Awakening Now

Get Support You Need At The Perfectly Okay Community

• Ilona Ciunaite • Episode 61

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Have you heard of the Perfectly Okay community? 
A wonderful community offers the support you need and is available for everyone seeking awakening, going through the shift and exploring what’s here after the shift. If you feel alone on your journey and are looking for people to connect with, watch this interview with one of the organisers. Amy is a host of weekly Friday morning meetings and she is sharing how POK came to exist, what’s going on in the growing community and how it can be helpful for you. 

To find out more go to 
Http://perfectlyokay.org 

In short Perfectly Okay is the OG social and support center of the Finders Courses Alumni community, with over 2300 members. Graduates of any of Jeffery Martin‘s courses, as well as ALL awake/awakening folks, including members of the Fetters Free FB group, are welcome to join POK. It’s suggested folks take the free mini Explorers Course to get the jargon of much of the community. This is a safe space where all respectful viewpoints are welcome.  A diversity of opinions is the norm.  Everyone is considered to be a peer in the meetings.

Since this is a private website, you have to be a member to look around. Want to join? Email Patti to get full access!
https://perfectlyokay.org


If you need assistance with your inquiry come to Liberation Unleashed where you can register for a free account and get a volunteer guide free of charge. Or if you need my support, send me an email through my website which is 

http://www.IlonaCiunaite.com I’ll be happy to help. 

Liberation Unleashed
Http://www.liberationunleashed.com

Ilona's Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/markedeternal

Liberation Unleashed book is available on Amazon. 
https://www.amazon.com/Liberation-Unleashed-Breaking-Illusion-Separate/

#awakeningnow #ilonaciunaite #howtodoselfinquiry #selfinquiryquestions #liberationunleashed #seeingthroughselfillusion

Info about free monthly meetings on Zoom 
http://ilonaciunaite.com/events/

Podcast 
https://awakeningnow.buzzsprout.com

Music by Valdi Sabev, Visit his channel for more calm and relaxed music 
https://www.youtube.com/c/ValdiSabev/featured

