September 4, 2025 • 41 mins
We’re excited to revisit this powerful conversation with Dr. Shefali. Whether it’s your first time listening or you’re returning to a favourite, this episode offers profound insights into self-discovery, authenticity, and the journey toward awakening.
Robin is joined by Dr. Shefali Tsabary to explore shedding societal beliefs, redefining love and relationships, and the vital role of setting boundaries as an act of self-love. Dr. Shefali highlights the importance for women to embrace their inner power through the concept of the ‘Awakened Queen’—a figure of strength, compassion, and discernment. This conversation invites listeners to reflect on consciousness in personal growth and transformation, offering practical guidance for reclaiming one’s power and stepping into a more authentic self.
We want to hear from you! Please send us your anonymous questions for the Podcast as well as our weekly IG Live Ask The Experts Q&A. https://realloveready.com/submitaquestion
Links:
https://institute.drshefali.com
https://courses.drshefali.com/aradicalawakening
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Watch the podcast on YouTube: youtube.com/realloveready
Credits: the Let’s Talk Love Podcast is hosted by Robin Ducharme, recorded and edited by Maia Anstey, and transcribed by Otter.ai.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Welcome to Let's Talk Love, the podcast that brings you real
talk, fresh ideas, and expert insights every week.
Our guests are the most trusted voices in love and
relationships, and they're here for you with tools, information,
and friendly advice to help you expand the ways you love,
relate, and communicate. We tackle the big questions, not
(00:25):
shying away from the complex, the messy, the awkward, and the
joyful parts of relationships. I'm your host, Robin Ducharme.
Now let's talk love. Hello, our beautiful community,
and thank you for joining us today.
I am just so honored and so happy to be joined by.
(00:49):
The most beautiful and wise honestly, doctor Chavali, I've
been looking forward to this forweeks and weeks and weeks and
here we are today so I really I finally get to speak to you and
meet meet you and thank you so much for being on our show today
it's. Such a pleasure, I'm so excited.
I can't wait to have this conversation.
I have been loving your book A Radical Awakening.
(01:10):
It was. It was fantastic, Chavali.
It really, really was. I, I gained so much wisdom and
actually so much confirmation when I read your book.
I want to just read a quick excerpt about what you about why
you read this book, what or whatthis book is about.
(01:31):
It is teaching women how to transcend their fears and
illusions, break free from societal expectations and
rediscover the person they were always meant to be fully
present, conscious and fulfilled.
So you tell a story at the beginning of the book about how
you became an awakened. I mean, you've been working on
(01:52):
your your growth and your awakening for a lot, a lot of
years, right? And but you tell a story about
how you were in your car one dayand your car came derailed off
the road And it was like this wake up call for you.
Can you can you talk about that,please?
And then just like really go into why you wrote the book.
Yes. Thank you.
I do have to say, out of all thebooks I've written, this one is
(02:15):
the is the real deal in terms ofpacking a punch and being a full
on journey, right? You read that book and you will
come out at the other end transformed.
I mean, I've had so many women reach out to me telling me how
this book has been their complete 180.
(02:36):
So yes. So I started the book with this
accident. I have, I'm a mother, I'm in a
PhD program. I'm trying to be a Good Wife.
I'm trying to be, you know, all things to all people.
And I was so exhausted and so fatigued that I fell asleep at
the wheel and derailed my car. And thankfully nothing happened.
But it was such a traumatizing wake up call, which then led to
(03:01):
many more wake up calls, which called to my attention that I
was severely disconnected and I was living the role and many
roles, but not really living from the soul, right from the
heart. And so dangerous is that
severance from the self that I can guarantee you every single
(03:22):
woman will resonate with that webegin to do things and make life
choices from a severed place, which can only lead to more
inauthenticity and more turmoil.And then one day you find
yourself at whatever 654575 going, who the hell am I?
Like how did I end up here? But but when choices are made
(03:43):
from the conditioned self, from the fear based self, it's very
easy to become somebody you can't recognize and have a life
that you don't feel part of. And it's so tricky because
culture supports this disconnection for women, because
a connected woman is a dangerouswoman because she begins to
speak her truth and and clamorous to be heard and she's
(04:04):
an inconvenience. So women are told that it's
better off for us that we're we're better off playing small
and being quiet. So that disconnection actually
serves us well in a tragic way. But, you know, it's really is
not the way we need to live our lives.
We don't deserve it. And we need to give ourselves
permission to enter a new rebirth.
(04:28):
And that's what this book is about.
I wrote it in my divorce, like when I was in it all the way
till I was out of it. And so it's very rich and very
emotional and very real. But I had many awakenings.
I was actually more awakened than than even now because now
I'm in another kind of cycle, right?
So the cycles never end. But when you learn to alchemize
(04:51):
the cycle for your highest transcendence and your
renaissance, you actually elevate to a a place that you
can't even imagine. And that's my invitation to
women reading this book is lean in and be curious to all the
things you haven't yet even discovered about who you are.
I just, Oh my gosh, I love everything that you just said
(05:12):
around just being in how we are going through.
We're constantly going through cycles.
And I was talking to my partner about this around like how it's
like we think we're like going through the same pattern again.
But if you are living consciously and deliberately,
you know, with that awareness, it's like the rings.
(05:33):
It's like going up a spiral staircase, isn't it?
So you might be seeing a patternthat you've been in, like it's
entrenched, it's deep. However, you're looking at it
from a different perspective, a higher perspective.
So hopefully from that new perspective, you can recognize
the pattern. It might be still there, but
it's like, OK, the choice I'm going to make now is going to be
(05:55):
different than before. So you you might right?
Absolutely. It's not about ever thinking or
having the delusion that you're going to be pain free and
suffering free. No, But what this, what this
work of conscious awakening is about is that spiral of
ascendance. Learning to tweak that pattern
(06:16):
just a little bit, you know? And today I was able to speak up
in truth just a little bit more.And I always tell my clients,
and I have a coaching institute where I coach people to do this
today. Just aspire to speak from your
authentic truth just a little bit more.
So if your authentic truth is atthis level, but you're on this
(06:37):
level of superficiality, you can't just expect yourself to go
to this deepest level of truth. You just go one layer down.
Is there a more authentic version of what I can be and
just enter that place And then tomorrow you're going to enter a
slightly more authentic version of what you can be.
And bringing into awareness all the parts of you that are
(06:58):
terrified to be authentic. The parts of you that want
security from the outside. And therefore you lie a little
bit or you get dressed a little bit more sexy because you're
really feeling, you know, inadequate today.
It's not about eliminating the insecurity.
It's about bringing to awarenessall the parts of you so that you
can live a more integrated life.You know, and that is the
(07:21):
radical awakening is to understand that you are Co
creating your reality. There is no victim except if
you're a victim of something physical.
Every emotional victim is a victim that Co creates their
reality. Every physical victim can be
truly a victim, but emotional victims are definitely Co
creating their reality. Yes, something I have been
(07:46):
doing, which you are teaching throughout your book is shedding
beliefs, shedding old beliefs and what our beliefs anyways,
right. I think about how so many of my
beliefs that I had deeply like, oh, this is it.
I'm going to die by the sword, right.
And now it's like that was useless.
Well, that is that was not serving me.
(08:07):
And so I think this is, this is such a key is like shedding this
the stuff that we get, we're taught so much growing up.
Of course we are. We're surrounded by our family,
our friends, our traditions, ourculture that is beliefs,
beliefs, beliefs, good, bad, black, white.
And the more beliefs we can shed, I think the better off we
(08:28):
are. Yes, so this time.
It comes a relationship. Absolutely.
This entire book is about what Icall a deconstruction process of
eliminating, or at least deeply questioning your cherished
beliefs. Because when we deeply attach to
beliefs, they will come in the way of our connection to human
(08:49):
beings. Because every human being has
different beliefs. So the more we cling to beliefs,
we actually stunt our capacity for the deepest union with
ourselves and with each other. So every chapter of the book is
deconstructing some big belief. I've deconstructed the
institution of marriage and divorce and love and beauty and
sexuality. So all of that is clearly
(09:13):
deconstructed and and it's been a provoking book because to
deconstruct your beliefs and to loosen your attachment to them
is very provoking because like you said, we've been raised with
our identity around that belief.I will be the perfect mother.
