Resurrecting Venus with Cynthia Occelli

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. And today we have a gorgeous guest, Cynthia Ocelli. Cynthia is a radio host, a blogger, and also an entrepreneur and the author of Resurrecting Venus. Amazing book. And she has such an extraordinary story, which we'll get into. And I read Resurrecting Venus in, like, three days or something, and I just fell in love with it. And I fell in love with her and just her energy and her mission in life to really empower us women. So welcome Cynthia.

Thank you so much. That was beautiful. I love to hear that.

Yeah, I'm so.

I'm.

I just love your. Your energy and your approach and just. Yeah, you just got good vibes all around.

Oh, thank you. That's important. So, so important.

So I'd love to start off with your. Just a little bit of your story, you know, college dropout and welfare to now empowering women, the world and a law degree. And just give us a snapshot of how you became so lovely.

I would love to. Okay, so I'm gonna try to pick a place to start that's not the whole saga. But at around 14, I really came into that place in our lives as young women that we want to have connection. We want to be attractive and liked and recognized. And I came out of an upbringing that was. I had a lot of racism around me. And then it was kind of a two prong challenge in my upbringing that I had racism from inside my family and in my community because my mom was white and my father was not in my life at all. And I had women who were just powerhouse driven, had come out of the feminist movement, and they were going to be better men. And they had great justification because my father left, which meant that men were bad, and now I have to raise kids on my. I had this kind of sense that, one, I don't belong, and two, I've got to be this extraordinarily powerful, unshakable, driven. Excuse me, driven woman who has just a thick skin, no feelings, no emotions. And I remember that feminine was like a weakness in my house. And so I find myself at 14, and I realize I don't fit and I'm not good enough. And so I was a good student, but I dropped out of school and I started to hang out with people who would accept me because they were also so broken and feeling so unworthy that they could take anyone into their environment and welcome anyone. And they were also drug dealers and single welfare moms and drug users and abusers and dropouts. And it was kind of like everyone swimming in this pool of despair. And that didn't bother me because for the first time, no one rejected me. So I stayed there and I felt better. And I couldn't see that that may not. I could see it wasn't the best thing. But the feelings of acceptance were just too wonderful to let go. So by the time I was 19, I was living in a garage on welfare. And I had been in a relationship with a man who was very abusive. He cheated on me nine times. I mean, did I need 10? I mean, like, how many times did I really need. And I was pregnant, and I had this beautiful, beautiful baby boy. And everything changed the moment that this baby. Not while I was pregnant so much. I didn't really take it too seriously. I couldn't really understand what life on the other side would look like. But I saw this little boy. And all of the worth that I should have had or that I help women develop now in their lives, I didn't have for me, but I had it for him. And I knew that the worst outcome ever would be for him to grow up in the life that I had created. And how could I ever live if this son, this young man that he would one day be, was one of these people that I was hanging around with? So it's this power that kind of just ignited inside of me that I could do and I would do anything. I was afraid I was unworthy. I was all of these things that we have. But he was enough to override all of it. And so I started to dream. And I would dream sometimes to escape the misery because I was surrounded by people saying, you know, get over it. You're not going anywhere. You're thinking I would say, you know, I want my son to go to a great school. I want to live in a great community. I want to have great people around me. I don't want to struggle anymore. I can't wait. I can't buy diapers today. But, you know, I want to buy him. I want him to have a beautiful bedroom and a dog. And they would say, you know, you are just disgusting in your disconnection. You're so disillusioned. And I would get all this talking down to from people everywhere, all along the line, even in my family, because it sounded kind of nuts, you know, that I was sitting there as a 9th grade dropout on welfare. Thankfully, one of the benefits of being excluded and growing up feeling like an outsider is that it doesn't really matter. When people, how many times can they tell you you can't or you're not good enough, you get desensitized to it. And I thought, well, they've always said that, so let me try something else. And we. I packed up and I moved out of town. And I just followed this idea that I could do better. And everything rearranged. I showed up, I did my best. I did not have a plan and an answer and connections or any way to make it happen. And it all shifted with my energy, my desire, my drive, and that power fueled by love, which is that feminine creative principle. It's the stuff of miracles and magic. And in five years I was in law school. I had never finished high school. I never did my undergrad. I found a school that would accept me on probation, have me take a couple standardized admissions and make me hit a certain barometer in order to stay in. And I did. And I got my real estate license and I started a real estate business. I fell in love with a magnificent man in my second year. I went to France and got married. I built my dream home. I had a daughter. All by five years from that time in the garage of just despair, I had totally remade my life. Everything had transformed. Nothing was left of that. And I had a real sense that there was no magic in me that was different from anyone else. This is something that we can do once we find our why, once we get there and we tap this. And that was. That's kind of how I got started and got out of that terrible place.

That's a beautiful story and so amazing. And I'm curious, you know, because people who are watching this, you had a lot of doubt and you had a lot of fear and insecurity and all of those things, shame and guilt. So can you just talk a little bit about how you move through that and how you recommend women and just people kind of move through that because we all have those.

