463: Ancestral Veneration, Facing Your Shadows + Conscious Sex Work with Trap Witch

Welcome to the Highest Self podcast. My name is Sahar Rose and this podcast is all about making the spiritual journey approachable, modern, fun, relatable and grounded. And I am so deeply excited to be reconnected with you here in this lifetime. I started this podcast over five years ago and since then it has become the number one spirituality podcast on itunes. Because of the depth that we go to in our conversations, we really go there speaking about childhood traumas and Ascended Masters and Tantra and Dharma and karma and everything in between. And if you don't even know what these words I said are, it's okay because we bring you along with us on the journey. So, a little bit about me. I am an author. I've written three books. I have an oracle card deck and journal. You can learn more about me on my website. I am Sahara Rose and really I'm here to allow people to see a new lens on spirituality, one that is deeply connected to our feminine, to our joy, to our bodies, to expression and creativity. And again, I am so deeply grateful that you are here. So this conversation is a really deep and nuanced and multi layered one. If you haven't heard of the Trap Witch, I came across her on Instagram and her posts really just stood out to me because she's fierce and she's brave and she's controversial. And to me that makes for a really interesting conversation. So I invited her here on this podcast and she shares with us and really opens up on her story of transitioning from being a sex worker to a spiritual worker. And we really get into the nuances of that at the end of this conversation. So be sure to listen to the end. She also shares about her journey of being involved with Santeria, which is the African traditional spiritual branch that really comes from the African diaspora and has taken many shapes and forms throughout the Caribbean, Cuba specifically, which is where her family comes from, as well as in Brazil. And we really speak about how ancestral veneration has been such an important part of her path, but also bringing that into balance with psychology and emotional understanding and shadow work. Because it's very easy for us to sometimes just, you know, connect with our ancestors, connect with our spirit guides, rather than looking at our relationships and the triggers that are showing up and even the conflicts that we are in and seeing that our prayer and seeing that as the guidance that our spirit guides and highest selves and ascended masters are giving to us, it's actually right here in our present day reality. So I really kind of zoom in and out and really speak about that hierarching understanding that we are connected to spirits and also like what really matters, which is being here in this human experience. So we speak about many different topics along this subject line and then move into what it was like for her as a sex worker. And this was the first time I got to interview someone who has ever been in that line of work. And for me, my background was working in nonprofit organizations for sex trafficking. So it's always something that I've been very interested to know about how someone chooses this path, an empowered person choosing this path. Because I had really never met someone before. So I got to ask her many questions that I had for myself and just her answers were so deeply surprising and shows again how multi layered this conversation is. So this is a good one. You're going to definitely feel like a fly on the wall on the most interesting conversation that you have dropped into at the party that you're like, oh damn, we're really going there. And I know you're going to love this episode. So without further ado, let's welcome Tatiana AKA the Trap Witch here on the Highest Self podcast.

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Welcome Tatiana to the Highest Self podcast. It's so great to have you here.

Thank you so much for having me, Sahara. So excited.

And the first question I would love to ask you is what makes you your highest self?

I would say it is my undeniable enthusiasm to not be afraid of the dark anymore.

And you have an incredible story about going into the underworld and also with your deep like intellectual background as well. So can you share a little bit about your spiritual awakening story?

Yeah. So I consider myself by societal terms to be a late bloomer. Not because I would say that I was stagnant, but because my plans were interrupted by divine intervention. So I graduated high school at 16. I was finished my BFA. I have a fine arts degree. By almost 19, I had a plan and I started working. I wasn't happy with what I was working with for my art degree and I decided to go back to school and I was on path again to be a celebrity photographer. And I started freelancing and I was just miserable. And so I decided to take a break and try and begin to have this Eat, Pray, love moment. And I met a friend of a friend who had known me through photography and she was like, hey, you need money, girl. Like, you need money. So I always tell people, if you're familiar with the movie players club, I always say, she players club me. She Ronnie player club me. She's like, let me put you onto some game. Let me help you in this moment, because you still need to survive. And so it was that time in 2012 that she was in the sex work realm. And she was actually also a daughter of Oshun. She's also still a daughter of Oshun. For those of you who aren't familiar, that's the Orisha of divine femininity. The fresh waters of the world flow abundance under the umbrella of Santeria ifa, African traditional religion. And so she came to me. She was already deep into the practices, and she's like, you're a daughter of Oshun. And I was like, girl, I do not know what the fuck that means. Like, I don't know. Like, I don't know. I don't care. But let me hear what you have to say about, you know, just, you know, helping me. And so she introduced me to the world of body rubs. For those of you who don't know that central, you know, central massage, there's a bit of tantra involved. I always tell people, like, I recognize how naturally attuned to tantra and Reiki I was once I stepped into that world. And so for five years, I gave myself an Eat, Pray, love moment. Although I wasn't going around the world, I was deep in trying to find myself. I got married in that time, and I just was trying to figure out who I was, what I was doing, because I knew my plans were not working and I was not happy. And so it was through my now ex husband and the woman who had got me into sex work, I started developing an interest for the orisha. I really wasn't drawn in to say, oh, I would like to become a practitioner. But there was a curiosity. And that curiosity peaked more and more as Spirit sent messengers to bring me back home to those practices. So I always tell people my spiritual awakening was kind of like Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I was here. I was, you know, I loved shopping. I loved the 3D. I really loved the 3D. I wanted just to live a very 3D life. And now, if I recognize now my, you know, my south node is in Virgo in the second house. So things I've already integrated. I was resisting coming into my purpose by being content with what I thought my plan should be. And so every year from 2011 until about 2016, Spirit would send someone who was either involved In Santeria, in the occult, in voodoo, in ifa. They would just send these people to befriend me. And it would never work out well. It would be, hi, let me befriend you, let me help you. And in turn, there would be a power struggle or dynamic. Not even because I was completely resistant, because at times there was a bit of malevolence in their intentions. So the way I always tell people is that spirit had to a rob me of a lot of things that I thought I desired. Whether it was my ex husband, whether it was the type of life that I wanted to live, and also infuriate me to gather interest to walking towards the practices. So I always tell people it was nothing but loss and pure rage that fueled my interest to knock on the door of traditional African religion. I have Cuban ancestry. My mother's from the Cayman Islands. I grew up in the Cayman Islands, but we have Cuban and Jamaican heritage on that side. And then my father was Eastern European, Polish, Lithuanian. So I'd always had a drawn to my Cuban ancestry from around 2010. And it was one day when I literally said to. I was looking at pictures of Cuba and I said, I don't know what it is, but I know my soul is there. I know my heart is there. And whether that was metaphorically or just knowing that the return to myself would be through these practices, spirit took me through a big season of loss and anger to welcome me back home to myself through those practices. So I'd say that's how that my spiritual awakening happened. And I always tell people I could have probably been in that wave of people in 2012 that awakened, but I was still resisting. So in 2016, they dragged my ass.

I love how, you know, I so relate to sometimes we're drawn to certain parts of the world because our deep feeling and our soul connection is there. The exact same thing happened to me in India. And I know for you your ex husband was Nigerian and that brought you there. My ex was from India and that brought me there. And it's like sometimes love, sometimes just this deep soul calling, you know, because I also have Indian ancestry but was never really connected to it can bring us to these places that we have this like deep soul contract with that the only way that we're going to get there and fulfill that is to be guided through love. But then when that soul contract is complete, that person, that situation is no longer needed because the deeper work has already begun.

Absolutely, I totally agree.

So I want to talk about ancestral veneration because, you know, Connecting with your ancestors is kind of a big thing right now in spirituality. And I'm so happy for it because I feel like before we were very separated from our history, our past spirituality was like, you know, don't identify with the human body, don't identify with family. And it was sort of like just create your own reality, right? And we're realizing, well, we're not only creating our own reality, but we're connected to our ancestors, our ancestral trauma gifts, and also hardship. So can you speak a little bit more about what is ancestral veneration?

