Ep 109: Part 9/12, Crafting Christianity Your Own Way with Dani: How to Build A Relationship with God Series

Janelle and Andrea sit down with psychotherapist, Ashkenazi and spiritual fire-starter Dani Grace to unravel the tender, tangled, and often taboo terrain of faith, godliness, and what it means to rebuild Christianity on your own terms--no culture war rhetoric included. This conversation dives into the Universal Christ, and how Dani went from atheism to a reclaimed, rebuilt, curiosity-fueled faith, but didn’t leave her intellectualism behind. This is a conversation for anyone who has been burned by institutional Christianity….. someone who misses God, but not the rules. There’s a big nod to Internal Family Systems and The Big Bang. You’ll hear

-How the Universal Christ peeks into personal awakening

-How community curiosity (and volleyball) led Dani home

-The difference between self-knowledge and God-knowledge

-How suffering can give God space to speak

-A new lens on WWJD bracelets 2.0

-How therapy can clear the debris between you and God.

-Why IFS works WITH Christ consciousness

Learn more about Dani Grace at sacredlightjourneys.life

TRANSCRIPT:

Janelle Orion 0:00

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.

Andrea Enright 0:54

If you're seeking permission to be brave in your relationships and want to feel less alone along the way we got you.

Janelle Orion 1:07

Okay, brave hearts. What I want to convey about this episode is the state of which I'm feeling right now, after having our conversation with Danny grace, I just have a sense of like calmness in my body. I feel a little bit more at peace. I can take a deeper breath, and I don't I don't know why that is, but that's just the feeling I have after I was having had this conversation with her.

Andrea Enright 1:36

Danny Grace has a way of articulating Spirit, God, the universe, Christ, Jesus with kindness and understanding and presence that I have not experienced before, and psychotherapy and psychotherapy and she has made something her own and woven together the intellect with the intuition, along with spirit, she's redefining Christ and redefining Christianity for me as

Janelle Orion 2:10

well. She brings her analytical lens to a belief system in a way that has so much the results with so much compassion and grace and no more. To say, You need to listen to her in her own words.

Andrea Enright 2:26

Yeah, this is a good down regulating episode with a lot of wise gems.

Janelle Orion 2:36

Hi, brave hearts. Welcome to permission to be human. I'm Janelle, and I'm Andrea, and we are on our latest episode of season five, building a relationship with God, and we are so appreciative of our guest today, because, you know, brave hearts, we talk about taboo topics on all sorts of different things on this podcast, and talking about our spirituality and God is one of the things that's the most taboo, because it's a deeply vulnerable conversation, and so we are so appreciative to all our guests, and especially everyone today, for being willing to share their personal journey with us and help us understand what their relationship with God is like.

Andrea Enright 3:22

Yeah, we're so excited to have Danny grace on today. She's a psychotherapist who lives in Pittsburgh. She loves ecstatic dance, yay. Star Trek, paddle boarding. Mentos love that. And her cats, which you may see behind her in the frame, she says that they, one of them taught her to be brave. So, Danny, welcome. Thank you for being here. I'm so excited to begin this conversation with you.

Dani Grace 3:53

Thank you for having me very excited.

Janelle Orion 3:55

So, Danny, how do you describe your spiritual and religious beliefs?

Dani Grace 4:00

Such a good question. I've been asking myself that more so recently, to really start to separate myself from the type of belief systems that don't work for me and to really head in towards the ones that do. And I actually just had a conversation recently with a with a new friend, climber friend that was missed on my bio. I'm a climber too. Maybe I didn't write that down, amazing, but we were talking about just superficially, just a very quick conversation about our spirituality. And what got brought up for me was this concept called universal Christ, which is actually the name of a book by Richard Rohr. I have no connection to it. I just love it, and it really beautifully describes very closely to what I believe. And I don't really have a particular label for my religious. Beliefs, or like, how I kind of label or see my faith, but kind of, in summary, I just, I see Christ, this concept of, like, goodness and connection to God in everything. And sometimes it's harder to see the connection at certain times in my life or certain when I'm in a certain state of mind, but in generally speaking, I really see that God is truly everywhere, and that God is not limited to a specific religion. I see that any world religion or non religion, is a place where we can connect with God through each other, through ourselves, through our pets, through the work that we do. I think that anytime where we can find some sort of connection, we start to reach for God.