Well, first is to know that it's so normal and common and you're never, you're going to get better and you can do a lot to manage and heal things that are disproportionately high. Like guilt is something that you actually can end in your life when you, when you get your mind around the fact that it is a wasted, useless emotion that benefits no one, not even the person who you're feeling it for. It has no asset, there's no upside, there's nothing there. So you can look at it and say, and I love my approach to everything that's unfavorable or quote, bad that I encounter is to transmute it into something good. That's how I define myself. Living successfully, kind of like an alchemy of whatever the negative is. I'm going to find the good and I'm going to extract it from there. And with guilt, there's good to be had. There's an energy there. And so if you feel remorseful, then you can't. And it checks with your center. Like it's not a remorse that you did the right thing for yourself and now you're feeling bad because everybody tells you you shouldn't take care of yourself. That's another connection, and I'm sure we'll get there. But if you're feeling remorseful and it's genuine, then you make amends and you do what you can. And, and I've had some tremendous moments of guilt and I've even had moments where the person is no longer reachable to say what I had to say, and you say it anyway and you make the amends you do. If there's restitution you can make, if there's something you can do, you do that and then you forgive them and you forgive yourself, and then you go out and you live better in honor of it and you transmute it. So the guilt and all of the guilt, I feel like I've turned it into so much good. And we all have that power. Fear and anxiety and self doubt are things that are going to come up. They're going to come up less the more we do whatever it is we think we can't do whatever it is that we think, oh, that's terrifying. It's going to be horrible. I cannot do that. If you let it box you in and like set the walls on your path, you will absolutely nurture the fear. What you, what you've got to do is turn into it. Do the thing that you fear you cannot, and you will realize, oh, I can. And also in the moments in anticipation, because that's the worst. You can always do whatever the thing is you're going to do in the moment that it happens, you're going to be fine. It's the anticipation before, it's the eight hours, the days, the moments before that. You're just in that moment and in that strain. Talk, talk to someone. Get it outside of yourself where you can see it and where you can also Know that everyone who's ever done anything goes through it. And I live here in Los Angeles, and I have a couple of friends and a couple of clients who are very, very successful in the entertainment industry. And they are on TV 300 days a year. They still get nervous. They still get nauseous. They still have the moment of doubt. It's part of it. But they say, okay, I feel that. Let me try to transmute this energy into something more positive. Don't let. I'm not going to be held hostage by it. I hear you. Sit down and let me, you know, put you over my shoulder and rock you. My fear. Let's do this. Take it with you. Don't fight it. And don't think that you're the only one who has it. Everybody's got it.

Yeah, I love that you said that, too. Because I know for me in my journey, there was definitely. I had the fear and the doubt and insecurity, and it seemed like everybody else had it figured out and they didn't have any of it. And I was like, what is wrong with me? And I think so many of us, when we start off, we're like, what is wrong with me? And then for you to say, no, I've had it. These big celebrities have it. Like, everyone has it. So it's so powerful.

Oh, yeah, absolutely. I think I heard it was. It was Madonna years ago, when I was in that time of I have to face these fears because I had tremendous fears. I couldn't even speak up one on one for myself, let alone two or three people. A classroom, certainly not on the radio. I just couldn't. I couldn't do it at all. And I thought that it was so. It was paralyzing, debilitating fear. And I thought that this was something I would never be able to shake. And only I have the experience of it. And around that time, Madonna was on this world tour, and she was still having a complete panic attack right before she went on. And I thought, you know, maybe I'm not going to just all of a sudden be fearless. Maybe that's a myth. Maybe I'm just going to have to learn that on the other side of fear is the expression of my dreams and be willing to walk through it.

Beautiful. So I'm curious on the dreams and the desires and being willing to say, you know, this is what I want, and then literally, like, being willing to dream, because I think for so many of us, we've stopped dreaming. So can you talk a little bit about that and, like, how we can ask for what we want. You know, I've been doing this for 15 years and it's still challenging for me to ask like something simple to ask another human being for support. Yeah, it's definitely one of my issues.

Wow. Well, on dreams, first and foremost, especially for us women, we are conditioned to have it backwards. We live this life of goodness and rightness and shoulding and all of the appropriate and proper and the normal, the norms. We live that life and then we earn some time to do what we want. So we work really hard, slave away. And now I finally earned some time to give myself pleasure or to do what I want to do, or to express my heart's desire. It's completely backwards when, and I'll get sidetracked when you put it in the proper order of pleasure first. Actually connecting with your desires, not the ones you're taught, not the ones that are plastered all over the walls and the television and on the radio station and pumped into your head all day long. When you create a space around yourself to get in contact with what really resonates with you. Because your dreams are. Nature is not stupid, nature is brilliant. And every living being is hardwired to be to just gravitate toward what it's supposed to do. So if you can drop down and for us it's really thinking below the head, it's dropping down. It's a very sensual thing. Drop down into the body and find the things that you warm up to inside. Find the things that create that expansion and that expression inside. And they're always through the portal of pleasure. That's where your dreams are going to be. And on the other side of your dreams, because you're hardwired, you've got this innate ability already. You will persevere, you will struggle. If there's a struggle, you will ride through it. You will find pleasure in the normally unglamorous and mundane things. It's like if you're shoveling manure, but that's your dream pony, all of a sudden that manure shoveling is kind of pleasurable, right? Totally. So it's putting the pleasure first as a portal to your dreams and then using that as the, as the centerpiece of your life and living from there and everything issues from there. And when you are happy, you are a miracle maker, magnetic manifester without. That's really like, to me, like there's the secret. It's not like a fixation on something. Red car, red car, red car. It's a tapping into your truth and letting that Be your guide.

I love that. Beautiful.

And imagining, you said dreaming and imagining. If you can tap that facility and cultivate your imagination. I have a really good imagination. I was an only child. Stared at the walls. Supposed to sit still. German family, you know, Sit still, be quiet, don't make noise. I had a party in here all the time. Okay. I still have that. And it can be cultivated. Whether it's movies, music, sensual things. You can grow this idea that I can. If I can create it in here. Everything exists in mind first. So the more you flesh out that idea in your mind and that vision in your mind, the more you, in a very logical way, will notice opportunities for it to come forward in the world and you signal the universe. Hey, consire with me on this one. And your single pointed focus, it's incredibly powerful.

Mm. Brilliant. And then I love that. The portal to your dreams, too. You said that the port, that pleasure is the portal to our dreams.

Yes.

