In this episode, after a personal update, we get to have a delightful, informative, hopeful conversation with someone I consider a possibility model in collapse times, my friend, Kirsten Hunter. We're talking about parenting, trying to plan ahead, and how we go about trying to build community, trust, and collaborative decision-making during times of tumult, precarity, and turmoil. We get into managing the particular challenges of being a renter who is also gardener and a small scale farmer with a desire to live more communally.

Kirsten advocates for a return to earth-oriented living in response to the polycrisis of unravelling ecological, social, political, and spiritual systems under late-stage colonial capitalism. She is a mom, a civil servant, a volunteer counsellor at a local mental health non-profit, and a facilitator of the Work that Reconnects, an experiential framework for navigating collective despair, hope and love for the world.  Kirsten lives as a 3rd generation euro-settler transplant in WSANEC territory, colonially known as Saanich, BC, where her family rents a small rundown acreage. Kirsten and family specialize in rebel-gardening on rental properties, with a focus on regenerative ecosystem restoration. They are also passionate about braiding together cross-cultural rituals and practices that reflect their mixed Coast Salish, Metis, and Euro-Pagan ancestral family lineages.

Referenced in this episode:

The Work that Reconnects from Joanna Macy

HelpX (WorkAway and WWOOF are other options) 

Follow Kirsten on Instagram @tendingnettles

Visit their family's website at www.goodseedland.com for seeds and more farm-based goodies

Join us in The Numinous Network!

Other episodes referenced:

TNP226: Wild Horses of the Chilcotin with Wayne McCrory

Selected collapse-themed episodes of The Numinous Podcast: 114, 161, 193, 207, 268

{Content Warning} Discussion of sexual abuse, assault and yoga cults. Please take good care of yourself if you feel vulnerable or distressed with these topics. Press pause, stand up and walk around, bring on your arms and legs. Walk forward while looking forward. Say to yourself, I am not prey.

In this episode, we refer to Matthew Remski's exposé: Practice And All Is Coming: Abuse, Cult Dynamics, And Healing In Yoga And Beyond

You may also wish to listen to my conversation with him about this topic, ep. TNP116 Matthew Remski on Attachment High Demand Communities and Yogas Culture Of Abuse

Let's take a cinematic journey in time from childhood as the daughter of artists in small town Massachusetts in the 70s, to the 1980s Tribeca loft art scene, to the East Village of the 1990s as a provocative film and movement artist becoming involved in yoga, butoh, and sexual liberation. Our protagonist is Marisa Sullivan, a somatic and sexual health practitioner and one of our Guides in The Numinous Network.

Marisa is a Sexual Empowerment and Intimacy Educator and an Embodiment and Movement Facilitator.  She counsels how to maximize the magic and medicine of sexual juiciness, how to be authentic in our sexual expression, inhabiting our yes and no, and understanding the power of pleasure, not just in Sexuality, but Joy and Pleasure in our bodies and everyday life. 

Her certifications include multiple yoga systems, pelvic floor yoga, Reiki Masters, Womb/Perineal Steaming, deep study of The Wheel of Consent with Betty Martin, training in Psychodrama, breathwork for trance, and a Masters in Theater for Educational and Therapeutic Use.  Marisa is the mother of a teen, lives with multiple chronic illnesses, and is queer.

{Special Bonus Rant} At the end of this episode, I provide a little critical analysis of patriarchal conduct online, seasoned with several F-bombs, about leaving reviews on books. 🔥

Follow her on Instagram to hear about upcoming workshops and online courses: @marisasullivan1

***

Learn more about my Facilitation Training

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In this conversation, former emergency dispatch supervisor, current somatic mentor, and one of the hosts of The Numinous Network, Christi Jarland, shares insights from her multi-decade career as a frontline worker on some of people's toughest days.

In this episode, Christi shares tips on how to stay focused and grounded when navigating an emergency and calling for help.

We also map the somatic and stress management advice onto the large scale dilemmas of collapse – what lessons can we learn and take with us as we move through the world, trying to be of help? What matters most when we're coming out the other side of an emergency situation?

I found this conversation really brought my situational awareness into focus and offered many good reminders for how and who I want to be in an emergency. 

We laughed! We cried! It was thought-provoking and tender.

When you sign up for The Numinous Network, Christi is one of the people right there to lend a helping hand and support to navigate the platform. She can help you discern how to make the most out of your investment while staying within your energetic capacity.

