In this episode, Mackenzie Amara and I explore the idea of cultivating a secure existential attachment. We talk about what that means and explore what it feels like to have a secure attachment to source, life, or existence itself.

In this fascinating conversation, we also explore themes of love and shame, the experience of spiritual bypass, and what Joseph Campbell really meant when he encouraged us to follow our bliss.

We talk about the experience of gods dying and being born, as well as the necessity of living with what Mackenzie calls “crucifying paradoxes.”

Mackenzie Amara is a writer, researcher, consultant, & 5Rhythms® teacher. She is a Diploma Candidate at the International School of Analytical Psychology in Zurich, training to become a Jungian analyst, and she is a clinical psychology doctoral student at Saybrook University in Oakland, CA. She holds a Master's degree in Clinical & Counseling Psychology from Columbia University & a Bachelor's degree in Psychology & Spiritual Experience with a minor in Child & Adolescent Psychology from New York University. She is certified in Integrative Harm Reduction Psychotherapy (The New School & Center for Optimal Living), 5Rhythms® (The Moving Center), and Holistic Psychology (The Open Center). Her research interests include psychedelic psychotherapy, psychedelic integration, dream analysis, mythology & symbolism in clinical practice, and the application of nondual teachings to human growth. 

Connect with Mackenzie:

Website

Substack

IG

Upcoming retreat

Connect with Vanya:

Website

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Contact Vanya

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Download free eBook: A Guide to Leaving the Obedient Life

In this conversation, Perdita Finn and I talk about the generosity of the long stories of our souls, explore what it means to have meaningful relationship with the dead, and circle around deep questions of belonging and connection.

Acknowledging that our species often feels lonely, bereft, and disconnected, Perdita invites us to wonder about what it would be like to live in an “economy of prayer.”

She asks this beautiful question: How would we live if we all remembered we have been each others mothers?

Her work invites us into a sense of deep belonging with all beings ~ human and more-than-human, living and dead.

Perdita Finn is the author of Take Back the Magic: Conversations with the Unseen World and the forthcoming Mother Spell: Summoning the Love at the Heart of the World. She is the co-founder with her husband Clark Strand of The Way of the Rose, an international fellowship of beings dedicated to the earth, the rosary, and the Lady by any name you want to call Her. They are co-authors of the book of the same name. They live with their family in the moss-filled shadows of the Catskill Mountains. 

You can connect more with Perdita and her work at here:

https://takebackthemagic.com/

https://wayoftherose.org/

IG: @perditafinn

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Connect with Vanya

Sign up for Vanya’s Letters

Download free eBook: A Guide to Leaving the Obedient Life

In this episode, Amy Wilding joins me in this wonderful conversation about finding inner permission, cultivating body sovereignty, and decolonizing our inner landscapes as we walk into more fullness and freedom.

Amy shares about how her body led her into a powerful awakening of her wise and wild knowing. We talk about ways patriarchal consciousness uses our disconnection from our bodies as a tool of oppression, emphasizing the importance of body autonomy and cyclical literacy.

As we weave our way through this conversation, we explore the significance of finding the voice of our pleasure and honoring what feels good right now as powerful ways of knowing, guidance, and liberation.

Amy has been leading women's circles and mother-daughter circles in the Louisville area for over 15 years. Her soul work is, first and foremost, dismantling patriarchy by creating safe spaces for women to access their wild wisdom and reclaim their inherent power. She supports people of all ages in cultivating body sovereignty, cycle literacy, and empowered embodiment. She is passionate about guiding menstruators in connecting with their inherent wisdom, and unlearning the shame and taboo related to our amazing, powerful bodies.

Amy is a queer and inclusive feminist, author, and National Board Certified Integrative Women's Health Coach. Her first first book, Wild & Wise: Sacred Feminine Meditations for Women's Circles & Personal Awakening, was published in 2017, and her next book, Period of Change: Welcoming Your Daughter's Period with Care and Confidence will be launched in March of 2026.

