Have you ever felt stuck in life, wondering where your true path may be? Although we often feel like we should know exactly what we’re doing and where we’re going in life, I’ve found – from personal and professional experience – that it’s quite normal to get confused and stuck at least once along the way. Wouldn’t it be lovely if you could discover a map for navigating life’s challenges? And wouldn’t it be awesome if you could tune into yourself and embrace the inherent, precious gifts inside of you? If this sounds interesting, you’ve found the right space.

I’m joined by a delightful guest, Nid Ra, who specializes in helping others tune into their true path with clarity, wisdom, and grace. Topics discussed include mindfulness, transformation, soul, positive change, self-love, Awakening Spiral, challenges, inner change, calmness, trust, and vitality.

Please note that this episode may contain sensitive material; listener discretion is advised.

Emergency Assistance Note: If you or someone you know needs immediate support, please call your emergency services. In the US, 24/7 help is available by calling “911” or “988” (Suicide and Crisis Hotline). Support/informational links are in the show notes.

IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER: No expert in this (or any episode) is offering medical or psychological direction; the content is purely informational in nature. Please consult your physician or healthcare provider before undertaking any new regimen or procedure. https://www.nami.org/support-education/nami-helpline/

Connect with Dr. Carla Manly:

Website: https://www.drcarlamanly.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/drcarlamanly/

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/drcarlamanly/

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Books by Dr. Carla Manly:

Joy From Fear: Create the Life of Your Dreams by Making Fear Your Friend 

Date Smart: Transform Your Relationships and Love Fearlessly

Aging Joyfully: A Woman’s Guide to Optimal Health, Relationships, and Fulfillment for Her 50s and Beyond

The Joy of Imperfect Love: The Art of Creating Healthy, Securely Attached Relationships

Imperfect Love Relationship & Oracle Card Deck by Dr. Carla Manly:

Etsy

Amazon

Connect with Nid Ra:

Website: www.nidsnidra.com

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nids.nidra/

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/c/nidsnidra

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4HT3waAypLq98uCxkl4tg9?si=a3d199aedeb14b44

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Getting Unstuck and Finding Your True Path with Expert Nid Ra

Top Tips for Discovering Your True Path and Purpose

Have you ever felt stuck in life, wondering what your next step should be? Although we often feel like we should know exactly what we’re doing and where we’re going in life, I’ve found from personal and professional experience that it’s quite normal to get confused and stuck at least once along the way. Wouldn’t it be lovely if you could discover a map for navigating life’s challenges? Wouldn’t it be awesome if you could tune into yourself and embrace the inherent, precious gifts inside of you? If this sounds interesting, you found the right space. In this episode, I’m joined by a delightful guest who specializes in helping others tune into their true paths with clarity, wisdom, and grace.

We’ll focus on this reader’s real-life question. “All my friends are on great trajectories with work. Most of them have partners, and a few have kids already. I have an okay job in the restaurant industry. It’s fine, but not my dream. I don’t even know what my dream is. Compared to my friends, my life is pretty embarrassing. I’m pressuring myself to change things, but I don’t know how. What do you suggest?” With that question as the focus of this episode, this is the show. Please note that as this episode may contain sensitive information, reader discretion is advised.

I am joined by a tremendous guest, Nid Ra. Nid is the Founder of The Awakening Spiral, a soulful map for navigating life’s challenges and remembering your inherent gifts. Welcome to the show, Nid. It’s such a joy to have you with us.

It’s lovely to be here. Thank you so much for having me here.

Soul Guide And Energy Master Nid Ra

It’s such a delight. Before we launch into the subject of this episode, could you tell our readers a little bit about what makes you you?

I named myself when I was eighteen months old. I’m with that very determined personality. I’ve navigated that world of knowing myself, but then also getting very lost in fitting into the world. I understand that dance that we have between what it is to live with our left brain, but also want to follow the love of the right brain. For me, what makes me unique is that I am both quite clear, very focused, and direct, but I also have that warmth. I have discovered the softness of how it is that we gently glow through life. That’s the space that I love to be in and to share with people.

That is beautiful. Thank you. A question for you. How did you name yourself at eighteen months old?

My parents had called me a lovely Italian name. I had a nanny who used to sing Knick Knack Paddy Wack. I decided to land on the word Nid, as you do when you can’t quite pronounce things as a little toddler, and I refused to hear another name at all. I’ve never been called anything else by my family. Even in the worst trouble that I ever get, my parents still say Nid.

I love that. May I ask what your beautiful Italian name was?

Luciana.

Maintain The Softness Within Yourself

That’s beautiful. I have a cousin named Luciana. First off, let’s maybe start with the softness inside that you’re referring to. What do you mean by that?

In our world, it’s very fast. There’s a lot of quite harsh language that we use. There’s a very strict way in which we tend to live with time and how we use our days and our energy through, in a way, what is the only asset we have in life, which is the time we have to live. When we are sharp with that, it creates a hardness in how we then cope with things. That can create those protective patterns to try and take care of ourselves in the quick pace of getting things done.