That's amazing because like you said, so many of us have it backwards, you know, And I. It's. That's been my process, literally as well, to really put pleasure first. And like, okay, I'm important. My desires are important, you know, that it. That it is a vital component of my health and happiness. And I'm a better wife and a better mother and a better, better human being when I'm happy, like you said.

Well, you may think, and I get this a lot. I get a lot of email about. I'm worried about being selfish or someone called me selfish, or if I put myself first, other people are going to be unhappy. And that may be true. And there's so many. This is the. This is the truth. When I was sitting in that garage and I was surrounded by people who were all kind of drowning in life, everyone was saying, you don't sell out. Don't leave us behind. You're being selfish. You don't hang out with us anymore. You're not doing this anymore. You should be. You know, we're out doing this. You should be helping your friends out. I had all of this should and all of this guilt and all of this selfishness accusation. And I can tell you that today I contribute to the world in a way that I couldn't have even fathomed, got my mind around at that time. In my selfishness, I'm able to be more generous than anything ever before. And in my happiness, I create family, a marriage, happy children. I can create anything with. With inspiration around it. I can impact the world in a far more positive way. So this self love, this self first is actually generous rather than. It's the generosity that comes through selfishness. Yeah.

Because when you have an overflow, then it's totally easier to be generous.

Yeah, you, you water the world and your cup is filled to overflowing. Everybody gets that.

So I'm curious because I know that I hear this as well for this, I think it's more for women, but the feeling like if I actually go for what I want and do it, like it's gonna consume me. I'm gonna want to do it all the time, like every day. I'm just gonna kind of fall apart. And that's not, maybe that's not what they say, but there's that energy of like, do you know what I'm saying?

Well, I would say to that it certainly could be worse because if you are living something that consumes you and it's not an egoic consumption, but if something from your heart is consuming you, like, maybe, I don't know, when my baby was a year old, I was completely consumed. There could be like the greatest offer to go to the greatest dinner and the greatest concert and see a show and I don't know, Fabio could come or whoever was hot then. And I would be like, no, you know what? I got to be with my baby today. I was consumed. And that was what it was. And I was, that was my abandon. And I was happy for that. And I think that we have to know that we're growing. We are creative and growth seeking, growing beings. And we can allow ourselves to jump in and really give in to our deepest desires and not be afraid. And we can also trust ourselves, really, if you, if you get in your center and trust yourself. I have all these people who say, well, you know, if I don't, if I don't constantly work and effort, I may lay down and never get up.

Totally.

Yes. You won't. You'll lay down and you know what? Three, four days probably. People say, I'm going to take three months off. Three, four days. They call me. Yeah, I need to, I need to do something. I try to think of what I want to create. You are, you're a growth seeking change. Trust yourself. Don't think that by being selfish and putting yourself first that you won't still be giving and generous. Don't think that you need to be in misery in order to make a contribution. Your contribution from a place of misery is actually minuscule and it's not true. And you don't fool energy in the universe. You don't fool it. What you, what you put out there, it's like going and doing community service because you feel like you have to in order to be a decent individual. You're not giving anything, so it has.

To come from our true authentic desire and to not as you're saying that too. There's like the feeling of not judging it. Like, what is your authentic desire? And okay, great. Maybe one of your friends goes to the soup kitchen and feeds the homeless and you think she's a saint and you want to, I don't know, dance naked. You know what?

That would serve someone. I'm sure in a major way. You'll find that opportunity to serve and.

It will move you.

And it won't be. It may not be in front of everyone in the line on the holiday. It may be your next door neighbor who can't get out the front door. You'll do it because you'll have that natural desire. We are giving creative, loving beings and trust that.

Yeah, that's so great too, because it's the trust and then the not forcing it, like just letting it unfold, like trusting that it is unfolding. Right?

Yes. And kind of seeing it because, you know, like take a look around, if there's a chair across the room, that chair existed in someone's mind. First it was fully formed and then they trans, they put it on paper and then it was crafted and created and now it sits there. Everything, all creation is an idea, a divine idea. And so what you want to do is be as connected to your center as you can, thinking from within your body, in your own energy and your intuition, rather than with the mind of the world or what everybody else taught you and grasping that idea. So it's an inspired idea. And that's like the most magnificent creation ever.

Yes. So I'd love to hear on your book a little bit more Resurrecting Venus. And I'd love to know who is like, what is Venus for you? And how do we resurrect her?

Okay. Venus for me was the. Of all the goddesses, she was the one that just that I resonated with the most because she was powerfully feminine, not weak in any way, creative, beautiful, unapologetic about pursuing her desires. And she knew that she was worth it all. And for me, especially in the background that I had, there was this great sense that, you know, feminine is weakness. You should cut yourself off from that and learn to move through the world in a masculine way so that you can, quote, be successful. And that idea I went to my favorite city in the world is Rome. And I touched down in Rome and I had spent a week there and I thought, you know, I really like it here. It is like everybody is your boyfriend. Everything was like, the doors would open and they were smiling and everybody was helpful and there were no questions or qualms about whether you could do that for me or not. Because if you were impinging on my independence as a woman and I thought, you know, that's really nice, I really enjoy that. And I. And I came back and I got connected. I was in law school and everybody's. There were a lot of women's groups who were very. If you open the door for them you'd like, you may get cussed out. You know, I can open my own door. I can do anything you can do and you can't. And they can't do anything you can do either. Have a baby, I mean, make that, incubate that baby. Let's see how that works, right. And so I really felt a call and it was what healed me and it was what got me through the next. I went through a life tragedy after. And it was what pulled me through this idea that this feminine power is actually a strength that is as powerful, as productive, as potent as masculine. Just in another way. It's silent, it's fluid, it's done without thought. And think about the time of incubating a baby. We can have a full time job and create a baby inside. Okay, like that's pretty powerful, right? And we're not thinking, okay, eyes here, legs here, structure this and that. We are effortless creators. And I wanted to have that back in my life. And I wanted that to be a part of my life. And it wasn't to deny the masculine. It was to say that the masculine has been elevated above the feminine. Let me turn my focus to this feminine. Let me bring these qualities of Venus back so that the moments of life will be joyful. Because what else is there? There's nothing beyond these moments.

