#165 - Philip Shepherd: Softening Into a Porous Relationship With the Present - Radical Wholeness (p.1.)

#165 - Philip Shepherd: Softening Into a Porous Relationship With the Present - Radical Wholeness (p.1.)

Okay a long quote, but seriously, check it out: "We feel ourselves held within a personal boundary that keeps our life separate from that of the world. It's hard to appreciate how strangely normalized that state of ours is until we look to other cultures for comparison. When we seek to promote our personal well-being, for instance, we might think about taking the right supplements, eating organic food, exercising regularly and sleeping well. I have no issue with any of that—but it's based on an assumption that health will be achieved by doing the right things to the body. So our focus is on the self as an isolated entity, as though it were a machine requiring upkeep. For Anlo-Ewe speakers, well-being is something quite different. It has to be, for they experience the self as porous rather than enclosed. For instance, the Anlo-Ewe sense of personhood is described as having a "nonboundedness and a lack of the kind of unitary wholeness of being that is characteristic of Western psychologies of the self." This reflects the Anlo-Ewe understanding of being itself: "Not stable, being is highly changeable, always in transformation." (Philip Shepherd, Radical Wholeness: The Embodied Present and the Ordinary Grace of Being,page 15-16 (North Atlantic Books, 2017) I feel this so deeply - I can only hope it reaches you as well, because I am talking life-changing with this interview, feel into what Philip is saying, is my advice in this first of a two-part series on Radical Wholeness. Enjoy this interview with teacher and author Philip Shepherd, who has developed "The Embodied Present Process" (TEPP) together with Allyson Woodrooffe. He is originally an actor, and a counter-culture biker, if I should name it, and the way he shares is also an experience, that might resonate for you too. TAP in with us as we in this first interview speak about: -What deep fitness is about around tapping into the bodies intelligence -How thinking moved from the belly to the head! -Feel-Feel-at-Flesh-Inside -We are in a Story culturally, can we step outside of it? -How the process of balancing presents us with a model in which the self is not encased within a boundary but is oriented in the world by a fluid, felt partnership. -Why we are teaching our children that it's better to think with a portion of their beings than to think with the whole of their beings -Spatioception is a sense that everyone is born with -Presentation mode that manipulates versus being present that is relationship and receptive -Every sense is felt in the body's resonance -Our relationship to the body is our fundamental relationship, and the underlying template for all of our other relationships and hiw that relates to the meta-crisis we are in -New terms rather than exteroception and proprioception -a term to tell you where space is in your body! -'as we relate to the body, so we relate to the world' -Philip Shepherds personal motto !!!! It is so valuable -Thinking and being are not two different entities -Security and safety -Out primary wound -There is an Inner Ocean in Your Body - You Are Fluid- Breath is an Experience of the World Passing Through You (I considered all this to be the title!!) -Our body's intelligence has been fractured -You can integrate what has been stuck within the body -the body as a bell -A little comment on a significant Pluto transit where it applies pressure to whatever you've been quietly clinging to for a sense of safety, in order to expand conciousness and uncover Truth. I found this date from a talk Philip did, where he mentions the story also in the book, but you can find his bike-story by googling "Philip Shepherd's Bicycle Journey". LINKS Please enjoy these wonderful embodied practises for yourself, that Philip offers here: https://embodiedpresent.com/pages/embodiment-practices-for-uncertain-times [https://embodiedpresent.com/pages/embodiment-practices-for-uncertain-times] Here is the book we speak of today: https://a.co/d/0gRa4Yxc [https://a.co/d/0gRa4Yxc] And it is also on audiobook, whereever you listen to books youtube version: https://youtu.be/WhUpDldXC-E [https://youtu.be/WhUpDldXC-E] See his website here: https://embodiedpresent.com/ [https://embodiedpresent.com/] More Mannah? you got it! https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/ [https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/]

#164 - Christina Rodenbeck: Lilith Untamed - Making the Case for Black Moon Lilith: The Astrological Lilith

