SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, spiritual, life, coaching, feel, learning, Psychology, consciousness, thinking, drinking, good, affirmations, create, happen, called, talking, book, resolve, healing, practice, Holistic Coach, mental, emotional, physical, supporting people, taking really good care of yourself so that you can of best service to other people, internal block, external block, outer block, fear-based, assumption, belief, past, self-sabotaging, unconsciously, consciousness, shift from goal line to soul line, living, work connection with myself, atomic habits, true behavior change is identity change, focusing on who you believe yourself to be based on habits, spiritual psychology gave me a new way of looking at myself and being with myself, able to approach life again, mental health issues, trauma challenges, having human experience, paradigm shift, resonate, stories we tell ourselves, replacing negative thoughts, self-loathing, reframing, self-forgiveness, deep self-acceptance of oneself, tolerant, accepting, mistakes, past choices, practice, awareness, commitment, dedication, resolving, completing unfinished business, learn new skills, embodying, transformation process, higher being, self-worth, recovery, move forward, unworthy, misinterpretation, misunderstanding, commitment to my healing, intention, nurturing myself, making space for your own process, practical focus, journey, how you can receive value, learning the lesson, navigating, continuing to grow and evolve, removing alcohol, sober momentum, coping mechanism, grateful, creating a life that is truly joyful and content, tolerating coping, victim versus creator, meditation, what needs my attention, setting a boundary, affirmations are really powerful, affirmation cards, energy, mantra, principles of spiritual psychology, we are souls using a human experience, purpose of awakening, guilt, shame, give you a different perspective of yourself, free yourself, accepting personal responsibility, empowering, spiritual curriculum, purposeful and meaningful, roadmap, do the work inwardly, realigned, vulnerable

SPEAKERS: Casey McGuire Davidson + Beverly Sartain

00:02

Welcome to the Hello Someday Podcast, the podcast for busy women who are ready to drink less and live more. I’m Casey McGuire Davidson, ex-red wine girl turned life coach helping women create lives they love without alcohol. But it wasn’t that long ago that I was anxious, overwhelmed, and drinking a bottle of wine and night to unwind. I thought that wine was the glue, holding my life together, helping me cope with my kids, my stressful job and my busy life. I didn’t realize that my love affair with drinking was making me more anxious and less able to manage my responsibilities.

In this podcast, my goal is to teach you the tried and true secrets of creating and living a life you don’t want to escape from.

Each week, I’ll bring you tools, lessons and conversations to help you drink less and live more. I’ll teach you how to navigate our drinking obsessed culture without a bus, how to sit with your emotions, when you’re lonely or angry, frustrated or overwhelmed, how to self soothe without a drink, and how to turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life.

I am so glad you’re here. Now let’s get started.

Hi there. Today I’m welcoming to the podcast, Beverly Sartain. She’s an author and has written a book called Transcending Trauma: How I Use Spiritual Psychology To Heal My Life. That release created the spiritual psychology healing workbook. And she’s also the creator of The Holistic Coach Certification Program. And the Spiritual Psychology Coaching method never leaves a Certified Alcohol and Drug Counselor. And in her career before Coaching, Beverly managed and developed domestic violence and co-occurring residential programs.

 

So, I’m so excited to have you on Beverly, welcome.

 

02:04

Thank you so much for having me. I’m very happy to be here.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 02:08

Great. Well, just to start, I know that your Coaching Program focuses on a Holistic approach to Coaching. And can you tell us a little bit more about what exactly that means?

 

02:19

Yeah, it’s a great question. Because a lot of people have a different perspective on what holistic means. So, when we talk about holistic, and our program, we’re looking at the four levels of mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical. And we’re really supporting people. And first of all, the coach operating from a holistic level. So, making sure that you are operating on those four levels and taking really good care of yourself so that you can be of best service to other people. And then we’re also learning how to support other people around those four levels, because oftentimes, we’re top heavy on one, or we might be missing one or two of those. And so that’s why maybe we don’t see the results that we see. Because there’s certain levels that we’re not, we’re not hitting, and we’re not looking at and we’re not aware of. And so, this kind of approach brings a really well-rounded perspective to somebody creating good results for themselves.

 

Well, and how do you see that different from maybe what other coaching approaches are, um,

I don’t always hear about, you know, the four levels, I think oftentimes when people are coaching, they’re maybe coaching around fitness, or maybe they’re specific on one area. And the truth is, I just really like to subscribe to being well rounded on all the areas, it doesn’t mean, you’re going to be perfect on all the areas, but at least you have the awareness that if you are working on maybe some health issues, that you also need to be looking at the mental level and what you’re thinking about that, or you need to be aware of any emotional issues that are maybe getting in the way of you reaching your health goals. And also, a lot of times the spiritual is not always included there for people. And so, making sure whatever that word means to you that you’re incorporating it in, in your approach.

 

04:17

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I see that too, in coaching in terms of, most of the time when people want to achieve something that they haven’t been able to achieve in the past. It’s almost always an internal block, not an external block or an outer block, meaning it’s a fear-based issue. It’s an assumption, it’s a belief, it’s something from their past that is sort of self-sabotaging, often unconsciously. And so really addressing sort of both the mental and the emotional and sort of everything around that what is making them not achieved their goal or not follow through that super critical.

