00:00:08 Sana: Hello and welcome back, listeners to this blend, where we dig into real conversations about work, life and everything that shapes us in between. Amirhossein as always. And, you know, listeners, I think, most of us have had that moment for sure. Like lying awake at two a m, um, wondering why we are not more, more successful, feeling this more fulfilled, more something we set. Goals we set, we hustle. We create vision boards. We read the books. We listen to the podcasts. Ironic, I know. And yet there's this gap, this space between who we are and who we sense we could be. So today, listeners, we are not here to sell you the dream or hand you a five step formula. We are here to explore why that gap exists in the first place. Why? I mean, despite our best intentions, do so many of us fall short of our own potential? Joining me is someone who's lived on both sides of this conversation. Listeners. She has sat in boardrooms advising C-suite executives on system change and innovation, and she is also guided people through vision quests in the Australian wilderness. She's a serial entrepreneur, a published author, a ceremonialists, a shaman initiated in multiple indigenous lineages. And let me tell you listeners, she was recently voted best spiritual practitioner in Australia Holistic Practitioner awards. But you know what makes her story particularly compelling? She didn't start there. She experienced her own complete dismantling, burnout, disconnection, autoimmune illness, and had to confront the trauma that had been masquerading as her personality for thirty five years. She is the founder of Transforming Tribes and also creator of frameworks like Shift Protocol and The Six Layers of Being. So with that listeners, let's begin this conversation and let's welcome our amazing guest, Catherine. Catherine, welcome to whisper. And I'm really, really excited for this discussion.

00:02:44 Kathryn Sforcina: Thank you so much for having me, Sana. I'm equally excited to be here.

00:02:50 Sana: Um, Catherine, uh, the way the I started the intro, I mean, I literally picture those, like, I my mind was visualizing, reminiscing those moments when I used to be awake. Maybe sometimes, you know, any particular. I used to listen to songs while doing something and any particular word or word in the lyrics. It used to trigger this spiraling thought within me that what exactly I'm doing with my life. Is this something that I really want, or should I go with the flow? Is this my potential? So many questions. And somehow those questions, they kind of raised this feeling of judgment. But, you know, is something wrong with me or not? So I'm very sure our listeners will definitely connect with this, this topic. But before that, let's start with your journey. I mean, you have worked with, um, executives, entrepreneurs. You have also worked with seekers, like a lot the spectrum. And I think that's exactly what we need right now. So when you look at why people don't meet their full potential, what's the most common thing that you see?

00:04:02 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah. Thank you for sharing that with me. And it's it's definitely I think we've all had not only our dark nights of the soul, but a few nights in the dark thinking about ourselves.

00:04:14 Speaker 5: Yeah.

00:04:16 Kathryn Sforcina: And, uh, I've definitely not been immune to that myself. Look, it's, um. It's a really interesting question that you pose, Anna, because I do feel many, many there are many, many layers which can have us confusing the reason why we don't meet our full potential for a plethora of different things. I guess what I found in the work that I do with so many and varied people is it does come down to some very fundamental core things in someone's being. And the first one would be how well they know themselves and how deep they're prepared to meet themselves. Mhm. And if someone is on that journey then I would also say from that place of being prepared to meet themselves, they're also prepared to look at all the different ways that they either give away their power or they take power. And by power I don't necessarily mean, you know, loading a sword over someone's neck or, you know, like it doesn't need to be dramatic like that. But in our society has conditioned us in this modern day age to believe that everything we need to be happy and successful, healthy and connected lives outside of ourselves. And so we have been fundamentally trained to believe we do not have the power within our own being to be healthy, to live a good life, to be at peace, to be happy, to be successful. Unless we have x, y, z outside of ourselves. Um, and so once we are on that journey of knowing myself and mastering myself, it becomes a journey of also understanding how to stand in our own sovereignty and power. And and fundamentally, that comes down to remembering everything in our lives really, truly after we were about sixteen to eighteen is our choice. And and so what I tend to find is that most people have forgotten that they can make a choice as to how they show up every single day, how they can reframe, how they can, um, attach to perspectives or outcomes or not attached to them. Um, and I could go on and on about all the different choices that we can make, regardless of what situation we find ourselves in. Um, and fundamentally, we get to choose how we even feel about situations. These aren't predetermined things. Um, once we understand the mechanics of cell memory and of, you know, the power of choice and the power, our words, both internally spoken and externally, have we completely changed the game on what we're capable of as a human being?