"Somewhere inside you there is a wildness that yearns to be acknowledged and seen, honoured and cherished, brought into the light. That untamed sliver of self is in all of us". Welcome to an insightful and wide-ranging conversation with Christina Rodenbeck about her book "Lilith Untamed: A Guide to the Astrological Black Moon" (The Wessex Astrologer, 2026, the above quote is from the very beginning of the book). Christina has a long experience with tracking Black Moon Lilith (BML) she started from scratch and tested whether the assumptions about the Lilith archetype actually held water, rather than inheriting them. In this episode, she introduces us to some of the key themes of the book and she is totally great at it probably because of her on Lilith placement! Mythologically we can say that Lilith was a Hebrew she-devil/ Adam's first wife, formed from the same clay he was. She refused to lie beneath him during intercourse, arguing they were equals, spoke God's name, grew wings, and flew off to the desert and there accepted that a hundred of her children would die daily! What does this archetype have to do with us? According to Christina Rodenbeck A LOT. The book is her attempt to bring understanding of the astrological Lilith up to date and to make her as important a point in interpretation as, say, the Nodes of the Moon. TAP in with us as we speak about this important and rejected archetype. Some of the points in our conversation are around: -The way Lilith shows up archetypically, in her books Christina lists these 9 ways: Rebel / independent woman- Wild woman / innocent in the wilderness- Adulteress, seductress, sexual vampire / erotically liberated- Victim of abuse / avenger- Killer of infants / mother of millions- Independent woman / serial killer- Femme fatale / sexually fulfilled- The joker- Extraordinary or prolific talent -Examples of public figures as Lilith symbols (extra point there, she stresses that the untamed self of Lilith is gender-fluid !!) -Christinas own client cases plus her own lilith experience right on the day we were meeting! -The space between the true and mean Lilith as a kind of power corridor in the chart, that Christina labels the "Via Lamia" -What it is technically, because Black Moon Lilith is neither planet, asteroid, nor star, but a mathematical point. It is the Moon's apogee, the point in its elliptical orbit furthest from Earth. Kepler identified the point in the 17th century; the name Lilith was only attached in the 1930s. -How Lilth relates to initiations and love affairs -Light and shadow, what else are we -Loving your own Lilith -Tracking BML for example your Lilith Return comes every nine years -Why Christina looks forward to BML moving into capricorn Thank you for being with us!!! Here are some links for you to look at further: LINKS: youtube version: https://youtu.be/ZcZF24CTtz8 [https://youtu.be/ZcZF24CTtz8] the book: https://a.co/d/09KtIDFB [https://a.co/d/09KtIDFB] Christina Rodenbeck: https://oxfordastrologer.com/ [https://oxfordastrologer.com/] and My website: https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/ [https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/] support me by listening to the podcast at https://podimo.com/s/m8a0anov [https://podimo.com/s/m8a0anov]

#163 - Jack Morrigan: I've Stared Into the Eyes of the Beast - Something Has to Break - We Could be Facing an Actual Apocalypse

