Ep. 140: Decolonizing Time with Ixchel Lunar
You know how you hate hustle-culture but always feel like you don’t have enough time? Yep, that’s pretty much standard when we live under traditional “clock time” that’s come from dominator culture. Not to mention growing up under systems that demand extractive productivity from us.
But what if we could shift that?
Turns out we can and Ixhcel Lunar speaks on it in this incredible interview. Ixchel is passionate about helping people rethink their relationship to time, especially time scarcity, and teaches them how to get into a natural flow state.
Ixchel’s work is infused with JEDI activism (Justice-centering, Emergence, Decolonizing, Interconnecting) as well. In this interview we talk about what it means to “edgewalk” with time, how to understand time from an Indigenous perspective, and why doing this work is so crucial for transforming our world.
Links:
Website: https://ixchel.love
-
This week's episode of the sell it. Sister podcast is really something special. This interview is so cool and we didn't even scratch the surface of this topic, honestly, but it's so fascinating. And I feel like if you're here and you're resonating with me, you definitely need to check out the work of my guests after this episode, because it's so good.
It's so valuable. It's so important. And, uh, you may be leaving this episode with more questions and answers, but that's okay. This is not, this is not quick work. This is not work to be rushed, but I think it's important to listen to what each shell has to share and then really see, you know, what you want to learn next, uh, on this very, very, very.
Important and interesting topic of decolonizing time. So today's guest is each shell lunar who runs each shell rainbow living and their website is shell.love. That will all be in the show notes. And let me tell you a little bit about. With over 25 years as an eco feminist web Deva ECL was the first Latin, a vice mayor of Petaluma, California.
At a mighty four foot 10. They are a light-skinned Mestiza and digit queer vision impaired neuro emergent medicine carrier, and even ran for Congress in 2011 as a survivor of significant childhood trauma. ACE Q score is 10 plus six, each life's w east shells life work is infused with Jedi activism, which stands for justice, centering emergence, decolonizing, and interconnecting.
Her curiosities include plants, pollinators, and handmade textiles. They created a wildlife sanctuary for native bees and Paracelsus, which are slobs in the Highland jungles of Nico. So I'm going to get right into it into this episode. I will not keep you here in the intro any longer, cause this is, uh, such a deep and wide conversation, but one that I feel like you are really going to love.
Hi, Michelle. Welcome to the cell it sister podcast. I am so glad that you are here. Cannot wait so much, Erica. So good to be. Yeah, thank you. So I had gotten last year, so in 2021, um, my friend hunter Niland welling shared your decolonizing time workshop. And I was like, oh, this is like right up my alley. Who, who is this human?
I got to check her out. And then I did. And I was like, oh, we have some other, you know, mutuals in common and, and just different things. And I was like, yes, I'm here for it. Bought the workshop, watch the workshop, loved it. Uh, and then I was like, I have to have you on the podcast because I just, I feel like what you teach people is so integral to a, the moment that we're living through in history and B just the way that I really like to approach business.
And even the way that I've been trying to change my relationship. Over the last, like five years with time and urgency and productivity. It's amazing. And I found out this morning that we also have another, um, kinship around bees. Oh yes. I guess your Facebook posts. And I was just, I was so. Excited to be able to share that with you, like beaks, we have our own language and code, and it's just wonderful.
So we do, I love it. Like B yeah. B B people are my kind of people because we're unique in our own, in our own weird and wonderful way. So I love it so much. So I would love to know, obviously, you know, listeners have heard your, your bio at the beginning at the top of the episode, but how did you. How did you come to start to focus on decolonizing time and like what, what does that look like for you?
Yeah, it's pretty fascinating story because I grew up in between cultures. Um, my parents divorced when I was two. And, um, and because I come from a mixed family, mixed heritage is I had a very, um, binary sort of experience between the two households. Um, and, and because of that, um, I really noticed where the, uh, the more Latin a indigenous side of my culture was bumping up against the sort of, um, dominator colonial culture, uh, and, and trying to integrate, and, and in my generation being a gen X or, um, you know, it was all about assimilation and fitting in and, you know, trying to.
