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Practicing Love in a Fear-Filled World With Marianne Williamson · QUESTION EVERYTHING

0:03
Speaker 1: No one has all the answers, but when we ask
0:05
Speaker 1: the right questions, we get a little closer, closer to truths,
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Speaker 1: closer to each other, even closer to ourselves. I'm journalist
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Speaker 1: Danielle Robe and each week, my guests and I come
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Speaker 1: together to challenge the status quo and our own ways
0:22
Speaker 1: of thinking by daring to ask what if, why not?
0:28
Speaker 1: And who says? So? Come curious, dig deep, and join
0:33
Speaker 1: the conversation. It's time to question everything. Hello, my friends,
0:41
Speaker 1: I hope you're having a really great week, one full
0:44
Speaker 1: of love as Valentine's Day is coming up. And yes,
0:48
Speaker 1: we are calling this our Valentine's Day episode because it
0:50
Speaker 1: airs two days before Valentine's Day. But I don't know.
0:53
Speaker 1: I don't think this episode is exactly a typical one
0:56
Speaker 1: about love and romance. Today is more of an invant
1:00
Speaker 1: to rethink what love actually asks of us. Not the
1:04
Speaker 1: big romantic gestures, not the way we present the idea
1:07
Speaker 1: of love, but love as a daily practice, Love as responsibility,
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Speaker 1: and love as the choice to shift your thinking and
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Speaker 1: take ownership of your inner life to be love. You
1:20
Speaker 1: all know I have a tattoo l on two left
1:23
Speaker 1: fingers and ve on two right fingers. I got it
1:27
Speaker 1: begrudgingly to my mother in twenty twenty, and I got
1:31
Speaker 1: it on my prayer hands as a reminder because I
1:34
Speaker 1: look down and I think, let me make this decision
1:38
Speaker 1: from love, not fear, because they are polar opposites. You
1:42
Speaker 1: cannot be coming from a place of love if you
1:44
Speaker 1: are coming from a place of fear, and vice versa.
1:46
Speaker 1: And I'm going to be honest, I have not been
1:48
Speaker 1: looking down at my fingers to remind myself that very
1:51
Speaker 1: much lately, and I want to get back to it.
1:54
Speaker 1: So today is a reminder for me. I hope it
1:56
Speaker 1: is one for you. Our guest is Mary Anne Williamson.
2:02
Speaker 1: She's a best selling author, a spiritual teacher, one of
2:05
Speaker 1: the most influential voices on love and healing and inner
2:08
Speaker 1: transformation for more than four decades. Her book A Return
2:12
Speaker 1: to Love became a global phenomenon after Oprah called it
2:16
Speaker 1: famously one of the most meaningful books she had ever read.
2:19
Speaker 1: You might also recognize the title because more than a
2:22
Speaker 1: few past guests have named it as the one book
2:24
Speaker 1: they think everyone should read. When we ask that question
2:26
Speaker 1: at the end of the episode, and if you're an
2:28
Speaker 1: og listener. You know, I'm always interested in breaking down
2:31
Speaker 1: ideas like miracles and luck, and not so much as
2:34
Speaker 1: magical thinking, but more as philosophy, as frameworks, as a
2:38
Speaker 1: way of understanding how we shape our inner lives and
2:41
Speaker 1: in turn our outer ones. Really, how can we all
2:43
Speaker 1: live into the highest versions of ourselves. So in this
2:47
Speaker 1: conversation ahead of Valentine's Day, we are talking about miracles
2:51
Speaker 1: and fear and responsibility and what it really means to
2:55
Speaker 1: return to love.
2:56
Speaker 2: We all have the same purpose. Lift the vibrational energy
3:00
Speaker 2: wherever you are, the greatest base of love, greatest base
3:03
Speaker 2: of possibility, greatest bace of grace.
3:06
Speaker 1: You may know mary Anne Williamson from her presidential runs,
3:09
Speaker 1: but today's conversation isn't about politics. It's about what happens
3:13
Speaker 1: when spiritual ideas are tested in the real world, and
3:16
Speaker 1: what it takes to keep choosing love. When fear is
3:19
Speaker 1: so loud, it's easy to lose sight of love when
3:21
Speaker 1: fear is everywhere right and lately it's really been everywhere
3:25
Speaker 1: I feel it. I think what's striking about talking to Marianne, though,
3:29
Speaker 1: is she doesn't paint a rosy picture of the world.
3:32
Speaker 1: She is a realist about the challenges we face as
3:34
Speaker 1: a country, as humans, and yet she insists on something
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Speaker 1: deeper that love isn't naivete it's discipline, that when everything
3:43
Speaker 1: feels out of control, the most meaningful work isn't controlling
3:46
Speaker 1: the world, but changing how.
3:48
Speaker 2: We meet it, and all that life's experience is a
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Speaker 2: reflection back to us of the thoughts that we've been thinking.
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Speaker 2: So the miracle is to change things on the causal level,
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Speaker 2: which is thought.
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Speaker 1: So, while it's not the romantic question two days ahead
4:01
Speaker 1: of Valentine's Day, I do think today's conversation meets the
4:04
Speaker 1: moment of where we're at right now, and I actually
4:07
Speaker 1: think this conversation feels like the one that this moment
4:10
Speaker 1: calls for. So I want to offer one piece of
4:13
Speaker 1: context before we jump in. Throughout this conversation, mary Anne
4:16
Speaker 1: references a course in Miracles, and for anyone unfamiliar, it's
4:21
Speaker 1: not a religion. It's a spiritual psychology text that has
4:24
Speaker 1: deeply influenced her work. I have not read the course itself,
4:28
Speaker 1: but through Marianne's writing, its core idea is clear and
4:31
Speaker 1: very compelling, that a miracle isn't something supernatural, but a
4:35
Speaker 1: shift in perception from fear to love. Isn't that beautiful?
4:39
Speaker 1: So the question we're circling today is simple, and it
4:42
Speaker 1: is not easy. What does it mean to practice love
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Speaker 1: when fear is loud and life feels out of control?
4:49
Speaker 1: It's time to question everything with mary Anne Williamson. So,
4:58
Speaker 1: mary Anne, on February fourth of nineteen ninety two, you
5:02
Speaker 1: were on the Oprah Show and she looked at the
5:04
Speaker 1: camera and she says, I have never been as moved
5:07
Speaker 1: by a book as I have by mary Anne Williamson's
5:10
Speaker 1: book called A Return to Love. So moved in fact,
5:13
Speaker 1: that I went to buy a thousand copies and then
5:16
Speaker 1: of course she gives them to the audience. And A
5:19
Speaker 1: Return to Love spent thirty nine weeks on the New
5:22
Speaker 1: York Times bestseller list. It was a global phenomena. People
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Speaker 1: reference it today. And when I was in my very
5:27
Speaker 1: darkest moment, it was then when I found your book
5:31
Speaker 1: and read it, and it helped me make sense of
5:34
Speaker 1: my feelings and gave me hope. And I learned that
5:37
Speaker 1: you actually wrote it after your darkest moment. Where were
5:41
Speaker 1: you when you wrote that book or what mindset were
5:43
Speaker 1: you in?