"I've stared into the eyes of that beast, and it's shown me what it is. And I'm not looking away anymore. In some ways, that's shattering — but at the same time, it's a relief, because I don't have to pretend that beast isn't there anymore." Spirituel teacher Jack Morrigan shares how he feel unburdened of the need to resist or pretend that things are different than they are! In this interview we hear of Jack's awakening and the start of his profession as a dragon channeler. Jack was originally a junior researcher in psychiatry-related research at UK universities (including the Institute of Psychiatry in London) before a Kundalini awakening experience redirected him toward spirituality and channeling about a decade ago - something he was absolutely not into before!!! But what also happens in this interview is that Jack shares about a very current situation a breaking point he's living through right now. After being "kicked out" from a non-dual spirituality Facebook group he has become aware of something much deeper, that that humanity is facing genuine catastrophe. Listen and I think you will honestly love sinking into it with me, because Jack speaks in such an honest and inviting way or unhurried way, and his voice itself is mesmerizing, so I am incredible thankful for this episode that turned into a firsthand witness account from the underworld, the perception through which Scorpio sees. Another - or in face the same- reason this is a special episode, is that we are right on the full moon with all the shift of nodes into Leo and Aqurius and "The Four Degree Pattern" with Jupiter at 4° in Leo opposing Pluto at 4° in Aquarius and Neptune at 4° in Aries sextiling Uranus at 4° in Gemini - a pattern we expect to turn things around in a massive way, transpersonal planets being involved, also in eclipse season, lots are going on right now! Therefore it is not so strange that Jack is talking about shattering in this interview, where we could relate the theme to say he's in this raw, cracked-open place where even good intentions, his desire to save the world, are revealed to himself as another form of that same need for specialness and control. That's very Leo-South-Node, and the even he shares where a spiritual collective (Aquarius) revealing its shadow use of power (Pluto), because people in the group needed to be "the most awake person in the room" rather than actually awakening. Also just with Neptune in Aries being so activated now, this emphasis on dissolving the mask, the persona we can relate to Jack refusing to be "the dragon guy" all of which I think is part of his personal Neptune square eventually leading to a higher love - And so we could continue to relate and relate to the astrology of our times, but just in essence with the nodal shift what's genuine outweighs what's popular, and a new movement is now seeded, if not in fact rising! From the Plutonian/scorpio phase we outgrow the old psychic architecture first. Anyway thank you for listening LINKS https://www.jackmorrigan.com/ [https://www.jackmorrigan.com/] his youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@myrisingrose [https://www.youtube.com/@myrisingrose] Mannah: https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/ [https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/] Youtube edition: https://youtu.be/XkNOxoXLSU4 [https://youtu.be/XkNOxoXLSU4]

#162 - John Michael Greer: The Magical Writings of W.B. Yeats - The Reality Behind Folk Belief & Poetry

Quote from the magical writings: "The dead living in their memories, are, I am persuaded, the source of all that we call instinct, and it is their love and their desire, all unknowing, that make us drive beyond our reason, or in defiance of our interest it may be; and it is the dream martens that, all unknowing, are master-masons to the living martens building about church windows their elaborate nests; and in their turn, the phantoms are stung to a keener delight from a concord between their luminous pure vehicle and our strong senses" John Michael Greer is back with us here on tap- this time to talk about his latest book, "The Magical Writings of W. B. Yeats: The Original "A Vision" and Other Essays on Occultism". This collection brings together Yeats' esoteric writings for the first time in one volume, opening a doorway into a body of work that many readers of Yeats have never read!!! We begin with the fact that Yeats' occult writings have long remained "an unfortunate omission" from the literature, before exploring some of the central ideas that run through the collection. John helps us understand the channelled concepts of the Mask, the Will, the Creative Mind and the Body of Fate plus the meaning of the Anti-Self, the constant mediumship and inspiration going on AND the influence of the dead!! We also talk about the striking parallels John sees between Irish and Japanese folk occultism. TAP in with therapeutic astrology podcast as we open to the cosmos an learn with such a brilliant writer and thinker, John Michael Greer, We speak about: -Why Yeats' occult writings remained scattered for so long—and why John decided to collect them. -The power couple of Yeats and Georgina ("Georgie") Hyde-Lees, Yeats' wife and collaborator on the automatic writing that became the foundation of A Vision. -"A mysterious contact is perceptible first in painting and then in poetry and last in prose." -Carl Jung had a copy of "A Vision" -There are four interwoven dimensions of A Vision, quote: "The first is a study of human personality, the second an innovative system of occult philosophy, the third an account of the cycles of history, and the fourth a description of the afterlife—and all four of these unfold from the same symbolic structure, share the same philosophical outlook, and interleaf with one another in a galaxy of ways." -How our deepest thoughts sometimes seem to come from elsewhere - a stream of images -The soul's continued development after death -Cycles of history and why civilizations move through recurring phases rather than linear progress -Yeats believed the imagination opens us to "an invisible commerce of reverie and of sleep." -How Yeats wanted to start an order, see this quote: "I planned a mystical Order which should buy or hire the castle, and keep it as a place where its members could retire for a while for contemplation, and where we might establish mysteries like those of Eleusis and Samothrace; and for ten years to come my most impassioned thought was a vain attempt to find philosophy and to create ritual for that Order." -How irish is poetry - see this quote: "An impulse towards what is definite and sensuous, and an indifference towards the abstract and the general, are the lineaments, as I understand the word, of all that comes not from the learned, but out of common antiquity, out of the "folk" as we say, and in certain languages, Irish for instance—and these languages are all poetry—it is not possible to speak an abstract thought." -How Yeats and his wife was great astrologers!!! If you've only known Yeats as a poet, this conversation offers a glimpse into the esoteric vision that informed so much of his work and this conversation with John Michael Greer oh man, it is so informative, inspiring and helpful in explaining these invisible workings. John is a wonderful Gemini as was Yeats! LINKS: https://ecosophia.net/ [https://ecosophia.net/] the book: https://spirit.aeonbooks.com/product/magical-writings-of-wb-yeats/95401 [https://spirit.aeonbooks.com/product/magical-writings-of-wb-yeats/95401] Mannah: https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/ [https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/] youtube edition of this programme: https://youtu.be/cuwma60tggQ [https://youtu.be/cuwma60tggQ]