Ways to connect with Amy:

www.periodofchange.com

www.redtentlouisville.com

Facebook: www.facebook.com/amywildingofficial

Insta: www.instagram.com/amywildingofficial

Insta: www.instagram.com/periodofchange

Ways to connect with Vanya:

www.drvanyaleilani.com

IG: @drvanyaleilani

Download Vanya's free eBook, A Guide to Leaving the Obedient Life

Check out Belonging to the Wild Collective

Order Vanya's book, The Flesh & The Fruit

In this conversation, Dr. Thomas Moore and I explore the experience of creative transgression and the relationship between Eros and transgression. Deeply grounded in the archetypal sensibility and perspective, we discuss the role of obedience and disobedience in the soulful life and the importance of being faithful to the creativedaimon.

In this intimate conversation, Dr. Moore shares his views on what he calls “imaginal theology” and what it means to live in spiritual sovereignty.

Thomas Moore is the author ofCare of the Soul, a bestseller on the New York Times list for almost a year. Since then he has written thirty books on matters of soul and spirit. He lectures in many parts of the world, recently online in Rome, Brazil, Argentina, Romania, Malta, Russia, Serbia, the United States, and Canada. In those years he has also been a psychotherapist influenced mainly by C. G. Jung and James Hillman, his close friend for four decades. He has won many awards, including an honorary doctorate from Lesley University and the 2003 Humanitarian Award from Einstein Medical School. He has been an archetypal analyst and an unaffiliated theologian. Thomas’s most recent book is The Eloquence of Silence.

Thomas Moore's website

Vanya's Book: The Flesh & The Fruit

Download Vanya's Free eBook: A Guide to Leaving the Obedient Life

In this conversation, Ben tells us the story of realizing that at some point his heart had snuck out the back door. In that moment he heard these powerful words: “if you don’t have your heart you have nothing.” He tells us about how this experience launched him into a mythic quest to find his heart again, a journey he shares in his book The Way Home.

We talk about his experiences with synchronicities, vision quests, and the power of images to guide us on our mythic journeys. We explore practices that help us find our heart and Ben encourages us to find practices that “we feel charm around” as we court our hearts back to the center of our lives.

Ben Katt is a meditation teacher, hospice chaplain, and coach. He is the author of THE WAY HOME: Discovering the Hero’s Journey to Wholeness at Midlife. Ben teaches meditation in prisons and facilitates wellbeing experiences for companies and organizations. He is a certified advanced meditation teacher, holds a Master of Divinity degree, and is a former ordained minister. He lives in Milwaukee, WI with his wife and three children.

website: www.benjaminkatt.com

book link: thewayhomebook.com

IG: @akabenkatt

Here is the episode with Cherie that I mentioned:

Sexuality, Spirituality, and Self-Belonging with Cherie Katt

I would love to connect with you!

Website: www.drvanyaleilani.com

Check out my new book: The Flesh and the Fruit

Download my free eBook:

A Guide for Leaving the Obedient Life

Offerings in The School of Wild Knowing

Find me on Instagram @drvanyaleilani

In this conversation, I am joined by the wonderful Molly Remer, MSW, D.Min. We discuss the dance between effort and ease that our days bring.

We explore what she calls, “the revolution of lying down” and the importance of recognizing when we are on the edge of too-muchness.

We talk about honoring our limitations and finding places of restoration. Molly also shares her beautiful insights on cultivating the sacred experience in everyday life and on the magic of power spots. 

To connect more with Molly and her work:

Etsy shop for books and goddesses: http://brigidsgrove.etsy/com

Daily practice and everyday magic: http://30daysofgoddess.com

Power Spots kit: https://www.30daysofgoddess.com/power-spots-resource-kit

Permission slips for allowing: https://brigidsgrove.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Permission-Slips.pdf

Also

Find our more about my book, The Flesh and the Fruit

Find out more about The School of Wild Knowing enrolling now!

In this conversation, Erin and I explore what it means to follow the ways of water. She shares the significance of her lifelong relationship with water, and we talk about how water remembers where we come from and where we belong. We also talk about desire as a key to our belonging and the power to create and re-create worlds by following what we want.  

As we follow the ways of water, Erin helps us re-member ourselves as part of Nature and invites us into re-membering our belonging here in these bodies and on this Earth. She shares suggestions for ways of practicing embodiment and staying close to the lived experiences of our bodies.

