAKER_00: You're not reading alone.
35:00
Sure,
35:00
you're reading alone in bed,
35:01
you're reading in your Kindle,
35:03
maybe on your commute.
35:04
SPEAKER_00: But I want you to take stock that what you're reading isn't just for you.
35:08
SPEAKER_00: It's much more than that.
35:10
And the exploration that we're going to do in Forbidden Doors
35:13
is exactly that.
35:15
It's to explore what is behind these doors and from level one
35:20
to level two to level
35:21
SPEAKER_00: three and to have discussions together where we explore these as a group.
35:28
SPEAKER_00: I'm very much in the journey as you are in the journey.
35:33
SPEAKER_00: So how does it work?
35:34
SPEAKER_00: We're going to meet for six Saturdays, Saturday morning.
35:38
SPEAKER_00: So bring your coffee or your tea.
35:40
SPEAKER_00: We're going to it's going to be via Zoom.
35:42
SPEAKER_00: So it's on video so you can be wearing your pajamas.
35:44
SPEAKER_00: Be very comfortable.
35:46
SPEAKER_00: We meet for about 90 minutes.
35:48
two hours and we're going to go through these doors and we're
35:52
going to explore
35:52
SPEAKER_00: what's underneath the romance genre,
35:55
underneath the tropes and explore what are the ones you're
35:59
gravitating towards.
36:00
SPEAKER_00: So it's a mixture of me talking about what I see from a depth psychology
36:05
SPEAKER_00: perspective,
36:06
SPEAKER_00: from an astrological perspective,
36:08
SPEAKER_00: but also inviting you to the conversation.
36:11
SPEAKER_00: What do you see?
36:12
SPEAKER_00: What's your experience?
36:15
SPEAKER_00: And
36:17
And the other thing here,
36:18
too,
36:18
is that this is to explore the genre that we are dismissing.
36:24
Like I said from the beginning,
36:25
even avid readers can find themselves dismissing it.
36:30
SPEAKER_00: And it's to explore why in this moment,
36:33
why romance can be such a powerful medicine for us individually
36:37
as well as
36:38
SPEAKER_00: collectively.
36:39
SPEAKER_00: Now.
36:40
We're not going to be reading a specific book because we're not
36:43
going to be talking
36:43
SPEAKER_00: about the plot of the book.
36:45
But I invite you to bring the books you're reading currently or
36:49
the books that
36:49
SPEAKER_00: really marked you.
36:51
SPEAKER_00: Of course, these are all romance novels.
36:54
SPEAKER_00: I don't care what subgenre you're reading, spice levels or whatever.
36:58
SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter as long as it's romance.
37:01
And just as a little side note,
37:02
if you're wondering like,
37:03
what is romance?
37:04
SPEAKER_00: Just think about this.
37:05
SPEAKER_00: It centers on relationship and
37:07
SPEAKER_00: Usually has a happy ending or at least a happy for now kind of ending.
37:12
SPEAKER_00: And so that's a romance.
37:14
SPEAKER_00: And then you have all the subgenres you want.
37:16
SPEAKER_00: Thriller, mafia, sports, dark, fantasy, you name it.
37:23
SPEAKER_00: And this is to explore for you to help you look at your own library,
37:27
SPEAKER_00: your own books,
37:28
SPEAKER_00: your own to be read pile and think this is not just books and stories.
37:33
SPEAKER_00: This is my spell work.
37:35
SPEAKER_00: This is the medicine I have right here at reach for myself.
37:40
SPEAKER_00: Like I said, we would be meeting six Saturday mornings.
37:44
SPEAKER_00: We start on May 16th and we go through June 27th,
37:48
SPEAKER_00: but we skip Memorial Day weekend because,
37:51
SPEAKER_00: well,
37:51
SPEAKER_00: it's a holiday and it's a good time to integrate.
37:55
SPEAKER_00: We meet from 10 to noon Pacific time via Zoom.
37:59
SPEAKER_00: Everything is recorded.
38:01
SPEAKER_00: So if you miss a Saturday, you still can catch up.
38:05
SPEAKER_00: But I'll be honest,
38:06
the live sessions is really where the magic is because it's
38:09
where you bring in your
38:10
SPEAKER_00: medicine and you share what is going on with you.
38:14
SPEAKER_00: This is the first time I'm offering forbidden doors.
38:18
SPEAKER_00: And so I really do want this cohort to be small, intimate.