Websites
http://ilonaciunaite.com
http://liberationunleashed.com

I think having that um yeah these meetings all these different meetings I think it's such a valuable resource for people that they can just you know pick one that resonates with them or pick a bunch that resonate with them and just go and get support in whatever way it's just it is this beautiful thing to yeah the people who have newly shifted or they shifted a while ago but they haven't had that support it's just such a beautiful thing to have them in the community because it's I don't know cause yeah it's hard to express but it is it's so beautiful it's like a glow yeah you connect people together and you know they they spark yeah exactly exactly  
Hello Amy hello so wonderful to meet you yes likewise and thank you so much for coming on this podcast yes well thank you so much for inviting me this is just such a wonderful opportunity to spread the word about perfectly okay so yes that's why we are here to talk about perfectly okay community and what's going on there um but before we start well the podcast is called Awakening now and for a lot of different people it means different things so I would like to know your definition or how you see it what is Awakening what is Awakening from to what's going on yeah that's a wonderful question and it's interesting because um having been in this community the perfectly okay Community since 2016 I've had the privilege of being present for so many different forms of Awakening and it's such yeah it's been the most Splendid opportunity um and it so it's difficult to encapsulate in a single definition having witnessed so many of the such diversity of ways so but I think maybe the most broad definition would be a fundamental shift in the core of being if that makes sense right it's like there seems to be something that apparently fundamentally changes and it could be from a sense of suffering to a lack of suffering or to a sense of being I am a separate self to oh no there's no separation I am everything and there's nothing right um or just you know a sense of always feeling anxious and nervous and caught up in thoughts to maybe a sense of separation from thoughts a distance from thoughts that gradually slowly becomes the sense of just all-pervasive peace and then I think there's probably about 10,000 other ways to Define it but I think those are probably some good good ways fundamental shift sounds about right yeah I think so yeah and then it's interesting because there sometimes there's the experience of it's been it happened and it just gets so normalized that it just seems like did anything really ever shift was there any other way of being before this whatever this is so yeah and it's it's really interesting because there's a memory of something apparently was different before but it's just it that is so inaccessible it's like is there really anything different but I think yeah shift seems to be a really good good word and fundamental because it's so deep deep deep deep yeah that that's how it changes yes yeah it cannot go noticed basically yes yeah exactly yes although it's interesting because we've had you know various people in the perfectly okay Community where it's they don't notice that there's actually been a change until it kind of hits them like there's some experience where it's like oh wait I'm not reacting like I did before you know or something like oh oh wow yeah I'm not suffering or oh the mind isn't spinning out like it used to be or I'm not getting grabbed by the thoughts and they there's not a realization that oh something did really fundamentally shift until all of a sudden there's the oh yeah that's in the rearview mirror something did shift but I I didn't realize it until now so so I think that's yeah beautiful it's so true for some people it's like a lightning bolt from the clear sky for other people it's so slow like that frog that doesn't even notice when it's boiled yes oh yeah the poor frog yes that's yeah that's a very good way of characterizing it yeah still um could you share a little bit what happened in your life in your story oh yes yeah it's it's sort of a long story because I think it started when I was a little kid and there was kind of like a sense of having the rug pulled out from under me and this was like things that I believed in strongly like my parents you know religion um yeah all sorts of like even just silly things like Oh Santa Claus or whatever like those things all of a sudden were seen to be oh no those are just fiction like these are just made up by people um and that was really disturbing I was maybe eight at the time maybe who knows how old I really was but I think I was eight and it was so disturbing that I kind of entered into like this long year-long thing of like depression I guess I didn't know it was depression but I just every night before I go to bed I just lie down and I like I don't want to exist anymore wow I don't want to exist anymore and I would just I was an insomniac I guess I could I didn't didn't really sleep very much as a kid so I would just imagine myself no longer existing like sinking into the Earth and like rotting I apparently was a little morbid um and then that just happened for a year and then afterwards I think I was a little bit of a of a prolific reader I guess like I read a lot of books um and I read um a bunch of books by Kurt Vonnegut and he kind of has this absurdest view of the world and for me I realize like oh it doesn't have to be tragic it can just be hilarious and light and free and even if there's this trategy of losing my worldview it's okay um and then that I think that was kind of the key to like this lifetime of really just diving into various things like you know fear and anger sadness and like being able to get really released from those emotions I guess like just by really diving deep into them and just really coming up with this really high sense of well-being you know maybe by the time I was in my 30s I just every day was awesome oh wonderful yeah so interesting because it's not many people that see that in childhood yeah yeah mostly it's already like the second half of Life yeah yeah and I didn't there wasn't really any like big you know because I was still a person there you know even though that person was very happy there was still a very strong sense of I am a separate being you know I am this Amy and there is the world out there and the world and I are buddies because we have fun together in this absurd reality um but then I think I kind of hit a wall where it's like I could only kind of go so far with that ego and I think I just got into a lot of trouble quote unquote because I was overcommitted and you know not really reflecting on like are these really the things that actually resonate are these really the important things I was more focused on the material things I guess like achievements Etc um and then I started getting interested in like meditation and you know I'm kind of a very modern meditator I guess or modern spiritual Seeker or I was because the you know like oh I