In this episode, you'll hear and understand why I trust her with this important job – you'll really feel held in a capable embrace. 🥰

📷 Follow Christi on Instagram

🔗 Check out Christi's website and somatic mentorship offerings

Currently, Christi offers monthly mentoring, one-to-one sessions, and free monthly drop-ins. You can also listen to her read her monthly musings newsletter, and there's always a new meditation included in it.

✨ Learn more about The Numinous Network ✨

My friends, I just do not have the brain glucose in me to try and cite references or resources for this episode. It's a personal update. 

Content warning: Discussion of severe mental health challenges.

But in the end, I also share how I'm coping using post-its and catchphrases and the four-level framework (PEMS). I also share the vision we have for our land as a queer sanctuary for They/Thems interested in rural living in a neuroaffirming and validating environment with our family.

*

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Exciting news! Sophie Strand returns to The Numinous Podcast with a probing conversation around her stunning new memoir, The Body is a Doorway, and:

• the meaning of the word "health"

• the debatable value of pursuing a complex medical diagnosis

• orienting towards a reparative reading of the body

• New Age purity culture and healthism

• avoiding the pitfall of one's work being seconded to support a Pollyanna narrative or spiritual bypassing on a 'healing journey'

• navigating complex health issues that overlap with sexual trauma

• one of my favourite answers (in over 250 episodes!) to the question: How are you coping with grief and rage?

Content Note: All the usual warnings around dealing with sensitive material – it' a conversation that goes deep around many forms of trauma. Especially if you have a sensitive nervous system, consider doing some light tasking while you listen, keep your arms and legs moving while you listen if you can, or listen if small increments.

Check out Sophie's website

Buy The Body Is A Doorway

Support treatment

Follow her on Instagram @cosmogyny

Ep.205: Sophie Strand on Mary Magdalene and Miracles

Join us in The Numinous Network (where sensitive nervous systems are centered and people really understand this type of journey).

This is a conversation about the ritual my husband and I devised – mentioned briefly in my new book, Spells for the Apocalypse – and which we've shared with many friends who've heard us refer to it, who've asked us how to do it, or for advice on what we've done when our marriage was on the rocks. We touch on topics like the real estate market, intergenerational trauma, neurodiversity, astrocartography, collapse-oriented choices we've made, attachment and the somatic cycle – all my favourite things!

This ritual was a "Hail Mary" move in our marriage. Granted, we've never dealt with infidelity or lies, and we've always had a foundational respect. We really, genuinely like each other which, sadly, not all couples can say.

However, patriarchy is still in play, what with us both steeped in this patriarchal culture. And trauma always lurks in the shadows. And attachment is a dynamic force that can sometimes be stretched too thin.

So here's the breakdown of the ritual we've done in desperate times, why we think it worked/works, and the impact it's had on our marriage. We call it The Ritual of the Marriage Moon.

We begin with a little context around why we needed the ritual in the first place, and how it's still serving us many years later.

Referenced in this episode:

Diane Poole Heller's somatic attachment therapy training

Portrait of a Marriage podcast miniseries

Portrait of a Marriage article

The Roots of Addiction in Free Market Society by Bruce Alexander

The Numinous Network (where you can access my two attachment courses: Secure and Contact Nutrition 101)

*Not referenced in this article but definitely related and recommended for man-identified folks who want to learn more: Bear Hebert's course, Undoing Patriarchy

Order your copy of Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times

Leave us feedback!

On Tyranny: Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century, Timothy Snyder

Donate to the Amazon Labour Union

Get involved in your local 4H Club in Canada or the US!

Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year

Buy Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times (publication date: Jan.14, 2025)

~ Join us in The Numinous Network ~

Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year

Buy Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times (publication date: Jan.14, 2025)

~ Join us in The Numinous Network ~

Buy Aly Halpert's song or album, Loosen, on Bandcamp

The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year

Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times (publication date: Jan.14, 2025)

~ Join us in The Numinous Network ~

Today we're doubling down on our protective plant magic to bolster our spiritual safeness while the veil remains thin. We also look at 'wassail' as a noun, verb, and greeting which is especially appropriate on the 9th night of Yule which is associated with the 9th month of the year – the apple-iest month there is – September.

Buy The Spirited Kitchen: Recipes & Rituals for the Wheel of the Year

Pre-order Spells for the Apocalypse: Practical Magic for Turbulent Times (publication date: Jan.14, 2025)

~ Join us in The Numinous Network ~