5:44
Speaker 2: I mean, i'd have my darkest moments. I'd gone through
5:46
Speaker 2: my twenties. I think that's a really important point to
5:48
Speaker 2: make at this time in a history. The twenties are hard.
5:50
Speaker 2: They're not a mental illness. But I'd gone through my twenties,
5:53
Speaker 2: and I certainly talked about that when I was writing
5:55
Speaker 2: the book. However, I was not in my darkest period,
5:58
Speaker 2: but the community I was, and was because it was
6:01
Speaker 2: during the age crisis, so I was surrounded by a
6:04
Speaker 2: lot of suffering. It's interesting people who have been through
6:07
Speaker 2: crises like that everything is sort of heightened. But in
6:10
Speaker 2: a way, it was a great privilege for me to
6:11
Speaker 2: be able to be so active in the midst of that.
6:13
Speaker 2: You know, I think that you experience life, you know,
6:16
Speaker 2: in all of its vicissitudes of suffering and woundedness and
6:20
Speaker 2: so forth. But I think you create out of that,
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Speaker 2: probably once you've moved a little bit beyond that season,
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Speaker 2: because while you're in it, you're too overwhelmed by the experience.
6:29
Speaker 2: Usually you're not yet at a point of integrating what
6:31
Speaker 2: you learned there.
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Speaker 1: Absolutely, when you say your twenties were hard, what do
6:36
Speaker 1: you mean by that? Were they hard in a quintessential
6:38
Speaker 1: way or were they hard in sort of a different way.
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Speaker 2: They were hard, in very garden variety ways. I'm a boomer.
6:44
Speaker 2: There was a lot of sex, drugs, and rock and roll,
6:46
Speaker 2: and there was a lot of what I see now
6:48
Speaker 2: as the angst that is very typical in the twenties.
6:52
Speaker 2: The twenties, as I said, are hard. You're individuating, You're
6:55
Speaker 2: no longer a child, You're becoming an adult. I think
6:58
Speaker 2: today probably even more so because when I was in
7:00
Speaker 2: my twenties, there was the lot, there was the Vietnam War,
7:04
Speaker 2: there was the assassinations that had occurred at the end
7:06
Speaker 2: of the sixties. It was a very difficult time culturally,
7:09
Speaker 2: but to be honest, there was actually more hope in
7:11
Speaker 2: the society, and none of us had anything, but we
7:13
Speaker 2: figured the time would come when we would all that
7:15
Speaker 2: kind of thing. Every generation has its own wisdom, every
7:18
Speaker 2: generation has its own challenges. But in terms of my
7:21
Speaker 2: own dark Knight of the soul of that period, it
7:23
Speaker 2: was a very garden variety and I don't want to
7:26
Speaker 2: romanticize it, but I also don't want to glorify it anyway.
7:29
Speaker 1: So when was it that you found a course in miracles?
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Speaker 2: I was in my mid twenties and I had been
7:35
Speaker 2: very interested ever since I was a teenager, and I
7:37
Speaker 2: read my first like astrology book and got the eaching,
7:41
Speaker 2: and then took a philosophy class when I was fourteen.
7:43
Speaker 2: My first philosophy class in a summer school was short
7:46
Speaker 2: in carecuad Guard and I always was very interested in
7:49
Speaker 2: anything having to do with higher mind. It could be Eastern,
7:52
Speaker 2: it could be Western, it could be standard exoteric religious,
7:56
Speaker 2: or it could be the tarot cards. I never felt
7:59
Speaker 2: you had to choose one or the other, and I
8:00
Speaker 2: think part of it is that nobody would have told
8:03
Speaker 2: you how to choose one or the other. But until
8:05
Speaker 2: I read the course in Miracles, I had quite a
8:08
Speaker 2: bit of a problem applying any of it to my
8:11
Speaker 2: own life. And that's why the Course of Miracles made
8:13
Speaker 2: such a difference to me. It's not a religion, it's
8:15
Speaker 2: a psychological mind training, and it gave me tools. You know,
8:19
Speaker 2: the course doesn't claim to be for everybody. This is
8:22
Speaker 2: not about prosthetizing, but if it's for you, you know it.
8:25
Speaker 2: And for me it made all the difference, and that
8:27
Speaker 2: it taught me how to take certain ideas that were
8:31
Speaker 2: already in my head and apply them in very practical ways.
8:34
Speaker 2: I think that's the genius of the course. I was
8:36
Speaker 2: in my twenties and it really changed the trajectory of
8:39
Speaker 2: my life. No, not about it.
8:41
Speaker 1: How did your parents or family feel when you found
8:44
Speaker 1: the course, because I can imagine you changed personally so much.
8:48
Speaker 2: Well, my father rarely got tough, but he calls me.
8:52
Speaker 2: It was breakfast at my uncle's on a Sunday morning.
8:55
Speaker 2: My father said, come here, I want to talk to you.
8:58
Speaker 2: Goes into the library, close it or and this is
9:00
Speaker 2: what he said. It's the same God. And I said yes,
9:04
Speaker 2: and of course it's the same God. He said, okay,
9:07
Speaker 2: I don't want to hear it's a different God or anything.
9:09
Speaker 2: And that was it. You know, the Course of Miracles
9:11
Speaker 2: is written in Christ's centered language. I myself being Jewish,
9:17
Speaker 2: when I first saw the material, I just thought it
9:19
Speaker 2: was a Christian book. In college, I had already read
9:22
Speaker 2: quite a bit of Christian theology. I'd read say in Augustine,
9:25
Speaker 2: I'd read Thomas Quinas, I had read a lot of
9:28
Speaker 2: comparative religion. But this was my personal life. This was
9:31
Speaker 2: a book I found at a cocktail party or whatever
9:34
Speaker 2: it was. But then once you start reading the book,
9:36
Speaker 2: you realize, oh, this is not a religion, and students
9:39
Speaker 2: of the course come from all religions and no religion.
9:42
Speaker 2: At no time reading the course that I feel like
9:44
Speaker 2: I was supposed to change religion or anything like that.
9:48
Speaker 2: So there were some times with my family that there
9:51
Speaker 2: was a little what is that? And I would not
9:53
Speaker 2: talk about certain things at the dinner table. Then I thought,
9:56
Speaker 2: you know, it's not going to be understood. Just don't
9:58
Speaker 2: go there. And everything was fine, And in fact, towards
10:00
Speaker 2: the end of my father's life he was listening to
10:03
Speaker 2: my little cassette tapes. I would go into his bathroom.
10:05
Speaker 2: He'd be shaving and listening in that middle lot to me, as.
10:08
Speaker 1: What was the emotional landscape of your house? Like, what
10:11
Speaker 1: did love look like when you were growing up?
