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The Awakened Witch with Ivy West · Rare Medium with Deb Snyder

• Ivy: everything in the world will shift and change when women realize how powerful they are. But there's like millennia of these systems put into place to keep us asleep to our power. Because if we really knew how powerful we were, I mean, the system would crumble. I remember saying to my daughter, I just want women to like wake up and realize how powerful they are. I just want them to like awaken the witch within. And I was like, that's what I want to do with my life. I want to awaken the witch within Deb: Rare Medium with Deb Snyder, celebrating life's rarities, the people, places, and experiences that just might be a little bit weird. This podcast explores all facets of our energetic connections to each other and beyond. We'll dive into the depths of mediumship, psychic ability, intuition, near death experiences, afterlife research, healing modalities, and more. Our focus is to bring you relevant and moving accounts with guests who share their authentic selves and their treks into the spiritual and energetic realms. We'll learn how those experiences shifted their perspective on life itself. Join us to be inspired by everyday people on their extraordinary journeys into the rare medium of the mystical world. Topics discussed on Rare Medium by the host and guests are presented for informational and entertainment purposes only. It is not a substitute for professional, legal, or medical advice. Deb Snyder: Hello and welcome to Rare Medium. I'm your host, Deb Snyder. I have a very interesting show for you guys today. Today we're going to be meeting Ivy West. Now, Ivy is an author, a certified life coach, and the founder of The Awakened Witch. Using a framework that blends structured planning with feminine wisdom and witchcraft, she helps women get unshakably clear on their life purpose. And gives them the tools to confidently step in their new identity. Ivy escaped a high-control religious community in her early 30s and rebuilt her life from the ground up. Ivy found a path beyond what the patriarchy had taught her to accept. Her program, The Alchemy, walks women through understanding their gifts, claiming who they are what they want, and alchemizing their past. Into purpose. You can learn more about her on her website, theawakenedwitch.com. Ivy, welcome. Ivy: Thank you. Thank you for having me. Deb Snyder: Well, it's pretty neat to have a witch. I don't often Ivy: Yeah. Deb Snyder: have a witch as a guest. So welcome. Ivy: I would say, I would say, so I people say this all the time, like what makes you a witch? To me, I think it's any woman who's like awake to her power. So whether like you claim the title or not, I just think it's like it's powerful women. Deb Snyder: Right. Ivy doesn't run a Wiccan church or anything like this. So this is her empowerment. Right. Ivy: No, no. I'm done with church forever. Deb Snyder: This is her empowerment of her natural, feminine, divine wisdom from within. now, Ivy, you refer to yourself as the awakened witch. Tell us what you mean by that. Ivy: Yeah, so I came up with that that name. I was sitting on the couch with my daughter one day and we were talking about I was I was just saying like how frustrating it is because women are so powerful. I think like everything in the world will shift and change when women realize how powerful they are. But there's like millennia of these systems put into place to keep us asleep to our power. Because if we really knew how powerful we were, I mean, the system would crumble. And so I remember saying to my daughter, I was like, I just want women to like wake up and realize how powerful they are. I just want them to like awaken the witch within. And I was like, that's what I want to do with my life. I want to awaken the witch within women. And that doesn't mean, you know, turn them into like a, you know, pointy hat and stirring a cauldron, unless you want to. It just means Deb Snyder: That's right. Ivy: that you are. You're connected and you understand how powerful you are, and you get rid of the stories that have been handed to you that tell you anything less. Deb Snyder: Excellent. Now, Ivy, you have a very, very unusual background. You spent 34 years growing up in a cult. Now walk us through that experience and your decision to escape with your family. Ivy: Yeah, so I was born into this. my dad is actually the man who ran our group. So it was very much a bubble. I didn't really have access to school outside of the the group or people or safe people, teachers, anything like that. So it was everything that I knew. And I went to school there, I was I was homeschooled in the group, I went to church there, all my friends, everything I knew was on this in this group. And then we lived on an a farm kind of away from everybody else. So very secluded. And the way that the group ran was that men had all the power. very, very pyramid scheme, right? So