If the devil can't get to you, he will make you rush.

"We think our limits live in the dreams we don’t chase, in the tasks we put off, in the emotions that we avoid - but they’re most alive in all of the small ways we deny our right to enjoy life.

In the ferocious hurry between movements, in the relentless devotion to our False God of Control that promises certainty we never actually find.

We yearn for love, but refuse to let life touch us. 

Even when it’s right in our hands - fragrant, bright, asking only to be received, we mistake consumption for communion." - Realizations from Near Death

Let this episode bring you home. 

-—  

Sign up HERE the FREE Heart-Healing 10-Day Challenge co-hosted with CURE Hydration - starting MONDAY, 2.16.

Sign up for the mailing list <3 - you get a free energy protection meditation when you sign up!

Patreon

If You Liked this Episode - You'll Like This One, Too!

I Had A Spiritual Awakening Running a Marathon

Socials:

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

I recorded this for the woman whose thought about joining this retreat but told herself it wasn't possible. This episode a full, honest walkthrough of why this retreat exists, what it's grounded in, who it's for, and what we will be creating in the jungle together.

There are five days left to join us and a few spots still open.

BOOKING CLOSES ON 1/31. RETREAT IS MARCH 22-27TH.

• Booking Page (Use Code FSO200 for $200 Off)
• Book a Call with Me to Talk it Through: https://calendly.com/fontanavg63/costa-rica-retreat-info-session
• Reach out over IG with any questions: https://www.instagram.com/byvanessafontana?igsh=OGQxcXdiMHRiM3g5&utm_source=qr

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

"I learned how to reach for my dreams with a shaky hand. And time and time again, I’ve seen that once they are in my palms - it makes no difference if I really believe they should be there or not. Because here they are. In my hands. I cannot drop them. I have claimed them. They are a gift and yet - they have always been mine."

- an excerpt from my most recent essay "Dreams" (which I read to you in this episode <3) 

This episode sits inside of the humbling silence of realizing you've been playing it small when you've always been meant to shine - that you've been playing it safe when you've always been divinely protected to expand.

Your dreams already believe in you.

There is nothing to change here, nothing to fix, and nothing to do.

There is only remembering. 

---

IF YOU LOVE FSO, LEAVE A COMMENT <3 RATE THE SHOW 5 STARS <3 FOLLOW WHEREVER YOU GET YOUR PODCASTS. I LOVE UUU

-

COSTA RICA 3 SPOTS LEFT - CODE: FSO200 FOR $200 OFF - YOU HAVE UNTIL JAN 30 TO BOOK.

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

We won’t ever say it aloud - but most of us hold an ideal of perfection inside of our self-development routines.

And after spending enough time nipping and tucking away pieces of ourselves that we don't like in an effort to curate the most acceptable, palatable, "perfect" version of us - what many of us will find is this:

We are only as whole as we are able to accept the parts of us that don’t make us feel like it. 

We are only as healed as we are able to hold our brokenness. 

We are only as loving as we are to the pieces of us that we can’t fathom. 

And we will come to know, by peering into the depths of our own hearts long enough to see the it's shadows, that the space that is our bodies was created to hold love for our imperfect flesh. 

This episode is another reflection on a topic that is core to Figuring Sh!t Out: Shadow-Work. It is a continued conversation from recent dialogue on stretching our capacity for complexity within us and expanding our conscious creation in this world.

May it be a friend to you when you feel the tenderness of being deeply human.

xx

THANK YOU for listening!! If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3 Don't forget to rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

----

APPLICATION TO JOIN THE FSO TEAM AS AN EDITOR (SOCIAL MEDIA / PODCAST) OR A COMMUNICATIONS ASSISTANT: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScsKyjL0Qfsl2jZimwm_TVrb1zLT798zoChzgp9_9IZEHitWw/viewform?usp=publish-editor

COSTA RICA spots are still open!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it / want a discount code <3 YOU HAVE UNTIL JAN 30 TO BOOK.

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

If you liked this episode, you'll like these too!

Episode 21: A Beginner's Guide to Shadow-Work

Episode 37: Healing Self-Expression, Shadow-Work Series

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

"We are mosaics. Pieces of light, love, history, stars. Glued together with magic and music and words." - Anna Kritzen

There’s a quiet grief that lives inside a lot of people.

Because we’ve learned how to contain ourselves.

Creativity was once somewhere we all went to feel alive, and became something we use to prove who we are. 

We learn to identify with a medium, a label, an aesthetic, a version of ourselves to be understood, admired, approved of. And without realizing it - these identities shrink us. 

This episode is about how identifying too tightly with a creative medium - or with being good at something - can quietly disconnect us from our true nature, which is plural, fluid, and undefinable. When creativity becomes performance, identity, or ego, it stops being an expression of our aliveness and starts feeding validation instead.

Today, I’m talking about creative repression, the “shadow artist,” and what it really means to be a starving artist - not financially, but spiritually. We’ll explore how boxing ourselves into one identity limits our expression, why losing passion is often a sign of creative deprivation, and how curiosity, play, and permission to be bad can reopen the door.

As Julia Cameron once said: ""You're either losing your mind or gaining your soul."

--

THANK YOU for listening!! If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3 Don't forget to rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

----

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

COSTA RICA spots are still open!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it / want a discount code <3 YOU HAVE UNTIL JAN 30 TO BOOK.

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

If you liked this episode, you may like this one too:--

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This episode is not what you think it is. 

It is not a hustle-forward, all-gas-no-breaks charge to a new year. 

But it is also not a total rejection of the new year.

It is a subtle and soft invitation into moving forward with reflection, ritual, and intention. 

Through redefining and examining our relationship with "locking in," or what we turn out focus towards, we can refine our communion with newness in a way that feels true to us.

