Cultivating Collective Sanctuary and ReBlooming After Trauma with Rachael Maddox

How do we become and grow ourselves into sanctuaries of health and wellness in a world of so much chaos and difficulty?  

This week I'm thrilled to talk with one of my teachers and mentors Rachael Maddox on how to cultivate collective sanctuary and post traumatic growth.

ThisListen below, or tune in via: Apple Podcasts,Stitcher or Spotify.

(complete audio transcript below)

This week I'm talking with Rachael Maddox,  a trauma resolution educator, coach and guide who’s helped hundreds of people resolve their sexual trauma and reclaim their pleasure, power, and wholeness.  We're jamming on what it takes to build sanctuary within and collectively. 

On a fierce mission to help as many humans as possible who’ve experienced trauma, Rachael teaches experienced coaches, therapists, and guides to work safely and powerfully with trauma in her magical, soulful ReBloom Coach Training.  I've been honored to be in her ReBloom Trauma Informed Coach Training program since last October, and it's been an incredible experience.

You can learn more about the ReBloom Coach Training  HERE. (early bird ends 9.15.20)  I highly recommend it!

Follow her on Insta HERE. (her feed is magic)

Join in the discussion on this episode and more in my free Facebook Group, Find Your Feminine Fire HERE.

Listen here or tune in via Apple Podcasts,Stitcher or Spotify.

Amanda Testa (00:01):

Hello, and welcome to the Find Your Feminine Fire podcast. I am your host, Amanda Testa. I am a Sex Love and relationship coach. And in this podcast, my guests and I talk sex love and relationships and everything that lights you up from the inside out.

Amanda Testa (00:19):

Welcome. Hello everyone. And Welcome to the Find Your Feminine Fire podcast. I am your host, Amanda Testa, and I'm thrilled today to be talking with Rachael Maddox, who is one of my mentors and she is trauma resolution educator. She's a coach and a guide, and she really works around helping, helping people move from trauma into pleasure and trust filled relationships and feeling empowered as well as really helping other leaders to be more trauma informed in their work and really changing the way they do their lives and work. So it's much more regenerative among many other things, but welcome Rachel, thank you for being here.

Rachael Maddox (01:00):

So happy to be here with you, Amanda.

Amanda Testa (01:02):

Yeah. And you know, as we are recording this episode, it's, you know, it's a crazy time in the world and there's fires going on. All the injustice being brought to light even more than ever and just a lot going on. So before we started recording, Rachael mentioned something that I thought was so beautiful talking about how we can become more, more strong in times like this. And you said it much more beautifully. So I want you to repeat what you said about becoming a sanctuary. Cause I think that's feel so relevant right now. Yeah.

Rachael Maddox (01:37):

Yeah. I've just been thinking about this a lot. It's something I've had to learn how to do in terms of working with trauma. Because when we work with trauma in individuals, or if we have groups over teaching groups, nervous systems can be really disregulated. And so one of the things that's really important around facilitating post traumatic growth is cultivating enough blueprint and health and resiliency and capacity in your own nervous system, cultivating a wide enough base of support so that when somebody comes to you with a lot of emergency, you're not thrown off by that. And in fact, your blueprint, your health your wellness because has a bigger momentum than their emergency. And so they fall into your momentum as opposed to you falling into theirs. So I'm thinking about that in terms of culture, how, and of course not one person can shift the momentum of culture.

Rachael Maddox (02:41):

So the question then becomes, how do we, how do we, and who is the we, and where are the we's? How do we become sanctuary? How do we become some kind of momentum of wellness, blueprint, cooperation, regeneration, which is making things healthier than they were before. How do we become those things together in a culture that is currently full of chaos, disregulation violence, emergencies, of course, injustices, who do we need to be together and not alone? How do we become sanctuaries together? And who do I have to be as an individual to be able to be part of a powerful collective sanctuary of wellness? So what, what ways do I have to tend to myself? Do I get to tend to myself, to my body, to my spirit, to my psyche, to my nervous system, to my heart, what are the ways I get to tend to myself so that I can find other people who are here to collaborate on sanctuary?