like the men were at the top, women and children underneath. and you I was just taught to have kids and then to serve my husband. Like that was my whole point in life. That's what I was taught from very young age. And par part of what we did was we we made all almost all of our food from scratch and we made a lot of our clothes from scratch to make sure that they were like modest and I think younger me would just just die seeing how I look now. so I I would use the internet a little bit to find resources for this type of life. So I would go to the library to get access to the the internet and I found this one woman who designed patterns. And I started following her blog and she created a mom's group on Facebook. And I was like, I wasn't really supposed to be in it. We weren't really like encouraged to use Facebook. And so it was kind of kind of a secret. But I joined it and it blew my mind. I mean, there were women on there that were like. There were like devout Catholics and there were Wiccans. There were women who you know, had their babies in the river and women that scheduled a cesarean. There were women, it was just like every type of woman was in this group. And instead of judging, they were like, that's interesting. Tell me more. And I had I had never seen women, one, just accept other people and two, be allowed to do whatever they want. So I was obsessed with this group. And I became friends with the woman, the pattern designer who started the group. And she came and visited me one time and saw what I was in. And she decided that she was gonna help me get out. And it took her two years. So I met her when I was 30. And for about two years, she taught me how to think for myself. And within that, that's when I started to Realize like there was life on the outside that I could, I could probably do this. I could, and I started speaking up in the group, which caused a lot of problems, but it it taught me to that I was brave and it taught me to be courageous. And that that was the beginning of the end of getting out. the final push came when I my sister got cancer and I went to stay with her for a month. And it was the first time that I was away from being a mom, being a ch person in the church, being a wife. Like I just was myself. And this was all coming after years of questioning what I was in. And I had gotten to the point where I I was I was really struggling to even stay alive in this group because I so desperately wanted to be out, but I didn't know that that was an option for me. I I couldn't see a way out. I went to see my sister and the day before the night before my flight, I had a panic attack. speaker-0: So I had a layover right before I got home. And I remember, you know, those metal mirrors that you can't break, they kind of make you look a little wonky. I remember I'm in this layover. We have one stop before I get home. And I remember looking at myself in that mirror, thinking, it can't be harder to stay alive inside than it is to figure out how to live on the outside. And that's when I decided I don't care how hard it is. I don't care. What it takes, I can't live like this anymore. so then I went home. My husband had been keeping the kids for that month while I was gone. And so it was actually his birthday when I got back. So I gave him like a couple of days. I just didn't say anything. And then maybe two days later, I said, I'm leaving. If you want help with the kids, y'all should come with me, but I can't survive in this anymore. And he was he was like, Yes, absolutely. Let's let's do this. And we left the property maybe two months later. speaker-1: Wow. That's amazing that so even though he was sort of born into this as well or been living in it most of his life, he was ready. He was feeling it also wasn't resonating with him any longer. speaker-0: Yeah, so it's it's interesting the way that that we're raised in it, it's it's you're it's brainwashing. And so neither of us really liked this way of living, but we had just been conformed to it. And so when we met this woman and she was like teaching me how to think for myself, then I this was an ongoing conversation between the two of us the entire time. And neither of us like liked this lifestyle, but it was the only thing we knew. And we did believe that it was right. And so as I was deconstructing, he was trick deconstructing right along with me, which yeah, I'm really grateful for because it would have been even harder having to. speaker-1: And you are still married today? We are. speaker-0: Yeah, I would definitely say we're not married to the same people. We are we are very different from you know the version of ourselves that we met. but it's I would say we yeah, we we really like each other now, whereas before we were had so many masks and so many things like hidden behind that we we didn't really know each other fully. speaker-1: Right, you knew your roles, but not each other. speaker-0: Yeah, we knew our roles, but we actually hated our roles. So