We got to do this. We got to do that. There’s a lot of pressure that can come on us around what we should be doing with that time and what the right use of it is. What’s the best way to be your best self in all of those confined time and experiential things that apparently we should do? That can create a hardness. That hardness can also come through trauma and conditioning. There are many layers in which we develop a hardness to be in this world. There’s a softness inside of us that wants to be loved and wants to love.

Thank you. I appreciate that. I love how you frame it. What I’m getting is the armor one puts on to get through this very fast-paced, chaotic world. Especially for people who are highly sensitive, it can be a pretty jarring world to live in at times. You are saying that you access and try to live in and nurture that inner softness. It sounds like you’re talking about pure love, that sweetness, and a place that I dare say many people don’t know a lot about.

I would agree. It’s very hard for us to always know what that is, because often, we feel a sense of condition in order to receive love. We are in a transactional world. I was a lawyer for a while. I was a commercial lawyer, so I understand transactions well. That transactional world where we think, “If I’m going to give something, I expect something in return,” that’s not how love works. That’s not how that softness works. That’s not real love.

Real love is unconditional. It’s not one and then the other. There isn’t this direct correlation and consequential linear experience that happens. My way of living in this world has been to understand that softness. Like a flower, its aroma wants to diffuse through us very softly and gently. It’s not a force that meets the forcefulness of the outside world. It gently lets the hardness soften and dissolve.

I imagine that for many people, that brings up a sense of deep vulnerability.

I personally find that with the way that I work, vulnerability is very easy to access if someone feels that they are in that space.

If they get into the soft space, then the vulnerability is there. It’s part and parcel of that love and that softness. What I mean is, for somebody who’s living in the hardened external world, accessing that soft inner world, especially for people who are new to it, A) They might ot understand it, and B) They might be very scared of it. They’re like, “What are you talking about? I’m not going to be vulnerable. That doesn’t make sense.” What do you think of that?

I have a very rational, logical family. For them, that kind of language doesn’t fit. That’s not to say that they don’t have an experience of loving people, but vulnerability and that kind of approach doesn’t sit well. It’s not that everyone can relate to it or can feel it, but you can’t force yourself to drop into it. You can’t say, “I’m going to decide to know what it’s like to feel that softness.” It doesn’t work like that.

For me, one of the telling signs of someone who finds a place that’s hard to connect with is when they say, “I’m good at surrendering.” I go, “Hmm.” When you know that softness, it’s hard to ever say you’re good at that. Surrendering is not an easy thing for us humans to do. It’s recognizing that it’s okay to be exactly where you are. If that softness and vulnerability don’t sound accessible, sound a bit weird, or don’t sound like a safe place, then that’s okay. Don’t try and make that somewhere that you are going to. Start by noticing if there are times or places where you can feel that inner calm and peacefulness.

Listening And Understanding Your Soul Whispers

That is a beautiful place to start. I’m right with you, in many respects. To the readers and the person who wrote in, if you are used to that left-brain, more regimented world, or that linear progression in life, like, “You should know where you’re going. You should know how to get there. Take step ABC,” that is the linear, more rigid world.

Whereas the realm of tuning into the self, I don’t know that it’s a skill, but it’s almost like starting to learn how to listen to the little knocks at your door. It’s not the giant ring of a doorbell that your psyche does. It is those little nudges and sweet openings. It can be hard to listen to those if you are used to the cacophony of the outside world. You might not hear.

I know it has happened to me. I’ve had the nudges. If my life is very busy, then I ignore them, and then I later think, “I remember getting that nudge.” I didn’t make time for what you’re calling the softness, or that going inward to listen more. What do you call it? I call it the spirit talking to me, or my inner voice talking to me. Sometimes, it’s also my inner child talking to me. What do you call that voice that can come up if we’re quiet enough to listen?

For me, it’s the soul. Placing context, the challenge of the journey that we have here as humans living a life is that we’re a little person or a little human being, and we have this huge soul. It wants to live through us. It wants to experience this life. All of these sensations, interactions, or moments, whether they are considered good or bad, the soul doesn’t have judgment. It has an experience that it’s interested in. That’s what the whispers that are coming quietly through are seeking. They want an adventure.

I love how you put that. The whispers. You are right. They are whispers. That makes perfect sense. Not just once, but many times, I get asked, “How do I know when it’s my spirit, my soul, or my intuition talking and when it’s my brain or my mind chattering at me?” My response is, unless you’re in danger and a bus is going to hit you, generally, it’s very soft and gentle. It’s like that tiny little knock. You are calling it a whisper. That works perfectly. If it’s the mind, here’s my perspective, and I’d love yours. It’s generally insistent, nagging, almost yelping at you, or sometimes screeching at you, whereas the soul is language. Does that resonate with how you work?

Yeah, it does resonate. You brought up whether it’s the inner child. I do think that there is an important piece of the different parts and the different layers that might be talking to us that need care in order to hear those whispers. I’m going to go back one step and say that the soul whispers, but they get louder. In the shamanic traditions, they teach that there’s a feather, a brick, and then a truck. You begin with the little feather. It’s like, “Are you listening?”

