Becoming Exquisitely Skilled Givers

Becoming Exquisitely Skilled Givers

We live in a world built to take — a culture running on greed and extraction that keeps asking more of us. For those of us wired to give, it's easy to feel responsible for being the counterforce: to give and give until we end up burning out and needing to step away from the very work we love. In this July reflection, I explore why it’s so important to become an exquisitely skilled giver in these times — someone who serves from a place of self-awareness rather than self-abandonment. In the co-exploratory spirit of the We Heal For All podcast, I unpack the savior complex and the victim–perpetrator–savior triangle it sits in, and the difference between helping and trying to save. I share three boundary mantras for givers from the work of Bert Hellinger and Family Constellations — I am here, you are there / That's your story, not mine / I offer myself until I'm no longer wanted. And sit with the harder questions underneath this work: Can we actually save anyone? Can I keep showing up even if I never see the fruits of my labor? And what becomes possible when we ground our giving in a healthy dose of self-centeredness. This is an invitation to get seriously skilled - and honest - about how we go about our giving. To clean up our own side of the street, fortify our inner home, and give in ways that can actually be sustained. Come sit in the questions. I'd love to hear what edges you’re working on in becoming an exquisitely skilled giver. Time Stamps: 00:00 - Welcome 01:49 - The importance of becoming an exquisitely skilled giver 02:44 - Systemic roots of greed and extraction in our culture 03:40 - The challenges for naturally compassionate givers 04:27  What "giver" really means (an orientation, not a humble brag) 05:59 - The types of professions naturally inclined toward giving and healing 07:54 - The risk of burning out and abandoning one’s calling 08:49 - The vibe of this space: co-learning, not teaching from on high 10:16 - The spirit of co-exploration vs. hierarchical teaching 14:30  Liz's journey: international development and Kenya 15:33  The victim–perpetrator–savior triangle 19:04 - The arrogance of the savior complex and the importance of mutuality 20:30  Bert Hellinger, Family Constellations, and three mantras for givers and empaths 22:32  Mantra 1: "I am here, you are there" 24:01  Mantra 2: "That's your story, that's not mine" 27:17  Cutting cords vs. fortifying the heart center 31:28  Mantra 3: "I offer myself until I'm no longer wanted or needed” 35:01  Can the world be saved? 38:02  Can I participate without seeing the fruits in my lifetime? 39:31  Grounding giving in a healthy self-centeredness 42:46  Cleaning up your own side of the street Connect with me, Liz Moyer Benferhat:   Subscribe to my Substack [wehealforall.substack.com] to get episodes directly in your inbox.   Website: www.wehealforall.com IG: @wehealforall Youtube: @wehealforall   Check out my new book, When the World Hurts [https://www.wehealforall.com/book]