Amanda Testa (03:53):

That just feels what, when you just say that to even just the word, like creating that collective sanctuary, it's like, ahh, That feels so good. Yeah. Right. Yeah. And I love how you said get to like, we get to tend to ourselves.

Rachael Maddox (04:09):

Yeah. Well, the thing is, you know, there are a million things that are going wrong and they're all real, right? Like the stresses of COVID the stresses of Trump, the stresses of systemic injustices, environmental stresses, like they're so real. And many of us, not all of us, but many of us still have enough privilege and enough choice. Now the, the challenging thing is when our nervous systems are really stressed and jacked with traumatic fear, it actually reduces choice or reduces, excuse me, choiceless, or it reduces choice. And it increases choiceless ness because our reptilian brain hijacks our neocortex, which is our decision making part of our brain and our prefrontal cortex, which is the planning part that can say, Oh, even though I don't want to do this 20 minute or 10 minute practice in the morning, even though I'm resistant and tired and grumpy, if I do it, everything will be better.

Rachael Maddox (05:18):

It's the prefrontal cortex that can weigh consequences and make decisions. But if our reptilian brain, which is the part of our brain that gets hijacked by trauma is super activated. It actually decreases our access to our prefrontal cortex by like 75%. So that's why, I'm just kind of launching into random ideas here, but that's why trauma informed support and care is so helpful doing, having, doing work, to heal our nervous systems and to increase our capacity, our capacity, our nervous system capacity is so important because it's what gives us choice in times of stress.

Amanda Testa (05:59):

Yeah. I think that piece that you mentioned just about how the reptilian brain takes over, and I just read something recently, like when someone's under stress, it reduces your IQ. And then when it's like intense stress, it's like something like 40% reduction in your IQ. That makes so much sense. Right. And I think, . And I was just going to say, you know, I think when you, when you were mentioning, you know, just the whole trauma informed care in general, for people who might be listening and they're like, well, what exactly is a trauma resolution guide? What does that mean? I love if you would share a little bit more about that.

Rachael Maddox (06:35):

Yeah. Well, you know, I think especially today, all of us are experiencing things that we did not consent to. We didn't consent to COVID, we didn't consent to forest fires. We didn't consent. A lot of us didn't consent to our president, even maybe as a nation, we didn't consent our president and yet he's our president. So we're experiencing a lot of collective trauma. So whoever you are, whether you have a background of any kind of sexual violence, whether you have a background of maybe any kind of childhood neglect or not, we are all experiencing collective trauma. What it means to guide someone from trauma to trust, a trauma resolution guide, right, is to help somebody one first become aware of the experiences that they're having that are hijacking their nervous system or the experiences that they have had in the past that have hijacked their nervous system. And when we have, when our nervous system gets activated, we tend toward different responses, right? This is something everybody's heard of fight flight or, freeze or appease,

Rachael Maddox (07:46):

Right? To hyper socialize, to try to make someone else feel safe and comfortable so that they are less of a threat to you. So we develop these responses in our system, hyper arousal responses of hypervigilance, escaping situations, being really argumentative or combative, right, fight or flight or flight or fight hyper socialization, which is the appease, or hypo States we get into hypo States of free is depression, dissociation, chronic pain, chronic illness, exhaustion. Why bother, who cares numbness to your dissatisfaction purposelessness? These are all actually not our natural way of being. These are States that emerge when we've experienced something or many things that felt like they were too big, too much, too soon, too fast for our nervous systems to respond to in a healthy way. So instead we respond to them in these, with these trauma responses, but the trauma responses get stuck in our system until we complete them and get a sense that we can actually have a new future, have a new experience in relationship to ourselves, others or the world.

