On today's episode, Alex had Dan, her psychic. Dan has been a previous guest on previous episodes so if you haven't tuned into those, make sure you check them out. In today's episode, Alex and Dan speak about having the courage to live a life different than what society expects of them. They speak about living nomadically and following alternative career paths. Alex records these episodes live in the Sober Girls Yoga Facebook Group.
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If you're interested in booking a one-on-one session with Dan, you can do so here: https://www.themindfullifepractice.com/intuitivehealingwithdan. Follow me on Instagram @alexmcrobs and check out my offerings in yoga, meditation and coaching at http://themindfullifepractice.com/.
Transcript
Alex: Hi friend this is Alex McRobbs founder of the Mindful Life Practice and you're listening to the Sober Yoga Girl podcast. I'm a Canadian who moved across the world to the Middle East at age 23 and I never went back. I got sober in 2019 and I now live full-time in Bali, Indonesia. I've made it my mission to help other women around the world stop drinking, start yoga and change their lives through my online sober girls yoga Community. You're not alone and a sober life can be fun and fulfilling, let me show you how.
[Music]
Alex: Perfect, amazing. So welcome everyone. Um for those of you that are just tuning in, hello hello so wonderful to have you. If you can just pop in the chat like let us know where you're joining us from and if you have any questions for us. Um we'd be happy to answer them as the podcast goes on. So today I'm sitting here with Dan who is a really important person in my life and Dan is actually the reason why I started all of this the Mind Life Practice, Sober Girls Yoga. It was kind of like one of these moments where I met him at the exact moment in life where I was like lost and looking for direction and he really inspired me and we do have another episode that is earlier on in Sober Yoga Girl podcast, where I share a lot about kind of that story and and how I got to this place. Um but I'm really happy to have you again today so welcome Dan, how are you?
Dan: I'm great and thank you for having me on again. and I really enjoy our podcast so it's great to get another one uh rolling right now.
Alex: Yeah, and are you you're in Toronto right now, right?
Dan: Yeah, I'm currently in Toronto. Um, I'll be heading to the Middle East uh sometime next week. Um it's been a very interesting uh time in Toronto. Uh a lot of things happened while I was here that I didn't expect and uh we just we we didn't really uh foresee these things happening. But I mean to fill out everybody in I think that uh uh Alex had gotten Covid uh uh about a month ago, and I was I was telling her it's okay I mean there must be a reason why Covid had to happen right now and you have to you know change things but it's okay you'll see a new way of working things out. And funnily enough, the following week I got Covid and I had to cancel a couple events that I had and I had to cancel a trip that I was going on for my birthday and it was a solo trip and I was really looking forward to it for the full year. But I had to cancel it and it was in a it was a big adjustment for me to um change those plans but at the end of the day I also looked at it and I I thought about what I told Alex and I implemented it in my life and I was like okay sometimes you gotta listen to your own advice. And um I think that, uh it was needed. Because actually for the last, I don't know how many years now, it's probably been a good uh uh 15, 16 years that I've been doing uh my holistic practice and my psychic readings. And I don't think I've taken a break where I've taken, I might have been sick with a cold and might have taken a break for that day but this is a very long extended break it was about two weeks if not three where I didn't do sessions, I didn't answer questions, I didn't do healing, I just took the time off and in that recovery. I also was gonna leave in a couple of weeks to Punta Cana which is Dominican Republic and I think I needed this time off to just regenerate myself and it was amazing I got regenerated um. But yeah, it was it was interesting that uh me, Alex and I were mirroring each other on what we're what we were both going through at the same time. I remember my words to Alex and when I got covered, I panicked for about 30 minutes because I was like thinking oh my God I have to cancel tickets, I have to cancel hotel rooms, I have to cancel my events, I had to call people message people but within those 30 minutes uh of panic I uh really align myself and said, hey it's okay.
Alex: And what were some of the things like the takeaways or the things you learned from that experience?
Dan: I think thatI took away a couple of things. I took away that um, if I'm not going to heal myself I won't be able to heal others. And that I needed the time off to also just recalibrate myself to get to a place of peace within myself. And that I've been giving so much out empathetically compassionately that I wasn't looking at myself empathetically and compassionately. So I had to give myself the empathy, compassion, love kindness. So the universe, God whoever we want to say or Covid for this matter was forcing me to look inwards and say, hey what are the parts of you that you just need to take care of right now? And I took care of those parts and it's a great way of um, you know this was a great way for me to just find out the how powerful um how powerful something like Covid is. That could just debilitate you. And this debilitated me on my psychic and intuitive way. And I've never had that before even if I had a cold or cough or anything, I would still have a little of those powers but this really debilitated me in this process. And I really, I felt bad because I had to tell people I couldn't talk to them, I couldn't give them the advice. A lot of people were going through um court cases at that time. A lot of people are going through health issues and I wasn't able to be there spiritually, psychically, intuitively but I still had my prayer and I still have said my prayers and I still gave that out so energetically maybe I wasn't there for them. Um but spiritually, I was at some level um.
