The Crucible:Conversations for the Curious

Hamish Niven (00:01)
Welcome to The Crucible, Conversations for the Curious. I am Hamish, your host. This podcast is for anyone going through awakenings, trying to make sense of life. Whether dark nights are the soul, needing to make life -changing decisions, struggling with addiction or critical illness, or simply realizing that their life as they know it is not aligned to values and purpose. You are not alone. You can get through this, promise you. Life is far more beautiful on the other side.

Hamish (00:30)
Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of The Crucible Conversations for the Curious. Today I've got Prem with me and she's living in South of France at the moment where she is doing some amazing stuff. Prem, thanks so much for turning up today. Can you tell me a little bit about your story please?

Prem (00:46)
Yes, of course, with pleasure. Thank you, Hamish. Thank you for inviting me to partake in these podcasts. It's very exciting times. And so I'm delighted to be able to assist you in bringing the word to people. Gosh me. So I guess really the best place to start is the traditional route. started, I followed the script of normal familial and societal expectations.

get a job, follow your education, get to the top of it, get a good job, get married, have kids, that kind of thing. And I had an identity imposed upon me, one which I swallowed hook, line and sinker at the time. I was taught like we all are to identify with who I am by society standards, by external validations, basically.

So I studied law, I became a barrister. I worked in the criminal justice system for over two decades, got married, had two wonderful boys, became an addictions therapist in between all of that somehow. I stopped smoking back in the day with a system called Alan Carr, not the funny man, but Alan Carr's easy way to stop smoking. And I was so impressed with the method that I actually decided that I'd become.

one of his therapists and from that I actually then evolved into an addictions counsellor. So I ran stop smoking sessions for that organisation and at the time I then branched out into their food, their diet and also alcohol. Now at the time I would not have considered myself to have been addicted to alcohol at all. I stopped very easily and I worked

the premise that if you're presenting something it's do as I do not do as I say. So I couldn't in all honesty run these sessions without actually not drinking myself and so I did very happy with it didn't cause me any grief was was delirious with that decision just happened naturally and so there it went. Classic midlife crisis divorced my husband and then started traveling.

expanding my life options and still very much identifying with the who I am by outside criterion. And it was during 2015 I found myself, I'd been on several retreats up mountains, again it was all to do with the kind of, you know, the giving lectures and seminars and counselling people on food and I'd gone

to a friend's retreat center in Turkey. He's known as Jason Vale, the juice master, good friend of mine, former colleague. And so I ended up in this retreat center in Turkey. And I think for the first time in my life, I stopped. I've always been very busy. And I was on the yoga platform overlooking the mountains and this

tremendous overwhelming sense of oneness, completeness, tears, absolutely bawling. I was just absolutely kind of bowled over with the serenity of just being. So I kind of went on a little bit of a, I think a quest, if you like, the hero's journey, Dante's hero's journey, towards living a more authentic life.

you know, sitting, learning, reading. And I had become introduced to Deva, Pramal and Mitten who are very well known mantra singers at this retreat. They played their music. Kenny, one of the yoga teachers was playing it. And so in 2015, I found myself in Arilas in Corfu.

where I had what I could only be described as a spiritual awakening. So that's the genesis of where I got to. I wasn't looking for that. I hadn't gone looking for a spiritual awakening. I'd simply gone for some glorious music.

And back in the day, I wasn't still a particularly early riser. So I'd literally drag myself out of bed, walk down to what was called the Gayatri Mandir. I was always late. I'd then sneak into the back of the Mandir and lay on the ground listening to 150 to 200 people singing Sanskrit music, mantra.

I mean, it is just beautiful. What a lovely way to wake up in the morning, because, you know, the reflexes are a bit dopey in the morning. Well, they were back then, a lot better now. And it just was like an infusion. Vibration, sound, music, sacred hurts, you know, all the things which I didn't really know about back then. The powerful sound of om.

sung at a certain frequency. I'm not very good with numbers, I know somebody will know what it is. I want to say it's 432 but it's probably wrong. But at that sacred level of singing, chanting, musical vibration, and I just elevated into a place of pure and utter calm.

The best way of describing it was, I was almost floating. It was almost as if my feet were no longer attached to the ground. I knew where I was, knew that I was doing completely comprehension, fully compos mentis, et cetera. I just had this amazing sense of serenity, a bit like the first experience on the yoga platform in Turkey.