I will be a skinny woman. I will be a religious human
(09:33):
being. These belief systems have halved
and grooved our identity. So now when somebody like me
comes along, and books at that, that is very threatening and
provoking. Yet the Buddha himself said that
Nirvana and enlightenment is a place where you have no more
beliefs because you don't have to attach to anything as your
(09:54):
identity. And that is when you truly enter
your emptiness of self or truly a oneness with the universe,
because as long as you, you actually create separation.
And so just by me saying I'm an Indian woman automatically, by
me saying that doesn't mean thatyou don't appreciate who I am,
but by me identifying as an Indian woman immediately creates
(10:18):
separation between me and you, Robin, because you're like, oh,
I better back off. I don't know what it means to be
an Indian woman. So just there through my
labeling and my attachment to the label, I've created a
separation. You know, parents do that a lot.
With non parents, you won't knowwhat I go through because I'm a
parent. On some level that's true, but
on another level that's not true.
And as long as we create these bifurcations, I'm Jewish, you're
(10:41):
Muslim, we are actually creatingseparation.
Yes, one of so there there's a from I don't know what chapter
going on, but I mean, I would say like at least a third of the
book really talks about, like you said, the deconstruction of
marriage. And I mean with real love ready.
We are all about love and relationships and helping people
(11:02):
build skills to be better in relationship and different
perspectives. And of course there's the lies
of love, right. You've got a chapter all about
this and all section talking about how we've been fed about
we and it's still going, still going very strongly in the bill
of lies around the other about finding your one right.
And so and you, you talk about this concept of twin beggars.
(11:26):
I want to, I want to quote you on this because I just, I love
this part of your book. You say that you talk about the
lies of love that many people fall into.
You say falling into need, possession, control and
familiarity. To love someone is to feel for
them without our own feelings about ourselves getting in the
(11:47):
way. So I think it's like we've been,
it's like there's so much codependent relationships and
not this free love that we all want to have, but we're not
really a lot of us aren't there,right?
So what does it mean like the twin beggars, Like what is that?
What does that mean? Please and like and explain that
to us and like how is how do we shift out of that?
(12:09):
Well, society and culture has definitely set us up for this
idea that this other person is going to be your, you know, your
perfect, you know, other hunts and together you're going to
create this perfect family. What that does is enforce and
in, you know, perpetuate an enmeshment and a codependency
(12:30):
because what culture really saysis that this person now belongs
to you and you belong to this person.
And that is really a delusional way of looking at adult
relationships. We don't belong to anybody.
And when we have that idea, it sounds so lovely and romantic,
but it's actually a very toxic, codependent message.
(12:52):
She belongs to him. What?
Like, no, but we want the other person to belong to us because
we want to own and possess the other person.
So we come into these dynamics with these delusions of
ownership and possession and control and enmeshment and
dependency and actually end up being what I call twin beggars
because each one is looking to be belonged to by the other and
(13:17):
belong to the other as if they are our mother and our father.
And we come needy and hungry anddesperate and demanding and
controlling and tantruming, justlike a three-year old wanting
candy. And we expect and culture tells
us we have a right to expect. I mean, it's legally sanctioned.
It's by the justice and by God himself or herself to demand
(13:39):
complete fidelity, loyalty, attention and focus.
And it's just such a toxic engagement of each other's
spirits. And we don't want to own it
right? We don't want to accept that
that is actually the agenda. And how do we know it's the
agenda? Because the moment our partner
dares to even be emotionally connected to another human
(14:02):
being, we call them as if they're cheaters.
Really. They can't be emotionally
connected if they are the, if they are of this gender or sex
that attracts them. We're not allowed to do that.
No, we're not allowed to do that, you know.
So out of all these beautiful masses of human beings, we can
only have eyes for one. And if those eyes stray and
(14:22):
forget the genitalia, we will sever the relationship because
it's a conditioned relationship.It's based on a binding to each
other. And it's really unfair.
And not just unfair, it's downright unrealistic, which is
why most marriages dissolve, because it's predicated on lies
that we can do this, we should do this, and this is the only
(14:46):
way to do this. Right.
So when you, I mean you've, thisis the work that you do, you're
working with, you're working with couples, right?
You're working with, you're, youspecialize in parenting, of
course, but there is this side of your job, of course, that is
working to help people with their marriages, their
relationships. So we have that, that construct
(15:06):
and then we have, you know, whatI really aspire to, which I love
how you talk about high love in your book and how, what that
means, what that really means tohave like the deep that love
that actually, I think we, I think I, I, I'm aspiring to it.
I'm working towards it in my relationship right now.
But how do you help people get there out of what we're
(15:28):
conditioned to, to that place? Like people have to be on board,
right? Don't, don't they?
They both have to be like committed to their awareness.
Right first, high love starts with yourself.
Do you have high life for yourself?
Right. Can you fully accept yourself as
a very flawed, imperfect and limited human being?
Are you honest with yourself? Are you authentic to yourself?
(15:49):
Most of us are not even telling ourselves the truth.
Forget each other. Let alone know each other.
You know ourselves, right? Yes.
Yes, and when you know yourself and you accept that you too are
imperfect, flawed, limiting and you you too constraint, then you
will accept that about your partner and not take it
(16:09):
personally when they have affection for another person or
when they don't love you the same way or when you are no
longer a match. Allowing the fluid fluidity and
the adaptability of ever growingrelationships is the hallmark of
consciousness. But most of us, because of the
marriage box and because cultureputs us in this box that's
(16:29):
supposed to be for luck, we actually stop growing together
and stop confronting hard troops.
I'm all for living together forever, but I'm also very much
a pragmatist and a realist that if that does not continue to
work for people, there should bean adaptability and an evolution
that is permissible without scorn, judgement, scathing, you
(16:51):
know, ostracism from culture. But culture doesn't allow that.
It's very limited and you know, we want designed for long term
pair bonds. We want designed to live with
one person first. We want designed to live this
long. And so while I advocate living
together for as long as is possible, I also advocate for
growth and advocate for health and functionality as opposed to
(17:17):
just staying together as a statistic of a married couple.
But you're actually miserable roommates who are not growing
together. Right.
Many people are just miserable roommates.
Yes, but are they really wantingto shift that dynamic into like,
I think if do you have let me ask you this, do you have
(17:38):
clients that come to you that are like, OK, I can see that
there's, there's a lot of stuff going on and you're helping
people like identify. All right, You think that that's
about your partner? No, it's about you.
Let's work on that, right, So that we can change the dynamic.
And so are you like, that's whatyou're doing, right, Doctor
Shefali? You're helping people.
Absolutely. Like, just because this is what
your book is about is about introspection, changing your
(18:00):
beliefs, deconstructing all of this so that you can appreciate
and know and fully love, love yourself, love all parts of
yourself so you can love anotherin a better way.
Yes. OK.
Yeah, so I mean, the people are always coming to me asking to
fix the relationship, but then we discover that they are so
(18:21):
broken and damaged themselves that they can barely see
themselves as whole people. So when you are not fully in
love with yourself, you cannot expect your partner to be in
love with you because you are not showing up as your truest,
fullest, biggest, largest, the most authentic part of yourself.
(18:41):
So when you love yourself enough, then you can be in a
matching relationship with another human being who also
loves themselves and who can take you in, but they don't need
you to fill them up. Most of us are just scavenging
off this other person, hoping that they can hold us up and
fill us up and our cup is empty.And we're using them really to
(19:05):
give us an identity, to give us meaning, to give us empowerment,
and that those relationships will eventually start to crack
because they're not sustainable,because they depend on another.
Right, so you've got a section, a whole area in the book around
boundaries, how you like what really boundaries are for and
(19:26):
how we set those boundaries and discernment.
Can you talk about like these, how these practices help you
love yourself more? Like how would how would
somebody show up if they say to you, OK, I'm I love myself.
I don't know what you mean. Like of course I love myself,
but what kind of behaviors wouldyou be seeing in somebody that's
demonstrating absolutely that's not showing self love?
