Kristen Gilbert, welcome to the Quantum Biology Collective podcast.

It is a pleasure to have you here. Thanks, Meredith. I'm

really grateful to be here with you. Okay. So you have 10

years under your belt as an occupational therapist, and

you have such a, a unique take on it cuz you say that

occupational therapy is perfectly suited to champion

quantum biology. I love that. So tell us a little bit about

what kind of work you did and how you see those two things coming together.

Yeah, so I was originally drawn to occupational

therapy because of the breadth of this

profession. Like, what you actually do in OT can be

so broad, it can look like almost anything.

And as someone who has a really

diverse set of interests, this is super appealing for me

and I think if we were called functional therapists, that would

make so much more sense because I'm happy to

advocate for defining what OT is. Most people don't know what

it is, and it is such a valuable profession because what we

do is we meet people where they're at and we

assess how they're functioning in the world, and then

we get to work with them on— in the mental health

sector, what I've been doing for 10 years is so supporting people with

individualized goal setting, setting up healthy

routines. So with quantum biology and

circadian health, I have found this to be

absolutely foundational with my clients in public

practice, especially when we can start with

light hygiene. Because when I give people a pair of blue

blockers— and I have a loaner pair, you know— when I set them up with

that and when they can take it on to actually get outside in the morning

Sometimes with people who are struggling, we have to start whenever

you get up and slowly work it back to actual sunrise.

But when people take this on, inevitably they come back a

week later and they like, I feel like a different person.

Wow. Yeah. And that's just after one week of—

Yes. Light hygiene. Yes. And

circadian rhythm optimization. It's so powerful. I,

I I just continue to be amazed whenever I hear these stories.

We just, it's, we dismiss it, we ignore it, we don't really think about it,

but it's so, so powerful. It's incredible.

And so what I started to see over time in clinical

practice was like, I'd be helping people out, we'd set up

routine, incorporating their goals, it's individualized,

everything's going well, and then all of a sudden everything falls apart.

They're like, I, I don't know why, I just stopped doing all the

things. And so then I got really curious because that's

as far as the traditional OT skill set

extends. And I was like, what if there's this self-sabotage?

What if there are these deeply seated illusory

beliefs of lack of self-worthiness

that's really what's causing people to

sabotage their progress again and again. And so I

did Gabor Maté's Compassionate Inquiry

program. I studied that for a year and work with people

with addictions. And then I also took

somatic relational therapy, which is a, a branch

of somatic experiencing. And that has

been invaluable in terms of being able to work

with people through the nervous system and to

help them expand their capacity to hold

joy. Because we all have this upper limit

problem, right? It's a subconscious upper limit where we only allow

ourselves to feel so good. And usually this gets

dictated very early on in life. And as soon as we

bump up against that upper limit, there will be— the

sabotage comes in. Everything falls apart. We're not really

sure what happens. And I mean, I don't think anyone is immune

to this because so many people say, oh, I know I should

be doing X, Y, and Z. I know I should be going outside

at sunrise or eating a certain way, but

I tried that and I had a New Year's resolution and then it just

fell apart. Not sure why. Back to baseline,

which isn't really where people want to be, but it's where they end up.

And so this is really the work that I do with people,

is like, how can we create self-care

that facilitates coherence, right? And how

can we expand the nervous system to hold

this new rhythm of being as we integrate

with the rhythms of nature and our own rhythms,

you You know, how can we create this routine that supports

that structure that then allows people to truly

expand into the life that they

fully desire? I love that. And Kristin, it's

such an important piece. And I remember

years ago, someone, you know, one of my mentors using the

metaphor that it's like we've set like an internal thermostat to a

certain temperature. And no matter what we do, you know,

if we're trying to cool the house down and no matter how many windows we

open, our being is going to try and find a way to go

back to that. Cause that's where the thermostat, that's where the

thermostat is set. So the thermostat is set to

like, you can have like 33% joy, but no more.

It's like, no matter what, when we start to go back

past that, it's like, there's some kind of internal trigger that's like, no, no, no,

no, no, no. Yeah. And then mentally, intellectually, we're like, we would—

I would like to continue. I'd like to get to 40 or 50,

but it just feels like we can't. There's like an invisible wall.

