“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is” - Albert Einstein
We recorded this earlier than planned because Becky experienced an immediate and potent feeling filling her up after boldly surrendering to The Mystery for the last few months. What is she supposed to do with this feeling of immense awe and the need to let it move through her? Having lived a creative life for decades, Christina has a lot to share about this feeling, one she calls “directional.” This conversation meanders around all things INSPIRATION—how it feels when it arrives, how to trust that you’ll be able to work with it, how to nurture it, and how to let it take form without rushing it or forcing it in any way.
Becky points out that the source of awe is not universal, but the feeling of awe IS universal. In other words, what inspires her will not inspire everyone. Similarly, the same idea might take form in two people and will result in different interpretations. This is creativity at work.
The conversation takes a rich turn when we realize that only by loving yourself can you allow yourself to create something unexpected that you’re proud of. And, perhaps the first moment that Becky has felt speechless during a recording, we sit together with the difference between three precious words mixed around to form two completely different beginnings. I am here. Here I am.
Episode Transcript
Becky: I was reading my book this morning. I’m still reading, the Assembly Theory book. Um, and then I paused and watched the trailer for Hamnet, the new Chloé Zhao movie. And I just was struck with this overwhelming feeling of awe. And like, I can’t even describe this feeling, but it felt like too big to stay inside of me and I just had this desire to create something like move it into the world or express it like it felt like so big it wanted to be expressed. And I was reflecting on how much of my life I’ve been a observer of others who express this feeling. Awe is the best word I have. But like observing when people are connected to Source and are compelled to create something that feels like it’s just has to come through them.
And I was like, oh. I want to create. What is my own creation? What is my own outlet? Is that what it feels like where you’re just like, what does it feel like, maybe, I’m just curious. What does it feel like when you have a feeling where you’re like, this needs to come through me, and you don’t quite have the, um, modality or the mechanism for it to flow yet?
What does that feel like and what do you do?
Welcome to Noticing: A Podcast About Nothing And Everything At The Same Time. This week is our 10th episode, and we talk about this feeling that I had. And I turn to my dear friend Christina to explain what is this that I’m feeling. So we talked about what Christina calls a directional feeling.
Receiving this feeling of awe from other people’s work and wanting that to move through us as us. And as we continue to talk, we realize that only by loving yourself can you allow yourself to create something unexpected that you’re really proud of. And for maybe the first time in my life I found myself completely speechless after Christina dropped
a bombshell of an insight on me. So I hope you enjoy.
So before we jump in, I have to tell you a little story of what just happened to me. Uh, so I was at the park walking Juno, and, I was, you know, reflecting on our talk and, and then my reflecting kind of started to move into rehearsing territory, you know, like rehearsing what I was gonna say.
And as soon as it did, I slipped on a piece of ice, I, and almost fell on my ass. I stayed upright, but just barely. And I started laughing hysterically because of course I would slip on a piece of ice, life is very clear of where it wants me. It wants me right here, right now. Not practicing for the future, not ruminating on the past.
It was the most joyous moment in the middle of this beautiful field, full of snow. And no one was there. And I laughed out loud, just as loud as I could and it was wonderful.
Christina: I love that.
Becky: It was so good.
Christina: Oh my God, I love that. It was just like, no, see in your body. Watch out, don’t die.
Becky: Yeah, just, just enough not, not to hurt me, but to get my attention. So since I stopped rehearsing, how do you wanna enter this conversation?
Christina: Yeah. I mean, so I feel like we can just begin. So yesterday Becky sent me a message that was so electric and elated and like I, I could hear her whole being vibrating and we just recorded the most recent episode to be released like a couple of days ago, I think.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And, and you know when, when Becky sent me this message. Both of us individually said, um, at the same time and then sent different voice messages that had the same information that we should pause and have this conversation together so that other people can hear it because it’s so fertile. So if you can, there’s the introduction if you can.
Perfect go.
Go.
3, 2, 1. Like my kids say, tell me. 3, 2, 1, go. Okay. Becky, 3, 2, 1.
Becky: Go, go. Okay. So I will, I’ll set the context that, uh, this happened at the end of a week where I intentionally had a lot of alone time. Tara was outta town. My partner Tara, was outta town, and before she left I was, I set the intention that I really want to slow down.
I channeled my inner Christina and remembered, you know, kind of the beginning of this awakening period for you where you were like, I am intentionally going to be in my studio and receive slow time. That was kind of my intention and my mantra. Not to repeat or replicate what your experience was, but just I’ve been noticing this call to go inward and I think it started with that message around self-love.
I just got this, I mean, where does it start? It’s been, it’s an, it’s an ongoing journey, but I’m noticing these little pieces and when I got the piece of what does self-love in action look like for me? What does it mean to love myself? And so I’ve been kind of sitting with and noticing that, um, message or inquiry.