Erin Chalfant, MA, MFA is Program Director and Core Faculty at Alliance Avalonia a Published Author, Holistic Coach, mother, adventurer and mystic. She is the founder of Wild Sage Path, where she supports women in reconnecting with themselves through Earth-Based Spirituality Practices in the Indigenous Celtic Traditions. She facilitates deep and powerful work in ceremonial spaces with plant medicines and supports the integration process for a variety of profound journeys. She is completing a Doctorate in Depth Psychology and is rooted in Indigenous Earth-Based Wisdom Practices, Western Herbalism, Hatha Yoga, Hakomi (Mindfulness-based Somatic Psychotherapy), and Buddhist Meditation.  She offers 1-1 integrative counseling sessions both in person and remotely in California, and also teaches online class immersions that open seasonally, including The Song of the Dragon ~ a collaboration with her teacher and dear friend Holly Hamilton at Alliance Avalonia.

To connect with Erin:

Visit her at WildSagePath.com

IG @Erin.of.the.wild

To connect with Vanya:

Visit www.drvanyaleilani.com

IG @drvanyaleilani

In this episode, I tell the story of Bluebeard and explore this archetypal figure. Bluebeard exposes the nuances of a kind of archetypal experience where we may be charmed into believing that what keeps us too small is beautiful, and that what offers us favor is also keeping us safe when in fact, it is plotting our disappearance.

Bluebeard forbids knowing and demands unquestioned obedience. In this story we find a powerful example of how disobedience can propel us out of harm and falseness and into safety and freedom.

Dr Clarissa Pinkola Estes wrote that learning to recognize Bluebeard is an initiation into becoming someone who know how to see beyond the overt. Learning to recognize Bluebeard in our lives is crucial as we transgress out of obedience into more freedom, sovereignty, and belonging.

www.drvanyaleilani.com

@drvanyaleilani

Download Ebook for free:

A Guide to Leaving the Obedient Life

In this episode, Lucy H. Pearce shares her thoughts, experiences, and deep wisdom with us as we explore creativity and the creative life. We talk about the threshold where the urgent creative force meets daily life, and the treasures and tensions we might meet there. Our conversation includes questions and reflections on the nature of creativity, recognizing its call, and the importance of knowing when things are just too much. We talk about the importance of claiming our own time and of being meaning-makers rather than only consumers.

As we circle around creativity and the creative life, we recognize creativity as magical and sacred act as we engage with the unknown and bring it into form.

In this beautiful conversation, Lucy offers us her vulnerability and truths as she tells us about both the freedom and the sacrifices that come along with living a life devoted to creativity.

More about Lucy ~

Crow Moon: reclaiming the wisdom of the dark woods, the latest book by Lucy H. Pearce is available worldwide wherever you get your books. For signed copies visit https://womancraftpublishing.com/product/crow-moon/

AND

Join Lucy H. Pearce for a Live Masterclass on Tuesday 28th May, 7-8.30pm UK time (BST)

WORD + image LIVE MASTERCLASS: Becoming Visible

Join Lucy as she shares one of the key images – the cloak – from her most recent book, Crow Moon in this live Zoom class. This class is for you if you are wanting to step into greater visibility in your life – be that public speaking, sharing your art or writing, starting or building a public social media presence, wanting to unmask and be more authentically yourself with family and friends, taking on a larger role at work, sharing more openly about your spiritual path, starting a blog or podcast, starting or leading a group…

Find out more and sign up - https://womancraftpublishing.com/product/becoming-visible/

lucyhpearce.com

You can also find Womancraft and Lucy on instagram:

@lucyhpearce

@womancraft_publishing

In this episode, I talk with Dr. Safron Rossi about the Kore Goddess, an archetypal pattern that is deeply linked with sovereignty, self-belonging, and psychological integrity.

The Kore has to do with our ability to know where we stand, to be grounded in our deep essential nature, and to be in vital relationship with our own emotional reality and vision. The Kore sanctifies the inner life.

Focusing on Persephone as a primary example of a Kore goddess, Dr. Rossi explores the complexity of this pattern and the ways in which we can return to the Kore even as we live out the many roles involved in the human drama.

We discuss the mythic and archetypal significance of virginity as an inviolable “unto-one-selfness” and the power of the Kore to guide us into a state of being where we are one-in-ourselves.

Find more of Dr. Safron Rossi's work:

www.thearchetypaleye.com

www.winterpresspublishers.com

IG @archetypaleye