How to Navigate Loneliness When You’re Single

Kate Harlow: 00:00:00

It doesn't matter if someone's laying in bed next to you. It doesn't matter if they're snuggling you every single night, you can still feel that ache of loneliness inside of your heart. In fact, I believe most humans in the western world feel this and the reason they feel this loneliness is because there we have been separated from the truth of who we are. That's the only reason you feel loneliness.

Kate Harlow: 00:00:20

Hello, my loves. Welcome to the new truth podcast. Kate Harlow, here, I am so happy you're here, and I'm really looking forward to diving into this topic that is tender for so many women. This one goes out to all the single ladies, all the single ladies, all the single ladies, this feeling of loneliness without a partner and a longing for something else. And where I want to start today is to talk about the fact that loneliness only comes from a separation of self. So when you were little, you were just present in the moment, and you were just in your little being, human being. You were in your being self. You would entertain yourself. You know, I think of all the only children, I was at the beach. Yesterday, I'm I went to a Greek island for a little midweek jaunt to a beautiful island called Sifnos. And I was watching this little boy play by himself at the just where the water meets the beach, this the seashore. And he was burying holes, and he was building things, and he played for hours by himself, and I was like, He's not lonely. I was, I was feeling into this week's conversation. And, you know, loneliness is such a common feeling, not just for single women, but I know a lot of women feel that are single, feel lonely, right? And they long for a partner, imagining that that lonely feeling is going to go away when they get a partner. And you know what it does at first? Usually it does. Someone comes along, you get swept off your feet, you feel excited, you feel so connected, but that feeling of loneliness creeps back in. And I can share certainly, all the divorced women I've worked with or married women I've worked with. It doesn't matter if someone's laying in bed next to you. It doesn't matter if they're snuggling you every single night. You can still feel that ache of loneliness inside of your heart. In fact, I believe most humans in the western world feel this and the reason they feel this loneliness is because there we have been separated from the truth of who we are. That's the only reason you feel loneliness, right? Little kids aren't like, I'm lonely, I'm alone. They just like, they're like, Oh, I'm alone. Okay, I'm just gonna follow what feels good. Oh, I'm gonna scream if I need to scream, I'm gonna cry if I need to cry. But they are just with themselves in the present moment. Key word here is they are with themselves in the present moment with themselves, not by themselves. Like I don't want to be by myself. If you when you are alone, you feel like you're by yourself. That means you're next to yourself. You're not with yourself. You're not inside of yourself, right? And I've worked with a lot of very powerful, very independent women who are like, Oh, I have no problem being alone, but they're never actually alone. They're alone, but they're busy and they're on their phones and they're on Netflix and they're working and they're busy, and they're doing and they're doing and they're doing and they're doing and they're doing, you get the picture, but they're not really alone, right? And so they're not really with themselves ever. And so often they have moments of loneliness and ache too when they actually tune into the feelings underneath being busy. Because if we never allow ourselves to drop into ourselves and to stop and to slow down, we never feel what's underneath, right? That's what busyness does. It's like when you are so busy going, going, going, doing, doing, doing, and your schedule is completely overfilled, and you're pushing and forcing and performing improving. You're skimming the surface of life. You're skimming the surface, and that's why so many women humans, but women wake up in the night, anxious, worried, freaking out. Wake up in the morning, anxious, worried, because that's when our guards are down. We're not doing we're being and it's so easy for the saboteur voice in our minds to creep in and be like you're alone, you're doing life wrong. Here's all the things you're doing wrong that conditioned mind, which is your saboteur, comes in and attacks you when your defenses are down. If you're busy all the time, your defenses are never down. So you never actually feel and often the feeling is this, like. A deep, deep feeling of loneliness and aloneness inside of so many humans, but especially people in relationship. The reality is, it's almost lonelier to lay next to someone and feel lonely. Have you felt that before? Like that? Almost feels worse to have someone in your bed, which is so fucking common. I know that if there's married women listening. Y'all know what I'm talking about, to have someone laying next to you and to still feel lonely or alone. And the only reason we feel lonely is because we're separate from the truth of who we are. Because the reality is when you are truly home inside of yourself, it doesn't mean you're not going to feel lonely for a fleeting moment or a fleeting 30 minutes or an hour, but if you consistently feel the same way, it's because you are attached to the belief, you are believing stories in your mind that you will feel better when right that this, this is a temporary state. I am single, and it's temporary, and once I have a boyfriend, or if I start dating, or if I start getting affection, that not to say we don't need affection. Of course, we need affection. We need connection, we need intimacy. We need all of those things. However, if it's your saboteur in charge of getting those things