10:13
Speaker 2: Well, you know, as you get older, you see your
10:17
Speaker 2: childhood differently. When I was first growing up, I thought, oh,
10:20
Speaker 2: so neurotic boy. I look at it now and I
10:23
Speaker 2: realized I was really one of the very blessed and
10:25
Speaker 2: fortunate ones. My father was really extraordinary. My father was
10:29
Speaker 2: a magical creature, and I was loved. I don't think
10:32
Speaker 2: that I was deeply understood because I was born in
10:35
Speaker 2: nineteen fifty two. So I did not feel deeply understood,
10:39
Speaker 2: but I certainly was loved. The older I got, the
10:43
Speaker 2: more I began to take responsibility. You know, so many
10:46
Speaker 2: times people go back to their childhoods and they see
10:49
Speaker 2: it as the source of this or that coal or
10:51
Speaker 2: neurotic pattern, which could be true, But in terms of
10:55
Speaker 2: spiritual or psychological healing, it doesn't matter where you got it.
10:58
Speaker 2: It's yours now. It's now a character defect of whatever kind.
11:02
Speaker 2: I was not in any way abused as a child.
11:05
Speaker 2: I was abused as an adult. So I think sometimes
11:09
Speaker 2: when we look at our past, we just see things differently.
11:12
Speaker 2: If only love is real, then I now look at
11:15
Speaker 2: what I receive from my parents with deep gratitude.
11:19
Speaker 1: Actually, one of the pieces from your writing that I
11:24
Speaker 1: think plays over not just in my mind, but has
11:26
Speaker 1: become sort of ubiquitous in culture is that we're either
11:29
Speaker 1: walking in the direction of love or fear, And you
11:33
Speaker 1: say that there's really no in between. There are only
11:36
Speaker 1: two emotions when you look at society. Now, do you
11:40
Speaker 1: feel like people are more willing to take in your
11:44
Speaker 1: spiritual understanding of the world and apply it to politics
11:49
Speaker 1: or apply it to other ways of understanding or do
11:52
Speaker 1: you think there's still a lot of friction.
11:55
Speaker 2: Well, obviously we're three hundred and sixty million people, it's
11:57
Speaker 2: not a monolith. But in general I think the answer
12:00
Speaker 2: is yes, because America is clearly going through a crisis.
12:05
Speaker 2: I think there's a lot of fear. I think people
12:08
Speaker 2: are processing a catastrophe. And yes, I think it's knocked
12:12
Speaker 2: us off our high horse. I think there's a listening.
12:15
Speaker 2: You know, we've been so betrayed by a system of
12:17
Speaker 2: leadership that didn't want us to look. You know, anybody
12:22
Speaker 2: who's trying to heal their personal life, you go to
12:25
Speaker 2: therapy and the therapist says, we're going to have to
12:27
Speaker 2: look at the past. We're going to have to look
12:29
Speaker 2: at the underlying issues. We're gonna have to look at
12:31
Speaker 2: where you got it wrong. We're gonna have to look
12:33
Speaker 2: at where you got it right. We're gonna have to
12:34
Speaker 2: look at where you need to atone for your mistakes.
12:36
Speaker 2: We need to look at where you have to forgive others.
12:37
Speaker 2: You can't just go forward and keep pushing that down.
12:40
Speaker 2: And a group goes through those same dynamics at an
12:43
Speaker 2: individual does. But we had a leadership paradigm that said, Oh,
12:48
Speaker 2: the American people just want to move on. American people
12:50
Speaker 2: want to turn the page, and you got shouldn't we
12:51
Speaker 2: talk about the fact that like a million people died
12:53
Speaker 2: in a RockA No, no, We're just going to turn
12:55
Speaker 2: the page. Shouldn't we talk about the fact that like
12:57
Speaker 2: one in four American people are like skipping meals regularly
13:00
Speaker 2: because they can't make it in this economy. Now, the
13:02
Speaker 2: economy is good, So we bought into that. We allowed
13:05
Speaker 2: it to be. And I think, you know, because my
13:09
Speaker 2: professional grounding is within the higher consciousness community, I think
13:12
Speaker 2: we contributed to that. I think the higher consciousness community
13:15
Speaker 2: contributed to a me referencing patholgical sense of self reference
13:20
Speaker 2: and also to a kind of infantilization. Part of being
13:23
Speaker 2: a mature person is taking responsibility for more than yourself,
13:27
Speaker 2: taking responsibility for the planet, taking responsibility for your society,
13:30
Speaker 2: taking responsibility for the children, whether they're yours or not.
13:34
Speaker 2: We were given so much societal and fox spiritual permission
13:39
Speaker 2: to ignore a lot of suffering, and there's no serious
13:44
Speaker 2: spiritual or religious path. It gives a path on addressing
13:48
Speaker 2: the suffering of other sension beings. Now people are getting that.
13:51
Speaker 2: We grew up in America where we thought, well, it's
13:55
Speaker 2: not going to get that terrible. I mean, come on,
13:58
Speaker 2: we have a Supreme Court, we have Congress, we have
14:01
Speaker 2: checks and balance. It's not going to get that that. Well,
14:04
Speaker 2: it has in AA, it says every problem comes bearing
14:07
Speaker 2: its own solution. So don't get me wrong. I think
14:10
Speaker 2: this is an invitation to become who we're capable of being,
14:15
Speaker 2: and I think we're capable of doing that. And I
14:17
Speaker 2: actually think were arguing that. So I don't want to
14:19
Speaker 2: sound cynical here, but I do think it's a period
14:22
Speaker 2: of intense spiritual growth. And so yes, I think there's
14:25
Speaker 2: a listening for a conversation that people have been too
14:29
Speaker 2: easily manipulated into thinking was irrelevant to politics or kooky.
14:35
Speaker 2: There's something happens when I've seen it so much in
14:37
Speaker 2: my work. Someone is living their life, maybe at some
14:41
Speaker 2: level of shallowness, and then something happens. You know, you
14:45
Speaker 2: get the word from the doctor that the test results
14:48
Speaker 2: came back and they're not good, or your child is
14:51
Speaker 2: addicted or whatever, and all of a sudden, layers of
14:54
Speaker 2: meaningless and ultimately meaningless preoccupation just fall away in the
14:57
Speaker 2: space of five minutes. And I think that's what people
15:00
Speaker 2: going through. There's a very profound, very quick ascension. Little
15:05
Speaker 2: boys are becoming men real quickly right now. Little girls
15:07
Speaker 2: are becoming women really quickly right now. And that's good
15:09
Speaker 2: because we have about five minutes loveth.
15:11
Speaker 1: So actually that's my question because I wrote down a
15:14
Speaker 1: quote from the course in Miracles. It says the thought
15:17
Speaker 1: system of the human race is dominated by fear and
15:19
Speaker 1: has been for ages. So it's not like this is
15:22
Speaker 1: anything new. And a student of history, when I look
15:24
Speaker 1: back in time, we've been turning the page on human suffering,
15:28
Speaker 1: maybe even worse thousands of years ago, more so than
15:32
Speaker 1: even the last three hundred years of America's lifetime. Is
15:35
Speaker 1: the difference our consciousness? Are we coming to things differently?