From a very young age, I was trying to, uh, help people to understand my culture and appreciate it. Um, but at the same time, you know, really bumping up against being in an immigrant family and what that's like in the United States versus other places in the world. And I noticed that my experience of time.
Significantly different than the, um, the rest of, of, uh, the majority. And so I was constantly bumping into that as I was growing up and always felt it was my problem, versus it being something that was a systemic issue that everyone faces and I. I spent a lot of time in politics as a, as an adult and, and got very, uh, dissonant hammered by being a culture maker and trying to make those shifts in the culture to be more inclusive.
I was doing a lot of, um, you know, uh, diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging work, um, which I call Jedi work. And, um, we might talk about more that later, but. There was this constant, um, Disillusionment with the way that the world operated, that that being able to make those shifts was very difficult in the United States, as it grew more and more binary and, and the, the divide got greater and greater.
And so I moved to Nicaragua in 2017, actually five years ago in a couple of weeks. And. The experience of living in Latin America completely opened my eyes to the intuition that I had about time from when I was younger and the cultural upbringing that I had and the way that people relate differently, um, in, in these cultures that have more indigeneity.
And what was fascinating was that. There is a great deal of resistance to modern time and colonial time here in the way that, um, the folks. I don't really abide by clock time and, and, and you can see it in the relationships between, uh, for instance, immigrants are ex-pats as, um, as they're more widely known and the folks from here and sort of the, the disparity between.
Time differences that sort of bump up against each other. And that was a real eye-opener for me. And so really started exploring more of that. And then I met Kelly deals and something about her concept around, um, the things that have been used against us in our life can be our source of power. And really starting to explore that for myself and realizing that my neurodivergence, um, my experience of time itself and, um, the way that I was walking between cultures had all been things that were used against me, but actually when I grounded into them really deeply and started exploring them with greater curiosity, I realized how much they were really, um, Part of who I am and what make me unique and what are part of what I'm bringing to this world.
I love that. And that is such a good, it's such a good reminder because I often feel that way is what, in terms of the strength, like. People kind of held up as like a negative is, is your strength. Cause interestingly for me, that is speaking, it was always like, you know, you talk too much in class, you talk too much in general and now I'm like, oh, I have a whole podcast.
You know, like, it's, that, that is really interesting. And I loved that. You were able to morph that for yourself, into the work that you can. Used to help other people with and to understand that's really cool. Uh, so yet I would love to hear more like, cause I know that the, the people listening, like my audience, the people who resonate with my approach to business, they also are change-makers.
They are, they want to. Shift their industry. They want to, you know, even if it's just in, in really small ways, but they have a different approach to the work that they do. And they are really, uh, mindful and want to be mindful of that Jedi work. So I would love to hear then how, how decolonizing time and how.
Um, being mindful of flow states and things like that. Like how those two actually go hand in hand, because I feel like on the surface it can seem like, you know, they're, they're totally kind of disparate things, but I know that they're not. Yeah. Yeah. It's um, It's really fascinating when we start to do decolonial work, how we, we bump up against dominator culture and there are things that we can no longer unsee, like, you know?
Right. And so for me, that was really about when I started. Exploring time and the way that I was brought up within dominator culture, around productivity and around flow. Because when I learned about flow in the early nineties, when Mihai check, send me highs, book flow came out, um, I was hooked that explained all of my childhood.
My family had such a deep experience of flow from the group. Um, the cultural group experiences that I grew up in to the, the sort of adventure, like, um, way of, of play that my dad had. My dad. My dad had a period of wealth that allowed us to experience privilege that not a lot of people have. He bought a balloon, a hot air balloon, and he learned how to be a pilot.
And we got to chase balloons and go and balloons. And, and then, um, he liked helicopters and, and so we, we played in helicopters sometimes and he had a background in, in flying helicopter. In Vietnam. So that was part of that curiosity for him. But those kinds of things like really like risk is definitely something that's got some genetic factors to it.
People that are more willing to migrate people that are, you know, take more risks in life, have, uh, ease of access to flow because it's a risk can be a flow activator and. So there were a lot of things within that momentary experience of privilege that I had growing up where, um, flow was like on tap.