just listened to podcasts look at these apps um and uh then I learned about the finders course which is you know how why perfectly okay exists um which was uh saying that it was a 17-week research-based course that would teach meditation and teach techniques in order to awaken whatever that meant I didn't really know what that meant to lead to that fundamental shift and um as more of a scientifically based person I thought oh research-based that sounds wonderful and so I took the course and did the techniques continued to practice after the course ended and then one day I was writing an email and I was looking inside to say oh what do I think about this thing that we're discussing in the email what do I think and then I realized that there was no one there it was just like oh oh this is what they mean but the self is gone there's like just emptiness there and there was yeah no sense of Separation anymore and it was like Consciousness expanded to like the universe or whatever and it was very confusing for a long time okay and it was very wonderful um but I I think that would be like that was kind of the the second big shift because that was definitely a sense of like having been a very strong doer to just nothing just Stillness yeah that's the
shift yes um yeah so I guess that's that's the main story I guess is like that shift and then I joined the it was called the Explorers course which is about maybe 50 people um and it was just it was this sequel to The finders course and it was supposed to kind of help people deepen and it was just very experimental um and there was really no way to interact very much with the other people who are taking the course we could use like this very crude Message Board because it was 2016 um and yeah there's really no way except maybe emailing each other then there was suggestion that oh maybe just make small groups together to do practices together and then I'll just segue into how did perfectly okay start ahuh yes that's the interesting part yes because um two people John Conaway and Patti Levin got the idea I guess individually like oh instead of just doing practices together let's just have these open meetings where we can just all talk about what's going on and what's not going on you know like the weird changes that happen in and so we all started meeting in these random groups and we everyone just found it to be so magical it was just so wonderful to be able to just talk and we use zoom like we're using now and it was like the crude early version of Zoom but uh but yeah it was great because we were all just sitting in these little boxes together and sharing and it was something it was so like deepening and enriching and also normalizing the changes that were happening with us all um and also was giving us an opportunity to support you know people who maybe hadn't had that fundamental shift yet to kind of yeah just offer not necessarily like as a teacher like this is what you should do it's just like oh this is what worked for me so yeah so that was that was the magic and then we all there was initially five meetings a week and I was one of the hosts on Friday 9:30 Pacific of the open discussion that meeting still goes on every Friday wow eight years later yes um yeah and there was something that that that magic of being able to meet and be in these meetings with people and just having it just free flow um and then the community started expanding like concentric rings of a tree I guess where we okay we just got these 50 oh let's let in friends and family okay let's invite people anyone who's graduated from this online course you know anyone even if they haven't taken this other course just let's let them in um and then we just started you know opening the doors to other communities too um and it's just that's been more recent and it's just been so wonderful I've had um you know like new people coming through the open discussion and it's just so wonderful they have like these fresh perspectives and this wonderful curiosity which is just so so wonderful um and so yeah I think that's kind of that's how perfectly okay began and th and throve what's the past tense of Thrive thrived still thriving isn't it yes it's still thriving yes yes yeah and um we have I think now we have about 80 online meetings a week a week so a week yes wow that's that's a lot a week yeah yeah so I Grew From two with Patti and John to five and then now it's 80 literally 80 oh and how many people are in the community at the moment I think Patti emailed us saying that she had just registered the 23r hundredth member so we have 2300 people oh wow that's yeah that's amazing so you like a gravitational pull
for all these other communities also to come in into this perfectly okay because you offer so much a different teaches and different topics and it's incredible yes it's really it's and it is because I serve on the organizational committee there's four of us there's Patti LevinTancha McKnight David Kennedy and myself and so we've been serving as this organizational Community for maybe since 2020 um and before that it was John Conaway and Patti Levin they kind of did everything um and it's just so wonderful because the our philosophy is just letting it be organic right it's not a pyramid structure you know we're organizing things but we're really just you know serving the community um and the philosophy is we don't ask people to do meetups necessarily it's like people ask each other to do meetups and people get inspired to do their own meetups and so I think that's how we've gotten to 80 different ones is because you know people just feel inspired they say oh I've got something to offer and so they offer it and they just they email Patti and Patti says we'll run up by the committee and we're always like yes go for it and yeah it's just wonderful I was in anticipation of this I was looking at all the meetups and I was just like my goodness there is such diversity of meetups there's a bunch of practice I based ones um like stuff that people did in the finders course and then it sequel course the 45-day course um there's like those those core practices that people are able to do together and people just host these practices together like there's a one called group awareness another one called subtle noting um there's inquiry and there are all kind of putting their own spins on it you know like coming up innovating and inviting people to come and share um and then actually a lot of not a lot but several of our more recent core session speakers have started meetups with us so now they've started hosting meetups with us ah which is wonderful so they're just they offer something in the core session and you know they resonate with the community and the community resonates with them and then they start offering meetups based on what they're bringing you know their specialty so um yeah so it's really it's really it's really
