Ep 100: Janelle Talks Romance, Galactic Beings, and The Art of Receiving at Burning Man

Pop the champagne (or light that sage)—Andrea and Janelle are hitting triple digits! In their 100th episode, and on the cusp of their FIFTH season, your favorite duo covers the last 9 months of Janelle’s life. We’re talking Burning Man dust storms, ineffable teachings, the birth of a church and how FOMO got kicked to the curb. This is a full-blown joyride through divine feminine chaos, galactic embodiment, homeowner woes, poetry on the playa and more. There’s a nod to Mary Oliver, Bruce Lyon and Winter Jade Icely. You’ll hear:

-Why receiving is not weakness—it’s a damn art form

-The difference between soul love and human love

-Why romance doesn’t have to look like a RomCom

-How Janelle’s thumb turned green

-The hair extensions and acid-dropping hoopla of her 10th Burn

-How building a website can crack you open (who knew?)

-About the Goddess Temple and why you need to visit

-Janelle’s liberation from health insurance

TRANSCRIPT:

Janelle Orion 00:00

Janelle, struggling to discuss sex and intimacy with your partner, not feeling met, seen or heard in your relationships. I'm Janelle And I'm Andrea. We're two midlife Mavericks sharing our own experiences, messy, AF and no regrets with marriage, divorce, polyamory and pleasure. We've learned that when you're brave enough to figure out what you want and ask for it, with partners, friends, family and most importantly, yourself, you'll feel more alive and free question everything, especially your mother's advice. There's no rom com formula for this. But don't panic. Being alone matters, honey, I can't miss you if you don't leave, what if your breakup could be your breakthrough? Our podcast is for brave hearts. Anyone who seeks or has found the courage to confront their fears and limiting beliefs about breaking societal norms in the spirit of finding their truth. If you're seeking permission to be brave in your relationships and want to feel less alone along the way we got you. Hi friend, hi friend.

Janelle Orion 01:12

Talk about a throwback. Welcome to permission to be human.

Janelle Orion 01:14

Bravehearts, we are so excited that you're here, believe it or not, Andrea and I are celebrating our 100th episode today. 100 episodes. Wow, yes. This has been really a life's journey. It's a life project. We've been doing this for three years. Yes, right, we've been recording for three years? No, no, we started recording though, in the fall of 2023 2022 No, the fall of 2022 and we started publishing in the spring of 2023

Andrea Enright 01:55

Yeah, 100 episodes. I love actually saying, like, when I tell people like we celebrated our hundreds episode, people are just like, Oh, you're legitimate. Like, yeah. Like, it's a legitimate podcast. You didn't just, like, have an idea and do 20 episodes, no judgment on that. If that was your journey, great, and if you were happy with it. But I'm like, oh, yeah, we have 100 episodes. Like, this is a real thing, yes.

Janelle Orion 02:17

And when we brave hearts, if you've been with us since the beginning, then you know how much has changed for us, and we're just gonna recap a few of the things. So for me, when we started, I was still married. Had no idea that, like divorce was in my future. I was married. I was not living in the goddess temple. I was not yet a tantrika or professional DOM or erotic wellness practitioner. I had not yet started a church. I also hadn't started traveling every month to the east coast for work, but then also to see my dad right, like that. Like, one of the benefits of this of that time was figuring out that, oh, seeing my dad, who's turning 95 like, for 36 hours a month every month, was better than like, twice a year for four days. That's something that changed for me.

Andrea Enright 03:18

Yeah, that's true. That's true. I remember when you started doing that, and that really just worked out for worked out perfectly. You just perfectly. You were going to the East Coast anyway, then you go see dad and your brother and and your sister in law and the kids and that that.

Janelle Orion 03:32

Yeah, yeah. Because when I think about my life three years ago, it is literally nothing like it is now.

Janelle Orion 03:41

Yeah, I think you were wearing jeans. Oh, I wasn't.

Janelle Orion 03:46

I've had a new birth experience. I stopped wearing pants. I do only wear dresses now. Oh my gosh, my hair is so much longer.

