Turning Towards Life - a Thirdspace podcast

How can we be the ones who welcome what has been lost in others, and in doing so be the ones who welcome again what has been lost in ourselves? It's a central question for our fragmented times.

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about how we find our way back home to what was here all along, and the crucial role of welcome, truth-telling and relationship in making that possible. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

Here's a link to the details of the new Thirdspace Leading from Essential Self programme which we talked about in the previous episode and which is is coming up soon. 

You can find out more about other Thirdspace programmes we talk about this week on the Thirdspace website here:

Turning Towards Life is hosted by Thirdspace. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

Here's our source for this week:

The birth of new life is something to behold,but have you ever witnessed a revival?Have you seen a person meet themselvesafter years apart,hands touching through a mirror,eyes locked together,a smile so strong it echoes.Have you ever watched a person breatheafter drowning,deep gulps of air that lungs welcome with shouts of,finally, finally, finally!Have you ever witnessed the momentsoul sinks into body,the calm when mind and heart look at each otherwith love instead of longing.Have you ever placed your hand on your chest and with absolute clarity been able to saywhat was lost is now found.'

by L.E. Bowman
https://www.instagram.com/l.e.bowman.poetry/

Photo by manas rb on Unsplash

Stepping into leadership, on whatever scale, immediately asks a central question of each of us: What kind of person will I be? Can I be a person who brings out virtues of dignity, creativity, courage, compassion, persistence, humility, generosity and wisdom in myself and the people I am alongside? Can I catch on to the ways in which I contract into fear, or reactivity, or habit? Can I find others who will help me walk the path of attention, inquiry and practice that can support me in bringing myself to the world in a way that’s most fully expressive of my intentions?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about how we lead together in a way that draws upon our essential goodness. And it's an invitation to a new learning community we're launching. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

Here's a link to the details of the new Thirdspace Leading from Essential Self programme which we talk about in this episode and which is is coming up soon. 

You can find out more about other Thirdspace programmes we talk about this week on the Thirdspace website here:

Turning Towards Life is hosted by Thirdspace. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

Here's our source for this week:

The Call of Leadership

We’re ‘called to leadership’ any time we find ourselves caring deeply about the world and people around us and want to respond with wisdom, resourcefulness, dignity and creativity – whether that’s in an organisational setting, in national-scale leadership, in a family, because we’ve taken up a role in a community that we care about, or whenever we want to bring a new idea, possibility, cause or work of art into the world.

Stepping into leadership, on whatever scale, immediately asks a central question of each of us: What kind of person will I be? Can I be a person who brings out virtues of dignity, creativity, courage, compassion, persistence, humility, generosity and wisdom in myself and the people I am alongside? Can I catch on to the ways in which I contract into fear, or reactivity, or habit? Can I find others who will help me walk the path of attention, inquiry and practice that can support me in bringing myself to the world in a way that’s most fully expressive of my intentions?

Another way of saying this – can I lead from my 'Essential Self’, the goodness and wisdom that’s at the heart of each of us? Can I attend to being ‘right sized’, inhabiting fully the life-giving possibilities that are mine to bring without shrinking away or trying to be bigger than I really am?

Justin Wise

Photo by Simon Berger on Unsplash

When we're afraid, but not acknowledging our fear, we're most likely to act out of line with our deepest intentions. It's easy from the midst of fear to try to assert our power and control - by being right or over-certain or dominating others - or to shrink away from our own dignity by saying 'yes' when something else is called for. What if we could learn to notice and name our fear, to ourselves and others, and in doing so return to the qualities of wisdom, truthfulness, and reciprocity that give us the greatest chance of addressing the challenges of the moment at a right size and in right relationship with others?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about 'right sizing' ourselves so we can respond to the world with the depth that is the heritage of each one of us. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about the Thirdspace programmes we talk about this week on the Thirdspace website here:

Here's our source for this week:

Fear Is Contraction
Fear unites the disparate parts of our false selves very quickly. The ego moves forward by contraction, self-protection, and refusal, by saying no. Contraction gives us focus, purpose, direction, superiority, and a strange kind of security. It takes our aimless anxiety, covers it up, and tries to turn it into purposefulness and urgency, which results in a kind of drivenness. But this drive is not peaceful or happy. It is filled with fear and locates all its problems as “out there,” never “in here.”  

The soul or the True Self does not proceed by contraction but by expansion. It moves forward, not by exclusion, but by inclusion. It sees things deeply and broadly not by saying no but by saying yes, at least on some level, to whatever comes its way. Can you distinguish between those two very different movements within yourself?  