(19:47):
Well, the first sign of a unloving person to themselves is
a victim, right? Are you feeling like you're the
victim? So it shows up through
resentment, bitterness. Feeling like you're always tired
and fatigued and sacrificing foreverybody else and you're
carrying the burden. Or are you a savior rescue?
(20:09):
I talk about all these masks. So those are ways that you can
identify. You know what?
Maybe I need to do some inner work and it's something to do
with me. So a healthy person will
immediately catch their savior ship, their victimhood, their
martyrdom, their bleeding empathy, their codependency.
(20:31):
A healthy person will immediately go, there's my
disease, there it is. I'm showing up again as my
codependent self. So first is awareness and
compassion and acceptance of your shadow parts.
And then a person who is in lovewith themselves will be quite
comfortable saying no and quite comfortable saying yes.
(20:51):
But they will do it with this, this conscious connection and
attunement and discernment of their authentic self.
They won't do it to please. They won't do it to validate.
They would really do it because it means something to them.
And the last and the most telling sign of a very conscious
person is somebody who knows that they are on their own path.
That is a solo path. You know, it's kind of a lonely
(21:15):
path, but it's inevitable to be on that path alone because an
awakened person knows no one else can walk with you.
They can walk on their path in aparallel way, but not on your
path. Your path is yours and you have
to own it and celebrate it and embody the teachings and
(21:35):
understand that you are uniquelyhere because of your cause and
effect. All the causes and effects of
your life have brought you here.There is no victimhood beyond
the point now. If you were physically tortured,
yes, but otherwise you have to own the family trauma that
brought you here. You have to own the relationship
crisis that brought you here. You have to own that you were
(21:56):
unconscious in your own way, andthat's why you're here.
And by owning your own journeys,limitations, now you can grow.
And part of that is these boundaries you're talking about,
you know? So what are conscious
boundaries? Conscious boundaries have
nothing to do with the other person.
They only have to do with yourself, so an unhealthy
(22:19):
dynamic will look like this. Can you please stop drinking?
When are you going to go to therapy?
Have you called your mother? Can you please put away the the
dishes? Can you please go to a a can you
please go to so it's constantly,you know, asking the other to do
something, but a conscious boundary is would sound like
this. You know, I'm I'm aware that you
(22:40):
haven't done the dishes for 10,000 days.
And So what I've done to take care of myself is 1 of many
things. I've thrown away all the glass
dishes, I've locked them away and I only have paper plates.
Or I've learned to become OK andZen with dirty dishes.
So all the dishes are there. We don't have any more clean
dishes in the house. I only clean for myself.
(23:02):
Or I've learned that I want to clean the dishes and I'm going
to do the dishes for posterity and shut my mouth.
So conscious boundaries takes our own care into our own hands,
He says, OK, I'm the only one here.
I'm going to create my own rulesand whatever that looks like for
you. But you own it.
You don't keep whining, complaining, and waiting for the
(23:24):
other person to do what you needto do.
You're doing what you need to doto protect yourself and to.
Yes, yes. If you have children in the
house who don't clean, don't clear up, OK, you have choices.
Never do the laundry ever again or, you know, go live somewhere
else or buy paper plates and, you know, paper sheets, you
(23:44):
know, throw away all your clothes.
You have choices. And I know that sounds very
radical, but that's so much better than living in the
vibration of this constant complaining and this worrying,
you know, constant anxiety. You know, mother once came to me
and she was like, my daughter never leaves, never puts off the
light, and she always leaves thelight on.
(24:05):
And it was over and over and over.
And the mother tried to explain and the mother tried to remind
and the mother tried to put notes in the house, but the
daughter would never change. So the mother had two choices.
Either she accepts it and zips it or she does something.
So what she said I cannot acceptit, you have to give me another
solution. So I said, OK, just take out the
light bulb. You know, the child is no light.
(24:27):
And she was like, that's so mean.
So I was like, see, this is how we keep in this constant
whirring loop because we don't want to take action because
action then would mean that has its own consequences.
But conscious boundaries has consequences.
And you have to just decide, do I prefer the consequences that
come from zero boundaries, or doI prefer the consequences that
(24:49):
come with the boundary? Which consequences are more
livable? Right.
So in the book you also, when you say the single biggest
practical step that you took foryour own, you know, for
throughout your awakening is really learning how to pause,
right? This is about going, it's
(25:10):
learning to pause and listen to your inner self.
And you know, like you made it apractice and the more you
practice something, the better you're going to become at it.
And it's going to become like second nature.
But you have to practice like going inside and being like,
rather than reacting right away or saying that thing that you
used to say or behaving in that way that you used to behave.
It's like, hmm, this something is really bothering me here.
(25:33):
I'm going to go inside and, and really reflect on this, right?
Probably. Yes, yes, yes.
So a bigger lesson that leads tothe pause is a lesson of owning
your Co creation. When you become aware that you
are also a hazard to your own well-being and you are really
standing in your own way, then you will be humble and realize,
(25:56):
OK, next time I better not just bounce on the other person
because that's coming from this delusion that is only their
fault. But I'm going to now pause to
observe how I am a hazard to myself.
And it's that humility to go, you know what?
I'm kind of fully on board with my own pain.
I'm fully creating my own misery.
(26:18):
Once you are willing to accept that you are a participant in
your own health, then you will change your pattern.
But if you keep thinking it's your partner or your child
constantly and you have nothing to do with it, then you're going
to, you know, constantly be at their mercy and you will not
break out of the pattern. Right, a part of the book that I
(26:41):
was just like, Oh my God. So like I work with one of my
best friends, Kirsten and the two of us before we work on a we
work on a podcast together. So we read the books and then we
have like amazing conversations about what we both took away,
what we learned. And one of the keys was the
consciousness quotient. Oh my gosh, I was like, this is
(27:01):
this is the words attached to what I already knew.
But now it's like, and but I don't think that a lot of people
really understand this. And I think it is so key.
Actually, I've got it. I mean, this book is dog eared
all the way. It is highlighted everywhere.
But I've got I've got page 276, the consciousness quotient.
And this is around discernment, the wisdom of discernment.
(27:24):
A large part of self honor has to do with discernment.
There was one lesson I missed inlife.
It was to have discernment when it came to people and
situations. And you talk about one of the
fundamental pieces of awareness I was lacking when I was growing
up is the awareness of how different every single person's
level of consciousness is. I presume that just because we
(27:45):
were all sentient and relativelyintelligent, we were of this
similar consciousness. And how oh how wrong I was.
Gosh, it took me at least my entire 30s and I'm thinking, I
think I'm in my 40. I'm 47 now and I'm like, oh,
this in my 40s. I really have honed in on this
one. But it isn't true that
everyone's heart is wide open, nor is it true that everyone is
loving and compassionate. The key determinant is the
(28:08):
person's consciousness, emotion.I love it so much.
I was like, that is that is so true.
This, this is like we're, we're walking around as adults.
But like you say, so much is like actually, that person's
actually like a 5 year old. I'm dealing with a 5 year old
right now. Exactly.
And they've actually been in their five year old self for
most of my life in their life. They're not going beyond that.
(28:30):
So understanding that is so key.So that so you're not, so you're
not suffering trying to get thisperson to understand where
you're coming from. They're not.
Able to, they're not able to. Exactly.
So we as women especially have been trained to morph our being
and our essence to anything that's outside of us.
And we have been told that we are responsible for making it
(28:51):
work. So we put all our energy and all
our effort and we contort ourselves constantly who make it
work. But that's where we've been
given a real, you know, a big load of poison because it's not
our responsibility. And we need to have actually
learned instead of eternal self sacrifice, we should have
(29:12):
learned discernment to whom and to where can we give of
ourselves. And we need to wait for the
match before we give ourselves fully.
But we weren't trained like that.
We were told that we should sacrifice ourselves for every
relationship and just give and give and give without
necessarily receiving back. So we never waited for the
(29:33):
match. And now through this process, I
teach women that no, if it's nota match, you, you don't give.
If they give one toe, you give one toe, right?