I love how you emphasize that we're moving away from just solely like separation and isolation from the family unit to create your own reality. Because just like you said, if you don't understand some of the reasons why you incarnated into the specific family that you did to liberate yourself into yourself sovereignty, you're going to still have a hard time creating your reality. Especially when other people on this earth come around and remind you of the things you are in avoidance from healing. Because we know that we meet the same scenarios in other people until we break the pattern. So for me, I feel like ancestral veneration is understanding firstly that you are not alone on this journey. I think that for me, when I started my journey of tapping into my ancestors, I was in a very isolated place, just like you're saying, trying to create my own reality and feeling alienated from my family. Not even the sense of that they weren't around or they weren't there. But I felt completely different. The black sheep, the not supported, whether it's because they just couldn't, because I come from a very emotionally avoidant and emotionally dismissive family. And so for me, I was at a place of rock bottom and I needed to find my faith. And I think finally, at a point of having an extreme tower moment, I was like, man, if there's nobody around me that can help me, there's gotta be something, someone out there, whether it's God, whether it's a guardian angel, whether it's whatever. But I was looking for endurance because so many people lack spiritual endurance. And I believe that as long as we are here on this earth, we do have to become warriors. Because navigating this existence is not easy. We go through spiritual warfare every day, whether it's within ourself, with the system, with other people. And so I was looking for endurance by believing and trusting and seeing the invisible. Because people don't recognize that seeing the invisible is faith. And it's very hard for a lot of people to have faith, especially when they're codependent, on putting power outside of them. So I feel like ancestral veneration is giving light to your ancestors, but not just so that they can take your burdens off of you, so that they could reflect back to you the messaging that you need, the codes that you need in order to break your own patterns, but also to liberate your lineage and your heritage. And so I still think at times when I work with a lot of people, people are still getting caught up in. I don't know, is it. I would words be like idol worship. Like, I feel like, you know, I've known a lot of people who've got into ancestor veneration, and it becomes very like a slippery slope very easily because, again, it creates. It can create a lot of psychosis. I think, in general, the occult and these practices, I think even Christianity, whether it's Hinduism, when we are looking for extreme faith outside of us, it can create such psychosis, it can create fanaticism that takes us away from our sovereignty. So more than anything, I think we should just be able to analyze the patterns and from a subjective place and also an objective place, and take that data collection and move forward. And I think at times too, when we are looking to give light to our ancestors again, we can't become so codependent that we're like, oh, my God, if you didn't throw me a burning bush, you're not there. One thing that I've learned through ancestral veneration is sometimes the signs are very subtle. You know, it comes but like a quiet whisper, because I feel like that's what the intuition is too. The intuition can be a very quiet whisper. And I always told people, the. The moment I really started having faith is when I understood that God was not going to come down as some old fucking white man to tell me what to do and give me a message. So more than anything, I think it's understanding. Sexual veneration is understanding that you can create spiritual endurance by believing and seeing the invisible in some sense, and understanding cycles of death, transformation, and rebirth. Because our ancestors came before us, and yes, they have to be released back to the other realms so that the new can enter. And whatever they were not able to achieve, we have a personal responsibility to the ones who came before us to go further. You know, I don't know about you, but my father's parents, you know, worked so hard all their life to build a dream house to die not long later, both of them from cancer. So what we could take from that is, well, maybe survival and not having rest, not working from love, sabotaged their dreams before they could even enjoy them. And so many of us understand that through our family having chronic illnesses, having mental illness, emotional disease. So it's understanding that, you know, life. Life can be as simple and complex as you make it. And there's gonna be seasons of change that are going to be forever consistent. But in spite of it, you can have many days filled with gratitude, love and happiness. But if you are somebody who is reluctant to change, reluctant to transformation and avoidant of death, not just physical death, but spiritual death, it's going to be hard for you to evolve.

Yeah, I really agree with. It's that fine balance of trusting that we are supported and also not like, hey, spirit, if you're here, give me the sign. And if you don't give me the sign, then I don't trust you. And like thinking spirit is here for our beck and call or even like using it, right? Oh, like, I feel like so much of the manifestation spaces, I'm going to do this ritual so I can get. And it's like kind of taking. Or even in the plant medicine space, it's like you're going into it, trying to extract from it. So I think that veneration of you're here to honor. You're here to honor the people that have come before you and. And stand upon their shoulders of like, yes, our parents had to work hard and sacrifice, and we're in this mindset of martyrdom, so we could see that firsthand and be like, that's not how I'm going to live my life. And I'm so blessed, you know, that they did work as hard as they did so I could be able to even entertain conversations like this and. And be at this level of consciousness. One question I have for you, because I hear kind of mixed things of like, when connecting to our ancestors, should we be connecting to the ancestors that are healed and rested and well from like generations ago? Or is this your grandmother, a past family member? Are all, can we work with all ancestors? What should we be looking out for with this?

So I think that that's a great question. First and foremost, I wanted to just go back for a minute. Something that you said that was so powerful about the rituals and the mysticism. I think that there's tons of mysticism that exists in these practices. I've seen so many things that you'd be like, wow, but at the same time, do we prioritize mysticism over practical application? And that's the thing, is that ancestral veneration and practices, you have to put the work into application. It's very easy to light a candle, that it's very easy to make a beautiful, what we call like sympathetic, a sympathetic offering.

Right.

But until you're someone willing to work through your darkness and embrace your light and be ritualistic in changing your patterns, those sympathetic offerings sometimes are not a large enough sacrifice. To answer your question about giving light to certain ancestors. You know, there are people, there are people that have had really, really terrible experiences with some of their ancestors. There's also people who come from lineages that have had ancestors that also have done terrible things. By no means is it an obligation for people to give light to an ancestor that they may feel uncomfortable with or some of the things that they have done. But also, we have to understand that sometimes when spirits cross over into those realms, they are not the same embodiment that they were when they were on this realm. And that takes a lot of grace and it takes a lot of compassion. You know, I have a grandfather who was not the nicest person when he was here. I still give light to his spirit because I believe that there's evolution from even giving grace to his shortcomings. But yes, there are some spirits, especially in Santeria, we talk about, you know, like hardened spirits, spirits that are heavy that have to have extra light being given to them. So yeah, sometimes we don't necessarily want to work with a spirit that might be problematic because, yeah, spirits can be problematic to people. We talk about spirits and ancestral spirits that sit on people's chests at night, you know, while they're trying to sleep. I definitely feel like we have to take our time with going still outside of ourselves. When I work with people, I tell people at the end of the day, it doesn't matter if you knew your ancestors names, it doesn't matter if you knew who they were. Even if you have an understanding that the average person has a spiritual court of 2 to 20 spirits around them at all times, whether they were ancestral or whether they are assigned spirits that are there to walk with you. You know, I have a spirit that's really. It's funny, my spirits are predominantly women, but occasionally I have a very large male spirit that's described as a Congolese spirit. They say he's like a tower. I have had random strangers on the Internet DM me and be like, hey, don't forget your big black man. Because he is like, like, just wants you to know, like, don't forget like, totally random strangers will tell me about him at the most weird time. So we have, of course, we have assigned spirits, or we have ones that we have an affinity to if we build a relationship with them. But the most important thing is just I tell people, like, what the fuck do they want you to do? Like, what's the next step? Because a lot of times I think the inner child gets caught up in the. Ooh. I have unseen support. It's like having an imaginary friend, right? So sometimes we want to get caught up in imagining what our imaginary friends are like because we want that relationship. But you have to be careful to get distracted by that relationship when there's real life people that we need to interact with. And I've met people who can sit at an ancestral altar for hours, and it's like sitting in a playroom with your imaginary friend and they're feeling comfort. But this person can't go out into society and have healthy relationships with people. And that's what we have to be mindful of. So at the top priority, I tell people, what is it that your ancestors want to guide you with for this human experience? Because I think there's a lot of spiritual bypassing. And for me, I consider myself, you know, a shadow worker and a middle ground worker. And I feel like I'm here to help people navigate this human existence and enjoy it. Because at some point, we're not going to be here anymore. And most of us don't know what it's like afterwards. I mean, most of us can't recollect if we've transitioned and come back. We can't always remember what it's like in those other realms. So when we rush to just live in the spiritual realm, we rush just to connect with entities in that realm. It's like you're missing a whole lot. I recently saw a video where someone was like, if you ask me why I don't travel anymore, it's because I feel like I can astral project to those places. So why would I want to even travel anymore if I can just. I've experienced it? I was like, please, sir, shut the fuck up. Like, enjoy this. We're not taking this with us. So enjoy human connection. Enjoy the lessons that come through that. Because again, I think a lot of people have social anxiety and it's easy to tap into your imaginary friends and your unseen friends because you fear people. I used to be one of those people. I used to be terrified of people. I used to be terrified of myself. So if your ancestral practices are not bringing you back to your own humanity and how you love others and love the collective consciousness and your part in what you're here to do. I feel like practicing your ancestral practices, and that is not including it. It falls short. I think that's why I loved Coco so much.

