Gordon: Welcome back to Existential Tetherball. Rachel Fell and I are here with you today to ⁓ explore worlds within words and words within worlds. ⁓ so glad that you're listening and participating. ⁓ and ⁓ so please feel free to add your comments, offer your perspectives. ⁓ we intend for this to be a jumping off point for curiosity and multiple perspectives. How's it going, Ray? Rachel: Absolutely. ⁓ it's going all right, Gordon. It's good to see you. It's been a minute. Gordon: It's been a minute, yeah. I was traveling, doing stuff and came back and now I'm like packing up my house and moving to a different house. ⁓ and so there's like a there's a whole lot going on in in my life right now and it seemed like we it's been too long, Rachel. It's been too long. Rachel: Yeah. Mm. ⁓ would you say you find yourself in a liminal space? Gordon: ⁓ I I'd say I'm like preliminary, liminal, and perhaps post liminary in some other ways. Rachel: Sure. I mean, I feel like I'm living all three of those all the time. I feel you. ⁓ yeah. Yeah, yeah. There's Yep, there's my ⁓ attempt at being clever and just sliding right into today's tether, which is liminal or liminality. when we were Gordon: So that that's but that's the word, right? That's where we're we're s that's where we're stepping into today. Rachel: Catching up and chatting and texting, you sent me three options ⁓ for today's conversation. And they were in no particular order. I just want to revisit transition, liminality, and wilderness. Yeah. And in some ways, all three of those relate, of course. ⁓ like you, I'm returning from an adventure, from some travel, and ⁓ you know, being this way. you know, finding myself in all three of those states all the time. But yeah, this liminality, this exploration of the in between. ⁓ I love that this is what we settled on for today. It's a good one. Gordon: Yeah, there's there's there's ⁓ so ⁓ we'll get to definitions here in a minute, but I I'll just kinda throw an antonym out here that ⁓ that the like the anti liminal ⁓ is the arrived. It's like a completion, it's fixed. ⁓ we yeah, it's it's a f it's a it's a completion. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Mm hmm, mm-hmm, mm-hmm. yeah, to feet in the same place, not moving. me writing haiku is not on my bingo car, but maybe. ⁓ yeah, yeah, there's always this like ⁓ temptation to dive in ⁓ etymologically, look at external definitions. Of course I have my own definition Gordon: Are you riding a haiku now? This is amazing. Ha ha ha. Rachel: ⁓ meaning around the word, just like everybody has their own, you know, meaning and definitions around words. ⁓ but a threshold, an in-between state. ⁓ and then I thought this part fascinating when I was diving into the different diff dictionary definitions. Sensory or metaphorical in nature. So perhaps less physical in its definition, more psychic, evolutionary. Gordon: Mm. Rachel: ecosystemic, visceral, ⁓ some sort of in-between place or state, ⁓ evocative of like movement and of perception that's not immediately physical. And I was like, ooh, that's a fun wrinkle, or I I I, you know, I mean, maybe that's imbued in the definition internally, but to see it reflected externally, I was like, ooh, that's fun. Rubs hands together. Gordon: ⁓ That is fun. I'm so glad that you're narrating for the ⁓ for the Spotify listeners. who may not be able to see you rub those hands together. I I first encountered or came to a depth of feeling this word when I was in ⁓ in college. ⁓ as an English major in college. UmreSocial Life. and Rachel: Ha ha ha Gordon: I was in I had a concentration in Middle English, and one of the texts that we studied was Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. And in that story, as in so many ⁓ stories throughout the canon, ⁓ there is this period in the wilderness ⁓ that ⁓ is the liminality of Gawain's experience, ⁓ as he's moving from what he was to what he will be. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Beautiful. Yeah. And ⁓ I love that he is the subject of that liminality. ⁓ you know, it's it's there is something about that sensory or that metaphorical or that I think when you were sharing definition a definition that you found barely perceptible was what you had found, right? And so it's like, Is it always in reference to one's, you know, internal, subjective, less perhaps cognitive, more, you know, intuitive, these sort of ⁓ visceral psychic experiences that we have in in our in our inner world? liminality, let's say we're traveling together physically. Okay. Physically, we're on a plane. The plane is in the air. Gordon: Okay, physically. Rachel: And it's begun its descent, moving through space and time, not where it was, not yet where it's going to be, but in this liminal state of descent. That would that ring as liminal for you in your experience? What's what's your what's your relationship with plane landings or takeoffs? Gordon: It can and and I've got stories. ⁓ the the the focus of it being about ⁓ change, about moving from one place to another, about being in between thirty six thousand feet and tarmac. is at one level it this is kinda hard to talk about because we we, ⁓ the the the the royal we ⁓ tend to treat ⁓ reality as though it were like a series of moments versus like this flowing river