Yes. And you bring up the head piece of

like, we know in, in our head where we want to go, but unless

we get our subtle body, unless we get all three

centers of intelligence online with this idea,

it's not going to happen. And we do that— I do that

work with people through the nervous system. And I know you've talked a lot

about the nervous system on this podcast, but

for me personally and with my

clients that I work with, so much of it is about slowing

down and getting current with what's actually

happening inside of us. And

So that's why we work on— I work with mindfulness

and breathwork practices to start to get to know, like,

what's going on in my body, because so many people

don't feel anything below the neck. And

when we can start to feel the body, you know, there might be a lot

of good reasons why the body is also— why we're cut off from

the body. But when we can start to drop into

the wisdom of the body, and when we can connect

to proper light cycles, when we can connect to nature,

when we go outside and we experience

entrainment with the Schumann resonance, when we

find this rhythmicity of being— this

is like the foundation for the nervous system to start

to settle. And the settling is required first

for us to then be able to expand our capacity

for joy. Beautifully explained. So the first

step, and this is really important, especially for people who work with

clients. I know so many like brilliant coaches and doctors

and they're like, I'm giving, you know, I have all of this

guidance for people that, but they're not doing it. So this

is really helpful. And, or I have guidance for myself and I'm not doing

it as you were saying. So we're talking about settling

and that's where— I was on a, on a clarity call the other

day with the doctor and talking about circadian rhythm. And she's like, well, will it

help with mental health? And I was like, yes,

yes, it will. Absolutely. Because what you're

saying is that first step is to slow and

settle into the rhythm of our bodies, which

is connected to the rhythms of nature and light. And

darkness. And like living in cities and our

hustle culture, like that promotes

dissonance. And then when we choose to go to

nature, when we choose to be in nature,

simply walking and breathing is such a tremendous

therapy because it's one of the ways that we can start

settling and slowing down. And this is

revolutionary, right? When we are programmed for hustle

culture and go, go, go, and You know, that's like a survival

strategy. But when we can come into coherence

with nature and with ourselves, this is an

evolutionary strategy. And for me,

learning how to belong to myself has been

absolutely integral in my own evolutionary

process. And I also— it's central to the work

that I do with people is this idea of belonging.

Beautiful. Yes, because that is also something I think

that holds us back. If we're going to change or grow, there's a

subconscious belief that will be

rejected on some level, or not— you know, if we are different from

the people who are around us, we won't belong there anymore. And also,

like, yeah, just on that note of hustle culture, you know, I have different

points in my life, you know, I really participate in

like what I call like the, the regular world, you know, where people are out

and they're networking and doing things and going to conferences and doing all

the stuff. And in my experience, it's like, it's not that you need to not

do that. People are like, oh, well, I don't want to move to a cabin

in the woods and never talk to anybody, so I'm not going to do this.

What— in my experience, if I can participate in what

you're talking about of the slowing down and building

that as the foundation of my life, then I can go out and

participate in the the more hustly-bustly type stuff

without being thrown into decoherence. It's when I— but if

that's my source, then the burnout comes.

Yes, yes, because a healthy nervous system is a

flexible nervous system, right? So when we can

settle and drop into rest and digest,

parasympathetic, then, you know, we can go—

and I feel it when I go to the city because I live in like

a small somewhat urban area, but when I go to like a big city,

I drive off the ferry and I'm like, whoa, and I

feel this stimulation of that. And I'm so grateful that I can go

back to the settled quality. And it

is about just connecting to nature everywhere

I go, for me. Yeah, I know what you're talking about. I was on the

subway in New York City recently, which I

hadn't done something like that in a long time, and it was like really busy

time and the subway car was like packed with people and I was like,

oh yeah, this is— forgot about this.

But it was kind of fun because I, you know, sort of, I was grounded

and I was like, you know, in coherence and in my body and it was

like a fun adventure. So it's not that I can't, we can't

do those things, but it's, I guess, this awareness

that there's more. Yeah. And we all

long to belong. And when we go to nature, we belong

in nature inherently. And that's what

creates this coherence, right? It's like allowing

our physiological rhythms to

entrain to nature. And, you know, you spoke

to this external quality of belonging, and I think

belonging in nature This is why it's therapeutic. One of the many

reasons why is because we can entrain these

rhythms, but also when we do the inner work,

and this is one thing I've investigated a lot in myself,

is like learning how to truly belong to ourself

is an essential evolutionary

strategy for being a successful human in the

world. And that comes from

being able to steward ourselves through difficult

experiences. I went through quite a

devastating heartbreak almost 2 years ago now,

and I just felt like I was completely in pieces

for a long time. And I really leaned on my people.

I'm so grateful. I have so many wonderful friends that

supported me through— that, and there

was a part of that journey I really had to walk alone.