It's like you, you have to give it at the level that you're
receiving. But we were told that to receive
was anathema. To receive was a you're a
selfish woman. You shouldn't look at receiving.
Why not, right? I'm not saying not to give, but
(29:56):
can we also give ourselves? So this dynamic of which comes
about only through discernment allows a woman to understand
that every human being is going to be at a different level of
consciousness according to what I call the consciousness
quotient. So a longer continuum.
We're all on a continuum. Each person is further along or
(30:16):
not further along. So you get to discern, does this
person go to therapy? Does this person do the inner
work? Have they read books that are
going to instigate their growth?And then you get to observe them
for a period of time before you invest in them.
That are, is this somebody I cangrow with?
And quickly realize that this person is not growing.
This is this is not a growth seeker.
(30:38):
And this person is going to staystagnant.
And the minute you realize that,oh, he's a level 2 on a scale of
1 to 10, you stop taking it personally and you stop making
it your mission to make them a 7because people who are under 7
are rarely going to grow, right?They're kind of they're stuck.
But hey, miracles happen, but it's not your job to take them
(31:00):
to a higher level of consciousness.
And many of us women act like it's our job, it's our mission
to bring everyone to a higher level of consciousness.
And what that does is it drains us, it disempowers us and it it
cripples us. And we don't have to do that to
anyone anymore. Let them be at a level 2.
They will grow organically when they are ready.
(31:22):
And that's another lesson I learned.
Let people be where they're at instead of constantly rescuing
them because that need to rescueis actually my anxiety and not
theirs. When they are ready and they're
anxious enough, they will change, but not a minute soon.
People never change for other people really.
They only change when they are ready.
(31:43):
Yes, the you've got a there's the most beautiful section in
your book around the awakened queen.
It's just so everybody has all women that are listening to
this. And then I just want them to
read your book because the how you describe being the awakened
queen and what those behaviors look like, what those thoughts
look like that the queen is embodying is like so good,
(32:04):
right? Like you talk about like we're
no longer princesses, which is what we are taught to be as
girls. We're taught to be the damsel in
distress or looking for their Prince.
And it's like this seeking, seeking, lack, lack.
And as soon as you meet somebody, it's like they're
going to make all of that is still so in our society, in our
culture and how we're raised. But the awakened queen, it is so
(32:26):
much about being in her power, being in her strength, being so.
And I think that's everything about women these days.
It's like if you can get to a place where you are awakened and
conscious, you're you are the most loving and generous, but
you're also, like you said, discerning.
You're taking accountability. You're still, you're nurturing,
(32:46):
loving, generous self at the same time very strong.
And like my boundaries are firm.Like it's like having both and
embodying both ways of being in such a beautiful way.
So yeah, Yep. And I think part of being an
awakened queen is to allow ourselves to not do it all
(33:11):
right. The awakened queen doesn't need
to do it all right, because she doesn't need to.
She doesn't need to prove herself in every little way.
You know, I'm going to be the best cook and the best fast
fashionista and I'm going to go to the gym for an hour and I'm
going to breastfeed and I'm going to make homemade granola
cookies. And I'm going to also be a sex
maven in my bed. Oh my goodness.
(33:32):
And a boss babe, right? That's the new new title.
Right. We cannot be at all.
And their phases we have to go through, and we have to honor
the phases. An awakened queen knows how to
wait her turn. She knows that the cycles will
change. She's not in a rush because
she's already the queen. She's the queen if she's just
breastfeeding her child, she's the queen.
(33:53):
If she doesn't have children, she's already awakened to
acquaint them. So she doesn't need these roles
to create identity. And the next thing about an
awakened queen is that she brings her sisters along with
her, right? She is not threatened by her
sisters, and she works on it. At least.
Even if she is, sometimes she works on it and she tries to
(34:14):
uplift other sisters and brothers.
The Awakened Queen is not here to be a dictator or the
hierarchical superior. She's here to be part of a team
and she knows that we are stronger collectively than we
are individually. She's surrounded, she's
surrounding herself with with people who are embodying the
same in in the fact that they are on a growth mindset and
(34:37):
supporting one another and cheering each other on.
And you're all the same team. Yes, Yeah.
Yes, she's not living in this competitive insecure way that
where she feels like she has to be the most beautiful or the
most successful or the most anything because she knows those
are illusions that are transientanyway and they truly don't
(34:59):
bring about lasting sustainable change or growth or well-being.
These are F moral ideas that will never bring long lasting
abundance. When I read when I read your
book, Doctor Shwali, it just was, it was like coming home.
I was like, OK, I've been, I'm on the right path here because I
feel like a lot of the things that you are helping women come
(35:19):
to realize I'm working through it.
Like I'm on the spiral and I feel like every, every cycle I'm
in, OK, I'm feeling a little bit, I'm going up here.
OK, My, I'm because I'm acting differently than I was before.
That was getting me in trouble, right?
So it's like I'm, I'm more grounded.
I'm definitely taking more spacein my life and just not feeling
my calendar as much as I used to, right?
(35:39):
These are big things and I'm just not as anxious.
I mean, just like Robin, you canchill.
Things are good, right? And like you said, I'm not
trying to do it all or be at all.
I'm just like actually just feelthe spaciousness.
Yes, yes, the awakened Queen feels so much in a bounty.
The queen, the Kingdom queendom is inside her.
(36:02):
That is her awakening, that wherever she is, she is the
queen. And she doesn't need to be on a
private jet and she doesn't needto be on a stage walking a red
carpet to experience that inner queendom.
It's here, it's inside. And that's what we modern women
have to really work hard on because in many ways, social
(36:24):
media and this whole Instagram world, it's pulling us like, why
am I not there? Why wasn't I invited to that?
And that is designed to strip usoff our power to take us out of
our reality. So part of my practice now is to
really detox from social media. And when I find myself scrolling
(36:46):
and then comparing and then judging myself, I notice it
immediately and I go time to shut it down.
And then I get off it for a few days at a time because I can see
that it is designed to create anapp designed to create
insecurity and competition. And I'm falling into it, right?
That's my Co creation. So I am here now.
Wherever you are, whoever's listening to this, embody, own
(37:09):
and celebrate where you are now.You don't have to be where
another person is. Let them do that.
You are fine and abundant exactly where you are.
You know, all of us see this glitz and glitz, and all of us
think that there's a part of us that would do so well there.
But when you then meet people who are doing the glitzy, glitzy
things, you realize that they'retortured by it, right?
(37:31):
They're so anxious. And we don't want that.
So we have to sacrifice that level of, you know, I'll often
think about fame that I don't want fame because I don't want
the headache, right? The last thing because it strips
you away from you living for yourselves.
You soon become a pawn living for your audience, and that is
(37:53):
the most tragic way to live. It really is.
So tell us what you said in the beginning of our conversation
about your is it a course that you offer around this around is?
Well, I do have a course of a radical awakening course, yeah,
but I have an institute. I have a Conscious Parenting and
Life Institute where I coach people to do the work I do and
(38:14):
to break their patterns and findtheir inner radical self.
But there is a course on this book as well.
It's on my website so if people want the course they can go and
download it. Beautiful.
Well, I hope people, I hope people take it and read your
book and just there was just so,so many gems and tools.
Really that's what this is aboutis like how do I get there step
by step. It's just like you said, it's
(38:37):
just it's taking, it doesn't matter where you are in the
spectrum or where you are in theladder, whatever those things
are. We don't need those analogies,
but it's just taking the steps right and making the changes and
they will build on each. Other and the first step is
awareness is so allowing the words to just open you up and
open your curiosity just a little bit and it creates a
(38:58):
ripple effect of a consciousnesstransformational seismic shift
within you. Just one small idea that begins
to rattle in your brain can havea seismic level effect.
Yeah, well, I, I want to thank you so, so much for all the work
you're doing this world. And thank you.
The person that you are is just beautiful.
(39:19):
And I, I close all of our podcasts with a blessing with
your words. So we'll do that.
May we awaken to the knowing that the love we get from
ourselves is more valuable than the love we receive from
another. May we connect to ourselves
differently. May we have our own backs and
trust our own voice. May we see ourselves as a
(39:40):
magnificent beings that we are and put ourselves 1st.