like I am the one with the big vision and the big dreams, and I make a lot of our big like family decisions. And I was in the role of like all of the small like home care and like taking care of the kids and all of that daily stuff. And he was the one working. And now I'm the one who's working and he does all of the home stuff. And we're just yeah, like I have the big dreams and he just is like. the best support person I could ever imagine like I couldn't do any of this without him. speaker-1: I think that's absolutely beautiful and poignant that both of you grew away from that together and into this new life. I mean, that's it's it's wonderful to have that partnership survive such a trauma. speaker-0: Absolutely. speaker-1: Now, Ivy, tell me, has your own past traumatic experiences has that does that help you in helping women? speaker-0: I would say it is the reason that I do what I do. when I first got out, I started going to therapy. And I remember being so embarrassed. I was so embarrassed about what I had been in. And I felt like, you know, I was 34 by the time I left. And I thought, like, why didn't I get out earlier? I when I was leaving, I was helping other people leave, and they were like 18, 19. And The therapist helped me first understand that I had been brainwashed. Like I didn't know anything else. But the other thing she told me to do was to tell my story, to share my story. And she was like, just start talking to anybody who will listen. And so I would, you know, be at the park with my kids and there would be a mom at the bench. And I would just like start talking to her and I would tell her these things that I thought were so embarrassing. And things like, I don't really know who I am, I don't. Have I, you know, I've never really figured out who I am. I'm 34 and I don't know my voice and all of these things. And I would hear these women go, yeah, me too. And I was like, What do you what do you mean? You're out here in the real world. You're allowed to wear pants and go places by yourself. And you, you know, you went to university and like you had all of what do you mean? You don't know who you are and you're scared to live and you're afraid of using your voice. I, I, I at first like couldn't believe. That there was connection in that because of what I had come out of. But what I have realized since coming out is that we all live under this patriarchal pyramid scheme. And I just had a really, really intense, up close view of it. So that when I got out, I could see it everywhere. And the same things that affected me are affecting women in the normal world. And so at first, you know, there was a lot of therapy, there was a lot of healing to get where I am. but because of what I escaped, I feel like I have this like behind the curtain look. I have this inside. I often say, like, I know how to defeat the monster. I know like the soft spots of the monster. And it's all fear and control and guilt and shame, right? Like that's how it all works. And so I feel like my work is helping women understand the system and understand how it affects them so that they can. move out of it or they can they can get it out of their system. I I often say like I have no desire to destroy the patriarchy. I have used so much of my energy just to stay alive within the patriarchy. I just want to like walk out of it. And I want to lure I say this like I just want to lure women out of the patriarchal hellscape that we're in into this magical forest where like other women are holding space in circles. And as we all start to leave this system, it's gonna crumble on its own. Like we don't have to use our energy to tear it down. We just need to leave. And because I have literally left something like that, now we can't leave the whole, you know, we live in the world that where it all is. But there's ways to create safe space within that. And so yeah, I think everything about my past affects who I am. It affects the way that I speak. the way that I move through the world. And I I want to use all of that pain for something more than just something I survived. And so it has become, yeah, it's become my tool to build to build a better life for myself and in the process helping other women as well. Deb Snyder: with you having had to live in such horror and such a horrible dramatic situation, you can identify it very clearly where many women and men can't see the subtlety of that patriarchal pyramid you're referring to. that it's a little more transparent, but it's still there. That's why you're the person to help people shift beyond that. And I hope folks realize when they hear us talking about this, we're not talking about hating on men. I love men. She has she has a son and a husband, and we we love men. It's the system, the patriarchal system that causes imbalance, fear, control. That is what we're talking about speaker-0: There right. And I even say, like, the patriarchal system does not benefit men. The patriarchal system destroys all of us. It just