So the masculine. So when we go about being in the world the masculine, did you find like shifting to the feminine kind of your feminine essence? Life became more pleasurable, more joyful, more fluid and flowing?

Absolutely. My inner world just around me. Just the sensual aspects of having, you know, beautiful under things on. I could be by myself. I'm often at home all day long writing or recording and doing different things. And I will, will have beautiful things around me that make me feel happy inside, that really nurture my creativity. And I then produce all kinds of things that I couldn't produce if I were just trying to force it out in this masculine way. I'm kinder, I'm more gentle, I have more compassion. I don't drive. If I don't have this rigid schedule, that of production, it's this flow, this ease that I can actually live in and not be depleted. I don't come to the end of six months and go, oh my God, I need a vacation. I can't take it anymore. Go get myself filled up on femininity for a week and then come back to deplete myself again. I don't have that in my life anymore. And when I move through the world that way, I can go out into a confrontational situation where typically the masculine strategic tit for tat would be used to resolve it. And I can show up with an open heart center and almost magically shift things because we all have it. You can connect with anyone, even people who I had some intellectual doubt, like, this will be a tough one. I don't know if I can get through to this person. And if you just stay in that center, it changes everything. So it's truly a life transformation for me. And it made me happy, infinitely and indefinitely happy, because I realized that I didn't have to lose it. I used to tap into it and then it would disappear and then I would have that loss. And I grieved for it and wonder how I could create it again or how I could get it back and really owning it and writing the book and focusing on it because you in the, talking about the book, especially in the year after, I really took it in, really lived it every day and found, yeah, I can. And it's beautiful. It's great. As a mother, as a friend, as a sister, as a daughter, it's everything.

And did you, was it a practice for you? Like, how did you. Because I know a lot of people are going to be thinking, like, okay, great, I love this vision. Like, what do I do? How do I tap into it? What was your process and how do you recommend women tap into this?

It's, it's absolutely a practice. And it's something that you have to stay conscious about and continue to pay attention to it. And what it is, is just moving yourself to the top of the list. It is an aggressive and disciplined self love, practice. It's the question, how am I loving myself? Am I loving myself? And we ask these questions all the time as women. Am I loving my husband? Am I doing it? Sometimes we may phrase it Am I being a good wife? I don't like that question. I like the question, am I loving him? With our children, am I loving him? But first, am I loving myself? Answering that question and then doing what you need to do to make the answer yes, that's it. That's the solution. And also peeling back the layers, the taught and learned layers. Putting yourself on a media diet, really becoming observant in your life about your environment. Because we live in a very toxic environment, emotionally toxic environment, if we're not paying attention. If the last thing you see when you go to bed at night is the news and then you pop on the morning show, you are being hypnotized with all of these ideas that are going to make you feel wholly inadequate. Not because the media is out to get you and they hate you, but because they need you to buy stuff. And you won't buy stuff if you don't feel inadequate. So you need to feel like your hair is not shiny enough, you don't smell good enough. You're just too this. You should be whiter, but in summer, you should. Should be darker. And you should change something all the time by this now. It pulls you away from your center. So it's really creating your space intentionally and in a disciplined practice so that you can come through.

Resurrecting our Venus.

That's right.

I love. It's so great to the. The media, because I know that's been a huge practice for me as well, like to let go of that stuff. And it's. It's noisy. Like the modern world is noisy, right? That there's so much noise. And, you know, I've been journaling and doing this inner work for a long time, and it's still like, you just. You have to have it be a disciplined practice of coming home to yourself over and over again.

I still have. I have a meditation. I did it. I use a lot of guided meditations, and I used to. I recorded them for myself when I was. I learned to meditate when I was 5. I had an amazing teacher and thank goodness. And she would do guided visualizations and you would, like, walk in the forest and talk to your inner being and get yourself centered. She is so amazing. And I. So I started to do these meditations for myself and I did them for clients. And then I did one at Hay House, which was connect with your inner goddess. I listen to that meditation all the time because it takes me to my unconscious inner goddess, and I can ask for what I need. And interestingly, in the days that Follow. And we can do this in lots of ways. So it's not that you have to do it with the meditation, but asking yourself the question and being open and receptive to the answer and then heeding that answer, being committed, because it may get ugly before it gets fearful, because people don't like it. If you've been a servant and. And neglecting yourself, chances are high that people aren't gonna like your shift. That's okay.

And how do you recommend the. Making that shift and like, letting people know that, you know? Because that's been a part of my process as well. And I know that I'm not alone in that. With the being graceful of, like, okay, this is what I want. This is what I need. But not like, this is what I want. Yeah, you know?

Yeah, absolutely. Well, learning to say no to what you don't want to do is extraordinarily powerful. And it's not comfortable at first. It becomes far more comfortable. But you need to know if someone asks you something, and it can even be something you love. You know, I would be at my kid's school, you can have so much fun, do this and that, and it would conflict with something. Or I just knew in my center, I don't want to, but I didn't want to let the person down, but I should, because I want to be a good mom. But all these voices. Start talking to be able to say. To follow the original answer and say, I'm sorry. No, and be quiet. Because if you start explaining, you go. You go down the rabbit hole. You be quiet. And I even. I tell clients, like, they're like, I can't stand the silence. Sing the ABCs silently in your head. I don't care what you do. Just be quiet. And if you have to explain, keep it short. You don't have to explain, but start to really exercise that no muscle to create space in your life. And then learn how to set healthy boundaries. And with boundaries, people who love and care about you, if you approach them in a way that you sit down and you share your problem and you. In my mind, I would always say silently, I love you before I talk, because it will change me out of that. That, well, I need and you know, and I have to have it, it takes that down because it makes me really connect with that love. I also love me. I love you and I love me. And so I would sit down and say, I need more time or I need more space or this isn't working for me, and I have things that I need to do to feel good inside of myself. So I'm gonna have to stop doing this or I need you not to interrupt me at this time. Set the boundaries. And you've got to stand up and do this for yourself. And interestingly, if your son was sick and laying in bed, you'd set those boundaries, no problem. So dedicate it to someone. Do what you have to do to give yourself the power and strength to set that boundary.