Right. And so what I, what I learned about flow was not in the context of productivity. And so when I got to be an adult and started having to make my way in the world, You know, my family had lost everything by the time I was 16, my father was killed, uh, both my mom and my step-mom lost their houses because of that.
And I was homeless at 17 couch surfing. Um, you know, so, so I say it was, it was a temporary experience of privilege that allowed me to be able to see what the birthright of flow is and where that comes from for us. But that. When I became, you know, in mashed, in, in making a living it dominator culture has completely stolen flow as, as a, an extractive tool for getting the most time out of humans for profit.
Right? I mean, that's, that's what it comes down to is, is end over end growth. Right. That profit margin that has to increase year upon year, it's exponential growth, which is like how much time can we squeeze out of people? Oh, well, flow will really do that for us. So let's ensure that our employees know how to get into flow.
And so what happened over the last. You know, 20, 30 years in particular is that that flow has been completely hijacked for, for economic growth. And we've completely lost sight of flow for pleasure and for joy and play, which is our human birthright. Yeah. And I I'm, so I'm so glad you mentioned that and I'm curious.
In your youth where you, were you ever homeschooled at all? Or like non traditionally schooled? I'm just curious, like, yeah. So I was very fortunate for my first year of school. So both my parents were entrepreneur. And, um, didn't see them much growing up. And so I spent a lot of time at my grandmother's house until it was time to go to school.
At which point they did not know quite what to do with me. Um, because they were, they had flourishing businesses and, you know, they were focused on their businesses. And so, because I was, I was a December baby. In California, the, you know, there's like, um, when you can enter school at a certain time and age and all of that, um, which is really, um, something that Malcolm Gladwell talks a lot about in his book, outliers around kids who did, who performed well, where kids who, uh, Didn't go to school early, um, in sports, in particular, because then they had that extra six months of growth that allowed them to be better at sports.
Anyway, for me, I ended up being the one that got to go to school early. By going to private school, I went to Montessori and Montessori is something that has been a bit of an outlier in the flow communities. Folks are noticing over and over again, that Montessori education seems to make, uh, the educational conditions for flow to emerge in children.
That's so interesting. Yeah. Yeah. So I only went for a year and then I went to public school after that. And, um, so, but for that, for that limited amount of time where my, my parents really wanted me to. You know, be in, in school and not in preschool or at my grandmothers, it was like the thing for them to, um, But I really benefited from it, I think because it really helped instill.
And part of that, that they think, um, with, with Montessori is that there's this real autonomy and, um, student led activity that happens in the Montessori format. And they think that, that, you know, autonomy is, is a flow activated. It's one of the 22 flow activators. And so they think that that, that part of how.
Uh, uh, knowledge acquisition and learning is really is led by the student and what the student is interested in. So there's part of that curiosity, which is another flow activator. Um, and then that autonomy that they get to decide what it is that they want to do and learn, and, and that sort of thing. So those things seem to be really important indicators for children to be able to access.
That's really cool that you, that you got that experience and why I thought to ask it. So we ended up, uh, I had not intended on homeschooling, but for a huge chunk, our son is 17 now, but for most of his school aged life was homeschooled and, um, And just thinking back to what you said about, you know, once you notice the like dominant culture and things, and you kind of like step out of those waters, you, how you see things that you can no longer unsee.
That was very much our experience. And I feel like even entrepreneurship is one of those other cool experiences where you step outside of. Dominant culture in enough of a way that you're like, oh, there's a different way of being. And at least for me, it, it like almost makes me want to just keep pushing that envelope.
Like how far away can we move from like the dominant paradigms to create that new way of, of being in the world. But it was always very interesting to see. Other people's reactions to us homeschooling. It was almost like, um, it was causing them friction with like what, with their, their core beliefs and how they'd been inculturated.
It was almost like, well, like you can't like you're breaking a social contract and an almost like how that would be. And not all people, but for some people very like triggering almost like almost like I was, you know, do homeschooling at them or something, or like judging their choices. I'm like, I'm not judging your choice.
Like this is just our choice. Um, similarly to, you know, my, my. Spouse is employed and probably always will be his notice. I were to be an entrepreneur and like, that's cool, but he respects that like, I'm basically unemployable at this point and I have to do my own thing, but I think it's, it's, what's been interesting is like, because, uh, we didn't have to go by like, Regular typical societal like school starts at this time and ends it this time.