And I just thought it was normal. just thought I was relaxing. I just thought I was having a really good time. I just thought, God, this is the best holiday ever. And it was just wonderful. I was at peace. I felt connected. I was doing something. I was offering free Wotsu sessions. That's shiatsu in water. If anybody doesn't know what that is. You

water which is roughly 36 degrees body temperature and it's, I call it human origami in water, beautiful flowing delicate movements. Most people feel it's like a rebirth because you're cradling somebody and then you're moving them through this water in the most deliciously slow things and I was doing that just because I could, I'd been taught in it and I just thought what a nice thing to do and that's how I got my name because Prem Sarita actually means love.

flowing through water and it was Deva and Mitten who gave me that name. And so there I was bumbling along in this oasis of calm, went back to work and it was, we all know we're energetic beings and the energy I was giving off, the calm energy, people in the office when I went back were like,

what has happened to you? Who are you? Who is this vision of calm, energy, joy, happiness? I was just radiating, I mean, like a nuclear fusion. was just, you know, over everybody. And it was lovely because they all, they all, they all came to a really, it just changed a little bit the dynamic in the office. I worked in a, I worked in an office with the admin staff.

and they palpably, know, stress levels came down because I'd go, it's okay, we can do this. Let's just, you know, let's just take a moment and, you know, again, so was really lovely.

That was amazing. It lasted for about, where was it? that was August, September, October, November, December. Yeah, it lasted for about four months. And then, unfortunately, my youngest son fell prey to addiction, depression, suicidal ideations. And I...

obviously started to become very anxious about him, constant messages of wanting to end his life. And in the end, I ended up sitting on the public bench outside St Michael's Church every night in December when I wasn't working from uni at the time, watching his flat, just to make sure he didn't kill himself. Yeah.

So it was very intense. And like I said, like most of us, I think if we're lucky, we may have parents who were blessed with coping skills, but I fear that is the minority and I was one of the minority. I had no idea how to cope with this. And so that's when I took back drinking and wow, did I take it back big time.

I just had no other coping mechanisms. I did not know how to deal with this constant barrage of, I'm going to kill myself, life's not worth living, et cetera. And so that's when I realized, again, retrospectively, that perhaps when I did stop drinking alcohol, I had resonated with the logic behind it because I hadn't realized

how much of a crutch it had been to me and so I went back to that crutch because it was all I knew, it was all I had. My father used to drink quite heavily and I think that was the model obviously that we saw and so obviously that was what I picked up, I need to relax, I need to relax, I need not to feel like this. So it was, what I would call the reverse of most spiritual awakenings.

I didn't realise it had happened. I just felt amazing. But what I did notice is when it stopped. It was like falling off a cliff. It was just, yes, I just crashed. I just crashed and burned. And everything just went completely black, dark, miserable.

didn't know how to cope. so it's kind of fast forward a few years, things are a lot better now. My son is still alive. He still goes through intense phases of very deep depression, suicidal ideation. He is on the whole a lot better. And it's taken a lot of self introspection and work to

dig deeper into his soul contract with this world. I've now got into, I've now understood a lot more about the essence of who we are. Now, partially this came around as a result of doing a masters in spirituality, ecology and mental health at the university which I teach at. And it was during the first year, we're about to go into the second year.

It was during the first year that I discovered

scientific papers, information which confirmed everything I'd ever suspected to be true.

but has actually got science backed with

So that for me was a huge revelation. I'm an empiricist. I used to work with law. like to see things black and white and gray. I like to know where the gray areas are, but this was like, there was a name for that. Okay, that's very interesting. I didn't realize it was called that. And for me, perhaps the most remarkable work was that of a guy called Adashanti.

and he's got a book which he wrote called The End of Your World which he talks about the reverse of most spiritual awakenings which can cause what are commonly misdiagnosed as psychosis or breakdowns, they're actually spiritual awakenings. I was experiencing the reverse, I was experiencing the fall off the cliff and having

looked for spiritual awakening. Obviously I was wholly unprepared so I go back to my comment about feeling as though I was floating. I was ungrounded. had no, hadn't prepared. I wasn't ready to be that spiritually connected or aware of the oneness, the universe, that feeling of joy, peace and tranquillity which you get. And he's got a beautiful quote in his book and he says spiritual awakening is a remembering.

