Tag: Spirituality

the wolf you feed

by nathaliedanielleLeave a Comment on the wolf you feed

There is a Cherokee legend about two wolves.

An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he tells the boy. ” It is a terrible fight between two wolves. One is evil—anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego. The other is good—joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.
The same fight is going on inside you—and inside every other person, too.” The grandson thinks for a moment and then asks, “Which wolf will win?” The old Cherokee simply replies, “The one you feed.”

This story has resurfaced in my life repeatedly over the past few weeks, beginning with its mention in a workshop on polarity dynamics in intimate relationships. I started writing about its meaning as I integrated my profound experience in the course, but the words didn’t flow, so I set it aside. In the meantime, I traveled to a professional retreat, where I found myself surrounded by people who felt completely aligned—who inspired me and shared a mindset of curiosity, growth, and possibility. As I spent more time in this collective frequency, I became increasingly aware of synchronicities. There were so many unusual connections that I found myself sharing them aloud to prevent my mind from later dismissing them as mere coincidences. A few days into my trip, I awoke to a text from someone I hadn’t spoken to in many months. Out of the blue, he sent me a recommendation for a podcast I’d never heard of titled The One You Feed—with a picture of a wolf as the cover art. I was stunned.

Since then I’ve been reflecting more deeply on the wolf parable beyond the original context in which I heard it and its apparent connection to the notion of synchronicity. The story illustrates the ongoing battle within us—the tension between ego and our higher Self, between contraction and expansion, between fear and possibility. It reinforces the Universal law that where we place our attention determines what grows in our lives. And noticing synchronicity is all about attention. The late author and speaker Dr. Wayne Dyer emphasized that every thought carries energy that links us to something greater—a concept I was (not so coincidentally) reading about in Michael Talbot’s book The Holographic Universe the night before I received the text message with The One You Feed podcast. Talbot relays a theory that synchronicities reveal the absence of division between the physical world and our inner psychological reality, and what we are really experiencing “is the human mind operating, for a moment, in its true order and extending throughout society and nature, moving through degrees of increasing subtlety, reaching past the source of mind and matter into creativity itself.” So, when my high-frequency friend in the retreat circle, or soul brother as I lovingly call him, asked whether I thought these interconnected events were happening more often in my life or if I was simply more aware, I decided that it didn’t actually matter. I believe we are all creators of our reality. We are meaning-making machines, selecting what we focus on amid an infinite field of possibilities. And what we feed is what manifests.

At first, I saw this lesson through the lens of romantic relationships—how we show up in intimacy, and how our wounds and attachments shape our interactions. But the more I sat with it, the more I realized it extends to everything—our relationship with ourselves, with others, and with the material world. One of my favorite coaches, Peter Crone, offers that there are three fundamental “prisons” we all unconsciously live in: the first is our relationship to ourselves, where inadequacy manifests as self-doubt and imposter syndrome; the second is our relationship to the external world, where insecurity keeps us seeking validation and fearing judgment; and the third is our relationship to the material world, where scarcity convinces us we don’t have enough money, resources, or time. These distortions are the bad wolf. They keep us trapped in destructive cycles, feeding our fears, limiting our potential, and reinforcing the stories that hold us back. But when we come into right relationship, we shift. We open the field to the magic that is always available to us.

While I used to believe in coincidences, I don’t anymore. At some point in my journey, I realized that belief was rooted in the assumption that life is happening to me. But now, I see the bigger picture: when I take full responsibility, life is happening by me—through my choices—and through me, when I stop forcing or resisting and surrender. And in that state—when I trust, when I tune into the frequency of openness—I find myself aligned with something greater. The synchronicities increase. The messages arrive. The guidance becomes clear and life flows, just like the words on this page after I let the wolves inside me rest in peace.