That's powerful. The. No setting the boundary. And I think that brings it home too, with our children. Like, what would we do for our children? Like, if he was sick? Of course. No, I can't do that. I can't do this. This is what I'm doing. And to have that level of discipline and empowerment to say, okay, great, this is what I need with that same level of enthusiasm.

And you want, you know, your parenting is so much more about what you do do than what you say. So it's modeling. You want your child to be able to grow. You don't want your child growing up saying yes to things they don't want to do, having no boundaries and feeling stressed out and unfulfilled so you can have it for you.

Yeah, I love that. And it's always such a great reminder. And this is what I kind of say to myself often too with my child, is what am I demonstrating for him? Like, I don't need to get into judgment or whatever, but like, okay, what is he learning from me? Like, how am I, you know, approaching my life? And that brings it home Because I'll do things for him, like, if he sees me self sacrificing or whatever, I'm like, I don't want that for him. Okay, great. I need to be on my game.

Yeah, absolutely. Actually, it really works to take it into business with you. We are notorious. There's so much research from. In my book, I cited a bunch of research, but that women don't ask and we don't ask for what we're worth. We don't ask and we don't ask enough. So if a man sits down for an interview and gets a job offer and a woman sits down for an interview and gets a job offer offer, the man, and I forgot what the exact numbers were, but overwhelmingly will renegotiate and ask for more, and the woman will overwhelmingly say yes. We don't show up in negotiations because we want to please. But if we can take that negotiation and dedicate it to our child or someone we love, we show up differently. And I do that all the Time because I'm now I'm representing for someone I really love and I want to show. I want to show and create the best life for them and it changes how I show up. Now I wish I could just say no. You just get high self esteem and you'll be just, you'll ask for everything that you're worth. Doesn't actually work that way.

So how do we play with this idea of asking for what we want and really going for it and being successful, whatever that means for us and then at the same time not be so focused on being self sufficient and independent? Because I think for, you know, women mostly there's this feeling of I can do it all. I can be a mom and I can run a business or I can have a job and be a wife and look amazing and yada yada, yada. So how do we navigate that?

Well, coming up with your. I always say this and people kind of catch me. I say you can have it all. The thing is you have to define what that means to you. All is not what's prescribed on television. It's not superwoman. All is what's fulfilling and warms your heart on a moment to moment daily basis. So that when you are cleaning up the messes, the messes are tied to something that you're so passionate about that it's okay. So getting clear on your vision of success is the first and primary step. And you can. I always, I have goals to where we put pictures attached to what those visions would be, but really they're just like direction markers because along the way you may change the goal, may change the universe, may give you something better or different, but it's just to point you in a direction that resonates with your heart. And when you are on track and resonating with your heart and taking consistent steps and action toward that, you're likely to be drawn to a life that is actually fulfilling for you because it's hardwired inside of you. It kind of all comes together. So there shouldn't be the same chaos that comes around trying to be superwoman, buying into this feminist nirvana of I am all women, I can do all things. Because that's not going to make you happy, it's going to make you tired.

Yeah, totally.

And so really the premise is, what about me? What's my vision of success and having the freedom not to conform. If your vision of success is being at home and raising children and having a home business or no business. But I do have my caveat that you should Always be able to take care of yourself in case something happens. Because I've been in the situation where something happened, and it was great that I had that to fall back on. But beyond that, whatever way you. You design, your life is perfectly fine. Giving yourself permission. And I think as a Coach, that was 9, 10 of my work permission. You can do this. You can have it. It's okay. This is. This is your gift. This is your life. And I've had the. I want to call it a blessing, a fortunate blessing of sitting and watching people die when their lives were cut short. And it called me to a great presence, and it called me to a great understanding that it's not about anyone out there. It's. We live a finite amount of time, we're all going to die. Life is precious and fleeting. There's an urgency that we have to live with if we really understood that. And I. You know, I was married to my daughter's father, and one morning we were out having lunch at a Japanese restaurant. We were eating halibut. And that night, I slid the wedding ring off his finger after he had a brain hemorrhage. It was done just like that. And that really brought me back to center. There is no one else out there to be living for. There. There are no Joneses to keep up with. You have so many moments allotted for your life. How will you invest them? And in the end of your life, if you have the blessed opportunity to look back, will you be satisfied? Will you be happy? And Bronnie Ware wrote a book on the top five regrets of the dying. I interviewed her on my show, and she sat with dying people. And the number one regret was, I wish I'd had the courage to live the life I wanted instead of what others expected of me. So I live that, and I take that in. And I have. In my private Facebook group, we have a little acronym, and I don't want to be vulgar, but you could probably figure it out. It's called dgaf. Don't Give A. Okay, That's. That's the result of really understanding what this life is about and how we have to show up for you.

Wow, that's super powerful.

So when it gets overwhelming and you're doing what you don't want to do, stop it. Stop doing what you don't want to do. Start doing more of what you want to do. And when people are judging you or things get hairy or someone doesn't like it, dgaf. And I think that brings it home.

