00:00:06 Shreya: There is a quick question many of us carry beneath the surface of our lives. Why do certain patterns keep repeating. Why do we heal in one area only to feel stuck or depleted in another? Tonight we are not rushing to solutions. We are slowing down and turning the mirror inward to explore what keeps us sick, stuck and suffering and what becomes possible when we finally listen.

00:00:34 Shreya: Welcome to the podcast, a space where we explore the deeper patterns shaping our inner and outer worlds. I'm your host, Shreya, and today I'm joined by Katherine Sforzini, founder of Wild Tribes and Transforming Tribes and a visionary guide who bridges ancient wisdom with modern system thinking. And in this conversation, we'll explore what truly sits beneath chronic struggle, diseases and stagnation, and how healing becomes possible when we address the whole of who we are, not just the symptoms. If you have ever felt like you were doing all the right things but still feel stuck. This episode is for you. Welcome, Kathryn. I'm honored to have you on my show.

00:01:19 Kathryn Sforcina: Thank you. Shreya. It's so amazing to be here with you.

00:01:22 Shreya: Thank you so much. And, Kathryn, before we talk about, like, healing patterns and frameworks, when you look back at your own journey, what first made you realize that healing wasn't about fixing something that was broken, but about remembering something that was lost?

00:01:41 Kathryn Sforcina: Mm. A profound question. Thank you for asking it. I think it's because I really, truly did what you shared in the intro. I tried to throw absolutely everything I could at my healing journey and and the efforting and the energy and the money and the time that went into investing in that journey was huge. Um, and whilst the modalities were amazing. Um, and it wasn't until I really met shamanic energy medicine, which is where where I guess my path has, has moved on into the healing realms now, where I realized that we have an innate remembering within us, a cell memory that goes beyond this lifetime and beyond all lifetimes, that connects us to the fabric of of all consciousness, all remembering. And it was really, I would say, I really started to understand that I was a part of something much bigger than just my own suffering, um, particularly going out and doing some rites of passage like Vision Quest, um, where I was able to just so deeply connect with nature and in doing so, learn that, that it's actually a deeply symbiotic relationship. Far, far, far beyond the consumer model that our modern society, um, frames our relationship with our, our planet. Uh, and I guess that cultivating that relationship is what has brought me to a remembering of what my soul was and is, without needing to label it or identify or attach to, to masks or what have you about the pain that it went through and that that was simply like a weather storm. It was just a phase of my life that I could move through and still come back to a place of wholeness. My landscape might look different, but I'm not less whole because I've had those experiences.

00:03:57 Shreya: That's really beautiful. And I think that sense of remembering not repairing already shifts how we think about healing. I think it invites, uh, curiosity instead of judgment. And also, like one of the most common beliefs people hold, is that if they just find the right tool or modality or strategy, everything will finally resolve. What do you see as the biggest misconception people have about why they remain sick or stuck or suffering?

00:04:29 Kathryn Sforcina: Oh, I love I love this topic. It's my favorite topic. In fact, it's the topic of my next book. So my first book was called Bringing the Lost Parts of Me Home, and that really dove into soul retrieval and healing the soul wounds and the ancestral patterns that live below the surface of that really inform everything we do in our lives. The next book dives into this exact question what is it? What's the one thing? And look, I have to say, it's our relationship at the core of everything. Our society in its modern form, um, the way in which we are indoctrinated in schools, what Hollywood talks about in the movies, everything has us in our lives positioned to look outside ourselves for something to heal us. Every time we look outside ourselves and put our, uh, life, our healing journey, our agency onto something beyond our own being, we're giving our power away. And when we're not in our power, we're in our victim. And so a society that tells us to be happy, we need to have that thing to be successful. We need to have learned that thing to be healed. We need to take that thing to, um, to be loved. We need to do or act a certain way is gearing us up to believe. We always are not enough, and we cannot have the belief that we're enough, and also the belief that we're fully powerful. At the same time, they will cancel each other out or worse. And so when it comes to all the modalities and all the different tools that we can use on our healing journey, none of them will actually do more than help us manage symptoms. Until we have decided to own the fact that we, as a sovereign being, sit at the middle of our healing journey, and that we are orchestrating it, and that we're the ones that actually heal ourselves by taking the agency to engage these different modalities. But none of them can rescue us. And so in taking that approach to our healing journey, we take our power back. We stand in our sovereignty. And lo and behold, we start dealing because now we're actually telling our body we can do this as opposed to we can't do this unless we adopt this strategy or buy that product.

00:07:21 Shreya: Yes, yes, that's really beautiful. Like, uh, so rather than a lack of effort or discipline, it's often a mismatch. And like also in your work with the six Layers of Being, you speak about healing across mental, emotional, physical, energetic and spiritual dimensions. What tends to happen when one of these layers is ignored or overridden for too long?