Rachael Maddox (09:09):

If we don't get a chance to renew the way we relate to ourselves, others and the world in a safe enough container that helps us regrow new neural pathways in the place where we've had traumatized neural pathways, then there's traumatized neural pathways, secretly run the show. They secretly run the show. So a trauma resolution guide helps you see whats secretly running the show and at the level of the body at the level of the somatic felt sense, nervous system shift, internal physiological patterns, so that you have more capacity for choice as opposed to reverting to these unconscious trauma responses.

Amanda Testa (09:52):

So beautiful. And I can just tell too, from in my own life of doing this work is just noticing so much more capacity to just handle things. And it's just so huge because I know I'm one that in my past tend to be like super hyper and anxious and do all the things and push myself beyond what's normal all the time. And thinking that was the normal way of being which many I know of listeners are, could probably relate to feeling that like constant push to like whatever, you know, that society tells us that that is required to be successful or to that, to, to get what you want or go out and like seize and all those terms that are just very counter, counter regenerative. Right? So learning that in myself, I think that's one of the things that I have noticed so much in doing and learning this work is just my capacity has shifted. And the way I view the world has shifted in the way I like live. Every part of my life is more aware of like, what is really regenerative for me? What is pushing it too much? Like when can I set stronger boundaries and really honor those,

Rachael Maddox (10:59):

Can I ask you a question about that? Like what it for you helped you get to that place of realizing I've been pushing too far too fast. And then how did you not just intellectually understand that, but in your body learn to know what your limits were and to stop when you reach them.

Amanda Testa (11:21):

Yeah. And I think there was a couple of times, like the first was after my daughter and I, my journey kind of began as just like really learning tools and supports that would help me and like going through certifications to learn more about sexuality and how that was affecting my life. And then realizing when I was going to build my business like that is when I started pulling in that, okay, I've got to like push myself beyond what's capable. Even though I was doing things to help myself, it was definitely not balanced. And I think what happened is the end of last year, just feeling really burned out and the lack of energy, lack of joy, like the things that I would normally do, wouldn't bring the same kind of response and just realize I needed to make some shifts. And so one of the things that I decided to do is like, really take a hard look at how I was doing my business and realizing this is really not serving me at all.

Amanda Testa (12:13):

Like I am pushing myself far too hard and, you know, taking all the business courses from these dudes that were like telling me to do all these things and didn't feel, didn't feel right. It burned me out. Like my body was literally like, you're done, here's going to take a break. So I have, I did that. And that's when I found like, that's when I started doing the Rebloom your business and all those things like started the Rebloom work. It was just like this huge breath of fresh air. It was like this literally like a balm for my whole system. Like, Oh, wait a minute. There is other ways to do this and have it work even better. Wonderful. Yeah. And the other thing I think too is, you know, you talk a lot about the collective support, which I think is so key.

Amanda Testa (12:58):

And I think that's something that, you know, especially now feels a little harder to get to for a lot of people. Cause we can't be in groups like we normally can. We can't like see people like we normally do, and that is hard. But I think, you know, even having virtual connections and spaces where that is available more often is part of the help, you know, even just like with our sessions and our meetings, like just having that collective with similar goals, like you say, creating that collective sanctuary so everyone can just like regulate together. Yeah. Feels so good that everything I love. Yeah.

Rachael Maddox (13:34):

Wonderful. Yeah. Yeah. It's wild. How many people in the personal development industry end up finding me, like burnt out on personal development. They're like, I went too far, whether it's like Tony Robbins style, like I, you know, pushed, pushed, pushed, and like my adrenals are shot now or whatever it is or right. Some kind of marketing type thing where, and I mean, I don't know, I've never done anything with Tony Robbins, so I don't really have a personal opinion, but, and anyway, that's a whole other story, but you know, this idea of extraction versus regeneration, so extraction is what takes from us or what takes from the natural source without giving back to it. Regeneration will is what takes with giving back twofold, right? And so we are a culture of extraction the way we do our farming industry. It's completely extractive. It's why, you know, we are having to pump all kinds of pesticides onto the food because the fields have been so extracted from that they can't naturally grow. They didn't get their natural crop rotation or season of rest. So I look at these big systems and I say, how are we doing this to ourselves? We are not those systems. Yes. We've been literally eating the fruits of those systems since we were children, but we are not them. We are wiser than that. We just have to remember who we really are. And it's a lot easier to remember with others than to remember

