Turning Towards Life - a Thirdspace podcast

What if sadness isn't something to be avoided, but an opening, a doorway that we can step into? What if sadness could wake us up to what we most care about? And what if it could bring us into the orbit of others in a way that deepens our lives? Episode 148 of Turning Towards Life is a conversation about how we might treat our inevitable grief as a call, a question, a possibility - and about how we might do that with the support of others - with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Lizzie: THE GIFT OF SADNESS Sometimes sadness arrives as a messenger, to remind you of all the changes you still need to make in your life. Of all the risks you need to take but have been too afraid to. It creeps through you this sadness, offering up its painful gifts, whispering Truths that you do not wish to see or hear. Thank you very much. But sooner or later sadness will demand your full attention, making it too painful for you to try and stay asleep. It's so generous like that. Until finally one day you have no choice but to take a deep breath, get up from your knees and begin. To start facing the lies you’ve been telling and hiding behind. And feeling the heartbreaks and hurts you’ve been running from. To begin making new painful yet necessary choices for change in your life. Those that will make the difference between you existing or living. ‘ ‘Now’ whispers sadness...’wake up, the time is NOW’. So you take that first wobbly step into the unknown. And then from there, you take the next one. Sometimes deep sadness is the universe calling your name. Listen. Words by Donna Lancaster Photo by Catherine on Unsplash

Most of us were never taught to admit we don't know - and as a result we hold onto our positions and beliefs no matter what. Others of us learned early on that the most important thing we could do was get along with others, and so we routinely give up what we see or care about in order to avoid disagreement. At the heart of both positions is a kind of distrust - distrust that we can still take up our place in the world even if we're changed by our encounter with other people, or even if we have an opinion that matters to us. And at the heart of both is our fear that, if we let ourselves be fully in the conversation, we will no longer belong. Episode 147 of Turning Towards Life is a conversation about learning how to belong with one another even when we see things differently, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Justin. Willing to be Disturbed We weren't trained to admit we don't know. Most of us were taught to sound certain and confident, to state our opinion as if it were true. We haven't been rewarded for being confused. Or for asking more questions rather than giving quick answers. We've also spent many years listening to others mainly to determine if we agree with them or not... It's impossible for any two people to ever see things exactly the same... [And] to be curious about how someone else interprets things we have to be willing to admit we're not capable of figuring things out alone... When so many interpretations are available, I can't understand why we would be satisfied with superficial conversations where we pretend to agree with one another. What surprises and disturbs me [is] a very useful way to see [my] invisible beliefs. If what you say surprises me, I must have been assuming something else was true. If what you say disturbs me, I must believe something contrary to you. My shock at your position exposes my own position. When I hear myself saying "How could anyone believe something like that?" a light comes on for me to see my own beliefs. These moments are great gifts. Margaret Wheatley - from 'Turning To One Another' Photo by Artem Sapegin on Unsplash

Life keeps calling us to uncover and act on all the parts of ourselves we've so far left out, but much of the time we resist the call. Too painful perhaps, too unfamiliar. Sometimes, though, we find ourselves stepping right into exactly that unfamiliarity and making discoveries about ourselves the open up a whole world... and sometimes we find ourselves being that for others. Both require us to give up on how we've known ourselves so far; to give up 'playing the game of identity' that has become familiar to us. A conversation about learning how to step more fully into life, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Lizzie, and is by Marion Woodman: Most of us are dragged towards wholeness. We do not understand the breakdown of what has gone before. We do not understand. We cling to the familiar, Refuse to make necessary sacrifices, Refuse to give up habitual lives, Resist our growth. We do not understand rebirth, Do not accept the initiation rites. Most of us are dragged Towards wholeness. by Marion Woodman Photo by Philippe D. on Unsplash

Somewhere along the line, many of us learn that voicing our needs directly - asking people for what we want - is to invite ridicule, shame or otherwise ask to be hurt. Our learning to undo that - to find out what we really long for, and to give voice to it - is a necessary, difficult and life-giving path to taking up our full size and place in the world. And it's also absolutely necessary for a life of dignified, mutual relationships with others.  A conversation about discovering and speaking our truest longings to others - with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Justin, and is from Mark Nepo's  'The Book of Awakening' Photo by Aron Visuals on Unsplash

When we treat the pain of our lives as a mistake, we cut something off that could be deeply life giving - for ourselves, for our families, for our wider society. When we treat the pain of our society as a mistake, we cut off many avenues for healing, understanding, and for addressing the difficulties that surround us. A conversation about learning, with one another's support, to handle life's difficulties well - to 'turn, know, and honour' them so that they can become a rich source of deepening, courage and repair in our lives - with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Justin. from A Poem for My Daughter by Teddy Macker It seems we have made pain some kind of mistake, like having it is somehow wrong. Don’t let them fool you— pain is a part of things. But remember, dear Ellie, the compost down in the field: if the rank and dank and dark are handled well, not merely discarded, but turned and known and honored, they one day come to beds of rich earth home even to the most delicate rose. ❖ God comes to you disguised as your life. Blessings often arrive as trouble. In French, the word blesser means to wound and relates to the Old English bletsian— to sprinkle with blood. And in Sanskrit there is a phrase, a phrase to carry with you wherever you go: sarvam annam: everything is food. Every last thing. Photo by Diego PH on Unsplash