00:07:51 Kathryn Sforcina: Uh, yeah. Look, it's, um, it can be very subtle or it could be very obvious, depending. Um, so, for example, if if you are spending all your time sitting on top of the mountain meditating, you may have a very gorgeous relationship with self and with your energy body, and a really clear communication channel with spirit. But if you just sat there and did absolutely nothing, um, you'd probably find that your physical body would start showing quite big signs of wear and tear or disease over time because our bodies need movement and to truly, um, and we also and you might find that the mental and emotional aspects of self whilst you become profoundly, um, aware and connected in some respects, you'll become completely inept in, in regards to relational dynamics and social contexts and miss the joy of actually being here on this planet, which is the whole purpose of us being on this planet, is to have the full experience of of our human spectrum. Um, so we need to be in relationship and connected to other people. And whilst that's just one example, you know, there really isn't a way we are an ecosystem, um, ignoring one aspect or many aspects, most people would ignore more than one, um, to focus solely on another. Um, we find that we have a very lopsided, um, healing journey. And in many instances, it's a little bit like one of those squishy stress balls, you know, when you push down on them, um, you, you've applied pressure to one area and another area pops out like a bubble when you do that. And what happens when we don't have a holistic approach to the healing on the six layers of being is that whilst we may have cured symptoms in one aspect of our life, we ignore the root cause. Therefore, we're not able to have the deepest healing and so we end up finding that we end up with more intense symptoms, but maybe in a different area of our life. But the root cause is the same thing until we've addressed it.

00:10:14 Shreya: Yes, I think it sounds like the body and soul keep escalating the message until we are willing to listen, almost as if the symptoms are language and not a failure. And also, I'm curious like how this plays out in everyday life. How do these unhealed layers typically show up for people in their relationships, leaderships health, or sense of purpose?

00:10:45 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah, it's it's one of those things. Again, there's so many different ways that it can show up. Um, some very common ways would be that people's relationships start breaking down. Um, another way would be that we find we get stuck into the loops of the same pattern, so we might attract the same kind of person into our life. Um, an example of that might be that you may have had an abusive father growing up. Um, you may you may have learned not to find any more abusive fathers in your life, but you suddenly start attracting abusive romantic partners, and then that same person may choose that they may have done more healing work and no longer attract, um, abusive romantic partners, but now find they've gotten abusive male boss. Um, and so those kinds of things are very surefire signs that the same pattern is playing out and hasn't been healed. Um, another way is with, uh, chronic illnesses and or recurrent illnesses, um, for example, people who, whenever they might get the flu, they may suddenly they've the flu impacts them by always, uh, impacting their voice, so they might lose their voice every time they get the flu. Whereas another person may get a really bad chest infection every time. Normally it's a very good indication the recurrent things. Maybe you stub your toe every single month and you've had, you know, your nail fall off your toe many times because of how much trauma your toe has been through. Um, it's when we've got these repetitive, uh, things that continue to play out in our lives in the same ways that at some point we need to ask ourselves, what's really going on here? Um, and those kind of repetitions can happen, um, across the board. It could be in how we manage when we get upset. It could be our conflict resolution style, um, or the way we express anger or what have you. Whilst it's a healthy emotion to have, if we've got unhealed wounds, then we tend to have a go to mechanism that makes it really unhealthy for other people to be around us when we experience our anger. Um, yes, it it really would depend person to person. And the reason why their root cause wound is what it is. But it does tend to play out in, in threads in our life that that cause over a period of time, um, a pattern that can no longer be ignored.

00:13:23 Shreya: Yes. I think that's that's really, really powerful because many of us label these experiences as personal flaws when they are actually signals asking for deeper alignment. And also like for someone who's listening right now and who feels overwhelmed by the idea of healing everything, where do you usually suggest they begin? Not as a fix, but as the first act of reconnection.

00:13:53 Kathryn Sforcina: I love that. Uh, look, it's it's a very simple thing. And the thing with simple things is people often scoff at them or don't give them any credit or value for how powerful they can be. But any client that starts to do work shamanic work with me. One of the first things often times I find, is that we need to heal the relationship with with abusing ourselves. Um, because whilst we may be experiencing all these different symptoms or life patterns playing out, oftentimes the relationship with our self and our dialogue with ourself is quite abusive and keeps us going into a trauma bond pattern with our own being. And so for me, the best and most amazing thing to begin with is literally to have someone hold their own hand and allow them to take some deep breaths with their eyes closed and to really, truly feel what it feels like to hold the hand of the one who is meant to love us the most. And in that way, they every every single client I've ever worked with, that within a within about 20s, it's dawned on them that they're holding their own hand and they're meant to love themselves the most of anyone in this world. Um, now that might seem very simple, but it allows for a gateway for self-compassion to, to, to flood in. And so my answer to your question is deep self-compassion, because yes, you may we in adding a little comment to what you just shared before. These are not personal flaws. That is, it is not our identity. We do not have to continue to play the same script over and over again. We do have a choice. And by opening ourselves up to being compassionate, that all that has happened so far in our life is the absolute best we could do, given the tools we got. And when we truly allow ourselves to forgive, to love, to have compassion for the human that just simply didn't know. We can then move into a place where we're open and curious to learning, and we need to be in that open mindset to receive different frameworks, different patterns, to realize that our different choices than the one that we've been working with us. And so deep self-compassion and just taking a moment every day to hold your own hand and let yourself know I'm here for you. I we got this. We're going to figure this out. We actually have the capability to learn new tools and resources. And that's the journey we've signed up for. We didn't sign up for a journey of perfection when we decided to come down to Growth Planet, we signed up for a journey of growth. And that means lessons and lessons mean we're going to meet some crunchy things. And that's okay. We can do this.

