November 19, 2025 • 28 mins
A tour through GraceLand in Nashville was created to be a fun excursion. But became something much bigger: a clear view of how much has changed; and how much we take for granted when it comes to voice, rights, and real creative freedom.
Standing where Elvis needed producers, radio slots, and physical pressings to be heard, we realized we can open a laptop, hit record, and publish without permission. That contrast sparked a conversation about gratitude, responsibility, and the quiet privileges woven into everyday life.
Episode Highlights:
• contrast between legacy music gatekeepers and today’s creator tools
• creative control as modern privilege and responsibility
• women’s financial and legal milestones expanding choice
• tradeoffs of single vs double income households
• self‑actualization across generations and parenting timelines
• regulating the nervous system to make clear choices
• celebrating small wins as daily practice
• reframing success markers around alignment
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_01 (00:07):
Welcome to Desire is Medicine.
We are two very different womenliving a life led by desire,
inviting you into our world.
SPEAKER_00 (00:16):
I'm Brenda.
I'm a devoted practitioner tobeing my fully expressed true
self in my daily life,motherhood, relationships, and
my business.
Desire has taken me on quite aride, and every day I practice
listening to and following thevoice within.
I'm a middle school teacher,turned coach and guide of the
feminine.
SPEAKER_01 (00:36):
And I'm Catherine, devoted to living my life as the
truest and hopefully the highestversion of me.
I don't have children, I'venever been married, I've spent
equal parts of my life incorporate as in some down and
low shady spaces.
I was the epitome of Tired andWired, and my path led me to
explore desire.
I'm a coach, guide, energyworker, and a forever student.
SPEAKER_00 (00:58):
Even after decades of inner work, we are humble
beginners, on the mat, stillexploring, always curious.
We believe that listening to andfollowing the nudge of desire is
a deep spiritual practice thathelps us grow.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
On the Desire as Medicine podcast, we talk to
each other, we interview peoplewe know and love about the
practice of desire, bringing ina very important piece that is
often overlooked.
Being responsible for ourdesire.
(01:34):
So happy to be back with thelovely Brenda.
Today is a special.
Well, they're all special, buttoday's a special podcast.
I'm just giggling because I'msure I say they're all special.
I recently went on a trip toNashville.
I had a workshop, and one of mycoaches gave me a challenge of
(01:55):
just learning how to have alittle bit more fun in my life.
So I took some time and figuredout what do I want to do in
Nashville?
I've never been there before.
And it took a second, for sure,to decide what I was going to
do.
I did a little research.
I asked some friends, peoplethat have been to Nashville,
where should I, where should Igo for sure?
(02:16):
Like, where should I go?
One of the things on my agendawas I took a trip to Memphis for
the day.
I went to go to Graceland,Elvis' mansion.
It was the first time I ever gotto see inside somebody's home
how they lived.
It was a super cool experienceas a creator walking through the
(02:42):
house.
I was so impressed by what hisex-wife created, like what
Priscilla created.
We had these iPads, they hadheadsets, and you could walk
through the house, get a 360view on your iPad while also
having an audio tour of theplace.
And it would pause at the end,assuming it's going to take you
(03:03):
some time to go into the nextroom, and you would kind of go
little by little.
Took me about an hour and 15minutes to get through the
house.
It was the first time I got tosee to walk through somebody's
private plane.
I had never done that before.
That was really fascinating.
He had two different privateplanes, one of them he used on
tour.
I think the other one was morefor family.
And after that, I go to ZenStudios.
(03:24):
And this whole time, I mean, I'mnot a huge music fan.
I love me, I do love music and Ilisten to all different kinds of
music.
I am of Hispanic descent.
So I listen to Saliza music.
I listen to Latin music.
That's what I grew up listeningto.
But I can't say that I have thisfavorite artist that sings this
(03:45):
particular song.
Or for the most part, I listento podcasts.
I listen to books on audio.
Like that's how I spend my time.
My maybe as a teenager or in myearly 20s, when I went clubbing
and things like that, I was moreinto music.
Now it's not such a it's not notso in the front of my life.
(04:07):
But I get to some studios, andI'm taken back by all of the
gadgetry, like all the gadgets,the different speakers and the
different instruments, and howbig the rooms were to record and
the padding on all the walls.
And they're talking about on thetours, about Johnny Cash and
Elvis and all these otherartists, and how hard it was to,
(04:32):
I think they had to press theirmusic onto CDs to get other
people to listen.
And you'd have to have somebodythat someone that would be
willing to play you on theradio, and what that whole
system was like.
And I paused and was reallyovertaken.
And I want to share this.
Brenda's also hearing this forthe first time right now.
(04:54):
I want to share how privileged Igot to feel in that moment.
Like while Brenda and I haveover a hundred episodes on a
podcast, and we didn't have apimp like Elvis did.
We don't have a Mr.
Carnival.
We don't have anybody pullingthe strings.
Like we get to literally talkabout desire.
(05:14):
We have a mic that we each havea mic that sits on our desk.
We have software that sitsinside of a computer.
We don't have anybody as abarrier for what we want to
post.
We just get together, record,and upload.
And it's that simple.
We don't have any red tape infront of us to do the thing that
(05:38):
we get to do.
And I'm just so moved by that.
Like the fact that wow, we havethis body of work that was
created, and we didn't have topass anyone's test.
(05:58):
So what comes up for you thusfar, Brenda?
SPEAKER_00 (06:02):
I love your passion around this.