00:07:13 Sana: Oh, and I mean, that makes so much sense, Catherine. I mean, if I can interpret in my own words, it's basically okay. Physics one hundred and one, um, we are letting external factors, whether it's our surroundings, our environment, our upbringing, the people around us controlling the variables and throwing the answer out of the formula on us instead of us assessing, calculating and getting the right output of the formula here.

00:07:51 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah, and I think it goes a little bit beyond the mentality of assess or calculate. Whilst that's really whilst that's fundamental that we understand where the mechanisms exist and what patterns are playing out for us in that way, it becomes a mechanism of choosing whether we remain in the head or whether we're going to live a heart based life. because, I mean, and I'm not sure if, uh, you're you're aware of this, but there's a lot of research around our gut and also our heart and our gut and our hearts individually both have more neurons than our actual physical brain, and we spend so much time mentalizing our lives that we forget to listen to the parts of us, our heart, and our internal guidance mechanism. Funnily enough, our solar plexus, where that internal guidance mechanism sits energetically, is also the same space where the gut happens to sit. Um, you know, we spend so much of our time mentalizing instead of being in our body, connected in the moment, and truly listening to the intelligence of our own being that, um, we, we make decisions based on constructs that actually don't even exist yet. Um, many, many people will spend either their entire lives completely dissociated from their self because they're convinced that if they live in the future. When I get this, when I have this, when I'm this way, when I no longer feel this pain, all my life will be brilliant. Or they live constantly in their past, always thinking about the possible scenarios that could happen in their future based on their past. And so either way, we're either praying our past to continue to happen into our future, or we're oftentimes praying for the worst case scenarios to happen into our future before they've even existed. Um, and how we avoid staying in those mental loops that you spoke about, you know, in the middle of the night when they start coming, um, is really to drop back into our heart space and allow ourselves to be present in our body in the moment and listen to the intelligence of something if we're feeling closed or tight or constricted. Um, confused. That's generally a pretty good indication. Our body, our intelligence, is saying, let's slow down here, let's take a breath. Let's, um, lighten the pace a bit. Let's, uh, go and do something that's nurturing and nourishing for ourselves to bring us back into awareness of of the situation and into our center. Um, and if we're feeling ease and slow and, um, and a lot of lightness about something, it's a pretty good indication that we're feeling our nervous system's feeling really safe about that situation or, or personal, whatever it is that we're we're contemplating and that, um, we're in a state where we can be really open and receptive to opportunity and to different perspectives and to being in a in a lot more peace with that. Um.

00:11:06 Sana: But, uh, you know, here, Catherine, I mean, Personally, it's just not something that I would, uh, still agree with. But, uh, people would say, especially in the business circles, that in order to grow individually, you have to get out of your comfort zone. Sometimes you have to face the unknown. And, in that process, you may have to sacrifice maybe your health or your time in order to achieve something for the greater good. What what would you would you say to this, um, idea, you know, this hustle culture?

00:11:46 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah. Yeah. Look, I mean, I lived that for at least twenty. Yeah, it was about twenty years of my life. I really lived the hustle culture, and I. I wore a badge of working twenty one hour days, seven days a week, for months at a time. I wore that badge like it was my my honor and my right and my my, my, um, my, you know, that was that was the indicator that I was successful. Um, um, and yet, you know, nothing that happened in that time, whilst there were lots of great things that happened for me in business, um, none of them can bring back the hours where I sacrificed family time. Being at home with my little ones. I had three little ones during that period of my life. Um, you know, nothing can set. Nothing was as valuable as my health, which took me years and years to get back to a stable place after. So such a deep level of chronic fatigue. Um, and so I think when we are locked into the hustle culture, a lot of the time it's because we're using work as the addiction.

00:12:59 Speaker 5: Um.