For me, my little feather was panic attacks. I was getting panic attacks. My brick was that my marriage fell apart, and I got divorced. That was upsetting, but I could keep pushing through, as many of us do. We pushed through, and then I fell down a staircase and had a brain injury. That was the end of my legal career. I was unable to work for over a year. That was a truck. That eased my soul, saying, “I’ve given you lots of little opportunities.”

When we cannot see those things, it can get louder. The situations will become more dramatic. Your soul is calling you for attention in the way it knows how, which is through our physical experience becoming unpleasant and asking us to stop and look. There’s nothing wrong with doing what I did and getting to that point where you need the truck. It’s fine. That’s the way we are. What’s nice is that if you start to listen, life doesn’t have to get past a feather. You are listening. If you’re proactively listening, you avoid those scenarios.

It doesn’t mean that people don’t get sick, and you don’t injure yourself. Life happens. We all still have to do our tax returns. It means that you can proactively be tending to and taking care of. That’s where that intuition can become a louder voice that guides you towards things that would be more joyous for you. That gives you that sense of purpose.

Along that journey, you have to meet the parts of yourself that you’ve suppressed. All of us have suppressed something. That’s part of our conditioning generally in this world. We all have a little psyche and the things that are in the mind. Ultimately, they were looking for love, but it is your awareness without judgment that gives them love. We have to become aware of these things. It might be inner child work. For some people, it can be past-life work that comes up through things. It can be many different pieces. You have to identify those parts when they’re calling for their time to be given that love and attention.

Then, you build a new relationship with that part of yourself. That makes it quieter inside to hear your intuition and listen to your soul and those whispers. There is a staged process. That’s why with The Awakening Spiral, it’s not about, “You’ve done the work. You are complete.” There’s a deepening of listening that’s happening. In each layer, we are deepening into that awareness of what is wanting to experience life through us.

That is so beautifully said. I am following you, especially on the part where you are saying it is this process because life is a journey. Sometimes, we want it to be one-and-done, like, “Let me know what to do, and then I’ll get there.” First off, I’m very sorry for your accident. I understand that you are not happy that it happened, but that you are okay that it happened. It allowed you to listen to your soul and get on a path that feels good and feels true to you. I also agree that it’s ideal if we can avoid the truck. The brick is bad enough. I’ve had a few bricks in my life. Having the truck is a big one. Fortunately, you made it through it.

Finding Moments Of Pause And Keeping A Daily Journal

Let’s look at our reader’s question. It’s a perfect one to pair with you and your expertise. There’s no judgment here. I don’t know the individual’s age. Maybe they’re in their thirties, I don’t know. I have been there and did not know my soul’s calling at that age. I knew it far before, but it got overwhelmed by family messaging about what I should be doing instead.

How can this individual get in touch with what is ideal for them? How can they start that process of stopping that chatter? It sounds like they have some shame-based chatter going on. They’re embarrassed about what’s happening. They’re constantly comparing themselves to other people, which is never helpful. We can use a comparison, at times, to say, “I would like to go down this path. I see that this person’s happy. That feels good to me. Maybe I’ll give that a try.” If we’re comparing ourselves and judging with this very shaming and blaming voice, nothing positive comes out of that. What do you think?

The first piece that is sometimes helpful is to find moments of pause in our day. Start to make space in the mind and all of that mind chatter. It’s finding the gaps in between our thoughts, not silencing our thoughts. If we can learn to start to find the gaps, we start to step away from our thoughts being ourselves and identifying with our thoughts.

If you can learn to find space, even if it’s the red light that makes you stop your car, or even if it’s the missed train that you have to stand on the platform for an extra couple of minutes, those are pauses that, if you make intentional, build up lots of gaps that you can start to then feel more space inside the mind. If you can see space and pauses in your day, you start to see it in your mind.

There’s a mirror of what’s happening in our lives. It starts to happen internally. That takes the pressure off of saying, “I’m going to sit and meditate,” or, “I’m going to sit and do self-care.” We can see where life is giving us space and time to pause and take a few breaths. In that moment, acknowledge, “I’m getting a pause. I’m getting a moment to stop andcatch myself.” Acknowledge, “What am I feeling? What am I thinking?” Note it. Sometimes, it can help us to track these things.

Often, we are making progress, but it is this slow progress that’s slowly going up. It’s not this nice, straight trajectory. If you can track it without judgment, you get a bit more of an objective lens of, “Today, I’ve been thinking about these things. I’ve been feeling these things.” The next day, you could be like, “I’ve been thinking these things. I’ve been feeling these things.” You can keep it very simple.

That starts to give internal space for whatever those whispers are that want to start to come through to give you little nudges, like, “I’m going to go to that little workshop,” or, “I’ll go and listen to that podcast.” It helps create internally the little nudges that might send you to speak to someone you’ve never spoken to before. It can open up opportunities for us. That’s the first point. If we go straight to the mind and the comparison when we don’t have space, it’s confronting. That harshness is going to still be there. We need to create pauses to give the softness somewhere to start to diffuse into our experience.

