Love With Dottie Todman

[00:00:00] Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of the Thriving Adoptees podcast. Today I'm delighted to be joined by Dottie, Dottie Toddman. Looking forward to our conversation today, Dottie.

[00:00:12] Me too. Thank you for having me.

[00:00:15] Yeah. So does the word healing, does that resonate for you, Dottie?

[00:00:24] Oh yeah, that's a very important word.

[00:00:27] Yeah.

[00:00:28] It brings up a lot.

[00:00:31] Yeah, it does. It does for all of us I think. What does it bring up? What's the first kind of thing it brings up for you in terms of what it means to you maybe?

[00:00:44] Well, the first thing that I think of is love. At this stage in my life where I am now, I think before it was more about physical healing because of so much trauma.

[00:01:02] But now when I think of the word healing and my healing journey, that was so much devoted externally trying to have other people fix me versus the love that I wasn't able to receive.

[00:01:20] I think a lot because of how I came into the world and those challenges at such a young age.

[00:01:29] Yeah. So physical love versus, so physical healing is like a counterpoint to internal love healing?

[00:01:43] That's exactly right. That's exactly right. It's an inner journey and I really, more than ever now, knowing how much my relationship to myself, all the things we weren't taught.

[00:02:00] We were taught that you should think nothing of yourself and very little, at least that's what I was taught. Don't be too full of yourself and you are what you do and what you accomplish in life.

[00:02:19] And I feel like most of us here, I mean it's hard enough just coming into this world as a human being in a family with giant humans that are going to take out and project all their crap onto you.

[00:02:34] Right? That's what everyone kind of comes in with but being adopted kind of adds this other layer of complexity on top of that where, and I'm just going to shut that off so it doesn't bug us anymore.

[00:02:47] It adds another layer of complexity because there's this separation thing that happens. There's a longing that happens. There's a lack of understanding of who am I and why these people aren't, they're not like me.

[00:03:05] And I know that maybe a lot of other people feel that way, that came into homes with parents that did give birth to them. But for me, my healing journey, I think it started as soon as all the wounds began but I was unaware of it because I was not receptive to the love that was all around me.

[00:03:32] I didn't know how to, I mean at first you kind of know how to take it in. Right? But like what's that saying? You can have all the water in the world that it won't sink the ship unless it gets inside.

[00:03:48] But if you flip that and say there's all the love in the world, right? But it won't rise us up. It won't bless us unless it gets inside. And I feel like as being someone, like when you're adopted, when there's any sort of something going on outside of the regular something-something as a kid growing up, it can get really sticky with how that love is received.

[00:04:15] And we all know that love really does heal. So I can, I mean it's as cheesy as that sounds, right? I have proof in my life. I have proof that that's a thing. It's not just, it's not the physical, it's the inner and the inner creates, I believe, the outer wounds and all the other diseases and things that happen in a person's life.

[00:04:43] Yeah. Wow, there's so much there, Dottie. I like how do I, I've got about five different alternative questions off the back of that.

[00:04:54] Cool.

[00:04:56] So where do I go with it? Right. I'll go with mainstream, right? We'll stick on the love thing, right? So it's not about what they give, it's about what we receive. Is that kind of what you're saying?

[00:05:17] Yeah, yeah. I mean would you like me to share a little bit of my story to give a little bit of background so then I can kind of tie it in with how, what the healing actually, like what created, what happened for me?

[00:05:31] So coming into this world where literally my existence didn't make sense because, you know, I was taken from my birth mother, put in an incubator because there were some complications at birth.

[00:05:46] And so I was in there for two weeks and I didn't have, there's like no human. I'm sure there was a human somewhere but, so that separation from the mother that all, you know, that can do stuff.

[00:05:58] And then I was put into a foster home and she was visiting that home but after six months, she was told that I was adopted. And so, but I wasn't, I wasn't actually adopted until I was a year and a half old.

[00:06:18] So there was this sadness in me that never made sense. When I did get adopted and I went to a white lady who, you know, she didn't really, I mean back in those days, I mean, let me put it like this, they were old school.

[00:06:38] So I was raised by old school Canadian people.

[00:06:43] And they moved to a small community where there were no black people. Now my mother was married to a black man but they divorced when I was 11.

[00:06:54] And my mother's older sister who was born in 1920 was a big part of our lives and she moved in with us. She didn't like my, I mean, to this day even though she's passed now she'll say I do like him but she did not like my father.

[00:07:12] And my father was from the Virgin Islands, or is from the Virgin Islands. And he did not like children but they already had a son. So they had a biological son so he was black, and then my brother was beige and then my mother was white and then there was me who was like also kind of black, black, black.

[00:07:33] And so I was like for me that's normal, like our family's a color of a rainbow. How fun and I thought that that was interesting.

[00:07:42] And even though they gave love in ways that maybe

[00:07:51] didn't, they didn't fully, I didn't feel fully accepted but I felt accepted enough. I was a wild child I had a lot of energy and wildness and writing songs and bouncing around and my mother be like Dorothy, children are to be seen and not heard.

[00:08:09] And there was sort of reverence, but attitude there that made me feel a little not accepted. But over the years what happened in this family dynamic is you know there was the divorce there was, you know, all of the hang ups that people have mental emotional

[00:08:29] and all that normal stuff apparently that's normal these days going on in the home, and no understanding of why I was different. The hair didn't make sense my skin color. Back then we didn't have internet so it was like, why, you know, the only black people I saw were starving

[00:08:50] children sadly on the TV, but the commercials of the Ethiopia of the kids in Ethiopia and Nigeria with the bulging stomachs. And I thought that was me because I my stomach kind of protruded excites and gastrointestinal stuff going on.