I love that you went somewherefollowing your intuition to have
some fun.
And it sounds like you weretaken aback by something that
you didn't expect.
Like you thought you were justgoing to Graceland to have a
great time and check out Elvis'home, which is really cool, and
(06:23):
check out his private plane.
And you're like, whoa, oh myGod, look at how he used to
record.
And look at how we record.
And you had this big wave ofgratitude come across you.
And that feels so good.
And I can really tap into thatbecause we really do have
(06:46):
creative control.
You know, we get to show up whenwe want, plug our mics into the
wall, travel with them.
I traveled across country lastwinter with my mic.
I recorded in Colorado, inAsheville, I c recorded in
California.
(07:07):
And there's a lot of privilegein that.
Like to get to live our livesthe way we do, as opposed to
what you're saying, that Elvishad somebody who produced for
him, somebody scheduled.
He had to go to a recordingstudio, and there were all these
pieces that had to be done toget his music out.
(07:29):
And we just get to record andpublish.
I mean, there's so much more toit.
I have so much more to say aboutthat because we have different
kinds of red tape.
SPEAKER_01 (07:39):
We have different kinds of red tape, but the part
that became very clear to me.
So I'll pause here for a second.
When I think about our red tape,it's like, okay, we have a
podcast, we talk about thingsthat are near and dear hearts.
We talk about personal growth.
We talk about desire.
Our education in this arenadidn't come easy.
(08:01):
That may be part of the redtape, right?
It took some time to learn andto pass through our own
cauldrons, our own fire to gethere and to have to be in a
place to be able to sharewisdom, right?
We're coming to you, yes, afterX.
I mean, I've been coaching since2010, about after X amount of
years of coaching, X amount ofclients, like this whole thing.
(08:26):
And it could easily say, I'm notprivileged, I'm not part of the
1%, or I'm not privileged, I'mnot a white male, I'm not
privileged.
Like we could, and it was amoment in time where I got to
pause and say, Oh wow, I I dosee this privilege.
I do see privilege in us thatwe've been able to manage our
(08:47):
nervous system enough and ourfinances enough to be able to
have the education that we have.
Right?
That's a privilege.
It's a privilege that it wasn'teven available in our time.
I'm assuming there was a timewhere this wasn't available,
this school of thought wasn'tavailable, this self-reflection
wasn't available.
(09:09):
We can definitely do more incommunity than we can alone.
So that's a privilege.
Being able to record with you isa privilege.
I really got to feel that.
And even deeper than that, it'slike 2025.
I think the year I was born in74 was the first time that a
(09:31):
woman could have a credit cardwithout having a man sign.
Like in my lifetime, I'm able tohave my own credit card, open my
own bank account, buy property,not have to get married, not not
have to have children, andrecord a podcast.
And it doesn't have to be anumber one podcast in its field.
(09:56):
Like I get to just record andshare the insights that I have.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
That's really beautiful.
What what would you say thegifts are in your life that you
get to do this with me?
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
I think everything that I've mentioned, if we were
born in the 40s, we couldn't doit.
How crazy is that?
Just if we would have been bornjust two decades prior, that
would make me instead of 51, 71.
And I don't know if this is whatI'd be wanting to do at 71.
SPEAKER_00 (10:31):
It's not that long ago.
It's like our it's like ourmothers and our grandmothers
generation who really didn'thave the choices that we have.
It's pretty incredible that weget to do what we really want to
do.
I mean, we are a desire podcast,and we say it in the intro,
(10:52):
we're on the mat, followingdesire, curious, trusting.
There's no answers.
We don't, we don't have anythingsolved.
We're both on our own journey.
And we get to do that.
That is quite a privilege to beable to follow our true heart's
desire in that way.
SPEAKER_01 (11:11):
Yeah, I don't know what my true heart's desire
would have been if I was born inthe 40s.
But I do know that if there is awoman that was born in the 40s
that wanted to buy her own home,that wanted to go to school,
that wanted like all thesethings wouldn't have been a
thing of that time.
(11:31):
And when I sort of zoom out tomy experience, I was thinking,
okay, I went to Graceland and Ihad this experience.
I went to the Sun Studios and Ihad this experience.
And I feel really grateful forhaving had that experience.
And where else in my life can Inot see the privilege?
Because I'm so used to lookingat what I want and what's not
(11:55):
here, right?
Like, how do we get the nextthing bigger, badder, better?
And I think being tapped intowhat's already working is a
privilege.
Or maybe I want to rephrasethat.
It's not that being able to tapinto what's already working is a
privilege.
I think being able to tap intowhat's already working really
(12:18):
provides a perspective shiftwhere we can potentially see
gifts that we couldn't seebefore.
SPEAKER_00 (12:24):
Yeah, thank you.
It's a great lens to reallyexpand your own mind and say,
well, what am I not able to see?
And you're really pointing to alot of gratitude, is what it
feels like in my body.
Like a lot of gratitude to getto live this life, to get to on
(12:44):
a Wednesday afternoon, which iswhat this is, record.
And we have complete creativecontrol.
And you get to follow your pathof being a coach and how you
make money and how you live andmake your own schedule.
I mean, that wasn't available towomen in the past.
SPEAKER_01 (13:06):
It wasn't available to women in the past.
You're right.
It wasn't, I mean,entrepreneurship really wasn't
available in the past.
I'm thinking about another tourthat I took in Nashville, the
Raymond Auditorium, which iswhen we're like they part show,
(13:28):
part temple, part church.