It's been fascinating to actually watch my son's like normal circadian rhythms change over time. And how. Just his, like, just in terms of like sleep schedule and sleep hygiene. And, and it's really fascinating to watch how humans are sort of like how you said, like play as our birthright, whatever, like when he was younger and we would hang out with other homeschool friends, like it was kids of all different ages together playing, doing their thing, being curious.
It just, this whole different way of being that you don't get in like a regular American public school system. And so. Having that like sampling of that, it's, it's really, it's like fascinating to see how we can default to when we are not having the. Dominator systems like placed on top of us as just like, this is just the norm and you're supposed to do it without question.
Yeah. Yeah. It's so inculturated in, at such an early age in children, which is so harmful, like it instills the trauma narrative of the United States in particular, uh, you know, in terms of where that's really come from for so much of the world. And. And so even though study after study tells us, this is not healthy for children to get up at this time and you know, to do this much schooling and to have this much homework and all of those things that, um, that the research has telling us isn't healthy.
Uh, despite all of that, it continues to exist and, and the school systems continue to double down. And what I think has been so beautiful about the pandemic is the upheaval that that's caused and the way that it's, you know, for parents of kids who are in public school and what they have seen in their children and how they've sort of stepped back from the, the school model.
Because for one, it doesn't work to have parents also teach when they're also entrepreneuring or working from home. You know, all of those things that all of the layers that dominator culture has put upon us, uh, to get by and, and, you know, See, you know, you start to see into how this system reinforces itself and doesn't want the change and how much.
Really rooted in capitalism, right? It's, it's it's education for capitalism for that type of employment versus, you know, the actual blossoming and self-directed learning and curiosity of the child. Yeah. And I think, um, oh my gosh, I just completely blanked on his name. Uh, there was a book I read. Well, there were several books I read on homeschooling before we pulled our son.
But what really like did it for me. And I, it's funny because I see these parallels come up in my passion with like how I coach and strategize with clients now. And entrepreneurialship was the like school too. Um, Uh, factory sort of industrial age, like pipeline and, and again, yeah, it's like once you see it, you can't like you just, you can't unsee it and how, how damaging it is now, even, you know, for teachers like they, they are being crushed under the weight of these systems and, uh, Yeah.
It's, it's all just, it's, it's truly not sustainable at all. And I feel like as entrepreneurs, we, we kind of get to rewrite the rules, right? Like we, we get to shift that culture a bit in terms of like, like, what are the new norms or questioning? Like, why are these the norms and what they should be instead?
So, Yeah, cause I'm sh I'm sure people are listening and they're like, yes, this all totally like, yes, capitalism, it's awful. It's killing us. But like, I still have to get stuff done to run my business. So how do you find harmony or like when you're working with your own clients and stuff, like. How do people find harmony between the like, okay, really do need to get this sales page written.
So I can like make money to feed and shelter myself. Right. And be like, whoa, like it's, it's such a dance. Right? Like, yeah. It's so part of the place that I start folks from is this concept of edge walking and that, you know, um, Like, I feel I was born for this time that, that I'm here now because of the edge walking that I did as a kid, that, um, everything that I learned about the, the skills for thriving.
You know, sewing and cooking my own food and growing food and, you know, building soil and all of these things that, that helped me as well as entrepreneurship made it possible for me to sort of see the pandemic as the. Because I knew something was coming. I just wasn't sure what it was going to be. And knowing that it's, you know, it wasn't going to be a year.
Like I knew when it started, this was probably a four year thing that was, and I sort of set my mindset to that for being able to cope through that. But, um, What I feel has, you know, presented itself in the opportunity of this time is to really have this sense of, um, we're not, it took us at least a hundred years to get to where we are today in terms of the exponential impact that, um, industrialization maternity had, the colonization that, you know, had came forward over the past 500 years.
And so all of that took time to get us to where we are today and we're not going to actually solve those grand problems in our lifetime, but we can do those incremental things that help us to unsee, right. That daily decolonial work that I talk about is so important to being able to understand that we're swimming in the waters of white supremacy culture that, you know, colonialism.