wonderful well thank you so much it's like the answer to a lot of questions for people who're sitting at home and don't know how to connect or who to talk to oh yes yes that's a good a good question we're at it's perfectly okay.org and I think I sent you the I mean you probably know the link but I think I sent it to you it's just like yeah one word perfectly okay with y.org and that and that brings us to our landing page and there's a bunch of little links you can click on it is Patti who registers people for the community and so just look for the name Patti click on that and you can email her and join the community so and it's yeah and again we're just it's so exciting to have new members because there's really this recognition that with the community like the diversity of experience that's what deepens us all right that what's helps us to all shift because and also it's just it's not about just shifting right it's not about just we shift and then ah it's actually about deepening too right and stabilizing and integrating um because yeah after things change it can just be
weird that's true and it just gets weird and weirder it does just get weirder and weirder for a while yes exactly and so I think having that um yeah these meetings all these different meetings I think it's such a valuable resource for people that they can just you know pick one that resonates with them or pick a bunch that resonate with them and just go and get support in whatever way and do these meetings go all day long like there are different times zones right yeah yeah there's different yeah because we really are I think an International Community um I think we are our skew is that it's all like mainly english- speaking based um but there's you know I guess English is becoming more and more of like a universal language I guess for whatever reason American movie propaganda I don't know but um yeah and so and we so yeah most of the meetups are in English there is one Japanese language based Meetup um and I think there was a German language based Meetup as well but I'm not sure if it's still running I couldn't find it on the calendar um but the the beauty is if people have other languages and they want to meet up in that language they can start it wow wow and you have a zoom account that accommodates like thousands of people at the same time yes yeah Patti think she it's her Zoom account and I think she's gotten because that's the amazing thing you know like as our community has evolved Zoom has somehow synchronistically evolved as well because I remember very early on the the max was 50 we could only have 50 people in one room in one Zoom room and we had a speaker up very early on that everyone wanted to see and everyone showed up early and then it was maxed out and the the speaker could not get into the room because it was maxed out and so we had to have a person volunteer to leave so that the speaker could come so that's yeah that was way back when and now it's you know thousands 10 thousands who knows how many maybe they'll be like billions at some point hopefully yes hopefully um but yeah so yeah so Zoom has evolved and it's really it's wonderful because I think I sort of mentioned and we mentioned that you've been doing core sessions with us which is so yeah we're so so grateful um but yeah the core sessions are um they're more I guess more focused on bringing in people outside the community and and bringing things that might help our community in whatever way right it's like the focus of course is Shifting deepening integrating normalizing and so um we have people who uh like our members will suggest like various teachers and say oh this person would be great um and then as the organizing committee we you know we look and say like okay does this feel like they could offer something wonderful to our community and the answer is almost always yes um and yeah so then we have these um the core sessions are on Saturday and Sunday um every week we've been running them I think since 2019 maybe um and really it's just it's yeah so it's not a weekly meet up it's it's a special thing and it's really just a way again to kind of connect people with something that might be useful for them um which I think um is really wonderful it totally is and I really enjoyed being being able to share with your community so thank you so much yes yes and I already had three sessions and now I'm just getting new ideas and my ideas are big yes yes uh we have this Liberation Unleashed community that is sole focus is helping people to see through the illusion of separate self on a forum in a writing format but as everything evolved I moved away from Forum into live sessions with people and I work one-on-one and I do monthly group meetings um just just like just like that and the problem is in our community is that the after care or this deepening is not so organized we don't have that structure like you do and I think wow why not to bring these people who just had a shift into this platform and let them explore not just our Liberation unleashed meetings but there are so many more meetings whoever wants what I think that's that would be amazing yes I think yes I totally agree that would be amazing yeah it's just because it's such this beautiful time right like after the shift has happened it's such a beautiful experience I guess I don't know it's so the languaging is so hard because you know the language is so loaded right if you say oh experience who who's experiencing well yeah there's just nothing but it's it is so I'll just say for convenience it's a beautiful things there are things to take care of sure yes yes um but yeah it's just it is this beautiful thing to yeah the people who have newly shifted or they shifted a while ago but they haven't had that support it's just such a beautiful thing to have them in the community because it's I don't know because it's hard to express but it is it's so beautiful it's like a glow yeah you connect people together and you know they they spark yeah exactly exactly yeah and I think it seems like um there is and this is just based on just complete fabrication but it seems like there's a higher chance that if there's not that support of maybe that shift doesn't maybe take root who knows who knows um at least that there are many many traps to fall into and ideas that can get stuck and well it's all moving on its own way and its own pace and everything is right but having that support is always very beneficial yes yeah and I I based that on um because we had an experience like kind of earlier on in the community of I think what Adyashanti calls I got it I lost it right where there's kind of this dipping in and out of that shift experience and there's I think maybe a lot of stories that can be made around oh I got it I lost it what does that mean and that kind of draws the experience back into maybe the pre-shift or something um yeah and so I think that being able to communicate with people who oh they're deeper in whatever they're long that's their shift happened a long time ago and they've been through this um and being able to normalize it's like yeah that happenes that's normal a lot of people go through that not everyone goes through that but a lot of people do go through that