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Walking Your Spiritual Path, pt. 1 Episode Transcript

00:10 - Nachi (Host)

Welcome to another Om Body of I'm Not Yelling, I'm Dominican podcast, hosted by Nachi and Damaris. Hey everybody, this is your girl, nachi, and I'm so excited about our episode today. I don't know about anyone else, but I'd love to hear about other people's spiritual paths and how that shaped them in their lives, because, for me, it always gives me food for thought and how I navigate the world we live in and how I can be a better version of myself. So, Damaris and I, we're going to spend the next couple of episodes talking about spirituality, grounding and ancestral healing, and we just can't have this discussion without having our lovely niece, naomi of Om Body and so, who's been doing the work and leading the path for future generations. So welcome, naomi. Why don't you share a little bit about yourself, tell our audience what you're all about, what you've been up to, what to expect?

01:14 - Naomi (Guest)

That's a great question. I feel like when I have to explain like who am I, what I'm about, there's just so much right. It's like where do you want me to go down what aisle? Like I'm from Bronx, we're going down the aisle that I'm a Dominican girl are we going down the aisle of my spiritual journey? Like there's just so much right.

01:34

But in a nutshell, I am a girl from the Bronx, born and raised, and I would honestly, I can honestly say that I'm here like on my own, like I always say that right. Like I was born to, you know, my mom and my father and all of that good stuff. But from when I can remember, I've just been like navigating life on my own and just understanding life differently and I think, before I even understood spirituality, just kind of living in that spiritual realm without even noticing that I was doing so from a very young age and just feeling a connection that was bigger than me, right, but I didn't, you know, I didn't know what that was. My mom didn't foster that right. Like she didn't flee my family. My mom's family had no idea. They still have like kind of like no idea. So I've kind of been this Dominican girl from the Bronx, just navigating life and figuring life out on my own. I went away to school. I figured that out on my own. I've just been on a journey and I think I've been on a journey since I was a child like without even knowing that I was. I came here to do stuff right and and my mom was the vessel right that got me here, but I there's been a huge disconnect since I could remember right, I've just been doing my own thing. So fast forward. I'm a mother, I have a son, I'm a single mommy.

03:00

The last five years of my life has been extremely transformational for me. I became an entrepreneur, as I like to say. I got out of the matrix without even knowing that I was doing that five years ago and my journey has been. Every year has been something different. It's been mind, body and soul. Own. Body and soul was given to me and remember when it first started happening, I used to say it like it was just given to me and I started realizing people's faces Like all right, this guy was weird. What are you talking about?

03:33 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah, and I just yeah, I just stopped I said you know what?

03:36 - Naomi (Guest)

I'm just going to stop because I started sounding like a little too deep or a little bit too extra.

03:42 - Nachi (Host)

I was scaring people yeah.

03:44 - Naomi (Guest)

I was scaring people and then it was also making me doubt something that I never. There was no doubt in me that I knew what I was talking about, but because, once again, as a Dominican girl from the Bronx, the resources are not around us. You have to really be a nut job to sit here and be like, yep, this is it. Because everything around me was it's against my ideologies and for the most part, growing up, I was always too deep. I lost friends because I was too extra or like. I was too emotional, but not emotional like, but because I understood emotions. I've been very emotionally intelligent in an environment of people that just didn't understand that you sound like the Marist.

04:25 - Damaris (Host)

I tell Nachi all the time that anyone that cares to listen I have an extremely high emotional quotient. She tells that very well. But I do because I just need like up to 30 minutes to observe someone, identify certain things about them, about myself, everything, and take that into how I then approach my engagement with them, my interaction with them, and also identify their weaknesses. So if I ever have to use that against them, I will be to viscerate them mentally and verbally, physically, because I'm not that kind of person.

05:03 - Naomi (Guest)

So then think about that. So then, growing up, right, I'm this emotionally intelligent person and now I'm I'm still identified in my human experience, right, I get with my son's father, who's a complete street guy, right, like literally from the hood that I grew up in, and then I'm like battling like my inner self, like why I really am at the core of my soul, and then now I'm navigating life around all these other people. That was just, they were just not right, like completely just identified with their human experience, being from the Bronx, being Latinos, just being very limited in the resources, right, that were given to us, and then that awoke the fighter in me. I never was a fighter. I was always this jolly person, very happy, and there were years of my life that I identified as a fighter. You know where?

05:49 - Damaris (Host)

I was fighting people.

05:51 - Naomi (Guest)

I was angry and I I always remember that stage of my life because I remember the day I snapped out of it and I literally sat with myself and I said hold up, Naomi, you're not angry.

06:01 - Nachi (Host)

So this is not even you, yeah, so would you say that that was the turning point for you? Cause I feel like, like you mentioned before, you always had that in you, but you didn't know how to express it or articulate exactly what that was. When was that turning point where you realized your spirituality in that path that you needed to walk? Like what was that spark, that kind of set it off?

06:31 - Naomi (Guest)

I always say it started when I was pregnant with my son and I think it was very like mild right that I kind of knew. But I say that because I was very connected to myself and my spirit without I don't know. I was a little girl, I was 21 years old and I, you know, I just graduated college, right. So it was for the first time that now it was that inner trust. I would say like I fell into trust, like when I came up pregnant with my son I knew that he was a boy, I knew it was bigger than me, like I knew I had to have him.

07:03 - Damaris (Host)

I went into this like.

07:05 - Naomi (Guest)

I trusted it to another level. I also knew that I had to give birth with no medication. I'm a whole kid, right Like.