00:13:00 Kathryn Sforcina: Um, where some people might use drugs or alcohol or food or porn or, you know, you name it, all the other things that people can generally be addicted to. They decide to use work as that addiction and use work as their armor so they don't have to face parts of their life that they don't like and so that they can disconnect, um, and have an excuse to not be as connected to other people and to their own internal workings. Um, and so, yeah, when we're in that hustle culture state, it's um, it's very much because we, we've decided that being mental about life and staying in our heads is actually what success looks like. Um, and, you know, I would say that, uh, if, uh, that there is, uh, always in that culture, a scarcity mentality of the quid pro quo of there must be a cost for my success. Um, and it is a fundamental shift in belief systems and in a way of living to come into a pace of slow living. But to see through less physical efforting. More results, more productivity. More potential, um, a greater awareness in your being and just more zest and passion for life. Um, and look, I mean, people have to probably a lot of people have to hit a really, really deep point in low point in their lives when they're really locked into the hustle culture to want to change because it is so seductive. And we do really reward it in our culture.

00:14:41 Sana: Yes.

00:14:42 Speaker 5: Yeah.

00:14:46 Sana: Um, Catherine, you mentioned, I mean, in your in your, in your something that, you know, really kind of, uh, it's a heavy realization. I mean, you discover your trauma. It had masqueraded as your personality for thirty five years. I mean, it is heavy. So can you can you break that down for us? Like, how does trauma actually disguise itself as who we think we are? Like this? You know, our self-identity, it's connected. It's tied with our worth.

00:15:19 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah. Ah, gosh, that's such a beautiful question. Thank you for asking that. Um, um, because I do believe that there's very, very few humans on this earth that haven't experienced some form of trauma. Um, it's a very rare individual these days, sadly. Um, even if it's not in their personal life, by now, most of us, particularly if we've lived through Covid, have, um, have experienced at least some deep collective trauma. Um, and they all register in the body very, very similarly. Um, and this comes back to, I guess, your question about the hustle culture as well. Um, because we, we can actually start to when we've ingrained a way of responding to trauma or responding to traumatic circumstances in our, in our lives, when we've ingrained a way of figuring out when the ego self decides, I need to find a way to stay, uh, safe and alive here. Um, it does something to rewiring our nervous system. And over time, it can make threats look like opportunity. Because we get so wired into believing that that dopamine hit of adrenaline of I've got to survive is is the motor is internal motivation. We can really mistake that for internal motivation. Um, and on top of that as well, it can really uh, so that turns into a survival mechanism that is so easily mistaken for motivation. Um, particularly as we remove ourselves from unsafe situations, it's it's a very common thing to believe that because the environment now is safe around us, we we're now we now operate as if we are in safety. But the cell memory in our bodies has stored a pattern that any time we come anywhere near even an inkling, it could be that someone raises a tone in their voice, even if we don't outwardly, um, react to that. Our nervous system has triggered and begun an overriding based on an old survival pattern. Unless we've learned how to meet those things and clear it. And so I would say that it impacted, um, my leadership style. Um, I, I would say in my early days in and, you know, going back into hustle culture, it suited my my leadership style was really suited the hustle culture, because I guess you could say I was I was quite dominant, um, in my leadership style and, um, expected the same kind of, um, you know, hustle from everyone that worked with me and for solid probably ten years, that was considered to be the norm. And that was how you were a successful leader. If you could rally your troops to basically bleed their life into your business. Um, and that makes me cringe a little now. And I've certainly done a lot of work on, on on rebalancing that karma for sure. Um, and, and, you know, if I could track down some of the young, young ones that worked with me during those times, I would give them a very deep, heartfelt apology because that version of Catherine is is not not available anymore. Uh, but, uh, you know, it it also impacted how I saw opportunity because I didn't see opportunity as opportunity. I saw threat as opportunity. So I chose to get into business with people that would repeat the same patterns that I had in my childhood. Um, I literally would find, um, someone who a deeply narcissistic, uh, personality style was, I was, I was I would attract them like moths to a flame and um, and so that would create the drama that my pattern, my wounding needed in my life so that I would have something to fight against. And when I had something to fight against, I was unstoppable. Um, the moment that my life would be in ease and flow and and and and all the beautiful, juicy things that most people would just think are just the best parts of your life. I would start freaking out and need to find another challenge that I could fight against in order to feel like me. But I wasn't feeling like me. I was stuck in a survival pattern that that was, um, anchored in a soul wound around not being safe, not being heard, and not feeling worth enough unless I was actually physically working myself to the bone and proving myself up in the most ridiculously. You know, like some of the things I put myself through is just amazing. Um, I can definitely laugh about it now, but that, you know, these are the kinds of things that trauma does. Um, grief does the same thing. Deep resentment, deep regrets. Holding on to grudges. Um, you know, uh, abandonment wounds, self-worth wounds, scarcity wounds. There isn't something, you know, these are fundamental core wounds of our souls that as a human humanity, collectively, we've experienced on such mass that in some way, shape or form, they live in our epigenetic code. Um, and there's been so much study and research on how the experience of the generations before us still lives as a programming in our system.