Fear and contraction allow us to eliminate other people, write them off, exclude them, and somehow expel them, at least in our minds. This immediately gives us a sense of being in control and having a secure set of boundaries—even holy boundaries. But people who are controlling are usually afraid of losing something. If we go deeper into ourselves, we will see that there is both a rebel and a dictator in all of us, two different ends of the same spectrum. It is almost always fear that justifies our knee-jerk rebellion or our need to dominate—a fear that is hardly ever recognized as such because we are acting out and trying to control the situation. 

Fr Richard Rohr
Available at the Centre for Action and Reflection website

Photo by Ashley Batz on Unsplash

In the words of Marie Howe’s beautiful poem that is our source this week, “whatever leads to joy, to more life, to less worry”. Can we learn to live this way in the midst of it all - attending to joy in its deepest sense, in the way it brings us into contact with what is most real? And is there a way to not pile worry on top of everything that it already matters for us to take care of?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about the faithfulness it takes to lean into our lives, and to face their realness in doing so. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

My Dead Friends

I have begun, 
when I’m weary and can’t decide an answer to a bewildering question

to ask my dead friends for their opinion 
and the answer is often immediate and clear.

Should I take the job? Move to the city? Should I try to conceive a child 
in my middle age?

They stand in unison shaking their heads and smiling—whatever leads 
to joy, they always answer,

to more life and less worry. I look into the vase where Billy’s ashes were — it’s 
green in there, a green vase,

and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes. 
Billy’s already gone through the frightening door,

whatever he says I’ll do.

Marie Howe

Photo by Sergey Pesterev on Unsplash

In those moments when, in the midst of the brokenness of the world, any of us find ourselves able to kindle our resolute love or contagious joy, we're being of much needed service - both to ourselves and to those around us. And we don't always know that we're doing that. So what would it be to begin to notice this most human of capacities in ourselves, and share it with others - as a complement to all the other strong feelings and orientations that sweep through us when we are also in contact with the fragility of things?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about celebrating our capacity to be generous, courageous gifts to one another, this week seeded from a source from the wonderful work of David Abram. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

Holding Together

There are so many unsung heroines and heroes at this broken moment in our collective story, so many courageous persons who, unbeknownst to themselves, are holding together the world by their resolute love or contagious joy. Although I do not know your names, I can feel you out there.

David Abram
Photo by Kristopher Roller on Unsplash

How do we make contact with our own kindness, generosity, creativity, patience, courage, compassion, fierce or gentle love, and our capacity to stay in contact with life, right when we're afraid or wanting to turn away?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about how we find that in ourself that's ready to stay faithful, when other parts of us strongly want to turn away - and how we help one another to do that. Our conversation is seeded from a source from the wonderful work of Maya Stein. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

What If?

Whatever you’re afraid of. Whatever you’re warding off, trying to hold back
from being true. Whatever keeps sniffing at your legs, and whatever you keep
kicking away. Whatever draft you’re trying to seal. Whatever risk you push
to the perimeter. Whatever old whisper you’re turning from to deafen. Whatever exit
you’re avoiding, eyes locked on the straightaway. Whatever breakage you think is yours
to mend, and the endless ministrations of that mending. Whatever call you keep
not picking up. Whatever blank piece of paper. Whatever Hail Mary. Whatever salt
you keep throwing over your shoulder. One day, it will stop being enough
to keep you from your own magnificence. And what if, what if, what if
this was that day?

Maya Stein
mayastein.substack.com

Photo by Grant Whitty on Unsplash

We might imagine we can choose the 'threshold moments', when we're called to step into the unknown. Sometimes we can. But as events in the world remind us this week, what changes around us and within us often comes without warning and without our say-so.

One response to transitions on whatever scale is to run from them, or to try to be in control of them on our own. But that rarely works out, because for us to be in charge would mean having powers that none of us have. Instead, can we turn towards them and have them be an opportunity for us to connect with one another's lives more deeply, listen more fully, and support one another? And what kind of world might open if we did?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about turning towards what's being born, perhaps right when we're least ready for it. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

Liminal Space

In this
waiting place
we loiter, hover,
on a tentative cusp,
a threshold,
between the familiar
and the unknown,
with no possible retreat.
The customary comfort zone
is gone, and where
the entrance ushers
is not yet seen.
Our new question
(let alone its answer)
still is ambiguous.
We are in limbo.
We can either hesitate
or go forward.
The gossamer veil
of divine nearness
flutters ever so lightly,
breathing inseparably close,
as we step to embrace
the unrevealed with trust,
a shimmering opportunity
for connection and listening
and being led right on through.
Lean into this portal;
it is the doorstep
to fruitful ground.