07:12

The first thing you do when you have your first baby is not think about enduring pain right, Especially with all the stories that you hear from Dominican families, right, and all that good stuff. My mom gave birth to all three of her kids with no medication. So she was an advocate, but it was on a different explanation than I was Me. It was just like, no, I just can't. It was a command, right, it was an inner command that I didn't know what it was, but I just knew that I could not give birth with medication and it was, and it was very protective of my pregnancy. I didn't allow anyone to see me and I remember when I was in my pregnancy I was like, why am I even acting like this? Like I didn't even expect myself and it was really crazy. Like I would be in my home girl's house and if someone came like I'll cover myself, like and I'll run out.

07:56 - Nachi (Host)

It was very like mental issues.

07:58 - Naomi (Guest)

Like what's going on with her.

08:00 - Nachi (Host)

I don't need that inner thing.

08:02 - Naomi (Guest)

So it was bigger than me. So I would say it started there. But I wasn't aware, I was just living in it, right?

08:08 - Damaris (Host)

You would be impressive, which is, I think, is great. That's a good example, yeah yeah.

08:13 - Naomi (Guest)

Um, then when I gave birth to my son, that day that I actually delivered, it was supernatural and I knew that there was a presence there, but I didn't. This is still like knowing and not knowing. I just knew that it was something bigger than me. So I say this because my mom passed out when I gave birth, like literally in my first push she passed out and I had a very peaceful labor. So when all of that was said and when all of that was said and done, I'm like this was energy and I didn't understand energy. I didn't even understand that dialect at that time, but I'm like, oh, this is spiritual, but I always knew that I was going to figure that out. So I would say that that episode of Giving Birth to my Son allowed me to understand that I was communicating with something, and it wasn't direct conversation, it was an inner knowing and it was an inner understanding.

09:04

And when I left the hospital after that weekend, I remember my mom left me in front of the hospital building. I'm in a wheelchair with my baby. She goes get the car and I never cried after I gave birth until this moment. Right there, I was left alone. I had my baby in my hands and I'll never forget this. I looked up and I started crying because it was like I accepted the task and I thought I was crazy. After that, like when I started analyzing it in the car, I'm like who the fuck am I talking to? Like what the hell was that? Because it was energy.

09:35

It was when I started crying and it was just like I accepted, Like it was like I accepted a mission. So I'm like all right, I'm really losing my mind.

09:45

So that was like I would say, like the beginning of me understanding whatever's working for me is working for something different going on here. But it was like whatever, like I didn't give it too much thought because I didn't know what to give it thought to. Well, how to analyze that? What did it, for me, for sure, was fast forward, the day that I left my son's father. I will never forget that day. I woke up it was a Wednesday I cleaned my whole entire apartment. I don't know I wanted to clean, and once I was done, I sat on my bed and I didn't even know I was going to do this. I just started crying and I said out loud. I said please, because I felt like I always knew he was cheating.

10:25

But I was so focused on being a mom and just like I just graduated college, I was trying to figure out like all right, what's next. Like I had a job, I was getting my master's and I had given up on that because I was not emotionally stable. I went through really, really I had a hard time after I gave birth. I went through postpartum and I think it was so bad for me because I have a man around me that did not understand. My mom didn't understand. She had three kids and she was still like it's not a girl, I'm a woman of party, I'm a woman of party.

10:56 - Damaris (Host)

I'm a play. She's like well, you get birth, you get over it, bitch.

10:59 - Naomi (Guest)

Yeah, like this is what we do. Like women get birth Like chop chop.

11:04 - Nachi (Host)

Like that was funny and you're like this isn't normal, this isn't right.

11:09 - Naomi (Guest)

And I'm just like what I'm going through? Some crazy.

11:14 - Damaris (Host)

And I don't have support, and I don't have support.

11:17 - Naomi (Guest)

I have to thug it out. I thugged it out and it was different stages, like it was stages of even closer, like schizophrenia, like I always call it that, but it's just paranoia. I will never forget that I went through a stage that I didn't open mail for like two years. For two years I didn't open mail.

11:33 - Damaris (Host)

Not you didn't open her credit card bills.

11:36 - Naomi (Guest)

She came out of college. Maybe it's the same thing, no, but me it was after I gave birth.

11:40 - Nachi (Host)

I was trying to avoid.

11:43 - Naomi (Guest)

No, For me it was this fear that apparently I thought I was going to get bad news in the mail.

11:47 - Damaris (Host)

Really you said, let me avoid it, but not open it.

11:51 - Naomi (Guest)

It was some scary shit, and so I went through so many different stages that I just got out of by myself. So then I started realizing like OK, I'm going through some shit.

12:02 - Nachi (Host)

And.

12:02 - Naomi (Guest)

I couldn't really talk about it. But that day I sat on the bed and I said God, whatever it is. I said, please, whatever it is, just throw it in front of me and I'm going to, and I always remember exactly what for it. I said throw it in front of me and I'm going to take it for what it is and I'm leaving. I'm never coming back that day. I leave my house to go do taxes. While my taxes with my homegirl, I run two people over, like slightly hit them.

12:26

That whole event occurred so that the girl that walked past you know like I'm there. The cops were called. I want you to know there's no recollection of that day. There was no police report, there was no ambulance report. It was some extremely magical shit for real. But all of that occurred. For this girl to come walking by, she goes Naomi, I'm so tired of seeing you go through stuff. That's it, I'm going to tell you. And she tells me that my son's father was cheating on me with one of my best friends for a year and she's given me all this information and I'm just like, and she's like please don't tell. Yeah.

13:03 - Nachi (Host)

It woke you up.

13:05 - Naomi (Guest)

You should have received and she's like oh, all she's worried about is like oh my god, please don't tell nobody, because her husband at the time owned a restaurant. This is all on Dijkman. Her husband owned a restaurant on Dijkman and she's like I don't want no problem, because nobody wants to tell you that everybody's scared of him, because he's like, threatened people, like he had a whole mafia, like you know, of people that knew and should not tell me.

