Mark [0:00] Connection of the Heart are deeply essential and it is wonderful to welcome Jan, to the Heart of Connection podcast.  I’m your host Mark Randall and it’s wonderful to reconnect with you down here at Steele Island, in Tasmania for the Association of Transpersonal & Experiential Psychotherapists (ATEP) bi-annual gathering.  Just by way of intro Jan, would you mind giving a short brief introduction of where you fit into the picture?

Jan [0:23] Okay, all right.  Well, hi Mark.  It’s great that you put your hand up and joined us down here in downtown Carlton Steeles Island.   Right here, right now, I’m a 68-year-old, who’s been part of an organization, which is now called Association of Transpersonal & Experiential Psychotherapists (ATEP).   I put my hand up 18 months or so ago to coordinate our next gathering, conference gathering.   I’ve been part of this community for close on 30 years now.   There are 30 odd people have come from all over the country flown in.  There is a number from Tasmania because its’ down here in Tassie, just outside of Hobart.

I have worked within or under this organization – under this banner, as a full-time psychotherapist.  I was a co-director of an organization that did personal and professional development, over a number of years.  I’ve sort of retired, but from this gathering, I might be coming out of retirement (laughter).  Which is a bit scary, apart from, I’m thinking quite selfishly, I don’t know how much I want to give of myself again.  So it’s an interesting question.

Which possibly leads me into the heading of your podcast about Heart of connection and what that means for me.  Yeah!  So, it is a new wording.   So have any had a few minutes to get my head around it, and possibly my heart.  So I am thinking about it and right here, right now, I’m really connected. One of the delights, I guess, of, in this case, putting my hand up to coordinate this gathering.

Fortunately, 3 others, my partner and two very close friends, said you we’ll support you.  So it’s a four-person gathering or four-person facilitation.   One of the delights is the fact that I do reconnect with people who have really been part of my hearts journey.   I feel really moved for that.  So from a selfish perspective, or self-interest, this, even though there’s been quite a lot of work in organizing this, now that we’re here, and it’s all happening, this is a pretty good mob!  Our hearts are really important places for us to go to, and to be aware of.

Mark [3:26] Is the Heart an important place to connect?

Jan [3:32]

Mark [0:00] Welcome to the Heart of Connection podcast.  I’m your host Mark Randall. It’s wonderful to have you on board to have a conversation about the heart of connection. Just by way of introduction, which might give me a brief introduction to yourself, please.

Deb [0:13] Thank you, Mark.   Thank you for inviting me here today.  We’re meeting and we are at a National Gathering of the Association of Transpersonal and Experiential Psychotherapists. I work as a facilitator and also a life coach in my practice Conscious Work – Professional Development.   I’ve been really involved in personal professional development work well, most of my life, really.  Although I have worked in other ways.  I’ve always been enticed by interest, really.  Oh, that looks fun that looks interesting, that looks engaging, that looks like something I’d like to do. So I’ve had a number of different careers, I guess.  Enabling other people and seeing people grow and develop has been a real kind of thread and passion through my life.

Mark [1:03] Is that a connection for you?

Deb [1:05] Yes, definitely.  Absolutely.  When I see, I guess, people respond and people light up.  And people have ‘aha moments,’ or just shining a light on some steps or a place for people to hang out. But they haven’t thought about hanging out before.  And start their own journey of discovery is Yeah, definitely been one of the things I’ve love to do.

Mark [1:36] How do you connect to yourself?  Do you have a process?  What’s your – how do you do it?

Deb [1:42] Yeah, it’s a really good question, actually.   I would say that it’s not always as conscious as I could make that.  I take quite a lot of quiet time on own.  So I meditate, and I take quite a lot of time in nature.  I walk, surf and run and just have to get out into nature every day.  When I had a dog that was a lot easier to do twice a day.   These days, you know, I need that thing called self-discipline really, to kind of keep that really front and center. It’s easy or it’s such a temptation to just work a little bit longer and work a little bit harder.   That doesn’t connect me with myself, that takes me away from myself.

Mark [2:45] Do you disconnect from yourself a little bit in that?