Kate Harlow: 00:06:17

to fill a void inside of you that cannot be filled by another person, you will still feel lonely. This is a book title, wherever you go, there you are. I'm sure you've heard me say it a million times. It's a brilliant title. I don't know whose book that is, but I've never read it, but I've seen the cover. Wherever you go, there you are, right? All of your disconnection from the truth of who you are comes with you, no matter who you're with, you could be in the perfect relationship with the most loving and doting partner, and you will still that that feeling of aloneness and loneliness will creep in, because that is a wounded part of you that feels that way and when you're not in relationship to Your feelings, but you're in relationship to the stories about the feelings, that's when we get trapped. Right? How many? How many times, if you're feeling this, this deep ping of loneliness, do you tell that story to your friends? I just want a partner. I'm just ready for love. I just feel so alone. Let's flip that on its head for a second if you met a guy, or, let's say, a woman, or whoever you're into, and they were interesting, and you were intrigued, and then they were like, I'm so lonely. I just want a partner to lay next to me. I'm just so fucking lonely. Would you want to date them? Would you want to go on a second date with them? I'm guessing, probably not, right? Because the loneliness, it's like that's basically saying, Hi, I feel pain. Can you take responsibility for my pain and and make me feel better in this moment? I would like you to commit to a relationship with me so I can feel better. And the reality is, it doesn't actually work. It never really makes you feel better long term, because someone else can't fill that void for you, it's only a void because you're operating from your saboteur and the little wounded girl, right? But when you shift gears and learn how to operate from the truth of who you are, which is your soul, which is your heroine, which is the sovereign woman inside of you, that part of you doesn't need anyone to satiate anything for her, it doesn't mean she doesn't have a ton of connection and intimacy and all of the things pleasures of life and people in her life, but she doesn't need it. The only part of you that needs other people is is the extractive little kid that needs something else to make her feel better, right? And it's also, if you listen to the episode a couple weeks ago where I talked about the difference between path, being a passenger of your life and being a driver. When you're a passenger of your life, you are attached to stories like, Oh, I'm so, I'm so lonely. I just want a partner. Where is he? I'm so, I'm single. I'm like, I don't want to be single anymore. I want a partner, because that's going to make this pain go away that is being passing passive to life that is being a passenger of your life like I'm a victim of this label, this label that society made up, right? This conditioning, this brainwashing that you had as a woman that tells you that being on your own is like that your relationship status has anything to do with who you are. It has nothing to fucking do with who you are, right? But the world around us has taught us as women, if you are single, it is temporary, even the word feels temporary. And if you're in a relationship or married, it's permanent, right? Which we all know that's not true. We all know that many relationships end, and may we let them when they're ready to end, right? And that at the end of the day, you are you, are you, are you, are you, and may you, may you be so connected to yourself, May May your, may your devotion and your energy shift and you experience actual deep connection to your own soul and your. Own heart and your own body and devote your life to your own inner experience, and from that place, it doesn't matter if you're in a relationship or not. I shared last week, if you listen to you might not have listened to last week's episode, but I it's a phenomenal episode, whether you're going through it an ending or not. I shared about the completion of my relationship with my partner that I've been with for the last three years, and we had a really loving ending. But I was talking about this with friends the other day. Was like, people are like, when, when you're when you're in a relationship, it like, almost doesn't feel like you're in a relationship. And when you're single, it doesn't feel like you're single. A friend of mine said this to me, and I was like, Yeah, that's exactly how I feel. Because I am me, I'm me, I'm me, I'm me. When you are in your heroin, you're not like, now I'm a wife, now I'm a mom, now I'm a now I'm a girlfriend, now I'm a co worker, now I'm an employee. You're not changing hats and because that's the performative self. When you are home inside of yourself, you are you, are you, everywhere you go and but when you're fully expressed as you everywhere you go, you attract people who love and accept all of you, because you love and accept all of you. But it has to start from you accepting and loving all of you. So when I'm in a relationship, I'm just Kate, I'm the same, I'm the same, flirtatious. I'm flirtatious with everyone I meet. I'm loving with everyone I meet. I fall in love with people, and I'm not, I'm not polyamorous, I'm not having sex with multiple people currently. I mean, who knows? Could be my future self? I don't know my future self, but I am, but I'm the same, right? I don't compartmentalize, I don't shut off parts of myself. I don't change my behavior. I don't stop traveling as much. I don't stop going away as much because I'm in a relationship, people are like, wow, how do you leave your partner for so long? And I'm like, what? I'm like, not leaving him. He's always with me in my heart, even after the breakup, I don't like breakup, even after our relationship completion, he's still in my heart, and I still think about him. I feel his energy. I care so much about him. He's with me everywhere I go, and so are all of my friends. Another friend said the other day, like, how did you leave your whole life in Vancouver behind, all your friends and family, everyone, and just start over. Like, don't you miss people? And I learned this from Abraham Hicks. Actually the spiritual teacher Abraham Hicks, it's a Esther Hicks, I guess is the teacher Abraham is, who she channels. If you haven't heard of Abraham Hicks, she's awesome. She's been around forever, and I've listened to her forever, like, really, since I was like, 25 and I remember a long time ago, her saying, I miss you is creating the words, I miss you creates discord in the body, and that it's not, basically not a healthy perspective to hold. And at first I was like, Oh, but I love missing people back back then it's like, oh, missing people is like, so sweet. It's like, it's so nice to say, I miss you. But when you actually experience the feeling of missing someone, it's basically thinking that they're separate from you, or that they're like, they're gone, even when people die,