00:17:17 Shreya: Yes. Starting with awareness instead of action, I think removes so much pressure. And also like even with deep awareness setbacks still happens. Old patterns resurfaces. How do you help people navigate those moments without slipping back into shame or self-abandonment?

00:17:39 Kathryn Sforcina: Um, look, it's different again. Different for everyone. Um, one of the beautiful things about shamanic energy medicine is that weaves almost any other natural modality into it to ensure that someone can be met and supported Wherever they're at on the healing path. It's the medicine of the Andean Incan traditions, is to weave a path forward, show the path forward, not necessarily to dictate what should be on that path. Um, and so having said that, uh, I talk a lot in my book about the fact that we can be circling our wounds or we can be in the spiral, but both are really powerful and important to our journey, because when we circle our wounds and we feel like we're being stagnant, oftentimes one, we're either resting from a large period of growth or two where we're about to enter. You can only circle your wound so much before you enter another level of awareness that you're doing it. And so to your point, just earlier, yes, awareness is critical because without observing what we're doing, we're not we're not consciously recognizing that there is anything to meet. And therefore we don't have any intention to. To heal, let go, shift or change anything. And so that level of awareness that even when we feel like we're circling the same stuff, we're actually in a phase of growth is so powerful, to be able to give people the permission to let themselves have the human experience of healing, not the perfect experience of healing, because that doesn't exist. That's a framework I don't even know. You know how we ended up there, that it has to be this perfect straight line. But like, if I drew what my healing journey looked like on a piece of paper, it looks like a mess. I still, at the end of the day, came to a place of deep peace, deep healing, and incredible gratitude for my entire life and all that has befallen my journey. And it looks like a three year old took to a crayon on a wall. If you were to look at it from from a, a picture, a pictograph perspective. Um, and so we really just need to get real with ourselves and be very, very honest, radically honest that this journey is messy. It's imperfect, and that's what makes it perfect.

00:20:13 Shreya: I have a reflection question for you, like, for anyone who's listening and who feels tired of trying to heal, I want to ask you, like, what part of them has been asking to be seen and not to be solved?

00:20:28 Kathryn Sforcina: When we're tired, our bodies also giving us feedback and information.

00:20:39 Shreya: Mhm.

00:20:40 Kathryn Sforcina: Um, when we're confused, our bodies giving us feedback and information. When we fight tiredness and confusion, our bodies giving us feedback and information. And really, the only way that we can meet tiredness is through deep rest. And it comes back to everything we've talked about. Shreya, it's a beautiful question and yet it's the same answer. Deep compassion for ourselves. Also honoring that our journey for healing given it's not a straight line and given it's this big, wild, you know, whimsical squiggle, um, we every day we're going to have a different capacity for that journey and so on. The days where it feels too much, that is your body saying it's too much today.

00:21:38 Shreya: Mhm.

00:21:39 Kathryn Sforcina: When you're on a day where you feel energized, that's your body saying let's get to work, let's roll up the sleeves.

00:21:46 Shreya: Mm.

00:21:47 Kathryn Sforcina: And it's okay if you don't have a string of energetic days or if you need, you know, there have been times in my healing journey where, um, having a shower and making my bed. If I did that that day, I just said to myself, good for you, darling. Good for you. And there are other days in my healing journey where I've completed days long quests in the wilderness on the back of a shamanic initiation, and it was the most profound and hardest thing I'd ever experienced. But I was also ready for that in that moment. And yes, it was deeply profound. But would I say that there's more miracle in the big moments than there is in the mundane? Absolutely not. And so it's about a consistent love of ourselves, a consistent compassion for being a human, a consistent willingness to let ourselves be the imperfect journey that enables us to have the energy to move forward.

00:22:58 Shreya: Yes, that's really, really a nice statement. Thank you for sharing this. And also, I think like healing begins not when we fix ourselves, but when we remember that our wholeness and allow every layer of our being to belong. And this is truly, truly a very powerful, very insightful conversation with you. And if after this, my listeners want to connect with you, then what's the best way?

00:23:25 Kathryn Sforcina: Absolutely. I would love them to feel, to reach out. They're very welcome to visit me at Transforming Tribes dot com. Or they can find me on socials through my name or through Transforming Tribes. I'm on all the social channels.

00:23:43 Shreya: Yes, and I will make sure to attach all these details and links below so that the listeners can find them easily and get in touch with you. And again, this is truly, truly a very amazing conversation with you. And for my listeners, thank you for joining us on the podcast. If something in today's conversation start, you sit with it, journal, breathe, or simply notice what's alive in you. And if this is episode resonated, share it with someone who may need permission to slow down and listen inward. And the next time you meet yourself with honesty, gentleness and courage and do not forget to hit the follow button, subscribe and feel free to share your thoughts because your ears deserve premium content. Thank you.