00:21:08 Sana: Yeah.

00:21:09 Kathryn Sforcina: Um, and so we know these kinds of things through epigenetics, but then also quantum physics has also started proving everything shamans have known for thousands of years. So, you know, it's really cool because now, am I a quantum physicist or am I a shaman? Um, because really, at the end of the day, what we're really saying is if someone has observed this in our lineage before, then it's bound to happen again. Um, and so unwinding those timelines and unwinding the code around epigenetics that informs our systems. That's really where things started to shift for me. Um, and that's a really fundamental thing that I guess my medicine brings to the table for people because I understand the energetic frameworks that trauma, um, and the map that trauma creates in someone's soul and how to unpick that so that we can start rewiring it in a way where it sees opportunity as opportunity, threat as threat, safety as safety, love as love. And we, we, we stop playing the opposite game with ourselves. That trauma often wires us to respond like I do.

00:22:22 Sana: So one thing I can very, very confidently say that, you know, it takes a, it takes a different level of self-awareness that, you know, um, most of us, we are still building. I mean, it's it's part of that inner work. I mean, it takes time. It takes time different for different. I mean, we all are different, of course, spiritually but physically. But it takes a different kind of, you know, self-awareness in there. and, yeah, I mean, it's it's it's a lot. I mean, twenty one hours and but at least, you know, um, through your lived experiences, you are out there helping people, and it's it's kind of, you know, what what I have learned through so many conversations on, on, especially on this plane that it's it's kind of what many, of, many of the high achievers they, they face because the challenges they would like to face every day or maybe every moment. It's it's absolutely tied to how they assess their self-worth or their identity if they feel like, you know, rest is something that is going to defeat them. Um, it's it's going to take away all the control from them.

00:23:45 Kathryn Sforcina: Yeah. yeah I agree. That's a really, really big one and one I deeply had to meet. Um, but it's not so much like that. That's that is exactly when, it's when we're still locked into our mentality. Um, our which which, by the way, is totally just sitting in our limbic brain, our primal brain, um, which is just survival mechanism. So when we're in just our mentality and we can't drop into our body, our heart, we stay in the fear, fight, flight, feed, fawn, freeze or fornicate. That's the only functions we've got when we're in our primal limbic brain and everything in our life. We organize around being able to access and feel like we've got control over those specific mechanisms. The F's, as I would say.

00:24:45 Speaker 5: Um.

00:24:47 Kathryn Sforcina: So when we are in our heart space and we're listening to the intelligence of our entire being, which means taking in the information from our brain, but also our gut and our heart. Um, we actually observe in brain scans the blood flow shifting to the neocortex, which just so happens to be around our third eye from a chakra perspective.

00:25:14 Speaker 5: Um.