of time and experience. ⁓ And so at one level, everything's in between all the time. But there's no not in between. So it's it I I I I I immediately kind of get a little like Rachel: Yeah. Gordon: lost in my own wilderness sauce over here, ⁓ around how to explore the liminal in a way that feels like it's separate from something else. Rachel: Right, right. Separate, contained, ⁓ as distinct from location. I love this question, where am I now? It's a question I come back to often and I use a lot in my client work and I use to orient myself as a being with, you know, who's, you know, configured in this sort of odd DHD, you know, ⁓ everything everywhere all at once kind of way, right? And the the register of a liminal state or place, ⁓ completion anticipation. It sort of has a way for me of oddly enough grounding me in like space and time, ⁓ because there is this really interesting sort of like overlap of, you know, two, let's say, discrete places. I'm in the air, I'm on the tarmac. Gordon: Mm. Rachel: I really appreciate and love those liminal states and places ⁓ as a way to orient myself in space and time. ⁓ not that they need to be named or defined, it's more like it registers as a location, if that makes sense. Gordon: Yeah. Yeah, so like ⁓ when you're asking yourself, Where am I now? What's a what's what's an example of an answer to that question? Rachel: Sure. where am I now? can answer it so many ways. I am sitting in my corner office chair speaking with Gordon on our podcast. I am in a state of heightened emotional awareness coming into our podcast. That emotional state has changed since we began chatting. ⁓ I am Feeling my physical body and I am speaking pretty freely without a lot of reservation. That's another place, that's where I am. I am uncertain as to what will happen with the rest of my day once we're done with our conversation here. Gordon: Yeah, so this location, this where is yeah, coming at it from all of these different through these different layers of your experience, ⁓ from from the physical all the way to the psychic ecological. Yeah. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And liminality has a really interesting opportunity, it presents us with a really interesting opportunity, I think, to play with that. ⁓ location-based ⁓ self-inquiry or meta-awareness, which I really appreciate. ⁓ something about not being so, let's say, fixed. ⁓ not that being in the air or being at the tarmac is specifically fixed, but in the process of state change externally has a way of for me at least promoting a certain sort of ⁓ in like a like an awareness with that sort of where am I now question. ⁓ you know, tuning in with and to the self. It's almost like physical liminality is a cue at some level to go within and to take that sort of inventory of state. Gordon: Yeah, and the the idea that when we're talking about the liminal, we're talking about the the barely perceptible, ⁓ from that technical ⁓ utilization of it, ⁓ and then to expand it into something more about psychology and consciousness, ⁓ that that perceptivity could be equated with awareness, and that ⁓ when I return my awareness to where am I now, ⁓ The pin gets dropped and I can name a space. ⁓ there's another one to come, and I don't know what lies between them, but there is something discrete and defined there, I hear you. Rachel: Yeah, it ⁓ it reminds me essentially as you're saying that, it's kind of putting this together for me as I'm listening, is like I am discreet and defined. So I can contain ⁓ my awareness, I can check in with myself, that physical liminality in the external world, ⁓ promoting a sort of yeah, like psychic and internal awareness of my own state, which is like a sort of coalescing. ⁓ where it gets really interesting for me personally is the other direction, which may be which may be, you know, ⁓ maybe not more difficult for everybody, but I think it's certainly more difficult for me. Gordon: Well why do you suppose that is? Rachel: Yeah. ⁓ As within, so without, as without, so within. So like the liminality externally cues a sort of like coalescing around state, which then brings me into a certain kind of like agency, which is awesome. If it begins in the psychic and in the deep psyche, then there is an agency in the external. It goes the other direction, right? And so that maybe being Gordon: Mm, I see. Rachel: more of that individuation or that becoming elder that we've spoke about in previous episodes, right? Where it's like if I become aware of a liminality in my psyche, in myself, in my internal experience, then there is this like follow on to move with that in the external, let's say. Gordon: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Rachel: Yeah, a responsibility to bring the formless into form, let's say. Or an opportunity. Yeah. Gordon: Yeah, and it it's a it's an acknowledgement of ⁓ dynamism ⁓ in in life. ⁓ it reminds me of of a couple of our recent conversations. One about ⁓ letting go of the riverbank in a time of great change, ⁓ from that Hobie Elders piece, and that is to like very intentionally enter the liminal, ⁓ and enter a place of uncertainty and ⁓ Confusion. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yeah. And that being a skill of its own, ⁓ that I wonder, you know, ⁓ we're really the royal we as having this orientation to control, to stillness, to, you know, fix fixed, ⁓ fixed knowing, certainty, ⁓ having it all together, ⁓ fear of dynamism, ⁓ you know, the river as a lack of control. ⁓ do I trust that I can survive this rushing river if I let go? ⁓ I always really appreciate the metaphor of like the the dance of being influenced and influencing like a kayer. You know, you're the kayak and you're going it's like, do you fight the rapids? Do you go with the rapids? When is it too much? When do you pull off into an embankment? What do you do when it takes you and you don't have control anymore? How do you navigate that situation? So You know, internal, that that sort of deeper psychic liminality is a really interesting space to explore, but I think there is a little bit of discomfort in that sort of external reflection or taking that psychic liminality into physical because you're basically going the other direction. You're like unmooring a static or controlled or the status quo existence in the external with a liminality that's coming from this deeper formless place. Gordon: Hmm. This deeper formless place that is at the heart of existential being. It's at the heart of everything we're we're talking about here. ⁓ and and yeah, there's there's ⁓ a simple way of saying it is acknowledging that we are in a constant state of change. and that if Rachel: Yeah. Gordon: We are willing to acknowledge the liminal spaces, ⁓ and and to some degree accept being in that ⁓ uncertainty, that we we gain agency. Like, ⁓ okay, ⁓ to use your kayaking example, ⁓ a very wise ⁓ professional boater once said to me that if you're in a kayak on the river. Rachel: Yes. Gordon: Keep your eyes on where you want to go because if you're staring at the places where the th bad things might happen, you will end up there. ⁓ and it just spoke to this agency ⁓ and uncertainty. Rachel: Yeah. Mm. Yeah, I love that. I love that. Attention and intention as very powerful forces unto themselves without having to, you know, you this precedes the physicality, the musk the muscling, the musculature, the like actual physical movement. And so even now you're you're evoking the liminal ⁓ between that deep inner space of recognizing. Gordon: So Rachel: a call for shift or change or may perhaps even a call for ⁓ tension and intention and then the physical movement or expression or like you know the the the corporeal being doing what it's gonna do that you know this this idea of like where we're pointed has a lot of power ⁓ in navigating change shift evolution dynamism i love that so much yeah Beautiful. Beautiful. Gordon: Yeah and ⁓ it it it comes to mind that ⁓ so I I was recently traveling and in some ways for me it was kind of like a bookend, like I've been doing a lot of travel for about five years, and am now changing my circumstances so I'm a lot less likely to travel for the next several years. ⁓ at least not to any degree like I have been. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Gordon: And one of the ways I've been talking to myself and others about it is that I am ending my travel era and entering my country gentleman era. And so I'm describing these states, and neither is like my travel era. It's not like that's the only thing that happened. ⁓ and then there's this imagined future state. and I am somewhere between those shores. Rachel: Ha Yes. Beautiful. And that has everything to do with your intention and attention. Yeah. Gordon: Yes. Yeah, it's all very chosen. Rachel: All very chosen. And I think that's where it gets really interesting with going into these deeper waters of the, you know, let's come back to liminal, the deeper waters of the subliminal subliminal, the subconscious. ⁓ that imperceptible learning to be with and perceive what was what maybe many would call imperceptible. Gordon: Imperceptible. Rachel: But you know, as best I can ascertain from everything you've shared with me, you are honoring a call from within. The the the call is coming from inside the house to to move into your southern gentleman era. Gordon: Yeah. And and i I I like that I haven't tried to define that. I ⁓ Rachel: Fair. Gordon: Did get a new suit jacket. Rachel: Ha ha ha ⁓ Gordon: I also am like gonna I just am now going to spend a lot more time ⁓ on some land nearby ⁓ in the forest and increase the quiet in my life. ⁓ not knowing what effects that will have, but feeling like to your point, the call ⁓ to move in that direction. that while there's something subliminal, there is also something liminal in that it is barely perceptible, ⁓ that is directional. ⁓ yeah, I guess which is which is pretty interesting, because that liminal can also be wilderness where you are lost ⁓ and the only reason you're there is because you're trying to become something or go somewhere. Rachel: Right, right. Well now we're talking about the very generative work of learning skills to go within, which you know, traditionally sit in the realm of therapy, but certainly don't have to only sit in the realm of therapy in terms of like embodied witness, embodied meta awareness, and really like participating in one's own life book of life, you know, sort of co-creating with what is moving through us through space and time. So you're honoring a call that's coming from deep