[00:09:05] Over the years I developed something called endometriosis which is now one in every 10 women have this horrible disease where every 20 days, like the year cycle doesn't stay in the uterus it goes outside of it and pulls on the organs and creates excruciating pain.

[00:09:23] And I would cry out in pain when I was at home and my auntie and my mom would be like oh you're so dramatic you're, you know you're. And so between that all of the racism that I faced in school, and all of the other things that happened for me.

[00:09:40] What became my best friend or my parents was God, I was like, God is my dad.

[00:09:48] You know, I love God, and my youngest understanding of God was, I remember when I was so tiny and thinking, God was this big glowy ball of light, this big glowy ball of light.

[00:10:03] And God, and I came, I was like a little tiny ball that popped off of it. I just remember this is so weird it sounds so weird, but then they were telling me that God's this white dude in the sky, and he has a beard.

[00:10:17] And I just thought that's so weird but then there was this other guy Jesus that died and I love Jesus and I got the Gideon Bible but like all this stuff relates to like well how do I make sense of myself right.

[00:10:30] So I created my version of what who and what I thought God was, which still didn't make sense with what the rest of the world seemed to think God was because it was some dude in the sky that was like Santa that was like you're good, and I judge you, or you're bad

[00:10:47] or you're bad like if you're bad then you're being judged and you're going to go to hell forever. And if you're good, you're going to be loved and that seems so conditional and that was the same type of love I got from this family, but I didn't know what my real parents were they told me

[00:11:01] that I was adopted. So, all of that I feel like all of that plays a role in the psyche of human especially if you're adopted because you don't know your roots you don't get a sense of like, at least for me especially like when there's not even teachers in school

[00:11:18] and then except for Gary Coleman, you know, and to the right so they're like kids my age or like older than me when I was a kid right. So you see these people on TV and nothing made sense.

[00:11:34] Nothing made sense, nothing made sense but it forced me. It forced me to carve out my own journey at a young age. And what I was rewarded for was singing, it was, it was being able to sing and I was writing music to comfort myself.

[00:11:53] And all of this information right well where do you get love. Oh I'm singing I'm on stage I'm getting acceptance there. So that's, that was a key for me to flourish in that area.

[00:12:05] But was I doing it because I love God and me or was I doing it because I want to be accepted and fit in. Right.

[00:12:15] So, this is where I say the healing when you asked me about healing. Now looking back and looking back through like we could go on a lot of different pathways I don't know which one you want to go on there's the endometriosis path right there's the psychological

[00:12:31] path of the spiritual journey and all that which is sort of tied in there's the singing. Hey, I could just ramble on forever so.

[00:12:40] Okay.

[00:12:42] Let's go back to the, let's go back to the love thing because I think that's so we talked about love as the healing power and you're talking about love from within as different from love from without, you know the love of the crowd and finding, finding love, love within.

[00:13:04] Something popped into my head and earlier this week, which is, are we like we seek, do we need to seek love outside when outside ourselves, when we realize we are, we are actually love itself.

[00:13:30] If we are love.

[00:13:34] We don't need it from anybody else right.

[00:13:38] Well that's the thing I mean, if we're all we're also all connected.

[00:13:43] And, and so, when you're with in a relationship with someone, you can. How are you ever going to know where your triggers are right and your bumpy areas that things that like we're we're not love because everybody has that everybody has shadows.

[00:14:00] And when you're just on your own which honestly for me I have been a lot of my life. You, you might get a false sense of I'm doing great right and then you get around someone you're like man this person's driving me crazy.

[00:14:14] My mother or my father or this or that like all of this is connected so yeah we don't need, we don't have to have love when we realize we are love, but we can benefit from that because as we grow and evolve right we we know man is an island, like they say.

[00:14:33] And I feel like maybe for some, for some people like if they've always been with with other people or have all this comfort around them and love and they're just then it might be growth for them to be on their own and to know like I'm okay on my own.

[00:14:48] And then there are other people that have always been on their own or that maybe have felt abandoned or and learn to live through that that might grow from having you know that companionship and learning what is like instead of if they have avoidance tendencies right like I'm just going to avoid the pain.

[00:15:08] Well that wasn't pleasant I'm done like now, now I'm not love. And so I feel like part of this game down here on this planet is actually knowing when we are buying into a lie.

[00:15:21] Because I feel like what you're talking about when we don't feel loved or like we are that love, which is pretty much happens to people every day probably right there's always going to be something that irks you or that's when we're buying into a lie and that's when we got to do this formula

[00:15:40] that I discovered for me that's helped me a lot it's helped my singers it's called core. You know you connect yourself, you pop out or become objective and see yourself and go I see that right now I'm buying into a lie and I am being triggered right now I do not feel love I want to kill this other person

[00:15:59] or not really killed them but you know I want to or I've really irked right now what am I what what's going on for me oh do I feel like I'm nine again or five again and the kids were picking on me when I was all alone and I had no parents to protect me.

[00:16:14] Or like see everything I feel like we do in our adulthood is oftentimes connected to protecting that child that we were when we were just little and helpless in the world and we feel that way.