And I had to meet the

darkest, most scared, most in pain parts of

myself from my highest self and steward those

parts to really truly be with all the parts

of myself in order to put myself back

together. And this was an initiation. It was

a really important initiation because I did collude

in my own victim mentality with that for a long time, but

there's dissonance with that, right? And it's

like when I could truly meet myself with

care and compassion for the oldest

exiled parts of myself that were in so much pain

This was essentially just a

completely transformative experience in my life because

I really truly developed this

quality of self-belonging. And once you

have that, that cannot be taken from you. Once

you understand how to meet all the different

parts of yourselves, it's a skill, and it's

skill that I can now support others in

discovering in themselves. And that

was such a dark night of my soul, but I can say

I am so much better for it now, and I

have alchemized that experience

into my soul offering and my inspired

work. Yeah, you know, Kelly Ritter made the point to me that

often finding the right practitioner, it can be about

that person's specialized knowledge, but it's

often about finding somebody who

embodies where you need to go. Yes, because

a stronger biofield will

uplevel other weaker, weaker biofields around them,

right? And this is also, like, in terms of

quantum biology, we understand, like, we attract the

people that are meant to work with us, and that

is usually because we have these gems that

alter our biofield. It's all out there to

be perceived, you know, whether we're conscious of

that or not. But it really is

like— so much of the therapeutic relationship is about that

quantum resonance. And it's such

a beautiful experience when you click into that with someone

as well. It's like, for me, it's

nourishing, like doing this work with people. It doesn't take from

me. It doesn't— I don't take on other

people's stuff. I am able to— it

nourishes me in a way that maybe wasn't

possible before I understood things from the quantum

biology perspective, from the subtle body perspective,

from the perspective of the biofield

and how we carry trauma in our bodies. All

of these things— say more about that, because that's something that I

find so empowering about studying

quantum biology. I talk to a lot of

scientists and doctors who approach it from a very

almost materialist perspective, even though we're talking about things on

the quantum scale. But I feel like quantum biology

has the potential to be the bridge to give

that scientific foundation to the types of things that you're talking about, such

as the subtle bodies. Yes, absolutely.

Well, Eileen McKusick talks— about how we store

our trauma in our biofield. And so

this is one way of looking at it. There's so many different ways to look

at trauma and how we carry trauma and how we can

release it, which is amazing. There's just such a myriad of

ways. So we also store trauma in

our metabolic water, in our exclusion zone

water, and we don't have studies right now

to prove this. But we also know that we store it in

our fascia, which is likely in the metabolic water.

And as body workers— body workers will tell you, you can

press on a certain point and this flood of emotions come

back. And these things bubble up in order to

dissipate. But again, the nervous system has to be ready for

trauma release, because if things come flooding back,

then we end up— we can end up getting ensnared in them

again. And so we need to feel regulated and often

co-regulated for that to happen. But quantum biology gives us

so much information about the layers of our subtle

body as well. And I work with the

Enneagram with my clients, whether they know it or not. Usually

they know it. I like to introduce the idea. And

on a subtle body, body level, the Enneagram talks about

the three centers of intelligence. And we can

store trauma in the belly or the body center. We can store

trauma in the heart center where our emotional intelligence

resides. We can store it in our heads. And when we can get

all three of these centers communicating with each

other, first we need to bring them online, and then when they get to talk

talking to each other, then that is really when we

can release what isn't serving us and come back to

a regulated state and then move

forward in a new way, in a more whole way. And this work

happens in the subtle body. So when you're working with someone

to move through that, you know, we started out by talking

about raising the ceiling on our joy

capacity or our success capacity or our

financial stability capacity, or whatever it is. Those are probably the

big three, or health capacity. So you talked about that first

piece being to slow down

and integrate into our rhythm, which is connected to the

rhythm of nature, grounding, light and dark

cycles. So then this— the next phase is moving up through

these subtle bodies. Yeah. I think so.

And so I have a 6-week course that I've

designed, and in each week we learn— we get a different

lesson about quantum biology and circadian health, and then we

also get a different nervous system regulation

technique. And in week 2, we learn the

3 centers of intelligence meditation,

and initially We're simply tuning into these parts of

our body and becoming aware of what they

represent. And when I first started working with one of my teachers, whose name

is Carly Forrest, she was cueing us to

feel our belly. And this was an entire

retreat where I was like, what do you mean? I don't

feel anything. Like, I don't feel anything

in my belly. And then At the first retreat, I was kind of like,

yeah, belly, whatever, cool, see ya. And then I came back a year

later and she's still talking about the belly, and I was like,

okay, why can't I feel this part of my body? And I find

that curiosity is such a key

way in of like, okay, obviously I have a

belly, why am I cut off from my belly?

And from there opened up like so many

layers of social conditioning, you know, of like our

bellies, how they're supposed to look, you know, as women, all

this self-scrutiny. So these are like the

layers of trauma as they're peeling back that show

up when we start to steward these parts of

ourselves. So learning how to meet what was in the belly was

actually a process for me that took years.