This episode offers a three-phase process to entering - might we even say *sauntering* - into the new year in a way that will allow our new year practices to feel like sustainable daily rhythms rather than temporary sprints & quick fixes. 

This is a conversation about where and how we spend our time & attention, and will give you a framework of tools to carry forward as you reflect on the previous year and look ahead at the new one.

It asks two questions to answer honestly, poignantly, (and to take time meditating upon):

What have you been locked into in 2025?

And what are you ready to unlock in 2026?

These questions aren't so much asking to be answered directly, yet used as pointers to the emerging answers within you that come from peering inwards and sitting with self.

May these suggestions support you as you continue to evolve & figure sh!t out in 2026.

---

THANK YOU for listening!! If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3 Don't forget to rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

----

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

COSTA RICA spots are still open!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it / want a discount code <3 YOU HAVE UNTIL JAN 30 TO BOOK.

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

If you liked this episode, you may like this one too:

Ep. 72: CREATE OR BE CONSUMED

--

Resources Mentioned in this Episode:

Digital garden: https://fransfieldnotes.substack.com/p/how-to-make-a-digital-garden-a-beginners

Wild geese podcast: https://open.spotify.com/episode/4j9fApvoYIkFYkJrMeHifp?si=b7ade01156704390

You need to be bored: https://hbr.org/2025/08/you-need-to-be-bored-heres-why

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

"Allow shame to find no home in your posture, in your dances, in your aura, in your lovemaking sounds, in your dreaming spaces, in your every single desire," - India Ame'ye

This episode is an exploration of releasing shame, guilt, and fear from our bodies and rekindling our inner magic.

Through poetry, storytelling, and recommended practices of somatic wisdom and inner reflection, this episode of creates conversation around what it means to let the soft animal of your body love what it love and wants what it wants.

Most saliently, it asks a few important questions (left here for your courtesy to journal about after listening):

1. What does it look like to take the best possible care of myself in this present moment life-situation I find myself in?
2. What would I do if it didn't have to be perfect? Or good? If the inner critic in my heart wasn't watching, judging, and eclipsing the inner child who just wanted to try?

If you take anything from this episode, let it be this:

You do not have to be good. You do not have to crawl on your knees for hundreds of miles repenting.

You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

(Courtesy of Mary Oliver, Wild Geese.)

--

If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3 Don't forget to rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

----

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

COSTA RICA spots are still open!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it <3

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

If you liked this episode, you may like this one too:

Episode 102: Unapologetic, Unconditional Beingness: Take up Space!

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Growing wiser into the ancient knowledge of our spirit and the animalistic nature of our humanity demands the realization that many things our society looks at as luxuries are actually necessities. 

One of them: rest.

As a society, we have a complicated relationship with rest. An anxious-avoidant one where we long for it, but don't want to get too comfortable in it. We crave it, yet we fear leaning into it.

In this Winter Solstice episode, we lean into a discussion about restoring balance in our natural rhythms and cycles through embracing rest and ritualizing our lives with intention.

I take you through my complicated and once toxic relationship with rest and productivity, and the ways that I've healed it.

What I've found is that -

Inspiration strikes most in surrender,

Romance can flourish in the spaces in between -

And when we allow ourselves the birthright of rest and recovery, we can receive so much more.

In a world that never stops turning, if lighting a candle and reading a book in the sun as it begins to set early is an act of rebellion, then let us all be the leaders of the next revolution.

-

If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3

Rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

-

Growth Diaries Template

COSTA RICA spots are still open!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it <3

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

IG: @byvanessafontana 

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

a reminder that it's as easy as a deep breath

and seeing that it has always been okay.

x

If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3

Rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

x

COSTA RICA spots are still open till 12/22!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it <3

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

IG: @byvanessafontana - follow along to see the voyage this week!

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This episode is about remembering that your purpose was never meant to look like anyone else’s - and releasing the comparison that’s been convincing you you’re behind.

I believe that we all have a gift. I believe that we all have a purpose. I believe that it is buried within the places we don’t want to look. It is entangled in the masterpieces of destruction, it is the diamond in the roughest moments of life, it is forged in the fire of standing tall as you face yourself - no longer running away. 

But in this age of endless self-help prescriptions from talking heads on the internet, 25 year old millionaires who tell you you're doing something wrong because you haven't figured out how to make 100k overnight while gallivanting at the beach, how can you not feel like you're behind? Like you’ve missed something?

Comparison does not just steal joy from you - it steals your knowing, your presence, your direction, and the thread of your purpose from you.

These are illusions that are meant to distort our inner compass and seep us into comparison. To keep you running towards something that isn’t your own.

No one else has lived the life you’ve lived through your precious eyes. 

And for that reason, the unique purpose that you have - the gifts that you have - are buried within the threads you have been weaving your whole life, not in the framework of someone else’s. 

This episode is for anyone who feels like they're behind, who feels a little confused, who feels like they don't quite know their purpose but have been trying to find it, who feels like they have one but don't know where to start in pursuing it, who wants to pursue creativity in some form but feels limited, who wants make their creativity their living but has no clue where to start -

I see you.

But here's the truth:

Knowing your purpose is only half of the equation.

Staying true to yourself in it is the other half. 

x

If you love FSO & this episode, leave a comment!! Tell me what resonated, share what you want to hear next <3

Rate the podcast on your preferred streaming platform!!

x

READ THE SUBSTACK PIECE HERE

COSTA RICA spots are still open till 12/22!! DM me over IG if you wanna chat about it <3

MAILING LIST (Sign up for 10% off Merch + a Free Energy Protection Meditation <3)

MERCH

IG: @byvanessafontana - follow along to see the voyage this week!

TIKTOK: @butterflyfountain 

Support this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/figuring-sht-out/donations

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy