Meditation 101 with Ashley Turner

Welcome to Mama Goddess. I'm your host, Alexandra J. Johnson. This podcast is all about rocking your goddess life, creating vibrant health and celebrating motherhood and family life. It's about living an authentically awesome life. Let's have some fun. Hello and welcome. I'm Alexandra J. Johnson and today we have an awesome guest, Ashley Turner. And Ashley is known for her innovative fusion of yoga, psychology and neuroscience. She's a yoga meditation instructor, a registered marriage and family therapist intern, a writer and an ordained priestess. She's also the founder of the annual Meditation 101 online conference and the creator of five best selling yoga DVDs and the co author of Aroma Yoga. And I love Ashley. She as you know, her bio, she's just so wise and amazing and has such a broad perspective on life and transformation and the divine feminine and all things awesome. So I am thrilled to welcome Ashley Turner.

Thank you so much, Alexandra. It's so good to be here. Hello everyone.

Yes, pleasure. Yeah, I'm thrilled about picking your brain, tapping into your wisdom for the next hour and it's going to be fantabulous. So I'd love to start off with meditation. I know that's one of your big passions and you had the Meditation 101 conference and such a huge success and I think so many people want to meditate and just there's so much confusion around it. And I would love to just hear your thoughts on meditation. Like, what is meditation?

Well, that's exactly why I wanted to launch Meditation 101, because I am, as you said, a psychotherapist and then also a yoga teacher for 14 years. And the first thing that I recommend to any of my students or clients or friends, family, when they come to me with a problem is meditating. Do you meditate? And let's start a meditation practice. And the very next thing that I always hear from people is I don't know how to meditate. I can't still my mind. I just, I'm a little add. You know, it's sort of like when people say in yoga, I can't do yoga because I can't touch my toes. It's like, well, that's not what yoga's about. And that's, you know, actually that's a great myth of meditation, is that it's about emptying your mind or stilling your thoughts. It's really not. Meditation is about how to work with the nature of the mind, which is to think, which is to analyze, categorize. And so it's really building skills of how to Navigate those waters wisely, and it serves us in every single aspect of our life. So I really recommend people a few tips. Just to start is take it easy. First of all, know that you're not alone. You know, it's challenging to work with the nature of the mind. We all have the same exact struggle. And, you know, unless you become an enlightened being, it's pretty rare in this lifetime to get to a place where your mind is really empty for a sustained period of time. You know, we hopefully, we get glimpses of that. And hopefully over time, with consistent practice, those stretches of spaciousness between our thoughts start to extend and get a little longer, but they're going to come back. That's just the way the mind works. So that's just number one. And then start easy. I really recommend just five minutes a day and getting into practice. Like anything, as you know, the important thing is that it becomes a habit. And so making it accessible, making it manageable, and so you're not adding another to do that's going to overwhelm you. Five minutes a day is a great starting point. And then add one minute on every week and until you get to maybe 20 or 30 minutes is lovely. That's ideal. 20 minutes is ideal. I like to try to do 30, but, you know, 20 is a good place to land.

Nice. Yeah, I love that too, the habit. Because I think a lot of people will start off and they meditate for a little bit or do it for a week. And like, I suck at this. This is lame. I'm not seeing any benefits. And then they stop. Stop doing it. So why meditate? What's the incentive for us to meditate?

Well, I think that the root of all of our struggles essentially is our thoughts. It's how we're choosing to perceive what we're experiencing in life. So two people can be in the exact same situation. And of course, this happens all the time in relationships, especially romantic relationships. Two people are in the exact same situation and they have a completely different experience of it. And it's totally based on our thought forms, the habits that we have, the way that we're lensing the world and filtering our experience. And so when we can start to become more skillful and understand or at least observe, hopefully even in the moment. Wow. This is how my mind is choosing to interpret this and choosing to, you know, what is the story that I'm beginning to create? Because our response and our reaction to any stimulus or any situation is entirely based on what our story is about it, how we're choosing to interpret it. And so when we can start to really untie those knots and get to the root of, oh, here's actually what my perception is, Could I change my perception? And once we start to change our perception, you know, that's the great quote about a miracle is just a change in perception. And how do we stretch our awareness to begin to see something from a slightly different angle, Maybe the other person's angle, really feel that. So it takes practice. It's challenging to do that. But that's one number one reason to meditate is that the root of most of our challenges comes from. I would even almost stretch it to say all what our perception is, what our thought is about something. But there's a whole host of physiological benefits as well. It certainly helps the body move from a sympathetic nervous system response to a parasympathetic response. In other words, instead of just sympathizing with the outer world and the stimuli, it means our body's in a fight or flight response. So our adrenaline goes up, our cortisol goes up, we feel stressed, we feel anxious, our breath is really shallow. And then it has a whole plethora of byproducts that then occur in our organs and our bloodstream and et cetera. And the parasympathetic response is when we're in a relaxation response. And so the feel good hormones of oxytocin and serotonin, melatonin, they start to kick in and we have a more relaxed response. Our body is more alkaline in nature and again, a whole other set of physiological benefits that come from that. So that's number two. And then I would say number three is that we really do like anything becomes a habit. If we can start to train our mind in a more positive way, we are literally laying down new tracks in our brain tissue, in our, the neural pathways. And so the more that we have a thought, the more likely we are that we're going to think that thought the next time. So if you can start to shift it into positive thoughts, you're more likely to see, again, a positive thought automatically occur. Rather than compassion is a muscle that we build, or forgiveness or understanding, or patience, it's a muscle that we build. And so we can really learn how to completely shape shift our reality. But little by little, just like anything else. Yeah.

Yeah, that's awesome. I love that, that I'm sold. I mean, I've. I've been meditating for six and a half years now and I haven't missed a day. Like I Made.

That's incredible.

Hundred percent commitment. Like I'm doing it, I'm all in. And I started off with an hour every day, which is just ridiculous. But I did it for like two years, an hour every day. And it's changed now.

You split it up a half hour? Half hour?

No, I did an hour first thing in the morning. Wow.

I was just, you know, that's impressive.

Kind of go all in. And now it's evolved to now I have a child and life is different. So I do like 15 minutes in the morning and sometimes five or 10 minutes at night, but that's not a guarantee. But what I love that you said like the perception because that literally it's changed my entire life and my relationship with my husband. Like crazy how we used to get in these little fights and now you just have more space to like interpret and think and be like, okay, what's his perspective? But before that it was just like reaction, reaction, reaction. So it's so I love that you just said that in our relationships and it's made parenting so easy for me because I can step back and breathe and give a different perspective and it's so awesome. So I love that you said that. Of. Yeah, it's amazing.

Yeah, that's impressive. An hour a day I'm hoping to get right now. I'm like, definitely a half hour in the morning and sometimes at night, but a whole hour together, that's really impressive.

I tend to be extreme. I wouldn't, I'd never even meditated before, literally. And I was like, oh, it sounds like a good idea. So I did a vipassana, 10 day meditation. Never meditating one day of my life. And I went and meditated for 10 hours a day. I cried on the third day and I was like, this is horrible.

Yeah.

Okay, so meditation. So what do you think? It's important because I know for me it was making that 100% commitment of I'm doing this and it made it much easier. I didn't have to wonder if today was going to be the day. And so what's your thought on like, what are some of the obstacles? Do you recommend doing it every day for a period of time versus every once in a while?

You know, I mean, listen, if you can be all in like that, that's amazing. And I think I tried to do that sometimes, but I very rarely achieve that, so. And I also think as women in particular, like, we tend to set very high or hold very high expectations for ourselves and for others and then we beat ourselves up and it kind of spins, can spin into negative self talk. And I know that's how it is for myself. If I'm not accomplishing everything that I set out to do, which I am definitely very ambitious, and I like to bite off more than I can chew. A lot of the time in the deep end, figuring out how to swim. You know, I think it's good to sort of give ourselves a manageable goal. So, you know, I definitely think every day. I certainly notice a difference on a day that I meditate or on a day that I don't. But to be honest, I don't sit down seven days a week every single day. I cannot say that I've sat down every day for six years. I would love that. But again, I think, you know, as one of my teachers said, consistency is much more important than quantity. So it's like it's better to do five minutes of meditation or 15 minutes of yoga four or five times a week than it is to do an hour meditation or an hour and a half yoga class every four weeks or every three weeks. So the more you can slip it in. And there's some really easy ways to slip it in. I mean, I tell my clients, look at when you get in your car, before you're getting ready to drive to work, or before you're getting ready to go somewhere, just pause, you know, close your eyes, you know, car parked, and just take 10 long, deep breaths. 10 long, deep breaths. Four counts in, four counts out. I mean, you're gonna. That's at least a few minutes. So there's a few minutes of meditation right there, maybe even five minutes of meditation, right? So you can start building in these little, I just think of it inserting these little moments of pause into your life. So wherever you can insert a 10 minute, a 10 breath break before you call someone on the phone, you know, before you're getting ready to go pick your kid up from school or you know, whatever it is to make it easy for yourself and just insert that and it just starts to train the whole system. It does really train the nervous system to slow down and just, it's okay, you know, I don't have to be on the spin cycle all the time.

Yeah, I love that too, because you just broke that down to simplification. Because I think a lot of people have what is meditation. And they don't ever start because they don't know what it is and if they're doing it right. So like, great, two minutes. Breathe deeply. You got it. You're meditating that's it.

Yeah, exactly. And I On the Meditation 101 conference again, one of the reasons that I wanted to do this conference was because that's exactly what I. I don't know how to meditate. I don't even like where should I start, you know, and it can be overwhelming. There are a lot of schools of meditation. There's different ways to approach the. I think it's good to try out a few different kinds if you have that sort of interest and then feel what really. Because there are different kinds of meditation that will suit different personality types better. So, you know, maybe starting with a. If it's really hard, if you're one of those people that says, oh, I'm add, you know, I can't even sit down and focus. Which you know, I was like that. And it's very common to be like that in the first place. Phase of meditation. And then you start to settle down and sort of the homeostasis of your mind settles and drops a little bit. So that when the next time you sit down. This is also another tip for meditation is to create a little ritual around it. So let's say was it inserting 10 breaths into your day? So it's every time when you get in your car before you go to work, I'm just going to pause, I'm going to sit back, sit tall, 10 breaths in and out. If you're going to meditate at home, I recommend setting a little space. It can be a corner of your room. I mean I literally have it in one of my closets. It's like a walk in closet. And we don't really have a proper space for an altar. I can't really do it in my bedroom because my boyfriend gets up later than I do and I want to do it in the morning. So I just set up a little table closet and it works really well. So when you set a place that's dedicated to that activity, then it helps trigger the mind, the subconscious mind that oh, when I sit down, when I light this candle now I'm shifting into a different phase, I'm shifting into a different thought process. And ritual helps. It's just like, you know, as a mother, I mean it's what you want to do with a child. That's why giving them a bath every night, it's training the unconscious mind. Oh, now we're going to bed. Now we're going to start calming down, we're going to start quieting down. Same thing with meditation. When you set some little rituals to just Sit down and settle. I notice even the difference if I'm at night and I just decide I'm just going to sit in bed and meditate before I go to sleep. Much different than if I actually get down and sit in front of my altar and. And properly sort of ritualize it. So that's a big tip too, to help out. Yeah.

So it's like the trigger, you know, it's just kind of the trigger of like getting into that space. And that's easier to create habits when we have those triggers, right?

Yeah.

Very cool. Okay, so then I'm curious because one of the reasons that I shortened my meditation was because I realized I love sitting. And it's incredible, the benefits. But then I also realized as a woman, it was really important if I had an hour of time to move my body.

Yeah.

So can you talk about that and like meditation and yoga? Because I think some people have it that they have to sit. And I'm curious of your thoughts around like dance and yoga and just meditation through movements.

Yeah, no, it's a really important point to make. And that's why what I started to say was I had a all these different people on Meditation 101, because I wanted to present. There's all kinds of ways to meditate. And so, you know, if you're someone who is challenging to sit down and quiet your mind, then a concentration practice might be what you would prefer, which is you could choose a mantra. That's a great one. So you have something to focus on. You're not sort of just abstractly. So there's sort of an open mind awareness. And that's one direction to go with your mind, of just observation, open mind. And then there's a concentration practice, which is a totally different approach of focusing the mind like a spotlight. That would be like a mantra practice or a breath practice. And then I had actually on my conference, Kate Northrup was on there and she was talking about she doesn't sit and it's never been her practice, but dance has been her practice. And so she really feels into that, you know, accesses that open mind awareness through movement. And I certainly, you know, have experienced that a lot. And through yoga, through dance as well. One of my, you know, I think knowing a lot of people on the call or, you know, on this conference are mothers, young mothers like yourself. And it's just, it's so difficult to find literally a minute out of your day. So if you have 30, 40 an hour, you really have to choose wisely what's going to best serve you and what's the most effective. I know for myself there are certain days where I am just like sitting in front of my altar is not going to. I need to move energy through my body and running or a yoga class or a hike in nature. Connecting to nature is what's really going to fill me up more than sitting down in front of my altar. So I think it's really important to give ourselves permission to do that and to really know what you need. And it's a good dialogue to be in, to really understand your own archetype, your own constitution and what is going to create the most. In yoga we call it the most sattvic environment or the most optimal environment for you. And it's different for each one of us. So another reason, you know, it's not one size fits all. It's not just about sitting down in front of an altar for 20, 30 minutes a day.

That's cool. And I think you give us all permission to experiment with that of like, what is our optimal. Just because this expert tells you you need to sit for 20 minutes and do mantra and you try it and you're like, you know, I actually feel more alive when I do open eye, looking at a candle or whatever, you know, like it's very. Yeah, I think that's important to be able to experiment and find our own feminine flow.

It's true. And I actually have a couple different teachers and one of them was on my meditation 101, my priestess, Ariel Spilsbury. And her whole practice is meditating in a feminine way, which is an open eyed meditation. It's like we're not trying to. So vertical axis is the masculine principle. If you just look at the genitals, like that's just the way of it. It's a erect, upwardly mobile, linear flow. And so we want to access that vertical axis which is turning our energy inward, our attention inward, refining our attention, sort of moving upwards through the chakras to more and more refined aspects of who we are, connecting to our own spiritual through line. And that's important. And that's what a lot of traditional meditations are about, turning our attention inward, harnessing the power of the mind. But feminine, the feminine principle is a horizontal axis which is relational. And it's the energy of the arms, it's the energy of a hug, it's the energy of coming together, it's women making food together and gathering our families. And this is the way of the feminine principle, it's connecting, it's the energy of the womb. It's to invite and merge. And so a feminine principle in meditation. You know, most of our traditional practices of meditation and yoga have been this very vertical, sort of patriarchal, linear way. And so dancing or anything that's connecting us out and into the world is feminine. So it's very tantric practices like dance, like hatha yoga, sexuality, sensuality, all these things, nature, that connect us to what is present right in front of us, right here, right now. And that's the feminine principle. And then the second teacher that I'll just speak to on this is a new friend and amazing teacher of mine, Randy Lewis, and she's a fertility expert. And she taught me this meditation, which maybe we can do in a little bit, which is a breath meditation in the womb. And I just never. I've always sort of conceived of breathing my energy upwards or on this linear inner axis. And this is actually literally a horizontal breath where you're expanding outward. And it's so empowering because as women, we're taught, you know, the collective unconscious and sort of the media coverage of women's bodies is like, to narrow it down, to slim down, to reduce. And this practice, actually the opposite. It's like, take up more space, push out in every direction, Expand, live in your full presence, your full body, your full womb center. So if we have time, we can do that.

That is awesome. I love that. And I definitely have. I totally want to do that because I'm feeling, you know, since I've been pregnant now I have a child, like, there, I've been really interested in the divine feminine, but totally shifted into, like, I'm all about it after having a miraculous being be created inside of me. And it's. It's very. I've been doing that of, like, breathing down into my womb. And it's amazing the connection I feel to my divine power and my divine feminine energy. And also how I've noticed for years, most of my life, I've been sucking that in. Cause I want to suck my belly in. You know, people say suck your belly in. You know, you want to have flat abs. And when I release it, it's just. It's amazing the power that's there that we, I feel, like, have been constricting by constricting. Trying to be skinny.

Yep, exactly. Exactly. I'm so in love. It's literally my meditation. It's what I'm doing right now, my meditation. I'm not doing, like, anything else. Like, this is what I'm doing in my meditation. And it's just so empowering. And I'm. It's kind of opening all these new doorways. I'm like, wow, what a concept. That's awesome. I actually understood it for a long time, but actually to bring it into the body in this way is very different. Nice.

Okay, so let's do it.

Okay. So I'm not an expert in Chinese medicine, but Randine talks about there's this place that's called the dantian, and it's just. It's about 2 inches below the navel. It's basically right at the top of your uterus. And so it's sort of like a vortex. And we had. There's a similar concept in yoga and Ayurveda called. It's the second chakra energy. And there's considered a bindu. In the second chakra is the sexual organs, the womb, the whole pelvis. If you think of the pelvis literally like a bowl, and the element associated with the pelvis and the second chakra is called svadhisthana. And the element associated with it is water. And so I just think of water, of this bowl of water in our pelvic bowl. And it's the essence of the yin essence. It's our emotional body, it's our feeling body, it's our creativity, of course, our sensuality and sexuality, but it's really our power. It's really the seat of the power for the feminine principle within us, where it's literally our womb, as you said, it's our ability to. To create life. To, you know, as women, we have a very unique access. We have the doorway that connects the unseen realm into the scene. And we are literally the portal from the unmanifest into the manifest. We are the birth canal for a human being to move from the spiritual realm into the physical. I mean, it's beyond, really, comprehension how powerful that is, and not better or worse. But men don't have that same access. So there's something very sublime about our ability to connect into the unseen realms. And the womb is really the gateway and the portal into that. So when we connect to the womb, we're really placing our attention on opening that doorway and. And cultivating this quality of consciousness. You could call it intuition, wisdom, whatever the yin aspect. So the dan tien in yoga tradition, in the center of the second chakra of the womb, you can think of it, it's called a bindu. And a bindu, it's like a lodestone that we think of bindu often as like the jewel that you see on the third eye. But it's also, if you kind of see, place that image of this jewel essence in the womb center, in the center of the womb, as I said Randine said, a couple inches below the navel. And then it's a little bit more internally towards the front than the back. And it's really a lodestone. And it actually pulls energy, pulls the yin essence from the moon in helps to regulate our lunar cycles, our menstrual cycles, our emotions, very, very powerful. And so we're going to think about the breath sort of sitting there. So go ahead and just place your hand and maybe it's like three or four fingers below your belly button and you just might go ahead and close your eyes. And then if you can visualize that 2 inches below the navel, draw back into the center of your body, horizontally into the center of your body and then just slightly forward of that. So you might feel like in the beginning you're just imagining this place. And that's fine. Just placing your attention where you feel like it might be is enough. Just bringing awareness here to this bindu or this lodestone. In Chinese medicine it's called dan tien. And so this breath is called a daime breath. And from this place you're imagining that you're breathing outwards as if you have an inner tube around your waist and you're breathing the breath outwards to fill up that inner tube in every direction. So it's not at all a vertical movement, it's a horizontal movement. You're literally pushing energy down into the womb and out horizontally to the sides through your waist, front and back, right and left, sort of right where we might have love handles right there. And you're really expanding outward. And of course your belly and your pelvic floor, it's very relaxed. So just place your attention here. We'll take about five minutes. As you inhale, feel the dan tien, this point, this lodestone, pulling prana, pulling the breath down, attracting the breath down into the womb and then widening it outward in every direction, softening on your exhale. So as you inhale, you're magnetizing the breath down to the dan tien and widening, expanding like an inner tube in every direction, Inhaling, pulling breath down into the pelvic floor, womb center, svadistana, and widening in every direction. And it's literally a, a pushing out. So this meditation is also said to have anti aging benefits and keep us youthful because you're actually pushing out impurities and latent energy that's held and there's a lot of latent energy that's held in our womb that may not have been expressed in our lifetimes and our maternal lineage and our culture in general. Just pushing a. Pushing outward of any latent energy or impurities expanding. And it might take some concentration to really feel horizontally blowing this inner tube outward in every direction. Just notice if there's any direction that may be more challenging for you to feel the breath widening. If you have any resistance to letting it all hang out, letting your belly be really soft, just observe. And then we'll add on one other piece. This, of course, is our center of receptivity. So being this completely relaxed and receptive state, Feel into your deepest yearning right now in life what you have the greatest longing for, and imagine the fulfillment of that. So imagine feeling into that longing, but not from the empty side, from the full side, from what it feels like in full expression of that, that you have already received that deepest longing, that deepest yearning, and letting it just sit in your womb and your belly, in your whole body and your whole being just filled up with the feeling of receiving this longing. What's the expression on your face. Last minute here, keeping this breath going, widening the inner tube in every direction, being filled up with this longing. So in this way, you're also seeding, pushing prana and activating the sexual organs, the reproductive organs, the ovaries, in particular the fallopian tubes, the uterus, the cervix, the vagina, everything really being filled and flooded with powerful energy, light, consciousness, Just drinking in this prana. Make a couple more rounds, And then as you're ready, very slowly take a natural breath. When you're ready, gently blink your eyes open and just take a moment to look around. Eyes are soft. Just look around the room and notice shapes, colors, things that appeal to you, things that maybe don't appeal to you. Just observe. Mmm. Mmm.

Yummy.

It's a really good one. It sort of drops our center of gravity down into the womb instead of even in the heart or in the head, of course, but really coming from, you know, that deep orbit of the womb center, I love it too.

And, you know, as I, you know, we're very aligned in where we are right now. But I think just as you were guiding it, there for me is such a much easier to breathe and focus on my breath, focus on my heart. But when you start breathing down into, you know, the womb space or even down into, like, your root chakra and bringing energy down there, there is for me, and I'm in A process of reclaiming my sensuality and sexuality in a new. In a new way. But there's like a. It's challenging. Like, I can.

It's very challenging.

I can feel, like, a little emotional because I've been very kind of cut off. Like, I didn't realize how cut off I was from that. And what a disservice. Like, that is our power source. Right?

I mean, I feel the same way. And it's been so. I mean, when I started doing this breath, it was. I mean, I've been teaching priestess workshops. I've been doing yoga for almost 20 years. You know, I thought I'm really, like, anchored in my feminine.

I.

But the actual reality of breathing outward and expanding the womb space like you, I had. I really had to find. I'm still kind of finding it and really, you know, feeling into that, and it's not natural. It's not second nature. Like, I can definitely feel into my heart or sort of clear my mind, but that piece is really difficult. Now, there's several things, you know, to say about that. One of them is that this is actually an ancestral wound that we all carry. And that's just a fact of where we are in the timeline of history, in living in our Judeo Christian culture for the last 2500 years, at least. And realistically, a little more than that. We, as a culture, as a collective unconscious, we have not honored the feminine. We've actually marginalized it in all ways, really. You can see what's happened with our relationship with the planet, our relationship with food, our relationship with the physical body, all of which represent our relationship with the unconscious and the emotional realm, all of which represent the divine feminine. And so this is men or women. You know, it's very. And there's just been a sort of a lot of unconscious, you know, in parenting, it's called benign neglect, which is just sort of like, I'm not looking at it, I'm just not dealing with it. It's not really abusive, although we have also had abusive and still have a lot of abusive attitudes and practices towards the feminine, towards our sexuality, sensuality, our physical body, our organs, women, all of that. There's definitely abuse, but there is most certainly this. Even if you didn't experience sexual abuse, there is a lot of collective unconscious, just sort of ignorance, denial, benign neglect of the womb space and of this feminine power. And so for us to reclaim that, we're working through generations upon generations upon generations of our mothers, our grandmothers, all of our ancestors, men and women who haven't accessed this. And so it's very. It's deeply layered and compounded. And so there's a lot of latent unconscious material to flush out there. And it takes time and it takes practice to access that.

Yeah. And just the. You know, as you were just saying that I was thinking, I just recently listened to an audio by Brene Brown, and she was saying there was a research project on femininity, and they asked women what femininity was. And the four things that came up, the most common were quiet, modest, thin. Well, thin was number one. Thin. And then number four was you spend all of your time, money, energy and resources into looking more beautiful. And literally, I just. I totally had tears. And I was like, oh, my God. And I looked at my life and I was like, I have had. You know, like, as you're saying, there's the. There's the wounds that we've all had. And, like, to look at where we have played small and become quiet and thinking that we need to be thin and beautiful and all of that, like, how much that limits our feminine power. Like, it's. I mean, it was just like this emotional hit for me of like, oh, yeah, it's devastating.

Yeah, it's devastating. I mean, I know I can just speak for myself. I mean, I went through at least a decade, probably a decade and a half, you know, until I was, like, 30, early 30s, mid-30s maybe, where I really felt like, honestly, I wasn't gonna excel and succeed and sort of reach things in my career until I lost that last 10 pounds, you know? And I literally was like, well, you know, you just have to lose that last ten pounds and then you'll be worthy, you know, or that. I don't even know there was. I don't even think it was really a rational thought, but I just felt like that was the thing that was holding me back, and that's conditioning, you know? I mean, I don't, you know. Well, I was gonna say my parents never said that to me, but I certainly had. You know, I was acting here in LA for a little while. I certainly had agents tell me, yeah, you need to lose, like, 10 pounds or, you know, whatever. So that. That is there, and it is verbalized, and it's really, you know, what happened was ironic in that my yoga DVD company came to me and they said, we want you to do this dvd, and it's called Yoga for Weight Loss. I had an inner meltdown because I was like, oh, my God, I'm not the thinnest yoga teacher. I'M not that thin. Now I got to lose another 10 pounds. And how am I going to. You know, I'm a fraud. And all of this until I really got what Spirit was trying to tell me was, you need to go out there in the body that you have right now and talk about what is healthy weight, you know, what is the mind, body, perspective, A holistic perspective on body image and people. To this day, it's my best selling dvd. And luckily, you know, my creative team, my producers let me get in all this messaging and positive messaging about body image and making healthy choices. And, you know, it's not about losing weight. It's not about. Because I also hated the title of that. I was like, oh, my God, it's not about losing weight. You know, so. But we did my whole twist on it, which is really the empowered version of it, and it's amazing. And so that was my own inner experience that shifted for me, being able to say, all right, you know, I have a curvy body. I have love handles. Guess what? Sometimes they're a little less than others, but usually they're there, and I'm okay with that. And it was still a process and still is to this day, of not beating myself up or feeling like. I mean, I literally just did a photo shoot the other day, and the girl, my very dear friend next to me is this tiny little bird, and I have this curvy body. And I was like, oh, my God. I was on set and I was getting so irritable, and I was like, what am I getting irritable about? Oh, I'm feeling insecure because I'm not as thin as she is, you know, and let me work with that. Let me reign it back in. I'm beautiful. I'm here representing another body type. Yeah. Not better or worse, you know?

That is awesome. I love that. Thank you for sharing. Super inspiring.

Yeah, I just think it's important to demystify this. You know, it's like, what are we really aiming for? I mean, it's absolutely crazy. And also my point in it is that we are also responsible for holding ourselves prisoner. You know, I was. I am responsible. I was on set yesterday looking like, you are the one that needs to change your thoughts about this right now. Like, you're not. It doesn't matter even what the images look like. You know, it's what you're thinking right now, and until you change it, nobody else is going to perceive it any differently.

Yeah. Oh, I love that. Because that's like taking the power back, you know, because I think there's a lot in our culture of, like, we've been victimized, and there is.

There's.

As you said, there's wounds and there's. There's some shit that has happened with it. But then it's like, okay, are we gonna sit in it and stew and be victims or rise up and say, I can choose to change my perspective and change the world right here and right now?

Yeah. Because guess what? Until I embrace my curves and until I embrace my love handles, no, how can I expect anyone else to, you know, until I say, guess what this is a healthy, beautiful, athletic body. Yeah. And this is my body type, you know, Very cool.

I love that. Yeah, it's. I mean, I've had the same. Being athletic and having visions of being really tiny. I'm like, I'm an athlete. That's not my body type. And it's been huge for me. It's been. Yeah, it's just a fascinating. We've had a very similar journey on that. And I've, you know, I competed in fitness shows, and I've gotten super lean. But the thing that I found fascinating, which I love your work on, is the psychology of it. I still felt like I wasn't good enough having the perfect body. And it's like, okay, it's not the body that's the problem. It's this.

I had that moment about a year ago. I'd gone through a tough breakup, and I finally got down. I didn't even realize, but I got down to that number that I like. For me, it's like 125. I think in my mind, it's like this hilarious story in my mind of, like, if I'm just living at 125 pounds, like, all is well in the world. I remember I showed up at the gym one day. I got on the scale, and it was 125, and I was like, oh, my God. And then I realized, like, five minutes later, I was like, and I'm not any happier. I mean, it's very difficult for me to stay there. At least, you know, that's why. I don't know, I could change that story, too. But anyway, I sort of fluctuate above there, but when I even touched down to that, I'm like. I could see right through the hilarity of the whole situation.

That's awesome.

Yeah.

Okay. So I'm also curious. Do you think, since we're on the body image and stuff, and this idea of being thin and more beautiful, do you in your work find that that's a reason for women to not follow their dreams, to not live the life that they want to, you know, like sabotage ourselves because we're not beautiful enough or whatever.

I mean, I think, you know what it is, is it's symbolic of a much larger conversation, which is what we just touched on, that it's not about the number, it's not about the body type or the body. It's really about what is your inner experience of you, you know, your relation, you doing, you, your relationship with yourself. And I actually ran a whole six week mind body weight loss program for Prevention magazine a couple years ago. And it was phenomenal being with these women for six weeks and really listening to their stories. And you know, as a psychotherapist and my whole approach, it's very holistic and it's like, what are the underlying stories or why if you're not really feeling good in your body, it's definitely something to address, you know, because we want to, you know, our body is our temple and we want to treat it really well and not, you know, everything in moderation, but to really honor ourselves. And our body and our relationship with food is the number one indicator of that, of how we're treating ourselves. So I think it's a much deeper dive than just than just the body. And what happens if you really want to sustain, you want to really sort of lose some weight, which there's nothing wrong with if it's need to get yourself into balance. What is the weight? What is the weight that you're carrying symbolizing? Or what is the emotional eating symbolizing? And that's where the conversation needs to go, right? And so it's a spiritual conversation. That's why even for that, my first recommendation is to start meditating so that you start to really observe and get to the root and deal with your thoughts and just sit. Because ultimately meditation, whether it's dancing or sitting, it's being with yourself and being with what is present in this moment. And so when you start to just settle down and sit with an okay, what am I experiencing? What, what am I thinking right now? What is really stirring underneath the surface that's coming out sideways as me wanting to have two or three glasses of wine or you know, overeat or sabotage and not exercise or sabotage and not, you know, go after dreams that I want, you know, where is the self doubt rooted and coming from?

Yeah, such a important conversation, right? And so like there's so many, it's so unique for all of us. You know, like looking the meditation and having that awareness of what is actually stopping us from being the light that we know we are.

Yeah. And I. And I think again, for me, what meditation does in is connect me to a spiritual nature. You know, connect me to my spiritual nature. Connect me to the larger sense spirit in the world. That's really the break in, you know, sort of in all of our consciousness of feeling like we're separate, you know, and so any practice that can get us feeling like we are connected and we have access. I always think of it like plugging a, you know, electrical cord into the outlet. Like you literally are plugging into a whole motherboard of power. You're pulling off the grid system. And so each of us as individuals can take different practices to plug us into the motherboard and then call on a larger power, power larger than our own, to help us overcome addictions or self beat or whatever it is, emotional eating, self sabotage, etc. So turn into spiritual solutions.

And I love that you said that too, because there's like, we have this. We get like myopic on our certain problems, but as you were saying that it's like there isn't. I mean, there are certain problems, but the main problem is we're disconnected from source. Right. I mean, that's the main.

Yeah, they're all masking. Yeah. They're all masquerading as that. Yeah.

And we can just find how we plug in and plug in.

Mm.

No drama.

Exactly. Exactly.

Cool. So I'm curious on, you know, because I know this is my dance and I know a lot of women today is this feeling of overwhelm, stress, not feeling good enough comparison, you know, just really forcing and pushing ourselves to. Because there's that balance of, yes, we're all destined for greatness and we can be more and we can achieve more. And then there's like the. Yeah. The stress that the modern woman is putting on herself. Can you talk a little bit about that? And what do we do about that?

I mean, one of my favorite mantras, maybe even my favorite mantra, is, you know, I am enough. I do enough. I have enough. And that just brings right action for me. I am enough. I do enough. I have enough in the feminine way, is to honor who we are right here, right now, as ourselves. And so as my priestess Ariel, and I've seen this quote all over the place, says comparison is the thief of joy. And I know for myself it's very true. My self beat usually stems from me comparing myself to someone else, a colleague, a friend that I'm thinking I should be doing that or I should be doing that. Well, from a depth psychological perspective, you're doing exactly what you should be doing. You're doing exactly what your soul and your psyche is calling for. And if you want, you can work to change those things consciously for sure. But at the same time, I just was in New York City with a bunch of my girlfriends that ran Megan Watterson had the reveal conference and she's just incredible. And my friend Latham Thomas was up there speaking. And Latham is a specialist in fertility and motherhood and birthing and all doula. And so she got up on stage and was talking about, which is something that I've really been talking a lot about lately. And interestingly I never thought about it in this vernacular. Latham says we spend so much time talking about manifesting, what are we going to manifest and how to manifest this and the science of manifestation and the secret and all of that. And she said, well, we really need to shift the conversation into womb festing. And I just love since fallen in love with this term, I didn't even think about the word manifesting. It's like this push outward, you know, it's the masculine principle, which is a push outward. It's ejaculation, you know, and nothing wrong with that. We need that. In many ways we love that we worship the lingam. But wombifesting has a whole different connotation. It's a drawing inward, a magnetizing inward, pulling our attention inward like the meditation that we just did to root into our womb. And then ask what inspires me? What is lighting me up right now? What do I want to do? And it's interesting because as I said, I just did this photo shoot yesterday with my girlfriend and we're doing a whole project together, which I'm super excited about. And she's amazing. And I have several girlfriends in the yoga world who are just literally, they are non stop travel and they're just, you know, the yoga lebrities all over the world and literally, I mean from Hong Kong to, you know, Europe and I mean without coming back home, you know, they're transversing the continent and the globe and they're barely ever here. And when I. And you know, for a while I was sort of on that path and then I really had to call it back in woomifesting and say, wait a second, what really feels good to me, you know, whether it's my astrology, my constitution, my karma, whatever, I don't want that. You know, I'm very clear. Like, I want a family. I want to be a householder. I want to be with my man. I want to spend a lot of time, you know, cultivating that sphere. And I do still want to be out in the world and play big, but it's gonna look very different. And again, nothing's better or worse. But when I find myself getting caught up and even as I was yesterday, like, she's doing all these things and I should, you know, I should, I should, I should. And I was like, no, just rein it in. Come back to your womb. What wants to be birthed through you is different than what wants to be birthed through her.

Yeah.

You know?

Yes. I love that. Beautiful. I mean, I'm very similar to you. And I just did a video recently on my heroine's journey into motherhood.

And it was love that.

It was just my challenges and what motherhood was for me. And it was very much like, I've had this idea that I need to be out creating and doing business, and I can do business and I can be a mother and I can cook all of our meals and I can have it all, you know, and it's like the realization, like you said, what feels good for my womb and my constitution and what makes me feel joyful. I had to come to the reality, like, you know what? I don't like to be online that much.

Yeah.

I don't like to be out that much. I like to make our food. I like to just be. I like to just kind of flow in my own. In my own beingness and.

Yeah. Are you in cancer too?

I'm an Aries.

Oh, you're an Aries. Okay. Yeah, yeah.

But, yeah, so that was just. And it was. It's been challenging for me because I have Aries and I have fire. I got ambition and I got ideas. And then there's like, coming back to that womb space of what feels good for me and not ignoring that, trying to be my friends over there. Yeah, I love that.

Yeah. Yeah. So it's a. It's a. It's a. It's a deep self practice. And, you know, like, anything, it gets easier the more we do it. And so I find, like, very quickly I can just. It's water off a duck's back. It's like, oh, no, that's not actually what my calling is right now, you know?

And do you think that it's like. I feel like it's really courageous for each woman to follow her womb, like, to really, really sink in and say, great, this Is how this person does it, this, how this, how this person does it, but this is how I'm gonna do it. And being confident in your decisions, can you talk about that more of like, confidence and courage?

Yeah, definitely. I mean, I think it's sort of. I heard Marie Forleo, you know, say this in other people too. But everything, you know, everything is figureoutable. And look to people that, you know. For example, I mean, there's sort of these, like you said, like the super mom of like, I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna do it in high style and I'm gonna do. I'm not gonna miss a beat. And it, you know, that's a lot of pressure to put on ourselves. And look at. I like to look at women or role models, people that from my perspective. And again, it's always we're, you know, when we're looking outside, we're comparing, you know, I think Brian says, you know, someone's outside, you know, to our insides or something like that. And is that how it goes? I heard Brian, your husband, say that, or I think it was in one of his blogs. Anyway, when we're looking outside, we're just looking at one snapshot of what we think someone's life is like.

We have no idea the whole picture of what's actually happening.

But so just keep, you know, that as a caveat. But looking to women that I like, I would ask myself, who is embodying seemingly a balance that feels like, you know, works for me or something, that I want to strive for a healthy balance, you know, I have girlfriend here in Los Angeles, Hala Khoury, who's an amazing teacher and travels, but has two young kids and doesn't travel nearly as much. But I would say she is someone that I would really role model after. She seems to have a good balance and thriving in many ways. So I think looking to adjusting our viewfinder and who is it? What are we paying attention to? If you're just reading Goop magazine and the blog every day, it's like, wow, that's a lot to keep up with. And let's just sort of tone down our expectations of ourselves. Not that we can't strive for all those things, but really giving ourselves permission, as you say, to just what feels juicy, what feels inspiring, what is lighting you up? Place your attention there. I was just teaching with Ralph Gates, who's an amazing expert on addiction and yoga and recovery. And one of his quotes is, first things first, and just focus on the things in your day. That are your greatest priority. And then whatever you can fit in. Great. And then you focus on those things. And then the other things, they may or may not happen. And if they don't happen, it's okay. But your first things first. So really identifying for you what are your first things first.

Totally, I love that. And then the first things first. Yeah. Is our first things first. I know for me, like my first thing first, I had to accept that my first thing first was like taking care of me. It was meditating, it was exercise. It was definitely. And that was my, especially as a mother, those are my most important things. If I got those done, I was a rock star. But it was, you know, then I still had, you know, I'd go to bed feeling like I didn't do anything. I'm like, hold up.

I did.

I took care of myself, I took care of my son. But it's really like seeing what we're doing, like really acknowledging it.

Yeah. I think it's so important as mothers to, you know, I have so many clients in my private practice, psychotherapy practice that are young mothers and I am working with all of them to implement self care. And it is first, it's your first priority. Because a child doesn't get nourishment from a dry breast. You can't go to the dry breast and get any nutrients out of it. So your well has to be overflowing. Keeping that. What is it that you need to feel inspired, replenished, healthy and vibrant today and then taking care of your child from that place. So it's just so important to all of us, but particularly new mothers. Yeah. Yeah.

Cuz you bring that, you bring that joy to it. You know, I think this is a big thing for women. We're like trying to run around and do all these things, but what is our being like? Who are we being and what are we bringing to it? And if we're being frazzled and stressed and overwhelmed, we're not really changing the world. We're not being a service.

And also, is it in service to your child? Because what are you teaching them?

Yes.

You know, and so if you're training your child on self care and empowerment and you know, consciousness and awareness, they see you making these choices and it was like, you know, my girlfriend, I think she's such a great mother and we go out for hikes and she said, and her son, you know, might get upset when she's leaving and she just gets down, you know, eye to eye with him and says, no, mommy needs to take Care of her body. Mommy needs to go do this right now. And mommy needs to, you know, take care of her heart and spend time with her friend.

Yeah.

And you know, you're. We teach our kids that.

Yeah, it's definitely. Oh, I love that too. And I've had to do the same thing. I'm like, there's moms, you know, you need. You think you need to be with your child all the time, but it's like you need space to connect to your heart. And the other day I had like, I'm really good with my self care. And the other day I only had like three and a half hours of salt sleep just because I was awake and thinking and whatever. I just, I never have three and a half hours of sleep. I normally have like 9 to 10. And I woke up and I was just irritated. I felt tired, I felt fatigued. And I could feel my lack of presence with my son and my lack of connection with myself. And I was like, oh, my gosh, this is the most important thing for moms and parents to be connected and nourished themselves and people in general. But I just had such compassion for parents that are so stressed and so overwhelmed all the time.

Yeah.

And that's. Yeah, that's so challenging.

It's really challenging. It's really challenging.

Yeah, it's such a big. Oh, my gosh. Well, okay, I know I could talk to you. I have so many more questions, but is there anything else that you want to share? Just on how to help women rock their goddess lives. Any final. Any final thoughts?

I think, you know, the other thing that I just find so, you know, nourishing and healing and replenishing myself is spending time with other women. And I think that that sisterhood just cannot. The importance of that cannot be underestimated. And I know, you know, myself as a cancer, I can tend to draw in and isolate, especially when I'm in a moment of, you know, sadness or grief or whatever, you know, just internal space. And yet when I can reach out and connect and just, you know, really nurture those friendships and those sisterhoods, it's so healing. And we realize, okay, we're not alone. There's other people that have gone through, most likely something very similar to what we're experiencing and just cultivating friendships with true, you know, with people that can really hold the space for you that are, you know, soul sisters and wise and can give you a true reflection with no judgment, you know, with no judgment. That's really important because that's how we Heal and to allow ourselves to see and be seen and love and be loved. And so I know for myself, you know, my friendships is. It's what get. Really gets me through the hard times. Yeah. It doesn't have to be obviously just with women, but yeah, there is a special bond with women.

Is that connection that. Yeah, that you can't, I mean, you can get it. I get that connection. I get connection with my husband, but it's very different. Connection of another woman kind of witnessing and listening to me and holding space is very different than the masculine.

Yeah. And so I recommend, you know, I love moon cycles and I have a whole priestess training that I do. And part of it is cultivating your own moon cycles, your moon circles and you know, gathering women. So even if it's once a month, you know, gathering a few girls and the same few girls, three, four, five people, you know, every new moon or every full moon, you know, just spending time together. You know, for some people, I know my sisters, you know, they have a wine club or you can have a book club or you can make it more ritualistic with goddess cards or whatever it looks like. But just that time of coming together and community and feeling nourished and fed and inspired in that way is really powerful. So I recommend that if you can get your like 3, 4, 5 women together that can really commit to once a month meeting and you know, just. I love the talking stick and just going around and saying, hey, five minutes. This is what's going on with me right now and the other people in the circle. You're not trying to fix, you're not giving it advice, you're simply just listening. If that person wants to ask for advice, that's fine. You can say, yeah, I'd love to get, if any of you guys have, is there anything I'm not seeing? What could I be doing better? But maybe it's just a neutral space. So it's important to have that distinction, but find that to be just one of the most healing things in my life.

Brilliant. I love that. I love, love, love that. So cool. Okay, so where do we find more about you?

It's all on AshleyTurner.org and I have, you know, as I mentioned, my urban priestess training, which will be starting later this year, which I'm really excited. It's a month, it's a year long apprenticeship, mystery school about the divine feminine and a lot of what we've talked about today, and I'm co leading that with my girlfriend Siana Sherman. And then Meditation 101, which is an amazing resource for those of you that are interested in meditation. That's on entheos and yeah, super excited. Thank you so much.

Fantastic. Well, thank you. I love you. This is amazing. Thanks for your honesty and your wisdom and your vulnerability. And just sharing your process, too, is super, super helpful.

Of course. My honor. What a pleasure. Thanks, Alexandra. Great work.

Thank you. Lots of love.

Take care.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of Mama Goddess. Sending you lots of love and blessings. If you'd like to connect more, go to mamagoddess.com until next time, keep rocking it and have an awesome day.