Too, because, like, we do Have a short amount of time. You know, like, what. What are we going to do with it? And we. I know for me that that's so important because we can get lost in the drama of our daily life or whatever's happening. And it's like, okay, great. Like, I am going to die. My loved ones are going to die. Like. And I don't want to admit that sometimes, but that's the reality of, like, what are we. What are we doing?

Well, you got to use it for good. It's not to fixate on the misery of it, because, you know, I don't. And Bronnie also shared this. On the other side of death, she met all the people who died. She looked at, had such joy on their faces. It was amazing. So there's not this fear element. For me, it's to use it for good, Use it to really, you know, we spend more time thinking, how do we spend and invest our money? But our moments are so much more valuable. We. We have to make them meaningful. That's all life is. And so going after the cool shoes or whatever is not. You're not going to look back on that. You won't even remember that. Find what means something to you and pursue it with ruthless passion, without regard for what everyone else is thinking. Because it's there in you, because it's for you. You don't have to worry about whether it's okay or whether it's right. It's calling you because it's for you.

I can just listen to you talk forever, too. You just have, like. You know, I can feel the practice that you've cultivated of that. That energy, that feminine, like, I just. I feel that.

I definitely, definitely feel that. And it brings me such joy to be able to sit and have these conversations, because these moments, my work now makes everything that ever happened in my life purposeful, meaningful, wonderful. No matter how bad it seemed, it's all been used for such upliftment that it's incredible. And I feel so honored. And I take it, like, personally. All those people who died early. I live and I feel a responsibility to live in fierce grace because they're not living and they wanted to. So let me contribute. Let me honor them.

Gorgeous. So I'd love to hear more on the. You just mentioned a little bit ago, the shoes and this idea of beauty. I know you talk about this in your book as well. Like, beauty and sensuality and sexuality. If you want to separate them, you can. But just kind of this whole divine feminine energy of beauty, sexuality and sensuality.

Yeah, well, it's an inside job. Totally. The shoes are only good if they make you feel beautiful because you are only beautiful when you feel beautiful. And I have friends who are, you know, on the covers of magazines and they're, they're unhappy inside and feel insecure and they don't attract love. They don't radiate the beauty. They're actually very blocked in romance. I have other friends who do not fit the classical stereotype or what we're taught to think is beautiful. They may be a little heavier, they may be a different race, they may not be, you know, they may not look like the COVID of Cosmo, but they have such a sense of just deliciousness inside. They have such a happiness and a fervor for life that they can't even walk through the door without ever in the room. Just like magnetizing toward them. They radiate this beauty. And that's where it starts. And it again all comes back to your self love practice. Because when you are taking care of yourself and self love is not always the most fun thing. Sometimes self love means, okay, I'm going to add 5 servings of vegetables to my life because I want to have a healthier sense in my body. I want to avoid having, you know, degenerative diseases that are related to not having proper nutrition. That's self love. Even though it might be way more fun to sit down, eat a bag of potato chips. Even though. And that's not off limits. But it's not a practice, an everyday practice. Self love is an overall long term vision of how you create a life that is beautiful in your inside, beautiful on the things on your body. And that's very subjective because your idea of beauty and my idea of beauty may be very, very different. I know a girl who all she wants to do is put a sarong on. Well, rock that sarong and wear. And she's radiant when she has it on. And when she puts on a business suit, she looks like somebody, like she's walking death row. She's not supposed to do that. You give in to that and nurture that within yourself. And that's really where beauty comes from. And in the book or for the book, I interviewed a lot of men because I wanted, I wanted to know, I wanted them to tell me what they thought was beautiful. And invariably it was a woman who's comfortable in her skin. A woman who is fun to be around because she likes herself. She's not, you know, fixing all the time or worried about all of that. They weren't upset about the pounds. When extra weight turned into too much weight for me, the conversation that it turns away from what men like, because I really don't care what men like. It turns more to, why aren't you loving yourself? To give yourself a vessel that can do whatever you want, take you everywhere and keep you safe and give you all the possibility for enjoyment that you can have. It's really a question of self love then. And the whole process is so much about your toxicity, what you're taking in. What are you thinking about yourself. And when you walk past the mirror, are you noting what's wrong with you? Or are you noting, hey, I like myself or, you know, I have great whatever. Whatever. Whoever you are, you've got great whatever. Everybody does. And instead of looking at the whatever you think isn't beautiful, focus on the thing that is beautiful, cultivate that. And this is a great strategy in life. Stop trying to be good at what you're. What you're not great at. Be. Focus on what you're good at, and you'll be excellent. Just play to your strengths and know and really remind yourself that there's a malicious hypnotism out there that's telling you you're not enough because they don't want you to buy stuff. It's not true. Get away from that. Get back to you and realize that your inner energy is the sexiest, most beautiful, most magnetic thing about you.

Fantastic. Yeah, it's so. It's so. It's such a process, I think, for so many of us, right? I mean, I have journals from when I was in my 20s of, like, literally hating my body. I looked phenomenal, okay? And it's just like I. Now I look in the mirror and I don't. I mean, technically, when you look at a picture, I don't look as good as I looked then, but I look in the mirror and I'm like. Like, I look good.

You know? Interestingly, though, a man may see it differently. We are. We women do this for women. Women, we. We evaluate, we dress, we accessorize. If we're not doing it for our own joy, we're doing it for other women. Because men do not care. That is not where they find our beauty. They find our beauty and they want to be able to see through the extensions, hair, weave and, you know, eyelashes and lipstick. They would like to see what's under there, and then they'd like to talk to you and, you know, kind of get in your energy. That's what's sexy to them. We get caught up in all of this crimping and all this stuff so that other women look at us and go, oh, wow, she's hot. And come on, That's not even right on. And I bet. And a man you look at, men love women's bodies, and they don't love them only in one way. They love women bodies. And what, you think, oh, I look so much better, then I guarantee you that's the body of somebody's dream girl.

Yeah, for sure. Totally.