by Polly Castor
pollycastor.com

Photo by Mark Basarab on Unsplash

How do we approach our lives when they don’t go how we want? Or when we find ourselves judging the value of our lives by the outcomes of our actions and projects? When we find out we’re not nearly as ‘in charge’ as we imagine, and that every choice is riddled with complexity, it’s easy to tune out and seek the promise of easy answers or to demand of ourselves a level of control and power that’s impossible for us humans. So how else might we live? Might we find a way to honour that our lives are not made of ‘final destinations’ but are a process of becoming, in which each choice and action has a chance to move the world somewhat but, more importantly, to shape who we are?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about watching where we are going, leaning into what we love, and telling the truth. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:


ChoiceThere isn’t a right answer.
There just isn’t. The game show
where the bells ring and the points
go up and the confetti falls
because you got the answer
is a lie. The preacher who would assure you
of how to attain salvation
is making it all up. The doctor
who knows just how to fix
what ails you will be sure
of something else tomorrow.
Every choice will
wound someone, heal someone,
build a wall and open a conversation.
Things will always happen
that you can’t foresee.
But you have to choose.
It’s all we have—that little rudder
that we employ in the midst
of all the eddies and rapids,
the current that pulls us
inexorably toward the sea.
The fact that you are swept along
by the river is no excuse.
Watch where you are going.
Lean in toward what you love.
When in doubt, tell the truth.

Lynn Ungar
lynnungar.com

Photo by Cory Woodward on Unsplash

Can we look at ourselves and others around us as we all grow older with eyes of wonder... seeing and receiving the luminosity and depth that shines out from beneath the skin? Or will we get caught up in our culture's dominant meta-narratives - that to grow old is to be diminished, and that time is a 'resource' that we get less of as we age? What if, instead, life is a ripeness that we grow into, and growing into our elderhood is a deep gift we can bring to others?

This week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about what might become possible as we grow into the wildness of our bones, and attune to the gifts of the ones who walk the path ahead of us. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

Beneath the Sweater and the Skin

How many years of beauty do I have left?
she asks me.
How many more do you want?
Here. Here is 34. Here is 50.

When you are 80 years old
and your beauty rises in ways
your cells cannot even imagine now
and your wild bones grow luminous and
ripe, having carried the weight
of a passionate life. 

When your hair is aflame
with winter
and you have decades of
learning and leaving and loving
sewn into
the corners of your eyes
and your children come home
to find their own history
in your face.

When you know what it feels like to fail
ferociously
and have gained the
capacity
to rise and rise and rise again.

When you can make your tea
on a quiet and ridiculously lonely afternoon
and still have a song in your heart
Queen owl wings beating
beneath the cotton of your sweater.

Because your beauty began there
beneath the sweater and the skin,
remember?

This is when I will take you
into my arms and coo
YOU BRAVE AND GLORIOUS THING
you've come so far.
I see you.
Your beauty is breathtaking.

Jeannette Encinias
www.jeannetteencinias.com

Photo by Ýlona María Rybka on Unsplash

It's hard to turn towards the basic condition of our lives - that everything changes, and that everything ends, including ourselves. That we will lose it all. But our resistance to this truth can easily end up with us trying to freeze our lives in place, holding us back from encountering what's here in an effort to never have to face loss or grief. But we know not to do that with that which flows - we don't try to freeze each wave on the sea, for example, because we know that what makes a wave a wave is that it is free to arise and fall away in exactly the way that waves do.

And so this week's Turning Towards Life is a conversation about what might become possible if we understand ourselves and everyone around us as flow, arising from the bigger flow of life or existence itself. It's hosted as always by Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace.

This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website, and you can also watch and listen on Instagram, YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify.

You can find out more about our Professional Coaching Course, which we talk a little about in this episode, on the Thirdspace website here.

Here's our source for this week:

The Great Gift of Selfhood

“You will die. You will not live forever. Nor will any man nor any thing. Nothing is immortal. But only to us is it given to know that we must die. And that is a great gift: the gift of selfhood. For we have only what we know we must lose, what we are willing to lose… That selfhood which is our torment, and our treasure, and our humanity, does not endure. It changes; it is gone, a wave on the sea. Would you have the sea grow still and the tides cease, to save one wave, to save yourself? Would you give up the craft of your hands, and the passion of your heart, and the light of sunrise and sunset, to buy safety for yourself - safety forever?”

Ursula K. Le Guin, from 'The Farthest Shore'

Photo by Ryan Moulton on Unsplash