And when her husband, Raymond RyRayman, passed, she took it over
and she had to sort of sellherself to the board because she
was a woman.
That's not really what women didback then.
She was able to do it.
And I'm sure arguments can bemade.
(13:49):
He was a really, really wealthyman.
That's why he even had theauditorium.
That's why that was even part oftheir portfolio, let's call it.
So I'm looking at how we aswomen have things.
And this is something that I tryto tap into often that we didn't
(14:10):
have at a particular time in thepast.
I mean, just yesterday wasvoting day.
Many generations of women beforeus couldn't do that in the
United States.
Like we had to defer to the manin our lives for our safety, our
security.
SPEAKER_00 (14:30):
It's really true.
It's quite intense to thinkabout it, that that wasn't
really that long ago.
I just saw this thing onInstagram about this doctor, Dr.
James Barry, who was actually awoman.
So I think for like in the1800s, for like 40 years, she
practiced medicine as Dr.
(14:52):
James Barry, but her name wasactually Margaret Ann Bulkley.
How cool is that?
I saw a photo on the Instagramreel, and she was just dressed
in a suit, and she actuallycleaned up a lot of conditions
in hospitals.
Like she saw where thingsweren't clean and she totally
up-leveled conditions inhospitals.
(15:13):
But she couldn't just do that asher own self.
Like she dressed as a man everyday for 40 years.
That's incredible.
I mean, there's so many storieslike that.
You know, women couldn't havecredit cards, they couldn't own
a house.
If you were a single mother, itwas really hard to get housing,
(15:33):
not that long ago.
And there's always been womenwho have gone out of the box.
You know, there's always beenwomen who have done incredible
things and defied the odds.
God bless them, the ones thatcame before us.
It's really true.
It's pretty incredible theamount of courage that they had
(15:56):
to have.
Like I just think of someonelike Harriet Tubman creating the
Underground Railroad, gettingpeople out of slavery.
My goodness.
That's incredible what she musthave gone gone through to have
the nervous system and thecapacity and the selflessness.
And she would go back and forth.
I don't know how many people shesaved, but it's quite
(16:17):
tremendous.
SPEAKER_01 (16:18):
That's kind of what I'm pointing to on today's
recording.
Just the places where wepotentially have privilege and
it doesn't feel like it, right?
And I think if I were to thinkhard enough, I would assume that
the generations that come nextare gonna have even more
privilege, so on and so forth.
(16:40):
Because there's so muchavailable.
I mean, yeah.
Just look at AI right now.
I remember encyclopedias.
SPEAKER_00 (16:48):
Oh my god, encyclopedias.
I remember that.
What comes to mind for me is theage of women having children
these days.
I mean, my grandmother, mygreat-grandmother, even my
mother, they gave birth at like20, 19 to 22 years old.
(17:10):
That was like the age wherewomen had children.
And if you didn't have childrenby that time, something was
wrong with you.
And by 25 or 30, you were justan old mate.
And my mother had me, I thinkshe was 22.
I was 26 when I had my daughterand 29.
And now my daughter's 30 and shedoesn't have children yet.
And she has that privilege.
And I look at how, oh, even Iadded six years on, I went to
(17:35):
college.
My mother didn't go to college,my grandmother didn't go to
college.
My father's mother went tocollege.
But this is so interesting.
As soon as she got married, shequit her job.
I'm sorry, not her job.
She quit college.
And there was no reason.
But that was what it wasexpected of women at the time.
(17:55):
She got married, she stoppedgoing to college, and she was
brilliant.
And so I was really the firstwoman to go to college in my
family.
And so I gave birth at 26, whichwas quite different than the
women before me.
And now my daughter is 30, myson is 28.
They're both not parents.
(18:16):
And they're really have theopportunity in their 20s to
self-actualize more.
And I watch my daughter workthrough a lot of her
relationship patterns and gothrough many relationship
iterations that she watched herdad and I go through, which
ultimately ended in our divorce.
She went through all of thosethings.
(18:37):
She cleaned it all up, and nowshe's in a beautiful
relationship.
Of course, that opportunity wasalways there.
I know other people my age whospent their 20s in
relationships, living inHoboken, having a great time in
their lives.
I chose to get married.
That's kind of what my lineagecalling was.
I didn't really think ofanything else to do.
(18:57):
I never thought ofself-actualizing in my 20s.
No, I was started doing thatwhen I was in my 40s.
But that's really cool.
It's a lot of privilege in thegenerations for that to evolve.
SPEAKER_01 (19:11):
It is.
I and I love that the youth nowhas a chance to decide.
Do I want to be a young parent?
Do I want to be an older parent?
Do I want to self-actualize inmy 20s, in my 40s?
Pretty much it's all game.
Like it doesn't, one isn'tnecessarily better than the
other.
But I think what we are talkingabout is that the fact that that
(19:33):
choice is even there.
Like when you talk about one ofyour grandmothers who just quit
college because, well, that'swhat they did.
Now someone would have theopportunity to decide.
And I do think that in thatarena of family and money and
school and work, there are otherfactors now at play because of
(19:57):
our own consumerism and thatit's very hard, I think, to hold
a household as a single income.
I think a single income familyreally has to budget in a way
that double income familydoesn't have to do.
But a single-income family withchildren has the opportunity to
raise their kids in a way thatdouble income families don't
(20:20):
necessarily have.
It's there's really so much morechoice now.