Yeah, I loved. I love that movie as well. And I totally agree with. It's so much easier to connect to your highest self, connect to your spirit guides, your ancestors, than it is to really look at, okay, why do I have conflict in my relationships? And what is this showing me? And I was recently in a kind of like a work conflict, and I could feel my old self of just like, just walk away. Just leave it. Like, you don't need this in your life. Like, move on. But then there was a higher part of me that was like, this is how you learn. This is how you grow. This is how you get to know your attachment style.

This is how you.

You get to witness your ego when it feels offended. And instead of, like, distancing yourself, being in the discomfort, because it's only through repair that relationships actually grow. And conflict in relationships actually shows you care about each other. It actually means that you're going somewhere. So I definitely have recognized sometimes on our spiritual growth journeys, we become such isolationists because it's easier to live in our own minds, where everyone's gonna agree with us, than it is to be in the real world, where people have their own stories and their own fears.

And their own shadows.

And it's so much easier to call everyone else out on their shadows than it is to really look at our own.

Absolutely. You know, in the past, even in the past few weeks. Cause I think a lot of people think when you reach a certain status as a public figure, I'm sure you get this, and I get this all the time. They're like, oh, you must be perfect. You must be. And I think there's judgment sometimes, too, when cycles come back for reevaluation. Right. Because triggers can always be re triggered, no matter how deeply you heal them. A new situation could present new feelings. And so I've recently just discovered. I was like, damn, I'm really, like, sometimes dismissive, avoidant. And when you were speaking to that, like, yeah, I always tell people, I used to be the queen of God bless you. Like, God bless you. I'm out. Like, God bless you. I. I wouldn't even do the conflict, wouldn't even do the drama, because I just did not have space. It would be better to bless people away or tell them Go to hell than to go through the conflict. You know, I'm an Aquarius, so I thrive in isolation. But at the same time, there are moments where we don't need to discard people. Like you said, we need to go through the conflict. And sometimes we are avoiding those parts of ourselves that are uncomfortable in communicating our feelings, even regardless of people are in agreement or not. And when we think about so many of our ancestors from the past and their attachment styles and the way that they lived, you know, like, my mom's one of 10 children, and all of my aunts and uncles are, like, fucked up from the abuse that they witnessed at the hands of their father, even though they were never abused. But I just see how my grandfather's sense of self impacted 10 children and the way that they show up. And recently, before, you know, if we're even talking about ancestral practices, my mom just had a double bypass because, you know, I was supposed to come down there to Miami to film this with you. And it was so fascinating for weeks up until she had that diagnosis. Cause she did not know she had heart disease at all. She kept saying that my father was coming to her in her dreams. And she kept saying that my brother as well. My brother passed away from a heart attack last year. My dad succumbed by heart disease. And she doesn't necessarily believe in the things that I believe, but she'd wake up, she says, your brother just keeps coming to me. Your dad just keeps coming to me. I don't get it. I don't get it. I don't know. And then she goes to get a catheterization and gets hospitalized and is about to have open heart surgery. And I told her I was just like, they were coming to you because they were trying to give you the sign what was happening. And there was a bit of comfort. So I believe in those. I believe in those signs. But I know personally, my father succumbed to heart disease because he was dismissive, avoidant. My father died alone on a couch by himself and was found, you know, days later by a friend. But I think about the times where he was in isolation, not even just solely voluntarily, like how he might think, but because he pushed so many people away and so many of us. It's easy for us to do it. And whether we are not evolved in our spiritual journey or we are. Do you know how many spiritual leaders I meet? And I'll drop this gem on you. My mentor, my godfather, Senator A. It was some of the best pieces of advice he gave me in 2018, before I went through my large initiation. He was like, don't just become a queen of Instagram. He was like, become a queen in real life. And I meet so many spiritual practitioners who isolate themselves behind the telephone, behind their Persona that they've built on social media. Because a lot of us, our inner child builds these Personas. The inner child builds these Personas to protect us. And we get to a certain level where it's okay, it's great for us to share knowledge to our followings, to our supporters, but where's the evolution? Where we're actually putting ourselves in spaces with other leaders, with other people with the same amount of power? And then I realized how much of us are still dealing with so much healing. And that's why I tell people, not only putting myself back into human connection with whether it's people I work with, but people that I'm here to collaborate with. We have to move past this discomfort and this social anxiety, because, again, there's so much social anxiety and there's so much hurt that was developed in our lineages through the harm as human beings that we have done to each other, our families and societies as well.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

It's. It feels safe for us to put content out in the world and not receive, you know, feedback, not be in conversation. And I think that it's so important to have dialogue, because it's only through dialogue that our true understandings of things grow, you know, because you have such a limited perception. If it's just like, here's what I think, boop, boop, boop, rather than, here's what you think, oh, that's changing my worldview. So for people listening to this, and they're like, I'm not even at the point where I've gone too connected to my ancestors, too connected to spirit. I don't even feel like I have a connection to any spirit guide to any ancestor. I really want one, but is it in the cards for me? Is it not? Like, how can someone begin this journey?

Okay, so I think, firstly, foremost is that it's funny enough I've gotten this question where, you know, everybody has ancestors. Your ancestors are just the people who have came before you and allowed you to be a human and a spirit that's incarnated in this world. Again, like, although I'm someone who practices ancestral veneration and ancestral practices, I don't think it's important to start necessarily with knowing who they are. I just think it's important to cultivate a very strong bond with your own consciousness and knowing that they are guiding that. I feel like knowing that your own consciousness is your gps, but they're like a signal. They are a signal that allows your GPS to navigate. Just because, like I said, I'm very big on people not creating codependence on whatever it is, whether it's the crystals, whether it's the candles, whether it's what. So I think even just starting with building a relationship, an undeniable relationship with your own consciousness and yourself and being able to check in, like I tell people all the time, let's say theoretically, like I post something, you know me, I post a lot of controversial things. And so sometimes there's resistance or there's discomfort or there's people who are upset. There's been times I, in my past of being a people pleaser or being insecure, I'd be like, oh, I need to take this down. People are so upset. Instead, I would sit with my guides and I'd say, hey, is this something I need to take down? Is this something I need to hold space for? Like, did I just. And if I pull a divination spread, I tap in and there's a distinct no. I know that I have to move through the discomfort that not everybody is going to be happy. And I also need to stand my ground to leave it there. I feel like, again, having a relationship with your spirit guides is just going to help you create a stronger sense of security while you're here on this world so that you don't go through that disassociation from yourself and so that you feel secure. Because again, so much I, like, last year I did a workshop and they led me, my guides led me to do a workshop of social anxiety. And as I was like divining and getting the messages, I get blown away by the downloads that they give me. And I'm like, man, there's so much that's connected alone to social media anxiety. Because so many people are afraid of being in their body, in the world and amongst other people. So I think that ancestral veneration of these practices, if they're not helping you become safer in your body, in the present, in your home, going out into the world and amongst people of what you're doing, what's the sense? It's just about doing as the best that you can to cultivate not only connection with others, but to also have the things that you desire. But those are things that are secondary. Because the one thing I learned through going through a practice like Santeria before, they made me happy, they made me strong and I think that's the thing. People want all the desires, but sometimes to get to their desires, who much is given, much is required. So you have to ask yourself, when you're coming to wanting to connect with your ancestors, do you want spiritual endurance? Because that's the most important thing beyond anything. We could be stripped of our money many times. We could be stripped of relationships. We can be stripped of everything that we use to validate our self worth. But what is your spiritual endurance like? Because at the end of the day, a person who is able to have spiritual endurance in spite of what they have, can still achieve anything.