And it's an incredibly valuable process because

our belly, it's like our gut instinct,

right? It's like when we just know something in our

bones, when we get that sacred no, I call it— the belly is

like the home to the sacred no. When we just get that zing

of like, nope, that's not okay. So it's home to our sense

of boundaries and it's also home to anger.

And so when we have a healthy belly, we

can really develop— we can be in

right relationship with anger, because anger gets

set aside in a lot of spiritual communities.

And it's a frequency, like, we need to have access to the

full range of frequencies. And one of

my Enneagram teachers was talking about being able

to feel and hold the totality of anger when it

shows up, to be able to contain that in the body, to not need

to put it on anybody else, but to feel

the powerful mobilizing heat of anger

in its totality. And, you know, the reality

is that emotions have a 90-second trajectory. So

if we develop the awareness to

meet ourselves in the experience that we're having, and we can

hold on— hold it for 90 seconds, we can trust

that zing of intensity will then move through

us in a very short period of time. And then we can be in

right relationship with anger, because anger shows up when boundaries

have been crossed. Like, it's a healthy emotion. It's

not healthy to get programmed into that frequency and run

that frequency. Right. It's not healthy

to get programmed in, to run on it, to use it as fuel,

and it's not healthy either to just ignore it, pretend

it's not there, but it is a powerful messenger. And I

love this so much because I think a lot of the time we hold

ourselves in a state of dysregulation or a state of

dissonance by unconsciously trying to avoid certain types

of feelings, right? Like our mind just like, oh, not gonna think that, or just—

and so we're in this continuous state of like avoidance

and duck and cover and like, because we can't just be with

the totality of it because it's like, I don't know how to have that feeling.

And so when we feel that little spark, it's like,

nope. So this practice you're describing, it

like opens us to feel the feeling, move through it and be like,

oh, I'm still here. It didn't kill me. I also didn't kill

anyone else. Like, I just sat here and felt it. And then

like our— that expansion process is opened up.

And I'm going to tell a quick story because I think this is like

so key on the anger piece. This was years ago, but I

got a piece of information about somebody who is

relatively close to me. And it turned out that there had been information that had

been withheld from me for a long time. And I— was told

it, and I was just like filled with

rage. And so at first— and there was a part of me that was

like, okay, like, this doesn't actually directly affect

you. Like, why do I feel so angry? And then it

was like, oh, because I have been doing things

I don't want to do to make this other person comfortable. I have been, you

know, and I had— all of a sudden I could see the whole, like, the

full dynamics of the relationship laid out and all of the ways that I played

into it. So as opposed to this being like, oh, that was

a dumb decision. Why'd she— like, it was like so

much more because— but it was mine,

not hers. Well, and way to

be curious first and foremost, and

then also take responsibility for your role in

it. Because when we have— when we avoid

these uncomfortable feelings, Often then we need

some numbing, we reach for numbing strategies in order

to cover them up. And even, you know, Gabor Maté

talks about depression being repression, is like

this pushing down of our human

experience. But when we have a regulated nervous

system, then we can come from a settled place,

get activated, and in these, like,

waves of resonance and resilience, come back to that

place and be able to get curious. Wow, that was a

strong reaction. What's underneath that for me? Because

that is an evolutionary strategy, you know. This is

how we learn, and this is how we become more whole

humans, is to be able to experience the

totality of what it means to be on this planet right

now. Yeah, and being on this planet right now is

like no joke. It's no joke. And if you're here listening to

a conversation like this, like, you are most

likely dialed right into it. It's advanced

practice being on this planet right now, right? And all the

more reason that we absolutely need

healthy self-care. We need circadian strategies. We

need to cultivate our own inner coherence to

be able to navigate what's out there. Like, the

world needs this work right now more than

ever. Yeah. And I think it was Julie Shauna was talking

about, like, stabilizers. She's like, I feel the call

for stabilizers. And when I hear you describe your work,

I'm like, okay, Kristen, is planting her flag as

a stabilizer. Yes. And you know, if you're listening

to this and you're like, oh, maybe I should, you know, work with someone like

that. Yes. And I think you're sharing your story of the heartbreak

was important because as you know, an author I

used to read a lot of a long time ago used to say like spiritual

growth isn't a pleasure cruise. But that word that you

used, initiation. I think is so

powerful because it gives it meaning. Yes. And for me, it

was an initiation into healthy attachment

with myself, which is another way of saying

self-belonging, because I had to own in myself that I had an

unhealthy attachment to this person, and that was what

was creating the suffering for me. And

the reality is, like, we are so good at creating our own

suffering And when we can get out from under the

victim mentality and see it, then we can

really empower ourselves to liberate

ourselves. And yes, most often we do need

professional support for that too. And it can be such a

beautiful process of co-regulation to be

stewarded through that by someone else. Yes. 'Cause

it's— once you enter that space where— and you put it so beautifully,

right? Like, all the parts of myself are okay, and

I'm not in disconnection from the

darkness, from, you know, the worst things I've ever done and

the worst I've ever felt and the worst I've ever been treated. Like,

I can meet them and make peace with them,

which then allows me to be of service to others.

