Show Notes
Now we get to what may be the toughest part of reckoning with our planet’s situation: dealing with numbness, grief, and despair. It’s easy to feel overwhelmed by the enormity of the many crises around us, and natural to want to numb ourselves to the pain.
Joanna and Jess speak with great vulnerability and candor about what it takes to navigate our darkest feelings—and the strength and beauty that can be found when we honor our pain.
Trigger Warning: In this episode, we discuss suicide.
In this episode:
When it feels like our pain could swallow us whole, it helps to remember that all feelings come and go
Desperation can take us to dark places, but we are more than our despair
Numbness—Jess opens up about her familiar tactic for escaping pain
Our pain becomes sacred when we allow it to deepen our connection with the world
Bonus Exercise: Breathing Through
We recommend starting a podcast club with friends or family to do these practices together. Links and assets to help prompt reflection and build community can be found with every episode on WeAreTheGreatTurning.com.
More from We Are The Great Turning
In Episode 10, “We Are the Great Turning,” Joanna shares a story called the “Shambala Warrior Prophecy,” which was told to her by her friend, Tibetan Monk Chogyal Rinpoche. Joanna was tasked with teaching this prophecy in the West, and it’s one of her most famous teachings.
This bonus episode will support you to take the main insights from Episode 10, “We Are the Great Turning,” deeper into your life.
As this journey around the spiral comes to a close, Jess brings us back to the table with Joanna for one last profound conversation. Joanna shares an ancient Tibetan prophecy, “The Coming of the Kingdom of Shambhala,” which shows us that the way we build the Great Turning is through compassion and insight into the radical interdependence of all things.
This bonus episode will support you to take the main insights from Episode 9: “Live the Questions Now” deeper into your life.
When it comes to building the Great Turning, it’s natural to have questions: What is my individual role in it all? How do we win? Who do we fight? While Jess wrestles with her desire for a “prescription” of what to do, Joanna invites us to “live the questions” instead. In this episode, we learn about the three dimensions of the Great Turning and the way forward: community, relationship, and solidarity.