Self protected. Um, and that, that. That the United States, isn't actually the center of the world, that there are people that are living in parallel, you know, almost like parallel universes outside of that dominator culture, all throughout the world in many indigenous populations. And it is possible for us to get back there through Rayanne, digitizing ourselves and, and connecting, um, back to our relationship with time space in place.
And so. That piece of. Being able to Gloria. And so doula talks about the concept of Nepantla, which is the in-between it's this liminal place. And, um, and Nepantla is a Novato word. It's an indigenous Mashika word. And the best English word that I have found is edge walking. Is that in between liminal place where.
We know we're swimming, swimming in these waters, and yet we can find dry ground and, you know, start to create that new culture that we want to be in. And the other side of that is the future culture that we're hoping to create and being able to edge walk is sort of that friction of. Yes, this is where we are and yes, that's where we want to be.
And we can sort of start to get comfortable living in that liminal space of having to do both. I really, I love how you described that. Cause I like, I'm a very visual person and I can almost like I can almost see it in my mind's eye of just like, kind of being in that, that in between. World. And, uh, and it reminds me of, um, for anyone who has ever cared for like a young child, like a newborn is like the world is happening outside of you.
Like the world still goes on, or even, I would say, um, in grief, like a deep grief, like you've just lost, you know, a beloved and. Yeah, it's almost like you're in like a cocoon, like a personal cocoon, like, you know, that other things are still functioning out in the world, but you're, you've sort of just like, you're not in it.
You're just in your own liminal space where your own sense of time and your own sense of importance of what matters to you in that moment is so. Removed from sort of that, that hustle and bustle of the world, just continuing to, to go through. Yeah. And for me, what was really important in getting a sense of, uh, being an edge Walker and living in the potluck in the in-between was that I actually wasn't alone and that there were so many other people who were in this space as well.
And that sense of belonging that, that brought for me that. You know, dominator culture loves individualism wants to keep us separated. There are reasons these systems are in place to keep us separated so that we don't, uh, you know, Take notes and realize, Hey, I'm also experiencing what you're experiencing.
Maybe we should collaborate and, and support one another in getting rid of pesticides that are being sprayed on our park lines or, you know, whatever the thing is, where we're being confronted by, um, you know, the toxicity, um, Modernity and, you know, maternity wants to keep us separated, but that, you know, when we find there other edge walkers in these spaces too, and we can come together and collaborate, whether it's through entrepreneurship or a social justice issue or whatever that is that, um, we have to continually remind ourselves of that because Terminator culture does not want us to realize how powerful we are when we collaborate and connect in collective.
Yeah, that that is, so that is, that's so accurate. And I think even right now, I'm just, you know, thinking about there's obvious, obviously been talk like these last few years of, you know, collective striking and what that could look like and, um, And it is, it is fascinating when you, when you really think of how, how powerful it would be if like teachers went on a general strike or all workers or, um, but that, yeah, we often feel like there's no way, like we individually don't have enough power, but yeah, if we come together, Draw a line in the sand and say like, no more, like, we, we cannot do this, how much power we actually have.
And the teacher's unions are probably the most powerful unions still in existence today in the United States. For sure. Um, many of the other unions have, have really been, um, You know, cut off at the knees in so many ways. So, you know, I wanted to get back to this piece of balance that you were talking about around entrepreneurship.
There's a little something there around, um, the way that I learned about equilibrium and systems thinking. Which is different than, you know, this concept of work-life balance that, um, we hear a lot of that narrative in, in the culture around productivity is like, you know, if we, if we have a work-life balance and things will be good.
And really when we. The systems systems are, have these flows of feedback that really helped to sort of create an equilibrium. And it's not necessarily a balance. It's just a homeostasis. That's constantly, um, You know, adapting to increases and decreases in activity within the ecology of a system. And so when we look at that in terms of our own personal lives, the way that we can apply flow in ways that I think are helpful and less harmful, to be able to.
Both do the things that we need to do within dominator culture to get by and to thrive, but also to ensure that we, um, aren't exclusively using it for extractive ways is to really, you know, think about it in terms of an equilibrium. And one of the things that I love about flow is that when, when we get into flow, we're able to get so much more done in a short amount of time, which is why.