Andrea Enright 03:56

It's true, you had really short hair. I don't even remember you're having short hair, but you did

Janelle Orion 04:01

something else that's super different for us is with the podcast, as we are entering in season five, in a few weeks, that starting in season three and season four, we have done 12 part series where we've dived deep into one specific question. And when we started the podcast for the first I don't even remember how many episodes it was. It might have been like 80 episodes. Been like 80 episodes. We were just interviewing each other about the topics that were alive for us, and we didn't have guests on the show. It was just us. And so what we've decided to do today and next week is a throwback

Janelle Orion 04:39

to

Janelle Orion 04:41

Andrea, interviewing me, and then me interviewing her, so that we're just sharing about what's alive for us now, because we haven't done that in like nine months. So Bravehearts, you might not know what's up for

Andrea Enright 04:53

us. Yeah, and it feels important, because I think it really colors the context of how we interview guests and how we respond. To them and how our topics, you know, have an arc, because we're actually quite different. There's a lot, a lot of different things going on with us.

Janelle Orion 05:08

So yeah, and I think that that's what's fun about this podcast, when we think about going full circle on things, is I don't actually journal I haven't journaled in a number of years, and in a way, the podcast is my journal. I can look back at the titles and be like, Oh my gosh, that's where I was then. And so it is just a reminder for all of us bravehearts that, like, we change a lot, really, quarterly is like, I think, a good metric for like, how much have I changed in the last quarter? So the fact that Angie and I haven't had shared where we are the past nine months, it feels like, oh my gosh, it's like lifetimes ago.

Janelle Orion 05:43

Yeah, and I think that's a great lesson of impermanence. That's actually a benefit of impermanence. I mean, because we know impermanence is a bitch, except, you know when, except when bad shit is going on and we want it to end, so things change really quickly. This has definitely been a huge lesson for me, and I often measure that by looking back at my journals. And there's usually a list of stuff in there that is like, oh my gosh, things have changed so much. And there's also a list in there where I'm like,

Andrea Enright 06:15

Hmm, still working on that, yeah. So some parts of us stay the same, and some parts of us change. Okay, Janelle, you're first. We're gonna have an authentic conversation. I haven't even heard what's going on in the last 10 days. So let's start with this one. Janelle, what

Andrea Enright 06:35

have you learned lately?

Janelle Orion 06:39

That question in the context of nine months, feels like, Oh my gosh. But in the context of just having arrived back from burning man last night, that is consistent. I have gotten to Burning Man every year since the podcast. This is actually my 10th year in a row going to Burning Man. And that's another milestone marker for me, and what I learned this year again, I would say some of the lessons are just like you're learning them again, learning them again and again is is that being able to receive is a gift. So for those who don't know, Burning Man is a gifting culture, meaning that you go to the desert and you bring something to give to people without the expectation of getting something in return. This is not a barter system. This is not like a currency. And so one of the things that I gift are goddess sessions. So it's about 10 minutes of my presence, my attention, and that's it, right? No one's asking to give me anything back in exchange for me doing that for them. And what I realized, because I went to the burn this year with just one other person. We weren't in a camp. It was just two of us in a sprinter van that we were like, We're going with the intention of receiving, and we're going to go to all these camps that have put up so much time and effort and money to create an experience for those of us attending, and We're going to receive and express our joy and that that

Andrea Enright 08:23

recognizing that that's okay, stop, yeah, so stop. So, like, yes. So I love this. I already got, like, a little like, you know, like chills when you said that we are going to Burning Man with the intention of receiving, receiving,

Andrea Enright 08:41

meaning you did not run a camp. You did not offer anything. Is that correct? I did not run a camp. I what I offered were 10 Minute goddess sessions to individuals and strangers as I walked around. Got it okay? This is definitely different from what I've heard you talk about Burning Man in the past, and

Janelle Orion 09:02

there's lots of people who open camp, which is what it's called, and people who go to camp, who are at a camp, can still go and receive the gifts of other camps. But this is my intention, and realizing I actually was talking to someone in line while we were waiting for the gift of ramen that someone had was providing that at renegade burn, which was in 2021 when Burning Man didn't officially happen, that a lot of those of us who went were like the builders and the doers who were so excited to, like build the city. And as a result, there weren't as many people to attend the events that were created. And so the way this, I had not thought about this. What's the guy described? His name was striker. He said I kind of fell a little bit flat because there weren't enough people to receive the gifts that people had put all this effort to create. And I really see that as a circuit. It that like, you know, Betty. We talked many times on this podcast about Betty Martin and the art of receiving and giving, and this was just another example of how that circuit works and that giving. Here's giving a gift, you choose the obvious gift, but then receiving it and appreciating it with joy is also a gift.