and that's okay it doesn't have to have a meaning right you don't have to make a meaning you don't have to bring the Mind back and make a meaning out of it it can just be a thing that's happening and not happening at the same time so but yes oh that's so exciting that's such a great idea because now we are we are talking about how to give a better service for people who just saw it and we don't have a structure like this we have some meetings through our guides that they organize their own meetings four times a week or something like it's a lot and yeah yeah before we used to go on Facebook and do you know Facebook groups but everything changes and that also played it played its part played out and now it's a time to connect face to face it's before people used to be very scared to go on camera yeah yeah it's amazing and I think um yeah maybe the pandemic changed that I'm not sure or people just they got used to just being on camera with each other and that became normalized and they realized like oh yeah this is an opportunity yeah that that's one interesting thing is that um I had work colleagues who were doing zoom and they would speak of like some sort of like Zoom fatigue where they they would be in meetings and they would say like oh but I get so tired being in a zoom room with people it's so terrible and I was like what it's like amazing to be on Zoom with people it's so beautiful so um but yeah but I think that maybe um it's just a different context but um but yeah so that's yeah that's very cool because you guys are you you were like the OG perhaps like connecting people online right well you are we are helping individuals to go through that shift thing yeah but you had the the forum for a long time right yes but see on the Forum it's one-on-one there's a okay there's a Seeker client and a guide and they have a conversation until it plays out in whichever way it ends either somebody comes in and sees it or they drop away because not ready or for whatever reason and after that we add them to Facebook group but it's not so much help these days they used to be Lively groups and we used to have various groups but the moment I think you know everyone changes and the mindset are changing and there's so much information online in all different formats that you know if you are not so sure what happened you may be a little bit scared or reluctant to share because you know comparison and things like that yeah but if there are people who who can meet you face to face like this and and talk about that that's great yeah yeah yeah and that's one of the interesting interesting things is yeah the the fear or whatever trepidation of sharing what's happened right because there could be a stigma or maybe it's not the right experience right maybe not the right people to share yeah ex well yeah I think that's like I've I've encountered people you know saying like oh is it not maybe it's not the right experience right it doesn't meet up to this person's written standards or whatever um and so that can lead to the yeah the not wanting to share what has happened um and I think think in the open discussion and because I host another Meetup called shift integrate support um where I over the years I've become increasingly aware of you know trying to say it's okay we don't have to be precise right we don't have to match this person's Awakening it's not wrong you know there's whatever is experience it's not the wrong experience um and I think that is a really important thing to reinforce um because um yeah the thing about doubt right I think you were talking with Christiane yeah um during your podcast with her about that's like one of the early fetters right the doubt that comes up and I think that is like something that's there there's the doubt like oh is my experience correct and so that can lead to not wanting to share on these other you know even in meetings but as a host one can say it's okay it's okay you don't have to worry about being wrong just share what's coming up um and I tend to be very silly in the meetups I host just because I think I don't know it's okay to be serious but it's also okay to be silly in these in these states because with that lightness there is also humor and you can't really take that illusion so serious anymore more yeah yeah exactly exactly yeah um and we um I make a joke about the the non-dual police right if someone comes in and is trying to police someone in a way of making right it's like hey you know we don't have to judge each other as experiences because we can just learn from them you know we can be open to them um and yeah one of the most interesting things that I've witnessed in this community is someone will share an experience and sometimes people will be like hm that's interesting that's never happened here and then Weeks Later someone will share that experience it'll be a totally different person it'll be like oh yeah I suddenly started seeing rainbows around lights or
whatever um it's just all these all these all these things but it's like yeah there seems to be a power of sharing experience like even if it's okay that's not I don't think that's ever happened here and then all of a sudden oh some form of deepening will emerge in others which I think like synchronization kind of thing yeah yeah exactly yeah I know like the clocks with the pendulums they that they synchronize when they together yes exactly exactly yeah nice yes yeah yeah so it is really a fascinating thing and I think it is it seemingly is quite helpful for people
I'll be sending a lot of people to the community that's wonderful oh we're so so grateful yeah I'll organize a train that's good yes send them to Patti she'll let them in they can come to the open discussion on Friday 9:30 a.m. Pacific if they like silliness because it's mostly very silly that's great um Let me let me let my cat in cuz he's crying oh no let the cat in yes oh so cute very vocal talks a lot yes I used to have a a Siamese she was around for 19 years 18 years and she was very very vocal so yeah it's fun because people come um people's pets come to our meetups it's so much fun like we have the cats running you know going over the camera get like a little tail going back and forth we have the dogs running on in the background so yeah it's very very fun I think that's the I always want to start a pets meet up where we just have our pets what a great idea for a meet up yes yes I'll be here with five cats I nice you got five cats that's amazing I'm turning into a crazy cat lady oh yes well I will be on that path very soon as soon as say that's great yeah I think because I it just feel like there is um there's something about pets that help with the deepening process if one is open if there's an openness to the pets I don't know there's something that they there I don't know there's like seems like there's a deep teaching there I feel like um there was because my um my Siamese cat um she was very ill the last year of her life like she was formerly very vibrant energetic bouncing off the walls um but she became very ill and her