Yeah, well, it's a way of— I think of it as filling in my own

holes. You know, if I have this like hole, this energetic leak where I'm

like asking somebody else to fulfill

something for me, then I'm like leaking them my

power. And so as we learn how to more fully

belong to ourselves, it's like we're sealing in these holes. We're like,

I can take care of me. I don't need somebody

else to do something for me in order for me to feel okay.

Like I can do that for me and I can tend to my

most exiled parts in a way that, you know, I have

a regular relationship with my inner child now. Like

we hang out, like we talk and I take her for ice

cream

sometimes. Which she loves, by the way. Yes. Yeah, they love that. Yeah. And

all— that's a beautiful part of ourselves as well that we've often

exiled. So you also have a strong background in music.

Yes. Let's talk about how music and

rhythm play into the rhythm of nature and the rhythm

of everything we've been talking about. Yes. I love this. Thank

you for bringing this forward, Meredith. Music

is absolutely like my lifeblood. Like,

I don't know where I would be without music. I actually have

an undergrad in classical music,

and there's an interesting story of

self-belonging with music, because when I was in music school,

by the time I was done classical music school, I felt like

it had just ground the love out of it for me. Like, I was— I

could produce on command, I could learn songs written by dead guys,

I could complete all my assignments and get honors and all

that, but it just became dry for me.

And then I left classical music, and

then 10 years— were you, were you the singer or a musician, or did you

play an instrument, or what was your— I'm a piano

player. Okay. And I did education and composition

majors at U of T, so it's a very competitive music

school. Wow. Okay, for the non-Canadians out there, Kristen and I

are Canadian. Yes. The music program at University

of Toronto is top tier. That is no joke. All right.

Yeah. Rigor. A lot of rigor, but not a lot of soul is what I'm

meaning. Yeah, absolutely. And then about 10

years later, I just felt this call to learn how to DJ

because I'd been going to festivals and enjoying electronic music. And

I was like, I really want to express myself in this

way. And having had all the classical

background, it was just like, it began this process

of belonging to myself by doing something completely

different. Didn't really have anything to do with classical music. I was like, this is

just for me. This is for me. And this feels so good

and I love it. And I love performing. I

love facilitating an experience. And on the

surface, yes, DJing might seem like, seem like it is not so

quantum because you're up late, you're

in environments where there's blue light, you know,

there— you're pushing your body. But what's

magical about it is like kind of being

the driver of the spaceship and facilitating an

experience of oneness through rhythmic entrainment for

people. Oh, what a great description of

DJing! It has been a minute since I— actually, no, that's not true. I was

going to say I haven't done that in a long time, but that's not true.

I went to a music festival last spring and did that. Yes,

it's amazing. And I just— a quick note, like, it's not quantum in

the sense that we are, you know, it's out of alignment

with circadian rhythm, but I do think participating in really

high vibe activities is worth it and balances it all

out. So. Absolutely. And, you know, talk about

belonging, like the festival community. There's so

much belonging there. There's so much communion. And

what's happening with rhythmic entrainment is like all of

our nervous systems are getting entrained to the

same rhythm. And this is a very real phenomena. It's

like similar to if you take a whole bunch of grandfather clocks and you put

them in a room together and all the pendulums are

swinging in different directions, an hour later, you'll go back to the room,

and all the pendulums will be

entrained. And that is a quantum phenomena. And

that's what happens to our bodies when we're on a dance floor.

And then we can also look at things from

the perspective of our metabolic water.

And I've been delving into Cymatics lately,

which is so cool. It's such an amazing science to

have a visual representation of the

frequency of sound. And knowing that

we're 75% water by mass,

but 99% water by molecule,

knowing that our internal waters are

literally responding to frequency in a psychedelic way.