Janelle Orion 5:55

Do you said the word was it universal? Christ is what the book was titled. Yeah. What do you call it? Do you call it Jesus? Do you call it Christ? You call it God in your personal like conversations, sure,

Dani Grace 6:09

sometimes I use them interchangeably, but I do see a difference in them. I pledged my life to Jesus back in February 16, 2000 and 19. And I see that Jesus is an embodiment of Christ, but I see them as separate. I see that Christ is in everything, in all of us, and Jesus is kind of like the perfect model of embodying Christ. I love

Janelle Orion 6:44

that distinction. First time I've heard it like that way me too, yeah,

Dani Grace 6:49

I see Jesus. I call him Rabbi. I'm half Ashkenazi too. And so I see him as, like, the greatest teacher out there. And so rabbi is a type of teacher. And so whenever I pray, if I'm looking for like insight or clarity on some of my expanded states of consciousness adventures, I will write a letter to my rabbi, and I'll ask my rabbi with a capital R to help guide me.

Andrea Enright 7:23

I love how you've just made, made it all your own, right? Like, that's like, you're just creating this little world. Like, just like you could write a little book about this, like, this is really fascinating. I wonder if you could just just give me a definition, because I feel like I know, but I'm not sure the difference of an Ashkenazi Jew, Jewish person versus Jewish? I'm not. I don't even know how to say that, or if that's correct.

Dani Grace 7:47

Yeah, I'm probably not the best person to ask

Janelle Orion 7:51

that question. You're the person we're asking.

Dani Grace 7:56

So Ashkenazi is like a specific group of Jews who migrated from our Motherland to like Eastern Europe. Gotcha.

Janelle Orion 8:07

So I'm just gonna ask a follow up question. So, so are they? They're more tied to Eastern Europe?

Dani Grace 8:12

Gosh, my understanding, yeah.

Janelle Orion 8:16

Well, randomly, my neighbor has said the same thing. She goes to Poland every year, and she, she, that's where she actually prays to her ancestors, because she's an Ashkenazi Jew. So that little anecdotal affirmation, that's what, yes, yeah,

Dani Grace 8:30

I have Polish ancestors. And I knew, I knew that for a while, and then I did the 23andme and realized that I'm Ashkenazi. Like, Oh, that makes sense.

Janelle Orion 8:42

So how did you start building this relationship with, I want to say God, but now, now I actually want to understand, is it God, or is it your rabbi, like, which? Which one started the relationship? I

Dani Grace 8:57

think the answer is, over time, through connection of others, I started picking up pieces of godliness, of holiness, through meeting particular people along the way. Starting in college, I was, I went into college as an atheist, as like a really super logical, analytical kind of atheist. And it was through a relationship that kind of turned me into, like an agnostic, somebody who was, I was open to the possibility of a higher power, definitely not like God or Christ or Jesus or anything specifically named, and then maybe about looking at the year here, maybe like 1210, to 12 years ago, I started to meet other people who were like actual Christians going to church, and through my connection with them, like my connection with them, piqued my. Curiosity in God, in their religion. So it wasn't necessarily that I was interested in Christianity, and therefore I sought these connections. I ran into these connections through volleyball, actually through that connection through like wanting to be closer and deepening my understanding of them. I started learning more about, like, Christianity and God, and realize, like, how powerful it of a role it plays in their lives, and realizing what it can do in my life.

Janelle Orion 10:36

I love that it's what I'm hearing. And resonates for me is I say, Oh, I have spirit guides. There's people in my life who have just been the ones to like like, burst my awareness open to concepts or to ideas. And what I'm hearing for you is that you, you met people who like, somehow like, deeply resonated with you at a heart level, at a connection level you, I think you named it as godliness in a way like they embodied something that had you go, oh, I want to know them better. And then in knowing them better, you're like, Oh, this is maybe where this aspect of the godliness that I'm resonating with is coming from, is through their belief system.

Dani Grace 11:19

Absolutely, yeah, yeah, absolutely all relating to just the general concept of connection and how Christ is connection.

Andrea Enright 11:28

Yeah, it feels like you're a living example of how community can build relationship with

Janelle Orion 11:34

spirit. Do you consider our relationship with God different than our relationship with self.

Dani Grace 11:41

I think that all relationships with yourself is a connection with God. Is relationship with God. So I think that having a relationship with God both things need to happen. Like, if you want a relationship with God, you have to have a relationship with yourself. And I think having relationship with yourself can lead to an explicit relationship with God. I can imagine that maybe some people experience a relationship with themselves who are like really hardcore atheists and and don't end up like having a relationship with God. That's not my experience. My experience is as I learn more and more about myself and accept all parts of myself and all my identities, I feel more connected to God. So I feel like I have more of a relationship.