great expectations

by nathaliedanielle1 Comment on great expectations

The prevailing advice proffered to those who are new to plant medicine or psychedelics as a healing modality is to set intentions, but release expectations. Nevertheless, that line is indeed a fine one. In my experience, it’s easy to name a desire an intention, but a certain degree of mental and spiritual maturity is required to remain sincerely unattached to outcomes. This challenge confronted me as I returned to Costa Rica for the second time this year to sit in ceremony with the same ancestral Ayahuasca carriers I met in April. It was a “do-over” of sorts; as I recounted in a prior post, my body had an alternative plan for me eight months ago. But as 2024 concludes, a retreat opportunity paired with my inner calling led me back to reflect on an enormous year of growth and to make space for feeling the profound grief that will forever cast its shadow on the Christmas holiday since losing my mother on that day three years ago. Last but certainly not least, I intended to deepen my spiritual practice to support all I am creating for this coming year and beyond.

For those familiar with numerology, 2024 marks the completion of a nine-year cycle for me. In sum, it’s the end of an era. Energetically, I’ve felt the magnitude of that as I released limiting identities and habits, dedicated myself to restoring optimal physical health, and contemplated shifts aligned to the next chapter of life that I am manifesting. How apropos, then, to bring it all to the medicine and ask her for help (another skill I am practicing). Most of my past ceremonies have been physically and emotionally challenging – some of the hardest nights of my life, in fact. Yet, there is something so restorative on the other side of the inevitable purge that occurs upon drinking Ayahuasca’s potent brew, resulting in an ineffable lightness and spaciousness. Still, I had high hopes (one might even call them expectations) for the kind of earth-shattering, transcendental apex I’ve only heard described by friends and strangers alike. Throughout two sequential night-long ceremonies conducted by masterful indigenous shamans and gallant facilitators, I felt nothing but debilitating nausea, a weakness that confined me to the limits of my small mattress on the floor, and an amplified awareness of my chattering brain responding to every raucous sound that reverberated throughout the room. 

As my peers regaled each other with stories of their eventful journeys in the subsequent days, I couldn’t help but witness a familiar pattern of comparison arise in me. Why didn’t I receive the beautiful visions and mystical messages like so many others? What is wrong with me? Yet, if I’ve understood anything in this year of endings, I choose whether I am a victim or a creator, and I’m done with stories of victimhood. I’m reminded of the very beliefs that brought me to this healing medicine; I trust in the divine design, and I always receive that which supports my highest good. I may recognize it in a future moment of clarity, or it may impact me in more subtle ways, but the path to awakening is an exercise for life. Just as we don’t practice yoga to strike the perfect pose, but instead to apply its teachings off the mat, we don’t drink Ayahuasca (or work with any other spiritual or therapeutic tools, for that matter) for one peak experience. When we fall out of poses, or when our expectations are unfulfilled, it’s like a big developmental Christmas gift whose lessons are waiting to be unwrapped. And just as our retreat group danced to traditional Amazonian melodies at dawn to conclude each night of ceremony, I am dancing into 2025 with one intention: to welcome it all…even the feisty Costa Rican scorpion hiding in my shoe.*

*Ancient Egyptian mythology associated scorpions with the goddess Isis, who represented healing, fertility, and protection. The morning I was leaving Costa Rica, I stuck my foot into my shoe where a scorpion was inconspicuously hiding. After the adrenaline wore off and the relief set in that I wasn’t stung, I couldn’t help but smile at the magic of this symbolism at the close of my retreat. The medicine gave me exactly what I needed, indeed.  

grandmother’s medicine

by nathaliedanielle2 Comments on grandmother’s medicine

I prepared for months. Daily meditations and weekly practice of tools for emotional resilience, nervous system regulation, and ancestral wisdom set the stage to travel to Costa Rica’s jungles to sit again with the great plant medicine mother, Ayahuasca. It was abundantly clear in advance that in this lineage of medicine carriers from the Amazon in Colombia, women on their moon (as the menstrual cycle is tenderly called) are not permitted to participate in ceremonies. Yet, the probability of that impacting me was low. Since discontinuing my 18-year reliance on hormonal birth control, my cycles have been irregular and sparse. For me, this is just one unfortunate side effect of a larger, longstanding repression and denigration of my feminine body and energy, which I’ve dimmed with shame, judgment, and an impossible quest for perfection.

