Nonviolent Communication (NVC) has helped me communicate with clarity and compassion (even when emotions are high). It’s transformed how I speak to myself, how I speak to the people I love, and how I handle conflict. My first teacher in it was Judith Hanson Lasater, so having her on the show is incredibly special. Judith has taught yoga since 1971, studied with B.K.S. Iyengar and trained for years with NVC founder Marshall Rosenberg.

In this conversation she walks us through the four steps of NVC: observations, feelings, needs and requests. She does it through stories from her own life. We talk about self-empathy, saying no with respect, and how conflict can keep a relationship healthy. We also talk about the three words I now say to myself ALL the time…”how human of me”.

In this episode:

• Judith's definition of empathy
• "How human of me" as a daily self-empathy practice
• Saying yes on the outside and no on the inside
• The difference between complaining and asking for what you want
• Observation vs judgement, and why "you always" starts a fight
• There's no such thing as a wrong feeling
• Finding your core needs, and why having needs isn't being needy
• Making clear, specific requests
• How empathy leads to compassion, and compassion to gratitude

“May we live like the lotus, at home in the muddy waters”.

Resources:

• What We Say Matters by Judith Hanson Lasater - https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/62232936-what-we-say-matters
• Feelings and needs lists, Center for Nonviolent Communication: https://www.cnvc.org/images/pdf/Feelings-Needs-CNVC.pdf
• Judith's website - https://www.judithhansonlasater.com/

About Judith:

Judith Hanson Lasater has taught yoga since 1971 and is a leading voice in bringing yoga to the West. She trained with Marshall Rosenberg, founder of Nonviolent Communication, and now weaves NVC into her yoga teaching. She is the author of What We Say Matters and several other books.

7 Steps to Unlocking Your Limit with Poppy Delbridge

In this episode we walk through Poppy's seven-step system for creating change that lasts. We get into what she calls IMPs (Invisible Mind Patterns), why "I'm fine" can be the most limiting sentence you say to yourself, and why hitting a limit isn't a sign to stop, it's just information.

We cover:

• The difference between pushing to succeed and creating from a regulated nervous system
• What IMPs are, and how naming a pattern separates it from your identity
• Five common IMPs: the Prover, the Pleaser, the Doubter, the Controller, the Diminisher
• The "toleration test" — what you're quietly putting up with, and how that becomes the reality you're living
• Poppy's frequency scale, from despair to bliss, and why the flat "fine" middle is the sneakiest place to get stuck

Links & Resources:

Unlock Your Power

Poppy's website

Unlock Your Power Live, Royal Academy of Music, 11 October — https://app.poppydelbridge.com/high-frequency-live

Loved this episode? Please rate and/or leave a review, it helps more people discover the show.

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inwa

We spend so much energy holding pain at arm's length distance. So many of us do all we can to numb it, avoid it & distract ourselves from it. In this episode I'm exploring what happens when we do the opposite and move toward what hurts instead of away from it.

We look at the following through the contemplative and somatic lenses:

• The difference between pain and suffering
• Turning bad circumstances into the path
• Resourcing, the window of tolerance, and titration
• Why co-regulation matters
• Practical tools for people pleasers and empaths

Doors are now open for Reclaiming You, my 28-day group program, to reclaim your clarity, focus and personal power. Learn more and register here.

Use code EXPANDING for 15% off

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Loved this episode? Please rate and/or leave a review, it helps more people discover the show.

If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.

Maureen Walsh joins me in the studio (all the way from Hawaii!) to break down energetic boundaries. What they actually are, how to feel them in your body, and how to hand back what isn't yours.

We talk about:

• energetic boundaries
• sensitivity as a strength rather than a flaw
• the clairs (clairvoyance, clairaudience, clairsentience, claircognizance)
• how intuition shows up differently for everyone
• why grounding has to come before any of the more expansive spiritual work
• and why intuition is more important than ever

Maureen will be guiding in-person, 1:1 sessions at The Space in London from August 11-13th. You can learn more and book your session here.