[00:16:30] And so we, we have to remember as adults we're not that kid anymore. And so we can when we can be objective and do that, and then do the are in core which is tuned into what you just said we are loved our unique resonance.

[00:16:45] The R stands for resonate.

[00:16:48] I am a unique spark of the divine.

[00:16:51] Right, and to really tune into what makes me unique and why I'm loved. That's something we got to remind ourselves of because if we don't remind ourselves man we're going to get swallowed up this world is a crazy place it can be.

[00:17:04] It can be a beautiful place but it can be a crazy tough place because it's dense down here.

[00:17:10] And it feels dense because we are light. Right, if we weren't light if we weren't love, we would probably feel fine, because we would just blend in with all the gook.

[00:17:22] But we're where we feel heavy, because we're light and all the stuff around us can pull us out of that light.

[00:17:32] That was kind of a big answer to what you, you asked but, but like for me that's how I remember I connect. I learned to be objective and then have an objective What do I want today oh I want to bring light into the world oh I want to share my gifts

[00:17:47] I want to help these people sing right that's what I get to do. But if I'm not in touch with my resonance, I can easily fall out and get deceived by other people stop or feel their pain or become way too empathic which I was for years.

[00:18:03] I went to every healer on the planet to try to fix my illness that I suffered for 33 years, 33 years of pain will will teach you a lot of lessons for me, my voice and that disease were my biggest spiritual tools and my adoption, even though this sounds crazy but in

[00:18:21] And it was like a foundation for my soul to actually grow deeper and, and I don't want to say faster because I feel like a late bloomer.

[00:18:36] So you're talking about that. Where do I go next on this one.

[00:18:41] What about you talking about, you know, God as a God is my dad when you, you know, when you were a kid, and these these big, then it's this ball of light, which is kind of ironic when you're black, but it's the gentleman.

[00:19:01] But I never connected to my, the black.

[00:19:05] Right, because, because I wasn't, I didn't know what that was so I just ignored my physical body.

[00:19:12] Okay, so you're talking about your soul like I just was like, I'm not even this. I am a ball of glowing light.

[00:19:22] What does that have to do with being any color. Yeah.

[00:19:28] That's a big question right. That's a big question.

[00:19:34] I've had similar thoughts around that.

[00:19:38] But I've actually kept those to myself and myself, because I don't want to come across as racist, which is interesting isn't it.

[00:19:47] Oh, what are you going to say.

[00:19:49] Well, I would say, well, that big, that big white light that the God is and you're there.

[00:20:00] That's your dad, and then you said you're a little starburst Did you say what was the use the word that you're a little spark spark spark of the divine right spark of a design.

[00:20:15] I don't, I don't think sparks have a color.

[00:20:20] I mean, yeah, sparks. We're talking about a non physical self right.

[00:20:26] Yeah, that's, that's that houses the biological spacesuit that we are.

[00:20:32] So I can see that spark in everyone. It's the same spark, whether you're Asian white black, you know, Indian, I don't care what color you are on the outside.

[00:20:43] That's just like, like having a glove and then the hands inside. That's the spirit. But the body's on the outside.

[00:20:51] Yeah. Yeah. So I've heard this expressed as a meat suit.

[00:20:56] Okay, yeah. Yeah. So we've got a meat meat so meat suits come in different colors, but the spark on the inside is all the same.

[00:21:06] We're all one. Yeah, it's connected.

[00:21:10] But it's not exactly the same because it's connected to the spacesuit.

[00:21:15] And that space suit has the DNA in it and it has intelligence. So God's like big gods also like this magnet and God is also this like its matter.

[00:21:28] Well, I don't know if it's this because this is just this isn't alive. But I guess they say stones are even alive right we could we can go into a whole talk on metaphysics and neuroscience and we get deep into that.

[00:21:41] But yeah.

[00:21:43] Yeah.

[00:21:45] So, the, the, the, as the big ball as as God is the big ball of light.

[00:21:55] Or people, some people might call consciousness with a, I mean, yeah.

[00:22:01] And that is, you're seeing a link between that and the star, the sparkle that comes off it. And then the sparkle that sat in inside the meat suit.

[00:22:13] And we're saying that God is always saying that God is the same as love like, is that is that kind of what you're saying.

[00:22:22] That's the healing power.

[00:22:24] Yeah.

[00:22:29] Do you remember the first time you felt that

[00:22:36] the love of God in that big way.

[00:22:39] Yeah.

[00:22:41] Well, when I was acknowledging that that's what God was I felt it then.

[00:22:48] And then I don't, I, I felt it in different ways but the biggest like the one that the real time that I felt it was after I had what I guess you could call it a near to death experience.

[00:23:05] And that's when they, they had nicked my bowel. And I woke up from it that was in 2007 they nicked my bowel by accident. When I woke up.

[00:23:16] I had, it was like all of the pain up to that point in my life all the anger all the frustration and all the fear, fear and abandonment and all that was gone and I just felt so much love that I knew that there was that that there was this divine presence

[00:23:37] connected to us all. I also remember a time previous to that where this is gonna sound weird but so when I was a missionary before the church that I went to this person that we were teaching, put his hand he was a Qigong master.

[00:23:54] So he studied the art of energy and moving energy and we thought that was of the devil like that. But this man put his hand on my forehead and he did something. And about 20 minutes later, my third eye open.

[00:24:09] And I love that, like I always thought love was here. And he would always be pointing he's like no there's love and point to his forehead up we just kind of thought he was kind of, and he probably was a bit but hey you got to love his name is Richard.

[00:24:24] And Richard taught us a lot but the other time I experienced that was. Yeah, when he when he put his hand on my third eye I didn't know was, I didn't know he did anything and then 20 minutes later I had to stop the car I was driving.

[00:24:40] I was just filled with all this love. Those are the really two big times in my life, other than when I was having that moment of knowing and in that moment that I was telling you about about God being this big glowy light and me being this ball from the

[00:24:58] I was probably like three or four at the time. It also told me why I was here, it was like you are here to help humanity this sounds so weird. But that's what I remember I still remember that it was like, you were here and I'm like this three year old and I'm like crying.

[00:25:17] But I'm not even with my family, I'm with these other people. So it was almost like something was showing me like, don't worry this is going to be kind of jacked up for a bit.

[00:25:29] But you're here and then like over the years and things just have slowly been revealed to me like a lot of there's been spaces in my life where nothing made sense.

[00:25:41] And then I'm like, oh, like, oh, I have five sisters in 2012 I find out oh you have five sisters like my whole life I thought it was by myself you know weird stuff my life's crazy that way.

[00:25:54] So I just kind of at this point I'm just like, love.

[00:26:00] Simplify.

[00:26:02] But if you start asking me questions there are a lot of stuff's going to come off right because it's just all compacted in here and a nice little whatever, Piscean ramble.

[00:26:14] Fantastic.

[00:26:20] The sense is the sense of oneness with everything, part of your love.

[00:26:31] White shining ball experience. Is that part of it?

[00:26:36] Like we're all one but you can she said, we're all connected.

[00:26:40] Oh yeah we're all connected.

[00:26:42] Is that is that part of is that connection and oneness.

[00:26:49] Is that part of what the white ball has, the white ball experience.

[00:26:57] Yeah I mean, I, when I was little that's how I saw it was just a big white ball I mean, I mean it was a, it was, it was a big glowy ball of light, like, but now I'm grown like I don't know like I'm not saying we're all in this

[00:27:12] well maybe we're on this big glory ball like, you know, but it was like are you, are you asking me now like now how do I see it or is God or is love connected to the glory ball is that what you're asking me.

[00:27:27] Yeah, I'm asking you about the sense of connection.

[00:27:32] Because I have my little, my story about this.

[00:27:37] And it has, it comes about in a different way.

[00:27:41] And I'm, I'm just asked before I kind of rushing with my day, right because I'm supposed to be interviewing you.

[00:27:49] I'm asking you about this this. Well let me put it different way that okay. So, when do you remember having the first sense of us all being one do you remember when that happened.

[00:28:08] Yeah, the first time. That's the thing I mean, I always thought that. And then, and then life comes in, and it makes us see things differently it's like it almost changes our perception or consciousness is shifted into believing we're small.

[00:28:31] But when I was little.

[00:28:34] Right, and of course I had this longing like I always long for my mother.

[00:28:40] Right, and that that connection and that longing might may have pulled me out of it but when I was so little.

[00:28:47] You know, that that was, it was everything like I could see it around everyone it was. It was everybody was in everyone and when but they didn't know like they forgot like they were, they had all this other crap.

[00:29:03] And I feel like probably everybody might feel that like everyone might see that and then no one talks about it no one talks about all the glowy lights around people but baby see that stuff.

[00:29:15] We, we sense it is who we really are. And then it's like we go through this veil of forgetfulness and then we're just like, let's eat some hamburgers and like to turn TV on it's like, meet the hamburgers eat the junk food and drink some beer and dumb yourself down.

[00:29:30] And people are just walking around like zombies forgetting that they're these divine sparks and thinking that they are what they do versus.

[00:29:39] They just already are awesome and they get to create.

[00:29:44] So when you asked me like when is that first moment or when is that it was like, if you say well I was like it was on April the 10th like I don't know when when the day was or I feel like for me.

[00:30:00] It was, it was me and then over time, it just got smaller and smaller and smaller until I forgot and I just thought I was a piece of crap.

[00:30:10] And I've been spending the rest of my life right learning how to get back to like remembering and that's what healing is that's what I think healing is healing is is our journey of remembering who we really are.

[00:30:24] And finding out what those psychological problems are called psychological problems, but they're really just veils of forgetfulness and being able to identify when we're buying into that lie.

[00:30:39] Using tools like breathing and just getting back in the body because I used to hate my body I hated my blackness I hated.

[00:30:48] I mean I was like this isn't even black it's a brown why they call it black like nothing made sense right. So you got to learn how to make friends with this is a beautiful vehicle.

[00:30:58] Our bodies are also part of God and our bodies are far more intelligence than we can possibly imagine, and knowing that helped me heal, knowing that my body can go beyond what my thoughts are, and knowing that God beats its heart through my body.

[00:31:18] God is the heart beating through me I'm not controlling that.

[00:31:24] It's like how do you explain that.

[00:31:27] Right.

[00:31:29] So it's all like whatever it is that you could say well your parents created you but yeah then who created them and you could just keep going back and back until it's like you got there's something beating that my heart.

[00:31:42] There's an energy there and that life force is the God in us that life force. So that was again another long answer from Dodd.

[00:31:55] Brilliant. Love it.