Janelle Orion 12:41

So do you feel that there's a distinction between self and God?

Dani Grace 12:48

I think it depends what like perspective you're seeing it as I do think that we are all just in God's mind, going back to the Big Bang in Genesis. There was nothing before God willed us into being. And if God is omnipresent, then I conclude with my analytical mind like, well, then if there was nothing, and then now, now there's all of this that we see and interact with, then we're just in like God's imagination. And so, in a way, we are God. We're pieces, we're pieces of God's imagination, and God is living through us. And so in that respect, I don't think there's a difference between like us and God, and have relationship with us and God, but on like a maybe more day to day, practical, grounded level, we he did think of us as individuals, and so we do have this duality of, I am me, you are you, and then God is all around us and in us too. So it's kind of like contradictory, sort of like both, where it's like we are God, but also not God. We also our own individuals, because He created us. So,

Janelle Orion 14:07

yeah, I'm just sitting with your description of We are the imagination of God. It's a really beautiful, yeah, vision that I have. Does your relationship, like, the deeper you go into your relationship with God, how does that help you find peace amidst, like, the suffering of the world?

Dani Grace 14:30

That's also a paradox. I mean, there's like, there's kind of that superficial, unsatisfying answer of, well, there's a reason for everything, but that feels so unsatisfying because there is so much suffering, and that's not part of me doesn't feel justified with that answer, but I do see that in suffering there's also God, like in suffering we that can drive us to connecting with God more deeply. So things are. Going if things were always like, hunk of Dory and like, We're doing great. Like, perhaps a lot of us wouldn't have a need to connect with God if we're all just moving in a utopian society with perfect mental health and perfect physical health. Like, why would we need on a day to day basis, why would we need God? So to answer your question, directly, I see, I guess I see it as an opportunity to connect to God. I see that suffering is an opportunity to dig into faith, to deepen faith, to rely on our higher power, our connection to our higher power. I distinguish that between just relying on the higher power. So there's relying on the higher power and relying on our connection with the higher power.

Janelle Orion 15:49

What I'm hearing and like and sitting with right is that the suffering is God, because without suffering, we wouldn't have a need for God, and so then suffering is part of it. And then there's, like, the meta, right? Like, okay, so there's suffering in the world, but then there's like, a lot of individuals and who are suffering. So just like, are they suffering because they don't have God? I'm not saying that, you're saying this, but that they need. I think I'm trying to wrap my head around the paradox of it, right? I was like, some people definitely suffer more than others, and is there a relationship to the degree of suffering to the degree of God that's necessary?

Dani Grace 16:40

I don't think I have an answer to that. That sounds like a very cosmic answer question. Yeah, I feel like that's a form of judgment if I were to answer that question. And that's not up to us to judge if

Janelle Orion 16:57

there is no difference, right? If we just had one emotion all the time, whether it was just joy or whether it was just grief, then it was just the one. Then there would be no way to differentiate, to know, really like, the depth of the feeling of either one. Like, we need these contrasts.

Andrea Enright 17:22

We need the contrast to feel like the difference. But then I'm thinking, if it was just joy, would we not find God in the joy and the delight?

Janelle Orion 17:32

Yes, I don't know. Okay, this is like, this is actually, I feel like our one of our most, yeah, just like, inquisitive, like, curious conversations, like, I feel us around the coffee table hanging out on a couch, being like, okay, so this is what you think. How do I now I'm just like, kind of like, like, twirling it around in my mind, trying to bring it out into words, to like, feel it in my system, to be like, Okay. How does that land for me? And in the process, like discovering my own way of thinking, right? Am I? Oh, what's what feels true for me too.

Andrea Enright 18:06

So I think so. Coming back to the I wonder if we can circle back, I don't know. Like, how does having a relationship with Spirit help you find peace amidst the suffering in the world? And I don't, I think that you're saying it doesn't necessarily, is that correct?