Andrea Enright 10:26

It really is. Makes me think about, yeah, so many things like, because there is so much joy in giving, and if, if no one is there to receive it, it is disappointing, because it feels good to give. Okay, so what a great practice

Janelle Orion 10:43

in receiving, right? And then, of course, if you're giving a gift with the expectation that someone's gonna receive it in joy, then that's also set up for failure, right, right? So at Burning Man, you're just like, literally the practices, I'm only going to where I want to go. I'm only receiving gift that I want to receive. No one's giving me anything that I don't want because I like, there's just, like, there's just an abundance of 1000 bazillion, million things. I'm just going to where I want to go. Got it okay?

Andrea Enright 11:14

Being able to receive is a gift. What else? What else did you learn?

Janelle Orion 11:17

Not a Burning Man, but another something that has come up for me in the past several months that I have learned is distinguishing between soul love, which we could call unconditional love, or trans personal love, and human love. And I have become very skilled at this transpersonal love. It's partly why I'm so good at being an erotic wellness practitioner, because I'm capable of opening my heart to strangers, to really to everyone, because I can see the purity and the love of the soul in everyone. And I think I've actually had that skill most of my life. But what I became really clear on was that in doing is that I had not allowed myself to put boundaries and conditions on love that was coming through the human relationships.

Andrea Enright 12:17

I feel an episode. I feel an episode coming on like, okay, okay. Keep going. Keep going. I've got questions.

Janelle Orion 12:26

Like, there was a part of me that didn't like, put boundaries up around, like, how I wanted to be treated, like, who was deserving of my love? Because I was like, everyone's like, everyone deserves love. Like, right? Like, I can see the love in everyone and in doing so I was, I found myself disrespecting myself, right, like the boundaries that my human deserved. Wow, in order to give my love, my human love, and this definition of love, I'm differentiating between like the human love, which is conditional, and then the soul love, which is unconditional. And so as a result, I can have unconditional love for someone at the soul level, but at the personal level, I can be like and I'm a no to you talking to me this way, to you treating me this way, and to us having a relationship.

Andrea Enright 13:35

Okay? So I think I'm hearing that at a soul level, you're loving unconditionally at a human level, you're loving conditionally. Would you say that unconditional love is also possible at a human level?

Janelle Orion 13:50

At this point, I would say, No. I would say that love to me is like, there's multiple facets. Like, you know the phrase that, like the Inuits, the Eskimos, have 20 words to describe the word snow, right? We have this one word for love that we're like, that we throw around, that I have thrown around my whole life, and have used it in this way that really I was realized now that I was using it in the unconditional love, like everyone, like I, have so much love to give. Everyone deserves love. Everyone has a loving heart, like everyone's born as love, like, I believe all that to be true, and yet, if I only look at it through that lens, then I allowed myself to let people treat me in a way, yeah, because I felt bad about not loving them.

Andrea Enright 14:40

So when you talk about this conditional love, are you only talking about it with a partner or with family or with children like and are you saying in general that this is just for you, or this is how you see love in general?

Janelle Orion 14:56

The realization came to me through a partner. Yeah, I never birth a child, so it probably does not pertain. I would suppose to like young children, right, who you're teaching how to behave, but like I would say, with my spirit son, right? My requests of him, like my boundaries with him are, you know, just to name a couple of them are, please call me and acknowledge me on my birthday, you know, and on Christmas. Like, those are really important to me, and if you don't do that, like, those are my conditions of my love. Like I doesn't it doesn't take away my unconditional love of his soul, but I have conditions of being in relationship with him. Got it. Another thing that I have learned in the past nine months is I view myself as a galactic being as well as a human.

Andrea Enright 15:50

What's a galactic being? You had to know that was common,

Andrea Enright 15:57

or maybe you didn't, yeah, yeah.

Janelle Orion 16:00

It's, it's like I have this expansive view of myself, like somehow I have put myself in a context of that's more than just me, Janelle, an individual on this earth that there. I've expanded my view to include, like, the different parts of the galaxy and like the parts of me that came from someplace else.

Andrea Enright 16:23

Okay, what is new and exciting for you? Janelle,

Janelle Orion 16:26

I have a green thumb that is like, very new and very exciting. I have never thought of myself as someone with a green thumb ever, and I have killed way more plants than I have kept alive in my lifetime. And how it happened is a pretty wild story that's definitely will be shared as another episode at some point. But the short of it is, after a three week container with my DOM, which means I, like, I got to be the sub in this container. The best way for me to describe it is that I was fucked into existence, and this new version of me is able to see energy differently. And one of the energies that I can see is the energy of plants, which turns out, is what having a green thumb is. And talking to other people about this, I'm like, Oh my gosh, I have a green thumb. Now I can see that the plant is like, I'm thirsty, or I'm over watered, or like, tend to my leaves. Like, this is never something I could just, like, they just did not exist in my life frame of reference. And so in talking to other people who had a green thumb, they're like, oh, wait, you can't talk to plants. Or, like, you two couldn't and Nick, you didn't feel plants before. And I was like, No. And so they're also surprised, because it's so obvious to them that plants are communicating to them. Wow.