Amanda Testa (15:16):

By yourself. I love that. It's funny how you were talking about the crops and just in general. And my dad was actually grew up on a farm in South Georgia. And so he originally went to school for agricultural economics was, you know, gonna go back and like take over the farm and then realize like that just the way things were changing in small forms, weren't gonna make it. And like that whole area he grew up in has been devastated. Right. It's just that whole agribusiness like been so negative in so many ways. And so I think it's like finding, but you know, finding those pockets of when things feel overwhelming and you look around and you're like, what are we done to ourselves? Realizing like, well, let's figure out what we can do. Yeah. Cause I think that's what happens. I see what happens for me. And I also see what happens for people I talked to as like sometimes when things feel too much, it's like, then they're like, well, I don't even know what to do. So I'm just gonna like shut down.

Rachael Maddox (16:11):

Yeah. That's normal. I mean, I had a day like that yesterday with all the fires, I was just like, Holy crap. And you know, and it's, it's normal to get overwhelmed. It's absolutely normal. And the more you've been practicing, cultivating sanctuary in yourself and with others, the more you can bounce back. So it's not about being perfect. What, what is that? Who can be perfect in this world? No one it's not about perfection. It's not about never having feelings or never being affected or never getting down on your hope. No, this is a hard time. It's about bouncing back together. What are the structures, relationships, communities, rhythms, routines that you have in place that help you bounce back because we need people with heart to have bounce back. Right.

Amanda Testa (17:07):

And I think that's what you mentioned earlier too, when we were talking about the creating that collective environment and just also creating strong more strength within ourselves, you mentioned Harriet Tubman or, you know, you think about these people. There are people that do amazing things in times of intense stress. Right. Right. And I, I would love if you could speak to that a little bit more, because I sometimes think about that too. Like when days I feel really down on myself, but I'm like, there's just, there are people out there who have done amazing things and don't, don't put pressure on yourself. Like you have to do it all, but like, know that it is possible for one person to make a big change. And it can be little start, little, little things that you do, right. Yeah. Yeah. And I'd love to

Rachael Maddox (17:50):

Hear your thoughts on that. Well, what's coming up for me is in the very last chapter of my new book ReBloom that's one day coming out, I have the print proof, but I read the first 80 pages and I was like, Nope, gotta change some things. So, but the very last chapter is, is called the next world, coming to meet us from the other side. And it's about this sort of parallel possibility. You know, I have this theory, this secret theory I've been running in my head, which is that we're going to be experiencing like as the world progresses in the next decades. Yes. We will still be here. Okay. So that's the thing, first of all, we're still going to be here, but there's going to be massive evolutionary changes in how we look as humans. And there's going to be, I think, splits in the experience of what it looks and feels like to be a human, which is weird, but this is just my prediction.

Rachael Maddox (19:01):

My prediction is there's going to be these splits and there's going to be certain people who are creating sanctuary together against all odds. There's going to be, there's going to be utopia and dystopia coexisting. And of course the utopia is still going to be like crying about the dystopia and trying to change it and heal it and everything else. But this is my prediction. And what that makes me think of is this part of the very last chapter of the book, where I talk about, you know, in Peter Levine's Seminole book, Waking The Tiger, he tells this story about these kids, these like third graders who got kidnapped. Have you read the book? Yes. Remember this story? So I just think the story like touched me so deeply when I read it, there were these third graders who got kidnapped and they were all buried underground in a cellar or like, yeah, the seller was underground.

Rachael Maddox (19:49):

And then it was like buried into the earth and they were just left there to die. And it was like some, you know, 20 3rd graders or something like this. And a few of those kids decided they found spoons, they found metal spoons. And most of the kids were like starving and about to like fall asleep, like just kind of wither away. And a few of these kids found these little spoons and they were like, we're digging our way out. And you know, it was like two kids got the idea. They enrolled, whoever would, would help. And there was like four or five kids that helped. And the other 15 kids were like, Nope, we're going to die. But those kids dug the whole group out. And then those kids that dug, they went on to become CEOs, doctors, philanthropists, like they went on to have these lives that were of tremendous impact.