Yeah, I think that we see so much in like the Law of Attraction, Abraham Hicks, and a lot of this just like more New Age. I've seen Abraham Hicks. I still love listening to them sometimes. But it's like, if it doesn't feel good always, then it's not for you. And we have created this belief of, oh, well, if it doesn't feel good, doesn't feel in flow, then I'm out. And I think that in some ways this spiritual understanding has rocked, robbed us from our endurance. A lot of people feel, even if they're not saying it, I don't want to be strong because I don't want to have to be strong. You know, I want a life that's easy and peaceful and flowy, which are like beautiful things. I think ultimately that's what we all want. But ease doesn't come because life gets easier. Ease comes because you become stronger, period.

It goes to that. There's that saying that says it's better to be a warrior in a garden than a gardener in a war. Right now, being in your soft era is trending. That's like becoming the new. One of the new catchy buzzwords, like, I'm in my soft era. I'm in my soft girl season, which is great. And I wanted to talk about this. And so, so I divined on it. And I was like, I want to talk about this, y', all, but how should I talk about this? And I was blown away because they said it's all great and dandy to have a desire to live in your soft era. But soft era is going to be defined by mood mastery, because mood mastery is what's gonna bring you back to that softness. But like you said, you can't just say, you know what spirit, you know what, God, like, I am just not responding to anything that doesn't feel good. No, like, you have to learn to adjust your moods. When I was a sex worker, I had a client one day come in and he said something to me, and I was like, oh, thank you for enlightening me. Cause there was messengers all the time. He said, you have to learn to be a thermostat mentality, not a thermometer, he says, because thermostats regulate their environments and thermometers respond to their environments. And so I think a lot of times people, they don't want to react. Sometimes they don't even want to respond. They don't want to even regulate. They just, again, the codependence of leaving the responsibility either to themselves, outside of themselves, or avoiding. And that's the thing. There are still so many healthy things that come through conflict, that come through the shadow work, that come through disaster, that come through tragedy. And it goes back to understanding that death is unavoidable in life. We're all going to die, but at the same time, so many people have already buried themselves at 25 because they've settled for a life that is avoidant of going through spiritual death.

Absolutely. I have definitely noticed. And, you know, I think everything has, like, an equal and opposite response, that because of capitalism and patriarchy, we've become such a hustle culture. And so much of us have seen our parents just, like, climb this corporate ladder that we've, like, shifted the opposite of how can I rest? Rest has become a revolutionary act. And I think so many of us, we need the reminders of being gentle on ourselves, being kind to ourselves. And like, that is the yin, and that's half of it. That's the soft, feminine energy. But also there's the other side of the feminine energy, which is more of that Kalima energy. I feel like the ocean energy has that. That's a little bit more assertive. That's like, yes, I rest, but then what do I do with this energy? Like, resting for the sake of resting is not then resting. It's like, you rest so then you can spring into creation. And like, creativity is ultimately why we are here as humans. We are here to be channels of the divine that is streaming through us and art. And I feel so many of us have associated our actions with actions that we don't want to do. Working the corporate job, doing the thing that we're afraid of, action. Action has become the problem. So then we've got said, I'm no longer taking any action. I'm just gonna let life happen to me. And whatever it is, I'm just gonna be at peace with it because I just can't give a Fuck. Rather than, okay, how can I see the situations that I'm in right now as the ancestral veneration. Like instead of me necessarily thinking, oh, I'm just gonna get the download at the altar. Conflict in your life is the altar. And that is the very thing that you get to really pray into and bless and receive. Even if it fucking hurts.

The application is always gonna be the ultimate test. Like there's tons of people who can do yoga on the mat, but they can't take that shit off the mat. There's tons of people who can. You know, it's just about application. One of the things that you just said before about initiative, right? Sometimes you really need to pray to your guides and to God to have a competitive spirit. I think that having a competitive spirit has been looked down on at times. But having a competitive spirit is even just understanding when you need to be self motivated and you need to take action again. I wrote a guide called Fuck youk Vision Board. That's what I called it. It's called Fuck youk Vision Board if it doesn't come with accountability. And so in some of the points that I made was manifestation and creating your reality. You have to know when to rest and you have to know when to get up and fucking go. And one of the best prayers last year that my father in law prayed over me was, God grant her the understanding when it's time for her to be humble and when it's time for her to get up and not fucking be. And that's understanding again, the balance between that yin and that yang. Just yesterday I made a video around ego work. I'm not a spiritualist that believes in ultimate ego death. I like that motherfucker. I think that motherfucker does us a great job. And so some of the things that the video brought up was about ego. It was about vanity, it was about politicking, it's about capitalism. All these things, right? Because all these things have nuances, they have a light and a dark. And I talked about if you don't have a healthy ego, even if we get into the word politics, because I'm big on language. When you get to the, the deeper meanings of politics, it is the art of government, the art of power. These are all things that are conducive to our individual spiritual journey. So a lot of times people like you're saying they're getting passive, they're just letting life pass them by. It's not about being a, you know, like a hustler or being in survival, but you still have to understand the polarities between that healthy feminine and masculine energy. And sometimes prayer is action. When you pray really like do this exercise one day, say a prayer and record yourself. Whatever comes through, just allow it to come through. And I want you to listen to that prayer back. One of the words that I tapped into was favor. A lot of people are praying for favor, whether it's from God, whether it's from their spirit guides, whether it's from their ancestors. But favor at its meaning and its core is to be in support of something, to be in approval of something, and to actually like something. And I said before you go praying outside of yourself, to your ancestors, to God, do you like yourself? Do you support yourself and do you approve of yourself? And if the answer is no, you have to start there in your practical application before you start begging for it outside of yourself. Because sometimes we have to be honest, sometimes prayer is begging.

Yeah. Do you think that having that connection with something greater than you can help you start trusting and believing in yourself? Or do you think you need to do that more like interpersonal psychological work first and then more of the spiritual application?

I feel like you can do both. But again, like I said, if you are avoidant of doing deep subconscious work and going through your patterns and your trauma, it's gonna be hard to create really powerful faith and it's going to be hard to create positive self esteem. I think ultimately it starts with that deep shadow work. I've worked with people who are in the like more boss, babe community, right? Or who have gone that path and manifestation, like you were saying, money manifestation, all this shit, right? Law of attraction, all that stuff. And some of them still have to come back, stop their business, come back and do the dirty shadow work that they were avoiding. Because spirit allows them to get to a certain point and then it says ahaha, you're not so fast. Sit down. What were you still avoiding? So I think that people need to recognize that everybody might have a different season, that these cycles come up for reevaluation. I think about poor Britney Spears all the fucking time, like for the past 13 years, what she went through once she got into the top of her game in the spotlight. That's extremely hard to go through when you get to a certain point of success and then you have to do your shadow work in front of everybody. And some of us are different, you know, some of us have to get it from the beginning, you know, create that lotus from the mud. But some people, they have a bit of an advancement and then it hits them in a different space. So I think that we have to just recognize when spirit is inviting us to do the work and being cognizant of that.