What happens when we confuse ourselves with just one part of ourselves – when we think we ‘are’ a particular way we’re feeling, a thought, the exam result I got… When we think we ‘are’ our job title, or our joblessness, our bank balance… In short, when we confuse ourselves with being ‘just one thing’. And how our forgetting our own variety in this way also has us forget and not see the richness, depth and intricate variety of others. A conversation about welcoming ourselves and other people in our inner and outer complexity, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is written for us by Lizzie. The Alchemy of Welcome Perceive problems and they will stay, See the gifts and find your way. Hold on tight and it will fall, Open your hand and receive it all. Turn away and the issue spirals, Face into life and the field enlivens. Stifle anger and it takes hold, Welcome the rage and find your bold. Ignore the sadness and wither so small, Accept the feelings and trust the call. Stay on the surface and miss the meaning, Go down deep and find love’s leaning. Tense yourself up and lose control, Relax into love and watch it unfold. Spinning around and to live is a labour, Stillness comes and you taste the flavour. Lizzie Winn Photo by Dimitar Belchev on Unsplash

A bonus episode describing and exploring the Thirdspace Professional Coaching Course in London, which this year is being offered as a completely on-line programme beginning September 2020.  In this special edition of 'Turning Towards Life' Lizzie and Justin talk about the Thirdspace Professional Coaching Course, offered this year as a completely on-line programme beginning September 2020 (offered in partnership with New Ventures West), a certification programme in integral development coaching which is at the heart of Thirdspace's work and a project of great joy and love for both of us.  This year we're offering the PCC as a completely on-line programme. Over the course of our conversation you'll hear what makes this special programme unique, how it changes participants and what it makes possible, the distinction between 'developmental' and other kinds of coaching, and more about the details and structure of the programme. You can read more about the programme on the Thirdspace website. 

Life keeps on happening, and most of it happens whether we want it that way or not. Our ‘not wanting’ can easily lead us into pushing away life as it happens, and into exiling the parts of ourselves and others that we find to be unwelcome. But another way might be possible for each of us, a path we can practice that has us turning towards what happens with welcome. And this could be a way in which we find ourselves opening over the course of a life, rather than narrowing. A conversation about curiosity and welcoming all of it, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen for us by Justin. A Cedary Fragrance Even now, decades after, I wash my face with cold water – Not for discipline, nor memory, nor the icy, awakening slap, but to practice choosing to make the unwanted wanted. by Jane Hirshfield, from Given Sugar, Given Salt, 2001 Photo by lucas mendes on Unsplash

Just beyond ourselves, just outside all the ways we’ve taken ourselves to be, just beyond our certainty and the familiar ways we know ourselves… Just here, beyond ourselves, something is calling all the time, something which we discover in our willingness to be affected by, to be changed by, the ‘other’ in other people and in the world. A conversation about the possibilities that come when we notice and drop our defences, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen by Lizzie. Just Beyond Yourself by David Whyte Listen Just beyond yourself. It’s where you need to be. Half a step into self-forgetting and the rest restored by what you’ll meet. There is a road always beckoning. When you see the two sides of it closing together at that far horizon and deep in the foundations of your own heart at exactly the same time, that’s how you know it’s the road you have to follow. That’s how you know it’s where you have to go. That’s how you know you have to go. That’s how you know. Just beyond yourself, it’s where you need to be. Photo by Joshua Earle on Unsplash

All the ways we try to protect ourselves from life by hardening our hearts, how this leads us to misunderstand love in ways that strangles the aliveness that's in ourselves and in others, and what we might do to exercise proper responsibility in how we care for each other. A conversation about our power to either recognise or smother the beauty in people, with Lizzie Winn and Justin Wise of Thirdspace. This is Turning Towards Life, a weekly live 30 minute conversation hosted by Thirdspace in which Justin Wise and Lizzie Winn dive deep into big questions of human living. Find us on FaceBook to watch live and join in the lively conversation on this episode. We’re also on YouTube, and as a podcast on Apple, Google and Spotify. You can find videos of every episode, and more about the project on the Turning Towards Life website. Our source for this week is chosen by Lizzie. How to Kill a Living Thing Neglect it Criticise it to its face Say how it kills the light Traps all the rubbish Bores you with its green Continually Harden your heart Then Cut it down close To the root as possible Forget it For a week or a month Return with an axe Split it with one blow Insert a stone To keep the wound wide open. —Eibhlin Nic Eochaidh Photo by Wexor Tmg on Unsplash