Alex: And I can so relate to that because I for me, it was like the day one of my retreat right? And I had literally traveled around the world to like hold space and and help people and meet these people that have been part of my life you know on Zoom. And um and that was it as I had to say like, I can't do it right now. And um a lot of a lot of things came out of it that were, I wasn't expecting. And it felt like a disaster for like the first you know, 24 hours. I would say I spiraled a bit longer than you. You spawned for 30 minutes. I spiraled for like probably 24 hours and then I just had to find a way to connect. And you said this too, find a way to connect with them um like from a distance. And that's what I did, and it ended up being a the most rich and deep connection that I've made on retreats with guests so far. So it was pretty amazing and there's definitely a lot of things that I did on that retreat that I'm going to be taking forward into all of my future retreats.
Dan: It's amazing, I Alex and I were also supposed to do a retreat while we were both in Toronto at the same time and it just couldn't happen. And right after I recovered, the first person I messaged was Alex. And said Alex, let's figure out what we're going to do. And in my head I was thinking Alex is going to do one thing. But Alex had four things she wanted to get done and she said let's do them back to back, come on come on come on. And I was like, you know what, let's do it. Um, I'm ready and we hadn't done a podcast in a while and we all are gonna do a couple of conversations over the next couple weeks, we're also gonna do an Insta Live, we're also going to do a retreat, an online retreat also and we've got another retreat in our in our clockwork right now thinking about it for later in the year. But um today, I think uh I think the topic's quite interesting that Alex had uh uh proposed.
Alex: Yeah, so I want to speak to you Dan, about living a life that's different than what Society expects. And the reason why it's come up for me is I actually did an Instagram post about this the other day which I know you've seen. And the reason why I find it so interesting is because, I'm kind of struggling like. When I left my job as a teacher in Abu Dhabi, I left with all these things. And then I have all this stuff in storage. And stuff I'm getting rid of and I'm like where's my home really you know? I'm slightly based in Dubai, I'm slightly based in Bali and I was like I just can't wrap my head around this. And you know, I'm visiting all these people in Toronto and explaining to them my life of like I'm kind of like, I feel like my business is in Dubai and my soul and my heart is in Bali. And then I had this connection of like oh my God, this is like Dan this is the way Dan lives right Dan. Every time I talk to him he's like, I don't think I figured this out about you until I knew you well. But you know, I was always getting these texts being like, I'm in Dubai, I'm in Dubai. And I was like I don't understand like if he's vacationing in Dubai? Is this his house in Dubai? Like and now I understand that you have many homes and that's the way that you've lived your life. Which is very different than the way most people kind of operate. And so, I wanted to ask you a little bit about your journey? Kind of coming into living a life that's different than, than what Society expects?
Dan: Yeah, um, I think I've been doing this for over two decades if not more. And when we talk about society we have to think about that we can talk about people. We don't know, we could talk about our family, we could talk about our tribe, we can talk about our friends, we can talk about loved ones, all in this. When we talk about society, and I remember when I first wanted to take this journey of exploration be it of my spiritual exploration my work exploration or my own soul and exploration and it took me a long time to understand to define my role and my purpose. But to make a long story short, I really do feel like I'm uh I'm uh Gypsy. I like going to different areas, meeting new people. And when I was growing up this happened basically while I was in my teens um, there's a period in my life uh where I wanted to live in the school district that we were in, my family had just moved to a house. And I was not going to be in my school district anymore. So, then I decided that okay, I'm gonna have to do something about this. I stayed with my grandmother who was in my school district and I lived with her for about a couple of years but I would be with my family on the weekend. I'd you know bus it back and be with them and I think that was the start of this nomadic or Gypsy type of Lifestyle and Society played a very big role in my teens. I remember that when I was going to um High School, the guidance counselor, so in Canada we have guidance counselors that kind of guide us to tell us where we should go study and maybe you know, look at the different areas that we want to go towards in our life. In the sense of do you want to go to medicine? Do I go in Hospitality do you want to go in which areas you want? And they'll give us the options. So, I remember sitting with the guidance counselor, my my father was with me and my father's an immigrant. He was, you know, I'm first generation in Canada. But my dad was an immigrant to Canada, so he's listening to this um guidance concept. Actually, the female and um she was like, you know um Mr. Kumar, your son uh uh and I remember the words because they've stuck with me and this is again how Society plays a big part in our life that um you know. He's not that smart, and uh maybe he should be looking at College because he doesn't have uh what it takes to go to university. And then my father being the man he was listening to somebody of authority, he said okay well what do you suggest he do? So, she didn't really give me options on what I could do. She just said that he should start looking at colleges and look at what colleges he wants to go to and look at