I’ve just kind of been sitting with it, but very much on the back burner, you know, not actively thinking about it. So I went into this week and, it just kind of looked like following my inner guide and following my inner rhythm. Um, and deeply listening, letting myself get bored, letting myself not distract myself.
Letting myself stop things when they were no longer feeling alive and in, in, in alignment. So on the last, the day before Tara got back, so this must have been yesterday, day before yesterday. It was yesterday. It was it yesterday. Oh gosh. That’s amazing. Um, I was reading my book. I’m still reading, the book on assembly theory, life as no one knows it. One ‘cause I’m a really slow reader, and two, because I’m really savoring it. You know, I’m really, it’s been really impactful. So I’m, I’m reading my book. And I just had this, this like feeling stir in me and I wanted to po put it down for a second and something prompted me to watch the trailer for the movie Hamnet.
Which, um, for those of you who aren’t in pop culture, like Christina, um,
Christina: I have no idea what this was.
Becky: So it’s the new movie by Chloé Zhao, who I love. She’s an incredible director. She won the Academy Award for Nomadland. She directed my favorite Marvel movie, like talk about taking a Marvel movie and making it epic and just like filled with.
Awe. That’s the best word that keeps coming out. So I just love her. And she’s directing this movie that comes out today called Hamnet. And it’s based on the book Hamnet, which is based on William’s Shakespeare’s life and how he lost his son. His son, uh, was named Hamnet and it’s kind of leading him to create Hamlet.
And I’m really excited about this movie. Jessie Buckley plays William Shakespeare’s wife, and she is just a force of nature. So I watched this trailer, I’ve watched it before, but I was like preparing, like getting excited. And I just was filled with this feeling. The only word I have for it is awe.
And I just felt like I don’t, I don’t know. I, the point is I didn’t know how to describe it. I didn’t know what to do with it. It kind of. Came with this feeling that I initially labeled as frustration because it felt like, oh, I just wanna do something with this. I just wanna like, put this out in the world.
Like I want, ah, I wanna do something with this. And you know, I’ve done enough work that I paused and I was like, what if I, I thought back to this practice that I’ve done with anxiety and I kind of reframed the sensations of anxiety or nervousness. Into labeling it, excitement, you know, in the body they are the same feeling and often we feel nerves or anxiety about things we’re excited about, you know, because it’s unknown.
And that practice has been really powerful. So I paused and I sat with that feeling that I was labeling frustration. And I said, what if this is anticipation? Obviously I was thinking of you, Christina, of how you’ve described things like wanting to come through you and like whispering through you and, and, and I started to get really curious, which is interesting because we just had the full moon in Gemini, which, and I am a double Gemini, so this is my core and Gemini is all about curiosity and asking questions and being a little, um, investigative reporter. So I was like, let me ask Christina and I, I, so I sent you the voice memo and actually it took me about halfway through the voice memo, I started off with these assumptions with like, does I assume this feels like this, this when you’re, when the book’s coming through or when art’s coming through?
And I was like, wait, no, let me ask you, is this, is this what you feel? What do you call this? What do you do with this? And it just felt like this moment of pure, um, pure aliveness. Mm-hmm. And excitement. And I’ve had reflection since, but I think I’m gonna pause here because this is when you came in.
Christina: Yeah.
Yeah. Because. What you’re, so like, I could, I could hear the excitement in your voice and there was energy that wanted to move towards something. And so what you are describing, I believe, is that you feel inspired by others creating something and you want to create something yourself. True?
Becky: Yeah. Yeah.
Christina: Okay.
So,
Becky: and, and I will add, I have no idea what it is. So that’s the new thing for me. ‘cause I’ve had inspirations before of like an inspiration for a class I wanna teach or a talk I wanna give or what, whatever. This is the first time where it’s like, I have no idea what the thing is. I don’t even know where, what the domain is.
Christina: Yeah. It’s so exciting. Like this is, this is a feeling that I have had lifelong. And I, and what you’re describing is just what it feels like to, to want your creative energy to take form in something. And the people that made the work that you were inspired by, definitely. I guarantee you 1000% had this feeling before they made the work, um, that inspired you.
So it’s this beautiful infectious feeling that grabs a hold of all of us, especially if we’re in a flow state and can trust that the feeling will take form in whatever it’s meant to take. So I, I mean, I’ve have had this feeling lifelong from when I probably frustrated my parents and said, I wanna, I wanna make my bedroom into a beach and I’m gonna put sand.
We can buy sand and I’m gonna put sand all over the floor of my bedroom and, and then I can hang up fake trees and stuff and just make it feel like the jungle, but also the beach and my feet will sink it to it. You know, my kids do it all the time now too. And. At some point, many of us stop that feeling.
Mm-hmm. Or we’re trained to stop that feeling. For those of us who are very lucky, I include myself in that group. We are encouraged with enough sanity, you know, and
Becky: I was curious if your parents actually let you do the beach?