body was kind of slowly slowly you know yeah degenerating I guess um but it was such an opportunity with her because it felt like the non-duality the merging the Oneness was like just went off the charts in a whole different way just being her human yeah extension of her body right because she couldn't take herself to the litter box anymore so I just did that you know it was hard for her to get to her food so I just picked her up and did that um and it was just like there was no it was just just kind of a knowing of the signals and just going with it which is really it was really really interesting to have that experience and i' there's a lot of gratitude for that that opportunity to just kind of like be her extension you know deep in that Oneness which I guess yeah maybe people will find that silly but I don't know to me it felt incredibly profound so I yeah and then the wonderful thing is when she passed there was a rainbow that happened over the the apartment here so I was like oh she achieved her rainbow body that's great she was a good little Guru so oh bless
her so so yes yes it would be wonderful to to have it's yeah it's just such a great experience to have these new members coming through these new people these new yeah participants wonderful perfectly okay so yes this is very exciting I look very very much forward we started doing like the little heart oh yeah we can how is it I forget sometimes it happens naturally but sometimes it doesn't yeah yeah I don't have a I have a a non-mac but I just love because everyone in the Meetup does this now and so I just started doing it instead of this so much I'm like oh just do a heart I do this yeah that's that's another fun thing too is that wait so it sounds like a fun place to be it is very fun yeah and it's just again I will just just going over the list of meetings I'm like there is so much people are offering and again it's just it's all volunteer um we're a 501c so it's like a nonprofit and donations just go to help support the website and paying for the community Zoom account you know so it's not a none of us profit we're all volunteers um and it's just wonderful like this Innovation that people bring you know that they're whatever they've specialize like we have circling uh circling for finders um we have like Vortex healing we've got um just so many different like beautiful offerings just so if whatever people resonate with they can just go to that Meetup which I don't know I just find to be so so amazing that it all emerged without us really efforting I hear you here it is what you gonna do with it just run exactly exactly although maybe yeah because I know Patti um she's she retired and so she does a lot I think a lot of the behind the-scenes stuff so maybe she I'm not sure if she would say that it seemed to just happen without so much effort but I think she just she does just experience flow like this doing flow and it's really wonderful to witness her in she's just kind of like a high-speed train just moving through the space and things just apparently happen which is which is very fun so yes I don't know if she would think it it was without effort but here it feels very much like this community just blossomed like a rose bush I usually ask my guests this one question and I and I think you're gonna have an interesting replies many of them since you're talking to so many people and you've seen it all right now um what is your best advice for a Seeker like somebody that is looking for a shift from your perspective what is the best thing so I would say and this is just based on my own experience whatever that means is it felt like the shift began when I just surrendered and this probably not going to be the case for everyone but I went from being a very strong doer very in control of my destiny and then I hit a wall and realize like that no this doing is not the answer I'm just going to surrender um and that doesn't mean I just like laid around on the couch as like a lump um I just with the surrender there was just this letting go of I know what's right and there was just this openness that arose to this you know just it felt like the universe was offering what was needed like after the surrender happened the sense of like okay just let him go just go into complete surrender and I got the email about the finder course and I was like oh okay maybe I'll sign up okay sure and it felt like that was really the key here and that's also been along the way um is just being open to what's arising um just being open to things that people suggest um and then also developing the discernment like well I don't have to do everything that people suggest it's just but then getting that discernment of this thing feels right this feels like it's in resonance um and so I think that that that was the yeah I felt like the most important thing that led to that big shift was just surrender and then openness and then the discernment to realize you don't have to do everything thank you that sounds right now the next question how to surrender yeah it was just yeah just a complete letting go um yeah it just felt like carrying around the sense of doership like yeah like in my hands or something and then just physically putting it down like okay this is just done no more Amy doing
Wow um yeah and yeah it's hard to describe because it's really just the sense of what going from like yeah kind of like charging like a freight train doing to okay now I'm lying on an inner tube on a river and just kind of on my back just floating down the river and looking up at the sky and seeing all the beautiful things that are offered Wow I'm curious was there any fear to surrender like losing something or like many people experience fear because there is an idea that I will lose control or I will not be able to live my life or I will have to abandon everything and go to a cave in whichever way yeah do you have any fear I have not I don't seem to be able to feel fear anymore like there's a startle response that can happen but the experience of fear and anxiety seems to have vanished um and I think it was only very small when that surrendering happened because I think it was waning over decades um because I think I'm I had mentioned I was doing that emotional work you know kind of diving into what is fear what is anger what is sadness um and I think by that point because fear was the first one I had started when I was I don't know 13 or something um it was very small and so there was no fear at the at the surrender because there was just the sense of like you know I've been going at it this way the complete doer and look where it's led 
eh not a great result I'll just do the total opposite of that and I'm sure it'll work out