It is not becoming something that we are not. It is not about transforming ourselves. It is not about changing ourselves. It is simply a remembering of what we are, as if we'd known it all along and had simply forgotten.

So that for me really was like a light bulb moment. I was like, wow. And then he's got a whole section on, I had it and I lost it. And it was like, that's me too. What do you do? How do you cope when you've had that wonderful experience? I mean, I said it was four or five months of floating.

it really helped to understand that and this is why from when we spoke about me doing this podcast I am not unusual in as much as some people do have what I call these silent stealth -like awakenings and those who have in spontaneous awakenings as they're called it's when you lose the connection

For some people they never lose that connection, and how blissful that must be. And for others it's that thud. And so if anybody has ever experienced the thud, I would definitely recommend Adishanti's book. It is a salve for the soul, it really is. And he says it's actually a very commonplace occurrence, albeit rarely spoken of. He said the state of unawakenedness can

Well, as it did in my case, know, that thud can be quite dramatic, can bring back old patterns, old behaviours. And he basically said, you've got to work through

you know, you can't make awakening happen. He said, you can no sooner turn the the spiritual light switch on or off at will, it will do it on its own, but you know it's there now, which I thought was really very sweet. It's like, I can see the light switch, I just can't reach it for some reason. Having said that, I have been doing more meditations, more introspective work, more connection to my higher self, which...

really does help and it's kind during this period that you know again joyfully the alcohol consumption dropped to I really don't want that I'm really not interested in that this is not serving any purpose in my life by listening to that inner guidance and life is hard enough as it is I think if you've been through a period of awakening and then had the thud this kind of makes

I won't say harder, but it's another challenge to add to it because you've had a taste of the nectar. You've had a taste of what it's like. And I've learned not to grasp anymore. I've learned to sit and go with it. And I was desperate to manually flip that switch back on and it was there just out of reach. was driving me mad. And as I said, blessed for me to have been able to do.

this wonderful Masters. So it's really, it's really taken me to where I am now. So, anyway, there's a little introduction about

Hamish (18:34)
That is a fabulous introduction and there's so many paths that we can go from there. Thank you. Thank you for that. And thank you for the, it's not the darker side of a spiritual awakening, but just another side of it. Cause I haven't, I haven't met a thud like that. I don't want to put the word yet in there, but I haven't yet. So we'll just whisper the yet exactly. I want to go right back to.

the dutiful person doing what everyone told society, all that identity based on family, friends, relationships, society, dogma, I should be this, I'm a woman, I'm expected to be, all that stuff. How did you make sense of that and realize that it's optional?

Prem (19:23)
I make sense of that and realise it was optional. Only very late in life, very, very late in life, did that dawning reality come to me. It was really, I think, one of my first retreat experiences which I would describe as being the spark to

people given that I was already kind of counselling, coaching, all of that kind of thing by this time I got a whole host of qualifications and I thought yeah this is what people need, this is disconnection. I need to disconnect from being everything that's expected of me because you just end up burning out and you lose your authentic self.

you've got these many masks that you wear and I wasn't prepared to wear them anymore. So it was that which really made me question the narrative of why I was, as I like to say now, I had this identity imposed on me. I wanted to know who I really was, but at the time it was still very ego -driven.

that who was who was I wasn't a spiritual who was I it was more like why am I doing a job that actually I don't like particularly what can I do which is more productive and helpful in the world and drop the mask and the veneer and actually be my own person in that sense and it was only later that the spirituality came in when I went for a deeper dive.

Hamish (21:09)
Yep. I love that. It's what Gabor Mate talks about, isn't it? It's that attachment versus authenticity. I'm sensing, I really, really am that our generation, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, that is our challenge. We were expected, certainly from the Western European Victorian era, children should be seen and not heard. You're expected to work hard in the factory, in the workplace.

for me go pay to be grateful, go on holiday for a little bit, come back and repeat. You're expected to conform. You're expected to be this, you know, the woman's role, the man's role, the gender roles. and that's changing. I was listening to somebody talking the other day about ADHD and his theory was ADHD. Those people with that, certainly as children, they've gone down the authentic route. They don't give a crap about the attachment. They want to be them.

which makes it really hard to love that child who is just wanting to be itself. and I, I see that's quite an interesting evolution and you you've had to realize that I had to do the same thing. I was, I was forged of my mum and dad. had their beliefs, their identity, and there was a conflict for long time. Drink helped. Yay. Brilliant. Got rid of it. However, that crutch broke, as you said,

Prem (22:30)
free.

Hamish (22:34)
So think it's really interesting as we start to question.

that we're not being authentic and we actually want to be because we're designed to be, we are meant to be. Certainly if you've got a spouse, you will become, you have to be authentic with each other and communicate. So I love what you said there. So you've made sense of it and you're starting to change, stop the alcohol.

Explain to me a bit more about the the bump. What what that was. You've you've met you've mentioned there was a certain lack of groundedness. But explain that process a bit more deeply for me just so can get my head around it a bit

Prem (23:14)
As I said, because it wasn't unsought, I wasn't on a spiritual path at all. I was on this more authentic me. I want to run retreats. I want to run coaching programs. I identify outside. And so this wonderful, I think I got lost in the egoic, look what I can do. so when the thud, the bang happened,

As I said, I'd been floating and then suddenly the ground loomed very quickly and I just hit it with a great velocity and everything again crumbled around me, that wonderful feeling of elation, joy, everything just literally disappeared into a big black hole and I was left being pulled down by it simply due to lack of coping mechanisms.

Again, a lot of this is kind of retrospective Hamish because I didn't understand...

Hungry ghosts, if you like, which are based on the Buddhist and... I'm going to get this wrong as well, I'm pretty terrible with things. The hungry ghosts, the ones who are attached, the ones who will attach two souls who are in distress to carry on feeding from them for that distress. It's like they were cut off in the middle of their distress and they've come back to get some more until they have completed their karma. It was just... It was like being in a car crash.

It was, was, I hope that explains it. It's the only way I can explain it. It's very difficult. I just knew I'd lost something and I just became absorbed by trying to protect my son, trying to find ways to get him to feel better and all that kind of thing. And it was just so encompassing, so draining.

that everything that had preceded it, instead of being able to draw on it and use it, was like it had been completely severed. I don't know if that really answers your question, because it was just such a violent process. It was...

Yeah, immediate, almost immediate. moment I kind of thought, can't cope with this anymore, I'm gonna go down the pub. And I did a wonderful pub crawl around Sunderland. bars and clubs than you could possibly imagine. And it was a disaster, disaster. yeah, I think, I don't know how else to explain it, if that's what you mean by the process. I knew something had switched desperately. But then of course,

booze took over and I just didn't have the bandwidth, very good expression, I didn't have the bandwidth to then start thinking about what's happened here, why don't I feel as good as I used to, because for me it was obvious it was causal effect, my son wasn't well, therefore I felt bad, I felt responsible for him, again stepping into the role of mother, protectress and all of that. And again with hindsight what I now realise is that obviously

it's his life, his world, he's got to do what is right for him. And, you know, even sleeping in the same house, in the same flat, I couldn't stop him killing himself if he wanted to. And so it was that realisation that I started to let go. And, you know, I support him, I talk to him, we chat, we do stuff. It is his pathway, not mine.

and I'm only there to kind of try and help mould him if I possibly can with it. But I now do so from this place of understanding rather than panic and despair, which is what I went into. Does that answer your question?

Hamish (27:17)
It, I think it answers a more important question. I think it really answers why you went back to something you knew intimately that would support you and not healthily, but would support you and allow you to numb out that absolute dread. I mean, I cannot put my head into that place where anybody has

a child who wants to take their life. know, no frame of reference. But what I do know from my experiences is the alcohol takes that edge off and more alcohol takes more edge off and even more edge alcohol takes off everything. So I can empathize there.

And again, being that being a mom and watching your child self -destruct. And it's what you want to do. You want to rescue them. You want to nurture them, hug them and fix them. And how did you manage to reconcile to the fact that it's not your responsibility to rescue them, but just to love

Prem (28:25)
Again, I think that was the discovery of perhaps things like near -death experiences, researching information

you know, is life finite as we know it? Yes, this meat suit will disintegrate eventually. Where does the soul come from? And it was really, they're all things I'd already suspected a long time ago. I was of the view that, you know, we're only energy and you can't destroy energy. We come from the stars. And although this particular meat suit will disappear, the energy will be reinvented somewhere else at some point in time.