What Comes After Religion? with Integral Coach Michael Stern

You have one of those friends where as soon as you open your mouths or sit down with each other you just go deep? That, my friends, is Michael Stern for me. With this month’s theme being about integration and maturity — the evolutionary draw towards social-spiritual maturity, and how that naturally moves us away from black and white approaches to… everything, and towards a more integrated, integral view and approach to the world — I knew he was who I wanted to talk to. Michael Stern is on a mission to help humanity navigate The Great Transition and create The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible. He believes the key is to integrate evolutionary spirituality, relational coherence, and regenerative systems. He attempts to do that through being a father, partner, meditator, coach, facilitator, event organizer, and community builder. In this conversation, we explore what the Great Transition is — one of the many meta-narratives used to make sense of the times we live in — and what it asks of us, in practice, as everyday people. Michael shares his vision of a "trans-lineage planetary spirituality" — the possibility of weaving humanity's wisdom traditions into something genuinely new — and why re-centering the sacred is at the heart of the big challenges we face. We zoom out into big picture thinking, exploring things like healing collective bodies and why a transformation of consciousness may be our best chance to navigate all that’s going. And then we bring it down to Earth by getting personal: what does this initiatory threshold we're crossing as a species mean for the nuts and bolts of our daily lives? What does it mean for him, personally? Questions like: Where to live? How to invest? Healing childhood wounds? Raising a family?   Here are some quotes from our conversation: "If we think of religions like languages — one language is not better or worse than another, but languages reveal different things about what it means to be human. Now we're living at a time where all of those streams are converging." "I'm in a phase of strengthening the vessel — getting my home life in order, doing my therapy, healing those early childhood wounds, to be a channel for all of the goodness to come through me that I sense is possible." "How does leveraging or investing in a kind of transformation of consciousness give us the best chance to navigate this great transition skillfully and successfully — to steward that process in a positive direction?"   Timestamps: 00:00 — Welcome to this conversation with Michael Stern 01:02 - Defining the "Great Transition" and its various names 02:17 - The meta crisis and our unprecedented acceleration of change 05:12 — "The future is already here, it's just not evenly distributed" — the spectrum from collapse to breakthrough 07:13 - Leveraging consciousness transformation to steward the transition 08:44 - The importance of inner practices for resilience and response 10:12 — Trans lineage planetary spirituality: religions as languages 14:45 - Re-centering the sacred: Post-secular spirituality and integrating diverse wisdom traditions 17:15 - The metaphor of spiritual and systemic birth and maturation 23:27 - The importance of collective, ritual spaces for grief and healing 25:04 — The expansive notion of social change work: breaking cycles, worldview shifts, inner work 29:28 — The nuts and bolts: where to live, how to invest, knowing your neighbors 32:08 — Finding the others: why community is non-negotiable 34:14 — Inside the Emerging Leaders Project: the three keys to intentional community 37:00 — Our relationship with the world as a living being; personal optimism vs. collective pessimism 48:58 — Hospicing the dying system while midwifing the new one 50:55 — Why collective experiences must be grieved in collectives: "It's too much for one body" 52:38 - Connecting with Michael and his current projects   Connect with Michael Stern: * Website & one-to-one coaching: integralalignment.com * Daniel Goleman Emotional Intelligence courses: danielgolemanemotionalintelligence.com * For information on six-day Mahamudra meditation retreats (online and in person), reach out through Michael's website   Teachers & Resources Referenced: * Duane Elgin (the great transition, the living universe) — https://duaneelgin.com [https://duaneelgin.com/] and the Choosing Earth Project: https://choosingearth.org [https://choosingearth.org/] * Charles Eisenstein (Mother Earth to Lover Earth, "the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible") — https://charleseisenstein.org [https://charleseisenstein.org/] * Elisabet Sahtouris, evolutionary biologist — https://www.sahtouris.com [https://www.sahtouris.com/] * Valarie Kaur ("sometimes it's time to push and sometimes it's time to breathe") — https://valariekaur.com [https://valariekaur.com/] * bell hooks — https://bellhookscenter.berea.edu [https://bellhookscenter.berea.edu/] (the bell hooks center at Berea College) * Otto Scharmer — https://ottoscharmer.com [https://ottoscharmer.com/] and the Presencing Institute: https://presencinginstitute.org [https://presencinginstitute.org/] * Josh Schrei, The Emerald podcast ("everything that's alive is growing out of the decaying body of what came before") — https://www.themythicbody.com/podcast [https://www.themythicbody.com/podcast] * Our World in Data (surveys on personal vs. collective optimism) — https://ourworldindata.org/optimism-and-pessimism [https://ourworldindata.org/optimism-and-pessimism] Connect with me, Liz Moyer Benferhat:   Subscribe to my Substack [wehealforall.substack.com] to get episodes directly in your inbox.   Website: www.wehealforall.com IG: @wehealforall Youtube: @wehealforall   Check out my new book, When the World Hurts [https://www.wehealforall.com/book]

Would A Matriarchy Actually Be Better?

These times we live in are awakening much-needed cultural conversations about what needs to change. Unfortunately, though, the loudest versions of these cultural conversations tend to be the oversimplified ones. There’s a tendency within the cultural dialogue that happens around social change to swing hard in the opposite direction of what we want to fix. To see a deficit within society, and to conclude that the solution is its mirror image. When I think about this pull - towards black and white thinking, towards clean solutions that are the opposite of the problem - it makes a lot of sense. It feels like a necessary step within a larger process. In this episode,  I unpack the opportunity that these times invite those of us who are called to help guide these cultural conversations and the social awakening that’s fueling them. To offer a spiritually mature lens that takes them out of the binary and towards something more whole and nuanced. I hope you enjoy, and would love to know what you think - what do you see as the evolution of these cultural conversations? Where are they now and where could they go? 00:00 Welcome + what's alive right now: social-spiritual maturity 02:23 - Post-awakening phenomenon: the stage of maturity 03:50 The heat wave and the matriarchy comment 05:00 Feeling the longing underneath — care, relationality, representation 06:50 "Would a matriarchy actually be better?" — when the opposite isn't the answer 08:30 Liz at nineteen: Marxist theory and black-and-white thinking 11:18 How a worldview gets humbled by real life 12:00 The body positivity movement and Gabriella Lascano's NYT piece 16:38 Why the loudest cultural takes are the simplest ones 19:25 Romanticizing what's in deficit 23:26 Humanizing rather than romanticizing Indigenous culture 24:00 Otto Scharmer: taking the best from all the timelines 26:21 Empaths, narcissists, and the savior complex 29:55 Bringing it home: inner worlds shape outer worlds 31:41 Closing reflection Connect with me, Liz Moyer Benferhat:   Subscribe to my Substack [wehealforall.substack.com] to get episodes directly in your inbox.   Website: www.wehealforall.com IG: @wehealforall Youtube: @wehealforall   Check out my new book, When the World Hurts [https://www.wehealforall.com/book]