Rachael Maddox (20:45):

And the kids that didn't help dig went on to have significant PTSD. And so I feel like that's both like a warning and an invitation without, again, trying to put pressure on things because sometimes we collapse and we're like, I just can't do it. Right. And so what do we do in those moments? How do we, again, how do we receive what we need in those moments so that we don't completely collapse, but if you have it in you to dig at all, now's the time and we're going to make it through this portal, we're going to make it out the cellar. And we won't look the way we've looked before humans are gonna look very different, but we're either gonna make it out with super powers, posttraumatic growth superpowers, or a lot of traumatized physiology. So my goal, my life's fucking goal is to grow more and more and more people that have the capacity to dig themselves out. Because if, even if you tend to collapse, tend to hypo, which there's no shame, that's like a very normal thing that happens for a lot of people. You can still grow your capacity to lean into difficulty and to stay showing up and to stay present. So the more of us that have that capacity, the better off we'll all be. So that's my goal. That's my vision .

Amanda Testa (22:09):

That that's powerful. And I like, you know, even that visual of just the digging, because you think like, even if you just dig one spoonfull a day, that's better than just not doing anything. Right. You're making progress in the direction of change or what you want. Like that escape that you're, you're doing some action, even if it's small. Yeah. But the more capacity you have, the more you can dig. Right? Yeah. I haven't thought about that story in awhile. Thank you for bringing that up. And I L and you know, and to speak, to post traumatic growth. I think let's speak to that for a minute. Cause I think that's one of the, the beautiful things that is the purpose of the work. Right. And to invite more into that. And so, and for anyone listening, who, you know, maybe you already work with clients and you maybe want to learn how to be even more trauma informed or how to create a pathway that feels even more magical and possible, but yet that posttraumatic growth. And how can you talk a little bit more about what that is and how, how that yeah. How, how that, how that works?

Rachael Maddox (23:15):

Yeah. So I love this idea of posttraumatic growth because you know, when I first started working with trauma and I'm remembering when I first went on my like podcast tour, the very first one, like five years ago with my first book, secret bad girl, I used to talk about this all the time. So I'm like, Oh, this is fun. I think that when we have traumatized physiologies, it's like swimming in a pool with 10 bathing suits on because you're still expected to do all same things that anybody else is, you're still expected to figure out how to show up, to work, how to make money, how to take care of your kids, how to be enough thriving or functional relationship, how to take care of your body. But you're doing it in a state of hyper arousal or hypo arousal. You're doing it outside of what Dan Siegel calls your window of tolerance, which is the physiological state of which you have the most presence.

Rachael Maddox (24:11):

And like resiliency range of resiliency is what my teacher Brigit calls it. So you're when you're walking around the world raw under a trauma spout. And I, you know, deep compassion, if you're listening, you're like, Oh my God, that's me. Like you're going outside. And you're anxious all the time. Or you don't want to see anyone you're in deep States of self isolation because people feel like too much to deal with. I mean, I've dealt with all of these things. It feels like lifetimes ago at this point, even though it wasn't, it was maybe six or seven years ago. So when you're walking around with traumatized physiologies, it is like you're swimming through life with 10 bathing suits on and trauma resolution helps you slowly take off one bathing suit at a time. Well, what happens when you've been swimming with 10 bathing suits and now you're only swimming with five, you can go faster in a, in an efficient way without working harder.