Dominate, our culture is used flow for productivity is that you can get so much more done and S and, and that equals more money, um, in terms of the corporations, but for, for entrepreneurs, there's this, this idea of, you know, Being able to have that sort of work-life balance or the things that bring us joy and pleasure while doing this thing that we love.
Hopefully we love if we're entrepreneurs, we're doing something that we love. And so to be able to apply flow in that way to. Shorten the amount of time that we have to be doing that entrepreneurial work so that we can find more freedom and more time, you know, reducing time scarcity and, um, you know, really expanding time for joy and for pleasure and for play with the people that we love on our communities and that sort of thing.
And so, so I look at it, um, as sort of an, uh, a really good. Uh, equilibrium sort of idea, rather than a balancing and, and that we can, we can utilize and sort of, um, Open up these pockets that are sort of like out of time when we're in flow to be able to do these things. Because when, when we're in flow states, they are described as you know, these, these sort of, um, states where your, your, your focus and your attention really, um, Come together, you lose a cent.
You lose sense of time. Your track of time is just, you know, it's either sped up or slowed down. Um, so time gets sort of weird, um, within flow itself, our self-consciousness drops away. And so that boundary of who we are expands, which is why group flow is a, is a really beautiful thing where, where, um, the self is more of a, a group self versus, uh, you know, an individualized self when they're, you know, you think of like theater or musicians in a band or the concert, right.
That sense of group flow that happens, um, that sense of self drops away. And so flow in that. Can be really beneficial for entrepreneurs and, you know, It's such a feel good state, um, you know, they call it autotelic because we do it for the pleasure of doing it, but what happens for entrepreneurs and for other folks that use flow for productivity is that, um, dopamine is such a powerful, uh, neurochemical that it can get hijacked by our nervous system.
Um, almost like addiction where it feels so good, we don't want it to stop. And so what is generally considered a good 90 minutes for a flow block that doesn't over deplete us of, um, the neurochemistry that's needed for flow, uh, and, and you can get quite a bit done in 90 minutes. Going beyond that a lot of times, and for myself in particular being an entrepreneur and, you know, really being able to access flow very easily.
I found that I was constantly pushing that window of like, oh, it's been four hours and I forgot to key and I didn't eat, you know, like all, you know, all the self care just sort of went out the window and. That's where, um, our dopamine can get hijacked in the flow process. And capitalism has just, you know, uh, really benefited from that quite a bit, but it creates a deep sense of body distrust.
And so flow becomes less and less accessible when our body isn't sure that we're going to get cared for. And it leads to burnout. Um, burnout is, you know, quite a. Quite a thing these days in our culture, because of the way flow has been used against us for productivity and the way that it's depleted our neurochemistry, our, you know, our ability to have the capacity for all the things that we have to do, which gets compounded and compounded, um, trying to live in these times.
Yeah. It, it does. It certainly seems like it. And I know you have, you mentioned earlier, you're like the floats. Activators like the ways to get into that. So sort of like the opposite of getting trapped there, like how to, um, get it going, but are there any, uh, cause I know, I know that's in your work and I know you and I definitely want to give you a chance to talk about.
The ways that people can learn from you and, and work with you as well. But are there, do you have any suggestions, like as, as people are just, you know, maybe hearing about this for the first time and not so much flow, I feel like flow is a lot more common, but really starting to think about like decolonizing time, just to, are there ways that you encourage people to just start to be more.
Mindful, like if a happens then think about be, or notice be or notice like what triggered it. Cause I've, I've been trying, I mean, really like over the last several years to really like, almost like interrogate, like when I'm starting to feel a certain way that it feels like the total opposite of flow.
Where is that coming from? I'm not always successful. So I'm say get a little bit trapped there as well. And the, like the friction of it, but to really think about like what. Come from. Cause sometimes it is like, oh, it's just dominator culture. It's just how I've been inculturated to feel like I should be getting more done or I sh you know, whatever.
And other times it's just, I don't know, weird self-imposed things. So are there, are there ways to like, almost like pattern interrupters or things that you suggest as people start to really like, integrate or think about. Doing this work well, one of the places that I really like to start is with our relationship to time itself, and this comes from my, my Mayan heritage and, uh, the.