00:25:15 Kathryn Sforcina: And so much of science and energetic principles align, you know, that there's no coincidence that for thousands of years, the same meridians as the chakras, as the energy channels, as where the different functions in our brain exist, all aligned to the same things. Yes. so when we move from limbic to neocortex, we were able to be present in the moment. But as long as we're in the limbic brain, we're either running from something we don't want to happen or wholly focused on something we do want to happen, because that is the primary function of our survival brain, is to either avoid a threat or to gain sustenance or procreation. And so when we bring that back to and it might seem a bit abstract, but when we draw that back into the comment you made about rest for entrepreneurs, one of the biggest reasons of why an entrepreneur who is stuck in the hustle culture won't be able to let go of the control they feel in that to be able to give themselves permission to rest is because they're addicted to being in their survival brain. For starters, and survival brain isn't about chilling out and taking a breather. There's no rest in those f words that I used before. Um, it doesn't exist. Um, so they're literally trained themselves to sleep with one eye open, even when we're talking about rest from a sleep perspective, that's true. And then if we're talking about rest for taking some time out, um, the other thing that happens is because they've spent so long disconnecting from the truth of who they are as a human, and from all the things about life that normally, if we're connected to ourselves, when we have a conversation with someone and it causes an emotional response in us when we're connected to ourselves. We get to meet that gently, and the emotional energy of that kind of just trickles into our being. And then we've met it, and then it processes and then we're not in that state anymore, and we move. Whilst there are highs and lows in life, we move through them a lot more easily when we're in that constant, um, survival limbic brain state. We store up all of the responses and reactions we haven't let ourselves have, and as soon as we switch into rest mode, we're completely flooded by this. And it's overwhelming because most of the time we have not done the work we need to on a daily basis to allow ourselves to have the tools and the resources to meet those feelings when they arise. And this is particularly true when we think about hustle culture from a place of, um, many people trapped in that have, um, wounds of abandonment or self-worth. So it's actually become part of their identity to make sure they're always working. To prove value to someone else. In order for them to feel love. In order for them to feel. Belonging or happiness or success, they have to be over extending and over giving and over proving and over efforting constantly to meet that need of that wound which is insatiable in its hunger for validation. Um, and so when we, when we decide that we're going to rest, all of that comes up and that feels too big. So the the only thing to do if you're not prepared to do your work in that respect and and to meet yourself, is to go back into survival mode and to kick up the game even more and to dive even deeper into hustle culture.

00:29:28 Speaker 1: No.

00:29:29 Sana: And, I mean, I know that, this will be a bit uncomfortable for, for, uh, many, many of our, many of our listeners, like, you know, because a lot of us are essentially living from a place that feels like us. I mean, it's actually just a survival strategy, a coping mechanism that unfortunately, we have perfected.

00:29:54 Speaker 5: Yeah. Yeah.

00:29:56 Kathryn Sforcina: And when you start to pull on that thread, we then have the beauty of being able to live in an awareness that we didn't have about ourselves before, and we start to be able to see all the other things that we thought was us, but were really just a very good strategy for surviving in a period of our time, of our life. And so the questions instead of being how can I reach my full potential often first become who actually am I? If I didn't allow myself to play that pattern anymore?

00:30:39 Speaker 6: No.

00:30:40 Kathryn Sforcina: And that's really what started my journey, was I got to a point where I went, enough. I'm not repeating this pattern anymore. The common denominator every time this happens in my life is me.

00:30:55 Speaker 6: Yep.

00:30:56 Kathryn Sforcina: And whilst the things that happened weren't necessarily, you know, I can't control someone else's choices, I was definitely choosing to put myself in positions over and over again where I would give away my power just as I was about to come into significant success in my life. And, uh, so I really decided that I would meet that person. And the thing is, yes, it's it's really weird and uncomfortable to meet ourselves to begin with. It's like, uh, you know, because we're meeting parts of ourselves we really don't like and parts we really love. But it's like having, uh, you know, inviting a group of people over for a dinner party that you once had a really close relationship with, but you feel fully estranged from now.

00:31:50 Speaker 6: Mhm.

00:31:51 Kathryn Sforcina: And sitting down and deciding to start talking as intimately as you possibly can with them.

00:31:58 Speaker 5: And.

00:31:58 Kathryn Sforcina: And uh, and so, you know, I, I often just say to people, don't start by giving yourself grand gestures of love because you'll probably run a mile from yourself. It'll be too much.

00:32:10 Speaker 5: Um.

00:32:11 Kathryn Sforcina: Especially if you've not been treating yourself kindly. You'll be like, what the hell is this? I'm not like this. Um. Or you're too clingy or. And so I invite people to consider treating themselves as if they were dating someone they really wanted to get to know. Um, you wouldn't flood that person with. Well, maybe you would, but like, it's it's not ideal to be flooding that person with, you know, a thousand text messages a day and ten bouquets of flowers and telling them you love them on date one. That's not going to really get you to know that person very well. They're going to put up all their armor.

00:32:51 Speaker 5: Um.