Christina: No. No, I didn’t do the beach. I didn’t do the beach. Um, but they steered me towards other ideas because their, that energy, it really does just want to take form in something.
Mm-hmm. So I channeled that into many different paths. Um, but it’s something that when you have this feeling, it actually, this is why we work so well again, because it was really important for me and why I wanted to talk to you about this even more right now, to flesh out what this experience is. Um, because it’s something that is like in the fabric of my entire being. Um, but essentially your role. One’s role, who has this feeling is to be with it, to use your words.
Mm-hmm.
Can you be with it? And can you let it stay alive by orienting yourself towards it in a little way? Um, and not putting an expectation on what it becomes.
Mm-hmm. So, like, I know you well enough, Becky, that a lot of times you wanna get to the end of something, like you wanna have for sure. The form that, that something takes. And a lot of times I see you, like when you come visit us up here in Maine, you always say how it’s a really beautiful reminder for you because we have a lot of projects in process.
Yep. And that is. That is like the physical manifestation of this creative energy and this force that you are feeling. And so I think it’s something that you felt before, but for you, your job now with this newer consciousness and awareness is to observe that feeling and not force it to take shape in any one thing, but I call it a directional feeling.
Mm-hmm. Um, because it points towards something, it points you in a direction. It doesn’t necessarily point you towards violin lessons. Like you did tell me that you were like, I don’t know, I just,
Becky: oh, I forgot that part.
Christina: Yeah, you said I, I just keep wanting to, I just, I don’t know. I have all this, I have all this energy towards something and I, maybe I’m gonna learn to play violin because I just keep, I just keep sensing that maybe like I can just pull a violin.
Is it a bow? Is that what you call it? It is, yeah.
Yeah. Okay.
Um, across each string and see what it sounds like. And when you said that it, it literally made me think of this image that’s been coming to me so often since I’ve allowed myself to receive slow time. When I am in my most contemplative, slower moments, I just get the feeling that consciousness, whatever I, I think I would call it consciousness or, or, or creative energy, wants to flow through me as me.
So that I am the instrument. Because you are the instrument too. So you, in order to be in creation with the universe, your job, our job, I believe, is to receive ideas and nurture them so that they can flow through us and out in the form that we might express them, which means that an idea could go through me and come out in a completely different form as the same idea going through you.
Becky: Yeah. Yeah. And that’s what I, what was hitting me last night in as I was sitting with this more, is I have, I have rec, I have felt this feeling so deeply my whole life. Absolutely. I recognize it all the way through the fe, the inspiration feeling, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, I cry at everything.
I can find inspiration in like a well-made commercial, you know? Yeah. Because I am feeling something, I’m, I feel like I have a capacity, a deep capacity to recognize the creative force.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Becky: Like what that looks like when it is flowing through someone as them, which is why I can be inspired deeply and sense that feeling in a physicist as a can of filmmaker, you know?
But what I’ve done with that feeling for all of my life. I do wanna, you’re, you’re so astute in noticing how I wanna jump to the end because I wanna jump straight to the sharing. So, oh my God, I don’t know how my poor wife Tara, handles me because I receive this feeling of awe and I just wanna share it so badly that I, my way of doing that has been here, watch this movie here, read this book, read this book with me.
You know, it’s sharing the direct source and now that I’m sitting with it and with, with this new, this new feeling, I’m recogni. I really am feeling the difference of. The source of awe is not universal. So exactly what you just said, what the, the feeling of awe, I believe is universal, right? Yeah. Because it’s coming from the same source, but what gives each individual person that feeling of awe is so unique and depends on timing.
You know, like one thing could inspire me today and not tomorrow, you know, and that’s what I, the, the piece that I was missing is, it’s not just sharing how I receive that feeling of awe. It is letting that feeling of awe live within me and flow through me in a new way.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Becky: And that’s what’s so exciting and making me feel so alive because.
I don’t think I’ve ever sat in the mystery this much before in my life because I really have no idea. It does not feel connected to, it doesn’t feel connected to my work in teaching. It feels totally new, and that’s why I think that’s why the frustration in the beginning, because I don’t have an outlet of an artist that’s like, that’s already established in me and I don’t want to, the thing that did come up was the violin.
I did have this deep feeling of like. But it it, what was interesting about that was I didn’t have this desire to be an accomplished violinist. I had the desire to play the violin poorly of just playing and, and seeing what it, what it sounds like, like, just like you said, when, when, if I move this bow on this string, what does it sound like?
And it’s that, that like curiosity, that raw curiosity that was just so exciting.
Christina: It’s so great because it’s, it feels to me when the more that you describe it, it feels to me that you were in a place of, you were in a much pure, essential human place than you have ever been.
Mm-hmm.
Because of all of the work that you’ve done.
Maybe it has to do with the proximity that you and I have to each other now by doing this podcast where this could be a ripple out as well. It’s very childlike what you are expressing, and it’s something that is a great service to each adult to be able to return back to this place.