Dani Grace 18:23

I think there's peace in knowing that when there is suffering in my life, that that's an opportunity that I can connect with God. When I'm actively able to connect with God, I mean, I'm, we're, I am my belief, like we're always connected with God. God's in us all the time, but sometimes we have our ego in the way or some other, if we're going into, like my profession here, there's another part of us that is resisting in some sort of way and clouding that connection still there. But sometimes it's cloudy, and we don't have clear access to that connection. And so that suffering kind of gives us an opportunity to sit with those parts that are resisting, or sit with our ego and ask it to step aside so that we can connect to our higher power. And in doing so this for me, that brings me a lot of joy to when I'm successful in cutting through that suffering. Maybe it is that contrast, because it goes from feeling suffering of some sort to be able to work through my parts, work through the ego, and get into that connection with God. And then it's that sometimes aha moment, or sometimes like this nice, slow sinking in, like settling of anxiety and depression or financial distress or whatever. And like, maybe week to week, realizing, Oh, I'm feeling better and better and better. And. More connected to my divine

Janelle Orion 20:01

I'd love to go a little bit deeper into when you say, like the ego and the parts, right? Because I know this is your work and so for brave hearts who maybe don't know what it is that you're talking about, can you describe a little bit? Because what I what I'm hearing, is that connection to God is always there. But there's parts of self that could be clouding or judgment, and then there are tools that you have that as a psychotherapist, you work with yourself and clients with to help clear some of the cloudiness or the judgment of some of those parts.

Dani Grace 20:35

Yeah, yeah. I'm going to reach for my book here, not going to go into great depth of it, but I wanted to show like what you're asking is going into this book, which is called a psycho a psychotherapy of love, psychosynthesis in practice. This is actually the second book of the series, but the concept I called psychosynthesis and the general theory is that we are made up of various parts we might have. And another word for that, that people might be more familiar with is like internal family systems. That's kind of like the big parts work modality that's out there that a lot of people might be familiar with, and we have all these different parts that exist because of some sort of wounding that happened to us, some sort of psychological wounding, and oftentimes that happens in childhood, where in psychosynthesis, it's when we are not Seen as human, which is fitting for this podcast, anytime we were seen as an object rather than a human, then that creates some sort of psychological wounding in us, which can create various parts to help protect us from further wounding. So if we are like, like like, I was a very, very sensitive individual in childhood, and I was told, don't be so sensitive. And so there was a kind of a manager part that rose up to be kind of emotionless and just focus on practical achievement based things, and that protected me against further of further wounding in that sort for the wounding of like, You're too sensitive, well, okay, then we'll just disconnect from our body and our emotions completely. That's a part that can, like, block this connection to God. And so in in my work, for myself and with my clients, we look for those parts that have needs that have been met or are trying to fulfill, needs that we can fulfill in more adaptive ways. Now that they're older, now that they have access to financial stability or physical stability, if they were in like an abuse situation, they have access to mental health. They have greater access to resources that we didn't have as a child. And we work with those parts to understand why they exist, what they want, what they need, and we kind of negotiate with them. We we establish a relationship with them, and through that relationship, this is kind of like the concept of having a relationship with yourself, to connect with God, in establishing the relationship with our parts, we can fulfill those needs of those individual parts. We can kind of start to gently reassign them. If they all still need exist, they're there. They're there for life. And so we can kind of reassign so, like, my management part can now become the person that I call upon to do all my administrative work when I, like, need to actually do spreadsheets and do, like, management kind of stuff, like administrative, management kind of stuff. And I'm like, Hey, miniature part, like time to shine, like, come on out. So in in healing those individual parts, we then tend to have greater access to that connection to our higher power. That's that's always been there.

Janelle Orion 24:19

Okay, this is so fascinating, because I love I have not I'm very familiar with ifs and internal family systems, but I've not heard it described through this lens of like, when we like, work with our mental health, work with our various parts that and integrate them right then. That actually a byproduct of that is that we have a greater access to the divine within us and to the you know, God outside of us. Did you write that book? Is that your book? No,

Dani Grace 24:51

no, no, it's a it's by John Furman and Gila. I forget her name. I don't. Know how to pronounce that, but, um, they were the original. What do you call them? The people that learned from the guy that that made

Janelle Orion 25:07

it the like the original students

Dani Grace 25:12

of psychosynthesis. Yeah, so the guy who wrote it, I actually it's been a long time since I studied the book. Ah, I don't also don't know how to pronounce his name. Asagioli, I believe he was an Italian. He was a Jewish person. He was an Italian Jew who created it like got went through the Holocaust and created psychosynthesis.