Deb [2:48] Yeah, I do.  Yeah, I really do.  Sometimes to get through that list, or to just finish something before the end of the day, you know.  I’ve got an internal driver that has been hard at times to keep quiet, to quieten her. To keep her sort o

Mark [0:00] Patrica Nolan it’s an honor and a privilege to be sitting here at Steele Island at the ATEP bi-annual conference or gathering. My name is Mark Randall as you know, I’m the host of the Heart of Connection Podcast. It’s a lovely opportunity to sit here with a doyen of the ATEP an elder of the ATEP community. Just by way of introduction, could you let listeners know, who you are and how it all came about?

Pat [0:41] Yes, I’ll do my best. As far as the inner journey work goes, I was working in a New South Wales in a small country town, with the indigenous community there. I and two others on the team work together. We did just walked along with the people and listened to their dreams and helped them put into form some of those dreams.  Until about, we’d been there for about 10 years.  They were up and active and had some of the association’s operative. We thought it’s time for us to move out. If we stay here, we will remain the kind of the focal point. They need to have that for themselves. So at that point, I had lots of inner reactionary material.  Particularly about racism in the town.

I went and heard from a chap who was a Jungian analyst, who had come north to run a dream workshop. He spoke about breath-work that he had learned about from a woman in Sydney, who had been to America, learned it all from Stanislav Grof, who was psychiatrist from behind the Iron Curtain. He got out from there to America and was practicing in America. She eventually found him and did her training with him. One of the things she heard was, in one of her sessions, heal the planet and she freaked.

He said, it just means, take step one.  Take this work back to Australia.  She did that and started Euro house in Balmain Sydney. Until she heard another directive in one of her sessions which was go to the Blue Mountains. So John Jensen, she’d met up with him, the two of them went to the Blue Mountains looking for a place to establish what we now call. “The Work.” She had also formed a new relationship, with a man who was a bodyworker. They found a place called it, “The Living Waters Centre” and people in those days, which was, think the late

Mark [0:00] Hello, Margie.  Welcome to the Heart of Connection podcast.  I’m your host, Mark Randall and it’s a real pleasure to be able to sit with you for the next 30 minutes to have a conversation about the heart connection.  Just by way of getting started, would you mind giving a little bit of an introduction to your kind self?

Margie [0:19] Hi Mark and thank you for having me.  I’m a mother of three.  That’s I guess my purpose in life is a mother and that comes first with everything.  I’m a nurse by trade I guess.   I worked in many areas of nursing, but I keep going back to mental health and I have a passion for perinatal area of mental health and substance use.

Mark [0:53] Is there a connection to it?

Margie [0:56] I think so.  I guess I’m a mother, so for me, you know, there’s a bit of a mothering thing, but in mothering, what I really value about mothering is empowering.  I think it’s really important to empower yourself and your children and family.  To be able to take control and decide what they want to do with their life and how they want to get there.  I think that’s really important, and I guess that’s why I keep going back to mental health.

Mark [1:33] And when you step away, what draws you back?

Margie [1:38] So – It’s that I can sit and be with people.  It is not task oriented as in other areas of nursing.   It’s just – it’s being with people. They allow you to come into their lives and they trust you and they value you and you see people change.  Even if it’s just the slightest little bit, by helping them to empower themselves that change occurs, it’s rewarding.

Mark [2:13] As you’re sharing that with me, is there a connection in that process of change between you and the client or you and the person you’re working with?

Margie [2:23] Yes, there is because those connections are about helping them to understand who they are.  I try to do that just through my observations and getting to know them.  It is helping them to develop their awareness of themselves and how they react, how they respond, how they think about what’s happening in their world.

Mark [0:00] Hello Daniel, welcome to the Heart of Connection podcast. I’m your host, Mark Randall and it’s lovely to be talking to you all the way from Australia to San Diego.  How is it over there on this lovely Saturday morning day morning here, Friday afternoon your time.

Daniel [0:16] Yes, San Diego is going through like a revolution.  We used to be 70 degrees all the time.  Now to this morning, we woke up with 39 degrees. That is cold for us. Normally, when it’s 69 we put on our parkers and think, there’s global warming effecting us. (Laughter)…..We’re supposed to have this level weather but it’s gone bonkers disasters but it’s beautiful.  The sun is out, ocean few blocks away, just having you know, we just need something to mess ourselves up with, right?