Yeah.

My husband is. Yeah, he's. No matter what size, no matter what, he's just like, oh, you're perfect. Like, yeah. Doesn't matter if I have a couple extra pounds, like anything. He's. He doesn't even notice.

No, he doesn't. No, you notice. And your girlfriends who have the same hypnotism, if you point it out to them, they'll go, oh, yeah, okay. It's nonsense.

And it's also interesting, like the. As we were talking about earlier, the fear. The fear of, like, what are people gonna think about me? You know, I used to not go to events because I was, like, nervous that I wouldn't look super great or like, oh, the last time they saw me, I was, like, super fit. And. Yeah, it's just crazy, the things that we miss out on life because we don't think we look good enough, right?

Absolutely. And it's such a myth. We've got to get ourselves over that. We've got to release that and let go of that and really focus on your inner energy. Because if you can heal that inner sense and really appreciate the fact that you. If you're ever looking for some outside validation, nothing can ever happen to you that's better than being chosen for life. You've already received the ultimate validation. You've already got the gold medal. You were born. You got a life. So nothing. I mean, what else could anybody give you that's even going to come close? So you're already enough. And if you can work from that premise of really opening your heart center, and it's really just about paying attention to where your heart is. So when you're sitting there and having those thoughts, your mind's running off down that path of, I don't know how I look, I don't look good enough. Just open your heart. Just focus on the love. Don't even argue with it. Just turn to that center and. And walk down the middle of a room with your heart open. Do some experiments. Next time you're in the grocery store, next time you're out in the world, put your attention on your heart, open it up, feel the love, radiate love, and watch the world change around you. It just happens.

Totally. And then it happens for you, too, right? Because then you just have, like, inner joy and you're, like, radiating and you're like, wow, this is good.

Well, you start to realize, oh, they just clicked into it. Oh, and people will come and magnetize. I am, like, such a master at that. I can put my hair up and.

I can have, like, a bad day.

Because everybody has them, let's be honest, Bad, grumpy day and have to go out, put my hair in a ponytail on the side of my head, put yoga clothes on, walk out. Don't want anybody to talk to me, and nobody talks to me. I can, in that same outfit, walk out with an open heart. And I can't get down the street just the way that it is. And everyone else in the room are all sitting there thinking about how they look.

Yeah.

We're all sitting there going, I wonder how I look. I wonder. It's nonsense. Totally.

They're not even looking at you. They're too concerned about what they're looking like.

Totally.

Okay, so I'm curious on the relationships, and you talk about this in your book, and I just love your style and flavor on the relationships. How do we have amazing intimate partnerships? Like, what are some of. What are some of your tips? Or what are some of the common pitfalls that so many of us do in relationships, whether it's dating or married or whatever?

Well, I think a foundational idea in a relationship is to. Especially for women. And we go into relationships and we want it to be great. So we try to do everything and give everything and be super attentive. And what we really could benefit from in an overwhelming majority of relationships is to learn to receive more, is to ask for what we want. And you have to do this for two reasons. One, because it's a life. We all need to learn to ask for what we want more. And it makes our lives much better because we're usually going to get it and you're not going to get it. Have no chance of getting it if you don't ask. But also, men aren't mind readers, and we think they should know what we're thinking, but they don't know what we're thinking. And we could really help things a lot if we would just ask. Makes things much, much better. But then to stop smothering, mothering, getting out there, you know, running ahead to smooth the path in an effort to. Because we think that that makes relationships better. What really one of the things that men love the most, and this comes from men, not from me, is to be able to give to you and to have you appreciate it. To have your approval, your appreciation, and basically to have you feeling like you've got a hero and acknowledging it, that is the elixir. It's like if we need intimacy and emotional connection and we want a man to. To just want to ravish us and think we're beautiful and just that we're the only woman in the world. If that's what turns us on. The counterpart, what turns an add on is to be desired, needed, wanted and allowed to solve problems and fix things, to be useful. And it's a much better life for us because, yes, we can do it all. We totally can. But it's really nice when we step back and receive. And I also mean that in the bedroom, instead of like being, you know, an acrobat rock star in the bed, be selfish a couple times to see what it is to relish in receiving and let the uninhibited, let the satisfaction.

Or the.

Joy you're feeling come through. That is magic to a man. And then, of course, there are things that women who were. Our society is really promoting. Perpetual adolescent, terrible loser, joker, irresponsible guy, the pig, the horny pig. You know, he's what's on most of the sitcoms. He's what's represented in most commercials. It's always the idiot guy and the woman who comes along, she's got a brain and he's just floundering around and that has. It's all kind of this direction we've gone, that women have it all together and men are just losers. We really, really. What stems from that? What? The other thing I want to add on that is what stems from that is women will sit at parties, I'll be in places and women will say, you know, I don't know how he'd get out the door if it wasn't for me. Well, you know he would. And he did it before you. Yeah. If not for me, he can't do it. Don't, don't put him down. Never. There's really no context that you need to put him down. And as much as it would bother you to be put down, it is a wound to the heart. It's like a knife through the heart when you put a man down. It's worse when you do it in front of someone else. Also, just as Bad when you do it behind his back. Communicate whatever it is you're unhappy with. Most men will gladly take that, especially if you present it without that snarky, snotty attitude. If you present it more matter of factly, they'll take it and they'll do their best for you. Because what do they want from you? They want your approval, your appreciation, and to feel like your hero. So you ask. And the other thing you do is when he does things you like, you acknowledge it. And it was interesting as I was thinking about this today. I'm in a very long term relationship and I was thinking about this interview today and I realized, wow, you know, I may have fallen off my game a little bit. I don't think I've been as conscious about appreciating all of the things I maybe have just silently noted I like that and not express it at all. So I got up and I started just acknowledging the things that I was grateful for. And you would have thought like, I just like a marching band came through. He was like so happy and he got so many offers to do things and he just left with a big smile on his face. So simple, so, so simple. And you know what? I'll probably get flowers today. Probably won't even be cooking din. So I think those things are huge. Your words are powerful. You can pick a man up, you can slice him through the jugular with your words. And then on the, on the, when we speak in the more feminine, you may be working and have a career, you may have a life that requires you to use your masculine energy, which is great because we need to be able to take a position, advocate for ourselves, to be decisive, to put our foot down or whatever that means. But when you come home, put it down and let go and get into your goddess. And sometimes you need a transition. So it may be a beautiful bath with things that smell good and leave your skin feeling slick and some music you like. It may be a five minute transition, but consciously leave it so that you know you can't sit on both thrones. You be the queen, he'll be the king, sit on your throne when you get home and let him encourage him to sit in his because it is, that's, that's the mix for great long term lasting sex and passion when you're in those polarities and he can be in his masculine, unapologetically not feeling guilty. I got a lot of feedback from men saying, you know, I almost have to hide it. I'm afraid to be masculine because I may be demonized for it. They're not changing. They're just hiding or repressing. And it comes out in horrible ways when you repress it. It comes out in abusive, you know, men who have no regard for women or who think instead of being in a relationship, I'd just rather read pornography. I had somebody comment on one of my blogs like that, and I was like, well, maybe you should just do pornography because I don't want to date you. I don't want anybody I know to date. But we have to embrace the masculine and embrace the feminine in positive, healthy ways and not repress or demonize them.