Resources & Links:

Maureen's website

Maureen's instagram

Loved this episode? Please rate and/or leave a review, it helps more people discover the show.

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.

If you’re feeling stuck (with work, with your health, with a relationship, with anything) this episode is for you. I’m walking through ten mental reframes that have helped me find my way back to myself, again and again. Some of these come from my meditation practice, one comes from my dad, and all of them are ones I still use today.

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.

Loved this episode? Please leave a review, it helps more seekers find the show.

Lastly, I'd love for you to help me shape Expanding Inward. Follow this link and tell me what you want to explore, who you want to hear from, ask me anything.

In this episode I sit down with Tracee Stanley to talk about the what, why and how of rituals. We explore how rituals help unearth our most sacred selves and connect us to a sense of wholeness and belonging. This episode is great for those who are looking for a way to bring the sacred back into their busy lives.

In this episode we talk about:

• True nature as something we uncover rather than build, the work as undoing, not adding
• Why ritual asks a willingness to change
• The difference between a habit and a ritual
• Earth mapping, moon cycles and three simple pauses a day to connect with nature
• Connecting to ancestral roots through food, seeds, music and the dream space
• Building and tending an ancestral altar, and why a new moon is a lovely place to begin
• Reframing discipline as devotion, and devoting yourself to one thing rather than everything

Tracee's book, Living Ritual, offers micro rituals, larger rituals, and self-inquiry prompts to weave into the day, growing the divine fabric of our lives and creating a shawl that nurtures, protects, and heals - not only ourselves but the collective.

Resources & links:

• Tracee's new book, Living Ritual
• Tracee's Substack post on The Enlightened Water Bottle
• Tracee's website

Loved this episode? Please rate and/or leave a review, it helps more people discover the show.

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.

Capacity is how much you can stay with (feeling, sensation, life) without getting overwhelmed or shutting down. In today's episode we cover what capacity is, how we can widen it and why it may be small.

You might find this useful if:

• You tend to flood easily or go numb and flat when things get hard
• You brace against the good stuff too like joy, love, being seen
• You're in a caregiving role, holding a lot for other people
• You've tried to push through hard feelings and it hasn't worked
• You want to feel more without being swept away by it

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.

Loved this episode? Please leave a review, it helps more seekers find the show.

If you're a nature lover, this one's for you. I'm joined by Wendy and John Steward, the co-founders of Wild Tomorrow, a nonprofit that protects and restores wildlife habitat for threatened species while building a more hopeful future for nature and people.

After successful corporate careers (John as a creative director at leading New York advertising agencies, Wendy as a Director of FX Sales for international banks) they left traditional paths behind to devote themselves fully to wildlife conservation, founding Wild Tomorrow in 2015.

In today’s conversation, we get into rewilding (both the inner and outer landscapes), how the window of tolerance relates to compassion, the nervous system and why the change we want to see outside us begins by expanding inward first.

Books & resources mentioned

Less Is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World — Jason Hickel

Dominion: The Power of Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the Call to Mercy — Matthew Scully

Zen and the Art of Saving the Planet — Thich Nhat Hanh

Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel — Carl Safina

We Are Eating the Earth: The Race to Fix Our Food System and Save Our Climate — Michael Grunwald

Learn more about Wild Tomorrow here.

Join us in London! On Saturday, June 20th we'll be hosting a Wild Tomorrow event at The Space in South London. It's a donation-based gathering where we'll explore rewilding our inner landscape while learning about rewilding out on the land. Learn more here.

Saturday, June 20th from 3-5pm at The Space in SW4.

Loved this episode? Please leave a review, it helps more seekers find the show.

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If this conversation resonated with you, subscribe to Expanding Inward wherever you listen to podcasts. For more on meditation, nervous system work, and practical spirituality, check out my Substack, also known as Expanding Inward.