 

Absolutely! I always say like the number one thing that I think people need to work on is what’s in their consciousness. Yeah. Right. So, we’re such a society that’s focused on goals and accomplishments, we’re really focused on the goal line of life, that we’re not so much focused on what’s going on within ourselves. And so that was kind of the big shift that I went through in my life is that shift from goal line to more of a soul line living or more work connection with just myself and looking at what am I thinking, what am I feeling inside of myself, that’s then leading to behaviors are that’s that leading to either what I want to create or what I don’t want to create. And so I really think there’s so much goodness that can come through when we actually focus on what am I holding in my consciousness, and I happen to be someone that was holding a lot of negativity, a lot of self-loathing, and just a lot of judgments about my past. Yeah. And so that was really getting in the way of, you know, the potential I knew I had, and the future that I wanted to create for myself, because I just kept going back into the old story into the old beliefs into the old way of being and it really hindered me moving forward into what I wanted to create.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 06:20

If you’re listening to this episode and have been trying to take a break from drinking, but keep starting and stopping and starting again, I want to invite you to take a look at my on demand coaching course, The Sobriety Starter Kit. The Sobriety Starter Kit is an online self study, sober coaching course that will help you quit drinking and build a life you love without alcohol without white knuckling it or hating the process. The course includes the exact step-by-step coaching framework I work through with my private coaching clients, but at a much more affordable price than one-on-one coaching. And The Sobriety Starter Kit is ready, waiting and available to support you anytime you need it, when it fits into your schedule.  You don’t need to work your life around group meetings or classes at a specific day or time. This course is not a 30 day challenge, or a one day at a time approach. Instead, it’s a step-by-step formula for changing your relationship with alcohol. The course will help you turn the decision to stop drinking from your worst case scenario to the best decision of your life. You will sleep better and have more energy, you’ll look better and feel better, you’ll have more patience and less anxiety. And with my approach you won’t feel deprived or isolated in the process. So if you’re interested in learning more about all the details, please go to www.sobrietystarterkit.com. You can start at any time and I would love to see you in the course.

 

I love everything you’re saying because I just did a whole series on atomic habits. And one of the main tenants is that true behavior change is actually identity change. And you know, really focusing on who you believe yourself to be based on the habits you’re performing the evidence you’re doing and changing that story. So totally the opposite of fake it till you make it it’s really building this new identity and how outcome based you know, habits or goals like you’re talking about, I want to achieve this goal is very different because identity based habits are based on who you want to become. And I love that idea of like, who do you want to become?

 

09:10

That’s awesome. But as like, to me spiritual psychology in a nutshell, like this, what you’re talking about is exactly what spiritual psychology gave me. It gave me a new way of looking at myself. And once I had a new way of looking at myself, then I create a new a new way of being with myself. And then once I created a new way of being with myself, then I was able to approach life again, in such a different way because I had shifted my identity from this person who you know, use substances and had mental health issues and had all these trauma challenges to now viewing myself as a spiritual being having a human experience. And that paradigm shift changed everything for me.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 09:55

And I know that a lot of women listening to this are going to resonate that I mean, I think we all have negative self-talk, we all have stories we tell ourselves; you know, we may not even be aware of them. But you know, we have these thoughts that are holding us back and pushing us down, I mean, hundreds of times a day. So, how do you actually do that, like what you’re talking about in terms of replacing those negative thoughts, that self-loathing that, you know, basically evolving into believing that you’re a spiritual being having a having a human experience? How do you do that?

 

10:33

Well, I think what’s interesting, like, as we’re talking about the different levels and identity change, I think, what happens for a lot of people is that they think it’s just about replacing a thought, or, or reframing, like we sometimes talk about in Coaching. And I oftentimes share that I don’t think flipping a thought or reframing a thought or replacing a thought is sometimes enough for people, right, because it’s just like changing a thought it doesn’t. It doesn’t do anything for me long term, maybe in the moment, it helps me see it a little bit differently. And that’s really what I loved about spiritual psychology is because it was it was a language of loving. For me, it taught me a new language of how to be with myself how to be more loving with myself. And I, at the time, didn’t know how to have compassion for myself, I knew how to have it for other people. Because I was a helping professional. I didn’t know how to give it to myself. At the time, I had never really heard about self-forgiveness, I had heard about forgiving other people, but I had not heard about how I actually forgive myself. And then, you know, just a deeper self-acceptance of oneself. You know, I was very tolerant and accepting of others, but I wasn’t tolerant and accepting of some of my mistakes or my past choices. So, it truly is a practice. You know, when you when you talk about how you do that, I think that first you have to be aware, you have to be aware of what is getting in the way. And then there has to be a commitment and a dedication to changing the thinking to resolving what’s in your consciousness is really a better way I think of saying it, it’s like completing the unfinished business that’s in your consciousness. And to do that, then you have to learn new skills, which is what you’re asking me right now. It’s like, you have to learn how to do that I happen to learn how to do that through spiritual psychology and learning their tools and techniques, which is a lot of what I share with people. And then it becomes a practice. And that’s truly how I feel like the transformation process happens. It happens through awareness through shifting your consciousness through learning new skills, and then practicing it, embodying it. So that starts to become second nature to you. Because the big shift that happened for me was realizing that I was identifying too much with my humaneness with my ego. And when I had that awareness, I started to realize that I could identify more with my spiritual being or, you know, my higher self, or whatever you want to call it.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 13:19

Could you give me like a concrete example of you know, what you were feeling what you were thinking in your life? And how you change that? Because sometimes I have trouble wrapping my head around, like some of the concepts around higher being and spirituality.