Imagine my disappointment when, the night before the first ceremony with my retreat group, my moon arrived. Normally, I’d rejoice as I’ve shifted my relationship with this biological reality, no longer viewing it as an unnecessary nuisance but rather as a vital sign and guardian of my dream for a future child. But this time, it triggered the old story of “inconvenience” and “weakness.” Yet, after speaking with some of the female facilitators and processing my disillusionment, I started to shift my perspective. Anyone on this medicine path will share the same message: the plant’s spirit works in mysterious and mystical ways. In fact, one doesn’t even have to drink her potent brew for the effects to manifest. We set intentions and attempt to release expectations, trusting that we don’t necessarily get what we want, but we do get exactly what we need.

Not coincidentally, my intention for this trip was to ask Mother Ayahuasca to show me my authentic self and reconnect me to the divine feminine that I’d locked away so that I could succeed in a man’s world, especially as I ascended in my corporate career in particularly masculine cultures. In the opening circle with my retreat group, I lay in meditation with my eyes closed, holding my intention in my heart. I felt warm, delicate hands resting on my womb, but when I opened my eyes, I realized there was no one with me. Looking back, it seems like a premonition. While the rest of my group spent their first night in ceremony drinking Ayahuasca, I communed with two medicine women, learning about their spiritual reverence for the moon cycle and how indigenous cultures across the world have honored it as a medicine ceremony in and of itself. It’s a time to gather, rest, cleanse, and give thanks. Since the womb is a portal for life, it must be cherished in the most sacred way. Thus, the combination with Ayahuasca is too strong, as they are both powerful purifiers of energy, and we can only safely process so much healing at one time. In fact, the elders say that long ago, women didn’t drink at all because it had no effect – it was the disconnection from our bodies that required the medicine to bring us home to ourselves.

Many traditions refer to the lunar moon as Grandmother. She is honored for watching over the waters of the Earth, regulating the tides, and nurturing the feminine because she also governs our cleansing cycle. Water always comes before new life, and I felt the spirits of my mother and grandmother united through Mother Ayahuasca and Grandmother Moon in support of my rebirth. Instead of the brutal purgatory that I anticipated and somewhere deep down felt I deserved, they gifted me an intimate, three-part ceremony surrounded by four female angels. We spent one evening gathered around an altar, as I was offered a ritualistic healing fortified by different sacred plants including nettle and tobacco. The next day, my soul traveled the celestial realm as we shared mushrooms, music, and pure magic. I grieved for time past, for loved ones lost, and I danced and played as the inner child within me was liberated from her cage. Indeed, my communion with the plant spirits offered me exactly what I needed. On my journey to radically loving myself in her totality, I am giving myself the medicine I was seeking outside – at last, coming home to myself.

Dedicated to Sathya, Dali, Mishy, and Sylvie at The Nature Within

Read about my previous Ayahuasca ceremonies in The Silence Between the Words, January 2023, and My Undoing, June 2021

a taste of soul sustenance

by nathaliedanielle2 Comments on a taste of soul sustenance

Hello reader, I’m Nathalie. I have to admit upfront that I’m a little terrified to publish this. I guess the thought of an invisible audience silently or not-so-silently judging me from behind their computer screens is intimidating. Yet, something is calling me to begin this public foray into writing and documenting my experiences. There is always an initiation and a learning curve with any new hobby, so bear with me as I educate myself on the blogging world and, ideally, improve this blog over time.

I am writing this first post on my 28th birthday, which feels appropriate because I believe a birthday marks a new year of life and fresh beginnings. I titled this blog Soul Sustenance because it celebrates everything in life that brings me joy and balance, and what better time to embrace, explore and share it all with the world than on a celebratory day?