And may we as awakened beings work from our hearts as well as
our minds, receiving as well as giving, fully settled into our
worth and desire nothing more than to empower others to know
theirs as well. Thank you, Doctor Shafali.
(40:01):
Thank you for having me so much.Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for being herewith us.
Let's Talk Love is brought to you by Real Love Ready and
hosted by Robin Ducharme. If you'd like to keep learning
with us, visit realloveready.comfor more resources and tools to
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(40:22):
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(41:04):
or family member, your recommendation could just be
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(41:25):
Many blessings and much love.
Welcome to Let's Talk Love, the podcast that brings you real
talk, fresh ideas, and expert insights every week.
Our guests are the most trusted voices in love and
relationships, and they're here for you with tools, information,
and friendly advice to help you expand the ways you love,
relate, and communicate. We tackle the big questions, not
(00:25):
shying away from the complex, the messy, the awkward, and the
joyful parts of relationships. I'm your host, Robin Ducharme.
Now let's talk love. Hello, our beautiful community,
and thank you for joining us today.
I am just so honored and so happy to be joined by.
(00:49):
The most beautiful and wise honestly, doctor Chavali, I've
been looking forward to this forweeks and weeks and weeks and
here we are today so I really I finally get to speak to you and
meet meet you and thank you so much for being on our show today
it's. Such a pleasure, I'm so excited.
I can't wait to have this conversation.
I have been loving your book A Radical Awakening.
(01:10):
It was. It was fantastic, Chavali.
It really, really was. I, I gained so much wisdom and
actually so much confirmation when I read your book.
I want to just read a quick excerpt about what you about why
you read this book, what or whatthis book is about.
(01:31):
It is teaching women how to transcend their fears and
illusions, break free from societal expectations and
rediscover the person they were always meant to be fully
present, conscious and fulfilled.
So you tell a story at the beginning of the book about how
you became an awakened. I mean, you've been working on
(01:52):
your your growth and your awakening for a lot, a lot of
years, right? And but you tell a story about
how you were in your car one dayand your car came derailed off
the road And it was like this wake up call for you.
Can you can you talk about that,please?
And then just like really go into why you wrote the book.
Yes. Thank you.
I do have to say, out of all thebooks I've written, this one is
(02:15):
the is the real deal in terms ofpacking a punch and being a full
on journey, right? You read that book and you will
come out at the other end transformed.
I mean, I've had so many women reach out to me telling me how
this book has been their complete 180.
(02:36):
So yes. So I started the book with this
accident. I have, I'm a mother, I'm in a
PhD program. I'm trying to be a Good Wife.
I'm trying to be, you know, all things to all people.
And I was so exhausted and so fatigued that I fell asleep at
the wheel and derailed my car. And thankfully nothing happened.
But it was such a traumatizing wake up call, which then led to
(03:01):
many more wake up calls, which called to my attention that I
was severely disconnected and I was living the role and many
roles, but not really living from the soul, right from the
heart. And so dangerous is that
severance from the self that I can guarantee you every single
(03:22):
woman will resonate with that webegin to do things and make life
choices from a severed place, which can only lead to more
inauthenticity and more turmoil.And then one day you find
yourself at whatever 654575 going, who the hell am I?
Like how did I end up here? But but when choices are made
(03:43):
from the conditioned self, from the fear based self, it's very
easy to become somebody you can't recognize and have a life
that you don't feel part of. And it's so tricky because
culture supports this disconnection for women, because
a connected woman is a dangerouswoman because she begins to
speak her truth and and clamorous to be heard and she's
(04:04):
an inconvenience. So women are told that it's
better off for us that we're we're better off playing small
and being quiet. So that disconnection actually
serves us well in a tragic way. But, you know, it's really is
not the way we need to live our lives.
We don't deserve it. And we need to give ourselves
permission to enter a new rebirth.
(04:28):
And that's what this book is about.
I wrote it in my divorce, like when I was in it all the way
till I was out of it. And so it's very rich and very
emotional and very real. But I had many awakenings.
I was actually more awakened than than even now because now
I'm in another kind of cycle, right?
So the cycles never end. But when you learn to alchemize
(04:51):
the cycle for your highest transcendence and your
renaissance, you actually elevate to a a place that you
can't even imagine. And that's my invitation to
women reading this book is lean in and be curious to all the
things you haven't yet even discovered about who you are.
I just, Oh my gosh, I love everything that you just said
(05:12):
around just being in how we are going through.
We're constantly going through cycles.
And I was talking to my partner about this around like how it's
like we think we're like going through the same pattern again.
But if you are living consciously and deliberately,
you know, with that awareness, it's like the rings.
(05:33):
It's like going up a spiral staircase, isn't it?
So you might be seeing a patternthat you've been in, like it's
entrenched, it's deep. However, you're looking at it
from a different perspective, a higher perspective.
So hopefully from that new perspective, you can recognize
the pattern. It might be still there, but
it's like, OK, the choice I'm going to make now is going to be
(05:55):
different than before. So you you might right?
Absolutely. It's not about ever thinking or
having the delusion that you're going to be pain free and
suffering free. No, But what this, what this
work of conscious awakening is about is that spiral of
ascendance. Learning to tweak that pattern
(06:16):
just a little bit, you know? And today I was able to speak up
in truth just a little bit more.And I always tell my clients,
and I have a coaching institute where I coach people to do this
today. Just aspire to speak from your
authentic truth just a little bit more.
So if your authentic truth is atthis level, but you're on this
(06:37):
level of superficiality, you can't just expect yourself to go
to this deepest level of truth. You just go one layer down.
Is there a more authentic version of what I can be and
just enter that place And then tomorrow you're going to enter a
slightly more authentic version of what you can be.
And bringing into awareness all the parts of you that are
(06:58):
terrified to be authentic. The parts of you that want
security from the outside. And therefore you lie a little
bit or you get dressed a little bit more sexy because you're
really feeling, you know, inadequate today.
It's not about eliminating the insecurity.
It's about bringing to awarenessall the parts of you so that you
can live a more integrated life.You know, and that is the
(07:21):
radical awakening is to understand that you are Co
creating your reality. There is no victim except if
you're a victim of something physical.
Every emotional victim is a victim that Co creates their
reality. Every physical victim can be
truly a victim, but emotional victims are definitely Co
creating their reality. Yes, something I have been
(07:46):
doing, which you are teaching throughout your book is shedding
beliefs, shedding old beliefs and what our beliefs anyways,
right. I think about how so many of my
beliefs that I had deeply like, oh, this is it.
I'm going to die by the sword, right.
And now it's like that was useless.
Well, that is that was not serving me.
(08:07):
And so I think this is, this is such a key is like shedding this
the stuff that we get, we're taught so much growing up.
Of course we are. We're surrounded by our family,
our friends, our traditions, ourculture that is beliefs,
beliefs, beliefs, good, bad, black, white.
And the more beliefs we can shed, I think the better off we
(08:28):
are. Yes, so this time.
It comes a relationship. Absolutely.
This entire book is about what Icall a deconstruction process of
eliminating, or at least deeply questioning your cherished
beliefs. Because when we deeply attach to
beliefs, they will come in the way of our connection to human
(08:49):
beings. Because every human being has
different beliefs. So the more we cling to beliefs,
we actually stunt our capacity for the deepest union with
ourselves and with each other. So every chapter of the book is
deconstructing some big belief. I've deconstructed the
institution of marriage and divorce and love and beauty and
sexuality. So all of that is clearly
(09:13):
deconstructed and and it's been a provoking book because to
deconstruct your beliefs and to loosen your attachment to them
is very provoking because like you said, we've been raised with
our identity around that belief.I will be the perfect mother.
I will be a skinny woman. I will be a religious human
(09:33):
being. These belief systems have halved
and grooved our identity. So now when somebody like me
comes along, and books at that, that is very threatening and
provoking. Yet the Buddha himself said that
Nirvana and enlightenment is a place where you have no more
beliefs because you don't have to attach to anything as your
(09:54):
identity. And that is when you truly enter
your emptiness of self or truly a oneness with the universe,
because as long as you, you actually create separation.