fine um so yeah so I think um yeah there was no fear and I think there was one experience um along the way since the big shift where there was suddenly this realization of um that I hadn't realized that thoughts aren't real which like it was because had never been looked at and all of a sudden there was like this like oh thoughts aren't real oh and that felt like falling off a cliff like there was like a physical sensation of just like dropping um and so I think maybe that was a fear response for some reason which was such it was so but it was so bizarre it's like why did that happen just with this one stupid word like one stupid sentence thoughts aren't real um so I think that was probably as close as I came to maybe a fear response in this process um but it just it was just such a silly response to that thought that it just it just made me laugh like I just laughed because it's like why why do I feel like I'm on a roller coaster like falling off um so I think that was that was probably the closest to fear that happened but yeah it was also just very silly um and it's amazing it feels like this process is just this successive series of very very simple realizations right it's like oh yeah sensation thoughts are just Sensations what's the difference between Sensations and nothingness no there's nothing there's no difference right it's like all the categories just collapse collapse collapse into one um but it's just like but they're so simple because it's yeah just even thinking about it it's like why did I ever think that thoughts were real like it's just but it seems so silly now back then it was like whoa like mindblowing realization um that yeah I feel like maybe yeah other people are like oh of course thoughts aren't real that's so
obvious it's wonderful yeah it's a it's a it's a trip where you never stop tripping yeah yeah exactly exactly yeah yeah can I is it okay to ask you questions too yeah yeah so how was your experience of fear like did you have it coming up around your shifts yes I had experience of going insane I mean the fear of going insane because for for me I found this Jed McKenna's books and I read them in three books in 13 days so it was like a complete knockout to my belief system he's a great writer too yeah yeah that's great yeah so I read that and that's how my process started of questioning okay because um well I took one thing from there that sit down shut up and figure out what is true until you know oh I thought this is it I need to do that so I started looking through all these beliefs and whatever I found out that I knew was just something I repeated after other people like I learned something that means I took somebody else's words and put it in my system and said okay now I believe this too yeah so just seeing that was huge opening so I could not believe anything anymore it was kind of you know believe word Believe there's lie in the middle you know it's right
there yes indeed yeah so you did yeah that so he his process was spiritual autholysis right right so yeah write like loads of papers just writing stuff what I thought was true but it wasn't yeah yeah so that that started it
and well at some point I kind of relaxed because what else can you do nothing makes sense anymore yeah and I went for holiday and holiday was um nice but it was like huge floods there and people were dying and not in a hotel but in the country like oh I I don't know anything I don't know what will happen you know think are happening but I don't know what will happen and somehow this led to curiosity like what is going on what is really going on you know Jed McKenna says the real self is no self okay these are words but what does that mean right and then I I Googled Jed McKenna oh no I went on Facebook to look for Jed McKenna but there was nothing there just a couple couple posts by other people and I followed one through and I landed in a forum where they said there is no you look I was like uhoh there's something here there's no you look! ah Jed McKenna didn't tell me look yeah but that was just so directly in the face so I looked but before I looked I had this fear of going insane because at that time I thought I'm not believing anything I don't want to take a new belief I don't know what's going on and then there somebody pointed out that you know who would be to go insane and that was just that one question that kind of dispelled that fear yeah and then I saw that there was no Ilona running the show ever it's
impossible that's amazing I love that story that's so awesome yeah and it's yeah because it feels like the things just present themselves right like that Forum I don't yeah I don't know what it was like but yeah the Forum is there and the questions there and then it's like that's the shift and for me it was like the email was
there it's like that's the shift yeah that's fascinating um it took about three days for me to recognize what happened that was one this question is there Ilona running the show The Mind stopped and then there was obviously not and then he was like how I never questioned that before it's just so insane not to question that because it's like the core but we just go along with this idea that was given to us and never ever look there yeah unless somebody points out that's that's why immediately I started pointing it out to other people like come on everyone is looking for this exactly this cuz that's the answer to all the questions I mean if you are doing math but there is no zero in the math wouldn't make sense but here you find the zero here you
go yes exactly yeah it makes sense yeah definitely yeah that's and also yeah the it's interesting the shift between like truth right because I remember for a lot of years I was like truth there is a truth and I'm gonna find it right or I'll know it and I was so and there's so many truths like with capital T's and I was so confident and I think the idea of there is no truth I think there was like a deep discomfort with that like for a lot of years but then with the surrender it was like that's actually okay if there's no truth and yeah so I think that's another like yeah I think that's a great thing that for people who are seeking it's like just what you what you did it's just like what is actually true and it's okay if there is no truth because I don't know that that for me was a really profound way of deepening was investigating like what are all these unseen things these things I'm not noticing that I'm assuming are true that I don't realize there's an assumption of Truth um and yeah and just that process it just feels like everything collapses collapses collapses into just one beyond that so yeah that's wonderful and that's really cool that it was Jed McKenna because I know early on in the community like a lot of us were big Jed McKenna fans too like we read his book and we talked about his his book so that's cool if only you had had you had taken the finders course by mistake and then you could have come and we could have talked about this for eight
years well it's it's another eight years ahead so we can that's true still talk that's true we can there's no time like like