Because as you’re talking, I’m thinking like, why don’t you just go and try to take a walk, but walk in a way that you’ve never walked before? Hmm. Can you sing a song to yourself in a way, you know, like there are things that you can do where you don’t have to be great at them or spend a lot of money going to school to learn how to draw or be, be, um, trained in some sort of literal art form.
It’s, it just feels like such a open place for you. And anyone to be where you’re actually sitting in this place that feels so possible.
Becky: Yeah.
Christina: Right? Mm-hmm. That you can just live into that thing. So it’s directional for you in a way that is just like, how can you exist in a more rich way?
Mm-hmm.
And like that’s, that’s what, that’s what I do every day.
Every single breath.
Becky: Yeah. Yeah.
Christina: And kids teach us this too.
Becky: Absolutely. I mean, it does feel so. Childlike in the best way. And I feel like that is my essence. Like even when I look at my astrology and I look at my human design, it is to have a childlike enthusiasm. Mm-hmm. Like that is the most natural state for me.
Um, and it is so easy to get disconnected. Um, but yeah, it’s interesting you mention can I take a walk in a different way? Or like, it was really windy yesterday and the trees still had a lot of snow and I just found myself watching how the snow was dancing in the air. Um, it was just, it was miraculous.
And I, in, in the car, I found myself singing to, I was playing songs that I loved in high school and like singing at the top of my lungs, you know, and, and it was interesting. Because these are the songs that I, I don’t memorize lyrics very well. Um, but the songs of my childhood are kind of in there, you know?
Mm-hmm. But I was re-listening, so I had just watched the documentary for Lilith Fair.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Becky: And I was, so, uh, this was this week, right? So this is another piece of the puzzle of following my knowing I was even listening to myself of what do I wanna watch? What do I wanna offer my attention to?
And it called me to watching the documentary on Lilith Fair. Do you know what Lilith Fair is? Mm-hmm. Okay, good. It’s shocking to me how many people don’t, but,
Christina: oh, yeah. No, I do.
Becky: My sister took me, I went to the second year. I mean, it only happened for, I think it only happened for three years. Yeah. 97 to 99.
Christina: Yeah.
Becky: And without even knowing what it was, I went and so I was like. Brought back to that magical time. And anyway, all this to say, so then I was listening to the soundtrack today and I heard the Indigo Girls closer to fine. Like I was really hearing the lyrics and I kind of always was like, you know, you sing along to, it was in the Barbie movie, so everyone was singing it.
But I found myself really, really listening and I just started crying and I was like, wow, this is like, it felt like it was speaking directly to my heart in a way that it never had before. And, um, that to me is pointing to this aliveness.
Christina: Yeah, you’re just, it’s, it’s so simple.
Becky: It’s so simple.
Christina: You’re just tapped in now, Becky, you really are.
This is like. It’s, and it maybe it’s just coming more consistently for you.
Becky: Yeah.
Christina: Like what? I’m, I’m curious, um, I am curious what, like, what feels markedly different this time?
Becky: Hmm. I, um,
Christina: take a minute and actually think what feels, what feels so different this time?
Because I’ve heard you notice things before. Mm-hmm.
But this, there’s something changed in you about this.
Becky: Mm. I think it’s complete surrender to the unknown. It’s, it’s the excitement that I genuinely don’t know where it’s leading and I am not trying to know,
Christina: isn’t that. So freeing.
Becky: It’s, it’s really, really just beautiful.
It’s really beautiful.
Christina: There’s so much possibility. I keep getting that word. It feels like anything is possible. Yeah. You open yourself up to so much magic and potential and possibility when you don’t have your eyes solidly on the end product. Yeah. And I think, um, you know, for someone who’s at a place like you are describing who maybe doesn’t necessarily have, like, you don’t have like a real practice of surrendering to the unknown.
You said that the artist way was sort of calling to you. That’s a cool starting place, but also I would, I would like spend some time reflecting on the things that you tended towards as a kid. And like, give yourself, well first of all, you did a good job of giving yourself a week of slowness, which is funny to me that you don’t do that often.
‘cause you’re slow. You’re just a slow human.
Becky: I am a slow human who can also quickly succumb to distractions.
Christina: Okay.
Becky: I, so it was, and, and it was interesting, uh, because, you know, I wanna paint an accurate picture for people because this has been a journey. And, um, so Tara left on Monday and so, you know. And we recorded on Monday.
So I was a little, had things to do. So Tuesday was really the first day that it was just me. I, you know, this was my intention. So it’s like, okay, Tuesday was so hard. My journal, entry was like, it is really hard to be with myself. And it was a lot of self-criticism.
It was, it was very hard. Um, so yes, I recognize that I’m slow and I mean, it comes back to what we’ve talked about so many times of like, I know I’m slow. That sounds, I know my natural frequency is a slower vibration. Mm-hmm. I am not slow. Um, and it’s so interesting because my body has such a slow
pace, but my mind is wicked fast.