Andrea Enright 17:58

I really had to talk to my plant friends and see if, like, this lines up, like they feel the energy of the plants you're saying,

Janelle Orion 18:07

yeah, and maybe they see it, you know, there's lots of different ways, like, you know, it could be in any number of senses.

Andrea Enright 18:14

But yeah, yeah. Okay, so now, so now you have plants in your house, and you're tending

Janelle Orion 18:19

to my and my plants are so happy. I brought two plants, two cactus that I were on their like, death bed that was like, I was about to throw out, and then this happened, and I was like, Oh my gosh, I see you. Oh my gosh, I love you. I see what? And so, like, now they're, like, growing for me, they're sprouting, they're propagating. It's so exciting. I talk to

Andrea Enright 18:40

them every day. Wow. This is fantastic. I love this. This is, yeah, a green a green thumb has developed for you. Yeah, did you think you saw energy before in different ways?

Janelle Orion 18:54

Yeah, I can I, and I would say I feel it, because there's people who very much can see it and I don't see it. I feel it. And so in this way, when I say I was, like, fucked into existence, it feels like the, like another, like the last part of me, like I could feel a lot of things, but this was, like, this last piece that I don't know I'm saying, last piece I don't know, another piece that came in.

Andrea Enright 19:17

I love that as some as someone who also has killed many plants and is now struggling to keep the plants alive in the house where my husband no longer lives. It is definitely like, wow. Like, how, yeah, how are you doing that? How are you noticing the plants in a new way? But I believe, based on just my past experience, that sometimes we start seeing things that have been there for a long time. Yes, right? And that's just, this is just a more concrete metaphor for that. Yeah, so Janelle, how are you letting go of form? Bravehearts, we talk a lot about letting go of form on this, this podcast, and I think it's just become. Yeah, it's be kind of an evergreen theme in my life. Yeah, I

Janelle Orion 20:04

learned about this concept through winter Jade IV when I was at the feminine mystery school a couple years ago. And the concept right is that we want something and we think we don't have it, but if we let go of what we think it's supposed to look like. We actually probably it's already here in front of us. So one of the ways that I'm doing it is, you know, just asking myself, every time I feel like a flicker of constriction, I ask myself, do I have what I need right now? And the answer is always yes, right? Like I might think, oh, I need more money in the bank because I have a bill that's due tomorrow. But do I need that money today? Do I have the money I need to pay the bills today? Yes, the answer is always yes, and it has helped me really stay in the present and get out of like, get being in scarcity or fear about my future and or the past, I suppose. But I was someone who would be like, Oh, but what if. What if, but what if, but what if? And I'm like, Oh, do I have what I need now? So that is one thing. The other thing that just happened was, in the integration after burning man, I was talking to my friend Allison, and we were talking about, like, partnership, and she asked me if I was looking for someone, and I said, I'm not. I, at this moment, I really feel like I have found the one in me and my I have this expanded view of partnership, and I'm getting my emotional needs met from all my different girlfriends. Different girlfriends. I'm getting sexual needs met from different people, but I'm not looking for this one person. And she said to me, she's like, Oh, but I still really want romance for you. Hmm, what does that mean, right? So I sat with that, and I like, reflected on that, and I was like, Oh, I actually have romance. So I have clients who are sending me texts of pictures of flowers whose blossom is so unique and beautiful that they've named the blossom after me, and sending me a picture. I've had another client who wrote a myth about the land of Orion and that there's Ambassador Janelle, and how she is this like gift of the future to remind us of who we are. And I've never had these kind of romantic gestures. Well, I mean, that's not true. I've had people, I've had partners be very romantic, but I realized that I was, in a way, withholding a little bit because I was like, Oh, that gets nice to receive these for sure, but because I didn't have it wasn't a reciprocal feeling from my end that I realized I was kind of withholding my heart A little bit and not allowing myself to fully receive the romance that was coming my way instead. Kind of back to this example from above, which is that, oh, I know for sure that both these men that I'm talking about the fact that their heart is inspired to create beauty as a result of essentially me being their muse is a gift to them, and so all I have to do is receive the gift of the beauty that their heart is creating through inspiration of me.