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So.

How can you tell the difference between whether it's coming from your spirit, from intuition, from your ancestors, versus if it's coming from fear or just like sometimes the randomness of the world?

That's a really good question. I feel like sometimes it's also intertwined, it's also interconnected. I believe that again, like there's, there's polarity. I believe that there are light spirits there, dark spirits. I think that there's light parts of ourselves. I believe that there's dark parts of ourselves. So I don't feel like I always get hyper focused on that. I just focus on being present and asking in this moment, what am I supposed to do? I made a post that I had a supporter, and who's now a former supporter, confront me and I had spoken out about abuse. I don't know if you know, I speak out a lot about spiritual abuse. That's something I hold a lot of space for. And so I was speaking about my own personal story of spiritual abuse through a mentor, and this person was like, I don't believe you. I think you're fake. I think you're lying. I think you're only sharing, like, a part of the. And that was. That was, like, deeply triggering. Okay, it was deeply triggering to me. But I had also just shared a full moon exercise for my following. But I realized that this was about to apply to me as well. And so it was about looking at the scenario and then asking yourself what you're learning from this, or something like that. And so I recognized that in that moment, I could go into extreme rage or anger or clapback. And I've been really trying to harness that energy. My rage is very powerful. I built probably the first two years of my practice and online following from a lot of rage and processing a lot of anger. But I've been trying to be more gracious and humble as I climb. So I, you know, said to her, I was just like, wow. You know, I feel like. Because she was another practitioner as well, I feel. I was like, I feel like this is really dangerous. Like, if I was someone who didn't have tough skin, then I could take this really poorly. But I'm just going to, you know, politely check you or whatever. So in that moment, right, we can look at something like that and be like, is this a spiritual attack? Is this a test of my confidence? Is this a test of my ego? Like, what feels. I had literally just gotten to a place where I was, like, sitting with the fact that I have still a lot of. Lot of repressed rage. And I feel like my shadow wants more space. And so what I asked, I sat down and asked my spirit guides, what do I need to know about this situation? Am I allowed to express myself openly? Am I. So I still think that it was a test of not repressing my voice. So I think in times when we're having different things, it's more important to look at the lesson and then ask, what can we do with this? And a part of. Also, a lot of what I do is I am here to take a lot of my rage and turn it into teachable moments instead of allowing it to be destructive. So I guess to answer your question, I feel like it's more important to ask what we're supposed to be doing in that moment. Yeah, there's times where I know that a sign is coming from a guide, But I feel like, again, we have to be so careful about fanaticism. And this is something I really want to highlight. I've been talking about this recently. Like, I made a post because, you know, people were talking about this new Jeffrey Dahmer Netflix series, and they're like, oh, don't watch it. His spirit's in it. All the evil energies are going to come at you. There's tons of that going on. And I think, again, these practices can be kind of tricky if you're somebody who has obsessive tendencies or you're somebody who has fanatical tendencies. So again, I think it's more about understanding in a moment whether you receive a trigger, whether you're going through feeling insecure and needing a. I think it's again, asking yourself what you can do and what you should do in a moment in order to, again, keep your spiritual endurance high. I always tell people that I work with, like, I believe that depression is something that people have throughout their life at times that comes to visit them. It's like rage is a visitor, depression is a visitor, all of these things. And we get to decide how long we allow that visitor to take up space on our couch. And so when I teach people about depression, rage, all that stuff, I said intuition's like a power window. Like, you know how you have a power window in your car that goes up and down? The more you allow those things to come in and take up a lot of space without dealing with them, it's like the intuition starts operating very low. But if you are. Are take handling these things head on, then the intuition is going to stay high. So it's making sure that as you're navigating through life and you're bobbing and you're weaving, that you're just making sure you keep the intuition high and you don't allow these things to come in and then cause you to have to do more work in the long term than you need to.

Yeah, I think it's. That's like the eternal question of, like, is it intuition? Is it fear? And it's. It's both. And for me, I always feel like the voice of my intuition is always going to bring me to greater expansion, and the voice of fear is always going to be greater contraction. So if I know it's making me close or blame or disappear, just, like, be so angry or also like, I need to protect myself, I need to protect myself. Which sometimes we think that spirituality, like, spiritual protection, more sage, more this, more that. But that can also be the voice of fear, you know, and there's also that voice of, like, the expansion of. Maybe I do need to pause rather than responding right away in this. Or maybe it's the opposite. Maybe you tend to step away and you need to respond right then. So it's so nuanced and it depends on the situation. But I love to tune back into the body of like, does this cause me to feel more expansion? Or does this cause me to close up? And for me too, sometimes it communicates to me through my dreams. So, like, when I was in this, it's this conflict. I like, went to bed so angry, but my dream was just like, just love them, you know, just love them. And I was just like, I woke up like, but like, I knew that was my higher self telling me, in this situation, don't show up with that, like, boundary energy. Show up with the love energy. Sometimes spirit speaks to me through music. Like, I hear, like, when I'm playing music. Like, it'll just give me those exact lyrics and tell me exactly what I need to hear. Or even if I'm writing through songs, opening even up your Instagram feed and like, it's the exact post that you needed to read. Or you just like, open up a book and it's. You read the passage. So I feel like they use this reality to really speak to us. And it's just a matter of, like, being in that conversation and acknowledging. Like, yes, I heard that. And then more of it is shown to you. Have you noticed that? Like, what is it like for you?

Yes. You know, as I went into my spiritual awakening, I became hyper aware. I don't miss much. My partner always says this where he's like, you like to see everything. I was like, yes, because I'm looking everywhere. Especially when you know that they can speak to you through many things. They can speak to you through the numbers, they can speak to you through the music. The animals. The animals are like, for me, I'm like, damn, am I snow white? Like, the way the animals are coming out. But again, I think one of the things I do want to highlight with that is too, is like, I love how when people go through that awakening and they have a desire to connect, they tap into that hyper awareness. But again, right, there's still a slippery slope. I also have experienced people who go into, again, fanaticism and obsessive behavior, addictive behavior. So it's about finding that balance and receiving. You're like, okay, that feels good. But how much you go down the rabbit hole. Because the. I mean, I've personally just met people who have. They have lost their mind. They've either lost their mind or they have developed attachments or become possessed. And so it's, it's about finding that happy medium where you allow yourself the confirmations without going deep into the abyss.

So I want to touch upon something you mentioned of good and bad energies. And I think that this is another kind of like, big universal topic of like, is there good and bad? Is there right and wrong? Is this like creating more separation? Or do we just need to acknowledge that there is evil on this planet? So I'm curious your perspective on that.

Even when things I think are evil, they still bring data that we need. You know, we would not know light if there wasn't darkness. You know, there's so much of our individual journeys that we have to give thanks to our shadow, give thanks to other people's shadow, because that's where the potency is. That's where the real medicine is. And so again, like, I feel like there's spectrums, right? There's spectrums where I'm the villain in someone's story, you're the villain in someone's story, you're bad in someone's story, you're evil in someone's story. But the measurement of the potency of that, like, again, if we wanna go back to like now, this trending, this trending, you know, Dahmer story, like, that's an exceptional case. Like when we talk about people who are extremely disturbed like that, we're talking about people who have exceptional amounts of darkness that they are dealing with. And even recently when that came out, I did a post around like cardology because there was connections in the cardology to like even his mur. And I brought up people like Joseph Mengele. I don't know if you know who that was. He was like the angel of death. He was a Nazi doctor who was, you know, experimenting on people. I just brought up a bunch of pretty terrible people and I looked at the cardology because a few of them had connections to like their.

What is astrology?