within the house. Your uncertainty tolerance has been calibrated and honed. And like you've worked on that to such a degree that you can say, all right, I'm in this liminal space of like, it was travel and move around. And that was my sort of like priority or that, you know, in terms of like what I'm really orienting to on the horizon line, it's new experiences and new physical places. There is now a call to perhaps knock that down a peg or two, not that it won't exist, but that to be in place and to commit to place ⁓ is really what is actually the priority now. ⁓ and to honor that internal evolution, which, you know, is it can be really subtle. Like so to develop those skills of listening within, you know, I think we both work with folks oftentimes who are navigating life transitions. There's a desire for something more or different or like there's a call for a shift. I don't know who I'm becoming. I don't know where my work is going. And so to really get deeper into that, you know, I'll go ahead and say it's sublime, deep inner space. that can nudge us in certain directions to develop this skills to really listen and witness to that space. Witness that space. ⁓ and then to work with it. Yeah. Gordon: Yeah, yeah, and I I I love what you're saying. That one of the the the pushes toward that the more sublime and liminal space was that sense of this is not enough or there has to be more. ⁓ that there's the call. The call is to to find more depth ⁓ and more connection to your own life. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that it's almost like for me, I don't know if this registers for you, G, but like the further I go, the more subtle it gets. And to get underneath, you know, I'll I'll bring back our friend neurocomplexity and neurodivergence into the ⁓ to the party here. You know, if we look at the function of neurodiversity, Gordon: Yeah. Rachel: Evolutionarily speaking, I forget who the author of this book is, and I I really need to not forget because I reference this often, and I think it's really a really powerful ⁓ frame is that you know, neurodiversity as an extension of biodiversity exists because we do have different functions or different roles. So in a hunter-gatherer society that develops agriculture and decides to stop and stay in place, you know, we are going to kind of build. ⁓ physically, we're going to erect walls and buildings and structures. And who is tending to outside the walls? Who is tending to exploration? ⁓ you know, a sort of a neurodivergent configuration that is more geared to exploration as a very real function of biodiversity. and how does that play with conditioning, with trauma, with actual safety, with the constraints of like modern society? And so to play with that, you know, I know that I'm definitely more I've got that exploratory energy in me. ⁓ but to steward that in a way that is really both conscious and not controlling, but to deepen into the subtlety of what that where that can take me ⁓ in acceptance is a really fascinating journey of its own. you know, in terms of like now we're talking about like you know, there's there's the the journey and then there is this like journey in that psychic inner space. ⁓ so for me it gets more and more subtle the further you go. yeah, but what does exploration, you know, what does more mean? What does different mean at this time? ⁓ that itself is a really fascinating liminal space. Gordon: Mm. ⁓ it is. My my thoughts are like ⁓ e eclipsing each other in rapid succession, so it's hard to organize them in the moment. You did it! Rachel: Well, my work is done here. I did it. ⁓ Gordon: ⁓ but the w the one of the central ideas to what you were just saying is that the dissonance or the friction of like ⁓ son ⁓ I'm not this isn't this isn't it. ⁓ th that that discomfort ⁓ becomes a enters our attention and then we if once we notice it we give it more attention. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Gordon: ⁓ and so that dissonance becomes a path of sorts. ⁓ and it's through that exploration, through the liminal space from not having considered this dissonance or not having experienced it, to having it change or resolve that is what I'm hearing from you. Rachel: Yes, yes. Mm-hmm. Absolutely. Absolutely. So that asks us, well, it requires us to develop a relationship with emotion that is not judgmental. Okay, that sounds real simple for me to say, but most of us are ingratiated and conditioned with an emotional interface that is very wound up with judgment and safety. So to actually, you know, what is the value of developing embodied metacognition. You know, I always joke that meditation has a marketing problem in the West, and it does. ⁓ because like what are we doing here? And a lot of people need that sort of rationale to engage with something that's going to be uncomfortable. And not everybody engages it the same way. Sometimes we need to start with movement. Sometimes we need to start, you know, there's all sorts of entry points to developing that embodied awareness. ⁓ But really Emotion is energy in motion as a biochemical, bioelectrical cascade. So when I'm frustrated or I'm agitated, that's actually the movement of the river trying to go somewhere. That it's, you know, you watch my neural pathways under a microscope and