Andrea Enright 23:39

Wow, what a receiving would back, right? Went back to the receiving. That is a beautiful reception, right? Like, of being romanced,

Janelle Orion 23:49

yes, and then being like, oh my gosh, I am being romanced. I do have romance in my life. It's not something that I'm being denied because I haven't chosen, because I'm not looking for a partner. No, I have romance.

Andrea Enright 24:01

Yeah, you've defined your own definition of romance, right? I let go of form. Let go of form. Amazing. That's, yeah, that's beautiful. I love that for you. As my 15 year old would say, Oh, my God, I love that for you. Yeah, it's a thing. So, okay, anything else about letting go for,

Janelle Orion 24:22

yeah, on, like, really pragmatic, mundane levels that have nothing to do with being a galactic being are like, you know, health insurance. And I have decided not to have health insurance for the first time in my entire fucking life. And if you were to ask me seven years ago, let alone seven weeks ago, would I choose not to renew my monthly subscription, I would have been like, no way. And there's just something like, it's really expensive. And the reality is, I pay way more in my premium than I do, actually, for the care that I'm receiving, because I'm fundamentally healthy. Me and back to like, the futurizing I'm like, if a catastrophe happens, right, and I have to go to the emergency room, like, I'll figure it out when that happens, and pay those bills when they have, when they come through. But there's something about I'm paying for something that's not happening and that doesn't feel good for

Janelle Orion 25:19

me anymore. Well said, well said, against the insurance system, yeah.

Andrea Enright 25:26

And I get, I totally get that. Yeah, I definitely have been. I've been uninsured several times in the last 20 years, and it is for me, it's definitely a better place to

Janelle Orion 25:37

live, yeah. And obviously, right for the like, this is also a privilege, right? We're both healthy enough to be able to, like, navigate that, and for those people who can't, it's fucking awful. Yeah, so I mean, it's like, there's like, it's a catch 22 like, there's no like, what's the right and there's no run right answer. I was just basically realizing that I was paying for something that wasn't true for

Janelle Orion 26:02

me. Yeah, love it. It was just misaligned. And to be clear, too, it's not that I have $50,000 that would cover if I if I had to go to into in an ambulance if I got cancer. I don't even have enough to cover probably, that the ambulance cost alone would be like 1000s. So that's it's not that we've got that ready. It's just that it's unlikely to happen, and we'll figure out what to do if it does right, when it does happen. Yeah, exactly, beautiful. What are you working on? I have a new

Janelle Orion 26:35

website, yay. Yeah. It's Janelle orion.com and it's a landing page for all the various things that I do, which include this, you know, permission to be human, podcast, the goddess temple and feel while the alive, which is my one on one, intimacy, work, company, all those parts of me have been pretty disparate, and like in the last three years, right? In fact, none of them existed three years ago. And so it feels like, in terms of this full circle moment, that oh, they are all now have landed in me, have integrated in me. So there's like one place to go for people to learn about all the different things that I'm up to. And in a way, it's also for me, I always find building a website, as someone who's built 20 plus websites, when I'm building them for myself, that it's a way for me to understand myself

Andrea Enright 27:30

better. Interesting. I never, yeah, I've never heard you say that, yeah. In fact,

Janelle Orion 27:34

my Zaya was like, Oh, I can, like, build, have aI build you a website in like, five minutes. And I was like, You know what? I was like, I would rather spend the 20 hours doing it, because I'm going to learn more about myself and learn about like, how do I want to present myself? What feels true for me? What are the words that are true for me? And so that kind of contemplation and reflection is actually time well spent and not worth me, outsourcing. Yeah, yeah, beautiful. And as a result, like I am, you know, in the spring, I created some new videos about erotic wellness and when I'm working with with couples and individuals, and so I'm really excited to have those get out there in the world. Yeah, beautiful

Andrea Enright 28:13

Janelle, how is the goddess temple

Janelle Orion 28:15

she's growing or, as my friend Sonia just said she can feel her heartbeat so brave hearts. For those who don't know, the goddess temple is where I live, and it exists to serve as a sanctuary for deep spiritual connection, healing and community, and it's something that I have been the steward of for the past two and a half years and but I was the way I would describe it is that it's been my home that has a name, and I call it the goddess temple. And what has shifted in the past few months is it's now the goddess temple, and I live there energetically, like the goddess temple comes first, and it's also become the home of the Church of witness sisterhood, and that's a church that I have founded. And our mission is to help heal the divide between the masculine and the feminine within each of us through gathering, education and ritual. And we believe pleasure is sacred and

Andrea Enright 29:20

our birthright, beautiful, the birth of the church of witness, sisterhood. Love that.