13:30

So I'm just looking at her and I'm just in the back of my mind like girl, you have no idea. Like I just asked for this, like I was more in the shock of, and I said, throw it in front of me. So now I'm just replaying like oh shit, something, just this is what happened. They threw it in front of me, I hit it and I just kept telling her girl, you don't even know what you did for me, you just set me free, girl, like no, no, no, no, you have nothing to worry about. I left my son's father from that day and I've never, ever got back with him from that day. And to me it was just like I couldn't get back with him. I didn't love him anymore. Anyways, I was already struggling, so I wanted to leave him.

14:04 - Nachi (Host)

But I just get back with him, you just needed a reason.

14:07 - Naomi (Guest)

I needed that clarity and they gave you the clarity.

14:09 - Nachi (Host)

It's clearly a reason.

14:09 - Naomi (Guest)

And then that's when I said OK, all right, I talked to somebody, but still in denial. So that moment only lived in me for a couple of weeks. I was just like could you believe that? I asked and it was delivered and hell no, I can't get back with this guy, I'm going to get punished for every delivery. I clearly said if you deliver, I'm not getting back, which is one of the main reasons I've never got back with him. I'm like I never. I wasn't in love with him anymore. That wasn't even negotiable, but that was an add-on to like, even if there was some type of negotiation, like I'm sorry, like I spoke to some people, they delivered Right.

14:44 - Nachi (Host)

I have to go. I got my medivit.

14:46 - Naomi (Guest)

Yeah, I spoke to people and they delivered and it was time for me to go. But that was the turning point. That's when I knew, ok, there's something out here, and I still disconnected from it after, yeah, from that information.

15:01 - Damaris (Host)

That's interesting, I think. I love to hear that Because you had your kind of turning point earlier in life and I want to say for me it was later. But just thinking about it, I think you always recognize that you are some sort of spiritual being and for me personally that's how I grew up knowing, sensing spirituality and knowing that it's connected to my soul, something bigger than just like you know this human experience, but never really, you know, just kind of living through it, not really thinking too much about it, not being too philosophical. I feel like in the last few years it's probably been something more that I'm more thoughtful about. What does it actually mean to be spiritual? And for me again, is to be connected with my soul, right, being connected with my intuition, following that, more Seeing how there's a connection to a oneness of everything around you, inside of you, et cetera, and so just to share. For me my turning point was definitely our father's passing like that, in a way that I always knew again that I'm a spiritual being, having a human experience.

16:27

And I was raised Catholic and religion was a big part of my life, not like some crazy religious person, some Bible thumper, but definitely, like you know, I'd go to church on Sundays. It was one hour and as a Catholic you're raised with this guilt. If you don't go to Mass for one hour in a week, can't get that to God. You don't love the GOD.

16:51

So I was like oh hey, let me give my 50 minutes of Mass every Sunday, whatever. And then I got past it because I just had issues with the Catholic Church and I was just like I don't need this institution and then fast forward. When Papi passed away, it was just a I needed. There was a connection of OK, I would have conversations. I mean, even the week that he was in hospice and the night that he passed away, it was a full moon.

17:24

I was on the balcony because they were living in Florida. He was in Florida and I just heard like you got to let him go. And I was like, and I'm in my this is all man, I'm like I can't let him go because I don't want him to be by himself. And I was just like he's not by himself. And when I heard that and I felt it like, ok, he's not by himself because he is with the Creator, he is surrounded by loved ones, ancestors, and then I was like, ok, and then he passed away that night.

18:00

And so I was just like, oh, ok, there is kind of like that conversation you heard and you felt it's like, ok, got it noted, I need to, and something's talking to me, yeah, and it's just not in my head, because actually stuff is happening right and that, for me, was the start of the transformation that continues to grow. But part of it is that also letting go of what people me. Caring about what people expect of me, what they think about me that's no longer my business. I don't even care, and I've lost relationships over these transformative years and I'm OK with it. I really don't care, because I feel lighter, I feel better.

18:54 - Naomi (Guest)

And it doesn't matter when people are not on your frequency, it's like right, right, it's like it takes itself out. You're not missing it.

19:00 - Nachi (Host)

Yeah, it's interesting because I feel like I had a little mix of where I had peaks and valleys in my life and with sidetracks For me, and actually it was always a little miss. Yeah, and actually it's only a little twist. It was actually for me. I would say my original turning point was in college because for me, my youth, I was basically living in a bubble. Right, everything was great, high school was fun, everybody loved me, all things are great, no issues. It wasn't until I went away to college where I dealt with jealousy, toxic relationship, all of that, and it was horrible.

20:02

I did not like my college years because I experienced things that I wasn't used to. I didn't like it, but I always found myself trying to, I guess, prove to people like. But everybody likes me. Come on, why don't you like me? So I struggled with that, right, why don't they like me? What's the problem and why is this person doing this to me? So, going through that and I drank a lot in college I tell them I was to this day when, whenever I see anybody who's drinking in X's just to drink an X, I'm like that person's, depressed. Why would you say that?

20:56 - Naomi (Guest)

Because I know how that?

20:58 - Nachi (Host)

how I felt I was there. I was there. I was like yeah, give it to me, I'll drink anything and whatever.

21:09 - Naomi (Guest)

I.

21:12 - Nachi (Host)

Now remember the it was like the first time I Heard of a Yama Van Zandt and I picked up her book act of faith, and so it was going through. That process made me kind of made me think or realize that it's never you, it's not you, it's they're the problem, they're the issue, they have their own problems and they're just projecting that on to your, onto you, and so you have to be able to kind of let that go. So that Help me make sense of it Didn't mean that I overcame anything, but that was like my journey on that path and I tell you I've, I've tried every single thing and it all helped me in my journey. But then I got married.