[00:31:58] So there's a sense you have that you have that felt sense of oneness and then you kind of lost it and then you found it again. Is that about it?

[00:32:09] That sounds about right and and every day I continue to find it I continue to strive to remember because it's so easy you can forget in an instant who you are.

[00:32:21] It's so easy to get pulled into the, you know, web of affairs of life and get all caught up oh I've got to do this thing and this is important and blah blah blah blah blah and then we get ungrounded and our muscles tighten because our we forget about it.

[00:32:39] Yeah we're not present but when I can stop and get really still it's like and I can literally feel now I'm to the point where when I'm meditating or just sitting and being present I can feel like when I think about a thing I can feel my oh oh wait I'm tightening my jaw right now.

[00:32:56] I'm thinking of this thing and it's like oh wait come back in.

[00:33:00] Just relaxes back down. It's like oh yeah I think that person tight oh wait oh yeah I'm here I'm here now I'm here.

[00:33:11] I had this feeling yesterday. It was a new feeling to me. It was a sense of warmth. It was actually an uncomfortable feeling and it started on my jawline and it went down my neck to where my neck joins my body.

[00:33:44] It was just in that little band there. I never felt that before. Any idea what that was?

[00:33:58] That's your throat chakra. Those are your digastric muscles. It's like a band that goes around your like your swallow muscles. It's connected to your swallow muscles.

[00:34:09] When you had the feeling, was it a pleasant feeling?

[00:34:12] No.

[00:34:13] Or was it a tight like a...

[00:34:16] It wasn't tight. It wasn't slack. It was like warmth. It was like an embarrassment. It felt like when your face is red through embarrassment but it wasn't on my face. It was just below my jawline.

[00:34:42] And it was and I was it was to do... I'd upset somebody and I hadn't realized that I'd upset that person. And she was telling me that I'd upset him.

[00:35:01] And as this was happening, it was this feeling as I started from my jawline all the way down but only just on my throat. So it must be something to do with what I was saying.

[00:35:17] I don't know.

[00:35:19] Do you remember what... Oh so you were talking at the time this was happening?

[00:35:23] So she gave me the feedback. I was listening to the feedback and I responded. Then she said something else and we were kind of like but for a good five minutes it was there. It didn't matter whether she was speaking or I was speaking. It's actually starting to come back now.

[00:35:50] Because you're thinking about it.

[00:35:52] Because I'm thinking about it.

[00:35:53] What was the quality of your communication when you were talking with her? Was it awesome or was it awful? Did it express how you really felt or was it...

[00:36:05] Yeah, good question.

[00:36:11] It was me being embarrassed and upset about the upset that had unintentionally and unknowingly caused.

[00:36:28] And so you acknowledge that when you spoke?

[00:36:31] Oh yeah. Yeah. I took the thing.

[00:36:34] Excellent. I touched it on board. I didn't say what you want about, you know, you're mad, you know, you're making this all up. I didn't say anything. I acknowledged it and I shared. Yeah, I acknowledged it. I tried to take it on.

[00:36:56] That's excellent. So what I'm picking up on is that your throat chakra actually, if we want to call it a throat chakra, but basically it's opening and it opened and you were connecting to your heart.

[00:37:16] That's actually a good thing. And that's how it feels though. It feels kind of like when it does it, it feels like something's melting and I feel kind of naked.

[00:37:26] Kind of like that. But like, like just like if it's and so these what everything that we say think and feel the throat chakra, like your voice. This one is kind of like it's connected to all the other chakras.

[00:37:44] It's connected to all the lower chakras. And if any of them, when they fall out of alignment, it can kind of mess up your throat chakra a bit. When you come into a space where you acknowledge another person and you're listening and you're like, you're open and receptive.

[00:38:09] That is healing to you. That's good. But it sometimes feel, it can feel very strange because you may have actually been a lot tighter in this area before than you than you ever thought.

[00:38:24] And when you release the ability to want to control or do anything like that and you just yeah feeling embarrassment is great because really it's just acknowledging oh like your ego is having a problem right now.

[00:38:38] Right now. Right. It's like, oh, like it's just the ego. But it sounds based on what you said that you let go of that and you just dropped in. And then when you drop in, I call it dropping in like really being in our body.

[00:38:53] This lets go.

[00:38:55] And you're able to speak the words.

[00:38:58] Yeah, is that resonator.

[00:39:00] It does. And the big word that's coming out for me to describe it was this is that was quite unusual for me. This is an it's an unusual thing you know you said strange, it was unusual.

[00:39:19] And listeners if you're wondering why on earth we're talking about this right so and Dottie was a singer, you still a singer. And she is also a vocal coach. So that's why I'm asking all these questions because clearly she knows her stuff right and it's

[00:39:43] What does it is vocal coaching from a kind of a holistic holistic approach, rather than just practicing scales or breathing techniques is she's she's looking, you're looking at the whole body the holistic side is that I mean how would you sum it up in

[00:40:09] Yeah, I didn't know that it was like that I thought you know you just sing. And I thought I'm going to be a vocal coach and help people to sing and we're all going to join hands and sing Hallelujah.

[00:40:24] And what I realized is, wow, like even my voice is blocked. And it is so connected to how I think and feel about myself and all of my childhood wounds and trauma.