And so with the master's degree, what it allowed me to do is to again, peel back the layers of that particular onion. I mean, know, these weren't popular thoughts back in 40 years ago when I was in my twenties. People thought I used to be called a witch and you know, she's bit doodoo that one. But now I can go, oh, well actually I have a nice little research paper on that if you don't mind, which pleases me immensely. know, quantum physics.

everything and then as I said near -death experiences when you start listening to the stories of people who have nearly died or have died and then come back and the similarity between them is beyond just mere coincidence it is is shockingly accurate everybody says the same thing literally and so then obviously that it just spins up into rabbit hole after rabbit hole of

why do we come back and that's where the spirituality really started to kick in is well you know okay if we are just these energetic beings where do they come

what is a spiritual being? How do we, yeah, and it gets really interesting because you're like, where does that come from? And that was, there's so many explanations, but for me, the one that kind of works the most is that, you know, the universe is a conscious entity. Again, lots of science now that proves that. We've got quantum physics, which actually, the double slit theory, for those of any, your listeners who might be aware of that.

We observe the universe and therefore the universe comes into being.

we can create our universe by observing it. Okay, so we have the power to do that, if we have that innate power to be able to live in this matrix, if you like, this simulation which we create in our own heads, then we've clearly come down for a reason because we cannot be destroyed.

our physical bodies will disappear but the energy will always be there so where does that energy source go back to? Well it goes back into the universe and then when you listen to the near -death experience you know you hear stories of them never wanting to leave that place again and these guardians, these angels, this universal whatever name you want to give them, God, Buddha, Allah, anybody it doesn't matter the denomination is irrelevant saying sorry you've got to go back you haven't quite finished and people are literally crying going no!

Please don't send me back. It was the discovery of this veil of forgetting that when we are incarnate or when we do arrive in this physical form, this time as a human, because don't forget, could have been a plant, it could have been anything previously, that on this occasion as a

are literally our memories are wiped but what we are finding is that more and more people as you said like ADHD not so much so seems to be a lot of the programming is still in there which is quite interesting and it's like when you think about little children little children often have imaginary friends don't they or do they are they actually communicating

I mean, you've got time for a little story. My son, when he was my oldest son, who by the way is an inventor, bus driver, very creative, mad like his mother. So he's on a completely different spectrum, but also very sensitive like the other one is. But when he was three, I put him to bed and he would not stop bouncing. So I went up and I

Hamish (32:35)
always.

Prem (32:58)
What are doing? He said, I'm playing with the funny man. And I went, well, could you tell the funny man to go away? Because you need to go to sleep now. So off he went to sleep. About three or four months later, we were packing up the house to move. And I found some photographs of my father who had died before my son, my eldest son, was born. And we were looking through them, just laughing. And this is typical of my father. He was sitting there in this photograph.

wearing a caftan with two candles stuck up his nose.

And my eldest son pointed at this picture and, that's the funny man.

Yeah, so this is the conditioning and we come back to the beginning of my, you know, my kind of this discussion with you is that we are conditioned that these things don't exist. We're only imagining things. We don't see the signs. We don't pay attention to what the universe is telling us, to where we're being prodded, where we're being thrown. And once you open yourself to seeing those things, that's when you start to realize.

And that at that point, again, coming back to your question, that I realised that my duty towards my son was to be there to help him, the youngest one, and at the same time, it's his journey.

It's the age -old adage, you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink.

And so he is, and he's, I think he comes under Indigo. He's an Indigo child. And if you kind of follow the astrological, spiritual reincarnations, he's of a generation where they are, they come back because they know that the world is in a strange place and struggling humanity is in a dodgy place. The planet is in danger because of the way we treat it, climate.

change resources, everything. We just abuse the planet. We become so egocentric, so consumer driven, that the indigo souls came down because they're meant to be the generation which are there to guide, revolutionise. And some of them just go, heck man, this is just too much. You are joking, I'm leaving, I want to go back home. And how many times do we say as individuals, I just want to go home and we

actually know what that means, but we do because it means we want to be back in the celestial universal connection. Being home is being connected and it is possible without having to leave this mortal plane. It's just a little bit more work to do it. So yeah, so was at that point that I realized that, you know, it was his journey.