Christina: Yeah, you’re right.
Becky: And I’ve lived in my mind for so much of my life that that is habitual. That’s what’s familiar. So even though I do know that I’m slow and I communicate that to you in moments of insight, you don’t see all the moments in between where I’m trying so hard to practice being slow and trusting that, and, um, because my mind wants to take over and be fast and distract.
And it’s, it’s the same thing I’ve said so many times of, when you sit in stillness you have to face all those things, you know, and there’s plenty of things that are still underneath my surface that are uncomfortable to see when I get slow and when I, uh, move into stillness. So that’s what comes up.
But I really just let myself be with it. And I did journal. So then the next day I was like, look, let’s take the pressure off. Let’s just follow. ‘cause I think even like sitting in stillness, I put parameters around it and I try and control it a little bit too much. Or I have this idea of like, if I watch a movie that is distraction, you know, I, I think I, I’ve tended to put kind of black and white, um.
Black and white thinking, or black and white constraints around what stillness looks like or what being with myself looks like, or you know, oh, Christina sat and just watched the light, so I have to do that. You know? Right. So there was a little bit of that I think was also coming into play. So Wednesday I was just like, just, just listen to yourself.
Whatever it tells you, just listen. And I had a great day, I had such a great day, and I reflected on Tuesday, and it was like, okay. I sat with my feelings. It was hard, but I also journaled, you know, there wasn’t that like judgment of what it looked like, and I think that day was really important.
Christina: Mm-hmm. And maybe it’s just more information for you to notice that as you’re tending to yourself and this directional feeling that you can expect a day.
Of discouragement, you know? Yeah. Like, that’s information, because the reason for sure, the reason I wanna parse this out with you is because like, it might be nice to sort of figure out what Becky, like you’re at this, you’re at this incredibly potent place. Mm-hmm. And , it’s a great thing to be able to figure out how to harvest that and like, move it in a direction that you are excited about to like, let it keep flowing.
So I’m thinking of like, when, when I have this feeling, I fig, I have figured out at this point because I’ve practiced for over a decade.
Mm-hmm.
Um, the, um, like what I need to do to cultivate the soil around me so that I can grow fruit. If I can use a metaphor of like a garden. Um, so for example, I know now that when I take a little solitude retreat, the third day is the day, and it sounds like this is similar for you.
The third day is the day where things become very clear, but I’ve learned that I can cultivate a lifestyle in my everyday life by doing a myriad of things that helps me stay in a consistent relationship with that inspired feeling.
Mm-hmm.
And so I am, I am like parsing this out with you to try to figure out, or to try to help you, or encourage you to reflect on how this feels different because maybe you can point towards something that you can consciously try again.
Becky: Yeah. Yeah, and I was reflecting on this a little bit ‘cause I, so on Wednesday, um, from Tuesday to Wednesday, I was kind of reflecting on what makes this day different. And one piece of it was, my mornings are really important. How I start that day is really important because I kind of wake up every single day of like clean slate.
Like I will wake up and this is why I have, I know I have to, um, not schedule my day, but kind of set an intention for the flow of my day the night before. Because I wake up in the morning and I’m like, I, I don’t know. Who am I? It’s like who am I? What day is it? Totally lost, right? Yeah. And I tend to abandon those practices.
Really quickly. So even though I’ve scheduled them, that’s kind of the first step, right? Is setting for me anyway, I need scaffolding around my days to anchor me and remind me what my intentions are. And, and I’ve been practicing that for a little bit, but then the next step is , to, to honor them.
So I think back to our conversation with Ashley, where you were talking about I would call it systematizing you, you may say prioritizing and like making sure that you, you know, once a quarter you, you do your, um, uh, sensory deprivation and once a year or whatever your rhythm is. Like you have these things built in.
And that is very important to me. I think now this next piece. Which I think is why it came with the message of self-love, because I have to have enough self-love to prioritize that and say, this is important and I am going to do this. Whatever it is that I figure out that my morning needs to look like, for me to be set up and be grounded in that day, be grounded in this feeling of I’m going to live in the mystery and I’m going to follow my directional feelings.
I need to be anchored in the morning. And one thing I noticed is, um, and if you don’t know, I would say to advice to anyone if, if you don’t know what that thing is, you could play around with like meditation, reading journal, whatever. These are kind of the known things. But I think what’s more important is to find your specific thing.
And I think for me, what I discovered this week and what I was reflecting on. When I read in the morning something that really inspires me. Not something generic, but something that gives me that feeling of awe or a person who gives me that feeling of awe. I think that was a major difference throughout the week that kept me, it like grounded me in that day, in that feeling of connection to awe. And in the past I think I’ve found myself. Um, prioritizing Tara’s needs and Tara’s schedule in the morning because she works and, and I wanna make sure that she has a really grounded morning and has her needs met before she goes into her job. Um, and I have more flexibility and that’s still true and that’s still really important to me.