 

13:36

Yeah, absolutely. So, um, one of my big challenges was self-worth. So, when I started my recovery and healing process, that was something that really came forward, for me was just a very deep self-loathing, and a deep, deep feeling of unworthiness. And so, then it would be looking at, what are the thoughts that I’m having about that? Right. So, then it would be you know, I feel like I’m unworthy of love. I feel like I’m deserving of good, good things. I’m, I’m unworthy of receiving goodness in my life, whatever the story is there.

 

14:17

Why were you saying thinking to yourself that you’re unworthy of love or stuff like that, like, what was the What was the reason that you were putting at the end of that?

 

14:27

I just believed that the core of my being that I was not a good person and unworthy of love, because of the choices that I had made during my active addiction. Okay, and so and then I had never really been taught growing up to feel worth you know, I always was taught to do for others in order to get love. And so, there was just a lot of misunderstandings about myself and my worth to people. And so, I had to really unpack all of that, in order to resolve it, you resolve it by getting in touch with what the thoughts are, what’s the story there? What’s the misunderstandings, all that that stuff? And then there’s a particular technique we learn in spiritual psychology that’s around self-forgiveness. So, then it would be I forgive myself for buying into the misunderstanding that I’m unworthy. I forgive myself for buying into the misinterpretation that, you know, because I have felt unworthy in the past that I’m still unworthy as I move forward in the future. And, and so essentially, what you’re doing is you’re bringing love, you’re bringing in grace, you’re bringing compassion to these thoughts and these misunderstandings and these stories. And the more that you make a practice out of that, then these things start to resolve and dissolve and don’t have the same energy that they once did.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 15:54

Did you do that by working with a spiritual psychologist? Or how did that process happen?

 

16:00

No, I didn’t. So, it happened because it was a two-year program that I participated in. And it was an experiential program, whereas we were learning the skills to provide them to other people, we were also receiving them.

 

16:14

Yeah, I did that in coaching school, to me to see that it is amazing, got coached while you were coaching, and you know, it was part of me realizing that everybody needs coaching and time to just process what you’re going through every single week, if you can, I mean, it’s so helpful.

 

16:34

Yeah, so that’s exactly how it was. It was just experiential, we learned it, we received it. And so, as I was going through that, to your process, I just had a commitment to my healing. It was a commitment to heal what needed to be healed so that I could live the potential I knew I had inside of myself. And I had hit such a rock bottom and Crossroads for myself that I was really ripe and ready to receive, receive it and really apply it and make some big changes in my life.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 17:05

Yeah, well, one thing I loved when we were talking earlier, is that you talked about the practical application of spiritual psychology because I’m a pretty practical step by step girl like that is what works for me, intellectually. And so, you know, sometimes spiritual psychology in the practices can feel very ethereal, right? Like, you just have to feel it and experience it to tell me a little bit about the practical application like how that is, you know, done.

 

17:37

Well, that’s why I broke it down in those four areas, because that’s how I start to make it practical that there needs to be a focus on awareness, increasing your awareness, a focus on looking at what’s in your consciousness, then a focus on learning new skills, and everybody’s different. So, for me, it was I needed to learn compassion, self-forgiveness, self-love, acceptance, like these types of skills, because I just wasn’t giving them to myself at the time, and then creating a practice for yourself. You have a practice going on, on those four levels that I shared at the beginning. So, making sure you’re hitting the physical, the spiritual, the mental, and the emotional in your practice. And if you’re doing that kind of practice on a daily basis, doesn’t have to be long, because people are always like, when do I have the time for this? Like, it could be, you know, a 30-minute practice that you do, it doesn’t need to, you know, take two or three hours, because no one has time for that. So, it’s just a matter of the intention. It’s having the intention that I’m supporting myself around the mental level, having the intention, I’m supporting myself around the emotional, the spiritual and the physical level. And I think it becomes a matter of, I’m taking care of myself, I’m appreciating and nurturing myself. And it’s this type of a philosophy. I think, when I apply, it’s like, you just start to change because you’re making space for your own process and your own nurturing.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 19:11

Yeah, that is wonderful. And one of the things I thought was interesting as well was you passed on to me 52 self-awareness lessons for the new year. And, you know, I sort of outlined the first 10 in my notes, but can you tell me about those, you know, at a high level, what’s the purpose of the lessons and Is that something that you or your coaches like work through with individual clients?

 

19:39

Yeah, so the 52 lessons are really, for someone who maybe has already been on the recovery journey, and as feeling like they want to deepen in their work, or they want to hit a new level in their process. And so, the 52 lessons just give a focus forever, every single week. And so, the intention, again is to be practical and to have a practical focus every single week. And to see now where you are, at this point in the journey, how you can receive value out of learning this lesson, we do it in a group format. And so, it’s just, it’s a group of people who are continuing to grow and evolve, that are trying on the lesson for the week, and then sharing how they applied it. And so, then we get to hear other people’s application of it, and also share our own application of it. And through that experience, people really start to, to just deepen in their connection to themselves and have more of a connected spiritual experience as well.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 20:43

Yeah, I completely love that. Because I feel like I mean, I work with women who are sort of right at the beginning of removing alcohol from their lives and getting their first few months of sober momentum and sort of navigating life without using alcohol as a coping mechanism. And the best thing that I see is that once you get rid of the alcohol, then there’s all the other stuff to work on, like the reason that you were using alcohol to numb out or checkout or, or make yourself less anxious or interact with the world. And then you get to not even have to, but you get to sort of deal with that stuff in a positive way for the first time. So, I think that it is so important that once you stopped drinking, like that’s the beginning of peeling back the onion, but in a really positive way. Like I’m always like, if I had learned some of the shit that I learned now 45 when I was 25, I would have saved myself so much crap.