Andrea Enright 25:36

So, Danny, I think I just want to read something that you had written as an answer when we asked questions earlier, that I think like really sums us up, which is so beautiful, as Janelle reflected, you said, My capacities to support others who are lost in their wounding comes from my ability to commune with Spirit and reflect its qualities onto the wounded person, first to provide an external source of compassion and care, and later for them to internalize so that they can access the same material, which I think you're talking about spirit from within themselves. Yeah, yeah, yeah, beautiful. I

Dani Grace 26:20

think that's what Jesus did, like he had, I think he was God, but he was son of God, like he had a very direct connection to God, and so he he reflected God's grace and compassion and never ending love onto his disciples, until they could internalize that love and compassion onto themselves and show themselves that love and compassion,

Andrea Enright 26:51

Janelle, I think you do this also.

Janelle Orion 26:58

Yeah, I mean and I and thank you. Yeah, I feel it as for me, that's like, the Christ consciousness, right? It's a state of It's a state of being. It's not a permanent like, oh, here i here is anyone in this, like, human form as that, but like, oh, in this moment. And I think that Danny, I would relate this whole part of the conversation to, oh, you're finding the godliness in someone of oh, they're just reflecting grace, love and compassion. Yeah.

Dani Grace 27:30

Said Janelle, like, I think that's a great way to put like, we, we can't exist in this state 24/7 we're not like, kind of, going back to this thing I said earlier, like Jesus was the epitome, like the perfect model of Christ. So he could exist in that state, 24/7, and he did, whereas us mere mortals here cannot. But as we work on our parts, more and more, we have greater ability to get into that state of being, that ability to like, to show a ton of grace and ton of compassion more and longer. And it's when those parts, like, if my manager, if I was over, identified and matched with my manager part, my manager part, does not have empathy. It has no empathy, no love, like it is strictly there to control and to achieve. And so if I was over identified with that part, I wouldn't be able to reflect grace and compassion to other people. I wouldn't be able to hold space for other people. And sometimes I do get, you know, sometimes I do get in my head and like, get into that manager must do, must achieve mode, and then I can't hold space for other people.

Janelle Orion 28:43

I'm curious, how does your relationship with God impact your other relationships?

Dani Grace 28:49

I think the most impact it does is indirectly. I think that as I have internalized God's love into myself, that newer relationships have popped up, that there's that opportunity to become deeper and more meaningful. So the word authentic just popped in my head. I think that it just it allows me to be my authentic self in relation to others, which feels the most real, feels the most called upon by God to be that authentic part, also actively, like reflect on the I don't know if it still goes on, but we had like the, what Would Jesus Do bracelets, you know, a long time ago, but it's like, it's such a seemingly simple concept, but it's, it's really impactful for me. So like, if I'm in a situation where a part or my ego or something is. Trying to do something selfish or being hurt itself. I tried to ask that question of like, What would Jesus do? What would like, what would a Christ centered person do in this situation? How would they respond? How would they feel? Am I capable of doing that in this moment, and if not, what's blocking me? What do I need to do to be able to get back into that state? Or is there maybe, like true be defined, that's being violated? Because there is that coming back, there is that duality. We aren't God, like we are part of God, but we are our own individual too, that have needs. Maybe there's a need that's actually being violated, a true need that they need that I need to protect myself. Wow.

Andrea Enright 30:44

I just say something about these bracelets, right? Like, such a piece of, I don't know, pop culture in the 80s and 90s. I mean, it definitely was a thing. But of course, I'm remembering how, like, I was judging it, right? I was just like, oh, that's all super Christian, right? Like, I just, I didn't know, right? I was just like, oh, this is a way of, like, materializing your spirituality. And it feels like an old like, I haven't thought about those bracelets in many, many years. I mean, now of course, I wouldn't, like, I wouldn't make fun of it, or just be like, Okay, that's great. If that's that helps you. But now I'm just like, oh, that's a great idea. Like, it's like a new lens. I'm just like, this is really, just because, really, I just said on when I was interviewed about this, you know, on the last couple podcasts, that one of the things I do want to emulate about Jesus is being kind, right? Like, kindness, right? How can we bring more kindness into the world, right? Like, that's always something I want to emulate. And so having a What would Jesus do on my wrist? Doesn't sound like a bad idea, right? Like, when your man for you, the manager part for me, that you know, the ego, the get shit done part, right? Car starts to take over, pausing and asking. That seems like a beautiful idea.

Dani Grace 32:00

So yeah, it takes awareness too to understand that you are in that situation of maybe diverting from what a Christ centered behavior or state of being would be. And that's that's part of like my work too, with my clients and myself, is like becoming aware in the moment, rather than, Oh shoot, last week I did this thing and I was stuck in it for three days straight to cut down that time, become more aware of it and be able to do something

Janelle Orion 32:34

in the moment. That's what I'm hearing. Is that this skill in that isn't so much. Can you remember to be in grace and compassion. The skill is, how quickly can you become aware that you're not in grace, compassion or kindness?