Cardology is a divination system. It's a divination system and an astrology system that's based on the playing card. So depending on your birthday, you have a certain playing card. Like I'm a five of spades. And it's a really frequently accurate system that brings together a lot of synchronicities and really rock solid predictions at times. And so I'm fascinated by it. I'm not an expert, but I have noticed like the correlations at times and the synchronicities are so scary and eerily spot on that I can't ignore them. And so I looked at the cardiology of quite a few of these people and for example, I was talking about the top. And so, for example, one of the serial killers was actually executed on a day that was like his Mars or Saturn card in his spread. Jeffrey Dahmer was actually murdered in prison by a man whose card shows up in his life spread. So when we think about stuff like that and we think about like, oh, can you really get back what you put out? Yes, I believe it. I believe that there's karma and I believe that there's karmic retribution at times. But again, there's spectrums. There are spectrums. And so we have to understand, I think even with universal justice and just justice in general, yes, there are people who are operating from an extensive amount of dark, but it's how much do they need to be held personally accountable to the amount of harm that they cause? I think that's a better way to measure. And again, I always tell people, you still have to learn to hold a little bit of space for the reason why somebody might have ended up like that. You don't have to rationalize it and say, oh my God, they deserve a pass for that, but just that understanding can bless you. And I think when we're talking about ancestral veneration, we're talking about clearing our ancestral trauma and lineage. Like, yeah, you might have a mom who has borderline personality and she's narcissistic and she's terrible to you, but she might also be operating from the place of that wounded inner child. And she's got stuck at 10 years old in her storyline. And so when she's projecting and causing harm to you, she's operating from that hurt 10 year old. I think situations like that, you have to find ways to protect yourself energetically from these, these harmful vibrations. But at the same time, still in the human experience, I think we have to, to understand the data. And I think again, sometimes people just want to say, you're a bad person, you're a bad person. It's like without understanding the data, and I'm someone who likes to understand the data, I want to understand why someone is the way that they are. So when I was a sex worker, that's actually what got me into this work. I wanted to know why people were there. I was like, they're either here because they're lonely, they're neglected, or they want their cake and eat it too. And I had some fascinating you know, it's 2:22, as we say it, too, 222. The signs, right? I wanted to know why people thought the way that they did or they acted the way that they did. Because there were times I had people request things, and I'm like, why? You know, when we get into fetishes, when we get into kinks, right? We have to understand sometimes there is a connection to why people do what they do and why people want what they want and why people act the way that they act. So I think, you know, yes, we can say people are good or bad. We can say that as a very superficial lens. But then we have to break down the data of, okay, well, why are they bad? Why are they good? And some people have good and bad. I have friends. I have a friend who's on death row right now. And he made an impulsive decision in the height of an egotistical moment that cost him his life. Was he a good person? To me, Absolutely. And I actually had wrote him a letter in jail, and I said, man, look, I know you did some fucked up shit, but even if no one tells you this before, you know, they potentially execute you, I want you to know that you were good to me. If no one says that to you, you know, so we. I think we have to, yeah, there's good and bad, but we still have to. We still have to look at the nuances.

Yeah. I think it all comes down back to trauma. You know, what traumas did that person go through as a child? And so much of the darkness that we experience as humans is just an absence of light, an absence of love. It's a yearning for attention and for caring. I'm curious for you and your experience as a sex worker, what were the reasons that people would choose to come?

See, I had all types of clients. I did it for five years. And I had, I'd say, a regular clientele of regulars that were about 70 people, and then just strangers who would come and go. You know, I had some exceptional cases that stood out in my head. I one time had a gentleman who had elephantitis. He had elephantitis of his genitalia. And I felt so much empathy for him because literally, this is somebody who cannot experience intimacy in the same ways another average man could experience intimacy. So he wasn't even there necessarily for a release. He was there just to feel safe. Most of the time when we were having conversation, it was about me affirming him. So for someone like him, he can't create the same intimacy as the Average person, he has to deal with this insecurity and he has to live with that unless he had a major, potentially life saving surgery and it might endanger his life. So we had people like that. I had people who, who had just got diagnosed with prostate cancer and they might have to have a release and their wife doesn't want to do it. You know, I had a gentleman who had just came one time and he had just gone through a biopsy and he said, you know, the doctor said, if I release, I might bleed. You know, I don't want to scare you. And it taught me to create safe space, a sacred space for people in their shame, in their darkness. So I remember just saying to him, I said, no problem, it's fine, I'll handle it. You know, I'll clean you up, out, whatever. So it really taught me how to create safety for a lot of shame that people had. And so there was tons of times where, yeah, I just had regular, I'd say Joe Schmoes. But I also had people who were dealing with high anxiety jobs. You had people who were upset in their relationships. And, you know, I know that there's always two sides to a story, but sometimes people did not feel safe communicating with their partners. I think the scary people ask me, what's the worst thing I've ever seen or the scariest thing I've ever seen? To me, it was the average man who looked like your guy next door who had secrets that he could never tell his wife. Not because he couldn't, because he didn't want to. And I can't imagine sleeping in a bed with somebody and calling them your life partner and they don't know who you are. So I feel, you know, I always tell people, again, there's spectrums. There are sex workers. I'm sorry, we're just gonna say there's some hoes that are just hoes, and they're doing it for the money. They're doing it for whatever reason, survival. But when I got into that work, I really chose to make it what I wanted it to be. And I considered myself that, you know, a high priestess of that of sorts, because sex work was my first initiation into becoming a sacred space holder.

Yeah, it's such a tricky topic because it's so rare to hear someone that chose and felt empowered in their journey as a sex worker because so many of them have been trafficked into it. They have pimps who are actually taking their money, their abuse. And from what I've heard, only 1% of women who Are sex trafficked, make it out? Is that something that you saw a lot of like women who were in it against their will or brainwashed? Or did you find that a lot of the women actually felt like this was part of their purpose?

I was fortunate to walk into a very empowered, safe space when I got into it through this woman who like I said, was a priestess. I walked into a space that on the surface was operating as a wellness center and had us under the table. And so we actually had to go through training. The lady that we worked under, she required us to go through a five day training with her in order to facilitate being able to create a safe, pleasurable experience. And so the women that I worked with, some of us did that full time just doing that. And some of them were. I had a girl I worked with or a woman, excuse me, a woman I worked with, she was a hematologist by day and a worker by night. I had another woman who worked in a lawyer's office by day and worked on the weekends with us. So I worked in a space with a lot of women who worked choosing it. I personally knew at some point during that journey that I was gonna be working on the other side. And what do I mean by that? I knew that I was gonna probably work with law enforcement organizations to help people with trafficking. Understanding the dark side of it. I've actually had a few scenarios where Spirit has dropped abusive spiritual leaders into my inbox. I had a girl reach out to me and was like, hey, this spiritual leader is tried to traff. Here is a five page document that he has created for women who would like to come into his harem. And when you read the verbiage, it was nothing besides a high control group and a cult. And he was trying to traffic the women who were coming to him for emotional vulnerability. So I personally was blessed to work in a safe environment. And then, and probably a year and a half into it, I went independent. So I created my own practice. I rented an upscale apartment and I would only work out of it. I'd go there, work, go home, work, go home. And I say that was my first spiritual practice. So unfortunately, yes, there are women who get into this from being trafficked, forced against their will, from survival. But I've also met a significant amount of women who are empowered through it. Last year there was an astrologer who made a international Sex Worker Day appreciation post. And there was a woman who commented in the comments. She was like, I don't understand why you would even post this. Nothing Good comes from sex work. I have never met a sex worker who was empowered, who wasn't desperate, and who wasn't a crackhead or whatever afterwards, all this stuff. And so I chimed in and I said, hey, sis, former sex worker here. I don't know if you've been one, but I would appreciate. If you've never walked in our shoes, don't comment for us, because I could tag 10 others who are deeply empowered, who are either married, have children, thriving businesses. But a lot of times, I can't tell you how many women who have been in that realm of work who do not come out of that closet because of the shame or the judgment, or they think that people are going to treat them differently having come from that path. And that was something that was dictated to me through many spiritual readings, that I am not supposed to allow anybody to look down their nose at me about where I've been, because it's going to inspire many women. And there are many high priestesses, especially that have walked that walk. Maya Angelou was a fucking sex worker. Toni Morrison. There was just a post yesterday about Toni Morrison and her. Her promiscuity, you know, so it's like, I think that, again, we have to look at the nuances and the spectrums. And absolutely, there are terrible things that happen to women and girls through greed, through control, and how they end up in those things. But there are also, I think, women who go through a sector of work that is here to understand the depth of the human psych. That big eighth house energy, that big scorpionic energy.