you're gonna see them like trying to go somewhere and not knowing and reaching and trying to figure it out, trying to go somewhere, right? The energy wants to flow, it wants to move, right? Yeah, it's fascinating stuff. So as a as a first skill, ⁓ or as an essential skill in this sort of going into the liminal within, I feel like we really have to develop that, you know, sort of embodied emotional awareness that sits beneath judgment and to be able to just feel it's like I feel agitation, I feel frustration. Gordon: Yeah, this is information. Rachel: It's information, it's good warm data. Literal. Gordon: Mm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And and the the as you were talking, I was thinking that there's that part of you that is has an impulse to greater freedom and greater autonomy and greater agency in your own life and the impulse to connection. and so ⁓ squaring that circle ⁓ is an ongoing process. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Gordon: ⁓ as far as from within to without. But if we keep it within and we talk about this connection to self, ⁓ this like internal secure attachment to self, then it it requires self-awareness. And then some degree of self-acceptance or self-compassion, at least inquiry without judgment. Rachel: Right. Yeah. Inquiry, yeah. Gordon: And and then from there we get to places where we can ⁓ execute some sort of agency ⁓ to to advocate for getting to the other shore. Rachel: Yeah. Yeah. And sometimes that might look like agents developing actual embodied cognitive sovereignty, like to recognize, you know, we talk a lot about patterns in the work that we do, right? Or like it's like choose your next thought, experience your next thought. It's like, you know, it's it's it this can also be very much a process deep within. And so where am I now? I'll go ahead and just be a weirdo publicly. I'm getting better and better at that, I think. More and more comfortable with it at least, if not better. that there is a certain sort of felt sense of where my actual awareness is in terms of my midline, in terms of my physical body. You know, the deeper you get into the subconscious, the more you get communication that is nonlinear or more simple, or you know, when we talk about like what is intuition, what you know, the body subconscious, that it's not some sort of like floating entity separate, ⁓ disconnected from corporeal form. And that, you know, there's four thousand questions we can ask and explore about that. But in my own personal experience, I can kind of traverse different levels or layers of processing in my own physical body mind. And watch where they come into congruence, where they where they kind of clash, where that is, you know, that dis where is this dissonance coming from internally? ⁓ you know, my my left brain may be saying X and my deep, you know, primal lizard brain, safety circuits, neurosception may be saying y. And then there's even a deeper place in my gut flora and physicality that's saying something else. And can I learn to include all of those things and be with those things in a way where you know, things do move around and I do really work with the depth of all that warm data that's available to me. ⁓ if you would have told me, if you had time travel 2026, Rachel, back to 2020 2016, Rachel, she'd be like, What are you talking about? You sound like a crazy person. ⁓ and now it's a very different thing. There is this sort of facility with that internal liminality or that internal dissonance or th that in-between space where it is coming into alignment. It is coming into connection. in its distinction. ⁓ yeah, yeah. I hope I hope that made some semblance of sense. Gordon: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. It does and and and so the the the distance you've you're traversing is from kind of conventional notions of what's acceptable, what ⁓ what's going to keep me safe and okay and connected and give me what I want ⁓ versus this sense of ⁓ to get what I want, I'm going to actually have to go through these change processes. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Gordon: And in your case, ⁓ and maybe other people's cases who can say, we become more and more unconventional over time, ⁓ in that we're less attached to this one model of how to find what we need, and are willing to enter these liminal spaces to get closer to whatever's being signaled from that visceral sense within. Rachel: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that, you know, there may be multiple levels or layers of visceral sense, you know, human process. I find it fascinating that not just a human fetus, but like life often begins and replicates in a self-similar along the midline kind of fashion. Right. And so, ⁓ I think it was Laura, ⁓ we had on the podcast ⁓ pretty early on in our journey, ⁓ who was speaking about the vagus nerve very much as in a spiritual way. ⁓ and here we are, right back at that, right? Where it's sort of like learning to be where am I now? I'm in my I feel myself, I feel, you know, I'm here, I'm here, I'm here. You know, it's like to consciously cultivate that relationship with mind and matter, not thought and matter, but mind and matter. ⁓ yeah, what can that do for our capacity? capacities to work with the liminality