And how can we both get our needs met? And it wasn’t her, like, she would’ve easily rearranged her schedule to, it wasn’t her, right. She’s the most supportive woman I’ve ever met, person I’ve ever met. Um, but it’s me having the self-love to say my needs are important. Whether I am earning an income or not, that is not the the worth of me.
I am inherently worthy to have my needs met.
Christina: Yep, you are. Yeah,
Becky: we all are. Yeah, that’s the thing. It’s like you are worthy, period. And this is like the feeling of why I get the feeling of awe when I read about, when I read Sarah Imari Walker and her awe for life. There are billions of years of, of life assembling and reassembling and just trying to explore that it created you and me and everything that is here today and. And so who am I to not love myself? Who am I to say I’m not worthy?
Life thinks I’m worthy because life created me and I am here and I keep coming back to what Einstein said, that there are two ways to look at your life, either as nothing is a miracle or everything is a miracle and everything is a fucking miracle. I’m gonna earn my E today.
Christina: I love when we finally earn the E.
Becky: If you, if you’re gonna do it, let’s, I think I already said ass, so might as well like put an exclamation mark on it.
Christina: Seriously? Yeah. Yeah. This is all, this is all so true. And so maybe this feeling that you have that’s so different than it has been before is because it’s your self love in action. The fact that you might think these people created this thing, I feel so inspired.
Something is different now, means that maybe you are ready to feel worthy enough to create something you’re proud of. Mm. Ooh. Ooh. Probably, huh.
Becky: Yeah. Something unexpected that I’m really proud of. Something that, ‘cause, ooh, wait. I’m actually gonna sit with that one for a minute
because, you know, I’m proud of, there’s plenty of things I’ve been proud of, but this does feel different. Like, I’m proud of the teachings that I’ve put into this world, you know, I’m proud of of a lot of things. But this does feel different.
Christina: Mm-hmm. So a lot of our conversations remind me of, of my conversations with my brother-in-law, and one of the things that he said he’s been thinking about recently is the, the phrase three words and how different these three words can feel in an embodied way when they’re changed.
So the first one is, I am here.
Mm-hmm.
And he’s working on getting towards here I am.
Mm. And it
sounds like you are sort of at this place as well. Like you are here, you’ve practiced being here. Yeah. And then to come out with something that maybe isn’t, like we, we don’t know. We don’t know. There’s so much possibility here.
You are ready to receive yourself and pronounce, here I am. Mm-hmm. In whatever form that takes. That’s an incredible feeling and different, here I am.
Becky: Here I am.
Christina: Here I am.
Becky: Here I am.
Christina: It’s different than I am here.
Becky: It really is.
Christina: Mm-hmm. There’s movement with here I am. Like you step into forward with, here I am. Mm.
Becky: Yeah.
I just wanna sit with it for a second ‘cause some things are coming up. That’s powerful.
Christina: We got time.
Becky: Um, it feels like the first thing that’s coming up is being born like here. I, I’m,
Cause when you’re born, everything’s so pure.
Christina: This is a pure, what you are expressing today is a pure, pure feeling. Yeah. It’s, it’s, I believe it’s what I’m made of. We’re all made of this, but for some reason I have stuck with it and like, it feels like a life, uh mm path for me to encourage this and like draw this out of others.
Becky: Yeah, absolutely.
Christina: Yeah. Being born here I am.
Becky: Here I am.
Christina: Everything’s possible.
Becky: Mm-hmm.
Christina: Anything’s possible and everything’s possible.
Mm-hmm.
And the willingness to be vulnerable enough to receive that possibility is radical.
Becky: It really is. Yeah.
Christina: Like what comes up? ‘cause you, I’m, I’m looking at you and you’re like, you’re, this is like a, it’s like a stunned, like, whoa, it’s, this is, something’s like changing. I, like my stomach is turning for you. Something is changing in you where you actually know enough to stop and let it like settle on you and I I am like picturing your own image of the water getting still and stuff coming up beneath.
Like what can you see when you, when you like, what comes up in the water when you reframe this for yourself?
Becky: Well, what came up first and why I do know enough to pause is the mind jumps in and, um, the mind jumps in. And so there’s, there’s the sitting with and there’s the stunned ness of, I just need to, uh, to take this in for a moment.
And then there was a little bit of the mind jumping in of like, you’re recording a podcast right now. Ladies, say something, say something. Say something. That’s the old habit, right? Um, but yes, I do know enough to, to say, okay, I hear you. I know why you’re saying that. Thank you friend. I’m just gonna sit, but it’s important to sit with this for a second.
Yeah. So what comes up? I mean, the baby image was the most predominant one that came out, was like, and it’s interesting, something that, that I’ve been kind of sitting with or hanging out with a little bit and something I know in my mind, but I’ve really been allowing it to come into my experience of life is every single moment is an opportunity to start over is like an a fresh start.