And that we're all experiencing that, no

wonder it's so powerful. It's so, so cool. That's

so cool. Yeah. And so there's another piece

to the music story that I'd like to tell, which

is a reclamation that's happened this year

that is also a part of more fully belonging

to myself. So I got a free piano, a a

few years back, and I started toiling around after

20 years of not playing piano. I was like, I'm just gonna

lift pop songs, I'm just gonna keep it fun, I don't want to play songs

written by dead guys, I just want to do this for

me. And— but then I was realizing I was not super inspired to

play on that instrument because it wasn't really a quality instrument. And then

a friend of mine bought a grand piano

this spring or earlier this year, and I went over to his house

and I played his grand piano, and I was

like, oh my God, I was like, oh,

actually, I think I need a grand piano. And I had told myself

all these stories about how I couldn't have

a grand piano. Like, I've always wanted a grand piano as a

piano player, and I just told myself all these— I had all

these reasons why I couldn't have one, and then I just realized that it was

all BS, and I was like, I'm gonna buy myself a

grand piano. Good for you, Kristen! I love to hear

it. Okay, yeah. And so I went, I found my— I drove

all over the island trying to find the piano, and I went to the

mainland ultimately and bought an incredible

piano. And I bawled my eyes out as I was

driving home. I was like, I can't believe I actually did

that. And it has been such a reclamation to have

an exquisite instrument to play. It's

been like— like full body chills with this. It's so good.

Yeah, it's just been so incredible to sit and

play and reclaim these old parts of myself, with my young self

that just loved to play music and then just got really

separated from that and Now I just— I play

my piano every day and I'm so in love with it

and it's just for me. It's so beautiful. I

just am ecstatic and it has turned out to be a

gift to my community as well because I've already had

one piano concert and everyone was so excited to

come. Like, they were like, piano concert, sign me

up! Yeah, so I had 30 people come over and we all

just cozied up and people were just like smiling and

their eyes closed and listening. And, you know, DJing is

about the body, it's about the booty. Piano is about the

heart. And I really saw it received in like such a

beautiful way. And so it's been

amazing. I have a grand piano now. What a gift

to yourself. Like, and that's You know, I mean, we started

out talking about increasing our capacity

for joy, and this is just the most perfect

story to illustrate that, is to give yourself this gift

of this exquisite instrument and to play it

just for fun. Mm-hmm. To

experience the beauty of music. And so I actually— I got

the Symascope app. Oh, great. After

I listen to your episode with Jon Stewart Reid, and then I'll put that

on my piano while I play, and then I kind

of like, what? And I look at it, so I just— oh my

God, that's so good. And I think it would be so fun

to like next piano concert actually like put that

up on a big screen for people

to witness as like, this is what's happening inside

you. When you are in training to this specific

resonance. Yes. Yeah. Oh, Kristen, you might

have just invented something

here. Cymatic— cymatic piano

concert. It's gonna happen, I can feel it. Yes.

Yeah. And, you know, I just also want to say, like, how beautiful it is,

like, to have— to have your community gathered

around the piano, like, that's— I mean, that's what we

used to do. Yes, I saw, I saw, like, of

course, you know, on, on

Twitter/X, on my screen, but somebody had put a little cartoon from when the radio

was first invented, and there was a, an illustration

on the left of all of these people standing around the piano. Someone played

and someone was singing, and then The illustration on the right, they were all

just sitting on the couch listening to the radio, and it was like, technology

is destroying

community. Yes, I mean, this is what we've done for thousands of years,

is gather, especially in, you know, it's the dark season

right now. We get together and we

gather by the fire. I actually have a wood stove in my space as

well. And— Oh, nice. And there's infrared

light. You've got it all covered. Infrared. I've got all these like

red strip lights decorating my space, and so it's

all totally circadian. And for people to come

and again let their bodies entrain to

that magical resonance, it's like such a

beautiful gift to offer people. And it feels like a

midlife transition, you know, because I have been

DJing and festivaling and dance partying for so

long. And I was really pleased with

people's enthusiasm about the more

quiet, contemplative, heartfelt piano

experience. Yes. And do you play all kinds of music,

like classical, pop, all of it? I do. Yeah.

Now I play whatever I want. I love

it. Yeah. No more rules.

Yeah. So I wanna just reflect back, you know, talking to

you, I'm really seeing something that I don't see all

that often, which is like— which

is the expansive,

creative, woo-oriented, um,

approach, but combined with like quite a lot of rigor and

structure and discipline.

And I, I think sometimes we make those

things a little mutually exclusive or compartmentalized, right?

And if it's like, if I'm the person who needs all— a study

to prove every single thing all the time, then

I can't go— I can't go into any of the spheres, you know, that we've

been discussing here. Or on the other end, sometimes it's

like, well, if I live in this creative,

intuitive, energetic space, like, I can't I can't go over there

and like put any structure or rigor around it, 'cause it'll wreck it or

something. And, uh, you're just like a really nice example of how

that's not true. Yeah. You know, my best friend, she

likes to make collages and she made me this collage card

for Christmas, which has like colorful zebra

print in the back and then like half

monk face to here. And then like party

girl. I was like, wow, you see

me. And you know, it's like, this is a— I love

paradox. I love uniting opposing ideas.