inside of us or the dissonance inside of us, right? It's like to come into real and true alignment. And so words like unmasking or masking as a binary, right? Immediately I'm like, like it's choice. You know, it's a deepening relationship with listening and witnessing in your own warm data. And then like, what am I going to choose in this moment? ⁓ yeah. And our buddy Victor Frankel enters the chat, right? And between stimulus and response, there's a choice. Gordon: Mm-hmm. Yes. And in that choice lies one's freedom and something else? Rachel: Yeah. Probably something about meaning. Gordon: He was searching for it. Rachel: Yeah. ⁓ meaning has the meaning you give it, right? And so yeah, now we're into like, you know, positive disintegration, recalibration of values, sort of like who am I becoming kind of territory. Gordon: So and and yeah, and within that, so when we're talking about liminality, sometimes it's like, ⁓ this feels like shit. Like I have actively I'm actively experiencing a disintegration of an identity or a way of being, and and and it the experience of it is really unpleasant. Alternately, there's also these liminal experiences that are not necessarily unpleasant at all. They can be fairly pleasant, ⁓ ⁓ I think of like someone who's decided to ⁓ express their creativity more thoroughly. ⁓ that through that process, not that there aren't some breakers you have to swim through in regard to your own fear, but the payoff is so massive when you get into flow that it draws you it just draws you further. ⁓ so there's a pleasantness to it. So yeah, I guess that's an important. Rachel: Sure. Yeah. Gordon: piece, I guess, of liminality is that it is it it's not one particular mood tone. Rachel: No, definitely not. And some pe for some people, right, back to that sort of like immovability is safety. You know, the status quo is safety. ⁓ control is safety. There's a I wish I could say this in a different way, but I'm just gonna say it this way. Like, there's a grossness in in the sense that it's like very wide tooth comb. It's like ⁓ same equals good, change equals bad. Right. And that is ⁓ you know, in in a neurosceptive sense, right? Good, bad, same, good, change, bad. But if we open that and kind of stretch that and turn that into a circle, right, and open that portal, it's like there's so much within that that we can actually not not just explore like cognitively or representationally, but physically, because you know, it's like this is an uncomfortable emotion. Okay. So let's not name the emotion right away. Like let's explore the actual language that, you know, come it does it is it prickly you know, all the stuff, right? Now we're into that like fun space of like the emotional interface where representational intelligence meets viscera. A word means something. What does it actually mean to you, you person, not dictionary, not you know, what you've been conditioned, right? Feelings wheel. ⁓ my god. Gordon: Feelings wheel. Yeah. Rachel: I I got a little beef with the feelings wheel. The feelings wheel is great. It's just like not the only thing. It's like a very small, you know, it it's attempting to do that. And it can when hell but it it's not sufficient. So it is this sort of like getting progressively more safe, let's say, body safety, with vis with visceral feeling, with what we might jump to a conclusion as discomfort, which it's like actually, ⁓ right? ⁓ and even that can be a liminal space. Like one person's excitement can be another person's fear. One person's one person's fear can also be their excitement. The nature of emotions is movement, right? And so we're back to this, you know, sort of analogy of the plane landing. It's like, well, I've been in the sky, and traditionally this has been fear. This discomfort has registers as unsafe. this discomfort has registered as like there's a fear-based response there. In the future, I would prefer to have like let develop a little bit more, let's say, like resilience when this things, this situation comes up. And I can learn to be in that liminal state of this is both, you know, unsafe, problematic, da-da-da, to this can be okay. This can actually be something different. And now we're talking about rewiring neurosception, which in oneself, which is like Jabrowski talked about auto psychotherapy. We're talking about auto fear circuit, messing with your fear circuits, which is yeah, it's it's real. Gordon: Hm and we're talking about the difference between chosen ⁓ change and unchosen change. ⁓ so so many liminal experiences are not necessarily as optional. ⁓ I get sick. Rachel: Beautiful. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Gordon: Get pregnant, ⁓ you're in on a bus on the way to a university for the first time. There's these places in our lives where it's the change is just kind of happening. Yeah, I made a choice to ⁓ in some cases, ⁓ but in some cases not. And what what where we kind of started ⁓ was like more in the depths of things, ⁓ where we're kind of Rachel: Mm-hmm. Gordon: Deeper and deeper into awareness because as the awareness grows, then the number of options to pursue liminal experience grows alongside it. And those unchosen liminal experiences are in some sense a training ground and an introduction to your own ⁓ flexibility and ability to weather ⁓ to weather the liminal. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yes. Frankel would be proud. ⁓ Yeah, I sure do. ⁓ yeah, I mean it's happening, it's happening in and through us at all these different levels all the time. Internal, external, internal, external, external. You know, where is the agency? How much agency is available to me? Where where back to where is the agency? ⁓ there is, in my experience. Gordon: Ha you think? ⁓ if I can Rachel: Always a space somewhere. Always a space somewhere. And so in that uncertainty, tolerance, relationship with change, relationship with evolution, that's evolved in and through me very much in my experience. ⁓ which is fascinating because you know I've I've mentioned the DHD part of my Aud a couple times, but when we talk about you know, that rigidity or that routine or that structural, that desire for that you know, that sameness, that, you know, is it possible to play with and calibrate that? Yes, if one wants to or we chooses to do that, absolutely, I believe that for sure. Do I also need and appreciate certain things that are predictable and safe and the same and comfortable? Absolutely, you know, being permeable, being sensitive, it's like there's an information overload in here all of the time. It's just it how it's how it is. It's it's at the even that's liminal, you know, having experiences of, you know, which for other people are probably more common. But like for me, I've had a handful of experiences of kind of going into overwhelm and going ⁓ quiet, you know, involuntary shutdown kind of thing. Gordon: Yeah, freeze freeze shutdown response, yeah. Rachel: Yeah, yeah. And I mean, I I think my nervous system has been for most of my life in sort of a functional freeze kind of place and is even calibrated to that. But I'm talking about like going nonverbal kind of thing, right? Where my body shuts down. The overwhelm is so much, right? ⁓ even that, you know, in that, do I have a choice to remove myself from the situation or bring myself into a place where I'm reducing information in ⁓ and finding a way to regulate with information energy out, right? Yeah, it's it's wild stuff how this exists on so many different planes, so many different ways of understanding. ⁓ but ultimately, yeah, I do feel like there is this this agency, these little spaces of agency available to us. ⁓ which Gordon: There are and here we are in this in this lifelong liminal experience between not being and not being. And all through it comes opportunity to expand awareness, expand capacity, and to come if one chooses to value a growth and expansion orientation. and if you're in that, then it's ever liminal because wherever you just decided where am I now is not where it's gonna be. ⁓ as as you continue to choose. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Yes. Right. Mm-hmm. Gordon: That direction. Rachel: Yeah. Maybe what I need for growth and expansion at this time for my own journey of becoming and becoming elder is to shift into more containment. Gordon: Wait, are you becoming elder? Rachel: I don't know, are you? ⁓ yeah. Well, you know, it's like it would be really easy to jump to growth expansion equals always movement, always travel. But something in you, I'm I'm just kind of throwing throwing you under the bus, putting you on the pedestal, some, you know, both at once here. ⁓ something in you is asking for more containment, more stillness, more sameness of place right now. More, you know, obviously you're shifting. Gordon: Yeah. What? Right. Yeah. Rachel: into you know Gordon: No, it's it's true, and and that ⁓ stillness is actually about ⁓ relationship and connectedness, but more to ecological and natural rhythms. Rachel: Yep, beautiful, beautiful, right? And so way to honor the liminal within yourself, Gordon Smith. Gordon: Yeah, and it's you know it's ⁓ the the limital's been so ⁓ romanticized in art and literature and ⁓ it's tends to be p kinda gauzy and ⁓ they're generally happy endings and ⁓ these these these paintings of this experience are ⁓ they're nice. They are nice. They feel nice. It's nice when the our hero goes into the wilderness and emerges better. ⁓ and not every liminal experience is necessarily an improvement, at least not directly. it's a change. ⁓ but I don't wanna ⁓ paint it too rosily. Rachel: Yeah. Yeah, that's That's a really important reflection. And I think what that does for, you know, as I hear you say those words, it's like, okay, yes. values at different levels and in different, you know, a deepening relationship, self and connection, self and becoming. Now we're in that co creative space where it's like, okay, this particular chapter of liminality. maybe asking me go to go through some really hard stuff. And what comes out on the other side, I can't necessarily control. I can influence, I can shape. ⁓ but that sort of when people say, you know, the word surrender used to bother me like crazy. ⁓ and my relationship with that word as a world, as a visceral thing, the reclamation of meaning through engagement, is changing. It's definitely changing. Gordon: Mm. Rachel: ⁓ but you know, I don't I don't find that being an overly controlled person is a good thing for who I want to become. Now, choice and agency is important. Those two things