what programs they have and then decide. So the first the first X that I got from my from my growth of where I can go next was from this guidance counselor. Where she kind of kind of made me feel less of myself and she also expressed that I'm a lesser person than everybody else to my father. And um my father didn't, he wasn't upset about it or he didn't talk about it. He just said you know this is what the person said we have to go with what it's like going to a doctor. When a doctor gives you a recommendation, we got to follow what the recommendation is and I said okay. So, I started looking at things and at the same time that I was doing this I was actually working for my father and his film Distribution Company. And I looked at uh programs and it started to look at things I liked. So a couple of things were, psychology and Society Sociology. But in college, I wasn't getting the programs I wanted. In college, they're all the university base. I said okay, I can't do that then the second thing which is a passion is I loved cooking. But then I was thinking coming from uh uh my family's background, if I told my family that I wanted to be a cook they'll probably look at me and be like what is that. So, I said okay let me diversify that and then I said I'll do uh culinary school. But I'll also take hotel management so that's what I did. But this was this something that was pushed upon me to an extent it kind of drove me to a direction. I mean, I'm not really in the hospitality industry right now but I don't think I would change what I went through because what I went through made me understand that in hindsight like now, many years later that people are going to push you into a direction that they think they want you to go into. It's up to you to just hear them passively and then decide what does your soul want you to do or what do you feel like doing and then go towards that without allowing anybody else to push you trigger you. And that's in anything I'm talking about school right now and I'm talking about my uh program that I took but I think that this also works within professional life, personal life, spiritual life that we've got to kind of come to ourselves and say, hey what makes me feel good and what gives me joy and we all deserve Joy. And allow whatever you're going to do give you some aspect of joy. So that's where I went many years later but this was my journey and I think I had to go through that journey to become the Healer that I am right now. I had to go through so many of these Society Norms or what Society wanted me to do or what my family wanted me to do, what my friends wanted me to do, what my lovers wanted me to do and what happened is because I'm I'm an I'm empathetic. I always took their uh ideology as the main ideology and work towards it. When I was younger and what life has taught me and what Covid just taught me was that maybe I have to just come back to me and find out what I have to do to make my joy and my um my life purpose happened the way that I wanted to happen. But this is a very uh you know uh a very abbreviated way that I've gotten to where I where I am right now. And how I haven't listened to society most of the time, but I have listened to society a lot when I was growing up. I did things that was a Society Norm. I did think that is a normal for my family, so everything that was normal was defined by everybody else. So, I always had an identity crisis, I had an emotional crisis, I had a spiritual crisis, everything was just not sitting well with me. Until I said hey, I gotta take these into my into my hands and do this myself. I'm gonna say something else I went through seven years of healing, and in seven years of healing I met many healers. And they also kind of programmed me in a way I didn't like that they just kept on having me stay within my issues. Because they were triggering my issues too. They weren't fixing the issues or they weren't, nobody can fix their issues because the issue is already with us. Because it's the past. It's already happened but we can change how we're feeling right now. And what they didn't do was make me understand that I had to change in the now to make things happen in the now. So, when we talk about society, there's there's there's so many ways that it you know, it kind of enforces what our narrative has to be. Be it a movie, be it a book, be it a TV series, be it family, be it friends, be it teachers, be it gurus, be it whoever. But we have to come to a place where we have to start understanding that hey, is this purposeful for me and is this bringing me joy and am I being kind to myself while I'm doing what I do?
Alex: Thank you for sharing that. That you know, it resonates so much with me what you're sharing right now because I even think I would need to hear it in this moment but I am coming to the end of a really long time of being out of my home routine. And I keep saying when I got back to Bali, I'm gonna get back into my yoga. When I go back to volume and get back into this and like it's now coming on like it's exactly two months that I've been away from Bali. And and I was very good about my my yoga routine until I got Covid and then I was like oh I feel bad for myself I'm just gonna like you know, lay here and whatever and you know. Whatever we're going on a month of me being recovered and I was just in a Sober Girls Yoga meeting with the 30-day Challengers and I was talking about how it's like I need to start now. I need to start tomorrow tomorrow I need to get myself to and I'm not talking about teaching you know. Because I do that all the time, but I know for my own healing, I need to like be a student. And I need to you know, go for a Reiki session. I need to find things that are going to fill up my own cup and I need to come back to like healing myself and that is going to be like what brings me joy and that's gonna like ripple out to others. So I didn't even know I needed to hear that right now until until right now so thank you for sharing that.