Yeah, it is such a tricky and nuanced topic. You know, I somehow ended up on a TikTok, and it was this guy who hired a Vegas escort, and in Vegas, it's actually legalized. And he just had her come and just started asking her questions, you know, why are you doing this?

And.

And she kind of gave this, like, fake response. And he was like, tell me the truth of, like, why are you really here? And she confessed that she was given up by her foster parents. She had a boyfriend who was a pimp and brought her into this and that she doesn't receive any of the money. And he's like, what if I could help you run away? And she's like. She ran out of that room because she's like, they will kill you and they will kill me. And there was so much fear.

And.

And so often I feel like the conversation is, well, if prostitution is legalized, then pimping woman out won't happen. But that was still happening there. So, like, seeing that reality, and it's so heartbreaking. Then on the other side, there was this other woman I saw on TikTok who is a sex worker for handicap people. And she's like, it's my passion to be able to give love to people who normally, like, no one would want to give love to. And she really believes, like, this is my dharma. And she works with many disabled people. And it's true. And she says most of the time, it's their parents who hire her because they want their child to experience love and connection in this lifetime. So both ends of the spectrum. And there's so much nuance in between.

Absolutely. There's a great movie called the Sessions with Helen Hunt, and it's based on a true story, again, like you said, of a man who spent most of his life inside what they call the iron lung. And I think he was paralyzed for maybe, like, the. The chest down. I can't remember. But there's actually a legal certification called sex surrogacy. And when I was a worker, and I'm actually gonna share this story very soon. When I was a worker, I had a client come in, and he was concerned for my safety. And he was just, like, I always tell people, like, he saw something in me that exists now as the trap witch that I wasn't seeing in myself yet. And he said, hey, I wanna help you. Like, have you heard of sex surrogacy certification? There's actually a. A legal certification that you can get. You. You bill through insurance. You can work with therapists and psychologists to help people and couples, you know, through any blockages. And he. He gave me, like, a whole business plan. It's sitting in my email still. I recently looked back and I was like, wow, this man was trying to give me messages about some of the work I would be doing now. But, yes, like you said, there's the beautiful aspects of this. Because, again, again, sex. Sex in itself is not a terrible thing. It's not. We are spiritual beings, and our spirituality is deeply connected to our sexuality. Not on the fleshly level, but how we show up in our voice, how we express our thoughts, how we show up in our embodiment is all deeply connected. But when, again, nuances and spectrums, when people are only operating from greed, from control, from objectification, then it could be a different. It's not about connection. It's about objectification. And. Absolutely. And it's not just here. I've watched so many documentaries. There's a beautiful movie called Sold. It's about, you know, a woman. I believe it was in. In the Middle east or in India, where her mother sold her. You know, her mother sold her into prostitution. There's a documentary called Whores Glory, and it's about prostitution from three different lenses. I think one was Thailand, one was Bangladesh, and one was Mexico. The one in Thailand was a very empowered perspective where it showed where when women could go, like, it literally showed them walking in, they do their prayers, they go get their makeup done. It was a very, you know, communal environment. They supported each other. But the heartbreaking one for me was Bangladesh, where you had girls who were 12 and 13 years old being sold into brothels by their mother and then end up servicing 10 men a day. And there was a young girl who said, it broke my heart. She goes, is this the birthright of a woman? Can you imagine at 12 years old already saying, is this the path and the birthright of being a woman? So I believe the more we have conversations about these things and not avoid them, we can get to solutions that look like integrating the empowering aspects of these things. And so what, we can cut down on the control and the greed and the objectification?

Absolutely, yes. There is a movie I. An Indian movie I saw recently called Gangubai. And it's the story of this, a real story that actually happened in India. This young girl was sold into trafficking by her husband. She went into Mumbai thinking she was gonna be a Bollywood star. He sold her to a barath. And within that first year, she realized she. If she was going to get out of here, she needed to become, like, the master. So it's like her story of, like, hardening and then becoming the madame of this brothel and then managing multiple brothels and then becoming, like, the mayor of that area and then becoming this, like, politician who eventually went on to speak to the prime minister of India to try to legalize prostitution. And her say on this was, if it's legalized, then there won't be girls who were forced into this like I was. There would be people who could choose. And another thing that she said, that was an interesting perspective I've never heard before. And I'm curious your take on this. She said if prostitution is made illegal, there could be more rape. Because she said that this can alleviate some of the sexual desires of men in, like, a safe and consensual way. And I had just never heard that, that bringing that together. I don't know if this is like, a common argument that is in the industry.

You know, it's fascinating to me. And I'm just gonna put it all out there. When I was a worker, you know, I live here in Georgia, I had a high percentage of my clientele who were Indian. Okay, I did. I was fascinated that people who invented the Kama Sutra, etc, were so sexually repressed. Yes. And I think, again, sex being a taboo topic increases repression within people. And then when they're repressed, they have to find outlets to safely express these things. You know, I had clients. I had. I remember to this day, I had this client who was an Indian man. And more than anything, he just wanted to come in and just say, I love you. Like, it was almost. It was scary to me because I had. I had very good boundaries as a worker. But he would literally get up off the table and he would, like, grab me by the shoulders. He'd be like. At that time, my name was Danny. He was like, danny, I love you. I love you, I love you, I love you. Just tell me you love me. Just. His wife was emotionally avoidant, and she was just very stoic. And he wanted nothing just to be more than. So I think when we look at what is repressed within people, we can understand how they show up and why they might need these spaces. And I think, too, when we speak about places, you know, like India and the Middle east, we have to understand that women's embodiment is very repressed there. I literally one time had someone who's Indian, and she's a worker, not a worker, but she's a spiritual worker. And she felt deep shame because one of her photos, which was fully clothed, showed up on this, like, this page for Indian men, for very sexy women. But it wasn't to me, when I saw. I was like, this is not even. This is not even like that risque. But what we recognize is that there are certain codes for women and levels of which they can express their embodiment. So all this repression's going on. Of course there's going to be so much rape. I mean, there's so much rape in India. There's so much rape in South Africa. You know, it is happening because people. People are repressed. People are being shamed, you know, and again, we can. We have to ask ourselves, how much is it because women have not been able to claim their sovereignty, claim their sexuality, also have boundaries with it. And again, we have to ask, in some of these places, how much are women still objectified? Not even in the sense of sexuality, but in their duty and their honor to their husband. We can look at those Places and be like, oh, you're an object of your husband. So of course, if you're an object or a possession of someone and your identity is tied to that, of course they're going to think that they are allowed to do anything with you. And I think we have to understand, too, rape is just not for strangers. There are women that are forced against their will, even in relationships. And that doesn't. That doesn't give allowance just because someone is your husband, just because someone is your partner. No, it's not. No. So I think it's the bigger topic of why are we avoiding having these conversations and why are we avoiding allowing people our larger embodiment? And I think we're seeing that, you know, with Iran right now, women and girls have had enough, and it's beautiful to witness. Right now we are at a. Was it like the. What's the word? The turning of the tides, and women are rising. And I. I feel like finally, in places of the world where women are still deeply repressed, like, we are seeing that sacred rage of the divine dark feminine rise up and say, enough. And I don't know about you, I'm really grateful to be alive to see it and to be a part of it.