[00:40:38] And through my healing journey. I took the tools and I was able to and am able to help other people as well. And I continue to work through my stuff. So when people come to me with vocal issues, I know that, you know, from the accident that I went through and and the healing from that accident when you have a

[00:41:01] Scar along your core. That's pretty much all your chakras ripped open except for your heart.

[00:41:07] So you got to heal that area and all of the healing involves a lot of understanding of where we're holding on to judgment to pain to guilt to all the all the things in the past, not feeling accepted worrying about what other people think

[00:41:24] That's going to affect your voice. So now I've become very keen and aware of when people come to me with their vocal issues.

[00:41:34] I want to give them the exercises too because those are important. But if they have a problem, you got to get to the root. Like if you just put a bandaid on something right

[00:41:46] It's not going to you can try to train it from the outside. But as soon as you put that person in a situation where it's like sing, okay, we're in front of 100 people now.

[00:41:57] They're going to freak out if they haven't dealt with their feeling of how they're being perceived by other people and that ties in with your real confidence.

[00:42:08] And when you really know that you are a spark of the divine, whatever you believe in right. I'm a spark is something good. You know, I mean, I am I almost think that people who don't believe in God like

[00:42:21] I don't blame them because the God that I think man has tried to create to generate money through businesses that are so called churches right versus like, hey, let's just learn about who we really are.

[00:42:35] And like, hey, I totally love Jesus. Like Jesus is I love Jesus. Like I you could say I'm a Christian, but it might not be the definition of Christian right but when you start to understand

[00:42:49] Who you really are and and what Jesus actually taught what he actually said we can do. It makes everything easier. It makes everything easier because you're not a part of thinking you're small anymore and thinking you have something to prove.

[00:43:05] I have nothing to prove. I have nothing to hide. I have nothing to protect, and I have nothing to defend those four statements are pretty impossible like I'm sure there's a lot of people who don't believe in God.

[00:43:16] I know I do want to prove that I sound good or I want to protect my reputation.

[00:43:21] But when you can do all four of these like really do all four. That's where we start to get into mastery level. I'm not saying I'm there yet because clearly even though I just said those four things.

[00:43:31] No man, I got stuff I need to work on. But I'm happy that I can feel peaceful and aware of those things and I can also it's easier right so is easier to when someone else has a problem like we always can give advice to our friends can't wait.

[00:43:53] Right, but then it's like okay am I going to live by that too. And so that for me is a very important thing.

[00:44:00] And so that for me is what I strive to do and at first when I started teaching, man, I would be telling people to do stuff and then I'd be like oh my god I'm not.

[00:44:11] I'm not doing that. I had to start writing it down I created books I created volumes of information that that I just wanted to live by, and I now get that this is really all it's for me.

[00:44:24] Right, first I got to make sure I practice what I preach, and that makes you more powerful because then you're holding the frequency of what you share.

[00:44:34] Right.

[00:44:36] Yeah.

[00:44:38] And by frequency.

[00:44:41] Do you mean that that scale of consciousness thing from David Hawkins yeah.

[00:44:47] Yeah, well you can you can you can say it like that yeah yeah Hawkins.

[00:44:54] But yeah, when I say it, I just mean like it's it's like telling someone you have a cigarette in your hand you're smoking and you're telling your kid hey don't smoke.

[00:45:02] They're not going to listen to what you do.

[00:45:05] They're going to listen, I mean they're not going to listen to what you say, they're going to listen to what you do.

[00:45:11] Children don't listen to what their parents tell them 90% of the time, they, they listen to the frequency or the actions and the vibration right because everything we think and feel that's that generates a frequency right and so yeah David Hawkins

[00:45:28] scale right you want to live in the higher frequencies and all that but just even to simplify it.

[00:45:34] Basically, it's living and breathing and being what you truly believe in.

[00:45:40] And then when you teach that you're in alignment with it. And when you're in alignment with it, it holds up way stronger than if you're not.

[00:45:50] And people can tell it's kind of like someone getting up and singing but in the mind they're like I hate myself I hate myself and they're like, and like everyone knows even though they might be hitting the right notes the frequency that they're giving out or the energy that

[00:46:02] they're giving out is like really awkward and no one enjoys it because they didn't.

[00:46:08] Does that make sense.

[00:46:10] Yeah, it does and I'm just thinking about the like the frequency.

[00:46:15] How the frequency changes at a gig right.

[00:46:19] So, I can talk about this David Hawkins stuff and it's a bit complicated.

[00:46:24] It is right. So, to we know what we know what low energy feels like and we know what higher energy feels like we know you know when the when the teacher that we don't like and nobody likes comes into the room.

[00:46:37] And the atmosphere drops through the floor right, you know, or when does that buzz of it does the buzz of excitement.

[00:46:45] Before the, when the, when the lights go down in the auditorium and it's clear that the band are coming right so there's this, there's this everybody's is it there's a certain level of buzz and excitement but people are talking and then the lights go out and then

[00:47:01] it goes up a level, and then that then the lights come on and all the band are on, and the crowd go nuts. That's the sort of energy we're talking about.

[00:47:11] Yeah, yeah.

[00:47:19] I want to run a little theory by you in terms of

[00:47:27] how trauma

[00:47:32] blocks this sense of oneness.

[00:47:40] So it's like a barrier, it puts a barrier between us and others.

[00:47:51] You had that felt sense of oneness as a kid.

[00:47:56] And you remember it.

[00:48:00] I may have had that felt sense of oneness but I don't remember it.