15:39
Speaker 2: No, the difference is that we have nuclear bombs, I think,
15:41
Speaker 2: if anything, And I think this goes along with what
15:44
Speaker 2: you were just saying. We haven't advanced nearly as much
15:46
Speaker 2: as we think we have. We're just reliving all around.
15:49
Speaker 2: The barbarians got to the gate, the barbarians got through
15:52
Speaker 2: the gate. The barbarians are, as we speak, pillaging and
15:54
Speaker 2: raping the city. The difference now is the price to
15:58
Speaker 2: be paid potentially by the entire human race if we
16:00
Speaker 2: don't get this right. Our technological advancements have so outpaced
16:04
Speaker 2: our moral and spiritual development. And I think that's what
16:06
Speaker 2: we're coming to understand from all this. You know, even
16:09
Speaker 2: when you talk about being a student of history, the
16:11
Speaker 2: elite who have run the politics the modern age in
16:15
Speaker 2: America thought that they were so smart because they understood
16:18
Speaker 2: the operations of political formulation. What they didn't have any
16:23
Speaker 2: clue about was how evil operates. And the reason there's
16:27
Speaker 2: no excuse for this is because the most rudimentary knowledge
16:31
Speaker 2: of history would have predicted all this, the most rudimentary knowledge,
16:34
Speaker 2: certainly of Germany in the thirties, the most rudimentary knowledge
16:37
Speaker 2: of human psychology. So yeah, this is going to make
16:41
Speaker 2: us better people and a better society. I just don't
16:46
Speaker 2: think that will necessarily occur quickly.
16:49
Speaker 1: Do you think you'll see it in your lifetime?
16:51
Speaker 2: I don't know.
16:52
Speaker 1: You talked about the power of love a lot while
16:54
Speaker 1: you were running for president, and of course you've talked
16:57
Speaker 1: about it so much in your books. Has your idea
17:00
Speaker 1: of understanding of love evolved as you've evolved, Like, did
17:04
Speaker 1: you think about it different in each decade.
17:06
Speaker 2: No, what hopefully has evolved is my capacity to embody love.
17:12
Speaker 2: A course in Miracle says, enlightenment begins as abstract concept.
17:16
Speaker 2: You know, at this point we've all read the same books.
17:19
Speaker 2: We get it, it's a mainstream narrative. Now we've all
17:21
Speaker 2: read the same books, all listened to the same tapes.
17:24
Speaker 2: But the era of data collection is over. So the
17:27
Speaker 2: course of miracle, says enlightenment, you begin as an abstract
17:29
Speaker 2: concept and then take a journey without distance from the
17:33
Speaker 2: head to the heart. And each and every one of
17:35
Speaker 2: us have a highly individualized curriculum. Truth is simple, but
17:39
Speaker 2: life is very complicated. The principles of truth are easy
17:43
Speaker 2: enough to grasp, but living is hard. So that's the issue.
17:48
Speaker 2: The issue is that we don't know. Oh, I need
17:50
Speaker 2: to atone for my home MISTX. I need to see
17:51
Speaker 2: where I have to take responsibility. I know that I
17:54
Speaker 2: can't just bring the past into the present like we
17:56
Speaker 2: get it. The issue is actually practicing that and living that,
17:59
Speaker 2: because resistance, that's what's hard. In the course of a Miracles,
18:02
Speaker 2: he says, my way is not difficult, it's different. What's
18:06
Speaker 2: difficult is getting over the resistance. We have.
18:10
Speaker 1: Where do you think most people get stuck when trying
18:12
Speaker 1: to change their lives.
18:13
Speaker 2: That they have been taught by the thinking of the world,
18:17
Speaker 2: and this thinking has been fostered by many aspects of
18:20
Speaker 2: our society, that they're alone in a random universe. And
18:23
Speaker 2: if you think you're alone in a random universe and
18:26
Speaker 2: you're just this isolated creature, the Course of Miracles says,
18:28
Speaker 2: you are like a wave in the ocean, thinking you're
18:30
Speaker 2: separate from other waves. You're like a sunbeam thinking you're
18:34
Speaker 2: separate from other sons. So think of the psychological effect
18:38
Speaker 2: of thinking that you are one wave surrounded by the
18:41
Speaker 2: entire ocean. How would you not live your life in
18:45
Speaker 2: total fear of annihilation by a bigger wave. That's where
18:49
Speaker 2: people are stuck. They're terrified. On the other hand, if
18:51
Speaker 2: you have a shift in your thinking too, I'm connected
18:55
Speaker 2: to every other wave, I move, the ocean moves I move.
18:58
Speaker 2: You know you're safe here because you can't be separate
19:00
Speaker 2: from the ocean. So that's the ultimate, you know, the
19:03
Speaker 2: form takes. They're stuck because they haven't been educated, or
19:06
Speaker 2: they're stuck because their mommy wasn't nice, or they're stuck
19:09
Speaker 2: because of whatever. But really we're stuck because we have
19:12
Speaker 2: a wrong minded attitude about who we are and why
19:15
Speaker 2: we're here. If you realize you're an idea in the
19:17
Speaker 2: mind of God, you are love itself. That's the true you.
19:20
Speaker 2: It's covered up by all your mistakes and your pathologies
19:23
Speaker 2: and your nusis, but you can learn to dissolve them.
19:26
Speaker 2: But the real you is love, and the purpose is
19:29
Speaker 2: to give it into everybody saying what's my purpose? What's
19:31
Speaker 2: my purpose? It doesn't matter if you're having a podcast,
19:33
Speaker 2: you're writing a book, you're getting married. You're a scientist,
19:36
Speaker 2: you're a teacher, you're a politician. We all have the
19:39
Speaker 2: same purpose. Lift the vibrational energy wherever you are, be
19:44
Speaker 2: a greater space of love, greater space of possibility, greater
19:47
Speaker 2: space of grace. And by the way, do it kind
19:49
Speaker 2: of quickly, because we're going down.
20:04
Speaker 1: How do you define a miracle nowadays?
20:07
Speaker 2: It's a shift in your own thinking. You know, we
20:09
Speaker 2: heal one aha moment at a time. Well, I'm only
20:13
Speaker 2: thinking of myself here too. Well, how does the other
20:16
Speaker 2: person feel. It's a shift from dragging my past into
20:21
Speaker 2: a moment to let the present show me what's possible
20:25
Speaker 2: right now. It's a shift from blaming a situation entirely
20:29
Speaker 2: on someone else to asking yourself, what was my part
20:33
Speaker 2: in this. It's a shift from trying to get what
20:35
Speaker 2: you want to knowing that you'll only get what you
20:38
Speaker 2: want by giving the energy that includes everybody in a situation.