Janelle Orion 29:27

Yeah, and so it's exciting, because to support the mission and to support the temple, I have a new housemate. Her name is Ariana. She's a priestess and also a doctor, and she has a title. She is the goddess of Temple operations and events. And our goal is to be hosting 10 to 14 events per month so that we're providing education and basic skills on intimacy, sacred sexuality, pleasure, like the full gamut. And one of the things we're also offering is grief. Grief like we have community, grief circles, intimacy, 101, such as the wheel of consent, rbdsm workshops. Andrea and I are hosting our permission to be human workshops back here at the goddess temple again, starting this month since Yeah, September. And then we also, once a month, do sanctuary Sundays, so for prayer and gathering and community, I feel like

Andrea Enright 30:24

the goddess temple has really been birthing for a long time. Like it's, it's gone through many iterations, but this feels like it's, it's home, like, where,

Janelle Orion 30:34

yeah, she's been up, she's up, leveled, she's now she's no longer just this, like, Baby like, like, that is getting born. She's she's born. She's a little bit more of a teenager. Maybe, I don't exactly know where she is in the journey, but what I feel really, really, really clear on is that she's here in service to what the community needs. And I believe deeply in that community needs community and that for all of us to have more fulfilling relationships, there's education needed regarding pleasure and intimacy that feels accessible and approachable and not intimidating, and that's what she's in service to.

Andrea Enright 31:13

Yeah, she feels like a soft place that's in service. Janelle, what is lighting you up besides the goddess temple.

Janelle Orion 31:21

Well, I'm part of many communities, but I believe, for anyone right, that community does help us navigate and support us what is going on in the world right now, right, like all the chaos and the grief and the pain and the uncertainty that being surrounded by people who can see you and hold you right, not fix anything, is a really instrumental part of being human right now. And with that, I'm in a new book club, and it's a group of us that are going to read the book. It's called our dark divinity, but written by my teacher, Bruce Lyon. This is also a group of galactic beings, and it's this book helped me understand myself in the context of time and space for where I am in the world right now and where the earth and America and like civilization is in time and space right now really helps me contextually. And in this book club, which starts September 21 we're going to cover one chapter of the book per month for nine months.

Andrea Enright 32:39

Oh, great. I love that structure. That's, yeah, that's really nice. Okay, and who is Bruce Lyons. What is he teaching you? How is he your teacher?

Janelle Orion 32:48

So his teachings are a trans Himalayan esoteric Mystery School, and they actually really relate to the fact that the black hole was just discovered in the past 20 years, and that the sun revolves around the black hole, in that humans have the cosmos inside of us, and so that our divinity, our dark divinity, is this like dark this black hole, this void, this monad that's inside of us. And how do we access that and bring that light from that darkness out into the world, esoteric mystery school, you know,

Andrea Enright 33:32

I know, like, I don't, yeah, okay, okay, yeah, there's, there's so much in there that we that we could unpack and dissect.

Janelle Orion 33:40

What's really funny for me is that I get really nervous when I'm having to, like, describe it with words, because someone asked me not too long ago, oh, like, what does he teach? And I'm like, Hmm, I don't know how I describe it. I just know that I'm an embodiment of

Andrea Enright 33:54

it. Hmm, you're an embodiment of it.

Janelle Orion 33:56

Okay, okay, which means that, like, the words I use don't feel like they convey it fully. But if, like the My presence does,

Janelle Orion 34:04

okay, beautiful. I think that's a good way to say it actually,

Janelle Orion 34:09

what's one small thing that you're excited about? Oh my gosh, it's a small thing, but it could have been a big thing, which is that I had, well, in June, I had a flood in my basement as a result of a hose being left on. And I thought, Okay, turn the hose off. No more flood. But then a few weeks ago, right before Burning Man, there was a small, like a small puddle of water underneath the carpet, the new carpet in the basement, and it was coming. It was coming. Yeah, it's coming through a crack in the foundation. So I thought it was going to be potentially, like, a really big and really expensive fix, but it was like, it didn't make sense. We couldn't figure out the source of the water. We just knew that water was coming in, but it was coming in inconsistently. In the end, what we figured out was that it ended up being caused. By the sprinkler system transformer, which is essentially the plug, had stopped working, and so the sprinkler system had, like, stopped midstream, or something I don't exactly know. All I know is that it has cost me less than $100 to fix it, and the problem is solved.