SPEAKER_00 (20:25):
And with the choices come new problems, new
awarenesses.
And you can really see that too.
I mean, two working parents,just to jam a little bit on what
you were talking about, doubleincome home, that's what I had.
And it was a privilege.
Like that was a privilege forme.
Like I went to college, I becamea teacher, I got my master's
(20:46):
degree.
That was really cool.
I'm really proud of that.
And working all those yearswhile I was pregnant and having
children was really hard, whichhas created a different path.
And now I see a lot of youngerwomen, a lot of moms in their
30s choosing to stay home.
(21:09):
Like they have the nextevolution, which is really cool.
Like they have the collegedegree, they have the education,
the self-actualization, andthey're still choosing to stay
home.
It's like the next level ofempowered choice.
I mean, we were from the 80s,where, you know, it was like we
were supposed to work.
(21:30):
You know, that was where we wereat the time.
And we put our shoulder pads onand we went to work so we could
look like men because we coulddo it like men and we could
work.
And that was a privilege at thetime.
And it's part of the evolution.
And I don't know where it willend, but there's there's like
something new happening rightnow, which is really cool, which
(21:51):
is more self-actualized womenbecoming mothers, which really
raises the entire vibration ofthe children that they're
raising.
Because I have no idea about thenervous system or regulating my
emotions or saying my true yesand no, asking for what I
(22:12):
wanted.
Like I was riding on fumes andluck and also joy, you know, but
it all, of course, came crashingdown.
SPEAKER_01 (22:22):
It's so funny.
But it's true.
There's always iterations andthere's always change.
And the biggest thing I wantedto share with that story from
Nashville in Memphis is that Igot to pause and say, oh, what
can I really be grateful for?
And but that wasn't necessarilya question.
It was like, oh, this is whatI'm experiencing.
(22:43):
And how cool is this to see thisarea where I have a certain
amount of privilege that Ididn't recognize it as
privilege.
Mostly because I think when wecelebrate, we we tend to want to
celebrate big wins, right?
Not, oh, I'm celebrating becauseI feel this privilege, even as
we try to figure this thing out,this podcast thing out.
(23:06):
Like, how crazy is that?
We have oh, we're a hundred pluspodcasts in and we're still
figuring it out.
Like you said it earlier, we'reon the mat.
There's no answer to that, but Ithink I definitely come from oh,
we celebrate when we hit a bigmilestone.
And this was a reminder that wecan actually celebrate the
(23:29):
privileges that we have, even ifit's not accompanied with by a
metal.
SPEAKER_00 (23:35):
Amen.
And we get to really pause eachday and look at where are we
going in our life?
And it does take time.
It change takes time.
We talk about that a lot, andit's really true, right?
And we're not only looking athuge successes like giant
(23:57):
markers on the calendar, butevery day, every moment that you
choose something that's reallyin alignment for yourself and
your values is a win.
So, yeah, there's the big winsthat are wonderful and they're
great to hit, right?
You want a certain amount ofmoney in your bank account, you
(24:19):
want to get that job, or evenland the interview, you want
your article to be published ina magazine, which I guess these
days with the internet isn'tthat hard anymore.
And everyone could self-publish,but you want to hit these
markers.
You want to lose a certainamount of weight, or you want to
have a certain desire, whateverit is that you want.
Every micro decision that youmake towards that is a win.
(24:44):
And that's a privilege andsomething that we're able to
really focus on today.
Where I don't know if theythought about that in the past.
Who knows?
Maybe they did, right?
Probably, I'm guessing, womenare are extremely wise.
I bet the mothers and the womenwere telling each other, hey,
you did a great job today.
That's a win in whatever versionthey they did it.
(25:06):
It is a privilege to get to lookat that every day and take the
pressure off.
Taking the pressure off is aprivilege.
And it's a choice.
It's a choice every day, everyday, to not put the pressure on
yourself and to say, okay, Ijust use food as as an example.
(25:28):
I ate way too much for dinnerlast night and I felt really
sick.
And today I made a betterchoice.
That's a win.
Amen.
SPEAKER_01 (25:38):
Amen for the little wins.
SPEAKER_00 (25:39):
I like food examples.
SPEAKER_01 (25:41):
I think I want to definitely just have our
listeners uh and ourselves.
Like, let's see if we can take amoment to just reflect on where
we do have privilege.
Like, where can we be grateful?
Whether it's because we're doingthe work, or maybe it's that
you're able to do something,we're able to do something
(26:03):
because it's 2025 and it wasn'tpossible in 1960, 70.
Where are there things thatthings and places where we can
engage?
I mean, even thinking about justdivorce.
Like there was a time when thatdidn't even happen.
I think people can getannulments now.
(26:26):
That wasn't part of thelandscape at one point in time.
It was like you're married tilldeath do you part, or you're
doing X, Y, or Z until.
And now we have so much choice.
And yes, choice does come withresponsibility.
(26:47):
We also have the real true needfor more capacity to be with
discomfort.
The more choices we have, themore possibilities there are.
And I think self-doubt pops up.
Is this the right thing?
Right?
Like, or or a fra or that can bephrased differently in our own
(27:08):
minds, but a version of am Idoing the right thing?
And I just want to encourage allof us to feel into where, if
any, is the privilege here?
What can I be grateful for?
It's not always about the bigwin.
(27:30):
So may we all get to celebrateall the little wins along the
way.
Thank you so much for listening.
That's a wrap for now.