I appreciate this. You can start by carrying a journal with you or using your phone as a journal, and then sit in that pause for a moment and maybe do a breath or two. If I’m hearing you right, then you can ask yourself a question about that pause. It could be an open-ended, “What did I feel here? What did I notice here?”

If I’m hearing you right, it’s almost as if you’re opening a window where a little bird can fly in. That little bird is a message from your spirit or your soul saying, “Maybe go to that little shop right there and sit down and have a cup of coffee.” When we listen to those little nudges, who knows what’s at that coffee shop? Maybe it’s the person we’re meant to meet. Maybe there’s a book that somebody left behind, and we get an idea from the book. Maybe we’re eating a pastry and go, “I want to make pastries like this.” It doesn’t mean you’ll be a pastry chef, but maybe these are all the little whispers you’re talking about.

I love how you are saying to keep this in a journal. Sometimes, we get very hard on ourselves and say, “I’m not making progress.” Yet, if we have a journal, while our mind might forget the progress we’re making, that little book that you keep is evidence. All of the hundreds of little books that are lined up are your testament. They’re your proof that you have been growing, shifting, and learning. It might not be perceptible to the outside world at first. It doesn’t need to be. What matters is that you feel the shifts inside of you. Does that resonate? Is that what you were talking about with this?

Yes, very much. It is important with journaling, not just to write and forget, but to go back, reflect, and use it as an opportunity to see your growth. Also, it will show you consistent nudges or consistent things that come through that maybe are either a direction of where you are going or something that there is a purposefulness to. It starts to give you a sense of continuity.

I’ve seen it for eighteen months in my journal. I was journaling something that then came true in my life. Internally, you know it. We all have that knowing inside of us. If we don’t track it, we are never going to discover it. We might go, “I remember about that a while ago,” but our mind plays tricks. It’s very clever and smart. It’s wonderful.

It’s a wonderful gift as well to be able to see these games that it likes to play, because it’s playful. It makes life more playful if you can see that the mind is just trying to play games. It’s not being as mean. It’s not trying to be in any way horrible to you. We don’t want to make our mind a villain in our life because we need our mind. It’s important. It’s helpful to see what the intuition is guiding you to, and then what the mind is doing.

I work with contemplation and spiritual inquiry. I love using the Gene Keys as a modality to help people with contemplation. That is all about open questions. We are not seeking an answer. We are seeking to let the mind go on its own little wandering without necessarily having a plan or a map. Sometimes, we might give the mind a couple of signposts in that wandering, which is the open question of, “How am I feeling?” The signpost is, “I’m tuning into sensations.” The open question might be, “What are my emotions right now?” The signpost is, “I’m tuning into an emotional state right now,” without saying, “I should or I shouldn’t feel that.” We want to remove the judgment.

Judgment can be very strong. Especially if you feel like life is unfair, that’s often the sign that you’ve got a strong inner critic and judge. You are feeling that the world is unfair. When we feel the world is unfair, it tends to come with quite a lot of anger, as well as judgment and harshness. It’s important to be kind with that and not try and push that sense of inner voice because it only becomes harder if we try to be too confrontational with it.

Disengaging And Taming Your Inner Critic

I have a question for you. When you were talking about the mind, that it is playful and that it’s not the evil villain, many times, the mind can sound and have word tracks that are very devious, critical, and harsh. When there is an individual whose mind has been trained by repetition, the person is not broken. It’s simply neurobiology. Once you keep having these, the thoughts are going to be more hardwired in.

How would you recommend it? It sounds like this would apply to the reader who had written in and said they have this sense of comparison, and they’re embarrassed. How would you recommend that they continue on this journey of being in exploration and asking questions when that mind pops up? It’s that critical part or that strong inner critic that many people have. The first response is that mean inner critic. How would you recommend that they disengage or tame that inner critic so that it becomes softer and gentler over time?

There are two things that are helpful for the inner critic, and it slightly depends. There’s an emotional piece that goes with the inner critic. Number one, you need to listen to what kind of inner critic you have. When we say having those pauses and being aware in those pauses of whatever that voice is and how it’s talking, acknowledge it. We could go, “I acknowledge you. Thank you. I hear you.”

That’s number one. You’re like, “I acknowledge you.” That’s the seeing. That’s the softness starting to happen. That unconditional love is starting to be present with the inner critic. The inner critic doesn’t particularly want love. It wants to be seen, so we validate it and acknowledge it. We’re like, “Thank you. I see you. I hear you.” That’s step number one. We want to be aware of what kind of inner critic we have.

The second part is if it’s a very angry and righteous inner critic, it often needs to do forgiveness. There’s a heavy judgment and blame that’s happening if there is a lot of righteousness and anger. There is one way. You might experience that as, “I’m a failure. I’ve got to put pressure on myself to compete and be up there with other people.” That can come through in, “I’ve got to strive. I’ve got to push. I’ve got to match that thing.” That can be that inner critic that is smashing you. They’re shaming and blaming you, and they’re putting you down.