 

21:48

I totally relate. Because I did get sober at 26. I did learn spiritual psychology when I was 26. And I tell people all the time, I’m so grateful that I learned this when I did because it really changed the trajectory of Yeah,

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 22:03

you got this so much earlier. I didn’t quit till I was 40. Like 39, 40 was when I finally quit. But I’m still so grateful.

 

22:14

Yeah, exactly, exactly. And I love what you’re sharing that, that there’s these stages that we go through and the healing process and, and at first, it’s just about stopping something, you know, and then when you stop something, whatever that behavior is, then it is like things think surface. Yeah, and I love what you’re saying that that doesn’t need to be a negative thing. Because we always say in spiritual psychology that like it’s coming forward to be healed. And it’s coming up in your consciousness to be healed, because it’s also ready to be healed. And so that’s the time when you really want to do the healing and the resolving of the unfinished business that has maybe taken place in your previous life. And so, it’s something to be honored. You know, it’s something to be honored that we get to work through these challenges. And on the other side of that is just profound joy, happiness, bliss, you know, all these wonderful things that that I think most human beings really want to have. But there’s these roadblocks that are getting in the way. And so, it’s just like, now’s the opportunity to work through the roadblocks. Yeah. So that you can experience your potential and the things that you really want to

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 23:32

Yeah, if I always picture the difference between that is a lot of us and I know I did my life was pretty good. But I was kind of settling for a life that was kind of just okay, meaning I’m got to keep my head down. I got to plow through this. Yes, it’s not great, but it’s pretty good. Versus actually creating a life that is truly joyful and content. And no, it’s not perfect, like crap happens all the time. But you’re not going through it tolerating and gritting your teeth and feeling honestly, like, you can’t change things like sort of, you’re trapped, or, you know, you have obligations and responsibilities and therefore Yeah, it would be nice to do what I would love to do or dream. But that’s not really practical now is it you know, and that sort of lowering your bar and life and we’re meant to be happy? you’re meant to live a life you love, you truly are?

 

24:30

Absolutely, I think you know, one of the things that we talked about in spiritual psychology is victim consciousness versus creator consciousness that was about that.

 

I know it was a big one for me, because I have really spent most of my life in victim consciousness and what I mean by that is just really in this I like I’ve shared several times self-loathing, self-pity, feeling sorry for myself feeling you know that I had been dealt maybe a hard a hard hand.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 25:08

Yeah, you like have to navigate your life as it’s been set up, you’re disappointed, but kind of it is what it is you just didn’t get, you know, you didn’t get this straight in poker when you were being deltad.

 

25:24

But then feeling really bad about that, right? And kind of gripping on that and staying attached to that. And because of that, not really allowing myself to move forward. So, it was almost it was disempowering. I always say victim consciousness is disempowering, right? Because it’s holding yourself in a state of mind, that does not serve you and actually starts to make you look at things in a very negative, dark way. And then and then how can you create abundance in your life from that place, or how can you create the relationships that you want or the career purpose you want? You know, so that was part of my road was resolving victim consciousness and really putting to rest a lot of these things that I was, I was now perpetuating in my consciousness and repeating over and over and over again to myself, and it just wasn’t creating a very good experience. So that was

 

26:23

into what is a creator, consciousness versus creator, then you’re jumping to like that taking responsibility for what is in my consciousness that I’m still thinking about, or what part of my past Have I not really put to rest or made peace with that I need to because it keeps coming up for me, your mind, your consciousness is going to tell you what you need to work on. Because it’s whatever needs to be worked on will be in the forefront of your consciousness. And that just means that something that comes up for you regularly, it’s something that disturbs your peace regularly, if there’s something that disturbs your peace regularly, that’s a sign, you know, that’s a message for you. And instead of being down about that, I just encourage everybody listening to just take that message and know that it’s trying to tell you something, and that there’s something for you there. And there’s something on the other side of it for you as well.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 27:25

One of the things you mentioned, and I think it’s so similar to what I do. And what I learned in coaching school is I do something called core energy coaching, I usually do it with women, once they get to like 50 or 60 days away from alcohol, meaning you’re out of the drinking cycle, you’re no longer struggling with sort of the day to day, navigating people places and things and, and triggers and cravings and all that stuff. And in core energy coaching there, the seven levels of you know, your default way of approaching the world like something happens. And here’s how you perceive it and react to it. There is no, “bad level”. But there are levels that are much more draining, and hard to live at, then other areas that are proactive and constructive and sort of allow you to navigate the world with less stress.

 

And level one is known as the victim. And it is, you know exactly what you’re talking about. Like the feeling is sort of I lose self-pity, disappointment, guilt, worry, feeling powerless to change the word, you know, you’re just navigating the current of your life. And that’s a really hard place to live. And in fact, it’s not true. Like the idea, like your feelings are not facts. And as you move up the levels, you know, then there’s a level of sort of tolerating, coping, trying to see the good, taking responsibility, which is more positive. It’s sort of a transition level. And yet, it’s kind of exhausting, right?