And if you liked the episode, asalways, please share, rate,
comment, let us know what landedfor you.
We'd love to hear from you.
SPEAKER_00 (27:58):
Thank you for joining us on the Desire is
Medicine podcast.
SPEAKER_01 (28:02):
Desire invites us to be honest, loving, and deeply
intimate with ourselves andothers.
You can find our handles in theshow notes.
We'd love to hear from you.
Welcome to Desire is Medicine.
We are two very different womenliving a life led by desire,
inviting you into our world.
SPEAKER_00 (00:16):
I'm Brenda.
I'm a devoted practitioner tobeing my fully expressed true
self in my daily life,motherhood, relationships, and
my business.
Desire has taken me on quite aride, and every day I practice
listening to and following thevoice within.
I'm a middle school teacher,turned coach and guide of the
feminine.
SPEAKER_01 (00:36):
And I'm Catherine, devoted to living my life as the
truest and hopefully the highestversion of me.
I don't have children, I'venever been married, I've spent
equal parts of my life incorporate as in some down and
low shady spaces.
I was the epitome of Tired andWired, and my path led me to
explore desire.
I'm a coach, guide, energyworker, and a forever student.
SPEAKER_00 (00:58):
Even after decades of inner work, we are humble
beginners, on the mat, stillexploring, always curious.
We believe that listening to andfollowing the nudge of desire is
a deep spiritual practice thathelps us grow.
SPEAKER_01 (01:12):
On the Desire as Medicine podcast, we talk to
each other, we interview peoplewe know and love about the
practice of desire, bringing ina very important piece that is
often overlooked.
Being responsible for ourdesire.
(01:34):
So happy to be back with thelovely Brenda.
Today is a special.
Well, they're all special, buttoday's a special podcast.
I'm just giggling because I'msure I say they're all special.
I recently went on a trip toNashville.
I had a workshop, and one of mycoaches gave me a challenge of
(01:55):
just learning how to have alittle bit more fun in my life.
So I took some time and figuredout what do I want to do in
Nashville?
I've never been there before.
And it took a second, for sure,to decide what I was going to
do.
I did a little research.
I asked some friends, peoplethat have been to Nashville,
where should I, where should Igo for sure?
(02:16):
Like, where should I go?
One of the things on my agendawas I took a trip to Memphis for
the day.
I went to go to Graceland,Elvis' mansion.
It was the first time I ever gotto see inside somebody's home
how they lived.
It was a super cool experienceas a creator walking through the
(02:42):
house.
I was so impressed by what hisex-wife created, like what
Priscilla created.
We had these iPads, they hadheadsets, and you could walk
through the house, get a 360view on your iPad while also
having an audio tour of theplace.
And it would pause at the end,assuming it's going to take you
(03:03):
some time to go into the nextroom, and you would kind of go
little by little.
Took me about an hour and 15minutes to get through the
house.
It was the first time I got tosee to walk through somebody's
private plane.
I had never done that before.
That was really fascinating.
He had two different privateplanes, one of them he used on
tour.
I think the other one was morefor family.
And after that, I go to ZenStudios.
(03:24):
And this whole time, I mean, I'mnot a huge music fan.
I love me, I do love music and Ilisten to all different kinds of
music.
I am of Hispanic descent.
So I listen to Saliza music.
I listen to Latin music.
That's what I grew up listeningto.
But I can't say that I have thisfavorite artist that sings this
(03:45):
particular song.
Or for the most part, I listento podcasts.
I listen to books on audio.
Like that's how I spend my time.
My maybe as a teenager or in myearly 20s, when I went clubbing
and things like that, I was moreinto music.
Now it's not such a it's not notso in the front of my life.
(04:07):
But I get to some studios, andI'm taken back by all of the
gadgetry, like all the gadgets,the different speakers and the
different instruments, and howbig the rooms were to record and
the padding on all the walls.
And they're talking about on thetours, about Johnny Cash and
Elvis and all these otherartists, and how hard it was to,
(04:32):
I think they had to press theirmusic onto CDs to get other
people to listen.
And you'd have to have somebodythat someone that would be
willing to play you on theradio, and what that whole
system was like.
And I paused and was reallyovertaken.
And I want to share this.
Brenda's also hearing this forthe first time right now.
(04:54):
I want to share how privileged Igot to feel in that moment.
Like while Brenda and I haveover a hundred episodes on a
podcast, and we didn't have apimp like Elvis did.
We don't have a Mr.
Carnival.
We don't have anybody pullingthe strings.
Like we get to literally talkabout desire.
(05:14):
We have a mic that we each havea mic that sits on our desk.
We have software that sitsinside of a computer.
We don't have anybody as abarrier for what we want to
post.
We just get together, record,and upload.
And it's that simple.
We don't have any red tape infront of us to do the thing that
(05:38):
we get to do.
And I'm just so moved by that.
Like the fact that wow, we havethis body of work that was
created, and we didn't have topass anyone's test.
(05:58):
So what comes up for you thusfar, Brenda?
SPEAKER_00 (06:02):
I love your passion around this.
I love that you went somewherefollowing your intuition to have
some fun.
And it sounds like you weretaken aback by something that
you didn't expect.
Like you thought you were justgoing to Graceland to have a
great time and check out Elvis'home, which is really cool, and
(06:23):
check out his private plane.
And you're like, whoa, oh myGod, look at how he used to
record.
And look at how we record.
And you had this big wave ofgratitude come across you.
And that feels so good.