has it tells us different lies. It tells men a certain lie that they will have power over, but they don't. All of their resist resources are also being sucked away. And if you think about war, right, the majority of people fighting war are men like that. They are their energy is being harvested for somebody else's gain. And so it's hating the patriarchy is hating a system. That takes us out of harmony with each other. And it, yeah, it harms women more, but it doesn't mean that it's not harming us all. Deb Snyder: Absolutely. Now, you're also author of a book, Moon Magic. Now, in that you share rituals, natural cycles, and how community are all very, very important. Why do you feel that this information is important for the average person to know and implement in their life? speaker-0: Yeah, so when I first started coaching, I am I am a highly ambitious person. I mean, I have big dreams and I make really big things happen. And when I first got out, I well, still to this day, because I feel like I was kept from so much for so much of my life, when I came out, I was like just I just had like this voraciousness for life and I wanted to try and do so many things. And so I made these really big goals and I helped my clients make really big goals and they were achieving them. But what I was seeing was happening was that we were all burning out. And I was like, okay, let me let me figure out. Like actually, that's not what happened. I burned out and I had to take probably a year, two years off, where I was like. I didn't, I I couldn't give up my big dreams and my ambition. That is like a part of who I am. But I knew that the way that I was doing it was something was off. And that's when I that's when I started learning about witchcraft. And as soon as I started learning about witchcraft, I felt like I had come home to myself. Because it's this connection with other women, it's connection with nature, it's wisdom passed down, but there are no rules. And that for me is a huge deal because I was just so controlled by rules in religion. I have, I have a really hard time with somebody saying, This is how you do it. These and I no. So when I found witchcraft, it was just this beautiful like ebb and flow, and like take what feels right for you and what feels true to you, and like go what doesn't. And so I started studying more and more and more. I had interviewed somebody about. working in cycle with your menstrual cycle. And that had really started to get me thinking. But a lot of the women that I work with are post-menopauses. So I was like, okay, how does this, how does this work? And then I started seeing how when we start working with the cycle of the moon or our menstrual cycle if we're still or if we have that, there is time for everything. There's time for the planning. There's time for like the the push and the the big energy. There's time to wrap things up and there's time to rest every single month. Like the moon is this beautiful visual picture that shows us our body does the same thing. And the more that I started reading this, I was like, my goodness, this is the feminine way that that matches the ambition. And when you match the ambition with that cycle, you don't burn out. And the burnout comes from the constant hustle, which we are taught within systems like capitalism. the patriarchy, right? Like it's like it's trying to extract everything from us. And here's what I think the big evil plan is. And you can see it in probably everybody you know, and probably yourself. We are taught to be so ambitious in our 20s to give, give, give, give, give. And that doesn't necessarily mean in career. It's often with family. so we give, give, give, give, give all through our 20s, all through our 30s, our mid-30s, we start to like start to. start to get off off kilts or and we think it's like a midlife crisis or something. And then right when we really come into the space where we have a lot of wisdom to share, we get sick. We have autoimmune disease. We burn out so badly that we have to quit our jobs or we just feel like we're not ourselves. And I think that is the point. I think they extract so much of our energy in those those 20 years. And also coincides with like childbearing years, right? And so the wise woman is not valuable in the patriarchal system. And so if we give everything we have to make our community proud and to make our our career the you know, our our career look good and to impress the people around us or live the life that we're supposed to want. When we get to our 40s, 50s, we're so burned out that we can't share the gifts that we have and the wisdom that we've learned. And so I think. If you if we are living within cycle, we're resting every single month. And so there's no burning out because we are working with our system and with our body and not the the cycle that is made for a man. And yeah, the moon is like this just beautiful, perfect picture of that. And witchy or not. That right there, I think, will save