Learning To Trust What's Ripening In You with Embodiment Teacher Rie Algeo Gilsdorf

In this conversation, I sit down with Embody Equity [https://www.embodyequity.com/] founder Rie Algeo Gilsdorf  to explore what it actually means to be in a body, and why that matters for — for us personally and for the work of changemaking. We unpack what embodiment is, really, in a culture that's still new to using the word. And how it isn’t just a practice or tool you do once in a while — like breath work — but is more of a through-line that can inform your consciousness all the time. As I think about our conversation, and the themes that came up, the one that stands out to me is: trust. Trust in the body’s intelligence. Trust that we don’t have to do everything all the time; we don’t have to occupy every lane. Trust that what’s ripening in us is exactly what’s needed, and trust that what’s getting moldy is meant to be on its way out. And trust that what’s softening or becoming less rigid — like what “social change” looks like these days — is doing so for a reason. If you’ve been feeling your own version of that softening, or shifts of any kind, and are in a process of doing something with that — acting from those shifts, bringing them into your life — then this episode is for you. Rie is an embodiment practitioner and teacher, writer of A Compass for the Cultural Intermediary [https://open.substack.com/pub/culturalintermediarycompass], and founder of Embody Equity. [https://www.embodyequity.com/] Learn more about her work here [https://www.embodyequity.com/].  Connect with me, Liz Moyer Benferhat:   Subscribe to my Substack [wehealforall.substack.com] to get episodes directly in your inbox.   Website: www.wehealforall.com IG: @wehealforall Youtube: @wehealforall   Check out my new book, When the World Hurts [https://www.wehealforall.com/book]

How Healing Brings Consciousness Shifts Down To Earth

We are taking in more of the world right now than at any other point in history — and it's doing something to us. Not just overwhelm and fatigue, but something deeper and more alive. A new kind of social consciousness is bursting forward, trying to take root. What helps this new consciousness actually land, take form, and become something we can live from. In this episode, I explore how embodiment and healing are what bring consciousness shifts down to earth. How building our capacity to be with the heavy, complicated stuff that comes with having our eyes so open — the pain, the moral weight, the disorientation — is what helps this new consciousness actually stabilize and take form. I draw on Dr. Rae Johnson's reframe of embodiment as capacity rather than self-care, Dr. Renée Lertzman's work on the inner dimension of social change, and the parallels between personal awakening and what's happening at the collective level right now. Show notes: 0:00 — Welcome 1:45 — This month's theme: embodiment and consciousness shifts 2:19 — Why I'm doing this one differently 5:09 — What I mean by consciousness 9:22 — What's unique about our awareness right now 12:13 — Awakening comes with grief and cleanup 15:11 — The parallel at the collective level 18:50 — Where embodiment comes in 20:01 — The printing press, abolition, and media opening eyes in mass 24:56 — How many eyes need to open before things change? 26:40 — Dr. Renée Lertzman on the status quo approach to social change 28:46 — It's not about more seeing — it's about supporting what comes with seeing 33:34 — Defining embodiment — Dr. Rae Johnson's "Embodiment Is Not Self-Care" 36:34 — Why this feels like a modern need 38:12 — Bringing consciousness down to earth through healing 43:04 — Insights from trauma studies 44:36 — The aliveness and opportunity in all of this 46:07 — Why rushing to action misses the point 50:39 — Closing and invitation Connect with me, Liz Moyer Benferhat:   Subscribe to my Substack [wehealforall.substack.com] to get episodes directly in your inbox.   Website: www.wehealforall.com IG: @wehealforall Youtube: @wehealforall   Check out my new book, When the World Hurts [https://www.wehealforall.com/book]