And I can really tap into thatbecause we really do have
(06:46):
creative control.
You know, we get to show up whenwe want, plug our mics into the
wall, travel with them.
I traveled across country lastwinter with my mic.
I recorded in Colorado, inAsheville, I c recorded in
California.
(07:07):
And there's a lot of privilegein that.
Like to get to live our livesthe way we do, as opposed to
what you're saying, that Elvishad somebody who produced for
him, somebody scheduled.
He had to go to a recordingstudio, and there were all these
pieces that had to be done toget his music out.
(07:29):
And we just get to record andpublish.
I mean, there's so much more toit.
I have so much more to say aboutthat because we have different
kinds of red tape.
SPEAKER_01 (07:39):
We have different kinds of red tape, but the part
that became very clear to me.
So I'll pause here for a second.
When I think about our red tape,it's like, okay, we have a
podcast, we talk about thingsthat are near and dear hearts.
We talk about personal growth.
We talk about desire.
Our education in this arenadidn't come easy.
(08:01):
That may be part of the redtape, right?
It took some time to learn andto pass through our own
cauldrons, our own fire to gethere and to have to be in a
place to be able to sharewisdom, right?
We're coming to you, yes, afterX.
I mean, I've been coaching since2010, about after X amount of
years of coaching, X amount ofclients, like this whole thing.
(08:26):
And it could easily say, I'm notprivileged, I'm not part of the
1%, or I'm not privileged, I'mnot a white male, I'm not
privileged.
Like we could, and it was amoment in time where I got to
pause and say, Oh wow, I I dosee this privilege.
I do see privilege in us thatwe've been able to manage our
(08:47):
nervous system enough and ourfinances enough to be able to
have the education that we have.
Right?
That's a privilege.
It's a privilege that it wasn'teven available in our time.
I'm assuming there was a timewhere this wasn't available,
this school of thought wasn'tavailable, this self-reflection
wasn't available.
(09:09):
We can definitely do more incommunity than we can alone.
So that's a privilege.
Being able to record with you isa privilege.
I really got to feel that.
And even deeper than that, it'slike 2025.
I think the year I was born in74 was the first time that a
(09:31):
woman could have a credit cardwithout having a man sign.
Like in my lifetime, I'm able tohave my own credit card, open my
own bank account, buy property,not have to get married, not not
have to have children, andrecord a podcast.
And it doesn't have to be anumber one podcast in its field.
(09:56):
Like I get to just record andshare the insights that I have.
SPEAKER_00 (10:00):
That's really beautiful.
What what would you say thegifts are in your life that you
get to do this with me?
SPEAKER_01 (10:10):
I think everything that I've mentioned, if we were
born in the 40s, we couldn't doit.
How crazy is that?
Just if we would have been bornjust two decades prior, that
would make me instead of 51, 71.
And I don't know if this is whatI'd be wanting to do at 71.
SPEAKER_00 (10:31):
It's not that long ago.
It's like our it's like ourmothers and our grandmothers
generation who really didn'thave the choices that we have.
It's pretty incredible that weget to do what we really want to
do.
I mean, we are a desire podcast,and we say it in the intro,
(10:52):
we're on the mat, followingdesire, curious, trusting.
There's no answers.
We don't, we don't have anythingsolved.
We're both on our own journey.
And we get to do that.
That is quite a privilege to beable to follow our true heart's
desire in that way.
SPEAKER_01 (11:11):
Yeah, I don't know what my true heart's desire
would have been if I was born inthe 40s.
But I do know that if there is awoman that was born in the 40s
that wanted to buy her own home,that wanted to go to school,
that wanted like all thesethings wouldn't have been a
thing of that time.
(11:31):
And when I sort of zoom out tomy experience, I was thinking,
okay, I went to Graceland and Ihad this experience.
I went to the Sun Studios and Ihad this experience.
And I feel really grateful forhaving had that experience.
And where else in my life can Inot see the privilege?
Because I'm so used to lookingat what I want and what's not
(11:55):
here, right?
Like, how do we get the nextthing bigger, badder, better?
And I think being tapped intowhat's already working is a
privilege.
Or maybe I want to rephrasethat.
It's not that being able to tapinto what's already working is a
privilege.
I think being able to tap intowhat's already working really
(12:18):
provides a perspective shiftwhere we can potentially see
gifts that we couldn't seebefore.
SPEAKER_00 (12:24):
Yeah, thank you.
It's a great lens to reallyexpand your own mind and say,
well, what am I not able to see?
And you're really pointing to alot of gratitude, is what it
feels like in my body.
Like a lot of gratitude to getto live this life, to get to on
(12:44):
a Wednesday afternoon, which iswhat this is, record.
And we have complete creativecontrol.
And you get to follow your pathof being a coach and how you
make money and how you live andmake your own schedule.
I mean, that wasn't available towomen in the past.
SPEAKER_01 (13:06):
It wasn't available to women in the past.
You're right.
It wasn't, I mean,entrepreneurship really wasn't
available in the past.
I'm thinking about another tourthat I took in Nashville, the
Raymond Auditorium, which iswhen we're like they part show,
(13:28):
part temple, part church.
And when her husband, Raymond RyRayman, passed, she took it over
and she had to sort of sellherself to the board because she
was a woman.
That's not really what women didback then.
She was able to do it.
And I'm sure arguments can bemade.
(13:49):
He was a really, really wealthyman.
That's why he even had theauditorium.
That's why that was even part oftheir portfolio, let's call it.