Dani Grace 32:50

Yeah, because we we are imperfect. So we are it's inevitable that we're going to deviate from that. It's inevitable that we're going to become more identify with a mantra part or a firefighter in ifs whatever. And so it's that awareness of when we are deviating that's really powerful.

Andrea Enright 33:12

And I think there is that moment of discernment that I believe probably came for me 10 or 15 years ago where I was like, Oh, I was just like, I was a good person, but I was more judgey, right in my 20s, like I just, there was just more of that happening, and then at some point that became the anomaly, right? And so now it's easy to it's easy to pick out because it stands out, because most of the time, I feel like I am being kind and non judgmental. But then something will come up and I'm just like, oh, that doesn't belong, right? That doesn't feel good, doesn't feel the same, and and then, you know, you take a look at it and say, Oh, what's going on here? Like, you know, where am I coming from? Where's my ego? What's here for me? You know? How can I reflect and learn?

Janelle Orion 34:02

So in terms of other relationships, right, you just you described, in the arc of your life, right, that you were atheist and the diagnostic, and now you have this, this, what you've just described as your faith in God and and Christ. How has that impacted your other relationships today, like your friends, at your clients, per se,

Dani Grace 34:25

there's a different energy to I perceive. And again, this is, I feel like this is, this is tiptoeing on possible judgment. So I try to be really careful with like, with this, but I try to see people who are truly in their authenticity, which I see is very related, maybe the exact same thing is their their light within there's at least my nervous system picks up on when people are. Meshed or identified with a particular part that's wounded, versus somebody who can access more of their authentic self, of their in psychosynthesis That would be like non wounded part, which technically like, doesn't exist. We are wounded. We'll always be wounded. We can heal some wounds. The scars will still be there. They still affect us. So I don't think that there is like, truly, like 100% pure, authentic us, necessarily.

Janelle Orion 35:33

But what I'm also hearing is that there was, then we'd be the embodiment of Jesus, right? We'd be the purest form. Because if our most if we were 100% authentic all of the time, then an authenticity is either our light or our reflection of the god part that we are, then we'd be moving through the world in that way.

Dani Grace 35:55

Yeah, yeah. That's a great point. I just came to mind, not like hugely into the Bible. But there's like, a passage there about how, like, the children are automatically part of, like, the kingdom of God, and that kind of brings the mind, like they're innocent, like they haven't been wounded yet, yeah, and so they're much closer to God because they haven't been wounded, they haven't then been reflecting their wounded parts onto the world, the hate, the misunderstanding, the disconnection of others,

Andrea Enright 36:31

yeah, and just like, heartbreaking, actually,

Dani Grace 36:34

yeah, it's so heartbreaking. Yeah.

Andrea Enright 36:38

I remember, like, looking down at my daughter, and I was changing her diaper, like, you know, 16 years ago, and just thinking, oh, like, her skin is, like, so untouched, right? It's, it's unstained, right? Like it had it's not, it hasn't been burned, you know, and that as a metaphor for the rest of her, right, like she hadn't been, she hasn't been hurt, she hasn't been disappointed. And just the law, you know, just the loss of that as someone grows is just a little bit heartbreaking,

Janelle Orion 37:10

and it also, yet feels like that is the human experience, because there's no one who actually gets to, like, bypass any of that, right? So it's like, Oh, if we say, if we, like, raised our hand to be human, then we raised our hand to be wounded, and then to go on the journey of, like, integrating the wounded parts so that we could remember that we're actually parts of God.

Andrea Enright 37:40

Just really kind of a fucked up game that we have created for ourselves here. Seriously, wow, I don't know

Janelle Orion 37:48

that's success. How would you suggest someone find their deepest belief or spiritual path? You know, you mentioned that there was a moment, there's a concrete moment on a certain day where you're like, I found it. And so I don't know if there's more to say about that, but that there's, you know, what advice, in a way, would you have for others?