 

A lot of times people are coping and tolerating because they don’t want to cause conflict, they want to maintain harmony. They’re so focused on other people, and the reason other people are doing things, you know, and then there’s sort of a caregiver problem solver level. And the level I love, level five is called the opportunist, but in a really positive way you’re looking for the widow in but what I love about it is you are putting your needs on an equal level or is primary, right, you’re figuring out what you want, and then figuring out how to make it work for other people too. And especially women who are in the drinking cycle, I feel like they either feel guilty for drinking, or turn so much of that you call it self-loathing and I call it like blame resentment guilt on themselves that they never, they’re just overcompensating so that no one will look at them too closely. So, their own needs are sublimated. They don’t think they’re worthy because they have this like I’m a bad person. I drink too much shit in the back of their mind, I need to make up for it. And it’s just a cycle. Whereas if you could get to, I am worthy, what do I actually want? And how can I make that happen, then your whole life is better, you don’t feel like you have to numb out all the time because you actually have positive things that you enjoy on your daily, daily experience. And you’re not gritting your teeth. So, it sounds when you said, victim versus creator. In my mind, that’s the same, like powerless. things just happen to me versus what do I want? And how can I make that happen? Right?

 

30:37

And the shift has to then come within your consciousness. Because I think what happens is people look external, and they go, Okay, I need to change this relationship, or I need a different job, or I need to move somewhere else, right? And we try to shuffle things around externally and hope that we’re going to feel happy and better and joyful. And the truth is, we’re still bringing our same consciousness to whatever we’re doing. And those new things.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 31:05

Yeah, like the idea of whatever. I used to do that I know in drinky, they call that like what polio geographic, right, like changing and thinking that something will change. I always did it with work. Like, you know, I would, oh, my God, this job is so stressful. I have so much anxiety, I can’t, you know, this pressure is too much, I’m going to go to a different company. And one of my friends actually, one of my best friends, like worked at Amazon worked at Kindle when they were launching. And she went home at five and she was super Zen. First, I can’t believe you’re in a startup mode at Amazon, and you’re Zen and chill. And I was like, well, I should go work there. If she said, then and chill.

 

31:46

And my husband was like, Honey, you’re going to be the same way, no matter where you go. Like, it’s not the job. It’s you. And it’s true. Like you have to do the work internally for us. And then the work internally is looking out what am I? What’s my story about this? What are my beliefs here? What? What am I making this mean about me? And I think that that connects again to the identity piece that you were talking about, you know, and it’s when we can’t then within our consciousness have a different identity of ourselves, or at least be moving towards a different identity about ourselves, then we can start to have a different experience of ourselves. So, it’s definitely an inside out job always. And I found like, the more I worked on the inside peace, then the outside peace started to reflect back to me how I was feeling on the inside. And I started to have this really great barometer almost of, you know, wow, I’m really, I’m feeling better on the inside. And now I’m starting to see that my life is better externally, too. And now I can be more proactive about how, what moves I make, instead of being reactive about changing things around to make myself feel better, or to help that I will feel better. Yeah.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 33:03

Yeah. And it’s not relying on someone else, to make you happy, or to do for you what you need, you actually have to do it for yourself, which means you have to change some setup relationships that you’ve had, right? Because, you know, your boss, your spouse, they, they, they may like you, they may love you, they may value they will also take as much as you will give, because it makes their own life easier. And so, it’s up to you to kind of draw that boundary and say, here’s what I need, which is hard, right?

 

As women, it’s hard today, I think that, you know, it’s, it is really important to just focus on yourself, when you’re first starting your journey, it feels like there’s so much that needs to be shifted, or changed. And so I think what really helped me is that the focus became on shifting and changing what was going on inside me via my thoughts. And when I focus there, I didn’t worry at that point about relationships and my job and these other things that that felt way too overwhelming to me. And so I just started with how can I set better boundaries, like within myself or for myself? How can I do a practice on a daily basis that I commit to and follow through on so that I was building some confidence with myself, I just I really focused on shifting the inside. And I trusted that the more I did that, that I was going to start to see some changes externally. And that is exactly what happened.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 34:40

So, when you first started out what was that you mentioned to practice, like, what did that look like for you was that writing was that meditation? Was that something completely different question.

 

34:52

I’m somebody who is very intuitive. And that’s actually something that you know, through getting Through it through my recovery I learned about myself. And so, I just I do encourage people to go with what you enjoy. When you’re starting off instead of trying to force yourself to do tools that maybe feel too out of reach for you. Just go with what you can right now and get going, right? Get going and get a practice going for yourself. So, so for me, like, I have cards that I pull, and I have a candle lit, and I have my crystals here, you know, that I use and but writing has definitely always been a way that I’ve expressed myself when maybe I didn’t have the words or didn’t have the voice. And journaling, what I mean is just really just writing down my thoughts, kind of acknowledging what’s in my consciousness. So again, just a stream of consciousness, writing whatever is there, and starting to get acquainted with, wow, there’s a lot of heaviness here, you know, like, there’s a lot of negativity here, and learning how to not judge that and learning how to just be like, that’s what’s there. What am I going to do with it? Right, and that’s the empowering piece of moving into that creator consciousness was okay, here it is, this is what it is. Now, what if anything, am I going to do with this and I think just continuing to put myself in empowerment is what started to inch me forward is just that real simple barometer of Am I disempowering myself right now with my thoughts, or am I empowering myself right now, with my thoughts? That was always just a simple barometer for me to use.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 36:37