20:43
Speaker 2: It's a shift in our own thinking. But the Course
20:46
Speaker 2: of the Miracle says there's no such thing as a
20:48
Speaker 2: neutral thought. All thought creates form on some level. So
20:52
Speaker 2: with every thought, we're programming our lives, and all that
20:55
Speaker 2: life experience is a reflection back to us of the
20:58
Speaker 2: thoughts that we've been thinking. So the miracle to change
21:00
Speaker 2: things on the causal level, which is thought, and that
21:04
Speaker 2: always starts with him and not forgiving. The Course of
21:06
Speaker 2: Miracle says, you can have a grievance to our miracle.
21:08
Speaker 2: You cannot have both. And whether you're a student of
21:11
Speaker 2: the Course of Miracles or any other path, it's always
21:14
Speaker 2: about that. It's about checking your own heart and your
21:16
Speaker 2: own mind. Just like you go to the gym or
21:19
Speaker 2: you go to yoga or whatever to strengthen your physical muscles,
21:25
Speaker 2: you strengthen your attitudinal muscles. I will not be immature.
21:29
Speaker 2: I will be a responsible, mature person. I will not
21:32
Speaker 2: be a victim. I will take responsibility for my own
21:35
Speaker 2: life experience. I will not be a grabber. I will
21:39
Speaker 2: not be whatever is the behavioral or thought habit pattern
21:44
Speaker 2: that I know is dysfunctional and will keep me down.
21:48
Speaker 1: Is that what keeps us from becoming who we're meant
21:50
Speaker 1: to be? Not taking ownership absolutely?
21:53
Speaker 2: Michelangelo has asked, how do you create a sculpture? He said,
21:56
Speaker 2: I go into the quarry and I see a huge
21:59
Speaker 2: piece of marble. He said, Now in my mind, I
22:02
Speaker 2: think God has already created the great statue Moses David.
22:06
Speaker 2: My job is to get rid of the excess marble.
22:08
Speaker 2: So the idea here is who you are is perfect,
22:12
Speaker 2: but it's covered over by acting in ways that are
22:15
Speaker 2: not an expression of who you truly are, because we're afraid.
22:18
Speaker 2: The course the miracle says, from the time that we
22:20
Speaker 2: are very small, we are taught to think in ways
22:23
Speaker 2: that are actually unnatural, and natural thinking feels unnatural to us.
22:27
Speaker 2: That's what the work is. And at this point in
22:30
Speaker 2: our lives, most people, if we are honest with ourselves,
22:35
Speaker 2: know what our issues are. I always say, if you
22:36
Speaker 2: don't know, ask your best friends, and they'll tell you, well,
22:39
Speaker 2: you know, when this happens, you always act that way.
22:41
Speaker 2: When this happens, You always go into negativity. When that happens,
22:45
Speaker 2: you always have an excuse or who are you to
22:49
Speaker 2: be small? Just learning that God is within you? I mean,
22:52
Speaker 2: all the principles of a serious spiritual path. For instance,
22:55
Speaker 2: in the course, it says the presence of fear is
22:58
Speaker 2: a sure sign your trust in your own strengths, because
23:02
Speaker 2: if you think you were just this isolated being in
23:05
Speaker 2: this chaotic, random universe, where's your radar for right action?
23:10
Speaker 2: Once you know that we are all imbued with an
23:12
Speaker 2: internal guidance system, and especially if you realize that it's
23:16
Speaker 2: divine intelligence and that the universe knows how to organize
23:19
Speaker 2: itself and how to correct this if you're living in
23:22
Speaker 2: a completely different attitudeal universe, not recognizing those really natural
23:27
Speaker 2: laws is how our lives get messed up. It's how
23:30
Speaker 2: our nations get messed up. It's how our species gotten
23:33
Speaker 2: messed up. But the universe is not only self organizing,
23:36
Speaker 2: it's also self correcting, so as we recalibrate and realign
23:40
Speaker 2: ourselves with those laws right now, That's why in the
23:43
Speaker 2: philosophy of political non violence. Self purification is the first law.
23:48
Speaker 2: If ever there was a time to be kinder, if
23:50
Speaker 2: ever there was a time, because otherwise, particularly in this
23:53
Speaker 2: country today, we'll eat your nervous system alive. You won't
23:56
Speaker 2: even be able to handle it, and then people are
23:58
Speaker 2: going to just start drinking or drugging or whatever to
24:00
Speaker 2: and we won't be the people we need to be
24:02
Speaker 2: to rise to the occasion and meet this challenge.
24:04
Speaker 1: Something that I was surprised to learn from your writing
24:09
Speaker 1: is that we are more scared of our light than
24:12
Speaker 1: our darkness. I had never considered that. I thought we
24:16
Speaker 1: were all afraid of our shadow sides, but you're saying
24:19
Speaker 1: that we're actually more afraid of the light. Can you
24:22
Speaker 1: share more about that.
24:23
Speaker 2: The ego is a false belief we have about ourselves,
24:26
Speaker 2: and the ego is the belief that we are separate
24:28
Speaker 2: from each other, and that we have to do something
24:31
Speaker 2: to prove we're better than other people, and all the
24:34
Speaker 2: things we have to do to get ahead, and we
24:36
Speaker 2: have to be suspicious of other people because you know
24:39
Speaker 2: they're not good enough, and all that kind of stuff.
24:41
Speaker 2: In a moment of pure love, that's the annihilation of
24:45
Speaker 2: the ego. So the ego doesn't want you to have
24:47
Speaker 2: pure love. No, don't because it will be the death
24:50
Speaker 2: of the ego. So we have this perverse comfort zone.
24:54
Speaker 2: Being in dysfunction and smallness is a perverse comfort zone.
24:57
Speaker 2: It's wio we identify with. Well this way, I'm this wound,
25:01
Speaker 2: I'm this whatever. What really scares us is I'm cool.
25:05
Speaker 2: I mean, I've made mistakes, but the real me is good.
25:07
Speaker 2: I'm getting better. You're good. Yeah, how you made those mistakes,
25:10
Speaker 2: but I love you. That's what the ego doesn't want. No,
25:14
Speaker 2: you can't go there. Everything will fall apart. Really, that's
25:17
Speaker 2: when everything comes together. The Course of Miracles says that
25:19
Speaker 2: love restores reason and not the other way around. Look
25:22
Speaker 2: at the world. Look at all the money that we
25:24
Speaker 2: spend on ways to kill each other, and we call
25:26
Speaker 2: it security defense spending. What if we had taken all
25:29
Speaker 2: that money over the last however many decades and said,
25:33
Speaker 2: all of that money, now, I'm not naive, I know
25:35
Speaker 2: one country can't do this unilateral et cetera, and said,
25:38
Speaker 2: you know what, all the money we're going to spend
25:40
Speaker 2: on making sure that every child on the planet has
25:43
Speaker 2: everything they need, medical care, housing, cultural opportunity, every opportunity
25:49
Speaker 2: to thrive. Now, no, you can't do that. Really, look
25:52
Speaker 2: where we are now and ask yourself where we would
25:54
Speaker 2: be if that's where we were. And I think every
25:57
Speaker 2: woman particularly has to ask ourselves out because we know that.