Andrea Enright 35:17

Amazing. Okay. Well done. Well done.

Janelle Orion 35:19

Homeowner, yes, yes. That is something. I have a small thing that I am very, very excited about.

Andrea Enright 35:26

Yeah, what are you neglecting right now? There's a part

Janelle Orion 35:30

of me that knows that I'm supposed to get like the thoughts and feelings and way of being that are inside of me, outside of me, whether it's through writing or whether it's through a YouTube channel, but I'm not clear which, and so I'm not doing

Andrea Enright 35:49

either. Okay, so you're just holding off for a bit, yeah, but I've been

Janelle Orion 35:53

holding off for a bit for a long time, and so it's so I don't know that I'm neglecting it, but I'm also like, Oh, am I supposed to put more something into it. I'm not sure so because, like, when I'm in, when I'm in a state of confusion, I just kind of like, step back and wait. And so it's not that I'm directly neglecting it, but it doesn't feel I'm like, Hello, I've been waiting a long time for clarity.

Andrea Enright 36:17

Yeah, so you're waiting for clarity and waiting for the download to come clear? Yeah, okay, okay, that's really interesting. I can't wait to see what, what kind of expression you're going to manifest, or, like, what, what that's going to look like. Maybe it won't be either of those platforms. Maybe it'll be something totally different that you don't even know.

Janelle Orion 36:33

I don't even know that's totally true. Janelle, is there anything else you want to tell

Andrea Enright 36:37

me about Burning Man? Like, like, what happened? What was the burn like this year. I know we talked about the giving and the receiving and that being the culture at Burning Man, but what happened? What happened at your 10th burn?

Janelle Orion 36:49

Yes, on my 10th burn, it was the magical adventure that it is. Every year, I keep going back, because it meets me where I am, and it does serve me as a milestone marker for me to see who I become, since the last time I was there, and this year I camped with my friend touch, and it was just the two of us in a sprinter van, Sprinter van, and we called it soft burn, which Andrea, you can appreciate because of what we've got going on. You know, a lot of people go hard at burning. Man, it's like, with it, there's a lot of intensity. Like the desert is intense, the drugs are intense, the partying is intense. Not a lot of sleeping. And this year, instead, I just followed the ease from packing for the burn to driving in. We had a lot of spaciousness. She and I did miss, like the there was one really big sandstorm, but we were there for the other ones and the three rain storms. And so we ended up actually sleeping a lot, because you can't go out in the rain. And the feeling that I had was, but I was always where, wherever I was, I was supposed to be. And one of the things that Burning Man has taught me over the years is to like, let go of my FOMO, which was very real for me for a long time, because at Burning Man, you are always missing something. Like, there is always something goinggoing on. So like, there's no way you can see it all. There's no way you can see like, a percentage of it. So in this way, just like, okay, so you might as well just be content with exactly where you are, because you get to go only to where you want to go if you choose to. And one of my favorite things at Burning Man, that this is our third year that we did it is Orion family Christmas started by My Spirit son, because he my spirit son goes. My ex husband goes to Burning Man every year. And so this year, on Thursday night, we came together. We all camped in separate places, but we came together. We invite friends to join us. We had a snowball fight, we exchanged presents, and then we drop acid and go sing Burning Man Christmas carols, and I love it so much, so much. Oh my gosh, that line, we came together for a snowball fight, we exchanged presents, we dropped acid and we sang burning. Man, Christmas carols. I have never heard all those things together in your tradition before.

Andrea Enright 39:19

That is amazing. Okay,

Andrea Enright 39:24

wow. Burning Man, wonderful. Ever go it is still still there, still hanging around in my in my consciousness, still in my aura. Janelle, tell us what you wore to Burning Man this year. Like, what was your outfit? Because I know it's always different, and like sometimes you have, like, dreads added to your head or tattoos or paints. So what was it this year?