And so just by me saying I'm an Indian woman automatically, by
me saying that doesn't mean thatyou don't appreciate who I am,
but by me identifying as an Indian woman immediately creates
(10:18):
separation between me and you, Robin, because you're like, oh,
I better back off. I don't know what it means to be
an Indian woman. So just there through my
labeling and my attachment to the label, I've created a
separation. You know, parents do that a lot.
With non parents, you won't knowwhat I go through because I'm a
parent. On some level that's true, but
on another level that's not true.
And as long as we create these bifurcations, I'm Jewish, you're
(10:41):
Muslim, we are actually creatingseparation.
Yes, one of so there there's a from I don't know what chapter
going on, but I mean, I would say like at least a third of the
book really talks about, like you said, the deconstruction of
marriage. And I mean with real love ready.
We are all about love and relationships and helping people
(11:02):
build skills to be better in relationship and different
perspectives. And of course there's the lies
of love, right. You've got a chapter all about
this and all section talking about how we've been fed about
we and it's still going, still going very strongly in the bill
of lies around the other about finding your one right.
And so and you, you talk about this concept of twin beggars.
(11:26):
I want to, I want to quote you on this because I just, I love
this part of your book. You say that you talk about the
lies of love that many people fall into.
You say falling into need, possession, control and
familiarity. To love someone is to feel for
them without our own feelings about ourselves getting in the
(11:47):
way. So I think it's like we've been,
it's like there's so much codependent relationships and
not this free love that we all want to have, but we're not
really a lot of us aren't there,right?
So what does it mean like the twin beggars, Like what is that?
What does that mean? Please and like and explain that
to us and like how is how do we shift out of that?
(12:09):
Well, society and culture has definitely set us up for this
idea that this other person is going to be your, you know, your
perfect, you know, other hunts and together you're going to
create this perfect family. What that does is enforce and
in, you know, perpetuate an enmeshment and a codependency
(12:30):
because what culture really saysis that this person now belongs
to you and you belong to this person.
And that is really a delusional way of looking at adult
relationships. We don't belong to anybody.
And when we have that idea, it sounds so lovely and romantic,
but it's actually a very toxic, codependent message.
(12:52):
She belongs to him. What?
Like, no, but we want the other person to belong to us because
we want to own and possess the other person.
So we come into these dynamics with these delusions of
ownership and possession and control and enmeshment and
dependency and actually end up being what I call twin beggars
because each one is looking to be belonged to by the other and
(13:17):
belong to the other as if they are our mother and our father.
And we come needy and hungry anddesperate and demanding and
controlling and tantruming, justlike a three-year old wanting
candy. And we expect and culture tells
us we have a right to expect. I mean, it's legally sanctioned.
It's by the justice and by God himself or herself to demand
(13:39):
complete fidelity, loyalty, attention and focus.
And it's just such a toxic engagement of each other's
spirits. And we don't want to own it
right? We don't want to accept that
that is actually the agenda. And how do we know it's the
agenda? Because the moment our partner
dares to even be emotionally connected to another human
(14:02):
being, we call them as if they're cheaters.
Really. They can't be emotionally
connected if they are the, if they are of this gender or sex
that attracts them. We're not allowed to do that.
No, we're not allowed to do that, you know.
So out of all these beautiful masses of human beings, we can
only have eyes for one. And if those eyes stray and
(14:22):
forget the genitalia, we will sever the relationship because
it's a conditioned relationship.It's based on a binding to each
other. And it's really unfair.
And not just unfair, it's downright unrealistic, which is
why most marriages dissolve, because it's predicated on lies
that we can do this, we should do this, and this is the only
(14:46):
way to do this. Right.
So when you, I mean you've, thisis the work that you do, you're
working with, you're working with couples, right?
You're working with, you're, youspecialize in parenting, of
course, but there is this side of your job, of course, that is
working to help people with their marriages, their
relationships. So we have that, that construct
(15:06):
and then we have, you know, whatI really aspire to, which I love
how you talk about high love in your book and how, what that
means, what that really means tohave like the deep that love
that actually, I think we, I think I, I, I'm aspiring to it.
I'm working towards it in my relationship right now.
But how do you help people get there out of what we're
(15:28):
conditioned to, to that place? Like people have to be on board,
right? Don't, don't they?
They both have to be like committed to their awareness.
Right first, high love starts with yourself.
Do you have high life for yourself?
Right. Can you fully accept yourself as
a very flawed, imperfect and limited human being?
Are you honest with yourself? Are you authentic to yourself?
(15:49):
Most of us are not even telling ourselves the truth.
Forget each other. Let alone know each other.
You know ourselves, right? Yes.
Yes, and when you know yourself and you accept that you too are
imperfect, flawed, limiting and you you too constraint, then you
will accept that about your partner and not take it
(16:09):
personally when they have affection for another person or
when they don't love you the same way or when you are no
longer a match. Allowing the fluid fluidity and
the adaptability of ever growingrelationships is the hallmark of
consciousness. But most of us, because of the
marriage box and because cultureputs us in this box that's
(16:29):
supposed to be for luck, we actually stop growing together
and stop confronting hard troops.
I'm all for living together forever, but I'm also very much
a pragmatist and a realist that if that does not continue to
work for people, there should bean adaptability and an evolution
that is permissible without scorn, judgement, scathing, you
(16:51):
know, ostracism from culture. But culture doesn't allow that.
It's very limited and you know, we want designed for long term
pair bonds. We want designed to live with
one person first. We want designed to live this
long. And so while I advocate living
together for as long as is possible, I also advocate for
growth and advocate for health and functionality as opposed to
(17:17):
just staying together as a statistic of a married couple.
But you're actually miserable roommates who are not growing
together. Right.
Many people are just miserable roommates.
Yes, but are they really wantingto shift that dynamic into like,
I think if do you have let me ask you this, do you have
(17:38):
clients that come to you that are like, OK, I can see that
there's, there's a lot of stuff going on and you're helping
people like identify. All right, You think that that's
about your partner? No, it's about you.
Let's work on that, right, So that we can change the dynamic.
And so are you like, that's whatyou're doing, right, Doctor
Shefali? You're helping people.
Absolutely. Like, just because this is what
your book is about is about introspection, changing your
(18:00):
beliefs, deconstructing all of this so that you can appreciate
and know and fully love, love yourself, love all parts of
yourself so you can love anotherin a better way.
Yes. OK.
Yeah, so I mean, the people are always coming to me asking to
fix the relationship, but then we discover that they are so
(18:21):
broken and damaged themselves that they can barely see
themselves as whole people. So when you are not fully in
love with yourself, you cannot expect your partner to be in
love with you because you are not showing up as your truest,
fullest, biggest, largest, the most authentic part of yourself.
(18:41):
So when you love yourself enough, then you can be in a
matching relationship with another human being who also
loves themselves and who can take you in, but they don't need
you to fill them up. Most of us are just scavenging
off this other person, hoping that they can hold us up and
fill us up and our cup is empty.And we're using them really to
(19:05):
give us an identity, to give us meaning, to give us empowerment,
and that those relationships will eventually start to crack
because they're not sustainable,because they depend on another.
Right, so you've got a section, a whole area in the book around
boundaries, how you like what really boundaries are for and
(19:26):
how we set those boundaries and discernment.
Can you talk about like these, how these practices help you
love yourself more? Like how would how would
somebody show up if they say to you, OK, I'm I love myself.
I don't know what you mean. Like of course I love myself,
but what kind of behaviors wouldyou be seeing in somebody that's
demonstrating absolutely that's not showing self love?
(19:47):
Well, the first sign of a unloving person to themselves is
a victim, right? Are you feeling like you're the
victim? So it shows up through
resentment, bitterness. Feeling like you're always tired
and fatigued and sacrificing foreverybody else and you're
carrying the burden. Or are you a savior rescue?
(20:09):
I talk about all these masks. So those are ways that you can
identify. You know what?
Maybe I need to do some inner work and it's something to do
with me. So a healthy person will
immediately catch their savior ship, their victimhood, their
martyrdom, their bleeding empathy, their codependency.