And the masculine feminine is that, you know, you said a little bit about the sex. Is that, like, how does that play into having more, like, sizzle and romance and juiciness in that intimate partnership?

Well, first, everyone is different. And so I have to say, I have to put a caveat out there that the majority of women, the, you know, legions who jumped off into 50 shades of gray, have a real repressed feminine. And they really do have those desires to have someone ravish them and love them and lust after them and adore them and worship them. And it wasn't, you know, that was not. To me, again, that was not the most positive manifestation. But the repressed feminine gets out however it gets out, okay? And. But not everybody is that way. In some relationships, the man is more comfortable in his feminine and the woman is more comfortable in her masculine. I have a very good friend who has no time for feminine. She likes it in the masculine, and that's the way she wants to keep it. Fine, that's great. And there's no judgment or right or wrong. But if you're in the group that is that repressed feminine that is swept away by romance novels, that dreams of the wonderful man that comes and romances her and seduces her, that wants to feel receptive, that wants to be pursued and adored. This is the arena for it. And most men, again, not all men, but the overwhelming majority of men, want to be in the masculine. They want to ravish you. They want to take you. They want to worship you and adore you and make you feel like you're the luckiest girl in the world. And when you really sit in your inner feminine and be in that space of sensuality and emotion and in your body and in the touch and the sound and the smell and the moan, and you give in to that, you're starting a fire, and it's amazing, it's magnetic, and you'll receive it and that is. It's something that only you and him will share. And it creates a foundation for you to create an entire life. And it's really, for us, we are, yes, emotional and we really need that emotional component as well. But for him, that's the way that he receives your emotion. That's his love language. And so standing in that feminine is a gift in so many ways. It's so much more than sex.

Yeah. Gorgeous. I love that. Very cool. And then finding your own, your own style, you know, I love that you said that too, because there's just so many. There's so many different ways of going about it. And you know, you gotta.

Well, it was interesting as the book came out and went around, I met a lot of people who were in same sex marriages or same sex relationships. And I was a little. I try not to speak about anything I haven't lived firsthand because I feel like I can't. I don't. I don't have the confidence in something that I'm just drawing an opinion from. So I would listen to them and I was a little concerned. I didn't know if they would really resonate. They are some of the biggest reading groups out there because they have the same dynamic in their relationship. One of them tends toward the feminine, one of them tends toward the masculine. And they come together that way, kind of staying polarized in those two energies so that they can come together and give the other what it needs.

Amazing. And so then you said, when we come home, the women come home. You need to kind of tap into that feminine because if you come home, you're all like, boss, yeah, that's not gonna work.

That actually came from a few men who he was saying, I love that my wife is a strong woman. I love that she goes out in the world and she asserts herself and she's successful and she does all these things. That's not the woman I want to be in bed with that night. That's not the woman I want to sit down with at dinner. And I. And they don't want a boss. And I'm certainly never an advocate of or. And I'm not justifying affairs or anything like that. But when a man marries his mom, sooner or later he's going to need a girlfriend. And that's the thinking that gives rise to those things. So we want to stay out of that. We want to leave him as an individual to make his own decisions, to lead in his own way and not come in and transfer our power out in the world. Our bossy power or our power of direction and leadership in and home on our. On our man. And not that we want to be bossed around by him either. I'm not saying the inverse. I always have to cover it because people will say, oh, no. Well, then you mean. And that's not what I mean either.

I definitely don't like to be bossed. No.

Well, you are. Of course not.

I like to boss more than I like to be bossed.

Any man who bosses a woman around is taking a big risk because that'll come back over days and weeks and months and years. Don't even. I think they know. They know that well.

Awesome. This is so great. I loved all of your information and all your knowledge and your wisdom and your experience and so much juicy stuff and just really inspiring and empowering to settle into that. That Venus. Let that Venus flourish.

Yes. Let it. Let it just take you over. Give in.

Surrender, surrender, surrender. That's on my whiteboard right here.

I love it.

So where can people find out more about you, your book and your coaching practice, all of that goodness?

You can find me on my website@cynthiaochelli.com and I'm doing all kinds of new stuff now and really, really working to bring this information all around the world and especially to women who it's brand new. It feels so good.

Yes. We all need it. We all need this for sure.

Yeah.

Well, thank you so much. 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.