I love that, that is awesome. I’m hearing everything you’re saying. I’m sort of nodding my head. One of the things I loved in your self awareness lesson, or the first one that jumped out at me was number two was intention so that you can direct your attention on what you truly desire. And tell me about

 

36:58

Yeah, so in my healing process, now, intention is a very common quality of experience that I’m going for. I mean, I’m very intentional in my business, I’m very intentional with my relationships. I’m very intentional with everything, but it started off with just having self-awareness around what do I need to be more intentional about and what needs my attention, you know, so if we’re talking about like, I have migraines, or my back hurts, or I’m feeling exhausted, or burned out, like, these are all messages to you. And so, then you can focus more attention on those things. And you can be intentional, again, with creating some sort of practice for yourself, or maybe the practices setting boundaries, maybe the practices honoring your Yes, and honoring your No, you know, so these simple type of practices can really start to change things for yourself, because you’re not just thinking about them, but now you’re applying them in your life. And that’s I think, when the big shift happens for people is not just when they’re gathering the information, but they’re actually at a point where, even from today, from this podcast that you’re listening to, if you could take one thing that you’ve heard today and actually apply it somehow to your personal experience, and see what happens if it’s setting a boundary, if it’s starting a practice on the four levels, if it’s being more intentional, around something, that’s how I think that we move ourselves forward, and, and really deepen in our process.

 

38:41

And, in addition to that, what I liked was the idea of what you truly desire. Because I know that like when I’m working with women, when I’m coaching women, and also in my own life, you know, where you start is, I’m not that happy, he does this, this happens. I don’t have this, which is all true, right? That is, you know, legitimate frustrations and problems. But one of the questions I ask is like, Okay, what would a fulfilling relationship look like to you? What would that feel like? What would that actually physically? You know, how would that manifest in in a daily life? Like, what do you want? And what would a good schedule look like for you? What would a fulfilling job look like for you? Like, literally, what energy would you have? How would you interact with people what you know, what’s your ideal, so that you even know what you want? What would feel good? And then you can kind of start making subtle changes asking for it. You know, a lot of times it’s you are changing your behavior. And you know, honestly, what we tolerate, we tolerate a lot of stuff that makes us unhappy, and we almost never actually verbalize. What we want a lot of times because we don’t even know what we want, we just know that we don’t like what’s happening.

 

So, I love that you were, you’ve said also what you truly desire, because I think figuring that out, you know, even at a really practical level, is the first step to actually get and that’s your, you’re speaking the power of coaching. And I love that because what you’re sharing as you were just describing victim consciousness, which is this is not working, he’s doing that, that into that victim consciousness. And then you just shared how coaching supports people and moving from victim consciousness to create our consciousness with the questions that you’re talking about, and supporting people and connecting with what they do want and what they would like it to feel like and what they would like to be seeing in the next six months for themselves, right. So you can already see there through the line of questioning that happens in coaching, or supporting people and shifting from what they don’t want and what they don’t like and what they just keep recreating to then now, oh, I’m shifting my energy over here, away from victim consciousness, and towards being the creator of my experience. And those powerful questions that you were just sharing are catalysts to then me now directing my intention, my attention and my energy to actually what I want to be creating. And that’s, that’s essentially, the experience that I went through over the last, you know, 15 years is learning how to shift away from everything that’s not working, that I don’t want to take in all my good energy that I really do have, and my potential to now build some things in my business in my life that I couldn’t have fathom, you know, happening 15 years ago. So yeah, that’s the power of coaching. And I certainly hope that people, you know, see the value in it and reach out and work with you. Yeah.

 

41:59

Yeah. And also, like, people learn to self-coach, right, you learn to start asking those questions of yourself, like, I still self-coach to this day, because it’s not like you and I navigate life without being like, are This sucks, this is no good. And then, you know, the next question is just, what would be good? What do I want? And how can I make that happen? As a win-win with other people, because you, you are not a victim, you are powerful in your own life, and you do have an agency and you are worthy of changing things, and, you know, all of that good stuff. So, I know, you know, positive self-talk, and affirmations aren’t the end all be all. But it starts with thinking about like, people are like, I want to be joyful. I live in powerful life; I live a life of meaning. And then the next question is, okay, what would that actually look like for you? How would? What would you do? How would you feel what would happen? And like, how can you, you know, I always feel like those small shifts inevitably lead to bigger ones, you know, you have to take that first step.

 

43:05

Yeah, I think that the, the affirmations are really powerful for people and I know that they’ve been powerful for me is because as I described to you, I didn’t have those good feeling thoughts on my own. And so, you know, pulling a car, looking at the colors, looking at the message, and starting to learn how to feel into it. You know, like, you talked about fake it till you make it, it was, you know, and not doing that. It was looking at the card and starting to see like, how can this become a possibility for me, right. And so again, that’s the creator consciousness that’s opening yourself up to possibility for yourself. And so that’s why I love affirmations because I like to feel into the words the energy of it to like, what’s possible. If this were true for me, and so again, it opens you up to exploring that other side, instead of keeping yourself stuck and maybe some negative thinking that you might have. Okay, I’m dying to know when you say pulling a card, like what card? Oh, I catch occurrences, I just wanted to tell you that, so I have to be honest, when I first started, it was Louise Hay. So okay, he’s fantastic for affirmations. And so, I have several of her decks. And, and so pulling a card from there. But as I’ve progressed in my own process now there’s an Ascended Masters card called keepers of the light that I put her on and so just different decks. So, it’s, it’s more about what you connect with and what resonates with you.