(20:31):
A healthy person will immediately go, there's my
disease, there it is. I'm showing up again as my
codependent self. So first is awareness and
compassion and acceptance of your shadow parts.
And then a person who is in lovewith themselves will be quite
comfortable saying no and quite comfortable saying yes.
(20:51):
But they will do it with this, this conscious connection and
attunement and discernment of their authentic self.
They won't do it to please. They won't do it to validate.
They would really do it because it means something to them.
And the last and the most telling sign of a very conscious
person is somebody who knows that they are on their own path.
That is a solo path. You know, it's kind of a lonely
(21:15):
path, but it's inevitable to be on that path alone because an
awakened person knows no one else can walk with you.
They can walk on their path in aparallel way, but not on your
path. Your path is yours and you have
to own it and celebrate it and embody the teachings and
(21:35):
understand that you are uniquelyhere because of your cause and
effect. All the causes and effects of
your life have brought you here.There is no victimhood beyond
the point now. If you were physically tortured,
yes, but otherwise you have to own the family trauma that
brought you here. You have to own the relationship
crisis that brought you here. You have to own that you were
(21:56):
unconscious in your own way, andthat's why you're here.
And by owning your own journeys,limitations, now you can grow.
And part of that is these boundaries you're talking about,
you know? So what are conscious
boundaries? Conscious boundaries have
nothing to do with the other person.
They only have to do with yourself, so an unhealthy
(22:19):
dynamic will look like this. Can you please stop drinking?
When are you going to go to therapy?
Have you called your mother? Can you please put away the the
dishes? Can you please go to a a can you
please go to so it's constantly,you know, asking the other to do
something, but a conscious boundary is would sound like
this. You know, I'm I'm aware that you
(22:40):
haven't done the dishes for 10,000 days.
And So what I've done to take care of myself is 1 of many
things. I've thrown away all the glass
dishes, I've locked them away and I only have paper plates.
Or I've learned to become OK andZen with dirty dishes.
So all the dishes are there. We don't have any more clean
dishes in the house. I only clean for myself.
(23:02):
Or I've learned that I want to clean the dishes and I'm going
to do the dishes for posterity and shut my mouth.
So conscious boundaries takes our own care into our own hands,
He says, OK, I'm the only one here.
I'm going to create my own rulesand whatever that looks like for
you. But you own it.
You don't keep whining, complaining, and waiting for the
(23:24):
other person to do what you needto do.
You're doing what you need to doto protect yourself and to.
Yes, yes. If you have children in the
house who don't clean, don't clear up, OK, you have choices.
Never do the laundry ever again or, you know, go live somewhere
else or buy paper plates and, you know, paper sheets, you
(23:44):
know, throw away all your clothes.
You have choices. And I know that sounds very
radical, but that's so much better than living in the
vibration of this constant complaining and this worrying,
you know, constant anxiety. You know, mother once came to me
and she was like, my daughter never leaves, never puts off the
light, and she always leaves thelight on.
(24:05):
And it was over and over and over.
And the mother tried to explain and the mother tried to remind
and the mother tried to put notes in the house, but the
daughter would never change. So the mother had two choices.
Either she accepts it and zips it or she does something.
So what she said I cannot acceptit, you have to give me another
solution. So I said, OK, just take out the
light bulb. You know, the child is no light.
(24:27):
And she was like, that's so mean.
So I was like, see, this is how we keep in this constant
whirring loop because we don't want to take action because
action then would mean that has its own consequences.
But conscious boundaries has consequences.
And you have to just decide, do I prefer the consequences that
come from zero boundaries, or doI prefer the consequences that
(24:49):
come with the boundary? Which consequences are more
livable? Right.
So in the book you also, when you say the single biggest
practical step that you took foryour own, you know, for
throughout your awakening is really learning how to pause,
right? This is about going, it's
(25:10):
learning to pause and listen to your inner self.
And you know, like you made it apractice and the more you
practice something, the better you're going to become at it.
And it's going to become like second nature.
But you have to practice like going inside and being like,
rather than reacting right away or saying that thing that you
used to say or behaving in that way that you used to behave.
It's like, hmm, this something is really bothering me here.
(25:33):
I'm going to go inside and, and really reflect on this, right?
Probably. Yes, yes, yes.
So a bigger lesson that leads tothe pause is a lesson of owning
your Co creation. When you become aware that you
are also a hazard to your own well-being and you are really
standing in your own way, then you will be humble and realize,
(25:56):
OK, next time I better not just bounce on the other person
because that's coming from this delusion that is only their
fault. But I'm going to now pause to
observe how I am a hazard to myself.
And it's that humility to go, you know what?
I'm kind of fully on board with my own pain.
I'm fully creating my own misery.
(26:18):
Once you are willing to accept that you are a participant in
your own health, then you will change your pattern.
But if you keep thinking it's your partner or your child
constantly and you have nothing to do with it, then you're going
to, you know, constantly be at their mercy and you will not
break out of the pattern. Right, a part of the book that I
(26:41):
was just like, Oh my God. So like I work with one of my
best friends, Kirsten and the two of us before we work on a we
work on a podcast together. So we read the books and then we
have like amazing conversations about what we both took away,
what we learned. And one of the keys was the
consciousness quotient. Oh my gosh, I was like, this is
(27:01):
this is the words attached to what I already knew.
But now it's like, and but I don't think that a lot of people
really understand this. And I think it is so key.
Actually, I've got it. I mean, this book is dog eared
all the way. It is highlighted everywhere.
But I've got I've got page 276, the consciousness quotient.
And this is around discernment, the wisdom of discernment.
(27:24):
A large part of self honor has to do with discernment.
There was one lesson I missed inlife.
It was to have discernment when it came to people and
situations. And you talk about one of the
fundamental pieces of awareness I was lacking when I was growing
up is the awareness of how different every single person's
level of consciousness is. I presume that just because we
(27:45):
were all sentient and relativelyintelligent, we were of this
similar consciousness. And how oh how wrong I was.
Gosh, it took me at least my entire 30s and I'm thinking, I
think I'm in my 40. I'm 47 now and I'm like, oh,
this in my 40s. I really have honed in on this
one. But it isn't true that
everyone's heart is wide open, nor is it true that everyone is
loving and compassionate. The key determinant is the
(28:08):
person's consciousness, emotion.I love it so much.
I was like, that is that is so true.
This, this is like we're, we're walking around as adults.
But like you say, so much is like actually, that person's
actually like a 5 year old. I'm dealing with a 5 year old
right now. Exactly.
And they've actually been in their five year old self for
most of my life in their life. They're not going beyond that.
(28:30):
So understanding that is so key.So that so you're not, so you're
not suffering trying to get thisperson to understand where
you're coming from. They're not.
Able to, they're not able to. Exactly.
So we as women especially have been trained to morph our being
and our essence to anything that's outside of us.
And we have been told that we are responsible for making it
(28:51):
work. So we put all our energy and all
our effort and we contort ourselves constantly who make it
work. But that's where we've been
given a real, you know, a big load of poison because it's not
our responsibility. And we need to have actually
learned instead of eternal self sacrifice, we should have
(29:12):
learned discernment to whom and to where can we give of
ourselves. And we need to wait for the
match before we give ourselves fully.
But we weren't trained like that.
We were told that we should sacrifice ourselves for every
relationship and just give and give and give without
necessarily receiving back. So we never waited for the
(29:33):
match. And now through this process, I
teach women that no, if it's nota match, you, you don't give.
If they give one toe, you give one toe, right?
It's like you, you have to give it at the level that you're
receiving. But we were told that to receive
was anathema. To receive was a you're a
selfish woman. You shouldn't look at receiving.
Why not, right? I'm not saying not to give, but
(29:56):
can we also give ourselves? So this dynamic of which comes
about only through discernment allows a woman to understand
that every human being is going to be at a different level of
consciousness according to what I call the consciousness
quotient. So a longer continuum.
We're all on a continuum. Each person is further along or
(30:16):
not further along. So you get to discern, does this
person go to therapy? Does this person do the inner
work? Have they read books that are
going to instigate their growth?And then you get to observe them
for a period of time before you invest in them.