22:14

That's when things sidetracked for me. I Was on the path, doing everything to sustain myself, keeping my you know vibration hot. I was good, I was, you know, things were happening, but I didn't let it overcome me, so I just kept it pushing, you know, and I got married and, for whatever reason, I kind of just let things go right and I just put all on my face on this one individual, all my expectations on this one individual, took myself out, because you know, I I can't even Tell you what was going through my mind or why I was thinking in that way.

23:02 - Naomi (Guest)

Because you're being the selfless woman, right, kind of like what we're taught to be. Yeah, like you have to be right.

23:10 - Nachi (Host)

You're, you know you have to be there for your husband and, you know, start a family. And that, with my focus, and that just took me to a whole different place, an entire different place, to a point where I Was becoming depressed again. And it was more visible After having Matting my first child, because that's when I really felt the effect that I didn't have the partner that I thought I should have. But again, he's his own person and I'm, you know, my own person. I have my own expectations. He has his own expectations. We had, we had two different ideas of what Partnership was or how that was supposed to look like, but I was placing that, that Responsibility, on him and because I was doing that, I was increasingly becoming more and more depressed not being there for For my child.

24:19

And then I get pregnant again. I'm not, I'm just like, completely disconnected. So I love it when I hear mothers who feel like, oh my god, it was magical. Like for you, it was magical For me. My pregnancy was wonderful, I loved being pregnant, it was no, my pregnancy was magical.

24:37 - Naomi (Guest)

It was the first part of that and I was just like what mental illness is this?

24:44 - Nachi (Host)

Yes, yes, yes, yes, pause, it was horrible, but and then I didn't have that support system there. You know, like I have my parents and I have de maris, but there weren't there with me, right, and it's but so much that they can Do living in florida and in new york and it's so internal that no one know, even if they've they've been a mom too Right no?

25:07 - Naomi (Guest)

one understand it's an internal, it's like a psychosis.

25:10 - Nachi (Host)

Yes, yes, yes. And it was the moment where I was like I can't do this anymore. I called my parents. I was like yeah, I think I'm gonna leave him and this is you know this is my plan and even in that I try yeah yeah, like I can't do this anymore.

25:34

I, I like you have to beat me down for me to just like Totally say, okay, I'll let it go. It wasn't until after I left him, even though those years were, were a struggle still, but not in the same sense. When I was living with him, I felt more, I felt freer, although I was struggling. I felt freer because Now I don't have any expectation, now I have to kind of work on me. Now I was focusing on myself and figuring things out and how. That, you know how, was I responsible and all of that. And and I say this because I know a lot of people think oh, if you think positively or you know, you know that love and light type of mentality that it's all good. But it's not because, like I said, that it was a struggle during that period. After I laughed great.

26:46

But equally I felt A lightness because I knew where I was going. But I kind of had to walk through the fire to really kind of Pick myself up and and get over that hump. And you know it's, the spiritual path is not a linear path, right, it kind of goes in Different directions. Yeah, you, you may fall off. Get that, you know, get yourself back on. So it's right when you're like at the high.

27:24

Yeah, but yeah it is, but I always appreciate that I had a foundation to fall on. Well, I wasn't. I've never really considered myself very religious. I kind of you know Religion or you know Catholicism. For us I looked at it as a tradition, like, oh, we have our baptism and we got to do baptism, we got to do the communion and all that. It was tradition for me, but not so much that I was. I Didn't go to church very often. I went every softened one. It is like that little lift and it has to be a church that I was comfortable in, never comfortable in a church that I Can't even explain it.

28:14

But the churches I I, they would have to resonate with you yeah, yeah you know and but again, there was a foundation there because even at home with Bobby he was always, you know, the one kind of ensuring Listen, you may have challenges in your life, but Kind of talk to God, you know, you always have that, that support. We're here, you know, you have that. We have our own little unit here so you tap in if you need to tap into. So I always felt like there was a foundation and I just needed to kind of Get back to that and so it, like I said, it's just, it's never that one straight, narrow path to To self, you know, self actualization or Ignoring, this is it, it's, it's. You know, you go through your peaks and valleys.

29:16 - Naomi (Guest)

It's never ending. Yes, yeah, yeah as long as we're humans and identified in our human experience is just, we're gonna keep going through it. It's that's what we come here for. We come to evolve. Yeah, and that, and it's not like one-aged gap, like all from 20s to 30s.

29:32 - Nachi (Host)

You even right, right, yeah, it's happy, it can happen anytime. You just you know you have to be aware and willing and be open-minded of you know, of the signs that come to you, of your own experience. It's not, you know who is me. It's okay, this is happening to me. What can I do? What am I supposed to learn?

29:56 - Damaris (Host)

Right, what are you supposed to learn and what? What is your part in this?

30:00 - Nachi (Host)

Mm-hmm. That's the key which a lot of people don't don't want to look at. They want to blame the other person for the downfall, but what was your part in it?

30:10 - Naomi (Guest)

Those people are highly identified in pain. I've learned that as I've just navigated. Like the people that are victims are in pain.

30:18 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah and I that was one thing I think I've always been like is this idea of you're accountable for For your own happiness.

30:28

You're, and you solely are, accountable for the things, that the decisions, the choices you make in life. Your life is a reflection of your choices. Your life is a reflection of your mental state and and I remember when actually was going through that Time in her life where she was like not really happy and I don't know if you remember that she, I told you, I said this is before. She actually told me she was going to leave him, but I said Whatever you do, you, if you want to leave him, do not worry about money, do not, I will, we will make this happen, no matter what I said between your parents and me, you're fine. So if this is not something, if money, is that something that could hold you back from moving forward? And I was holding I let that be a factor because I know for a lot of women and Marriages like that is a bit that's not something, that's something huge for them to undertake and it's not.