26:01
Speaker 1: What do you think it was in Oprah that she
26:04
Speaker 1: was so receptive to your work. I've watched almost every
26:07
Speaker 1: Oprah interview, and especially years ago when she was first
26:12
Speaker 1: on her spiritual path, it really seemed from the outside
26:15
Speaker 1: that she looked to you as one of her very
26:17
Speaker 1: few teachers and guides.
26:19
Speaker 2: She was so amazing. I think that a lot of
26:21
Speaker 2: people now, younger generations can't possibly know how many millions
26:25
Speaker 2: of lives she touched, how many careers, including mine, she
26:30
Speaker 2: essentially made. I always felt that if Oprah Winfrey and
26:35
Speaker 2: John Stewart had not gotten off the air when they did,
26:39
Speaker 2: that Trump would not have become president. When you say,
26:43
Speaker 2: you've watched the interviews, but you're not old enough to
26:46
Speaker 2: have been like an Oprah watcher, right, correct? Yeah? Okay,
26:50
Speaker 2: So we had a daily town hall on human decency
26:56
Speaker 2: in this country. Sometimes it was all about everybody get
26:59
Speaker 2: the car, but most of the time she held a
27:03
Speaker 2: Daily town Hall on human decency. There was no sense
27:07
Speaker 2: of whose Democrat and history Republican, none of that. And
27:09
Speaker 2: then John Stewart on the Daily Show every night was
27:12
Speaker 2: a real intelligent take on the news. And when they
27:15
Speaker 2: both left, and they left at the same time, it
27:18
Speaker 2: was like the center cannot hold. I really believe they
27:21
Speaker 2: formed a moral center. It was very profound and I
27:25
Speaker 2: think that, you know, it's her story to tell, obviously,
27:28
Speaker 2: but I think she has told it about her background
27:31
Speaker 2: and her own you know, she came from a very
27:34
Speaker 2: poor background and always had a sense. I remember one
27:37
Speaker 2: of the stories that she used to tell was that
27:39
Speaker 2: she was with her grandmother and her grandmother was teaching
27:42
Speaker 2: her to mop a floor and she said, you need
27:46
Speaker 2: to learn to do this because you'll be doing this
27:48
Speaker 2: for living someday. And Oprah said, no, I won't. She
27:51
Speaker 2: just knew and I remember, and most people remember this.
27:54
Speaker 2: I remember this about two different things. Borderline also Stings
27:58
Speaker 2: song every breath you take, and the first Oprah ad.
28:03
Speaker 2: There are so many manufactured stars now, but in those days,
28:07
Speaker 2: when something showed up that was like, oh, this is different,
28:11
Speaker 2: like when you first saw Madonna. No, this is different
28:13
Speaker 2: when you first showed that on No, this is different,
28:15
Speaker 2: and oph was, Oh, this is different.
28:17
Speaker 1: But you know, I love when you say that we're
28:20
Speaker 1: all kind of like waiting to be stars. But really
28:23
Speaker 1: the spotlight comes from within us. It's the light that
28:26
Speaker 1: comes from within us, and that we have a platform
28:29
Speaker 1: as being human. You don't need a social media platform.
28:31
Speaker 1: I just think that's so wise and well said, and.
28:34
Speaker 2: So necessary for young people. They're in a perpetual state
28:37
Speaker 2: of grasping. It's such a young age. It's very unhealthy. Now.
28:42
Speaker 2: Of course, with all these traumatized children, we will pay
28:45
Speaker 2: such a terrible price for what we are putting millions
28:49
Speaker 2: of children through right now.
28:51
Speaker 1: Do you think we're in an absence of empathy?
28:53
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean the system lacks empathy completely. We've had
28:58
Speaker 2: an economic system that no mercy. We've had a sociopathic
29:03
Speaker 2: economic system. Like I said, when I was growing up,
29:05
Speaker 2: you weren't like naive, but corporations, we're supposed to have
29:08
Speaker 2: a conscience. It's so cutthroat, it's so ruthless. And now
29:12
Speaker 2: you have some people representing those forces saying empathy is
29:16
Speaker 2: a bad thing. Christians shouldn't have empathy. It's like what, so, yes,
29:21
Speaker 2: there is a lack of empathy. There is a terrible
29:24
Speaker 2: lack of empathy. But I think also for many of us,
29:27
Speaker 2: we would do well to ask ourselves, who were you
29:32
Speaker 2: not empathizing with We're very big on they're not showing
29:36
Speaker 2: me empathy. Victor Hugo famous line, remember with everyone you meet,
29:41
Speaker 2: you are in the presence of a great war. I
29:44
Speaker 2: was at a retreat recently and a woman talked about
29:47
Speaker 2: her childhood being rough, and people asked her what was
29:50
Speaker 2: rough about it? And she described it, and then you
29:53
Speaker 2: went through around the room and what other people had
29:56
Speaker 2: been through. Sometimes we think we're the only people who've
29:58
Speaker 2: ever suffered, that our suffering is special, when really, if
30:02
Speaker 2: you knew what other people have been through or what
30:06
Speaker 2: other people are going through.
30:22
Speaker 1: I'll never forget an Instagram that you posted maybe five
30:25
Speaker 1: years ago. I saved it. You were talking about the
30:28
Speaker 1: journey of age, and I loved how you spoke about aging.
30:33
Speaker 1: It made sense to me. But I'm curious if you
30:36
Speaker 1: felt that aging was hard or if it felt like
30:40
Speaker 1: a relief. It's hard.
30:42
Speaker 2: You have to grieve that which is no longer yours
30:46
Speaker 2: in order to receive that which is finally yours. So
30:50
Speaker 2: it's a change of seasons. You know, midlife is like puberty.
30:54
Speaker 2: Your body changes, your persona changes. I've said to quite
30:57
Speaker 2: a few young women, you have something on anymore, and
31:01
Speaker 2: I have some things you don't have yet. Emerson said,
31:03
Speaker 2: as I age, my beauty steals inward. But it's a process,
31:08
Speaker 2: and I think particularly for women. You know you're young.
31:11
Speaker 2: You get out of bed in the morning, you put
31:13
Speaker 2: on a pair of jeans, your t shirt. You're hot
31:15
Speaker 2: and happening, because when you're in your child bearing years,
31:19
Speaker 2: nature is invested in men wanting to have sex with you.
31:23
Speaker 2: Nature is invested in increasing the probability that you will
31:25
Speaker 2: have sex in order to perpetuate the human race. Once
31:28
Speaker 2: a woman goes to menopause, nature doesn't care she ever
31:31
Speaker 2: gets laid again. Nature has no investment in it. So
31:34
Speaker 2: there's no reason to give you the hormones for it.