#161 - Jessica DiRuzza - Neurodivergence & Therapeutic Astrology - Trust Psyche

WARNING: REALLY RICH EPISODE, You will meet Jessica DiRuzza who is a depth psychotherapist and has Trust Psyche School of Astrology and Depth Psychology - For many years, she has been doing what Therapeutic Astrology is all about - that is, integrating the wisdom of depth psychology and astrology, helping people heal through both symbolic and therapeutic conversations. In THIS conversation, you are about to her, we explore exactly that- the meeting of psychotherapy and astrology and our main focus today is on neurodivergence!! Can it be seen in the birthchart? And if so, how? Jessica views neurodiversity as a necessary part of human evolution ! Here are some of what we talk about: -Jessicas embodied astrology practise -The limitation of one session of astrology and the importance of safety, trust, and time when working with trauma and deep psychological change -Meeting each client where they are instead of relying on a single therapeutic model -Neurodiversity and why so many astrologers are naturally drawn to symbolic pattern recognition -The relationship between neurodivergence, trauma, and living in a world that isn't always designed for different nervous systems. This conversation is definitivly with a neuroaffirming perspective !! We both share vulnerable accomodations to a disability -Interventions - is it the right word?? -Jessica shares about "twice exceptional" and how extraordinary gifts can mask invisible disabilities -Hyper- and hypo-sensitivity EXPLAINED really well - and of course remember that our greatest gifts often emerge from the same place as our deepest challenges! -Chiron as a symbol of the universal human wound (what does Chiron have to do with neurodivergence??) -Jessica is big on the value of PARADOX (libra south node perhaps) -Spotting neurdiversity in the chart...well...it is symbolism not causation! -we are reminded of the danger of dogmatism in both astrology and psychotherapy -Why every astrologer works from an underlying metaphysics! -My suggestion of Pisces and Aquarius to have a special relationship with neurodivergence, because of their otherworldliness (Neptune, Uranus, 12 og 11th house signatures of course also) If you know Jessica's work, you'll know she has produced many inspiring lectures and teachings online, see links below: LINKS: https://trustpsyche.com/about/ [https://trustpsyche.com/about/] https://www.youtube.com/@TrustPsyche [https://www.youtube.com/@TrustPsyche] Mannah: https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/ [https://www.therapeuticastrologer.com/] Youtube edition: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_z9D06N3y8 [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_z9D06N3y8]