are different. you know, a completely passive, ⁓ completely be swept up by the river kind of existence ain't my bag either. Could that change in the future? Maybe. But at this time I want to be the kind of person who has a thoughtful conscious and sort of like capacity to work with agency in ever more like subtle ways. Yeah. Gordon: Yeah, yeah. To be in to be in your kayak on the river with a good with a good boat and a good paddle. ⁓ rather than just dropped into the river. yeah, this part makes me really think about d you know that the tale of the Chinese horseman? Rachel: Yeah, exactly. I don't think so. Gordon: Alright, ⁓ I'll try to I'll try to keep this short. There's this Chinese horseman. And ⁓ one day one morning the villagers all come pounding on his door and they say, Hey, your your your your horses have have gotten out and they go out and all the horses are gone. This guy's lost all of his horses, and everyone's bemoaning it. So terrible. And the Chinese horseman says, We'll see. Rachel: ⁓ yes, yes. Gordon: And the next day that herd of horses returns and it's brought with it a wild herd. And now the horseman has twice as many horses as he had before. And the villagers come to him and they say, ⁓ my gosh, what great good fortune you're having And he says, We'll see. Next day his son is trying to break one of those horses and is trying to ride it and gets thrown and breaks his leg. ⁓ I mean it's bad. Bones poking out. Villagers are all real sad about this. What a terrible, terrible thing to befall you and your son, and he says we'll see. And the next day the Chinese army comes to conscript all young men into the war to go fight the war. ⁓ and his son is real, real messed up with that broke leg, and so he doesn't have to go. ⁓ and again the great good fortune, and again we'll see. Rachel: Can't go. Right. Right there with the the relationship with judgment and good and bad and the trusting of the unfolding without needing too much Well, I guess just I'm I'm just taken to that relationship with judgment and, you know, neurosception. The body, you know, lizard, warm rock good, cold rock bad, except for if it's hot out, cold rock good, warm rock bad. You know? It's like the function of judgment and understanding our own, I'll call it sacred physiology, ⁓ but that sort of ability to hold what has been and what will be. Gordon: Yeah. Rachel: without it needing to mean too much in that in that judgmental kind of way, without needing too much of a story, without, you know, kind of being too reliant on that narrative or that representational intelligence, which like, hey, Maya Culpa, like you know, big ⁓ previously big fan of like an overuse of representational intelligence, learning all the time to live at that waterline place where like what emerges and what Gordon: Yeah. Rachel: I attend to and intend to, yeah, they come together and it's just like, can that just be what's present now? You know? ⁓ it there there's a the to me that's mastery. ⁓ to me to be able to live in that place. You know, your story that story illustrates it perfectly. Gordon: to be able to take what's barely perceptible, the liminal, ⁓ and deepen our perception, so what was barely perceptible becomes pretty damn perceptible. ⁓ and but there's another layer of barely perceptible. And that's gonna keep happening. ⁓ and we're just following the breadcrumbs ⁓ to it you know i i in a sense of agency we're following the breadcrumbs. Rachel: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yes. Gordon: to see where that takes us, and rather than from the back seat of our consciousness screaming, Are we there yet? ⁓ we can instead simply ⁓ be be in it. Rachel: Yeah. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. Turtles all the way down. Yes. Gordon: Hey turtles. Rachel: Like turtles. Gordon: Our fifty minute hour is up, by the way. ⁓ do you wanna reschedule for a future session? Rachel: ⁓ yeah, yeah, let me get back to you and and on when and you know, I I'm not sure what locus of focus will take us into next time but I I'm I'm down to do this again, yes. Gordon: Yeah. ⁓ yeah. Yeah, the hocus pocus locus focus would be a lot of fun. Mm-hmm. Rachel: Mm. I don't even know what just happened, but I liked it. a pleasure, Gordon. And I hope for those of us who joined us for the entirety of this ⁓ very liminal exploration that you ⁓ enjoyed something we found something interesting, provocative, ⁓ reflective of your own experience. ⁓ as always, we really appreciate and ⁓ would love feedback or any sort of thoughts or feelings you might have. And yeah, anything else before we hop off, Gee? Gordon: Yeah, you know, if you like it, go ahead and like it. If you wanna know when we do this again because we're kind of erratic about it, follow it. ⁓ please share it with anybody who you think might enjoy it. Turn it on when you're on a road trip with your with your family or friends and kind of see what it makes. ⁓ those are the things that I would hope. Rachel: Yeah. Yes, yes. ⁓ and if you're in a liminal state of being unsure about us, just just ⁓ yeah, check out next time. We'll see what happens. We'll see if it goes. No, absolutely not. Love it. Love it. Awesome. Bye. Gordon: Yeah, we're not sure about ourselves, you know, like stick we T B D. Okay, bye Rachel.