The concept of, uh, indigenous time. I just want to preface it by saying the concept of indigenous time is very different all throughout the world. But what I have found in studying different indigenous cultures and their concepts of time is that it seems to be very location-based in that the relationship that people have with time with the land.
With place are all intertwined. It's all very interconnected. And so, um, from the Mayan perspective, which is my background, um, and where I come from. The idea of time is that time? Isn't this abstract thing. It's actually a person like it's an entity. Oh. And so that's a very different way of looking at time than what colonial, um, maternity would like us to think of time in terms of it being this segmented clock, you know, this, this industrial sort of mechanisms.
Concept of time as a very abstract thing, something that can be perfected and commodified and it's been stolen and you know, all of that and outsourced. Um, and so, so the idea that we can actually have a relationship with time as an entity starts to disrupt, um, Our concepts of time, because a lot of the way we think about time is around scarcity, right?
That it's, that it's finite, it's scarce. Um, it generally is very much linked to money then. And all of the, you know, all of the things that, that we're swimming in. By sort of stepping back and starting to establish a relationship with time. Then, um, we sort of get out of that, that those colonial concepts of time and being able to.
Deepen ourselves into our place, like where we are physically on the earth and really having more connection, being outside, being in nature. And, you know, and I say this as like not a. I'm going to take a walk and listen to a podcast, which is all good. Like those are great things to do, but also to sort of open up space to just like, not be connected to culture in those moments of being outside, to be able to start to have a deeper sense of pattern recognition.
The world itself is this incredible, um, mirror of a fractal patterning. Yeah. Right. There's natural fractal patterns that are constantly telling us things about the world around us about what's happening and. We start to lose sense of that because of maternity and our devices and all of those things.
And, and that really separates us from time itself. And so we can get back into really connecting, you know, at the micro level. What's around us, whether it's like the birds that come into your yard, um, on a daily basis in the morning, or, you know, the way the clouds come in and out in the afternoon, if you live in the San Francisco bay area or, you know, whatever those things are that sort of are very specific to where you live.
Um, and that sort of defined. Uh, the patterns of where you live, that is a way to sort of access that relationship with time. And by being able to do that, then you start to, uh, you can't unsee the way that we experience colonial time. And so that's sort of how I try to get people to orient. Um, and. The core of that comes around making space for that on a daily basis.
Those are those daily rituals that help us to instill wild presence. And by doing that, we can. We can edge walk. We can be in the pond law. We can, you know, understand that we're, we're swimming in these waters and we're going somewhere else. And it's only through those daily habits, right. That we really instill in us the ability to sort of hold both worlds and the friction that holding both worlds takes, um, on us.
So, yeah. Oh my gosh. That's like, Oh, I feel like I could, I feel like a good spin, like 11 hours soccer. Like this is like, I feel like I'm not even doing it justice, like, sorry, sorry. If you're listening, there's so much, we're leaving out. You'll just have to go, go check out your shallow and you know, all, all of the beautiful programming that you've worked to create, but.
Yeah, as you were explaining that, it made me think of just even these last couple of years, being more homebound and, and watching the birds and noticing like, oh, at this time of year, this bird comes back or this bird leaves, or, you know, just, uh, at this time of year, the sun sets lower. So it slants in through the windows at a different angle.
And, um, when my son was younger, we had the immense privilege of being friends with. A woman who works for New York state parks. And once a month we would get together and do like a nature walk and she would teach the kids and they always had a sit spot and, um, like a sheet of paper and pencil and they would, you know, date it and.
Draw what they saw. And so over the course of the year in that one spot, and, and she said, you know, you can also pick one at your, at your home or in your neighborhood, so you can track it there too. But like, it is so fascinating because obviously like nature doesn't care about capitalism. It's not on capitalism schedule.
And so to really like, witness. Something outside of those of those systems, just doing, just doing its thing and like changing how it changes and, um, just really being present, like you said, I love, I love how you used the phrase wild presence of just like, oh yeah, this is just how, like, things just know how to be when you, when you let them be is just really fascinating.