Dani Grace 38:10

Slow down. That's the first thing came to mind. Slow down. Find stillness. And then stillness. That's when we can connect with God the best. That's when and it's so uncomfortable to be still in this society. Yeah, all the things come up in stillness we can we're really good at distracting ourselves from authenticity, from the wounds that we are just trying to push aside, suppress, ignore whatever. And so I think that healing comes in stillness. And sometimes it's so it's so hard to find stillness in our culture, in our society, and sometimes, like in my work with my clients, sometimes the only stillness they find is is that 53 minutes, they're with me once a week or once every other week, and then throw it back into the rat race, which is sad that we have to operate that way.

Janelle Orion 39:11

Do you have any rituals or practices in your life that help you a be in stillness, or anything else related to your relationship to

Dani Grace 39:21

God, I struggle with stillness too. I have a couple. First one is, is this concept of connection with others? Like, really feel, I really feel that connection when I'm hanging out with my with my friends and, like, making very intentional, intentional conversation, intentional space for each other, and inviting a little bit stillness, like slowing down conversation, a little bit inviting some pauses, deliberating on what we're feeling in the moment. I feel like that's that's very helpful. Cool. I feel like I'm in church when I do that. There's like, something in the Bible too that says, like, when two more people meet to, like, talk about God, you have held church, and I really feel that when we can, like, when I can slow down with my with my friends, whether you're talking directly about spirituality, where we're just really deeply connecting over music or something else. Yeah, so there's that. And then I find stillness in listening to music. I have a really nice sound system downstairs in my living room, and I'll sit in the dark with my little special effects lights, and I'll just sit there, and I will listen to kind of like tribal, primal kind of music, and might stem a little and I rock a little bit back and forth, or I might stretch on the ground in the darkness, listening to this stuff and Just finding finding that quiet, which isn't quiet because there's music going on and I'm still moving a little bit, but it's still it's like just enough stimulation that I can stay with it, and just enough stillness that I can start to really connect with myself and sort through whatever I have been suppressing for The week, or two weeks, or whatever, however it is,

Janelle Orion 41:24

I love that. I'm gonna try that. Do you find that? Yeah, that practice that you just described, which is like a slight slight, almost like moving meditation, right? But there's an intent. I hear you like you've created the space set a thin intention, and then, like, dedicated and uninterrupted amount of time to allow whatever is inside of you to come out of you, right, or to, like, show itself. And I'm guessing, in some ways, it probably helps your nervous system for sure,

Dani Grace 41:57

yeah, oh yeah, I feel very relaxed afterwards, centered clear, and there's like a somatic difference too, of like just lightness, like I can feel like as I'm moving through it. I can feel things shedding off of me one by one. I feel it just sort of I can feel myself just thinking into this calm, relaxed peacefulness.

Janelle Orion 42:27

Is there anything else that you want to share? Danny, this like I actually my nervous system feels very relaxed, right? I feel very like soothed by this conversation, like I there's this like a calmness as we've each like, shared a little bit. So I can sense that in my body right now, is there like, something that your faith and belief has been hard for you,

Janelle Orion 43:00

that you struggled with. Well, I also want to recognize the somatic things going on in me. I also feel I have like when you said that, I checked in with myself too, and I've been feeling more relaxed as this episode, as this recording, has gone forward. It's definitely nervous at first, I could feel myself. I can feel that physical, like softening that I feel during that practice. I mentioned being in your your two presences, and talking about connection and spirituality, that that alone, just kind of like feels very comforting to me, reconciling so a lot of my faith is Christian based, and reconciling my connection to Christianity with how Christianity is being used today does not resonate With my beliefs, my identities and border again, borderline judging like I just, I don't see, I don't understand how, what is happening with how Christian is being used in our country right now, how that aligns with Christ, With this concept of sitting down with everybody, the sinners, the lepers, everyone, and just accepting everybody as is and figuring out a way to coexist. I don't see that happening. I don't understand how that is. What's happening is Christ like and so that's really pushed me, because I did used to consider myself a Christian, and I technically meet the definition of Christianity. I forget the tenants of Christianity is like believing that Christ is the Son of God and that He absolves of our sins and that sort of thing. So. So, like, technically, I think I still technically meet those definitions and it I can't associate with with that word anymore. So that's been really difficult, because I love I love Jesus. Jesus saved my life back in 2019 and he still continues to teach me. And so it's really hard to to navigate a religion where Jesus is the center of it, but then be excluded from that religion. So you've mentioned before earlier in the recording that, like I've made it my own. You said something to the effect of like that, I really made it my own. I had to, I had to, for to reconcile how I experience God and in Jesus and what the masses seem to see Jesus as in the religion that's been really difficult. It's also been difficult seeing, like a lot of my people that I hang out with, associate with, are very directly injured by how Christianity is being executed today, and seeing that turn them off even more and more and more to even The possibility that Jesus has something to teach them that's I feel like I'm kind of stuck in between two worlds that's really that's been very difficult to reconcile.