That are, is this somebody I cangrow with?
And quickly realize that this person is not growing.
This is this is not a growth seeker.
(30:38):
And this person is going to staystagnant.
And the minute you realize that,oh, he's a level 2 on a scale of
1 to 10, you stop taking it personally and you stop making
it your mission to make them a 7because people who are under 7
are rarely going to grow, right?They're kind of they're stuck.
But hey, miracles happen, but it's not your job to take them
(31:00):
to a higher level of consciousness.
And many of us women act like it's our job, it's our mission
to bring everyone to a higher level of consciousness.
And what that does is it drains us, it disempowers us and it it
cripples us. And we don't have to do that to
anyone anymore. Let them be at a level 2.
They will grow organically when they are ready.
(31:22):
And that's another lesson I learned.
Let people be where they're at instead of constantly rescuing
them because that need to rescueis actually my anxiety and not
theirs. When they are ready and they're
anxious enough, they will change, but not a minute soon.
People never change for other people really.
They only change when they are ready.
(31:43):
Yes, the you've got a there's the most beautiful section in
your book around the awakened queen.
It's just so everybody has all women that are listening to
this. And then I just want them to
read your book because the how you describe being the awakened
queen and what those behaviors look like, what those thoughts
look like that the queen is embodying is like so good,
(32:04):
right? Like you talk about like we're
no longer princesses, which is what we are taught to be as
girls. We're taught to be the damsel in
distress or looking for their Prince.
And it's like this seeking, seeking, lack, lack.
And as soon as you meet somebody, it's like they're
going to make all of that is still so in our society, in our
culture and how we're raised. But the awakened queen, it is so
(32:26):
much about being in her power, being in her strength, being so.
And I think that's everything about women these days.
It's like if you can get to a place where you are awakened and
conscious, you're you are the most loving and generous, but
you're also, like you said, discerning.
You're taking accountability. You're still, you're nurturing,
(32:46):
loving, generous self at the same time very strong.
And like my boundaries are firm.Like it's like having both and
embodying both ways of being in such a beautiful way.
So yeah, Yep. And I think part of being an
awakened queen is to allow ourselves to not do it all
(33:11):
right. The awakened queen doesn't need
to do it all right, because she doesn't need to.
She doesn't need to prove herself in every little way.
You know, I'm going to be the best cook and the best fast
fashionista and I'm going to go to the gym for an hour and I'm
going to breastfeed and I'm going to make homemade granola
cookies. And I'm going to also be a sex
maven in my bed. Oh my goodness.
(33:32):
And a boss babe, right? That's the new new title.
Right. We cannot be at all.
And their phases we have to go through, and we have to honor
the phases. An awakened queen knows how to
wait her turn. She knows that the cycles will
change. She's not in a rush because
she's already the queen. She's the queen if she's just
breastfeeding her child, she's the queen.
(33:53):
If she doesn't have children, she's already awakened to
acquaint them. So she doesn't need these roles
to create identity. And the next thing about an
awakened queen is that she brings her sisters along with
her, right? She is not threatened by her
sisters, and she works on it. At least.
Even if she is, sometimes she works on it and she tries to
(34:14):
uplift other sisters and brothers.
The Awakened Queen is not here to be a dictator or the
hierarchical superior. She's here to be part of a team
and she knows that we are stronger collectively than we
are individually. She's surrounded, she's
surrounding herself with with people who are embodying the
same in in the fact that they are on a growth mindset and
(34:37):
supporting one another and cheering each other on.
And you're all the same team. Yes, Yeah.
Yes, she's not living in this competitive insecure way that
where she feels like she has to be the most beautiful or the
most successful or the most anything because she knows those
are illusions that are transientanyway and they truly don't
(34:59):
bring about lasting sustainable change or growth or well-being.
These are F moral ideas that will never bring long lasting
abundance. When I read when I read your
book, Doctor Shwali, it just was, it was like coming home.
I was like, OK, I've been, I'm on the right path here because I
feel like a lot of the things that you are helping women come
(35:19):
to realize I'm working through it.
Like I'm on the spiral and I feel like every, every cycle I'm
in, OK, I'm feeling a little bit, I'm going up here.
OK, My, I'm because I'm acting differently than I was before.
That was getting me in trouble, right?
So it's like I'm, I'm more grounded.
I'm definitely taking more spacein my life and just not feeling
my calendar as much as I used to, right?
(35:39):
These are big things and I'm just not as anxious.
I mean, just like Robin, you canchill.
Things are good, right? And like you said, I'm not
trying to do it all or be at all.
I'm just like actually just feelthe spaciousness.
Yes, yes, the awakened Queen feels so much in a bounty.
The queen, the Kingdom queendom is inside her.
(36:02):
That is her awakening, that wherever she is, she is the
queen. And she doesn't need to be on a
private jet and she doesn't needto be on a stage walking a red
carpet to experience that inner queendom.
It's here, it's inside. And that's what we modern women
have to really work hard on because in many ways, social
(36:24):
media and this whole Instagram world, it's pulling us like, why
am I not there? Why wasn't I invited to that?
And that is designed to strip usoff our power to take us out of
our reality. So part of my practice now is to
really detox from social media. And when I find myself scrolling
(36:46):
and then comparing and then judging myself, I notice it
immediately and I go time to shut it down.
And then I get off it for a few days at a time because I can see
that it is designed to create anapp designed to create
insecurity and competition. And I'm falling into it, right?
That's my Co creation. So I am here now.
Wherever you are, whoever's listening to this, embody, own
(37:09):
and celebrate where you are now.You don't have to be where
another person is. Let them do that.
You are fine and abundant exactly where you are.
You know, all of us see this glitz and glitz, and all of us
think that there's a part of us that would do so well there.
But when you then meet people who are doing the glitzy, glitzy
things, you realize that they'retortured by it, right?
(37:31):
They're so anxious. And we don't want that.
So we have to sacrifice that level of, you know, I'll often
think about fame that I don't want fame because I don't want
the headache, right? The last thing because it strips
you away from you living for yourselves.
You soon become a pawn living for your audience, and that is
(37:53):
the most tragic way to live. It really is.
So tell us what you said in the beginning of our conversation
about your is it a course that you offer around this around is?
Well, I do have a course of a radical awakening course, yeah,
but I have an institute. I have a Conscious Parenting and
Life Institute where I coach people to do the work I do and
(38:14):
to break their patterns and findtheir inner radical self.
But there is a course on this book as well.
It's on my website so if people want the course they can go and
download it. Beautiful.
Well, I hope people, I hope people take it and read your
book and just there was just so,so many gems and tools.
Really that's what this is aboutis like how do I get there step
by step. It's just like you said, it's
(38:37):
just it's taking, it doesn't matter where you are in the
spectrum or where you are in theladder, whatever those things
are. We don't need those analogies,
but it's just taking the steps right and making the changes and
they will build on each. Other and the first step is
awareness is so allowing the words to just open you up and
open your curiosity just a little bit and it creates a
(38:58):
ripple effect of a consciousnesstransformational seismic shift
within you. Just one small idea that begins
to rattle in your brain can havea seismic level effect.
Yeah, well, I, I want to thank you so, so much for all the work
you're doing this world. And thank you.
The person that you are is just beautiful.
(39:19):
And I, I close all of our podcasts with a blessing with
your words. So we'll do that.
May we awaken to the knowing that the love we get from
ourselves is more valuable than the love we receive from
another. May we connect to ourselves
differently. May we have our own backs and
trust our own voice. May we see ourselves as a
(39:40):
magnificent beings that we are and put ourselves 1st.
And may we as awakened beings work from our hearts as well as
our minds, receiving as well as giving, fully settled into our
worth and desire nothing more than to empower others to know
theirs as well. Thank you, Doctor Shafali.
(40:01):
Thank you for having me so much.Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for being herewith us.
Let's Talk Love is brought to you by Real Love Ready and
hosted by Robin Ducharme. If you'd like to keep learning
with us, visit realloveready.comfor more resources and tools to
boost your relational skills andget better at love.
(40:22):
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(41:04):
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(41:25):
Many blessings and much love.
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