And like, you can be disciplined and

wild at the same time. You know, we can embody

these opposites because then we can also

occupy anywhere along that continuum, and we

don't do ourselves any favors when we put ourselves in

boxes, you know, and we compartmentalize things of like, oh, I'm like

this, so I should do X, Y, and Z.

And really it comes back again and again to like

touching into what is it I re— what is it I need right

now? I need an early bedtime for the most part.

And then every once in a while I can push myself. And go out

and have fun and get fed in a totally different

way. Because I find being in the boxes is like

a way where things get dry, like they did in classical music

school. And I've always just

really followed my interests. And when I get interested in something,

I go— like, I go for it, and I go down that

rabbit hole, and I go down the whole way. And

my curiosity feeds a lot of different parts of

me. I have a little saying, nothing like a little obsession to get the job

done. Absolutely. Yes. And it's

like sometimes we are a little obsessed and mono-focused

on something, you know,

like it's, you know, in get— starting a new habit or getting through a tough

time or whatever it is. Oh, we don't— yeah, but it's a

little obsession. I love that. Yeah, it's like, it's okay. And then we go back

to, you know, being a little more balanced. Yeah, but we have to be open

to all the different ways of being because they all have their

role at any given moment. Yes. And

working with the Enneagram has also really taught

me how to be a more well-rounded human

because that little obsession could— can

burn, burn us out, as you know, right? If it gets out

of control. And so through working with the Enneagram,

I've really developed like such a

deeper understanding of how to slow down and

what was driving the obsession, what

was driving the busyness, the

constant distraction. The constant productivity. Like,

we cannot be constantly productive. You know,

we look to nature and we look at the ocean and the wave, it

crests and it builds and then it falls.

And when we can— we can't just push and push and push and

push and expect our lovely bodies to keep performing

in that way. They're just at a certain point, they're going to be like, uh,

excuse me. So

again, coming back to the rhythms of nature,

coming back to like, what am I feeling

right now? I feel tired. I'm just gonna go lay on

my daybed and close my eyes for 5 minutes, and

I'm just gonna honor my hard-working body's

need for rest right now. And like, just

that practice has been so revolutionary for

me of like, when I'm tired, I

rest. When I'm hungry, I eat. When I have to

go pee, I go pee. I don't like override my

body and wait, you know,

and to, to be able

to truly slow down in order to catch up with myself because our

bodies need us to slow down in order to feel what's

actually happening, that's been one

of the greatest gifts of self-belonging for

me. Yes. Yeah, and back to that

slowness piece, which is so, so key

and challenging for some of us who are always— have a lot of

things we want to be doing. But yeah, you reminded me too, like, irene lyons

is like, regulating your nervous system is kind of boring.

Like, like, you got to be like— it's, it's

just be sitting still. And like what you're saying, it's like, you

know, you're— I feel like always wanting to

be stimulated and productive. It's like, take those things away

and it's like, ah, but then move through that and you

get to a new place. Yeah, we're so addicted to our

phones, you know, and they're designed to be addictive. It's like as soon as we

sit down and we don't have anything to do to do. There's such a strong

compulsion to just like pull out the phone and scroll and doom

scroll. And when we can just go, okay, just leave that just

for a minute— like, the phones are

constantly programming our nervous system. We know that blue light

stimulates cortisol. We know that we get a dopamine

dump when we're scrolling, when we're on our phone too much, like

We need to keep that dopamine. And so it really is

a revolutionary act to choose to go,

I'm just gonna sit here and be a

person. I'm just gonna like human it up for a minute.

Yeah, be a human being, not a human

doing, right? Yeah, so good. Um, okay,

before we wrap, if you could just give a quick overview of the,

of the Enneagram, because I realize people might not know what that

is, and you seem to have a very, uh, interesting approach to it.

So yes, I love the Enneagram. It

is at first glance a personality typing system, and maybe you

did a test at one point and be like, I'm a 2, or

I'm a 7, or whatever. I think I was a 9. I

I think. Yeah, I could

see that. So, tracking? Yeah. Uh, but to me,

the Enneagram is a psycho-spiritual map designed

for personal transformation. Okay. And it was created

by mystic psychiatrists, which is not

an oxymoron, in the '60s and '70s in

South America and brought to

Berkeley Bartó Eszilén by Claudio Naranjo.

