God and Stuff Like That Podcast

What do you get when you mix:

* Being born a trans woman

* Into a fundamentalist Christian family in Hattiesburg, Mississippi

* But the family culture is full of love, support, stability, and a shared search for meaning and integrity

* But the fundamentalist religion is the King of the Castle

* But you’re a courageous AF lady who is also tender AF

You get someone who is seeing into spirit realms most of us miss.

You get a person who has followed their pain to the deepest kind of liberation, but doesn’t sugarcoat the sacrifice.

You get a healer who can guide you through hell like Martha Stewart can guide you through hosting Easter Brunch.

Hope you enjoy!

XO,

Nora

P.S. I thought about removing the first 4 minutes wherein we talk about how we met because—while it is an example of self trust for both of us— it doesn’t really hold a candle to the experiences that she describes in the rest of the podcast. But I kept it in because a.) healing my perfectionism and b.) it’s on brand for the thing we are talking about and c.) you can just slide that little slider to minute 5 if you don’t want to hear us blow each other’s minds with how amazing it is that we met at all.

P.P.S. I love your feedback! Did you love it? Have a suggestion? Please lmk.

P.P.S. I really feel this podcast could help people, especially trans kids and adults too. Please share widely with those you think could use the wisdom.

In my first session with Dave, back in 2014, we talked a little at the beginning about what was bothering me (my kamikaze flight into the underworld is what was bothering me). After I told him about the smoking engines and fast-approaching tarmac, he didn’t keep talking at me. Didn’t introduce new ideas or insights. Didn’t even ask me about my family or early attachments.

He asked me where I felt the terror in my body. Then he invited me into a meditation that was more akin to a psilocybin trip than a have-you-thought-about-it-this-way therapy session. I connected to the thing in me that could witness the terror, love her as a part of me, and bring her meaningful comfort for the first time since my plane had begun to plummet toward the River Stix. The bomber transformed into a sea plane and I skidded out of his office on water—something was in me that could love that dark place. Something in me was not afraid. Something in me was reliable and calm, even as my life burned around me.

So that’s Dave for ya. I ended up in his mentorship for five years, and the work we did together is the foundation of all my individual work with my clients.

I hope you enjoy this interview with him. We talk about the trauma that led him to lose his self trust, how he found his way back to it, and the life that unfolded once he could trust himself to lead it. We also touch on how to trust oneself in the middle of therapy session going god-knows-where, and a current example in Dave’s life of rejecting productivity-culture and sliding into the self-trust river instead.

You can find Dave’s books, courses, and mentorship/ healing work on his website.

Please note: The views expressed in this podcast are for artistic, educational, and entertainment purposes only. As the host, I appear solely as an artist/creator, and this content does not constitute medical advice, therapy, or a professional client relationship. I do not condone, encourage, or recommend the use of psychedelics outside of a legal, medically supervised, therapeutic context. Listeners should consult with a qualified healthcare professional before making any decisions regarding substance use or mental health treatment.Before I met Dave, I relied on psychics, Zen teachers, witches and tarot cards for my healing journey. Therapists had never been helpful. They parroted back my neuroses almost as well as my most distracted friends.

The first interview! May you enjoy it.

Check out Heather’s music here.

Check out the rest of her incredible work here.

Heather is the only person I know who is fully living into and creating a culture that honors the pre-patriarchal/ post-patriarchal ways. Her commitment to this imbues everything she creates and every sacrifice she has made to get there.

She’s also hilarious and grounded and we have a precious vision of spoofing our own identities as spiritual millennials.

PS! The practice she shares at the end has been really useful for me in the month since we talked—it is at minute 30. TTYL!

This podcast is about God and Stuff Like That (creative process, ancestral wisdom and burdens, intuition, boogie-boarding the Tao in a wetsuit that’s too small, getting sunburned by these unbearable beams of love, etc.)

Today's episode is the first in the Self Trust Series, wherein I’ll be interviewing my friends and mentors who have really thrown down in the self-trust poker game of life. I’m asking everyone the same five questions, keeping each interview under thirty minutes, and generally doing research for myself that I would love to share with you. Each person will end with a little practice on how to generate self-trust.

Excited y’all! Please enjoy this 3 minute podcast intro that I recorded on a voice memo by the side of busy road. Perfectionism is the opposite of our brand strategy here at God and Stuff Like That.