31:33 - Naomi (Guest)

Father. I was 24 years old and I left that relationship with yeah, my dad, a car the whole time. It just so happened, right before I broke up with him, like I got rid of my car, was waiting for him to buy me another car. He's a buy me everything. It don't even crippled me, right, he just gave me everything.

31:51 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah, I.

31:54 - Naomi (Guest)

I walked and he thought I was never gonna leave because of that. So when I left, it was just like the biggest shock of his life. I didn't have a dollar to my name, I didn't have a savings account, I didn't have anything like, I didn't even have a vehicle to move around. And when I tell you that that was truly the beginning of my spiritual journey, like mind, body and soul, it was Because now, at that point, I was working with God, I was working with my journey, I was, I was just your face.

32:20

Yeah, I just said I I'm leaving him like I Trust that what I was gonna work is gonna work and it worked. And I used to envision myself. I'll never forget. I said after I left him, I played my friend's couch for a while. I took my son to my mom's house because I didn't have the emotional capacity or the mental capacity to take care of him. Hmm, and I will literally go every single day to my mom's house to like see him real quick and I'll spend the whole entire day laying on my friend's couch. I would even last days without taking a bath Because I was just so down and out so I would literally lay there. But I remember now that I know what that is. I was literally manifested.

32:56

Yeah, I was creating that girl how I wanted to feel, how I wanted people. I was so hurt and so much in pain that I I wanted vengeance, like I wanted. But I was so Humiliated, right like remember I woke to a reality that everyone around me knew, even my siblings. I was betrayed on every layer family, friends like it was disgusting. So my whole thing is like I wanted to regain myself from that. So I used to envision that girl and I used to.

33:24

I didn't know what that girl was gonna do financially, but I used to envision how I wanted to feel, how I wanted to walk by people and how I wanted them to feel about me. Um, like I envisioned it and I swear to God, exactly all those days of just being depressed, just playing the back, playing it back, playing the back, I made that girl a hundred percent. Yeah, I made her. Yeah, that by the time I started walking as her, I started. I created this shit, you recognize. Oh, yeah, I actually wanted to walk in this club and have everybody catered to me yeah okay, you know, like yeah, and and and.

34:01

What I wanted to do was very like, like 3d, like I wanted to go to the clubs, I wanted a pop bottle. It was at a moment of I needed to redeem myself for these 3d Individuals that were laughing at me. I needed to, like, get that back, oh, girl. I got it back, oh, and then I was over and then I said, hi, the same for me. My true, I needed to stunt and I it had nothing to do with the outside, I had everything to do with, like the inside of what that did to my, to my confidence, to my, my aura, to my, my self-love, to my security. I like it was all of that. Once I got that out the way and I turned the whole game around of all the people that were laughing at me and I turned them into it kind of started respecting me. I said I'm gonna Onto the next.

35:01 - Nachi (Host)

There you go.

35:04 - Naomi (Guest)

And then for me, I had situations that even people that I grew up with, that I considered my friends and family members that you wouldn't think they're sitting there watching like not saying anything, yeah so it's back to like.

35:16 - Nachi (Host)

What was that paper you downfall?

35:18 - Naomi (Guest)

100%, 100%. I think I'm so wise because I've experienced real life pain. My own mom sat back, like my own siblings, like all this is what she's. It was that I hate to even talk about it because it's a reality that I have to Continuously face. Sure, you know what I mean, and even friends that were just sitting there that she's gonna do now. Oh, he got a girlfriend.

35:45 - Nachi (Host)

Now that's what I'm going to get, he got a.

35:47 - Naomi (Guest)

He got a new girl for now. Hmm, yeah, she was living in a penthouse. I wonder what she's gonna. Or she's back to her mom's house. Mind you, I was at my mom's house for three months. Like I mean, it happened fast.

35:56

Right but it was still that energy and I used to feel it and I used to just Understand that I'm a little girl. So I'm like 24 and I'm trying to understand, like, wow, why are people like this? Like, like, why, when I thought my mom would support me the most, why is she part of the crew of the people that are not trying to help me, right? So it was like all of that just made me a stronger person and it allowed me to understand that I'm all I got period, and that was a Lesson that I have to learn early, and I'm very unapologetic now as a person, like, if you want me to be a bitch, I could be a real big bitch, and it's not that I'm being a bitch is I'm very dismissive. I don't take shit from right, just it is what it is like oh, you don't like me. Oh, that's cool. Don't call me, don't talk to me. Easy for it to roll off? Yeah, it's very easy. We got no beef either.

36:44 - Damaris (Host)

It's like oh, you know that approach it feels. I love that. I love icing out. I don't care, I don't mind. Looking at you like I'm looking through glass. You don't exist and I'm a queen. I look over you.

37:01 - Naomi (Guest)

I.

37:04 - Damaris (Host)

Look right through you, like I don't even see you. Like.

37:13 - Naomi (Guest)

Oh, security as an individual, that it bothers people, yeah it does it like and I, I, I, I find it hilarious.

37:24 - Damaris (Host)

I just like, wow, that really bothers them. I'm gonna do it some more because once I. Just growing up. I would hold a grudge, right. I would forget why I held the grudge and what the grudge is for, but I would be like I know I don't fuck with you.

37:40

I don't remember why but I don't fuck with you, that's it. I'm gonna be like I don't fuck with you and I like I remember this guy in high school Freshman you hit, did something I can't remember. I was like, oh, he think he mm-hmm, no, not gonna happen For three years. Wow Me. Like you will always think to me blah, blah, blah.