A lot of forgiveness needs to happen. You could say, “I forgive myself for doing that to myself.” When you hear the inner critic, you could say, “I hear you. I thank you, and I forgive.” It is important to tap in because that will start to allow the softness to come through with that inner critic. It lets the inner critic be there without trying to change or force something different because that will create more friction.

Thank you. I’d love to pause here because it’s such an important piece. That inner critic, which can often turn inward, can turn outward onto other people. It can go both ways many times. Many times, people will try to suppress it. It’s the same when there’s a part of the inner child that comes up and gets active and angry. They throw a temper tantrum.

Readers, if you don’t know what I’m talking about, we’ll get there. We’ll get to the inner child next, I promise. When we suppress it, compartmentalize it, or tell it to shut up, like any temper tantrum, it tends to make it worse, and it certainly doesn’t give it space. By simply saying, “I hear you. I understand. I hear what’s going on. It’s okay. I’ve got this,” and as we say that out loud, it softens it.

Hearing And Dealing With Your Inner Child

I love how you added, “I forgive you,” because that’s a beautiful part of the loop that brings it into how harsh that is on the human and the soul to hear that incessant battering. When you give it forgiveness, I’m getting a sense as we’re talking that it’s almost like putting a little bit of water on the fire. Thank you for that. Let’s move a little bit on the inner child. To me, it is such a precious part of who we all are as human beings. Please explain.

The inner child is the parts of our childhood that, for whatever reason, we interpreted a situation in a way that we didn’t get to express or feel completion in who we were. The inner child ends up with beliefs of not being good enough, not being worthy, or whatever these beliefs are that undermine the wholeness of what that softness or that unconditional love knows of who you are.

You’re born with an innate knowing that you are perfect and that you are whole. I say that there are some caveats, energetically, to that, but there’s a sense that we know our wholeness. In a way, those moments of conditioning and experiences that can happen in our early childhood create this whole raft of beliefs and structures about who we are and how we have to be in this world. With that are a series of armor and coping strategies of how we are going to navigate this world. Some of them will be learned from people around us, and some of them will be things that we’ve learned about how we can get through stuff. Some of it could be a natural skillset within you of how to survive.

These are not necessarily helpful as an adult. It’s a little bit like when you get into an argument with your friend or your partner. What’s happening is you’ve got two little toddlers who are having a fight, and there’s no grown-up to tell them, “Stop.” We’re fighting with another toddler because we’ve triggered each other’s little inner kids. There isn’t a resolution within a kid when kids are having a fight until they exhaust themselves, quite a lot of the time.

Especially with the question from your reader around that pressure of how to be like other people or how to find purpose, but still be fitting in, that is an inner child who knows that they’re fitting in. What is that true sense of joy that is coming from that person? They want to find their true sense of joy, but they’re conflicted with the conditioning and experiences, maybe in their life, of how they haven’t been able to fit in. They’re trying to walk a path of being themselves while still being accepted in this world and belonging with other people.

I have a question for you about the inner child. It sounds like when you were describing the inner child, you were talking about the parts of the young child that weren’t seen, heard, or given attention. Do you see there being positive elements of the inner child that get awakened and that want to play, giggle, laugh, and be silly?

Yes, very much. I sense that for a lot of people, at least those who come to see me, there has been an inner child where the joy has not been set free. There is so much joy and light that wants to be experienced. In our serious world, there’s no space for that. There’s no space for fun. There’s no space for play, playfulness, and curiosity.

We think of kids at school. They got to learn to spell. They’ve got to learn to do math. They’ve got all these skills that they have to do. Where is the curiosity in their play and in their day? They’re running around in their bodies and exploring their bodies. They’re being in their bodies and having a full emotional experience, and they’re being educated around that. There’s more of that happening.

There is that shift starting to happen in education. Parents are becoming aware that this needs to be brought into education, which is wonderful that there is more of that in the world. For those of us who are adults, we may not have had that experience when we were children. We may not have received that place where you were supported to be a child, be free, play,discover, and be your silly self. It’s so important to be silly and to have permission to be silly because it helps us get over potential embarrassment. That removes potential shame if we know that we can embarrass ourselves. It’s okay. It’s safe.

I wholeheartedly agree with you. When we look at the difference between shame and embarrassment, shame is, “I am, as a human being, bad,” and embarrassment is, “I’ve done something bad or inappropriate in public or in my life,” whatever it is. They’re very different beasts. Those heavy mantles of shame and embarrassment often started early on in life, sometimes pre-verbal, where we were shamed.

We might have run around without a diaper, and somebody says, “Go cover up,” or, “You are a bad girl. You should be ashamed of that,” or, “You are a bad boy.” We learn very early on in life if we’re not doing whatever this thing is that we’re supposed to be doing, or if we’re not like sister, brother, the neighbor’s kid, or someone else. It’s indoctrinated. It is setting ourselves free and using that joy.