Mark [0:49] Are you well connected to San Diego?

Daniel [0:54] I am a hermit by nature.  So I’m connected but I also am very secluded.  If you think about a person who should write a book called, The Mosaic on connection, I would be the least likely person to write that book.   Had I had my druthers, I would be sitting in a cave in the Himalayas.  I would just be spending the rest of my time meditating and enjoying the rest of my life with a vertical relationship to God.  For some reason, God decided to play a big joke on me.

Mark [1:37] So if you’re not connected to, if you’re more of a hermit, would that then suggest you’ve got a more of an introverted connection to yourself, or a connection to self, rather than others?

Daniel [1:51] I think I have a great connection to people when I go out there and do it.  It’s just like the other day we went and did a book club.  They invited us to come, my wife and I to the book club and present on The Mosaic

Mark [0:00] Hi Tracey, welcome to the heart connection podcast.   I’m your host, Mark Randall and it’s lovely to the in downtown Koroit having a conversation with you.  Just by way of introduction would you mind giving a brief introduction to who you are and what life’s like for you?

Tracey [0:16] No worries.  I am Tracey Mahony I was born Tracey Whitehead in Port Fairy a small town in Victoria.  Here, I  am not far from where I was born.   I’ve traveled lots and lots of places all over Australia and done many jobs.   Here I am back near home.   I have my four grandchildren in my care now and that is what I do by way of work.  Although I’ve done many things I’m very passionate about music, culture, and spirituality.

Mark [0:44] Cool.  Being raised in Port Fairy, traveled the world, now back in Koroit.  Is there a connection and affinity to this region, is this home?

Tracey [0:55] Definitely, this is home.  I am quite passionate about the fact that people do need to go home.  Even if it’s just to revisit as far as go ‘back to country’ and then they can continue with their life.

Mark [1:07] Tell me, the Heart of Connection when we’ve had this conversation, we had it a while ago.  When you think about or feel, what happens for you with that concept, the Heart of Connection, what comes up in your mind?

Tracey [1:23] I like the idea that our spiritual health, physical health, and mental health are all just one.  That is health. So if something’s a little bit amiss, that disrupts the conduit – the connectivity.  We can become less efficient and I like to help people to be efficient with their words and their mindfulness.

Mark [1:50] How do you connect. What and how do you connect to yourself?  What do you notice and what’s your process to connect to Tracy?

Tracey [1:58] I love to be on my own.   I find one of my favorite things that I do, is I either go to the ocean, which is only five minutes from here. That’s a really big thing for me, which frees my mind and that’s how I connect to the real me.  It is not about, “did I get milk and bread for tea or whatever.”  The deeper thing – the other thing I love to do, is in my garden, so I’m very big on nature.  Nature’s my connectivity.  Nature is my God.

Mark [0:00] Thank you, Frank, for being a guest on the Heart of Connection podcast.  I am your host Mark Randall.  It’s lovely to have an opportunity to sit with you and have a conversation, about the Heart of Connection – to self, others or All That Is.

Frank [0:13] Absolutely pleasure, Mark I’m looking forward to it.

Mark [0:17] Just by way of introduction can you give a brief story on and not that too many of us in Geelong need a story of who you are (laughter).

Frank [0:26] I am a Geelong born and born and bred boy.  I can only praise this rices tan up to the highest. The people that came before us that worked hard and contributed to making Geelong what it is today.  It has been a boon for all families coming into this town.   I’ve always said, that it was Australia’s best-kept secret, Geelong.  Our lifestyle living here and the ease of raising a family, the lower cost of housing compared to Melbourne. The quality of education in Geelong from primary school right up to tertiary.  The wonderful health services we’ve got at all levels, the recreation facilities, everything that goes to make up Geelong. This means for the family they want to raise their children and educate them here and perhaps get them into lifetime employment, you want to find a better place in the country, any country for that matter.  So, you know absolutely dyed in the wool Geelong ite.