Hamish (35:44)
Thank you. I love that bit about the, I don't want to call it imaginary friends anymore. Because there's a researcher and he contacted many, many children or through their parents. they, you I was here, I did that. He followed their stories up. And sure enough, the funny man, the friend, the situations, you know, they corroborated. was the child had...

an experience of something that was physically impossible to have done time and time and time and time again. I will find that resource and put it in the show notes because I think that's quite important. It's it's fascinating. So then how did

Prem (36:24)
really interesting isn't it? really is.

Hamish (36:31)
decide that the drinking the second time or the major time I'll start that again. So how did you how did how did you decide that the alcohol was really not helping you look after your son look after yourself and it was basically yeah a crutch.

Prem (36:50)
of some hard medical facts which I had a period fairly recently where I was quite unwell which involved MRI scans and all that kind of thing and I had a sign saying get your liver tested whilst you're there so I did yeah so

It was, that was interesting. know, typical alcohol, liver fatty disease or whatever it is, ALF -ty.

Just this constant nudge. As I said, the more you meditate, the more you can connect. When I meditate, I get this incredibly bright light that always comes in from my right hand side. It doesn't matter where I am, I can be in a completely dark room, this bright light comes down. And constantly going, what are you doing? What have you been doing?

and it was about six months ago. I don't recall my dreams. There is a technical term for it. Again, the dyslexic brain does not allow me to recall its name. But on this one occasion, I did remember, and I had a snake that had wound itself around my finger, a viper, it had bitten the end of my finger.

tiny, tiny little snake. And so I looked it up and it, the snake, the viper particularly, is part of the, you know, the medic sign with the snakes going around

And I thought, someone's trying to tell me something. And so I kind of did a couple of very deliberate meditations. And I'm very good because of the practice I've had, because I've always wanted to help people, because I enjoy coaching, life coaching, and my new thing is going to be spiritual coaching. I'm excellent at giving to other people. And this little boy says, how about giving some of that to yourself?

And I was like, am I allowed?

again, you know, and I was like, okay, perhaps I am Aladdin's and you know, naturally it just then completely cut off and disappeared. it wasn't again, it was a, it was a very subtle, I just lost interest in it with, and, naturally the voice also said to me is when you're feeling anxious or upset or disconnected, it is a sign of disconnection. It's not a sign that you need a drink.

Go and meditate. Go and reconnect. Go and find the light. Go and find that source. Go and have a conversation. And so that for me, you know, has been the way to overcome that coping mechanism because it's not. It's offering myself that love which I'm so willing to give to other people and yet I wasn't willing to give to myself. So, yeah.

I'm often in tears when I meditate now because when I listen properly I'm like, okay, yeah, you've got a point. I'm sometimes a bit begrudgingly with it, but yes.

Hamish (40:19)
you

That was exactly the word that came to my mind. Begrudgingly, like, yeah, you're right. Thank you.

Prem (40:26)
You

Hamish (40:29)
I know for a fact you've absolutely nailed something so importantly. You you've called alcohol a coping mechanism. It is a coping mechanism. There's nothing wrong with it apart from the fact it breaks. It does work, but it breaks and it breaks relationships and families and lives and everything else. But you managed

relatively effortlessly realize that that coping mechanism was not healthy and you you replaced it. You you you you through your meditation through thinking about it you realize that the alcohol is not the answer. Yes it works it brings you down so does breathing it does this it does that. But you know that that is so important when I I stopped drinking I had to fill that hole. I tried everything.

gym, getting fit, running, meditating, journaling, this, that and the other, all sorts of things. And I replaced it with a realization that I actually don't like to be hungover. I don't like to feel drunk. I don't like to feel awful. And I certainly don't like the following day to be like, I can't do anything. So for me, I had to replace it with the physical effects are not worth it. You know, I like this thing being sharp. I liked better run.

and see the world rather than like this. So it is a case of replacing that unhealthy coping strategy with something else.

Prem (41:50)
Yeah.

It's the payoff isn't it, it's understanding.

you know, how many hours do you spend recovering in the morning just for an evening's of drinking or, you a day of drinking because it always isn't, it gets progressively worse. You know, it's, yeah, everybody has to find their own key in many ways and they will, but sometimes the key is very well hidden. And this is, think it's a question of listening to the intuition sometimes, which is definitely there.