00:32:52 Kathryn Sforcina: And so, yeah, I often just encourage people to just start with a simple, hi, I'm, I'm ready to listen to you and to just stop and be in stillness and breathe for five minutes with themselves. Just know what breathing with yourself feels like instead of as a function of survival. When I choose to be in breath with you, what moves for me? Where does it move? In my body? Where does my brain go? Can my brain even allow me the permission, the opportunity to have those five minutes with myself and. And no pressure if it does or it doesn't, but just noticing. And every day it's consistency. It's not based on the quantity of time. Um, initially, you know, I always say to people instead of, um, you know, once a week on a weekend sitting with yourself for an hour, it's far more effective. Two to five minutes a day, because our self needs, first and foremost the reassurance that we're safe to be with ourselves. And that happens through concerted, consistent effort over a long period of time. And so that two to five minutes, just to breathe with the self and not expect anything in return. It produces miracles for a lot of people's lives just in and of itself. And so it doesn't have to be this huge, scary process. Um, and definitely once, you know, it's like any muscle that you might build up in the gym, once you go the fitness, um, of learning how to be in relationship and sitting with yourself a little bit more, for sure. A lot of the time, it's like being in the gym when you when you get more strength, you want to try more things. You're capable of more. And that's a really great time to then start employing, you know, uh, people in your life, um, who can really help you to meet deeper things, particularly if there's been trauma. It's it's generally not an awesome idea to just go alone, for sure.

00:35:02 Speaker 6: Um.

00:35:04 Sana: And I think it's it's a good point to start with. And the major thing that you stressed upon, you highlighted. And I think that is something it by default should be should be taking care of is to start small, maybe two to five minutes and then gradually, consistently building up more and more time. Just like as we gave the example, the parallel with building, you know, muscle in a gym. And then of course, um, having the right people to help you in that journey, who may have been there and have done that. I think they they kind of, you know, help you strengthen that muscle in a, in the best way possible.

00:35:56 Kathryn Sforcina: Completely. Absolutely. And that's the thing is, once we're we're prepared to and we're okay and we feel safe to sit with ourselves, we're then able to ask the bigger questions of ourselves. And also, you know, uh, be willing to start navigating some of the territory that felt too scary before. So I feel like it's a really, really, really solid place, particularly if someone it's very unhealthy to take someone who is the you could say they're on a high speed train when they're on in one in, in a very specific direction, when they're in the hustle culture mode or the burnout mode of active burnout, um, which looks very much like a high functioning addicts like to be an active in active burnout. Um, and it can be as unsafe as, uh, you would never ask a heroin addict to go cold turkey. You would taper them off. Um, it's I mean, and I'm I'm not really joking when I say it's as it's as deeply wired in our system, almost identically, when we go from the burnout, active burnout, we need to be very careful that we don't just shut everything down and stop that freight train, that that high speed train from moving so fast in that one direction, we need to slowly start touching on the brakes and allowing all aspects of our physical, mental, emotional, energetic and spiritual body to come online and be aware of and be on board with us and be our ally in that process. Um, and it's very difficult for people who are used to all or nothing. They either are full pelt or they're in bed for days because they're burnt out and need recovery. Um, when you're in that all or nothing mindset, it's very difficult to know in your own being how to touch on those brakes slowly and start to really unwind the system. And that's where, yeah, help is help from a physical and nervous system regulation perspective really, really valuable. But then also navigating the emotional and, um, energetic frameworks that often underwrite those drivers and can feel like really unsafe territory if we're not used to connecting with ourselves in that way, for sure.

00:38:17 Sana: Okay, and before we wrap up, uh, Catherine, I think, um, we are kind of, um, coming in full circle because and this might challenge the entire premise of this episode, like, Catherine, should everyone even be trying to meet their full potential?

00:38:41 Kathryn Sforcina: I think that that's a really curious question. I, I'm a little bit allergic to words like should, would or could.

00:38:53 Speaker 5: Um.