Every single moment and it doesn’t feel that way a lot of the times. I recognize that, you know, especially if you’re in the middle of hard times, it feels really difficult to, to say Yeah, right. Like I can hear even my own skepticism of, of like, my, my issues and problems are gonna be here this moment and next moment.
But it’s, I think when I can really embody that and remember that, that every single moment we are being reborn, every single moment is an opportunity to be reborn with a, a new choice. You know, like even just now you said this thing that felt like a bombshell and. The, the old habits were there, but I had a choice to not let those old habits take over.
And I have an opportunity to
To make a different choice to be different. Mm-hmm. And I think, so when I think of that baby like coming into the world, here I am, can I remember that moment by moment that every moment I have that chance to be reborn and say, here I am. And it’s interesting ‘cause I have been feeling like this week of like a starting over of like from a kid.
Like what if I started over from a kid? What would that look like? And maybe that’s why the. The violin kind of popped in. ‘cause I played it when I was very young, but didn’t really stick with it. So it does feel like this, like returning to what was there in the beginning before life got ahold of me.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Becky: And to be clear, I have no regrets for what life has, I have no regrets for anything. Like the life has assembled me in this way with the experiences that I’ve had to have this moment. And so there’s no negativity or, or regret. It’s, it’s a very joyous feeling.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Yeah. It’s just, um, it’s just, it’s just like an essence like.
It feels like a, like a returning to your essence. Mm-hmm.
And, and it is even just, it could even just be like a slight turn of the dial. A change of perspective. Like it doesn’t mean that all of a sudden you’re going to stop being a mindfulness teacher and like color your hair or do something very drastic and completely change, but it’s just a reorientation,
Becky: which those things, those drastic changes are what I would’ve reached for in the past.
It would’ve felt like. I need to be this totally different person, you know? Um, or that’s like tied to that feeling of frustration that I originally had because it’s like frustration that I’m not a different person. And that’s not what life is asking of us. It’s not asking us to be life assembled us in this way.
I don’t wanna say for a reason. I will say life has assembled us this way with great care and, and curiosity. Actually, I don’t know why. The why is not the important question to me right now, but I have been assembled and here I am with whatever I’ve been assembled with or for what, whatever reason. Here I am.
And now what am I going to do? What am I gonna choose to do with this, this one wild and miraculous life.
Christina: Yeah. As you say that, a couple times I got the image of like Becky somewhere saying, inwardly, I am here, I am here I am here. And it’s like a very, um, it’s a very present, very still expression. That’s beautiful.
And then when you, you like look up and say, here I am, and all of a sudden all of these paths stretch out before you.
Yeah.
Here I am is like the great unlocking to possibility. Here I am, and it’s on, no path is wrong, but it’s like all of a sudden the lights turn on and you see what’s ahead as possible.
Like so many possible paths.
Becky: Mm-hmm. When you said that it, it got, I got this like reorientation of when I say I am here, there’s such an emphasis on the I, which the I doesn’t really exist. Like what is the I? It’s like, it’s it, it’s who we are. Both our physical bodies, our identifications are ever changing, are not static.
So the I is an illusion. So when I say I am here, it does have this. Like emphasis on the, the most false thing about me, but here I am. Mm-hmm. Puts the emphasis on the only thing that is real, which is this moment right now, this assembly of me. This assembly of you. Mm-hmm. That’s the orientation.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Christina: I love it.
Becky: I love it so much. That’s a bombshell reorientation.
Christina: Mm-hmm.
Becky: It really is.
Christina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And like I said, this was my brother-in-laws and you know, when he figured it out, when he finally took time for himself and took a couple of days and went away, that dropped, he called it a download.
Becky: Wow.
Christina: Yeah. He told me at Mimi’s funeral, actually.
Becky: Mm.
Christina: He was like, can I tell you? Can I report back? This is what I learned when I went and checked on my silence. Mm. What a great offering of perspective.
Becky: Yeah. What a gift. I mean, and look how it ripples out
Christina: already.
Becky: Yeah. Mm-hmm. These things ripple out like the gifts we give ourselves to be more in touch with ourselves, ripple out in ways that we will never know. It is the least selfish thing you could do.
Christina: I know. Yeah.
That’s shocking. It’s shocking. But, but seriously, once you start tending to yourself like this, you realize that very quickly that it is not a selfish path.
Becky: Yeah.
Christina: It’s so much more
now we get to go and just take this. I am here and change it to here I am and see where that goes.
Becky: Mm-hmm. And it’s, it is playful and directional and it, and I love this image of multiple paths and it’s, it just feels so playful. Like, what’s next?
Christina: Yeah. Here I’m, yeah. What are we gonna do? What am I gonna do?
Where am I gonna go? What am I gonna create? What am I gonna receive?