Yeah, absolutely. You know, I think in these cultures, it's not. It's. Yeah, we have to look at the whole context of the fact that women are not seen as equal. Women's wombs are seen as commodities. Women are even legally in Iran considered half of a man. So, like, for every two female witnesses, you just have one male witness, you know, like, because a woman's worth is only half. So of course, the way that they show up in sex work is gonna, like, hyper. This sentiment that you are my possession. On top of that, when it comes to something, sex work, that's transactional. I think we see often the most disgusting behaviors, you know, because they. They feel like oftentimes these men too, especially living in India, who would go to these types of places. Because I. My whole life, I've been very interested in helping women leave sex trafficking. And often it was the men who felt abused. During their days, they worked as servants for people, they were drivers for people. They were working at hotels. So all day they had someone else telling them what to do, what to do, what to do. And had to be like, yes or yes or yes. And then finally, when they were with a woman, they could be powerful and have dominance over someone. And then this poor woman would often be, like, the victim of this. Of this rage. So it's a larger topic. It's like looking at the caste system and like, why. Why are some of these men basically feeling like the bitch of other men and then needing to, to have dominance over women? And I think that, that it's, I guess places like Amsterdam, you know, are an example of sex work being done in an empowered way, that these women are, are choosing to be there. They are independent and of age. But yeah, I think this, this larger conversation, I think why sex work is an important piece of it is it's because it's like to see someone empowered in sex work is like the polar opposite of the oppression, you know, And I think it's still so hard for us to even fathom of how it could be possible to. So I'm so grateful that you are open and sharing about your experiences because I do think we need to hear more from people who have been in this work rather than just like assuming from our own assumptions.

Yeah. And, you know, I think it is so powerful what you just said about how you witnessed it in India, especially, like you said, where these men who, who feel, who feel powerless or might feel purposeless and then they, they get to be in a dynamic where they get to express their rage and their anger and take it out. Right. Again, I think it's so interesting. That's just the cycle, I think, of life too. There's sons of people who have been victimized, who have been hurt, who have felt powerless, felt purposeless, and they, and they turn into, they turn into the extreme side of their shadow or the. On the imbalanced, toxic masculine. And that's, that's not limited to men. I see, I see women do it all the time too. We. I was just having a conversation publicly about this viral moment that's going on right now with this low vibration plate with Coach Stormy. Someone brought up that, you know, a lot of women at this time are still enjoying some of their coaches being dominatrixes or their coaches being sadists. And there's this desire where people want to be talked to in a way that's still a little bit demeaning, but it's that tough like people, because again, a lot of people too are into masochism and they're, they're into their own suffering and they're into their own humiliation and they're, they're attached to it. So we have to have a lot of these conversations. And I think it's so fascinating. Again, like when you were talking about your experience with workers in India, mine was a completely opposite, like Sex work is where I got to develop my queendom. Meaning I dictated how my ads were run, meaning I was really. I was really adamant about my verbiage, my photos. When I talked to people on the phone, I had such fierce boundaries. So when they came into my queendom and they came into my domain, they were under my rule. I only had maybe like a handful of people whoever made me feel unsafe, but I was in complete control and they were in my submission when they were in my sacred space. And so it actually taught me a lot about my healthy masculine energy. I got to dictate the amount of money that I made, the respect that I required. If I didn't have respect, from the time someone was booking, they didn't see me. So I always tell people, again, that space in my life was actually preparing me for who I was to become as a spiritual practitioner. Because the way that I ran my business, doing that work is not much difference than how I run my business now.

Wow, that could be a really fascinating book. From sex work to spirit work and seeing the parallels between them.

And there's so many of us. There's so many of us now that, you know, are transitioning out. So usually I work with a lot of women who want to get out and start a different business or do something else. I help girls stay in and be healthy and create fierce boundaries or goals, you know, because again, like, some people look down on that work, but, like, it's in the cards and it's in the destiny for some. Some of us, yeah.

I'm so curious to learn more about this cartography. Is that what you call it?

Cardology.

Cardology. Do you recommend anywhere to learn more about it?

Aquarius Maximus has a great page. Diamonds 8. Learn the cards. Those are always the ones I can remember off the top of my head. But yeah, cardiology increasingly fascinates me. Like I'm a five of spades, and my father was a three of diamonds man. My ex husband was actually a three of diamonds man. And my current partner is a three of diamonds. And then I recently found out that my mom's karma card is a three of diamonds. So I looked at the synchronicities and the patterns sometimes of how people can show up in our lives and how they are connected to our karma or how they are connected to our. To our fate and to our expansions. So I think it's a fascinating system. It's a little overwhelming at times, but it's fascinating.

Do you have any Scorpio placements? Is that often related to sex work.

Yes. I have a Pisces north node in the eighth house, and my Venus is in Pisces in the eighth house. Okay. So, you know, I'm definitely someone who's connected to the realm of spirits and astral, but to me, it's more like a dark. I always tell people, like, I don't represent the aspect of Pisces that's like a koi. I said I'm the Kraken, not the koi. You know, kois are very, you know, on the surface and the fountain, and I'm like, deep at the dark bottom. So that's how I would describe, like, Pisces, but in the eights.

Love that. So fascinating. Well, you have shared so much wisdom and experience and stories with us today. I'm so grateful for you opening up. I think that this was prob. The first time that many people have ever even heard someone who has been in sex work and their experience and has transitioned into spirituality. So I just want to thank you for your vulnerability and courage for sharing that. I know that that can take a lot for people to be so open and you're so courageous. And where can people learn more from you, follow you on Instagram and be in your field?

Thank you. Www.thedrapwitch.com I have one on one offerings through there, and I have a few guides on there. So if anybody would like a sacred space holding. Like I said, I focus on shadow work, subconscious blockages, stigmas, addictions. You know, anything that just might be holding people back. You can book me through the trapwitch.com and then you can find me on instagram under the trapwitch. And I appreciate you, Ms. Sahara Rose, for having me on. It's been such an honor and a privilege. I never take lightly when people invite me into their space. Especially I'm a human design projector. I'm a splenic projector. So I'm a splenic projector too. Okay. What number are you? I'm six two four.

Six.

Okay. Yeah.

My husband is a splenic projector. Six' two.

Ah.

So, yeah. So thank you for extending the invitation.

The projector in me sees the projector in you.

Yes, absolutely. I appreciate you so much.

Thank you. I am so deeply grateful for her vulnerability and courage in sharing that experience. You know, so many people have a lot of shame if they have ever worked in the sex industry and never speak about it. And I really salute anyone who has been in this and is opening up, regardless of what their experience has been. I think that it's so important for us to speak openly about all forms of conversations. Otherwise it perpetrates in the shadow. And that's how we get the dominant patriarchal rape culture that we see around the world, because we don't talk about these things. So I encourage you to continue the conversation because every single person carries a unique code and unique understanding of this very complex topic that can be very, very dark, but also can be empowering, as Tatiana shared. So that was really interesting for me because I, I had really never heard someone give that perspective before. And I just encourage you to continue to be curious and talk to people from different walks of life and get curious about their stories and their backgrounds, because that's the only way that we grow by really exposing ourselves to totally different worldviews, even if it doesn't go with the norm that we, we have grown up associating ourselves with. So I hope you enjoyed this conversation and if you loved it, I would love for you to leave a review for this podcast. It helps more people find it and as a free gift, I will send you the first half of my unreleased book, Eat Right for your Mind Body Type, which is all about Ayurveda and how to apply ayurvedic nutrition and wisdom into your life. So this talks about the Doshas, nutrition, self care and so much more. And all you gotta do do is just leave a review for this podcast and it really helps, you know, spread the word because I've never done really any marketing for this before. It's all been from word of mouth and I deeply appreciate your just sharing it and passing along to someone who might be interested in these types of conversations. So again, leave a review for the podcast, take a screenshot of it before you hit that submit button and email it over to me@saharaiam sahararose.com and you can find that link in that email email in the show notes. I'm so grateful to be connected with you and I'll see you on the next episode.

Sa.