I love how you help people tap into their inner truth, inner grace, and inner strength, so that our radar is less turned outward at, “What should I be doing?” We’re scanning the horizon for what we should be doing because that’s what others say, or Instagram says, or society says. Instead, you are following that internal compass.

What I love about this is when you follow that internal compass, what other people think or say matters very little because you’re tuned into yourself, your love, your goodness, and your light. Somebody might find you a little goofy, a little wonky, or a little off the beaten path, but that’s a pretty cool place to be.

You’re yourself. You’re happy because you’re yourself, and you are at home in yourself. That’s the key thing. When you are at home in yourself, it takes so much of that pressure off. It releases it. That’s a process of returning to yourself and returning to who you are by releasing these layers. There’s always more of a return to yourself. There’s always more to discover, and that becomes a pleasure.

At the beginning of a journey, it can feel like, “I got that wrong. I’ve missed that. Is there more?” Often, that’s what clients say at the start of their journey when they come to me. They’re like, “I got that wrong,” or, “There’s more. What should I do?” There are no shoulds. If there’s a should that, the only thing to say is, “Why have I put should in there? Why have I made this expectation and put this pressure on?”

You see it. Ask the question why. Where does that come from? Be curious where that arrived from in your childhood, and then what would it be like if you took away the should. It’s like, “What would the possibilities be? How would that look?” Those are two questions that can start to change and remove some of that pressure and judgment.

There’s the healing and often the tender part of looking at where that came from. When did it begin in your life? What are the stories that you have in your life that are connected to that belief and that pattern of behavior? There are lots of different ways in which you can work through that, but be tender and kind with it. You’ve got to be gentle with these things. They’re old, and they’re little person wounds. They’re like a little child. You would never be harsh on a little child. Don’t do that to yourself. Treat yourself like that loving parent. That’s the re-parenting side that people work with often.

How Imagination Can Lead To Inner Healing

It’s interesting. A parent would never talk cruelly to a child, and yet many parents do. I remember working with one individual, where we were doing a little bit of re-parenting work. We were talking about her coming home from school, and she said, “Nobody was there when I came home.” I asked, “How old were you?” She said, “I was in third grade. Nobody was there. When they came home, they were yelling at me.”

The work was for her to imagine herself as a loving parent. If she had a child, what would she want to do with the child? We did some lovely work around her, welcoming the child and saying, “Would you like an apple? Would you like some milk? Would you like to make some cookies with me? Would you like to do that before your homework or after your homework? Would you like to go outside and play for a little while?”

She was like, “My parents are not like this,” but once she got into it, she was able to create that inner world or that idea of, “I can do this with myself when I come home from work. I can be this gentle and this loving. Someday, if I have a child, that’s how I want to treat them.” We see in that moment or moments that it changes inner generational patterns often, or at least within that generation.

The other thing that I appreciate that you were talking about was how it is such a process. Some people think, “I’ll get there, I’ll be myself. I’ll always feel at home in myself. I’ll always know the next right step.” I’ve been on my journey for a long time. It is better late than never. I am delighted to join you in knowing that I’ll never stop my journey at this point. It’s a privilege. Sometimes, it’s a little bit like, “Here’s another lesson,” but in most cases, it’s like, “I did that.” There is no shame or blame. It shifted how I would want to do it next time.

Also, when we’re looking at the past, I find no need to shame and blame our parents. To me, that’s a no-win. We’re wasting our energy on that. Instead, it is looking at what you would do differently and doing a bit of re-parenting work inside yourself. If you have kiddos or young ones in your life or a partner, it is learning how to do it differently.

I have one side note. I love your example of the work you did with your client on re-parenting. Sometimes, what I find with some clients is that it’s not about a direct experience. I also use Lama Tsultrim Allione’s work of feeding your demons, where we take the energy of something. We do the same with some of the records work I do. We go into past lives. You rework a decision in a past life, and how that’s changing and affects your decisions in the current life.

The use of the imagination is the most important thing to recognize here. We can completely shift an internal paradigm of our life experience if we go viscerally deep enough with our imagination and believe and feel the change within us through some of these processes. They don’t have to be this life or this story, because sometimes, they’re too painful to sit with at certain times. There might be layers of getting to certain stories in our lives and experiences that we can then face.

There are often stages that we need to go through with these processes. It’s the imagination that is so key to our healing. It is letting that imagination be full-bodied, not in the mind. That’s one of the mistakes that we can very easily make with mindset work. We think it’s the power of the mind and visualizing, but no. It’s an embodied experience. It’s the feeling. That changes the beliefs, which then change the way we look for evidence in our lives of how our lives are unfolding. Is it changing?

We’re like, “If I do all this self-work, my parents are going to treat me differently,” or, “My siblings are going to treat me differently,” or, “My partner is going to treat me differently.” No one is going to behave anything other than who they are. That doesn’t change. We are always who we are. What happens is that as you do your self-work, you come to those relationships with a very different energy.