38:01 - Naomi (Guest)

I was like, yeah, I know I forgot what you did, but you know, that's me all the time, like so many fallout with people and when I try to go back and remember like, yeah, she did again. I don't talk to her, I don't talk to you. That's how much I, it doesn't matter. Like it's, like I'm dwelling.

38:20 - Damaris (Host)

Right.

38:20 - Nachi (Host)

I think, about it.

38:21 - Naomi (Guest)

Like I always tell people.

38:23 - Damaris (Host)

I need you to move on to.

38:25 - Naomi (Guest)

I tell myself, sending my sister this the other day. I'm like you know, I I learned this about myself. I didn't know I was doing this consciously. I give people free trials.

38:37

I I noticed that as I went, you know, underwent my healing journey as an individual I learned like, okay, in order for me to change the outcome of the people that I'm bringing towards me, I had to change certain things right. So at first I was very like, uh no, that's it, you canceled, like I wouldn't have space and time to just see people further than like them, not checking off the things I need on the list, right. So what started happening was that, which I think it was a great thing that I did, because now I know that when things don't work out with people is like I gave it all the angles possible, like I wasn't so fixed on on being me. Um, so I do that.

39:17

I I'm very nice, I'm very like flaws and all. I'm very receiving, I'm understood, I hold space right and I create even excuses for people, despite what I'm already seeing right. Because I'm like you know what, in order for me to create a different outcome in my life, I have to be tolerant of things in different ways. I can't continue being oh, you don't meet the, you don't meet my expectations, you don't need to list, you're gone. Right, that's very selfish. So I give people free trials and when they fuck up the free trial and then I'm back to unapologetic me, it's almost like bipolarism.

39:50 - Damaris (Host)

They like, why you switch up like that?

39:53 - Naomi (Guest)

I always say this like that this is who I am. Yeah, it's just. I gave you a free trial. Free trial is up. Yeah, and you fumbled yeah record decline. And it's not even about who's right or who's wrong, and I make it very clear. You know, it's not that you were wrong, it's. It's just I gave you that free trial Some reading, which is not there and it's like now. The boundaries and the walls are back up, you know.

40:20

Yeah preferably don't call my phone. Yeah, yeah, yeah, listen, like don't even text me, like don't, it's just nothing personal at that. And then people have a hard time Understanding how can it not be personal? But you're cutting me off? Yeah, because it's not. It's just, I have very strict boundaries.

40:35 - Damaris (Host)

I know what I want for people in life.

40:37 - Naomi (Guest)

And unfortunately, we don't make the cut for each other. It's not that you didn't make the cut.

40:44 - Damaris (Host)

We, we talked about boundaries a few episodes ago and and that was something really big for me personally is that I have, you know, when it comes to friends and family, I I used to be a little bit more forgiving with my boundaries, because while we were raised, especially with family, that's blood. You, you know, you, you always, um, you look past certain things and then, if you're a close friend of mine, I was willing to look past certain things.

41:12 - Naomi (Guest)

But again, since I'm the worst people to have less boundaries, yeah.

41:16 - Damaris (Host)

Yes, and since my father's passing, I've been even more strict with my boundaries, less tolerant of certain things. If, if I have a boundary, that's it Like we're, I'm not here to to negotiate For what? Life is too short for that. Okay, if you don't respect my boundary, then you don't respect me, you don't respect me and I. I started off with everybody with respect, but if you just like disrespect me, I'm gonna bring that energy times three. And why do that? That's too much. I'm not here for that.

41:49 - Naomi (Guest)

Like so People can't deal with the nothing you like when you nothing people.

41:54 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah.

41:55 - Naomi (Guest)

I'm not mad, I'm not bitter.

41:56 - Damaris (Host)

I'm okay with that.

41:57 - Naomi (Guest)

Yeah, just nothing. You don't exist. Yeah, I think that hurts people more Than seeing you in that vindictive nature of trying to get back Right, and I don't want to.

42:05 - Nachi (Host)

I'm like this, that was a hard lesson for me to learn setting boundaries.

42:12 - Naomi (Guest)

But how liberating has it been, it's.

42:15 - Nachi (Host)

Very liberating, very little Liberating, but for me I I didn't understand what boundary Work that was my issue.

42:24 - Naomi (Guest)

Like I explained that, like what's the point of you, of someone that doesn't understand, like what is Like? What does that look like to you? Like to know that you didn't understand boundaries?

42:33 - Nachi (Host)

Well, now I understand boundaries to being Okay, what is it that you do not want? And if that happens, then you are the person that needs to change, or not change in terms of let me appease you, but change In the sense of, okay, I need to walk away. Before I would never walk away because it was I'm giving you another chance. I didn't like this. I told you I didn't like this and it was that ongoing. You know I've said what my boundaries are, or what I didn't want, and you continue. You know you give me excuses, so, or I would make excuses for them stepping over my, my boundary, but in terms of understanding, okay, if you have boundaries, then you are the one who's responsible of making that, taking that, the steps that's needed for you to let that person know that they've crossed it and then that's it. So, for example, there's guy um, well, I'll use my ex-husband. He was notorious For, just you know, coming up, showing up Whatever he wanted to habitual lines.

44:03 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah.

44:03 - Nachi (Host)

Yeah, and you know, and I would engage in because I thought if I met him in his, at his level, you know where we will start arguing and I'm yelling and screaming and telling him and I'll come up in here and all of that. That that was telling him, or you crossing my boundaries, yeah, but I wasn't doing anything. It was just creating more problems for the both of us, for our children. So I have to Kind of switch it up, because the mares would always tell me why do you let him get under your skin? And I like cuz I told him I didn't like this and he's doing this. So I have to let him know that. That ain't it. So what I've learned to do is just Okay, well, if he's gonna Show up, then I'm not gonna open the door because he ain't calling me, he ain't tell you know what I'm saying. It's just I need to take an action that's gonna let that person know that, no, you just can't Do whatever it is that you want to do when it's against my wishes, and I will always feed into the argument, the, you know the, the fighting over nonsense, which it just I'ma tell you, it didn't make me feel. It made me feel better for that slight second, but afterwards it wasn't it. It wasn't, it wasn't worth it, because I felt terrible.