And it is a living map that

really shows us how we go to sleep. It's

shadow work, and, and your type is very much based in what happened to you

in your early holding environment as a very young person

and how that shapes you. And the idea is that

our personality is how we go to

sleep. So our personality is made up of these strategies that

we developed in order to hopefully

get our needs met in that early holding

environment. And as a parent, you know, like, there's no possible way that

you can attune to all of your children's needs. And this is the

human condition, is that we get separated from our

essence as the personality construct forms as

a survival strategy. And

if as adults we're still defaulting to the

survival strategy that we developed when we were 3, you could see

that that can cause problems, especially if

we're just going to sleep and doing the same things over and over again. And

so the Enneagram shows us how to wake up.

And whenever you're studying the Enneagram

you are doing presence practices every day, like the

three centers of intelligence, because the Enneagram

says, if you're a Type 7, then

you may be numbing through busyness and being go, go,

go. And the Enneagram will show you how

to recognize those cues in yourself and how to do

it differently. So the example I just gave

of choosing to notice when my body is tired, instead

of pushing, pushing, pushing, and being able to

rest. That's a simple example.

And for me personally, I think the Enneagram

has supported me more than anything else

in my personal growth, and in becoming a more

well-rounded human, because the idea is that we want to return to our

essence, As adults, we want to return to embodying this essence

that is our birthright, and

that when we can be present and

respond in situation, whatever it is,

with presence rather than defaulting to

the sleeping automatic way of doing

things, then we can expand our capacity for

joy. We can expand our capacity to be here. We

can come from a regulated place. And

so there's so much nuance with the Enneagram, and I love talking to

people about it. And when people do a Rise

and Shine course, we do get into it. We get into three centers

meditation. We start to talk about the ways

that— the patterns of like, oh well, That's a 9 pattern, what

you're experiencing, and this is how we can recognize it

when it shows up and have the freedom to choose

something different. Yeah,

the freedom to choose, and

yeah, the— to have a template that supports

us towards that freedom is so invaluable. So thanks

for sharing about how that works. Uh, I'm gonna go

back now and see. It's been— it was a long time. And it's funny, when

I was doing my executive coaching training, I remember I picked

like a really— somebody who was like very different from me so I

could cultivate like different— a different, you

know, just capacity and parts of myself. And he was like a very kind

of blunt, gruff, you know, and he'd be like, all right, so this is

executive coaching. We're here, though, we're talking to business people. He's like, if you're here

with like some Enneagram shit or something like that, this is not good. This is

not This is not the place for you. And I remember being like,

okay, well, I love the Enneagram, but I will keep that to myself for

this training. Oh, great.

And he was, he was great. I learned so much from him and he made,

he made me a much better coach, but that was just reminding

me of that moment. He's like,

oh, funny. Uh, um, okay. So

you. You know, you spent 10 years in occupational therapy

working in public services, and you have now shifted

over to become a private practitioner. Yeah. So

tell us how we can find you. You are certified by the

Institute of Applied Quantum Biology as, as one of the pieces of

the many pieces that you bring to your work. Um,

so lead us there. Help— help the people find

you. Thank you. Yeah, my website is my

name, kristengilbert.ca,

and I also have a YouTube channel

called Sunhunter_CV. That's short for

Comox Valley, where I live. I have a bunch of free

meditations on there, and, um,

also doing a free sunrise challenge starting

March 7th and guiding people with that, just encouraging people to get

out for sunrise, taking a little photo, posting it in the

WhatsApp group. So nice and sweet and simple.

I have a course that I've taken 5

years to design, and it's gone through many iterations,

and it's solidified more in the last 6 months. So I call it

Rise and Shine. Nice. And Over the course

of 6 weeks, people learn all the basics

of circadian health and quantum biology, and they also

learn 6 different nervous system regulation

strategies. And that's like the foundation of

what I want to establish with people. And then beyond

that 6 weeks, the work that we do together is the

more individualized work of What's holding us

back? What's limiting the amount of joy that we

can experience? How do we slowly

expand our nervous system in an integrated way to be able

to hold these bigger experiences and really

give ourselves permission to live the life

that our heart truly desires? So I'll be

doing that as an online group. Starting at the end of March.

So if you want to get on my email list, and you'll— I'll be letting

people know when these things are starting, and I'd love to have

you. Gorgeous. So that's

kristengilbert.ca, and it's Kristen, K-R-I-S-T-E-N, Kris-ten Gilbert, dot

ca. Uh,

Kristen, thank you so much for being here. This has just This has been

a really beautiful, expansive

conversation, and I know that just listening to it is

gonna be helpful for so many people. And thank you all for listening

and tuning into this. Sometimes I'm having these chats

and I'm like, oh yeah, other people are going to listen to this.

Thank you so much for having me, Meredith. It was really beautiful to connect

with you. Okay, well, we will do it

again. Wonderful.