Rachael Maddox (25:05):

All of a sudden you're able to get a further distance. And it's because you have been training under such difficult situation or conditions. And I like to think of posttraumatic growth is you got no bathing suits on maybe one, and now what's possible because you grew such phenomenal strength. This is the thing, people who are walking around the world with trauma, they are having to learn how to do things they're having, they're picking up all of these extra senses because they're exhausted. So they're like, how do I do that more efficiently? Or they're scared. So they're like, how do I read the room better? They're picking up super powers that they don't know that they're picking up, but because their nervous systems hijacked, they're also, you know, in constant States of hyper or collapse, which is like not very longterm functional, but when the hyper and collapse evens out and you're just in your range of resiliency, you still have all those super powers.

Rachael Maddox (26:04):

And that to me is posttraumatic growth. That's when you can use those super powers from a more regulated physiology, and then you can just be building on the super powers you have developed and asking yourself, instead of like, how do I experience less pain? How do I experience more pleasure? Or instead of how do I save everyone? How do we grow a healthy garden together? Or instead of how do I get out of this abusive situation? How do I create opportunities for, you know, women and girls to learn about financial independence? So they never get into those abusive situations. So these are the kinds of things that happen in post traumatic growth. The dreams that you have under the trauma spell become the reality of your post.

Amanda Testa (26:54):

Yes. I love that because you do the superpowers. It's like, so key. Thank you for that. And so, and I'd love to, if there's, you know, with regards to kind of that collective healing and creating that collective sanctuary, I'd love if you would maybe share, you know, maybe one or two things, if someone's like, I love that. How can I do that? And he wanted to cultivate that more in your own life. What would you invite for them as a possibility?

Rachael Maddox (27:25):

Yeah, well, you know, here's something that's really fun. Well, there I, okay. Two ideas. This is one idea. This is something I'm doing secretly about to two secretly. You can say to yourself who are six, five, six people that I resonate with, cellularly, who I want to see, grow and thrive, and you can invite them into a private free, short term mastermind. And you just say, we're going to gather for two hours a month, for four months, we're going to do one, two hour meeting per month for four months. We're going to ground together at the beginning. And then each person's going to get to come into the center of the circle and say like each person's going to get 13 minutes in the center. And each person's going to say what's up for them and ask for support from the group and receive support.

Rachael Maddox (28:25):

And if I were the one organizing that, which in this case, I am at this moment, I would invite people. I would ask myself, what are the questions I'm asking myself about my life and who might be asking similar questions or who might be one step ahead of me. And don't be afraid to invite people that are one step ahead of you, especially if you're a leader, especially if you're a teacher, especially if you're a guide or a coach, let yourself receive the wisdom of others, let yourself receive something. Somebody invited me into something like this, you know, a season or two ago. And it was so easy to say yes, cause I was like, wow, short term. You know, we ended up meeting like six times. We ended up doubling how much we met. It was really nice nourishing regenerative, all of these peers that I'd been seeing online and admiring, well now we dropped into relationship with each other.

Rachael Maddox (29:15):

That was wonderful. So that, right. That's one way to just make things really easy. Like it's not so hard to invite people into something, but right now also just being mindful, like everybody's on zoom so much people have full stressful lives. What would be an invitation? It'd be really easy for someone to say yes to what would be an invitation you would love to receive and can you receive it or can you offer it? So that's one, one thing. The other thing is, you know, possibly joining some kind of community that exists with like some kind of learning or healing community. So if there's right, the first way is a peer to peer circular kind of network that would be free. And I think we need way, way, way more of that because the dominant theme in our culture is pay the, the expert who knows everything.

Rachael Maddox (30:07):

And you know, that's a role that I play, not the expert who knows everything, but I'm a teacher who holds space. I've made it very important to me to have a more circular leadership. So the team that I have there's, you know, well, there's technically like nine of us, but you know, central team is like six of us and they're all paid and they're all paid well to be part of this circle and to be part of holding the leadership and that's going to continue more and more next year, like the decentralization of power and the training program and the circulation of money. But you know, if there's somebody that you admire and you think, you know, they've cultivated a community of regeneration, there's something they're doing over there. That seems like everybody in that space is getting healthier. Not everybody in that space is getting flashier or more like egotistically.