[00:48:05] And that's why I asked you about the oneness thing.

[00:48:09] Right, because I, I read this letter from my birth mother.

[00:48:15] 10 years ago.

[00:48:17] And I, I just, I just, I just cried.

[00:48:26] I just cried.

[00:48:28] And I felt, I felt what somehow I felt at one with her through this, this feeling that this belief that she didn't love me enough to keep me.

[00:48:48] Went.

[00:48:50] And when the belief went, the barrier, when and we were one.

[00:49:00] And then I thought, ah, I've had that sense of oneness in concerts.

[00:49:10] I've had that sense of oneness in sports.

[00:49:16] State in rugby stadiums.

[00:49:19] When I'm English and I'm listening to the Scottish national anthem.

[00:49:25] And I'm feeling a sense of oneness.

[00:49:27] And then the French national anthem comes on.

[00:49:30] And I'm still, and I've got that sense of oneness as well.

[00:49:37] And I'm English, I'm not Scottish or French.

[00:49:42] And it's, it's a, it's a, it's a space.

[00:49:45] And I touched that same space.

[00:49:51] I touched it with my somatic.

[00:49:54] I experienced a woman like a month or so ago.

[00:49:57] Last time I saw her.

[00:49:59] Touched the space and that, that sense of oneness, that love to me kind of feels like the healing.

[00:50:10] Feels like the healing space.

[00:50:12] I think you're spot on.

[00:50:17] Because people are giving their attention, which is the most beautiful gift that we can offer to their connection.

[00:50:28] And whether even though it's like, oh, this is my country or, oh, I can't wait for this music or, oh, we're all thinking the same thing in the same time in the same space.

[00:50:39] And so that, and then the oneness, the one mind, right.

[00:50:45] It comes, it connects together.

[00:50:49] But that's always there.

[00:50:51] It's just, I feel like part of the game is let's get humans to get as scattered in their mind, lower their attention span, help them forget who they are so they're easier to market to.

[00:51:04] Right?

[00:51:05] So they'll buy like if you, if you don't know your value or your worth, then you're going to want to buy clothes a certain way.

[00:51:12] Look a certain way.

[00:51:13] You know, keep this or that in your life to feel important.

[00:51:18] And you're going to not thrive as who you truly are.

[00:51:24] And I feel like it's part of the game to make us forget.

[00:51:27] But when we when we come together like this and community is such a beautiful thing.

[00:51:32] Right.

[00:51:33] And that's something like it's interesting hearing you talk about like coming together at all these things.

[00:51:39] I'm thinking, yeah, I rarely like even though I'm so all about the oneness and stuff as an adopted person.

[00:51:47] I just learned last year that it's a common trait for us to not have community.

[00:51:52] And that's something like I have like I've created small little communities for myself.

[00:51:58] But usually if I'm not the leader of that community, I feel weird being like part of the family of that.

[00:52:08] I don't always know my place.

[00:52:10] And like you say, when we have that trauma, right, everyone has different styles of dealing with it.

[00:52:17] For me, it's avoidance.

[00:52:18] I just step back.

[00:52:19] I'm like, oh, let me go back, crawl under my rock and not be a part of that because I don't belong because I'm so that's what I'm used to.

[00:52:27] I'm used to not belonging.

[00:52:29] I'm used to not being like everybody else.

[00:52:33] And with a name like Dot already, that name is like dot to dotty.

[00:52:38] Right.

[00:52:39] You're you're this spot like literally I was this black dot in the sea of white like it's almost comical.

[00:52:45] Right.

[00:52:46] The just the reminder that you're different, you're different, you're different, you're wrong, you're wrong, you're wrong.

[00:52:51] And that that's going to create a lot of trauma.

[00:52:54] And so, you know, I've come to learn in my profession because when people come to me, of course, they have they want to learn how to sing.

[00:53:03] It's not just all flowers and butterflies.

[00:53:06] And usually there's I thought it would just be throat chakra being shut down.

[00:53:11] What I learned is your throat chakra is actually connected deeply to the heart chakra and all the other ones.

[00:53:19] And it's between the heart and the mind.

[00:53:21] And isn't that how we feel sometimes when we sing like like or even speaking like, oh, my gosh, I'm so excited.

[00:53:28] I want to do and then you're like, oh, my gosh, what are they going to think?

[00:53:31] Right. Oh, this feels good. Oh, no.

[00:53:33] What's happening? What am I? What's my voice doing?

[00:53:35] Oh, yeah. And so see this cycle and the voices in between these two.

[00:53:40] And there's a battle between the heart and the mind, which is very similar to our lives.

[00:53:45] We live this life of trying to be in this world.

[00:53:49] And we know where that spark. We want to be in our heart.

[00:53:52] But our brain tells us you got to earn. You got to do this.

[00:53:56] You got to you got to make some of yourself because you're a piece of crap or whatever you bought into that the television or the media or your mom or your parents.

[00:54:04] Or whatever they're they projected onto you, you know.

[00:54:07] So we're walking around with all this stuff. And at the end of the day, no, I want to heal.

[00:54:12] Oh, I am that love. I am everything that I've been looking for.

[00:54:18] I'm all I am all of those things.

[00:54:20] I just need to what if I was still and I let my body unwind like you did in your moment of communication with someone instead of like tightening and reacting and going, whatever.