Dan: Well, some insight I think Alex and I had a conversation yesterday. Had nothing to do with our conversation today, that we're doing right now. Um, we had a conversation about Alex's life and Alex had a very uh let's say profound way of thinking yesterday. She wanted to make a certain area her hub. And coming back to what Alex said, said in this conversation today. Alex wanted to make a certain area our Hub and I said Alex why does one place have to be your hub? You're Global, you gotta think that each area gives you something else as she says Dubai. Dubai is probably her professional hub but that doesn't mean that it's not a spiritual Hub or a Love or her or her home. Dubai could be your home, Bali can be your home, Canada can be home and she can I mean if she wanted to go to Greenland to make that her home she could do that too. But I was trying to make Alex understand that, Alex were living in a world that we need to help people everywhere and we need to touch people's hearts everywhere. It's not only about being in that certain location. So, don't make it location driven. Make it about the type of work that you want to make happen and do that can happen from anywhere in the world. And if Bali fields like your peace and valley fields, like your base camp and valleys, your base camp, doesn't mean you can't still be in Dubai or you could still be can't be in Toronto or you could be in Tulum. I mean you could be anywhere. So, Alex had something profound to happen to her, and yes Alex is a gypsy like me. And uh she cultivated this herself. Nobody told her to do this. Nobody told her to become a gypsy. This is something that she's decided to do. I think also when um Alex or anybody else does a session with me, I'm just your guide. I give you the breadcrumbs, I allow you to kind of make your way the way. You need to make your way. Um and, the things I see are things that I see within your soul. The things I tell you are the things that I know that your soul would like to be expressed and articulated in words so you understand. You can understand it because sometimes we don't understand our Soul's language and sometimes we just need someone to help us articulate it. And um I think that's what happens with me uh Alex. Whenever we do have a conversation with each other, there's a love language that we understand with each other and she gets it and I get it and it it's very seamless and we've we've been on this journey for three years now and it's it's going strong. And I definitely think that when we come back and we come back to the topic that we're talking about, that when we allow society to define that for us. Or we allow anything to define it. Forget about society. It could be anything, it could be Covid, it could be anything anything can define or tell us to do something a certain way. We've got to we've got to come back to us again. We got to come back to who we are and what we want to do. A lot of people out there, I think the main question most people do in a session with me is what is my life purpose? What am I supposed to do? And it's hard for them to get to that level of understanding that until they don't take away what the cookie cutter idea of life is. What the programming that society has done on us about what you should be and how how you should be. Family, kids, um you should have a house, you should have a car, you should have this, you should do this, you should, you should, you should, you should take away that you shoulds. Because that's just a lot of noise. That's cluttering us and we come back to a place and we say okay, what really defines me? What really makes me feel good?
Um coming back to uh while I was growing up, while I was growing up, I always wanted to change the way people think. And the reason why I wanted to change the way people think is because people didn't have the right thoughts about me. And they kept on telling me things that made me feel lesser about myself. And a couple of the things which I've spoken about in many of our conversations. Alex and I conversations. Uh, I think the main thing that came across was um this idea of intelligence. Lack of intelligence. The idea of attractiveness, that I wasn't attractive in the scheme of what society called attraction. And then the other thing is that toying with the idea of where I was supposed to be. Because I wasn't feeling like I was supposed to be where I was. I just wasn't feeling like myself. So, there's a lot of things that everybody was just pushing me towards. But I heard a lot of things while I was growing up. I heard that you know, people would say oh you're not Indian. But yeah, people would say you're dark, you're so dark, why are you so dark? Why are you darker than everybody else in your family? Why are you so dark? Why is your nose like that? Why is your hair like that? And just nitpicking and bullying. Bullying throughout my life of triggering me. Of making me feel lesser and I don't know what joy people have of making others feel lesser. We shouldn't do that. We've gotta, we've got to be kinder to each other. And I really do feel that the moment we understand kindness first, to ourselves and then to others, we're not going to have all these issues anymore. And I I I look at that area in my life. And I bring it to date and I say hey does that still live true in my life right now? It doesn't mind you I do feel, I do have a couple bullies in a few bullies in my life. Uh my best friend's dogs, the British bulldogs. They bully me all the time and my nephews. I have three beautiful nephews. They all are little bullies because they want you to do the things they want you to do the way they want it to do they want you to sit here, do this. But now that word bully doesn't have a negative connotation for me because I've associated it with things that I love. And the way that they behave with me, and so now I don't get triggered with that word. And that when I do see somebody else getting bullied or getting triggered or getting traumatized, try to help them to get out of that. But again let me come back to society or we come back to everybody else creating this narrative. We all have read books like Cinderella or or I'm now going to like really old books or nursery rhymes. But we all, we all read these books about love. We read books about homes, you read, watch TV shows about you know, success and we watch movies about you know uh you complete me. Jerry Maguire you know um, had that saying that “you complete me” you know. It was a big statement in a movie and everybody's like wow and it was in uh it was in a group. I don't know if anybody watched the movie but if you watch this movie, Jerry Maguire, that he says it um to this girl while she was in uh uh some sort of like I don't think it was a reading book session but it was a session of a whole bunch of women that were talking about things and they were male bashing and he says this and all the women just melt and everything but I never liked that statement. That “you complete me”. I need to complete myself. I can't have somebody to come into my life to complete me. I need to be so full. I have to be selfful. I have to be a little selfful and anything extra that comes within selfful, my the extra love or the extra compassion or the extra thing is what I give everybody else. So, I fill myself up and the overflow is for everyone else.
Alex: I love that. Thanks for sharing and I feel like that was such a narrative from definitely from my childhood, definitely from something in like the 90s. Every movie that I saw, it was always this story of like I need to find someone who will completely. And I even feel that way when I go home. I feel it really strongly when I'm home amongst my peer group of friends from high school. Because every single person that I grew up with has bought a house in Toronto. Is either engaged or married or pregnant and I'm like what do I like? What's it's like ? I'm so dramatically different from all of them like and people are like what do you do and I'm like well like I help people get sober. I can't I live in Bali, I live in Dubai, I'm here in Toronto, now I'm in Mexico. like and I just feel like I'm such a different um a different person than all of them. And I always need to circle back to like you know, it's it shouldn't be about me following this path, journey to get to this state of like completeness right? I need to find that within myself and what I'm doing. Um and then and everyone finds it in a different way. Like for some people that might be really fulfilling for them and that's great.