And I, I farmed for a time and, you know, with bees it's like bees just have. You can't say like BS, no, I don't want you to do that. Now. I want you to do this. Like, they're just going to do the thing that they do, and we can only tend to them, like that's, that's it. And I think that like, from working in farming, I can't, uh, I am, and even for people who just guarded.
I feel like that's one of those ways to be wildly present to like you can't unsee how the seasons impact our food. Like once you swim in those waters, it's just, you can't, at least for me, I can't, I can no longer detach myself. It's like, I've rewired my brain in this different way and I can actually now, um, I definitely don't feel like.
Mastered flow or anything even remotely close. But, um, when I feel that something is off, I like if I can anchor it back to like the seasons or nature, like oftentimes it's like, I, I feel like I've come back to an answer or like, to myself, I still have to then decide how I want to proceed. But it's like, oh yeah, that's right here.
We are in this time and place. And or here I am. And like, How am I going to choose to. I don't know, start from this path or this path. And what you're talking about is what I see as co-regulation. So if you think about sematic, um, somatic experiencing or somatics itself, um, as a language around, um, how our nervous system is regulating.
Dysregulated or it's in co-regulation with the environment around us. Right. We, um, when it's dysregulated, we're in fight flight, freeze fun, but when it's regulated, we are, we're just sort of in that equilibrium of what's happening around us, we're relating well, things are not, we're not getting triggered by things that are happening around us.
Things are just sort of. You know how they're happening and that's, I think what nature is so wonderful in, in the way that it helps us to co-regulate with our environment. And, and when we, when we're dysregulated that the toll that, that takes on our capacity, where were we? You know, we try to push to get things done and, and you know, that, that sense of urgency that sort of creeps in and, and, um, you know, the, the scarcity, you know, of needing to, to work and, and, and those sorts of things that sort of come in, um, that are pushed on us from the outside, but.
You know, have a toll on us physically and make it difficult for flow to sort of emerge its flow as this emergent property that, um, when you set the conditions for it, it can come over and over and over again. And, and when we, you know, really honor it and respected and not overdo it. Um, taking care of our body and not going beyond our capacity, then, um, you know, it comes back again and again, and again, and folks have likened it to the muse of people who are creatives, you know, entrepreneurial creatives and that sort of thing.
Um, you know, there's a real sense that the, that flow in the music are, you know, almost one in the same in that kind of way. So yeah, I love it. This has been such a, a really. Rich conversation. Like I just, I really love, um, like hearing about all of this. I feel like it's just, we barely, barely, barely scratched the surface of what, you know, this can look like for entrepreneurs and how to.
Uncouple from a colonized clock time and how to get into flow and just all of it. It's, you know, there's so there's so much more here. So, um, obviously I'm going to have, all of your links will be in the show notes for people to check out, but what are some ways that people can actually learn more and go deeper in this work with.
Yeah. Well, I recently created a membership, which is based on the seminal work of decolonizing time and liberating flow. So it really helping people to get a sense of what time is both indigenous and colonial. And, and then what. The ways that we can liberate flow the 22 flow activators, the flow cycle, there's a cycle to flow and really having a sense of how that works.
And, um, I've put that together with some monthly coaching, because I think it's really important that when people do this work, there's integration as part of that process, so that it becomes an autotelic thing that we, that we actually enjoy. Uh, the decolonial work because we understand what's on the other side.
Right. And so, um, so that's available and, and if people want to go deeper, I have a year long one-on-one coaching program as well called wild presence. And that goes much deeper into the flow process. And how to access a flow by creating these conditions, um, really helping our biology, which is the basis of being able to get into flow and that, um, you know, that creates so much possibility and opens up, um, the capacity and the resources for being able to do the work that we're doing in the world.
And to be able to show up for the people that we love as. I love it. Well, I will definitely have all of those links that people can check out in the show notes so they can learn more and they can follow you on socials and you send out the nominal newsletters too. I love your, I love your dragon letters, so definitely, definitely get on, um, uh, your email list for sure.
Cause they're fantastic. Thank you. Yeah. I really have a lot of fun going down the rabbit holes for those they're so great. Well, I appreciate you so much and your time. Um, and this was, this was really fantastic. And just thank you so much. Thank you so much, Erica. It's been wonderful.