So I'm looking at how we aswomen have things.
And this is something that I tryto tap into often that we didn't
(14:10):
have at a particular time in thepast.
I mean, just yesterday wasvoting day.
Many generations of women beforeus couldn't do that in the
United States.
Like we had to defer to the manin our lives for our safety, our
security.
SPEAKER_00 (14:30):
It's really true.
It's quite intense to thinkabout it, that that wasn't
really that long ago.
I just saw this thing onInstagram about this doctor, Dr.
James Barry, who was actually awoman.
So I think for like in the1800s, for like 40 years, she
practiced medicine as Dr.
(14:52):
James Barry, but her name wasactually Margaret Ann Bulkley.
How cool is that?
I saw a photo on the Instagramreel, and she was just dressed
in a suit, and she actuallycleaned up a lot of conditions
in hospitals.
Like she saw where thingsweren't clean and she totally
up-leveled conditions inhospitals.
(15:13):
But she couldn't just do that asher own self.
Like she dressed as a man everyday for 40 years.
That's incredible.
I mean, there's so many storieslike that.
You know, women couldn't havecredit cards, they couldn't own
a house.
If you were a single mother, itwas really hard to get housing,
(15:33):
not that long ago.
And there's always been womenwho have gone out of the box.
You know, there's always beenwomen who have done incredible
things and defied the odds.
God bless them, the ones thatcame before us.
It's really true.
It's pretty incredible theamount of courage that they had
(15:56):
to have.
Like I just think of someonelike Harriet Tubman creating the
Underground Railroad, gettingpeople out of slavery.
My goodness.
That's incredible what she musthave gone gone through to have
the nervous system and thecapacity and the selflessness.
And she would go back and forth.
I don't know how many people shesaved, but it's quite
(16:17):
tremendous.
SPEAKER_01 (16:18):
That's kind of what I'm pointing to on today's
recording.
Just the places where wepotentially have privilege and
it doesn't feel like it, right?
And I think if I were to thinkhard enough, I would assume that
the generations that come nextare gonna have even more
privilege, so on and so forth.
(16:40):
Because there's so muchavailable.
I mean, yeah.
Just look at AI right now.
I remember encyclopedias.
SPEAKER_00 (16:48):
Oh my god, encyclopedias.
I remember that.
What comes to mind for me is theage of women having children
these days.
I mean, my grandmother, mygreat-grandmother, even my
mother, they gave birth at like20, 19 to 22 years old.
(17:10):
That was like the age wherewomen had children.
And if you didn't have childrenby that time, something was
wrong with you.
And by 25 or 30, you were justan old mate.
And my mother had me, I thinkshe was 22.
I was 26 when I had my daughterand 29.
And now my daughter's 30 and shedoesn't have children yet.
And she has that privilege.
And I look at how, oh, even Iadded six years on, I went to
(17:35):
college.
My mother didn't go to college,my grandmother didn't go to
college.
My father's mother went tocollege.
But this is so interesting.
As soon as she got married, shequit her job.
I'm sorry, not her job.
She quit college.
And there was no reason.
But that was what it wasexpected of women at the time.
(17:55):
She got married, she stoppedgoing to college, and she was
brilliant.
And so I was really the firstwoman to go to college in my
family.
And so I gave birth at 26, whichwas quite different than the
women before me.
And now my daughter is 30, myson is 28.
They're both not parents.
(18:16):
And they're really have theopportunity in their 20s to
self-actualize more.
And I watch my daughter workthrough a lot of her
relationship patterns and gothrough many relationship
iterations that she watched herdad and I go through, which
ultimately ended in our divorce.
She went through all of thosethings.
(18:37):
She cleaned it all up, and nowshe's in a beautiful
relationship.
Of course, that opportunity wasalways there.
I know other people my age whospent their 20s in
relationships, living inHoboken, having a great time in
their lives.
I chose to get married.
That's kind of what my lineagecalling was.
I didn't really think ofanything else to do.
(18:57):
I never thought ofself-actualizing in my 20s.
No, I was started doing thatwhen I was in my 40s.
But that's really cool.
It's a lot of privilege in thegenerations for that to evolve.
SPEAKER_01 (19:11):
It is.
I and I love that the youth nowhas a chance to decide.
Do I want to be a young parent?
Do I want to be an older parent?
Do I want to self-actualize inmy 20s, in my 40s?
Pretty much it's all game.
Like it doesn't, one isn'tnecessarily better than the
other.
But I think what we are talkingabout is that the fact that that
(19:33):
choice is even there.
Like when you talk about one ofyour grandmothers who just quit
college because, well, that'swhat they did.
Now someone would have theopportunity to decide.
And I do think that in thatarena of family and money and
school and work, there are otherfactors now at play because of
(19:57):
our own consumerism and thatit's very hard, I think, to hold
a household as a single income.
I think a single income familyreally has to budget in a way
that double income familydoesn't have to do.
But a single-income family withchildren has the opportunity to
raise their kids in a way thatdouble income families don't
(20:20):
necessarily have.
It's there's really so much morechoice now.
SPEAKER_00 (20:25):
And with the choices come new problems, new
awarenesses.
And you can really see that too.
I mean, two working parents,just to jam a little bit on what
you were talking about, doubleincome home, that's what I had.
And it was a privilege.
Like that was a privilege forme.
Like I went to college, I becamea teacher, I got my master's
(20:46):
degree.
That was really cool.
I'm really proud of that.