 

Will you send me those links? Like, I just think that would be super fun. And people always love the affirmation cards when I used to do women’s groups when I worked at nonprofit treatment facilities. And so, I would have the women pull a card, and we would talk about being okay with the card that you pulled. Because sometimes people would be like, No, I don’t like that one, I want a different card, you know. And so, it would be like the lesson and just receiving what you received and trying to find the value in the card that you had poll. And, and so there, they loved pulling those cards. And so, it’s just a part of my practice that I do I pull cards, because it helps me get in a good energy. So, on the emotional level, its kind of lifts me up and it gets me in a good energy. And then on the mental level, it gives me a statement or a mantra that I might be able to repeat to myself throughout the day, as I’m working and doing things.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 45:47

That’s great. Alright, and I want to talk about some principles of spiritual psychology. And I know you go through these in your book. And the first one was the idea that we are not human beings with souls, we are souls using a human experience for the purpose of awakening. And so, let’s talk about that. What does that mean to you? What do you want that to mean to people reading your book or working?

 

46:16

Yeah, so, I’ve really, you know, touched on that one a little bit, I think through our conversation already that that was where the big identity shift happened for me. So, the there’s 33 principles of spiritual psychology. These principles were created by doctors, Ron and Mary hole neck at the University of Santa Monica. So that’s where I studied spiritual psychology. And so I can remember sitting in and, you know, in the audience of 300 people, I had 300 people in my class and hearing for the first time, I’m a spiritual being having a human experience, which is that principle just said a little bit differently. And feeling like I had just heard.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 47:03

You know, for the first time, I had heard this deep truth, that I hadn’t been thinking about myself, I had just been thinking, I’m a human being who’s made a lot of mistakes, and I have a lot of shame, because of all the mistakes I’ve made. And I couldn’t rectify that I couldn’t rectify the guilt, the shame, the bad choices, the bad behavior, until I heard that statement. And I thought, oh, I’ve been thinking, I’m just this human being who can’t ever get it right. And it’s not worthy of ever getting it right. And I’m just gonna have this really difficult experience for my whole life. And then I realized that that wasn’t the truth of who I was. That wasn’t the truth of who I was. And there was a different truth. And that when I bought into that other truth that I kind of freed myself, I had a paradigm shift. And that’s what’s really, I think, good about principles and paradigms is they’re meant to give you a different perspective of yourself. And the bottom line is, is the perspective that you have of yourself working for you.

 

48:10

And, or is it not, and that was the big awareness I had is that the way I was thinking about myself was not working for me, it was causing anxiety, depression, a lot of challenges in my life. And so, I was going to need to take on a different way of looking at myself, in my experience in order to free myself and have a different experience.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 48:31

And that’s what happened. Yeah. Like, how is Serbia? I love that, like, is it working for you?

 

48:38

The truth, right? It’s like, I feel that way about any belief that people have like, if you have this belief, and it’s serving you and you’re happy, and you’re being a good person, and things are joyful, and you’re creating joy for other people, wonderful. But if you have a belief that you’re holding on to and it’s not serving you and it’s not serving other people, and it’s creating destruction in your life, then isn’t that worth looking at? and shifting? Yeah.

 

49:09

Yeah. And you talk about accepting personal responsibility for your spiritual curriculum, and how that can be empowering and open the door to freedom that so one of the things that spiritual psychology talks about a spiritual curriculum, I thought this was like a really neat perspective, right, that our life’s challenges are actually spiritual curriculum. We might say in layman’s terms, like life lessons, right? So, life lessons are like spiritual curriculum. But it was really helpful for me to think of my upbringing and the challenges that I went through when I was younger, as Hey, this was my spiritual curriculum that I came to work on and work through, and now I serve other people who’ve maybe had similar spiritual curriculum as me and want to do something purposeful and meaningful and their lives around this particular thing. And so, it just, it helps me take responsibility for myself and in a different way by looking at spiritual curriculum. And as I shared, getting to the point where I realize I’m the one holding these negative thoughts about the past about myself in my consciousness, so I am the one responsible now, no matter what happened in the past, I am the one responsible now for resolving healing, clearing these things that are in my consciousness, if I really truly want to create the life that I know that I could and want to create.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 50:45

And that’s hard to do. Right? That’s leggy, that’s so hard.

 

50:49

I always tell everybody because I have this healing roadmap that I created. And one of the parts on the healing roadmaps is his choice point and making a decision. And I always tell everybody that I’m working with that, that making the decision part is probably where most people get stuck on the roadmap, because it’s one thing to say we want it to be different, but then to actually do the work inwardly, to make it different. That’s the big hurdle for a lot of people.

 

51:21

Well, and if you’ve had a really difficult experience or really difficult childhood, I mean, it is natural and okay to be angry about that. Right? It is like, yeah, should you did not deserve to be treated that way. That is not okay. You were a child. And so, I feel like that anger is justified. And also, how long are you going to let that dictate the rest of your life?

 

51:49

That’s exactly what was happening to me. You just set it in a nutshell, right? It was like I was completely justified and my feeling about what happened to me. But then it got to a point where my life was literally breaking down. And, you know, I had such bad anxiety and depression. And the shame was so heavy. I mean, I was getting to a point where I wasn’t even able to function to go to work. And these things that were actually very positive in my life, were being jeopardized. And so that’s when it was like, okay, you know, I need to look at this and resolve this victim consciousness that I’m in, because I took it way beyond just being frustrated or angry or feeling justified in those feelings. Yeah.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 52:33

Yeah. And so, let’s talk about self-forgiveness, and how that can be applied.