45:49

I was angry for a long period of time and you know, when I started to learn how to respect my own boundaries because that's what it really boils down to is you respecting your own boundaries and Making sure that other people understand what those boundaries are. It's actually much easier than what most people think, like right now it's. You know, my ex husband and I. We have a Decent relationship, we have a good relationship right now, and even when he does things that I'm like you, you, you, real foul. I just like you. Don't let it get you. Let me, i'ma leave it there, cuz that's who he is. I've had to, I had to accept it, that that's who he is, and Not cross my own boundary like, okay, you don't need to even engage in, because that's really what it's about. They're trying to pull you into that to their level of their, they're, they're, they're disruptive this.

47:01 - Damaris (Host)

They want you to engage in that, and that's what I've learned to yeah disengage that's my favorite word.

47:07

I disengage when I feel an argument coming with a friend or or with my husband or anybody, and it's just like this isn't worth my time. I'm disengaging, I'll watch and observe you get out of hand and start like, have this argument, but I'll just watch you and that gets them even more riled up. But it's not even, is not even me purposely trying to round Someone up. I'm just disengaging. Yeah, because it mess, it disrupts my, my frequency, it disrupts my energy. Yeah, it disrupts my spirit in a way that I don't like. So I don't like to feel this way.

47:41 - Nachi (Host)

I'm not going to engage. Yeah, and that was my problem. I just I didn't. I.

47:48 - Naomi (Guest)

Think that I always say that, um, he's one of my greatest lessons and I went through a lot with him, right? But I'm so grateful for my experience with him. I'm grateful for having a child with him because, when I tell you, my experience with him broke me down. It broke me down to the point that I had no choice but to rebuild myself up, and while I was rebuilding myself, I still had to deal with because he's my father's, my father.

48:12

And I learned boundaries. I learned like literally honoring what just doesn't make me feel well, because I learned that he was a constant. It was nothing that I can do To get rid of this man, because I had a whole entire. Child right with him, so and and he had no chill right.

48:31 - Damaris (Host)

So, he, he's, a he's he's.

48:33 - Naomi (Guest)

He's a narcissist, he has a lot of narcissistic trait, so he just. There was one person that consistently wanted to knock me down and remind me of all the wack stuff that I could be and just like. It was just him. So I had to just like, okay, you know, after years of just kind of like, every time he said something, feeling triggered, arguing with him right him ruining my day.

48:56

Yeah, him ruining my day, him making me cry, him making me feel ugly, unworthy, just so many things. And this is after we broke up. That one day I said I hope you fuck up.

49:05 - Damaris (Host)

You can't have this control.

49:07 - Naomi (Guest)

I said hold on. Like what the hell did I leave him for? I left him to then still be under his control and there was that moment that I realized like okay, for example, I don't like to take money from him, him giving me money from my child. Although it's the right thing to do, because he has to provide for his child. He said it was coming with a lot of shit.

49:24

Yeah, it came with a lot yeah to the point that I said when that said, I don't need that, it's cool, as long as you. And then I started establishing the rule, not the rule, but like with myself. Like you know, all I need him to do is to be present, right, in reality, I just need to physically be present in a healthy manner for his child, because my son is not gonna remember the transactional shit. The transactional shit I, like, whatever I got to provide for my son, I, I made the decision and the old that give birth to him, like what you can do is just an add-on. But I learned that with him because when I do that, I could have continued playing the game of not. I could have continued playing the game of just not Not having boundaries till this day. I think I would have still not been as solid as I am because I would have not allowed, because he would have just been continuously hurting me and hurting me and I'm just triggered and reacting.

50:16 - Nachi (Host)

Now it's like yeah, it doesn't matter, you just step away.

50:20 - Naomi (Guest)

It doesn't matter.

50:20 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah, and that all goes into the whole. Your spiritual health, your overall spiritual health, and Boundaries is just a part of that right, and I think, um, you both have mentioned about what certain things that help you along the your spiritual health and your spirituality, and you know, talking about boundaries and setting that. I think that's a huge part of it, but not you. For you, what? What are some of the things that you felt Before you said, before you got married, you were like doing, you had you incorporated things into your daily life to feed you spiritually. What did you do then? And then what are you doing now? Because I'm curious to hear about all.

51:02 - Nachi (Host)

Okay, guys, so then I so, and I still, and I do that now. So one thing that I do is I journal. So for me, journaling, especially when I have a lot on my mind, if I'm Feeling down, depressed, like things are just you know, like just a lot of stuff happening, I have to let it out. And for me to let it out, I have to write it out. So that's, you know, when I'm, when I'm feeling kind of off, I need to start journaling. So that's, that's one thing. I used to do that and I, I, I do that now. Um, the other, sorry to interrupt you.

51:46 - Naomi (Guest)

who put you on to journaling? Was it something you learned, or if you just kind of figured it out on your own, that it just worked?

51:53 - Nachi (Host)

well, like I said, I think I've I've read so many different books and, um, along my my journey, that Journaling was always something that came up. So it was like, okay, you know if I'm doing, if I'm in a workshop, you know, journaling was always something that they would bring up and and tell you okay, this is a good method of using to To jot down your thoughts. Um, sometimes they give you some Journaling prompts, but for me, I the prompts never worked for me. For me, which is, I just need to kind of like, let everything out right, because a lot is going in my on, you know, inside my mind, I'm just like so much that I have kind of right and sometimes you know, like what I'm reading back back on it. I start one, you know, in one direction, then I start talking about something else. It's just being conscious and that always makes me feel better.