Hamish (42:27)
So you've made sense of things, you've managed to make peace around the alcohol and realizing it doesn't serve. You've managed to make peace around your son and be there for him and support him. Where is your life going now? What are you doing with this? Have you found that spirituality? Have you found that joy and serenity?

Prem (42:45)
Definitely getting closer, as I said, you know, my little white, my little golden ball of beautiful light that comes down from, it's like coming home. I actually joyfully look forward to doing my meditation because I can feel that light which is beautiful. And the whole Masters thing, I

you know, anybody wants to do a masters, please do the masters in spirituality. It's an MA because our last year is very much about creating service to Gaia, which of course fits with, yeah, which is amazing. And for me, Gaia of course includes humans. So I am looking at building, or I am building at the moment, a spiritual coaching app.

So for me, I've always said my life has conspired behind my back to lead me where I am. And when you get to certain points, you look back and you can see the prods. And now I'm actually living in the prods. So that's where I think I'm now more heart -led, more spiritual -led, because I'm actually actively engaging rather than retrospectively going,

That's why that happened. now going, and this is where you want me to go. So I'm flowing with what I hope is spiritual guidance towards an end goal. So for me, it's about helping people, you know, find spiritual. People are definitely looking for something outside consumerism, their daily lives.

their coping mechanisms. People are definitely searching for home and they don't know where to begin looking for it, I think. Some are actively looking for spiritual awakening, others like myself just fall into it and then lose it and want to find it again. So there's a lot of range. I've had this center now down here since 2018 and obviously with the COVID.

malarkey in between things slowed up quite quite dramatically but the idea is between now and another six years is to really get this place serving Gaia where I can invite facilitators hosts to come and do you know retreats well -being retreats and obviously then try and offer some spiritual coaching as well at the same time for myself

I'm an association, I've reformed myself recently into an association which means that it's a self -funding project. So it's not a profit organisation basically. So that's where I'm at with that at the moment. It's really just a question

As I said, I'm lucky that the Master of Arts gives me that freedom to be able to experiment with my end offering to Gaia. And so that's kind of where I'm definitely heading with it in person on the app here all over. I really don't know. Businesses, you know, helping people perhaps understand.

And of course I'm lucky that I've got the addictions counselling to go with it so it could actually become quite specific. I'm very open at the moment to moving with everything but the definitive movement is keep this place up and running as a centre and then also see what can be offered through the centre to everybody who's interested basically. So yeah that's where I'm heading with it. Exciting times, busy times.

Hamish (46:40)
Absolutely. I what you've the biggest takeaway of that last little bit was you've you've stopped having to go join the dots retrospectively by bumping into things and you're turning around and you're looking forwards. How do you know when you're going in the right direction? What what happens?

Prem (47:00)
There's no resistance to when it doesn't quite, I've lost the great expectations.

I don't expect or demand anything. I have a goal and I have a t -shirt which I made for myself and it says I'm moving in the general direction of forward.

Hamish (47:17)
you

Prem (47:17)
I will

Yeah, because, you know, it doesn't matter. kind of, you know, the pole star is set. How I get there is irrelevant. And so when it's not going, perhaps I've attached too much to it or I'm hoping, pinning too much on it. And so again, the art of letting go, it's like, well, clearly that's not meant to be. So for example, here at the moment, this year,

We've had disastrous weather and the tourist industry has died a death completely. But so to compensate what I've done this year is I've partially rented the whole house out for some of the summer weeks to generate some income. Wasn't on the books at all. I mean, good job you can only see this corner of the house because the rest of it looks like a bombsite. So.

that wasn't planned at all. I'm no longer phased so much. I've kind of gone back to that state of flow that I was in when I was in Greece. Although my feet are very much more grounded now. I'm definitely more weighted, but not in a bad way. So I follow the flow and if there's an obstacle, either

I'll try once or twice to go over it and if it's not happening and I'll just go well that's clearly not going to work so where do I go next and again it's the self -reflection it's the connection it's the meditation it's the okay come on give me a sign what am I supposed to be doing sometimes there's something and sometimes there's nothing in which case I just carry on and then see what happens yeah

It's a flowing process, think is all I can say. I've got back that lightness, that feeling of this is where it's going and it doesn't really matter how we get there. It will deliver at some point in time.