Dan: But Alex don't you think you're complete where you are right now? Because what you do you, you you're doing things that helps so many people and you inspire so many people and I think a lot of people that you just spoke about probably might be envious of your life. Maybe that maybe that story was their narrative but Alex within the last three years you built your narrative. You decided to follow your narrative. Yes, we have a lot of people. We have family members that will say, oh you know, get married. What are you doing? Oh you're wasting so much money on rent, you should buy a house, you don't have a car, you should get a car. There's a lot of you should, you should, you should. I can, but you got to do what works out for you and you've got to be, you have to be accountable. You have to be accountable to yourself that whatever you're doing is working within the scheme of your means. And help you come to a place of balance and comes to a place of love, compassion, kindness and joy. I really like this idea of joy right now for some reason. I want to know have we found our joy? I know I found my joy in many many places and it's hard for a lot of people to say that they've found their joy. A lot of people are on that journey to find that joy and it's hard for them to understand that. So, the moment you peel away what everyone else is telling me to do and wanting you to do and then you come to a place that maybe you're like okay but now I don't know what to do. That's when you do the soul searching. That's when you do the work to find out what inspires you. What makes you happy? You may even say you know uh, Dan going to Tim Hortons and having a uh a donut is what inspires me about you. Yeah and it could inspire you and it could be something that you want. Um but that's not the inspiration I'm talking about. I'm talking about from a soul level of what you want to do maybe you're the person that creates the donuts maybe that's the thing you have to do. Yeah and then that just brings in uh you know joy into everybody else's house and home whenever they, I mean in their life when they have a donut. Um, but yeah uh, I think Alex that journey that you're going through right now and the journey that you're in, you are in your joy. I don't think I could. I don't think anybody can doubt that. I don't think you can doubt that you are living in your joy you know.
Alex: And but you know what I and then I'm so hard on myself. I'm like it's not joyful enough um. But you know what it is for me now? It is I get so much joy and so much fulfillment from my work. I love working, I love helping people and supporting people and it's it's this thing for me now of like, how can I just do things for fun for myself that are not to do with the Mind Life Practice and Sober Girls Yoga? And how can I like bring that self joy in and I do think like you said the other day, that Bali, I wrote it down in the notes my, phone that Bali is like the most comfortable bed for you or the best slept you the best sleep you've ever had and like I love that description because it's like there it feels like I've just come into my myself and found that perfect balance. And now I have to have the courage to recreate it like recreate it here for this moment for the next few days that I'm here.
Dan: And all of us have to create our own narrative. We can, it's not like we follow somebody else's blueprint. We've got to build our own narrative. We've got to build our own story. We have to use the word that really reflect um a love language to ourselves that we create. We develop that and we kind of go with that. We also catch ourselves whenever we're feeling like we're going to be detrimental to ourselves. So, we're kind of instigating ourselves. We're feeling we're triggered. Be it triggered by somebody else or by ourselves that we catch ourselves and we say hey let me come to a place where I'm not reactive. And I come to a place of peace within my head. So I make a decision out of peace and not out of struggle, not out of defending, not out of fighting not out of do you do you're understanding? What I'm saying right? Um so yeah but that narrative, it's that narrative that is really difficult because we we've been taught this from the beginning. We've been taught right when we're born, boys do this girls do this yeah don't do that do this stop coloring, read your textbook, stop doing this, so we keep on getting controlled by this. Yes, some of us would say it's parenting, yes we need discipline in our life and I think our family and our parents have instilled discipline and love and a whole bunch of things into us. But sometimes we have to allow that narrative to happen. We have to allow that insightful ideologies to come out. I've been watching um, I've been watching a lot of shows that I had to catch up on and uh I was just finishing off this show that it's a family drama and I was just watching it. And I was just like thinking you know how they kind of let go of their their joys and they find some other life purpose. And they follow that and they feel very at one. But even the thing that was giving them joy that they dropped before they that they was following and they never. It always comes back, it comes back in different ways. So, we have to, we have to unlock that potential within ourselves and we have to unlock that story that's inside of us too. At the same time we we and we shouldn't be scared of them. I think uh there's a person that had messaged on one of the posts about her uh starting a new career path yes and that how she needs to go about it and she's very you know she's worried. She's worried about failing. She's worrying about… So my my point to her is what happens if you fail? What happens if you do it and you fail? No big deal. You do something else. But what happens if you thrive after you do it? What happens if it builds, it grows, it becomes something this unknown of the future. Even though I tell people about the future. I also tell them, sometimes we can't base things on the future. We have to base it on the now.
Alex: Yeah.