31:36
Speaker 2: As a matter of fact, there's even all this evolutionary
31:38
Speaker 2: conversation about the fact that it is purposeful that the
31:42
Speaker 2: woman does lose some of that as she gets older
31:44
Speaker 2: so that she'll be more in grandmother mode and that
31:46
Speaker 2: takes care of the young. Mean, it's all this perfect
31:48
Speaker 2: amazing ecosystem Now, if it was one hundreds of years ago,
31:51
Speaker 2: the woman had actually reached her lifespan. Now a woman
31:55
Speaker 2: could live thirty forty more years and actually have it
31:59
Speaker 2: going on. But you have to consciously create it. There's
32:02
Speaker 2: a terrible undertow of misogyny, there's a terrible undertow of ageism.
32:07
Speaker 2: You see both on the left as much as on
32:09
Speaker 2: the right in.
32:10
Speaker 1: Their own way.
32:11
Speaker 2: So it's a lot of processing, which is why I
32:13
Speaker 2: wrote the book. In terms of relief, the relief comes
32:17
Speaker 2: from the fact that you're much more comfortable in your skin.
32:20
Speaker 2: And I remember when I turned fifty, a friend said,
32:22
Speaker 2: fifty is the age passed, which you don't care what
32:24
Speaker 2: they think anymore. That's a relief. You're not grasping, you
32:28
Speaker 2: know what, you know, you're going to say what you think.
32:30
Speaker 2: That part's a relief. But there is work to be done.
32:33
Speaker 2: And when you do that work, and particularly when you
32:35
Speaker 2: do that work with other people, other women particularly, then
32:39
Speaker 2: it's very exciting because you have to see, oh, I'm
32:41
Speaker 2: holding that thought that it's too late for me. I'm
32:43
Speaker 2: holding that thought that I'll never be loved again. I'm
32:45
Speaker 2: holding that thought. But it's like all other personal growth work.
32:48
Speaker 2: It's like give that thought up and a sense that
32:51
Speaker 2: the universe is infinitely creative can make its way into
32:55
Speaker 2: your consciousness. If it makes its way into your consciousness,
32:57
Speaker 2: it can make its way into your life.
33:00
Speaker 1: Change your mind about any of your teachings as you've
33:03
Speaker 1: lived more years or they have just become more true.
33:06
Speaker 2: When I think of some of the biggest mistakes I've
33:08
Speaker 2: made in my life, I was already a student of
33:10
Speaker 2: the course in miracle. You know, I always say my
33:13
Speaker 2: life's pretty good when I practice what I preach. But
33:15
Speaker 2: when I think of, well, you didn't bless the room
33:18
Speaker 2: before you walked in, you didn't take the weekend to
33:22
Speaker 2: pray about it, you didn't pray about it, or you
33:24
Speaker 2: didn't follow the guidance sewer. If anything, I'm more and
33:27
Speaker 2: more impressed because it just never changes. But hopefully I've
33:31
Speaker 2: gotten better at practicing. Life has a way of making
33:35
Speaker 2: sure that.
33:36
Speaker 1: You do actually in that exact vein. I want to
33:39
Speaker 1: give you four scenarios to apply teachings to life and
33:43
Speaker 1: see what your recommendation is. So if someone wants to
33:46
Speaker 1: make one spiritual shift in the new year, what's the
33:49
Speaker 1: one thing that will create the biggest ripple.
33:51
Speaker 2: If you're not meditating, learn a meditation practice, prayer practice
33:55
Speaker 2: in the morning, wake up in the morning, before you
33:57
Speaker 2: even get out of bed. Bless the world before you
33:59
Speaker 2: even get out the bed, actually say anything could happen.
34:02
Speaker 2: The universe is infinitely creative. All things are possible. Where
34:05
Speaker 2: would you have me go, what would you have me do?
34:07
Speaker 2: What would you have me say? And to whom? Before
34:09
Speaker 2: you even get out of bed, Do not go to
34:11
Speaker 2: social media or the news. First, ground yourself in some
34:14
Speaker 2: spiritual practice.
34:16
Speaker 1: What is a ritual or practice that you personally use
34:19
Speaker 1: when you need a fresh.
34:20
Speaker 2: Start picking up the course of miracles?
34:22
Speaker 1: How did someone actually practice returning to love when they're
34:25
Speaker 1: in a season of heartbreak or exhaustion?
34:28
Speaker 2: It takes a lot. I wrote a book called Tears
34:30
Speaker 2: to Triumph Navigating depression, Navigating hardships. So let's take the
34:36
Speaker 2: image of the crucifixion and resurrection. So the crucifixion is
34:40
Speaker 2: the energy pattern that describes what lovelessness will do. It
34:43
Speaker 2: might have been your own lovelessness, that might have been
34:45
Speaker 2: somebody else's. That was your crucifixion. Then you're in the
34:48
Speaker 2: tomb for three days, and that's humanly processing it, and
34:52
Speaker 2: it's painful in there, but it's a season those three days.
34:56
Speaker 2: It's up to you how long those three days last.
34:59
Speaker 2: Truly reverence means you have to feel it, but feel
35:02
Speaker 2: it in a safe container, whether it's a therapist or
35:05
Speaker 2: very close friends that you know it's safe to talk
35:08
Speaker 2: to about it. Don't spew it. There's a line where, Okay,
35:13
Speaker 2: I've been feeling it, I have to process it. But
35:15
Speaker 2: if I tell the story one more time, I'm not
35:18
Speaker 2: processing it. I'm spewing it. If I hold on longer
35:23
Speaker 2: than I need to, I'm not feeling my feelings, I'm
35:26
Speaker 2: indulging my feelings. It's learning to navigate that season. There
35:30
Speaker 2: comes a time when you really don't need to tell
35:33
Speaker 2: the story one more time. It's interesting because when you
35:36
Speaker 2: go through something painful, this is one of those examples.
35:39
Speaker 2: Most things are where you can read the reactions of
35:42
Speaker 2: the people around you. If you are honestly, in a
35:46
Speaker 2: very meaningful way, seeking to process and endure your pain,
35:50
Speaker 2: people want to be there for you. The moment you
35:53
Speaker 2: start milking it, it's a repellent, and when you become
35:59
Speaker 2: a tentivet to the inner life, the way that a
36:02
Speaker 2: spiritual path makes you You know what that means. When
36:06
Speaker 2: I went through this last presidential campaign, it was so
36:10
Speaker 2: brutal and so awful what I saw and what I experienced,
36:15
Speaker 2: And I knew people watch how you fail. So if
36:19
Speaker 2: anything is going on in public, I knew I had
36:21
Speaker 2: a choice. You're going to age as a kind of pathetic, old, angry,
36:26
Speaker 2: bitter woman, and everybody will say it's too bad about hers.
36:30
Speaker 2: Used to be quite alion, or you can learn from this.