now that's wonderful um maybe you've already talked about um this an earlier podcasts um but um what motivated you to or inspired or how come how did this podcast arise oh the podcast oh okay um I have a YouTube channel and I was putting videos there and somebody said why don't you put the audio version I'm like yeah that makes sense just to put the audio version yeah so I found the platform and I started just you know the same thing that I put on video put it on audio and I got a name for it and started playing with that it's been over a year just over a year now that's awesome and it's been fun because I get to meet uh very interesting people and not just Seekers I love Seekers the people who are inquiring but it's also interesting to see and meet people who are other people like like me like you helping them like yeah in various ways from various mediums and yeah so it's kind of balancing for me now it's a every day I work with people who are looking for something and supporting them emotionally in whichever way they need to be met but I also get to speak to other people who are kind of like me yeah yeah I saw that you'd had Angelo Delullo right right yeah he's come he's come through our core sessions as well yeah I had to look through the list of people who were in your community was like quite impressive nice job nice job yes yes well likewise likewise um yeah and I oh and I guess one thing is yeah like post shift that's what we're we're there for right people who are post whatever shift has happened um but the reason why why we have core sessions and perfectly okay was actually an initiative started by um Don Conaway who has since passed um but he was because we had people who were still seekers in the community um and he wanted to start a program that would support Seekers and try to help speed them along the path as much as possible and so that's why we have core sessions I see because we started send them to Liberation
Unleashed exactly exactly yes yes yeah because we wanted to be able to you know we had our community but we wanted to connect people with other communities and other teachers um with these methods that might help them to get that fundamental shift that they were seeking so um so yeah so I guess um people who are Seekers are also welcome to join because they can get support in other ways you know through our through our core sessions and helping them you know maybe find a new tool that might be useful to them so yeah there are really three three places there before the shift during the shift after the shift right yes exactly one needs to be ready for the shift so whatever steps need to be taken or worked through yeah it's great to support people there and when there is a shift may take a week a day or maybe a year or longer it all depends on where people come from and then how they work so we are at that step at Liberation Unleasehd really just awesome pointing pointing through all these delusions Illusions so that everyone can sit down and find the truth for themselves yes yes and then you are here the after care I'll call it after care or deepening yes yeah exactly yeah yeah that's so wonderful and it's cool because um so it seems like you are teaching and supporting in the method that helped you shift is that correct uh or have you modified it since shifting hard to say as a community in the beginning we worked out what works precisely what works which questions work because the the key is the key is to look for yourself it's like nobody else can do that for you you have to know that you need to look but then how you look and where you look just to say look it doesn't mean anything yeah so we found a way how to point by exercises by questioning okay particular places and also there is always fear most mostly always fear very few people don't have fear yeah and there are always always expectations like what this Awakening would be like or somebody said this and now it's not like that you know working through all these expectations also resistances yeah and when you know how to navigate through all of that then you know seeing happens finding happens exploring continues yeah yeah yeah so it sounds like you kind of had the seed and then it it germinated right when you kind of honed it and made it to something that's extremely effective for folks sounds like it I I'm not so sure about now because I haven't been on a forum for a long time as I moved into the zoom face of face guiding I'm still working with people every day but in a different platform so yeah sometimes we have maybe 20 people waiting for a guide because all guides are volunteers as well it's just um the platform is typing you get a question you go home and you reply when you know the answer to get a new question so we just give people questions yeah and then they work it out and come back and until it's over yeah then so now with your guiding it's like in real time I guess whatever that means right because you're doing it through Zoom with people and so yeah yeah so you're asking the questions MH yeah and then it's whatever is coming up right yeah yeah that's amazing yeah yeah yeah did it feel like I sorry to ask so many questions but did it feel like a smooth flow from the Forum to zoom or was it adjust yeah you know you just grow into it yeah you start little and then grow into my other cat is singing songs all the cats want to come and join the zoom meeting yeah so that yeah that seems like that's a maybe a more common experience right where it just seems like things just kind of emerge it just happened yeah I didn't plan yeah I just watch what what's unfolding yeah yeah and it feels like that is a beautiful part of like deepening process as well right and that is like that is the surrender even if there's no one there to surrender right because it feels like with the open discussion it's like truly open there's like a few little guidelines just that are more historically based but um yeah it's just being open to whatever people are bringing to the discussion and we can have you know very like serious serious topics to extremely silly topics and just everywhere in between and it feels like that is such a vital part of practice now it's just being open to whatever is arising yeah isn't that great yes yes and it just yeah it does it's amazing how things just just emerge so like like this our conversation now I think a lot of good things is going to come out of it yes I totally agree yes yeah it is it's wonderful that I don't know that this platform exists that we can talk across 11h hour time difference right it's incredible talk about nothing for however long an hour I think we covered very serious topics like where to go when you need support when where you go where you need some fun with other people who are Awakening exactly exactly yes and what's with all these cats yes exactly oh they are the best the best part well thank you so much Amy I really enjoyed this and I'm sure I'll see you again yes yes oh my God gosh I'm so excited yes come come to meet up have your people come we will send people your way it'll be synergistic so wonderful thank you so much yes thank you again for the invitation it was wonderful to interact with you time thank you everyone for watching and now you know where to go it's perfectly okay.org right yes org yes yes org and we'll see you there thanks exactly bye