Dan: And taking that leap of faith and doing something that you want to do you. Must do that, as long as it's not hurting anybody or yourself, as long as it's something that's going to be beneficial for you then you must do. You shouldn't wait, you don't need to wait for somebody to give you the green signal the green light. Nothing, go for it. There's there's ways of doing it. Alex has a big project that she wants to get off the floor and she's been scrambling to figure out 50 different ways of doing it and Alex thinks she has the way right now. Um and I'm I I've actually told her something completely different and she's still saying no. But I think this is the only reason so I said okay you know what, you want to do that route do that route. But now get things involved or people involved that can help you to go that way because Alex doesn't know how to build a house. She doesn't know how to make the foundation for a house so she has to get a contractor. She has to get a designer, she has to get an architect, she needs to get the team together in order to build this house. Her intention is to build a house but she just doesn't know how to do it. So Alex was thinking, no but I'll just do it self do it. I'll just YouTube it and figure it out and Google it and I'm going to do it myself and I'm like okay we could go that route. But then we're delaying things because you're not taking the right steps for yourself. So I said you know, bring the team together and make a team for yourself and then do this. If you want to do this no problem, go for it but do it this way. Don't do it the other way that you're thinking does that make sense, Alex? I think this resonates even more for you right now.
Alex: Yeah, yeah we're done we're talking about my book by the way. Because I know Salon my book editor and um if anyone knows any any publishing houses?
Dan: So, she's been she's been 20 20 with the idea of how to get it published. And
Alex: Yeah.
Dan: I've been telling I've been telling her from day one, it will get published and it's not it's not the first time that you're gonna get published. But it will get published but we just have to find the right route for publishing. And yeah if there's anybody out there that wants to help Alex right now in that journey of publishing, please help her. She needs she needs some expertise on that because the thing is Alex hasn't ever published a book. But she's written a beautiful book and it's inspirational and I definitely think that this will have um a lot of people resonating with it.
Alex: Thank you Dan. Um Dan I just realized, I don't think you can see the comment feeds and people are commenting on our conversation in the Facebook group. So I'm going to tell you what they're saying um Emily says hi friends. Cathy says hello. I adore you both. Danielle says hello, all she says brutal comments from a guidance counselor when you're talking about your guidance counselor. She's also in education so um Cathy's saying Cleveland can also be my home. Um Cali who's in Kingston, can totally relate to our conversation around feeling what was that about feeling like you're choosing a different path than society. And Pam is really resonating what you said earlier about Joy. Dan so, if anyone else is watching has any other comments or questions or things they want to share I am I have an eye on the feed on the side you know.
Dan: This this I also want to make people aware that this this guidance counselor thing happened many many decades ago. I mean it happened around when I was around 16 and right now I'm 47. So it happened a long time ago and also the way people thought back then was very different. We had different you know, norms. Society norms. We had different ways of looking at things. Our families weren't so evolved. Also at that time right? We did we weren't exposed to so many things. Whereas we also we weren't in that digital uh world where we could see a lot of things or understand a lot of things. Information wasn't so easy to come by so we all just went by what we were told. I mean we also didn't have cell phone. We didn't have smartphones. Back then we had rotary phones uh and their satellite phones back then but we didn't have though that kind of communication back then. And do I do I do I blame her my guidance counselor for the way she treated me or the way she spoke to me? No. because I don't think she knew any better. And I'm not making an excuse for her but I I do unders I do understand what I went through while I was growing up. Because also I grew up with dyslexia. And they did not diagnose it back then because they didn't know how to diagnose it. They thought I had a hearing problem. They sort of had a eye problem, they thought their other physical problems or there's something wrong you know um family-wise. That this was the reason why I had a uh you know an issue and also when I grew up um. So because of Dyslexia, it was very hard for me to read the way people read. So I had to memorize words. But that happened with me while I grew up. While I was in my teens. I understood that I had to memorize words. I cannot read words, I can't not sound them out because I don't see letters the way everybody else sees letters. They don't I don't read the way everybody else reads. So I had to come up with a new language for myself or new understanding new education for myself of how to read, how to understand words, how to put them together. Um, but I don't blame her I thank her. Actually, I thank her that I had that situation happen because if it didn't. If certain things didn't happen in my life, I probably wouldn't be where I am right now. Probably wouldn't be the healer that I am right now. I wouldn't be this uh you know this intuitive uh person. I also wouldn't have traveled around the world the way I did. So everything has a reasoning and everything has divine timing. I know a lot of us um have been in uh very destructive relationships. Be it marriages, be it romantically, be with family, there's all this stuff that has happened and we don't have enough time to actually look at ourselves in those moments because there's so many you know there's so much uh anger and pain in these moments. So we kind of lose ourselves and then it's hard for us to lift ourselves back up. I think from the last couple of years actually from the last decade, I've been also working with parents and kids and have been sitting with kids and happy having them understand life differently and helping parents understand how they have to deal with their kids and speak to their kids. So they don't trigger them. I was triggered a lot while I was growing up because I was also in a class that I'm born and brought up in Canada. I speak English. Um but I had dyslexia so I had to go into English classes which were ESL classes. Which are English was your first you know, you're learning English for the first time. So I