women's lives, like their actual lives, not just if they want to achieve goals or not, but it allows us to enjoy our life rather than feeling like we have to get to an end point. Because that's what I was seeing within like the life coaching was like, we're just, we're just like trying to get to these big goals. And then we get there, we just try to get to the next one. And within witchcraft, it's like, no, this moment right here is sacred. What is special about this moment? Like. And when you live in cycle, you every day becomes sacred, and these little rituals bring us into our body into now. And I think it's especially important because the world is on fire, right? Like there are so many things that feel overwhelming and hopeless. And I think when we allow ourselves to make our Our everyday sacred, when we come back to our bodies and we come back to our purpose, then we can focus on the thing that we can do. My sister and I talk about this all the time because we like want to save the whole world, right? Bleeding hearts. But we have kids and we're escaping a cold and we're still healing. And it's like we can't do all of the things. But if we give ourselves permission to take care of ourselves and to focus on our Purpose, which is your passion and your core values and your what you've experienced all combined. Like I say, it's like alchemized, right? Like you take the cauldron and everything you've experienced and everything that you value and everything that you've survived and learned and you like mix it all up. If you allow yourself to just focus on that, it makes life more hopeful and more worth living, I feel like. Deb Snyder: I fully agree. I think for women and for men for that matter, tapping into nature and the natural world in all of its ways gets us back to our authentic selves. we have so much technology coming at us all the time that we don't ever seem to be able to get a break from that. We j everyone talks about the twenty four hour news cycle. Well, it's not just news cycle, it's work cycle. a good friend and I talked about when, you know, we were growing up in the in the 70s and 80s, you know, our parents were professionals and worked, but at the technology at the time, they might have a phone line with a couple lines on it. By the time we hit the business world, you had multiple lines and everything going to voicemail and email and everything coming. So you weren't just trying to manage a a regular job at a certain level, you never stop. And as you were saying, your goals just kept piling on and the expectation of you kept piling on where people are supposed to be producers instead of just being. And so I commend you for your work with people and helping them get back to their natural selves. Now, Ivy, we are running out of time and we end every episode of Rare Medium with what's called the Rare Mediums 10QQ. Our 10 quick questions. Are you ready for your 10 q? speaker-0: Think so. Deb Snyder: Do you believe in the afterlife? speaker-0: Yes and no. But I feel like that I I tend not to have any hardcore beliefs. I'm very much like open to anything, but not attached to anything. Okay. So I'll have memories of what I think was a past life and I'm like, yep, that's definitely happened. But I don't believe in any of that. But maybe it's true. Deb Snyder: Now, what was your age in the best year of your life so far? speaker-0: Forty. Deb Snyder: Who is your favorite musical artist? speaker-0: Sarah Barellis. She writes the song called Brave, and I listened to it as I was driving off of the cult like off the compound. Deb Snyder: Now where would you most like to travel? speaker-0: New Zealand. It's still on my list. Deb Snyder: What person has inspired you the most? speaker-0: My sister. Deb Snyder: if you could have an entirely different profession, what would it be? speaker-0: Okay, either party planner or interior designer. Deb Snyder: What are you grateful for? speaker-0: Wonder. Like, like so I had l so such little access to education and the world that when I get out, I have I'm like in my 30s and 40s being like, my God, I can't believe XYZ. So it's like everything from like discovering the Beatles a few years ago to like learning dinosaurs are real. Like I just I'm so grateful for that feeling Deb Snyder: Do you love yourself? speaker-0: Most of the time. Deb Snyder: What do you most regret? speaker-0: I mean the the thing that always comes back is I wish I had left earlier, even though I didn't like, you know, I didn't have the resources, but that's probably Deb Snyder: Now, in a word or two, what is your advice for your fellow humans? speaker-0: Take a deep breath. Deb Snyder: Beautiful. Ivy West, the Awakened Witch, thank you so much for being with us today. And folks, don't forget to visit Ivy on her website, theawakenwitch.com. This has been Rare Medium with Deb Snyder. Please subscribe on your favorite channel and leave any comments you'd like us to see. To learn more, visit DebSnyder.com or Heartglow.org.