Becky: And it, it’s reminding me to come back to what we’ve talked about before, this image that you got of like one stone at a time. You know,
Christina: mm-hmm. Oh yeah.
Becky: And so often I do, in the past, I have wanted to jump to where does this stone lead?
Where does this path lead? And it’s like. Who am I to know? Life, know, life doesn’t even know. I actually don’t even think life knows. Yeah. But life. I don’t know. Life. When I think of like the lineage of life, when I really connect to, from the billions of years, from the origin of life and the billions of years, there was 10 billion years before we got in the universe, before we got to life on this planet.
Life just wants to expand and play. It feels playful, like what can I create? Mm-hmm. So what can I create here I am, what can I create?
Christina: Yeah. Anything,
Becky: literally anything.
Christina: Mm-hmm. Yep. Yeah. And then there’s this beautiful thing, there’s this, um, I forget where I heard this, but if you give a child a toy, you can either teach them how to play with it, and that’s the one way that they will do it, or they will use it to play with it in all these different ways that it wasn’t actually created to be played with.
Mm-hmm. It really is this like baseline energy that can take form in so many things, processes, ways. I think it is, um, really worth remembering to orient yourself towards this possibility as often as possible. That’s a choice that you have moment by moment. By moment.
Becky: Yeah. Mm-hmm. I’m excited just to play.
Christina: Mm-hmm. It’s like nothing. It’s no big deal. It’s just, you just get to do it. You get to live your life.
Becky: Mm-hmm. Which is a radical orientation. Mm-hmm. Unfortunately, it’s a radical. I wish that were the norm,
Christina: let’s make it that
Becky: we will. Life is so, one of my, uh, uh, one of the directional feelings, uh, led me to rewatching the movie contact
clearly, clearly I love movies. And I love the movie contact with, uh, Jodi Foster. It’s based on Carl Sagan’s book and she’s talking to this, you know, in charge scientist and he says, I know you want the world to be fair, but we just don’t live in that world. And she says, funny, I thought the world is what we make of it.
Mm-hmm. And you’re right. Mm-hmm. Choice by choice. Moment by moment, we choose how to make the world.
Christina: Mm-hmm. And that’s what we get to do with this podcast and these conversations. Mm. It’s already happening. So many people will, will reflect back to me just like this, this thing that you said or Becky said, or you were talking about really actually helped me think of my own life differently.
Or, and then it just ripples, ripples out from there.
Becky: That brings tears to my eyes. Like that, that’s that feeling that I can’t, that’s, it’s a different feeling than awe, but it’s in that same vein of just like, wow.
Christina: Mm-hmm. It’s awesome.
Becky: Mm-hmm. I love you friend. I love you too. I’m very grateful for you.
Christina: Mm-hmm. Same.
Becky: Hmm.
Christina: The music was recorded live as a part of the Sound Service at 3S Art Space in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in January, 2025, where musicians responded to the changing light in the room that reflected and refracted through Christina’s suspended artwork. Andrew Halchak, the composer of this piece is playing bass clarinet and Tomas Cruz and Katie Seiler are singing.
Oh my God. Becky, I’ve been waiting all day. I know there’s never a rush with you, but this is something I really wanted to talk to you about. Because what you’re describing, it’s so, it’s so amazing to me that I get to be the one to tell you this. Um, but what you’re describing is what it feels like to have an idea and to want to make it take form through you.
Um. I think of what you’re describing as a directional feeling, and when it’s very strong, I pay attention to it and it’s what fuels my whole life, really. Um, but the more that you have this feeling, the more, um, I believe you’re in alignment with what wants to come through you.
That’s why I call it a directional feeling because it, it indicates a path forward. Um, I guess I would, I would think of this as sort of like the same thing that I would think of as synchronicities.
Like the more that you have this feeling. The more that it’s pointing you in a direction to walk, you know. Or to learn or to um, just experience. And it feels very much like a spark or like a light bulb moment. Like is that sort of how it’s feeling to you? Like it’s very energized and if it’s filling you with awe, that’s like the awe, I think.
I would put in a separate category, but I think what you’re describing is just like the creative spark for something.
And I think what you’re describing and the fact that it is so remarkable to you to be feeling this way, is that you are in flow with the present moment of being a creative, generative person. And that is enough, like that is where the meat of all creative expression lies, is in that feeling and in the meat of
of like the experience of feeling inspired. What you’re talking about is inspiration. Um, and you don’t have to know what it’s going to be. You just have to trust that feeling and allow yourself to be with it. So I’ll use those words back at you. They’re your words. Can you be with it? Can you be with this feeling and know that it doesn’t actually have to become anything necessarily. But even by being with it, it’s nature is to become something.
So you just have to trust that like the more you walk in that direction or think in that direction, or create in that direction, that is a fertile ground that will become whatever it’s meant to become big or small because you are tending to it by orienting yourself towards it.
What do you think? What do you think? I love you.