If you turn up without your armor, it’s amazing what happens with your parents who maybe have always had armor, and then they see you without armor. There will be these periods where there’s this transition phase, where they put their armor on, and you get a bit triggered, go away, and do a bit more work. The less you turn up with your armor to defend yourself against their armor, the less that interaction happens, and the softer the experience becomes. Their behavior is still the same as it has always been. It’s not going to change particularly, but you can accept them and love them without the condition that you want them to change.

That’s one of the hardest things to recognize. Our parents were under whatever stress, pressure, and inherited behavior patterns that they had. They were the perfect parents for the lessons you want to learn in your life. That doesn’t mean that they were a perfectly behaved parent or that they did good things, but it does mean that whatever they did wrong was part of your own growth and healing. It’s a gift.

I say my brain injury was a gift. The unpleasant things are a gift because they give us the opportunity to grow from them, feel a deep suffering, and discover what it is to hold our suffering with deep compassion. The more compassion you have truly for your suffering, the more you’ll have compassion for your parents’ suffering, and that they never did anything wrong. You can then accept them for who they are without them changing and the relationship changing. There is nothing to blame. There is no shame in anyone’s behavior because it was how it needed to be.

That’s a lot to unpack, especially if a parent was abusive. I’m not saying that abuse in any form is ever okay, but what Nid is telling us is that we can learn to see the gifts that come with the pain. It’s probably true of my life experience. I’m not saying that anyone ought to have ever done anything negative to me or anybody else, but we’re able to not be held by that cruelty or that betrayal and instead say, “What part of myself can I free up here? What part of myself can I grow?”

That pain and grief that we encounter as we grow, if we learn how to move through the pain and the grief and learn from it, it is one significant upside to some of life’s challenging experiences. That’s because then, you’re able to say, “I moved through that, and I moved through it with grace. I’m stronger, fuller, and more secure now because of it. I don’t want that to happen to me again, necessarily.”

That’s very true. I’m not saying that any form of treatment is acceptable. It’s how we can hold it in our hearts and how it can change our own sense of freedom and empowerment. It is how we hold our relationship to the memories. It doesn’t mean we have to be in contact with people who have been abusive to us. It doesn’t mean that we have to be in a relationship with someone who is unhealthy for us.

It doesn’t mean that you have to spend lots of time with relatives who bring out too much pain for you. You have to set boundaries. You need to respect your boundaries and uphold them because they won’t do it for you. These are important things you do for yourself. That’s why I’m saying it’s how you hold yourself. They don’t change, but how you hold yourself transforms it.

Keep Looking For Little, Beautiful Moments

Even the part you’re talking about with the boundaries, it is using experiences to grow stronger and clearer boundaries. I know we’re winding near the end. Let’s loop back to the reader’s question. Maybe she can find elements of what we’re talking about to go inward and free herself of some of these beliefs about what she should be doing.

Maybe it tracks back to her parents. Maybe it tracks back to her upbringing. Maybe her parents have tons of judgment about where this individual is. Maybe they have none, and it’s coming from this person’s internal world. It may be a quip or two that friends or coworkers made. We don’t know. It is diving into all of these internal parts and following the little nudges from the universe. It is getting those quiet spaces, so that those nudges and those whispers become more present.

Since I’m sensing that this individual is on the younger end of the spectrum, it is about realizing, “This is great. This is feathers.” You’re not at a place where you need a brick yet. Keep away from the truck. It sounds as if maybe this is feather time. What a brilliant way of looking at it. What are some final things that you might offer us, please?

In terms of the reader and that sense of listening to the whispers and following that, one thing I love to say is we spend so much time living in the seriousness, and we spend more time living in our shadows. She can try and start to see the pauses, the other little things that are like little flowers in her life, and the little bits of sunshine that are popping up. The more you give attention to the light and the beauty in your life, it will help cast light on the shadows. It will help you see the shadows when they need to be tended to and when to get the support to do that.

Do that work. Don’t bypass it. Keep looking for those little beautiful, light moments to help you keep moving forward. That will take you towards what it is that your soul wants you to experience. It’s not about having a job. It’s not about doing X things in this world. It’s about honoring who you are, showing up, being present, and showing up.

I went to a restaurant once where the waiter was the most beautiful, present person. It was like having some enlightened guru serving our table. That, to me, is what you can be regardless of what you are doing. It is how you are showing up with your joy and your lightness and feeling that sense. When you do that work, whatever it is you are doing is an expression of your love of being here and being a human. Try to follow those things that bring you light and joy. Do the work when it shows up. Even if your job doesn’t change, that’s okay. At some point, your explorations will take you somewhere, but you’re perfectly where you’ll need to be right now. It is so important to honor where we are in this moment.

The way that I work is very gentle. It’s gentle work. I offer a lot of free yoga nidra. My YouTube channel offers yoga nidra. It’s this deep guided relaxation. We go through the layers of the subconscious mind. It helps retune the nervous system, some of the symbols and archetypes that our brain has, and how we associate things. That, to me, is a super simple thing you can stick on and fall asleep to. It will help you sleep better.