And working all those yearswhile I was pregnant and having
children was really hard, whichhas created a different path.
And now I see a lot of youngerwomen, a lot of moms in their
30s choosing to stay home.
(21:09):
Like they have the nextevolution, which is really cool.
Like they have the collegedegree, they have the education,
the self-actualization, andthey're still choosing to stay
home.
It's like the next level ofempowered choice.
I mean, we were from the 80s,where, you know, it was like we
were supposed to work.
(21:30):
You know, that was where we wereat the time.
And we put our shoulder pads onand we went to work so we could
look like men because we coulddo it like men and we could
work.
And that was a privilege at thetime.
And it's part of the evolution.
And I don't know where it willend, but there's there's like
something new happening rightnow, which is really cool, which
(21:51):
is more self-actualized womenbecoming mothers, which really
raises the entire vibration ofthe children that they're
raising.
Because I have no idea about thenervous system or regulating my
emotions or saying my true yesand no, asking for what I
(22:12):
wanted.
Like I was riding on fumes andluck and also joy, you know, but
it all, of course, came crashingdown.
SPEAKER_01 (22:22):
It's so funny.
But it's true.
There's always iterations andthere's always change.
And the biggest thing I wantedto share with that story from
Nashville in Memphis is that Igot to pause and say, oh, what
can I really be grateful for?
And but that wasn't necessarilya question.
It was like, oh, this is whatI'm experiencing.
(22:43):
And how cool is this to see thisarea where I have a certain
amount of privilege that Ididn't recognize it as
privilege.
Mostly because I think when wecelebrate, we we tend to want to
celebrate big wins, right?
Not, oh, I'm celebrating becauseI feel this privilege, even as
we try to figure this thing out,this podcast thing out.
(23:06):
Like, how crazy is that?
We have oh, we're a hundred pluspodcasts in and we're still
figuring it out.
Like you said it earlier, we'reon the mat.
There's no answer to that, but Ithink I definitely come from oh,
we celebrate when we hit a bigmilestone.
And this was a reminder that wecan actually celebrate the
(23:29):
privileges that we have, even ifit's not accompanied with by a
metal.
SPEAKER_00 (23:35):
Amen.
And we get to really pause eachday and look at where are we
going in our life?
And it does take time.
It change takes time.
We talk about that a lot, andit's really true, right?
And we're not only looking athuge successes like giant
(23:57):
markers on the calendar, butevery day, every moment that you
choose something that's reallyin alignment for yourself and
your values is a win.
So, yeah, there's the big winsthat are wonderful and they're
great to hit, right?
You want a certain amount ofmoney in your bank account, you
(24:19):
want to get that job, or evenland the interview, you want
your article to be published ina magazine, which I guess these
days with the internet isn'tthat hard anymore.
And everyone could self-publish,but you want to hit these
markers.
You want to lose a certainamount of weight, or you want to
have a certain desire, whateverit is that you want.
Every micro decision that youmake towards that is a win.
(24:44):
And that's a privilege andsomething that we're able to
really focus on today.
Where I don't know if theythought about that in the past.
Who knows?
Maybe they did, right?
Probably, I'm guessing, womenare are extremely wise.
I bet the mothers and the womenwere telling each other, hey,
you did a great job today.
That's a win in whatever versionthey they did it.
(25:06):
It is a privilege to get to lookat that every day and take the
pressure off.
Taking the pressure off is aprivilege.
And it's a choice.
It's a choice every day, everyday, to not put the pressure on
yourself and to say, okay, Ijust use food as as an example.
(25:28):
I ate way too much for dinnerlast night and I felt really
sick.
And today I made a betterchoice.
That's a win.
Amen.
SPEAKER_01 (25:38):
Amen for the little wins.
SPEAKER_00 (25:39):
I like food examples.
SPEAKER_01 (25:41):
I think I want to definitely just have our
listeners uh and ourselves.
Like, let's see if we can take amoment to just reflect on where
we do have privilege.
Like, where can we be grateful?
Whether it's because we're doingthe work, or maybe it's that
you're able to do something,we're able to do something
(26:03):
because it's 2025 and it wasn'tpossible in 1960, 70.
Where are there things thatthings and places where we can
engage?
I mean, even thinking about justdivorce.
Like there was a time when thatdidn't even happen.
I think people can getannulments now.
(26:26):
That wasn't part of thelandscape at one point in time.
It was like you're married tilldeath do you part, or you're
doing X, Y, or Z until.
And now we have so much choice.
And yes, choice does come withresponsibility.
(26:47):
We also have the real true needfor more capacity to be with
discomfort.
The more choices we have, themore possibilities there are.
And I think self-doubt pops up.
Is this the right thing?
Right?
Like, or or a fra or that can bephrased differently in our own
(27:08):
minds, but a version of am Idoing the right thing?
And I just want to encourage allof us to feel into where, if
any, is the privilege here?
What can I be grateful for?
It's not always about the bigwin.
(27:30):
So may we all get to celebrateall the little wins along the
way.
Thank you so much for listening.
That's a wrap for now.
And if you liked the episode, asalways, please share, rate,
comment, let us know what landedfor you.
We'd love to hear from you.
SPEAKER_00 (27:58):
Thank you for joining us on the Desire is
Medicine podcast.
SPEAKER_01 (28:02):
Desire invites us to be honest, loving, and deeply
intimate with ourselves andothers.
You can find our handles in theshow notes.
We'd love to hear from you.
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