00:38:55 Kathryn Sforcina: And so I feel that the, the best way to answer that is. It when it feels time for someone to no longer play the game of disconnection. They will naturally arrive on a journey that can't help them, but come to their full potential. Are there some leaders I work with? You know, even some very high up execs in Google? You know, um, I have clients from all over the world, all different backgrounds, um, you know, detectives, tech executives, um, nurses, psychologists, road workers, you name it. Um, and uh, the it's it's not so common that people are worried when they first start this work about reaching their full potential. They've normally really hit a pretty hard place, and they're just really excited if they could just break one of the patterns. But invariably, As we do more work with ourselves and we fall more in love with ourselves, and we come into a deeper relationship with all aspects of self, we naturally desire to want to meet our fullest purpose in this life, and we can't meet that without coming into our fullest potential. Um, and so it really depends on the human being and what they are. Some people come into this life and their soul just isn't ready to learn their biggest lessons. Um, and so I don't normally, you know, I don't judge people for not wanting to explore the path. But what I do know is that there's only beauty when you do start walking it, and all roads lead to being a better version of yourself than you've ever been able to imagine. Once you start this journey of of truly connecting with the self, mastering the self, and coming home to the body for sure.

00:41:07 Speaker 5: Yeah.

00:41:08 Sana: And it makes sense. I mean, because, um, it cannot be just one simple single answer to this. Yeah.

00:41:20 Speaker 5: Mhm.

00:41:21 Kathryn Sforcina: It's very complex and complicated. And because most of us as well haven't just experienced a single trauma or a single experience for our own lives, we are intertwined with that of our ancestral lineages, with that of the places we live in, with that of our cultures, with that of the collective of humanity and so many other things, um, that we forget we're a complex energetic ecosystem, and we are as if not more complicated than the universe. And it's all encapsulated in this physical meat sack that we walk around. But, you know, a lot of the time we forget the spiritual being that's driving that meat sack. Um, and so, yeah, the the single answer is, uh, there's nothing bad has ever come from sitting for two to five minutes a day and taking some time out to take a few breaths with yourself.

00:42:18 Sana: That's right, that's right.

00:42:21 Kathryn Sforcina: Um, many, many bad things can can befall someone's being. I actually, I don't like the word bad. I prefer unhealthy or unbalanced. Um, but many unbalanced things can befall someone who is not prepared to take time out to be with themselves. Yeah.

00:42:39 Sana: Great. So, um, just before we, uh, just wrap up, uh, if if listeners, they would like to connect further with you, maybe they have their own thoughts or experiences to share with how they can reach out to you.

00:42:54 Kathryn Sforcina: Absolutely. Look, thank you for asking that. Um, they can go to my website, Transforming Tribes with an S on the end dot com. Or they can. My name is very unique, particularly my surname. So if they were to Google my surname they would find the books that I've read that I've written. Um, uh, I have a book Digitalizing Sustainability The Five Forces of Digital Transformation. That's my first book. Um, and that's available in, in Spanish, uh, in English. And it's literally just been picked up for distribution through India as well. So very soon that will be available pretty much anywhere and everywhere globally. And then my most recent book, Bringing the Lost Parts of Me Home and Explorer's Guide to Reclaiming Wholeness, Discovering Purpose, and Living Authentically, I guess, is the roadmap of what we've just been speaking about and how to get started on that journey. So yeah, searching my name or the website.

00:43:58 Sana: Cool. Great. So, listeners, there you go. I love all the links mentioned in the show notes, so yeah, find them attached along with this episode on whichever platform you're listening to your podcast to. And as we come to the end, I think, um, we started this discussion asking why we don't meet our full potential. And I think, I think listeners, we have uncovered something more interesting than answers. I mean, we have uncovered better questions. Um, so I think there is no neat resolution here. If you are listening and feeling the tension between wanting to grow and needing to rest, between honoring your ambition and accepting where you are, you are not alone. That tension might actually be the most honest place we can stand right now. And, um, Catherine, thank you. Um, I mean, you brought your whole self to this conversation. Um, and I'm really glad that it kind of holistically touched upon so many aspects of our lives, whether it's in the boardrooms or in our workspaces or in our in our own lives and own bodies.

00:45:13 Kathryn Sforcina: Thank you Sana. I really, really appreciated the time and the energy from yourself. It was a really, really beautiful space to be in with you and I hope we do it again sometime.

00:45:23 Speaker 1: Absolutely. Absolutely.

00:45:25 Sana: And to all the listeners, whatever version of potential you are pursuing, I hope you're also giving yourself you're allowing yourself to be fully human in the process. And if today's conversation stirs something in you, maybe it's a question or it's a recognition, maybe even some discomfort. I'd love to hear about it. And, um, until next time. I'm Sana and this is wisp, and I'll catch you in the next episode. Thank you.