Janelle Orion 39:50

Yes, so what? Yeah, clothing is like my main form of my expression, a Burning Man. A burning man actually taught me, taught me that clothing is a main form of my expression. Felon. So it's a full circle in that way. And so this year, I decided to go as the different archetypes of the divine feminine. And so each day, I primarily wore a solid color. And so then it kind of evolves. But essentially, I was dressed in all yellow as sunshine. One day I was all in red as Mary Magdalene. One day I was in all white, in my ceremonial whites when I was a goddess giving blessings out at the temple. So just really always wearing dresses, always and then my hair, I did have this time, instead of having my braids, my hair braided, I had it braided simply, but then I had clip in extensions. I tried, for the first time, in the hopes of making Exodus easier, which it was,

Andrea Enright 40:57

don't you have a ritual of going to a spa after Burning Man, oh my

Janelle Orion 41:02

gosh, yes. And I didn't know that that was gonna happen this year. This was one of the, like, the magical miracle moments of, like, having my dreams come true. Because I was driving home alone, and I didn't know if it was all gonna work out, but it did. I ended up. My friend Allison was like, I just need to ride to Reno. And I realized that what I was afraid of was driving. Actually, I wasn't afraid of driving home all the way to Denver, which is 16 hours, but I was afraid of driving at Exodus because, which could be six to eight hours in the middle of the night when I'm tired, that's the part I didn't want to drive alone. And so then she was I was like, Yeah, that would be amazing. And she's like, do you want to go to the spa? And I was like, oh my god, so you got to go. So I said, I got to go, and I got to be there the whole day. And I usually have to, like, leave after a few hours, because we have to start driving. But I didn't have to go anywhere, because it was just me and so and Allison, and so we got to, like, spend all day at the spa, and I got my facial and a massage.

Janelle Orion 41:57

Amazing, amazing. What's

Janelle Orion 41:59

Exodus? Exodus is when you're leaving the burn. And so, like, after the temple burn on Sunday night, then like, Burning Man is, like, officially over. And so then you have to leave. And so there's 70,000 people who are trying to leave. And so you'd like try to time it. If you were to Google this, like, there's so many pictures of, like, coming in and out of Burning Man, I don't actually know how long the drive is. Like, let's say, if you could, you could drive it in 45 minutes if there was no traffic, and it took me five hours. Yeah. So the exit of Burning Man is is long because you're, you know, you're in a line of cars, basically, yes. And the entrance into Burning Man is long because you're in a lot of crazy just part of, part of the deal, burning man. You gotta want it.

Andrea Enright 42:39

Yeah, you gotta want it. That's true. That's funny.

Andrea Enright 42:46

Okay, wow. Like I just I learned, I learned so much, even though I already knew what's generally, what's going on with you. Okay, so let's go on to what, what quote Are you loving right now? And can you read it to me?

Janelle Orion 42:59

Yes. So this also came through Burning Man, which is like one of the anomalies, which is, there's a lot of poetry in my burn this year. And touch brought a Mary Oliver book called Why I wake early to Burning Man. And on the first day, she opened it, like randomly to a page to a poem that became our anthem for the bird, so we read it every morning, and then we chose to memorize it. And I've actually never memorized a poem, and so that, in and of itself, was its own gift that burning man gave.

Janelle Orion 43:30

Hey, yeah, okay,

Janelle Orion 43:33

so I'm gonna read it, but I'm not gonna memorize I'm not gonna say it with fun sight, just in case I mess it up. So for the brave hearts, but it's called mindful. Every day I see or I hear something that more or less kills me with delight that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light. It was what I was born for, to look, to listen, to lose myself inside this soft world, to instruct myself over and over in joy and acclamation. Nor am I talking about the exceptional, the fearful, the dreadful, the very extravagant. But of the ordinary, the common, the very drab, the daily presentations. Oh good scholar, I say to myself, how can you help but grow wise with such teachings as these, the untrimmable light of the world, the oceans shine, the prayers that are made out of grass,

Andrea Enright 44:50

wow, hmm, thank you. Hmm, oh. Janelle, Janelle, so much going on for you. So much soft beauty, so much soft transition.

Janelle Orion 45:10

Yeah, yeah. Thank you for asking all those questions. Thank you bravehearts for listening. It feels really good to share what's alive.

Andrea Enright 45:20

Yes, I feel lighter. And I'm leaving this interview just feeling like full of delight. Like, where can I go find delight outside,

Andrea Enright 45:29

you know, in the mundane and, finally, yes, in the in the

Janelle Orion 45:33

very job, like, there's just delight everywhere.

Andrea Enright 45:36

Yeah, yeah. Love it. Okay?

Janelle Orion 45:39

I love you. Friend, Bravehearts, we'll see you on the next episode. We'll have another one with my update, and then we'll launch into season five. We love you. Love you. Hey, Bravehearts, looking for permission. Work with us. Andrea offers permission coaching, and Janelle offers erotic wellness sessions. Follow us on Instagram, meet us in real life at permission to be human workshops in Denver. Subscribe to our newsletter. Do all this and more at our website, permission to be human. Dot live. You.com.