Let me explain more about what drives me, which is really the essence of this blog:

  1. food (life’s literal sustenance): I can’t deny it, I love to eat. Lately I’ve been doing a lot of introspection and actively observing when I experience joy, and most of those moments in my life revolve around food. It’s not just the food that I savor; it’s how food has an incredible power to bring people together, stimulating conversations, expressions of love and connection. Aside from the actual eating, I enjoy the act of researching restaurants, curating my list of new places I want to try, and the adventure of dining somewhere for the first time. I witness the ambiance, absorb the energy of the other diners, evaluate the service of the wait staff, and of course, I hope to relish every flavor – from the wine to the dessert.  Throughout most of my adult life, I have avoided the act of cooking, shunning the idea of toiling in the kitchen for hours to make a meal for myself that will take me a fraction of the time to consume. Maybe it’s just a function of the current conditions of my life; I live alone, work a full-time job and generally consider myself to be an impatient person. Or perhaps, I am just a creature of convenience. I live less than five minutes from a Whole Foods, so why cook when I have an abundance of fresh, pre-prepared food just a few steps away after a long day? Nonetheless, while I still consider myself more of a diner than a chef, I am gradually starting to appreciate the art of cooking – at least when I have time. I acknowledge that there is something immensely gratifying about creating a tasty and nutritious meal, so perhaps there is more “sustenance” that I have yet to fully explore. Regardless of how and where I consume it, clearly food is one of my passions and it will continue to be a central focus as I explore new restaurants and recipes, and I share the joy it brings to my life through my writing.
  2. health & wellness: I started my active life as a dancer at the age of 3 and I’ve never stopped moving since. My choice of exercise and activities has expanded since then to include almost anything that gets my blood pumping. I have also taken an interest in the overall body and how it can change radically through exercise and nutrition. It’s convenient to love to be active when you have such an affinity for eating, but I don’t just exercise in order to justify eating more (although that’s fun too). The endorphin rush of finishing an intense spin class or even better, hiking a mountain in the fresh air of my home state of Colorado is a natural high that is hard to beat. I also love understanding how food fuels the body and impacts everything from energy levels to mood to physique. I read and research extensively on the topic so I plan to share some of my findings here.
  3. spirituality: What a loaded word. I believe everyone has their own experience and I’ve been spending the better part of the last few years defining what it means for me. I believe it’s a lifetime journey that I’m only just beginning, but I am starting to see themes and connections in every domain of my life. I’ve been finding my own spirituality through reading, meditating, and yoga, and I have truly found a passion for exploring the meaning of life and the experience of the higher Self. I can’t talk about these very physical manifestations of my joy through food and exercise without also contemplating the reason behind it all…
  4. service: …which leads me to the concept of service and living life with a purpose. If there’s one dominant lesson from my spiritual quest thus far, it is that we are all connected and no one person is an island. One of my favorite metaphors I read once is that living beings are like ice cubes. We appear separate and individual, but we are all comprised of the same elements and ultimately “melt” into the same glass of water. We need to support each other because nobody can achieve gratification and fulfillment alone. I live a very blessed life and I couldn’t imagine not sharing those gifts with others. More than anything, service offers a higher purpose that I mentioned before, and connects us to something beyond the realm of the ego. I believe that above all should be celebrated and shared.

So those are my passions, or the sustenance of my soul. I would be remiss not to mention one constant in my life that ties all these elements together, however, and that is the art of travel and exploring other cultures. I’ve spent my life chasing all that is foreign in both the professional and personal domains. I currently work in a company with a major presence in Latin America, and I am fortunate to travel often to some of the places I adore most in that region of the world. I also have a running list of new destinations, as I do with new restaurants, and nothing excites me more than planning my next trip. Through this blog I intend to explore what I consider to be the four pillars of a balanced life – food, health & wellness, spirituality, and service – in the context of other cultures and through my travels to new places. Each community, whether it’s my own current city of Atlanta or an indigenous population in the rainforest of Brazil, has its own expression of these elements and I plan to investigate them through my excursions.

Welcome to this journey with me and I hope it feeds your soul as much as it does mine. Namaste!