I've always said, that it was Australia's best-kept secret, Geelong. 
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Mark [1:23] And you’re well connected to Geelong?

Frank [1:25] Absolutely. Started off that way. I was born to parents that ran a business right in the centre of Geelong.  A fruit and vegetable business.  We were living upstairs in a five-bedroom apartment on top of the shop. So I got connected with people very early in my life.  Through all the shops around us, with the suppliers coming in, with the customers.

The most important asset any organizations ever got, whether it was from

Mark [0:00] Hello Belinda, welcome to the How to connection podcast.  I’m your host, Mark Randall and it’s a real honour and a privilege to be able to sit here with you today and have a conversation about the how the Heart of Connection.  By way of introduction would you mind sharing a short story about who you are and what life means to you, I’m just joking – but yes just a brief introduction to get the ball rolling.

Belinda [0:24] Absolutely. Thanks for having me, Mark. I am Belinda and I probably would say the best thing to describe my stories that I’m still on a huge journey of getting to know myself and where I fit in the world.   The things that I suppose are important to me the fact that I grew up at the beach.  The beach is really important to me, and connection with family and friends.  I’ve got a huge supportive group of friends and family and that sense of community growing up in a little beach town.  I still living a beach town now.  I guess what I do defines me a little bit as well.  My backgrounds in nursing, I’ve been doing that for nearly 20 years and I’ve most recently become a play therapist as well.   I’ve got a background working with helping people really through mental health, community health, Child and Adolescent Health and Family Support.  So that’s really my area of passion and what makes me light up.

Mark [1:32] Great. The transition from nursing through to play therapy how does that connection come about for you?

Belinda [1:44] I’ve noticed, it’s a different sort of connection, if we’re thinking about being in the heart and being in the mind nursing, despite being a brilliant helpful career and, being able to really help people.  I feel like it’s very task orientated, especially in the acute setting in the hospitals.  That’s probably one of the reasons I got out of working in hospitals.  I felt like I constantly have to say to patients, I’ll be back in a minute, we were just so under the pump, constantly doing things and we didn’t really get to connect.   It is similar in clinical settings, not in an acute setting.   In the community, despite having more opportunity to be one-on-one with patients or clients or consumers or whatever you’d like to call them, you did get to connect, but it was time limited.   What I’ve found through diving into the world of play therapy, and I haven’t as a student, I’ve only just graduated.   I haven’t had a huge amount of experience yet but you do get to get into a deeper level of connection with people.   It is more of a heart connection, especially with kids, because they don’t get through their play.  It is pre-verbal or nonverbal sometimes.

Mark [3:07] What’s it like to start to experience the world of Heart, the play of the non-verbal side of for children?

Mark [0:00] Thank you for coming in for a conversation regarding the heart of connection.  I’m your host, Mark Randall.  Thank you for taking the time and I really appreciate you for coming in to have a conversation.  By way of introduction, could you give a little bit of a brief story about yourself?

Rhiannon [0:20] Thank you for having me.   I have two young children, one beautiful loving husband and I have been working in Foster care for the last 10 years.   Recently in my maternity leave, I went back to university and I have almost completed my Masters in child play therapy.   That is my journey at the moment.  This is where I am sitting as it is all kind of interlinked.  Having children of my own young children, and doing this course has been quite valuable.  There are some powerful learnings throughout the whole of my life.

Mark [1:03] What sparked the interesting child play therapy as a Masters?

Rhiannon [1:09] I was in a role in therapeutic foster care.   It was around providing a system that could help a family around their children.   I was in contact with the parents and the children and my role was to assist the parent and the child to improve their attachment and to deepen their relationship.  I was doing things within the context of this attachment and realized this is interesting.  I found I needed to something a bit different.  The role wasn’t satisfying me and I had a need to do something different.  When I went on maternity leave, I thought, or maybe it’s time to start exploring this need.  I wonder whether I would feel different after being a parent and returning into the foster care realm.  I wondered whether that would have a different impact on me emotionally.   The hours are really quite tricky and did not want to be leaving my children for long periods in the day.  I wanted a role that fitted my lifestyle and also fitted this burning desire, to fulfill something in me that I wanted to do within my career.