Hamish (49:19)
I love that. think it isn't it. And this is, this is my daily struggle. That letting go when I let go of things, you know, when I, when I stopped trying to force things my way, Hamish's way is great, but it's not always the right way. You know, this podcast, I made a change two, three months ago, two months ago about something and the doors opened every single opportunity, podcast name, what it's about, who's doing it, podcast course I've just finished.

Prem (49:29)
Man.

Hamish (49:47)
this, that, the other, new people, new connections. And it's just like, I haven't got enough time in the day to do the editing, the contact, talking to people. And this is the best fun. You know, I could do this all day if someone else would do the editing. It's just so much fun. And there is a purpose to this and it's, it is wonderful. And when I'm on the right path, there's like a little, a little gift saying, yep, you're on the right way. Yes. It's like Hansel and Gretel as I get to that marker, there's a coin that drops down.

saying, yes, next level. And yeah, it is really nice to know that I'm on that right path today. As you said, where it goes, who knows.

Prem (50:29)
Yeah, it's a lovely feeling isn't it? It really is. It's nice and I think the more relaxed you become, the stronger it becomes.

counterintuitive because we're so used to striving. Again, Adishanti, stop striving, you've nowhere to go. Was there the other quote by Rumi? What is it? Go to the root of the root of the soul. I love that one. He says,

He says, after one moment with that glorious friend you become a loving, radiant and ecstatic. Your eyes are sweet and full of fire. Come return to the roots of the roots of your own soul. Yeah. New tattoo coming. With the snake. With the snake. I'm gonna have the snake. Gotta have the snake.

Hamish (51:15)
Yes.

Mm -hmm. Brilliant. Prem, this has been a fabulous conversation. Really, really interesting. Everything from bumps, working backwards, overcoming alcohol, making sense of things, letting go. mean, think, you know, that's, it's, it is just a journey of awakening and making sense of things and, and letting go. I love that.

Prem (51:41)
Thank you. Thank you for inviting me. Really, really enjoyed it. It's good fun.

Hamish (51:51)
Cool. Where can people find out more about you and what you do?

Prem (51:56)
I'm on LinkedIn, the classic, under my proper name which is Angela. We can put a link in the bio at the bottom if that's okay. I have a Facebook page, again I can provide you with the link for that and Instagram. At the moment I do have a website but of course because the whole thing has changed quite dramatically it's one of those pieces which is

motion at the moment so it's there but it's not up to date.

If anybody would like to be a beta tester for my spiritual coaching app, they are more than welcome because I probably will need to do that as part of my thesis. So that would be most helpful. So if anybody's interested in perhaps taking some spiritual coaching away with them, then I'd be happy to hear from them as part of my test group. That would be wonderful. So I'm pretty reachable.

And if anybody wants to come and volunteer at the end of the season, I run volunteer opportunities normally from about April through to June. And then I run them from September to October to kind of help in the grounds. The house is pretty much done finally. But you know, if you don't mind gardening, chopping wood.

Hamish (53:27)
carry water.

Prem (53:28)
it's good free boarding lodgings four hours work it's really not hard got a pool got a sauna got a spa it's not exactly slumming it

Hamish (53:37)
Brilliant. Well, we'll put all of that in the show notes for sure. Thank you. And last question. What is the superpower that you've got from making sense of your journey and your awakenings?

Prem (53:40)
Brilliant.

is the superpower what did I receive from

The ability to.

be more awake to the signs and the nudges from the universe and the desire to teach people how to do that themselves, that we are not separate, that we are one. So yes, I think it's... I'm pleased to have experienced the Thud.

because without it I wouldn't have like everything I wouldn't be here so I think the THUD was a good thing and it's a positive experience to be able to share with others.

Hamish (54:26)
Brilliant. Well, thank you ever so much again for this. It's been fab having you on and yeah, I've really enjoyed it. Thank you so much.

Prem (54:33)
Thank

Hamish Niven (54:34)
Thank you for listening to this episode of The Crucible: Conversations for the Curious. If these powerful stories of transformation resonated with you, be sure to like, subscribe and share this show with anyone who you think could do with a dose of inspiration for their own journey. I would really appreciate it if you could make any comments on your favourite podcast platform as well, that helps me reach more people. All the important links and information are in the show notes below. Thank you very much for listening and catch up with you soon.