53:01

Um, another thing that I used to do then that I really need to start picking up now that I don't do as consistent, but I used to, uh, meditate a lot more earlier on. That was something you know. I would come home and says the mask. You know, when I used to work, oh god, yeah, crying every day. Yes, I hated it, but the way I decompress, I would literally Meditate you. I don't know you ever remember my little table, my little wooden table that I had in my bedroom and I'll like my like my candle, Read my you know affirmation and kind of sit with my thoughts.

53:53

Now I don't meditate as often, but I do think, like, um, like I started doing these, these Kundalini sadnas with the Brua's of Brooklyn.

54:13 - Naomi (Guest)

They've been doing the last couple of years and you know they went to Binghamton, right, they went to my house.

54:19 - Nachi (Host)

Yeah, yeah yeah.

54:20 - Naomi (Guest)

The same year that you did.

54:22 - Damaris (Host)

Like around the time you did.

54:23 - Naomi (Guest)

No, they were older so they were alums to us, so when I was there they used to come. I think one of them is in a sorority, I don't think both of them are. So, they came like twice. We had like an alumni event and they have came, but they were nowhere near into nothing that they do now yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah they started, yeah, so it was, yeah, I know.

54:45 - Nachi (Host)

So I've been doing their sadnas and those been great, because it's it's something that I've had to do consistently. So it's the 40, 40 days of, you know, a meditative practice.

54:58 - Naomi (Guest)

So, sareeshie, they are her students.

55:01 - Nachi (Host)

Yes, that's how I know Sareeshie and why I follow her too, and so so that's one thing that I do now. Back then it was just my own little thing, and then I also did that one with you.

55:16

I enjoyed it a lot, but getting up at, like Get up at 5.30. You know, for me it's very refreshing, like whenever I do get up at that, the only time that I'm that I don't get out of the room if I've gone to bed really late, or you know, I'm just often tired, but I actually feel better when I do get up.

55:37

I know, you told me that it's just not your thing, and I rejects that. And you're the type of person that if it's not how it's it's meant to be, you won't do it. You don't like to do the work around you. You're not like. You're not the type of person like, oh, I'll do it later in the day, Cause you feel like it's so off and I'm like it doesn't matter.

56:00 - Damaris (Host)

You're the opposite.

56:04 - Nachi (Host)

But so that's what I do now. Back then, like I said, it was just my own little meditation session that I would do on my own. And yeah, so I and I and now I also do, I do I may break out an Oracle card. So that's another thing that I do. If I'm kind of, you know, if I have, let's say, I'm struggling with with something or I need answers to something, I may take out, you know, one of my Oracle cards to give me the answer that I need and my spirit is me telling me, my spirit guys be talking to me and tell me the truth, and I'm like, okay, okay, I heard you loud and clear. So I do that as well. That's been helpful, especially when I'm looking for answers. And you know, I just need to kind of sit back. That's what I do. I just kind of pull out my Oracle card. It's one of my Oracle deck.

57:12 - Damaris (Host)

When I think about what I do for myself. For me, I think it's the morning prayers, and I'll say that Mama Rita was the one that put me on to really being consistent with when you wake up, praying and starting with gratitude, because I would. I always came from a grateful place in general, because I'm a highly favorite child of the most high. I say this all the time my life is, my life is lit. I've never, I've always, been giving everything, and not to say not without a struggle, but largely without a struggle. So highly favorite got it.

57:53

But I need to show, I need to be mindful about doing that every morning when I wake up. And I realize that when I don't start my morning with my quick prayer and it's not a long prayer but it starts with gratitude and thanking for everything and then shielding myself from all you motherfuckers, but it's my day is better, because what I notice when my day is a little bit more, there's more frustrations or things happening that I don't like. I think back, I'm like, did I pray this morning? I'm like, oh, I didn't. And then, and then I did my quick prayer, like, come on guys.

58:30 - Nachi (Host)

Come on, you know, I'm grateful yeah.

58:34 - Damaris (Host)

Make my day better, and then it does, but that to me is like the biggest thing. And then the meditation in their traditional sense doesn't work for me, like you know, sitting down and being quiet. I think I find meditation through reading, and it could be reading anything you know, just sitting down taking a nap, yeah no, but that is, that's a first.

59:04 - Naomi (Guest)

That's a first Taking a nap. How do you meditate? I take a nap.

59:09 - Damaris (Host)

I never heard that word. Well, you're welcome, Naomi.

59:13 - Nachi (Host)

You need your body to rejuvenate.

59:17 - Damaris (Host)

My body needs to rejuvenate and I'm just like okay, I need to just rest my trouble of place to calmness my body doesn't like. And two for too many years because of this. You know how we're conditioned to work these 40 hour work weeks.

59:34 - Nachi (Host)

I'm too bad at that, donkey.

59:36 - Damaris (Host)

Yeah, working like a donkey and I never did that because it wasn't. It didn't align with my spirit. No, this has been a fantastic conversation and obviously this is not going to be our last. And again, Nachi and I we're grateful to our listeners and grateful to Naomi to sit with us and talk about all this important work that we need to do individually you know, spiritually, emotionally and mentally and we hope that our listeners have gotten something out of this and now have access to resources and things to consider different ways of aligning themselves with their you know, with their a higher being, and also just connecting intuitively with your own spirituality, and whatever that looks like, there's no one way to go about it. So thank you all for listening and we look forward to talking to you guys in our next episode. Please follow us on your favorite podcast platform and sign up for our emails on our website at imnotyelling.co to get the latest update.