Janelle Orion 46:50

Then you just explained that so beautifully and really opened my eyes to something that I hadn't really like pinpointed. Is that there can be a difference between Christ and Christian like this, like Christ, this universal Christ, right? Or this Christ consciousness would be one way. Like what I'm hearing, right is it's like the pure form of it. And then the term Christian is coming through a human lens, and that's the imperfect humans who are then turning Christianity against the the ideal of the Christ consciousness, of the universal Christ, in some ways,

Andrea Enright 47:35

really, you've claimed it and made it Your Own, because there is so much in life, we can take anything and make it our own, and make it and change it and shape it and twist it and still call it the same thing that and that's true of anything you know from love and marriage and parenthood, you know, and yet, by defining things so clearly and distinctly for yourself. You are just claiming it and making it your own.

Dani Grace 48:08

Yeah, I am doing the same thing that some other Christians are doing in this country right now, but I'm taking I'm putting it through my human lens, interpreting how I experience and see Christ. So doing the thing they're doing, I'm just reaching a different conclusion.

Andrea Enright 48:29

Yeah, I think I'm also just impressed with your bravery, because I think it would be easy to just be like, Well, fuck Christianity. They're not supporting me. Like, I'm just gonna do something different, right? But you're finding the good in it. It's

Janelle Orion 48:42

reminding me, I had an experience this week. I shared about what I'm doing, like, you know, my life with a whole bunch of friends and family from a long time ago, and I had someone respond, saying that they were going to pray for my soul because they felt that I was lost. We ended up having this really interesting conversation, or at least I had it with myself. With myself to some degree of recognizing and he had taught me this already years ago, where he's someone who really believes in guns to feel safe, and I really felt safe without guns. But what our friendship taught me was that we both actually had safety at the center of our decision making. It just expressed totally differently, right? And so the commonality when I'm hearing that you're navigating right? And so as a result of that expression being so different, we really couldn't see each other, right? So it took an effort to get to the top of like, oh, there's something here. But I have to find the grace and the compassion to say, I see you have the same we have the same thing at the center, even though I cannot

Andrea Enright 49:53

meet you there. I didn't know that was the guns person

Janelle Orion 49:55

too. Yeah, they came down. To the thread. And so, yeah, what I'm hearing right? Is that like, yes, like you and me and Andrea, and those who are identifying as Christians or Catholics, right, have this like thing at the center that is probably the same. But then, depending on how quickly from there, it gets interpreted, and then when it gets down to the human level as fullest form, it can be like, Oh, I don't even recognize it here in you. And that's sad, and that's sad, and that's like, heartbreaking. And yet, it's my work take, okay, but can I remember to go back to the top and see what we have in common, even though, in this is why it's just so hard for what you're doing. Like the judgment against me as an individual feels so painful. Okay, Braveheart, just take a deep breath part of the conversation, because I know there are a lot of us who are getting judged for being our authentic version of ourselves, and yet being the authentic version of ourselves, as Danny has so beautifully described, is this God like expression. The more we bring that into the world, the more love we bring into the world. That's Danny, what I heard and took away from our conversation, and I'm so, so grateful to you for everything that you shared today. You you spoke to so eloquently through this lens of psychotherapy.

Dani Grace 51:31

Really appreciate the opportunity, because I've actually been integrating ideas like there's been a few things I threw out today that I've never spoken out loud before, so it's been really helpful for me too, and really appreciate you helping me come to some more conclusions of my own. Yeah.

Andrea Enright 51:49

And Danny, if someone wanted to work with you as a psychotherapist, how could they find you?

Dani Grace 51:56

They can find me on my website. Is sacred light journeys. Dot life, unfortunately, because of our laws, you have to be in Pennsylvania for that to happen, but we can do coaching services for cash pay. Thanks.

Janelle Orion 52:13

Thank you for also letting us know about our insurance and licensure roles totally.

Andrea Enright 52:22

I get it, yeah, okay, thank you again, Danny, and thank you brave hearts for listening to this very touching and poignant episode of finding relationship with spirit and we love you. We'll see you next time, bye, bye. We love you, okay?

Janelle Orion 52:42

Danny, thank you so much. That was so awesome.

Janelle Orion 52:51

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.