36:33
Speaker 2: You're going to turne for your own mistakes. You're going
36:35
Speaker 2: to work on forgiving other people for theirs. You were
36:38
Speaker 2: going to alchemize this, and then you were going to
36:41
Speaker 2: come out of the tomb. You know the interesting thing
36:43
Speaker 2: about it comes out of the tomb, the women go
36:45
Speaker 2: to get the body of Christ, and the angels say
36:47
Speaker 2: he isn't here. He's risen. The resurrection. The course the
36:51
Speaker 2: miracle says is the return to your right mind. And
36:54
Speaker 2: the reason they say he is risen is because you're
36:57
Speaker 2: not even the person used to be. You're not the
37:00
Speaker 2: person that you were before the crucifixion. Those molecules don't
37:03
Speaker 2: even exist.
37:04
Speaker 1: What is the difference between magic and a miracle?
37:08
Speaker 2: Well, once again this is a little semantics. So in
37:10
Speaker 2: the course in miracles, the difference is when you're trying
37:13
Speaker 2: to use the mind to get something right, kind of
37:16
Speaker 2: think the secret type stuff. I'm gonna use my mind.
37:19
Speaker 2: I'm going to concentrate on something I'm gonna visualize so
37:21
Speaker 2: that I can have it. That's magic. That's when you're
37:24
Speaker 2: kind of using the universe as your eron. Boy, Miracles
37:29
Speaker 2: is where you say, may I be of use to love,
37:32
Speaker 2: may I be of service to the universe. And then
37:35
Speaker 2: the idea is, you know, back when you were visualizing
37:39
Speaker 2: that apartment, Yeah, I remember. Remember you thought it was
37:42
Speaker 2: so amazing because that was like a million dollar apartment. Yeah,
37:45
Speaker 2: I remember. Well, actually the universe wanted you to be
37:48
Speaker 2: in the three million dollar apartment up on the hill
37:51
Speaker 2: the house, but you blocked it because you were so
37:54
Speaker 2: busy trying to make it what you thought. The universe
37:57
Speaker 2: is already programmed to lift you to the highest level
37:59
Speaker 2: vibrating frequency that would support you and those around you
38:03
Speaker 2: in the maximal soul growth opportunity. So miracles is a
38:07
Speaker 2: path of surrender. Magic is a path of control. Now
38:10
Speaker 2: that doesn't mean that you're not supposed to love all
38:13
Speaker 2: the low. It's all magical, but it is on a
38:16
Speaker 2: deeper theological level, the difference between trying to make it
38:19
Speaker 2: happen and allowing it to happen.
38:22
Speaker 1: I have a few quick, rapid fire questions for you.
38:28
Speaker 1: Who's the first person who made you feel truly seen?
38:31
Speaker 2: There was a man he became very successful. He wrote
38:34
Speaker 2: about jazz. He was a brilliant man named Stanley Crouch,
38:38
Speaker 2: and he was a professor of mine in College of
38:41
Speaker 2: Course of Miracles, says the greatest act of charity is
38:44
Speaker 2: when you see someone beyond what they're manifesting as who
38:48
Speaker 2: they're capable of being. I felt he was the first
38:50
Speaker 2: person who made me feel I could be that.
38:54
Speaker 1: What is a book that has really changed your life?
38:57
Speaker 1: Something you think everybody could read?
38:58
Speaker 2: Letters to a Young Poet by Roca I read it
39:02
Speaker 2: every few years.
39:03
Speaker 1: What is the most loving thing somebody's done for you lately?
39:06
Speaker 2: My little grandbaby put her arms around me.
39:09
Speaker 1: You seem like you really like being a grandmother.
39:11
Speaker 2: You know, when my first granddaughter was born, I was
39:14
Speaker 2: staring at her. One day. My daughter's mother in law
39:17
Speaker 2: was sitting there. We were both just staring at the baby.
39:20
Speaker 2: I said, we're just staring. She said, yes, it's called
39:22
Speaker 2: granny gazing. I said, I don't remember when I had
39:26
Speaker 2: a baby, just staring at her this much. And she said,
39:29
Speaker 2: when you have a baby, you're too busy. Has she eaten?
39:33
Speaker 2: Has she slept? You know, blah blah blah. But when
39:35
Speaker 2: your grandmother, you're ready in your life to just stare
39:38
Speaker 2: all before the miracle of it all.
39:41
Speaker 1: I really love that granny gazing. I had a therapist
39:44
Speaker 1: one time say that we all just kind of want
39:46
Speaker 1: our parents to look at us with sparkly eyes, and
39:50
Speaker 1: it's very difficult for parents to do that, and so
39:52
Speaker 1: often we get it from grandparents.
39:54
Speaker 2: Yes, and it's sad.
39:57
Speaker 1: What's one thing every woman should try once?
40:00
Speaker 2: I got to answer that I don't know if there's
40:02
Speaker 2: one size fits all. I can't answer what every woman
40:05
Speaker 2: should try wants.
40:06
Speaker 1: I think that's a really good answer. Okay, tell me
40:09
Speaker 1: when to stop. This is the question everything, card game. Okay,
40:13
Speaker 1: when was the last time you felt rejected?
40:15
Speaker 2: I can't tell you what it means to Oh, actually
40:18
Speaker 2: I was gonna My first answer was that I can't
40:20
Speaker 2: tell you what it means to me that I can't remember.
40:22
Speaker 2: But it was about a week ago a friend of
40:25
Speaker 2: mine in a text exchange. Although I had to do
40:30
Speaker 2: my own work, how did something that you wrote contribute
40:36
Speaker 2: to that? I think she would have rejected my offer anyway,
40:44
Speaker 2: but I wouldn't have felt so cringe and icky about it.
40:49
Speaker 2: And there's a history there that has been difficult for me.
40:53
Speaker 1: Thanks for sharing it. My last question, Mary Anne, is
40:57
Speaker 1: you've been interviewed by almost all of the greats. Do
41:01
Speaker 1: you have a memory of an interview that really lit
41:05
Speaker 1: you up? And what happened? Why did it light you up?
41:08
Speaker 1: How did you feel seen Oprah?
41:10
Speaker 2: Obviously she's extraordinary, she said to me once early on
41:13
Speaker 2: one of my early interviews, talk less. I can sell
41:16
Speaker 2: your book better than you can.
41:18
Speaker 1: That's amazing, Mary, And I think I am curious if
41:21
Speaker 1: you agree. But I think some people are put on
41:23
Speaker 1: earth to raise our collective consciousness, and you are definitely
41:27
Speaker 1: one of them. So thank you for all of the
41:30
Speaker 1: love you put into the world, because I know it's
41:32
Speaker 1: not easy.
41:33
Speaker 2: Well, thank you, thank you so much. I actually think
41:35
Speaker 2: we're all put on this earth to raise collective consciousness
41:39
Speaker 2: and you're doing pretty good yourself, So thank you so much.
41:42
Speaker 2: I appreciate it so honor. It takes one to know one.
41:45
Speaker 1: Thank you for that. Okay, you know what time it is.
41:53
Speaker 1: Today's a good day, to have a good day. I'll
41:56
Speaker 1: see you next week.
42:00
Speaker 2: It is at
42:03
Speaker 1: Its