 

52:41

Yeah, so self-forgiveness is my favorite spiritual psychology technique and tool that I learned, because when you were asking earlier about how we really resolve these thoughts. It’s like, if you’re in a garden, and you’ve got weeds, and you have to really deep root, you know, like, you’ve got to pull up the roots. Like, that’s what I think like self-forgiveness is this bomb that really helps you pull up the roots, so that now you can plant a new seed for yourself. And learning, you know, this, this technique of I forgive myself for judging myself as unworthy. The truth is, that I’m completely lovable, and worthy. Now, the truth is, I’m learning that I’m worthy. Now, the truth is that I’m choosing to see myself as worthy now. So, learning how to start that, like you’re picking out the weeds in your consciousness, and then you’re planting these new truths for yourself.

 

And so, it was a really cool process to learn because it’s essentially learning how to work with the negative thoughts that you have in your consciousness and resolve them, instead of just reframing or doing a mental flip. It’s, you’re healing it on the spiritual level, you’re resolving it on a spiritual level. And when you can think about it that way that you’re really letting this misunderstanding go for maybe the last time and you’re now buying into this new truth statement, which is like an affirmation in a sense, and your, you know, saying what’s true for you now, there’s, again, there’s a level of responsibility and ownership in that that’s much deeper than just a reframe, or you know, reading an affirmation, it’s, it’s bringing that spiritual level to it. And I would encourage anybody that’s listening that if you do work, you know, with reframes, or affirmations, to think about how you can really connect to it on a deeper level for yourself on a spiritual level if you connect with that, but it’s more just on an energetic level. How can I really embody this, this truth? statement or this affirmation so that I’m living it in my life. Not I’m just reading a card. Not just I’m pulling a card and reading a card. But here’s this really powerful message, how can I feel into this message? How can I now go out in my day and maybe embody this message or share this message with somebody else, that’s when you’re going to start to see real changes in your life, when you take it from just an idea to that practical application of it so that you can see your own results from it.

 

Great.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 55:35

So, tell us about your book.

 

55:38

Yay, my book, this is like, such a long time in the making.

 

55:45

It is a big deal.

 

55:47

Yeah, it really is. It is because I’ve been wanting to write this book for a very long time interesting in that I wanted to write this book when I was about three years into my recovery process. And I didn’t like the book until 11 years later. So, I attribute that to probably needing more time to actually process and resolve through some of the things that I share in the book. So, the book is Transcending Trauma: How I Use Spiritual Psychology To Heal My Life. And I don’t go back into the story about the trauma, the book really starts at my breakdown of what I’m going to do now to move forward and heal myself is where the book starts. And so, the I always say the book is not about judgment on my story, or the players in the story. It’s really about how I came to have an awakening that I needed to actually do something about my trauma, and that substance use and my mental health challenges, were really messengers that there was something very, very off that needed to be realigned. And so yeah, it’s all about how I applied spiritual psychology. So, if you like, practical, you’re really gonna like the book, because the book is completely about my practical application of spiritual psychology. So, I give you some of the principles in there some of the practices I did I give you actual assignments that I did. So it’s actually quite a vulnerable book, because there there’s a lot of my process in there. But I figured if it if it helps somebody see like how someone took this information about spiritual psychology and applied it and got results for themselves, that it was totally worth sharing.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 57:37

I think it sounds like a roadmap. So, I know there are a lot of women listening to this, who probably also have similar experiences and need to heal in a similar way. So I absolutely believe that by sharing your story and your process, you are going to help someone else take the first steps, or be open to the idea that this approach or a similar one can help them move forward from where they are in their life right now.

 

58:08

Yeah, and I hope, I hope so. And I hope people recognize that I have no religious training. So, part of what’s really fascinating about this whole story of them studying spiritual psychology, and now sharing spiritual psychology is you know, that I really have no religious training growing up. And so, for me, spirituality doesn’t have pertain to religion, specifically, it more pertains to connection, connection with myself, connection with something greater than myself connection with nature, and also connection with other people. And so that’s really how I’ve used my version and my journey of sphere to spirituality has been about connection. And spiritual psychology really supported me and reconnecting with my true self, and then being able to share and voice and express my true self to other people. And that’s, that’s what I’m hoping to give people is just a different perspective, maybe on the word spiritual, and also, on how we recover, you know, because I didn’t go through the traditional treatment facility or 12 steps or meetings. And so really showing people that you can find your path, you can find your way and you can recover using that way.

 

59:37

Yeah, absolutely. I didn’t. I also didn’t go to recover your 12 steps and there are definitely many, many paths to recovery. There are, which I absolutely love. So, in the show notes of this episode, I will link to where listeners can find the book and you were kind enough to also share the 33 principles of spiritual psychology. So, I will link to that as well. So, anyone interested in learning about the principles of spiritual psychology or finding out exactly where to get that release book, please just go to the show notes of this episode and would love to share that with you. I’ll also share all your information Beverly on how listeners can get in touch with you if they want to learn more.

 

Awesome, I really appreciate it. I love connecting with people. So, if anybody’s feeling called to reach out, please don’t hesitate.

 

Casey McGuire Davidson 1:00:34

Great. And thank you for coming on. This has been incredibly interesting, and I appreciate it.

 

Thank you for having me.