would be sitting in a group of kids that were all different but lesser. So some of them are immigrants and a couple of them were probably a couple of them. I think were autistic and I remember uh Down Syndrome um student. Also I was okay with everybody, I didn't think I was different I just thought we were all kids of the same age and we're all going together it was later in life that I realized that it wasn't put in the right class then. Maybe if I was in the class with other dyslexic kids? And then we got taught differently that we would have excelled the way nobody else would have thought we would have excelled, right? But I was put into that. So we all have different types of trauma. We have to learn to have that trauma. And our story that we've gone through. Which may not even be our story. We we've adapted our story because we had to listen to what society wanted to do. But we must let that fuel what our new narrative is. We must let that fuel how we're gonna feel better. We must let that feel where we have to go next instead of making it a sore point in the life. Look at it and say, hey this has to be my feel. You guys might not know this but I only started helping people only after my father died. My father died tragically but it was because of him that I decided, well because of him and also my best friends at that moment, that I decided to help others. But it only, it got triggered to his death that I needed to help others. And it's a tragic thing to think about that somebody had to die in order for me to go help somebody. Maybe I would have gone down this route some other way. It would have still happened because it's my life purpose to help. It, but I think his passing was the thing that speeded it up for me because till that time I wasn't doing it. So, it was that incident that actually fueled me to become the person I am today. And I'm very proud of the person I am today. And I think he's super proud of the person I am today. Because every time I work with somebody and I'm done with them, I feel like he's smiling down and saying wow, that's good. I'm happy you're helping and happy I'm happy you're having people understand where they need to be and where they need to go and to feel better. So I got you know, that the thing we keep on talking about this society and the narrative. Yeah, we can stop that narrative that society has implemented on us and start living our own narrative. But we also have to know what our narrative is and how we make that narrative happen and it has to happen now. It doesn't happen, happens in five months from now, a year from now. Everything needs to happen and then. Now nothing has happened later, we have to start doing the things now. When I'm saying we have to start doing things now, that means being kind, being happy, being at peace, so.
Alex: And you know it's interesting that you say that it was something that fueled you. Um because Cathy also shared Cathy wrote in a comment saying um, back to like the guidance counselor thing. So she had a non-inter guidance counselor who told her to not ask her family for money for a two-year college and now she's a guidance counselor and that moment fueled her to keep going. And I think that's a really great example of how these moments in our lives that can be so traumatic um can be at. The loss or a comment that someone that we look up to has made can, inspire us and fuel us in the direction of where we're meant to be.
Dan: But those comments you know, when we hear these things, that go against what our fundamentals. I remember while I was in the same school in the same high school that a person came on the mic and it was Remembrance Day. Um and this person on the mic said Remembrance Day is to remember all the Jews that have you know passed or and stuff like that. And I I went into my head and I said isn't Remembrance Day to Remember everybody who's given their life um during any War? Doing any anything anybody who's given their life? That's a Remembrance Day. So I had a objection to this and then the teacher that I had who's who's an amazing teacher at that moment, she goes, you know you you have so much. She's actually my English teacher. She knows, you have so much conviction about this you should write to them. Write to the person. So, the following year, the two days afterwards there was another announcement from the same person saying I just wanted to change my statement about Remembrance Day and Remembrance Day is about this also it's also about that we're going to remember but this is what it is. And I then I felt I felt very at peace. I was like, okay good now he's giving out a statement was that me uh that was just I I just felt like nobody should feel the way I felt. I was like I needed this teacher and this is a network, this is an authority figure. It's a teacher who's saying this on a mic. So I said no, they have to change this. This can't be what it is. And I I remember while growing up that I always had this kind of um opposition with a lot of teachers or I had a lot of opposition with people when it came to my ethnicity. Because I remember I was invited to sit in a forum while I was studying at a certain School. And um it was a privilege because there's this very person from the government who's coming in. I think it was you know some Minister that was coming in and they were sitting with us and so there's only a group of 10 people that are allowed out of the school of whatever and the secretary called me and said you know Nash would you come for this meeting? We really want you there and I said oh that's wonderful. I'd love to be there. So I thought, oh special if there's something there. And then when I was sitting there and I said oh how come I was selected and by her naiveness and her innocence, she said oh we needed um somebody from your ethnic group to be represented. So I was like uh and then when we were in this forum, the person who was speaking starts talking to us and said oh so why you know, are you you it was good to have you here. Why you know, why were you here, so I said oh because my ethnicity had to be represented and that took that person apart a back. And then the principle also was like oh my God and I was just like I just said what was on my head and I said the truth. Um yeah, it was, it might have not been tactful at the moment but it was something that bothered me because I didn't really pay attention to what he was saying throughout the conversation. Because that kept on playing in my head and I was like I gotta take it out. I gotta just Purge and I can't perched my family because my family's gonna be like, you should just feel lucky that you're sitting in that forum. Like they wouldn't understand the racial uh discrimination because they they understood to kind of live with it and have a way of like saying okay, yes you're better. Where it laughter we have to listen to you we're in