Rachael Maddox (31:01):

Cool. Okay. Like, or more followers, like, no, they're getting healthier in a deep root way. I can see it. I can watch I'm watching it happen. They're all getting healthier. Consider hopping in. Considering seeing what communities exist like that. There's a lot of them. There's so many give yourself the gift of showing up. Thank you. Yeah. And I'm wondering too, maybe if there's any other question that you wish that I would've asked that I didn't know or any, any other last words you'd like to share? Well, I can just say like on, on that note the ReBloom coach training is open for enrollment for 2021. It's an Epic program. If you've been resonating with what I've been talking about, this is sort of the, the heart and soul of a lot of what goes into the program. But the bigger picture, just to be brief is there are two levels.

Rachael Maddox (32:00):

Each of them are six months long and then there's a certification process. That's three month process after that. So it's about a year and a half because we take a month off in between the different levels. And I am just so excited for this program. If you are an experienced coach, teacher, facilitator, guide, therapist who maybe is already working with trauma or who, Oop, kitty cat, who's maybe already working with trauma or who's having a lot of clients or students come their way with trauma, but you're like, am I doing this effectively? Am I really serving these clients or these students to the best of my ability, maybe you're not in the most healthy relationship with your business. Maybe you want to be more on the program of creating cultural sanctuary in these times. And you want to be with other people who are doing that.

Rachael Maddox (32:53):

We are going deep slowly. So in the first six months, I'll just give you what this is my thing I'm most proud of after running programs for a long time, I feel like I finally am hitting my stride with the pacing. It's going to be a pacing of like four day online virtual workshop, a little bit of time off after then four weeks of lessons followed by three weeks of peer practices followed by one week off. And you repeat that cycle three times. So it's very well paced and that pace gives you the chance to receive, to integrate, to digest, to really let the material work on you and to incorporate it into your current business and practice at a titrated doable pace. So that's just a little snippet. There's a lot else I could say, but those are the things I'm excited about. And if you're interested check

Amanda Testa (33:51):

Highly recommend it because I have found it to be so amazing. And even if you've had, you know, training around trauma informed training of any kind before I think what it's helped me do so much as just embody it on a deeper level. And I, and I also just love the Rebloom that you can listen to art. We did a podcast in 2019, Rachel, and I talk to you more about the re bloom, the model and the different archetypes. So you can go back and listen to that, but it's just such a beautiful way. I love the nature that's connected to it. And just how it's. So it is it's so regenerative and it just really kind of widens the lens of how you can support people and do it on a deeper and wider level. So it is not just individual, but it's also collective, which I think is the key piece that I took from it as well is collective part awesome. And not always doing it myself for like, everything has to be myself, you know, it's like, that is draining and depleting.

Rachael Maddox (34:49):

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And so to grow the program more and more into that collective space, because, you know, it takes time to figure out how did we do that? Because we're also brainwashed into hyper individualism, right? There's a lot of unlearning that we're also doing as a, as a program. And we're continuing that process. We're committed to continue all and learning and collective growth.

Amanda Testa (35:15):

Thank you. Thank you so much. I am so grateful for you and all your teachings and all of it. You've brought to my life too. And so if anyone is listening and wants to learn more, please check it out because it's a fabulous program and you will leave feeling so much different than you walked in. I'll tell you that.

Rachael Maddox (35:33):

Thank you so much for having me. Amanda to connect in this way. I loved it. And I

Amanda Testa (35:38):

Thank you for this conversation. I so appreciate it. And for everyone listening, thank you for tuning in, and we will see you next week. Thank you so much for listening to the find your feminine fire podcast. This is your host, Amanda Testa. And if you have felt a calling while listening to this podcast to take this work to a deeper level, this is your golden invitation. I invite you to reach out. You can contact me@amandatesta.com/activate. We can have a heart to heart to discuss more about how this work can transform your life. You can also join us on Facebook and the group find your feminine fire group. And if you've enjoyed this podcast, please share with your friends, go to iTunes and give me a five star rating and a raving review. So I can connect with other amazing listeners like yourself. Thank you so much for being a part of the community.