38:22
SPEAKER_00: You're like a founding member.
38:23
SPEAKER_00: If you want to join, you're a founding member.
38:25
SPEAKER_00: You're not just a participant.
38:26
SPEAKER_00: You're really helping me shape something new.
38:29
SPEAKER_00: So your insights,
38:31
SPEAKER_00: your responses,
38:32
SPEAKER_00: your,
38:33
SPEAKER_00: oh,
38:33
SPEAKER_00: moments,
38:35
SPEAKER_00: literally inform how I'm going to be teaching this going forward.
38:38
SPEAKER_00: So I don't want this to be just a sales pitch.
38:40
SPEAKER_00: Really, I want you to be a founding member if this resonates with you.
38:45
SPEAKER_00: And I think this is another point that I was saying a little bit before.
38:52
SPEAKER_00: It's about sovereignty.
38:55
I feel that the work really underneath these stories of romance
39:01
touch on something
39:02
SPEAKER_00: that the myth of Lady Ragnell touched on centuries ago.
39:07
SPEAKER_00: She was
39:07
a woman and I'll share this story more fully in Forbidden Doors
39:11
but she was a woman
39:12
who was cursed into looking like a hideous hag awful looking
39:18
monster and the only
39:20
thing that could break her curse wasn't a kiss wasn't a sword
39:24
wasn't even bravery
39:26
SPEAKER_00: it was two words you choose you
39:30
SPEAKER_00: You have the sovereignty.
39:32
You have the right to decide for yourself how you're going to
39:35
be seen,
39:36
when and by whom.
39:39
And I feel this is really the ultimate work of romance novels
39:43
that I want to
39:44
SPEAKER_00: explore more fully in Forbidden Doors that we're all walking through.
39:48
SPEAKER_00: It's the right to reclaim our own desires as serious.
39:53
SPEAKER_00: That the thing we dismiss as fluff is not fluff.
39:56
There's a lot of depth and a lot of healing right there
40:00
underneath your nose.
40:02
SPEAKER_00: And I want you to think about this and trust that.
40:05
SPEAKER_00: So even if Forbidden Doors isn't for you right now,
40:09
I invite you to think about the things you dismiss as fluff,
40:14
as just scapism.
40:16
SPEAKER_00: Stop.
40:18
SPEAKER_00: Take a breather and really think.
40:21
SPEAKER_00: It's doing more work for you than you think.
40:24
SPEAKER_00: And I invite you to stay curious with that.
40:26
So if this resonates with you,
40:28
the details are going to be in the show notes as well.
40:30
SPEAKER_00: But just go to my website, VanessaCuto.com.
40:34
SPEAKER_00: And that's Cuto as in C-O-U-T-O slash romance online course.
40:41
SPEAKER_00: It's right there on the website.
40:43
SPEAKER_00: And of course,
40:44
if you have any questions or you want to just let me know what
40:47
you think about
40:47
SPEAKER_00: this,
40:48
SPEAKER_00: reach out directly through the website.
40:50
SPEAKER_00: Or if you're here on Substack, just send me a message.
40:54
SPEAKER_00: And I hope you join.
40:56
SPEAKER_00: I hope you check it out.
40:57
SPEAKER_00: But more importantly, I hope you do the exercise to look at your reading.
41:01
SPEAKER_00: Look at your piles of books.
41:03
SPEAKER_00: What is hidden?
41:04
SPEAKER_00: What treasure is waiting for you right there?
41:07
SPEAKER_00: So just think about that.
41:10
SPEAKER_00: First question, what is the plot doing?
41:12
SPEAKER_00: Oh, why this?
41:13
SPEAKER_00: How does my body feel?
41:15
SPEAKER_00: Number two, what is happening to me as I read these books?
41:20
SPEAKER_00: And number three, zoom out.
41:23
SPEAKER_00: What do you see in the collective in light of the stories you're reading?
41:27
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so that's important.
41:29
SPEAKER_00: Let's not just escape.
41:31
SPEAKER_00: And I hope you follow the thread.
41:35
SPEAKER_00: like in the midst of Ariadne in the labyrinth,
41:38
I'm just here holding the red thread to help you enter your own
41:42
labyrinth and come
41:43
SPEAKER_00: out with the treasures you need.
41:45
SPEAKER_00: All right.
41:46
SPEAKER_00: Thank you for listening and I'll see you next time.