You can come and join in with my free monthly calls. We do a free monthly community call where we sit and contemplate. People bring whatever they want to bring. We’re open to sharing for an hour with people around the world. We sit, connect, and have that space. Whatever is present has space to be present. Sometimes, I’ll be like, “Let’s all bring a teddy bear. We’ll have a teddy bear playful party picnic.” It’s not as serious, but it can be very serious. It depends on what needs to be tended to.

Those are ways in which I love to connect with people. I also have a free quiz called the Awakening Healing Gift Quiz. If you go to that, it will show you what layer. Within our healing and our deepening, we will repeat themes in our lives because that’s what we are here to learn. We have certain topics that our soul is interested in learning, so we repeat them again and again. Each time, it is deepening into that remembrance, more love, and more unconditional acceptance of whatever that is that you’re exploring in life. There’s an energetic pattern of that spiraling into that deepening. There are gifts that are coming through. You will have natural gifts, and some that you’ve learned.

This quiz will take you to where in that pattern you are. It will show you what your awakening is and what shadows you need to tend to at that time. You can use that quiz at any time to see what it is that you’re currently moving through. I have every library of resources that you can use. There’s breathwork. Some are contemplations. Some are movement practices.

There are different layers of our physical, mental, and emotional experiences that we’re moving through that are awakening. Not everything is in the mind. Sometimes, it’s in the body. The body needs to move. We have practices that support that. The quiz will give you those resources. They’re all free. You pop over, do the quiz, and then you’ll find out what layer you’re in. It will start to help you process things at whatever level you’re at.

I adore how you have a pick-and-choose. It’s like going into the grocery store. You see all of these lovely vegetables and fruits, and you get to pick the one that’s right for you. Try it. If it doesn’t work, do some movement. I remember when I started yoga years ago. In my first class, I was like, “What am I doing here?” I felt a bit wonky. It then became so beloved. It is a part of my days, my week, and my life.

It’s the same with breathwork. When you get used to breathwork, you almost can’t imagine your life without it because it stops the noise in the mind. It sounds like that’s one of the key pieces. It is to help stop the noise, get in touch with this beautiful house or this body that is your home, and start unraveling some of the layers that are over top of this essence that is you underneath.

I see the body as the temple. The body is a temple. It’s something to be in reverence to, but also to take care of and respect. We don’t need to quiet the mind. We don’t need to still the mind. We want to learn to be in a relationship with the mind. The heart and the mind want to be in a relationship with one another. They want to be in a loving relationship that’s not trying to control one another. It’s finding a loving relationship with yourself, and that’s what we are doing. We are respecting it. We are in reverence for the whole of this experience. We’re always in a relationship, so it’s always dynamic. It’s always shifting and changing. We’re honoring that it’s a relationship.

Get In Touch With Nid

A beautiful way to wind down with that reminder is that it is making space for the mind and the soul. I’m so used to meditation leaders and yoga leaders talking about it. I’ve certainly said it. I’m like, “Quiet the mind.” If the volume is high, maybe it does get turned down a bit at first, but not demonized. There’s balance. That’s what we want. Thank you so much. This has been wonderful. Where can our readers find you?

You can find me on my YouTube channel @NidsNira. Instagram is also the same, @Nids.Nira. The quiz is on both, so you can grab that in either place. My website is also NidsNidra.com. It is very straightforward, all Nids Nidra.

What a wonderful, illuminating conversation about a different way to look at the body, mind, and spirit connection, and the connection to the body. What a wonderful way to look at how, when we get stuck in life or feel stuck, or if there are little feathers, bricks, or, let’s hope not, a truck coming, there’s a way to understand the experience that you are in. Make friends with it and learn. Learn, grow, and continue the journey. Thank you so much for joining us. What a pleasure.

Thank you so much for having me. It’s been a real honor. Thank you, everyone, for tuning in.

It has been such a pleasure. Take good care. Thank you again. To our readers, as always, thank you for being on a journey with us. It is, as always, my deep joy, my privilege, and my delight.

Important Links

• Nid Ra
• Awakening Healing Gift Quiz
• @NidsNira on YouTube
• @Nids.Nira on Instagram
• Nid’s Nidra on YouTube
• Nid’s Nidra on Spotify
• NAMI HelpLine
• Dr. Carla Manly’s Website
• Dr. Carla Manly on Instagram
• Dr. Carla Manly on X
• Dr. Carla Manly on Facebook
• Dr. Carla Manly on LinkedIn
• Dr. Carla Manly on YouTube
• Dr. Carla Manly on TikTok

About Nid Ra

Nid is a Soul Guide and Energy Master who created the Awakening Spiral—a soulful map for navigating life’s challenges and remembering your inherent gifts. Following her own transformation after a brain injury, she brings lived experience into her work, weaving high-level light frequencies with grounded, practical tools that restore calm, trust, and vitality. Through her guidance, Nid supports others to soften old patterns, embody presence, and express their soul’s brilliance with clarity and grace.

If you’re curious which Awakening Spiral gift you’re unlocking, Nid has a free quiz that’s a bit like a soulful personality test – playful, eye-opening, and a beautiful way to connect with your gifts: https://ivlv.me/oWtWm