your country so we have to do it what works that way. Things have changed now. Things can't, things are not like that anymore. We're in a different world right now but back then awareness wasn't so much. But then again as I told you you don't allow them there. You don't allow Society or you don't like people control your narrative .And these are these were times in my life where I decided that I'm going to take it in my hand because I felt passionate about it. And when you're feeling passionate about something you must go through, right? So this happened throughout my, throughout my life that I had these racial inequalities you know. While I was going to do my uh hotel management culinary school, I remember that a group of us failed a course and they wouldn't give it back to us. So that means we'd have to start the whole year again and do the whole program again. And then I found out that a student who was of a different color um the teacher was making him make up that course so he could graduate and I found that out and then I went to the dean and I said why is this possible and you weren't making it possible for us? No no, it's not happening I said this is the student this is a class this is what's happening oh well then they came up with a excuse. Made me idea like they came up with this excuse and they said no you know what I'm gonna put this down, and I don't play this card mostly, but I played this card I said my parents paid a lot of money for me to come to the school. So you have I will come to this office every day for the next, one week, two weeks, two weeks till you give me the course and after one week goes by I'm gonna make sure that the other students also sit with me and after that week goes by I'm gonna make sure that the parents come and sit with us till you give us the course because it's wrong that somebody that is not in the same ethnicity as the rest of us gets to do this and we don't. And then guess what happened, we got the course back uh we did the program I probably didn't do well again but I think they just wanted me out of the that school so they gave a good diploma and I was just like and I could see it in the bean space or the he was just like okay good you're going you're going. So I there was this spark of justice that was always there within me that I always wanted the whatever was right to come out. I always wanted the the right thing to happen. I think these are these little moments that I always wanted to change the way people thought, right? And how they express things to us but now as we were talking about the narrative and changing the way what society's, society is telling us to do, we have to take that control and when we talk again I'm gonna say this again, society doesn't only mean social. I mean we we're talking about families, also we're talking about brands, also we're talking about our could be our kids also, but we have to look at everything and say hey are they controlling the narrative? Are they dictating the way we need to live our life? Um maybe we need to start looking at things differently and change that perspective. Sorry it was so long-winded and I just thought it had to come out.
Alex: Dan, thank you so much. I find every time I sit and talk with you I just feel so, well first of all I feel this like grounded calm come over me, like I just feel so your presence is so peaceful and I know you are like one of the most inspiring people to me because you have lived a life that is so unique and so different and goes against what so many people think is like what society should expect of you. And I think it's so inspiring. And I'm sure it like inspires and resonates with so many people that were listening as well.
Dan: well it's we we all have to do our part and it doesn't mean that all of us have to become healers and all of us have to be you know life coaches and we all have to do these things but if you, if you follow what your inner voice tells you to do and I'm not talking about the logical mind. I'm talking about the subconscious mind. This mind here we follow here, everything will always feel better. That's all we just want to get to a better feeling. You want to get to a place where we're at peace and happy but yeah I love our talks. Uh and I think there's going to be many more after this and if anybody out there has any topics that you guys want us to speak about on a podcast by all means message Alex and let her know.
Alex: Yeah let us know and so we will be tomorrow where um Dan is going to be the guest speaker at the Sober Girls Yoga um Sober Girls Club and that is already fully booked. I think there's like 15 people booked in which is really exciting so if you want to join. Um, if you're a Sober Girls Yoga member it's free, um it is ten dollars if you're not a Sober Girls Yoga member. So you can jump into that and then we're going to be doing a retreat later on in the month and we're also planning a new Dose of Dan and Alex Instagram Live where we want to answer any questions that you have about anything. Life manifestation uh, relationships, it can be anything. Um so, send us your questions send them to me um and we will be going live. I forget what day we have for that one is that next weekend?
Dan: I think that's on the 14th of August.
Alex: 14th of August. Is that the Sunday?
Dan: Yeah. it’s the Sunday.
Alex: Yeah. So um.
Dan: and and any question and even if you just want to speak to us and just purge a little, that'd be fine. And if you want to send out a question that's anonymous just do it beforehand. Also I guess we're going to take some questions while we're live with people who are on at the same time. But anybody who wants to be anonymous and stuff like that and do it don't want you know anybody to know who's asking the question just send Alex that question and we'll try to see what type of magic we can work or what type of advice we could give on that day.
Alex: Perfect, wonderful all right. Well um, thank you so much Dan. Thank you for everyone that tuned in um and was supporting us and if you're watching this after um thank you for listening. And um we're here to support you and and help you and so we look forward to seeing you at our next events and retreats and all of that all.
Dan: Right, thank you guys. Kindness. Be kind to one another, be kind to yourself. Lots of love and light to all of you. Bye.
Alex: I love.
Alex: Hi friend, thank you so much for listening to this episode of Sober Yoga Girl podcast. This community wouldn't exist without you here. So thank you. It would be massively helpful if you could subscribe, leave a review and share this podcast so it can reach more people. If we haven't met yet in real life please come get your one week free trial of the Sober Girls Yoga membership and see what we're all about sending you love and light wherever you are in the world.
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