[00:54:32] I didn't do that. You softened and you opened and you were vulnerable.

[00:54:37] And that vulnerability allows love to come in, even if we just crack open a little bit.

[00:54:43] Now that love can get inside of that ship. Right.

[00:54:48] And really let it to let it soar.

[00:54:51] But if we don't have those vulnerable openings and let ourselves be seen and let ourselves feel that awkward feeling like, oh, what's this opening?

[00:55:00] You might fill it in your throat. You might fill in your heart.

[00:55:03] You might fill in your stomach wherever we fill those openings, we just like watch them or like, oh, I see my stomach's flipping out right now.

[00:55:12] Hi, stomach. And we just we know we're bigger than that.

[00:55:17] And that's where God can come in and bless us with all of the wonderful essence that is already who we are anyway.

[00:55:26] And that's where healing begins. And that for me has been really hard to learn.

[00:55:31] It's been really hard to learn.

[00:55:33] And I'm grateful that I feel like I'm just at the beginning of my journey, you know, and I've already been on this planet quite a few decades.

[00:55:40] We won't say how many. Right.

[00:55:43] But hey, I got to make friends with the now because that's really all I have.

[00:55:50] And I spent all my younger years going, oh, when I'm older, I'm going to do this and I got to be this by this age.

[00:55:57] And now I'm like, oh, I am that past that age that I thought that I would have all this stuff.

[00:56:03] Can you relate to that, Simon? Like, did you ever think like, I mean, you've done a lot.

[00:56:08] So maybe you don't feel that way.

[00:56:11] But I feel like, oh, I'm barely getting started.

[00:56:15] Yeah, I feel in some ways I've learned stuff and another way is I'm a complete beginner.

[00:56:27] Beginner's mind, as they say, you know, open, opening up curiosity.

[00:56:36] Because there's a danger we have these things.

[00:56:39] I don't know whether you have them in America.

[00:56:41] They're called grumpy old men.

[00:56:44] And here in the UK, grumpy old men are very, very sad in their ways.

[00:56:53] Their minds are set like concrete.

[00:56:56] Their habits are set like concrete.

[00:56:59] And I don't want to be like that.

[00:57:03] God bless you.

[00:57:05] You see, and all that is, is a defense mechanism.

[00:57:09] Right. And it's it's running off of an old world that doesn't exist anymore.

[00:57:14] I mean, if you're running like 1960s, 1970s, you're like running those old patterns.

[00:57:21] Well, there you go.

[00:57:23] I don't know if you heard that, but it's pretty loud.

[00:57:25] It's 11 o'clock.

[00:57:27] So we're running these old patterns right in our body because we want to be right.

[00:57:34] We want to, you know, we don't want to deal with that vulnerability.

[00:57:39] But the vulnerability is the secret to what leads to empowerment.

[00:57:43] Right. And as a vocal empowerment coach, that's the message.

[00:57:48] That's what I've had to continue to learn.

[00:57:51] And no one I don't know about you, but I'm pretty sure most people we don't love being vulnerable because it's very uncomfortable.

[00:57:59] Like you were saying earlier, it feels invasive kind of.

[00:58:04] But the more we do it, the more it's like, oh, my gosh, I actually I'm safe.

[00:58:09] I'm still safe.

[00:58:11] The protective personality doesn't have to jump in to try to save me.

[00:58:16] I'm still alive.

[00:58:18] I made it through.

[00:58:20] I didn't get and even if people come in and they're like, oh, you suck.

[00:58:23] You're so dumb.

[00:58:24] It's like that's that that's their pain.

[00:58:27] I don't have to take that on.

[00:58:29] I see who I am.

[00:58:31] And slowly we learn like I really am that spark and I really am going to be safe no matter what.

[00:58:38] And now that we have this world with all of the social media and all these people, all these young ones, I bless their hearts.

[00:58:45] They've grown up with numbers and likes determining their value.

[00:58:50] What they think is their value.

[00:58:52] We we we have the older generation that didn't have all that social media crap when we were kids.

[00:58:59] We really need to help the younger ones because they're I mean, I know they they were born equipped with the power.

[00:59:07] They're equipped with more knowledge in some ways.

[00:59:10] So they're going to be OK, but not if they're running that old world like you talk about that the grumpy old men are set in.

[00:59:18] Right.

[00:59:19] So bless you for your openness and even doing this and helping people focus not on the wounds, but on the healing.

[00:59:28] And that's what I really love about what you share is that you you want to you don't want to focus on like I could talk about all this bad stuff.

[00:59:36] Happen to me and da da da da da.

[00:59:38] But then I'm still making that alive.

[00:59:40] But when I talk about what heals me, what brings me joy, what brings me love, what?

[00:59:45] That's a beautiful conversation.

[00:59:47] And that makes the frequency higher.

[00:59:50] And that's where the healing can really come in because now our hearts are open.

[00:59:56] And that's what true, true love unconditional is.

[01:00:00] Yeah.

[01:00:03] That feels like a fantastic place to bring it in.

[01:00:09] And as always, listeners, check out the show notes to find out what dots doing in the world.

[01:00:16] And thank you.

[01:00:18] Thank you so much.

[01:00:20] Oh, thank you, Simon.

[01:00:21] I really enjoyed our conversation today.

[01:00:24] Yeah, me too.

[01:00:25] Lots of listeners will see you soon.

[01:00:28] We won't see you soon.