Kate Harlow: 00:13:21

in my experience, because I'm so plugged in and connected to my heart and my soul. And we talk, I think we talked about this last week, love never dies, just changes form, right? So breakups happen. People die. You move away. They get to stay in your heart. So when you are separate from someone, that feeling of like, Oh, I'm lonely. I miss having a partner. I miss this person. I miss that person. Is like, if you can actually just shift gears, close your eyes, sit in meditation, fill your heart and feel the energy of loving that person. I do this with Ola pangi actually, because I have so many friends at the farm and where I wrote my book, Ola pangi farm in Kenya, and I love it there so much. I also love where I am. I love Greece, I love Athens, I love where I am, and I love it there. And occasionally I'll get a message from someone at the farm, I miss you, Kate. I'm like, oh, and I feel that sweetness. And then I when I feel the missing feeling, I go into my heart and I feel the love that I have instead of missing something. It's like I bathe in the love that I have for that person and how beautiful that love is, rather than the discord, right? So if you're missing an ex boyfriend, or you're missing not having a boyfriend, like, can you feel in your heart the frequency of love, of how it would feel to have that person in your life and actually just connect with the feeling inside of you. Because the reality is, when you are with someone else in a relationship, who you're actually with is yourself, right? Except for the Aside from the physical time. Much experience you are with yourself when you're with that person. But here's the truth, most people actually aren't with themselves. Most people are in relationship completely in the other person's world. Why? Because the saboteur is in charge. So let's talk about the saboteur for a sec. The saboteur, the five archetypes, the fantasy addict, right? The fantasy addict is always in the future, always painting a future story, always in like the dreamer. The fantasy addict is, like, on a date, and she's already painting where it's going. She's maybe in a toxic relationship, but like, painting of nice picture on Instagram that it's a great relationship because she's created a fantasy rather than wanting to deal with the painful fear of making a new choice. The fantasy addicts projecting the perfect life. There's so many layers to it, but that's a little glimpse into the fantasy attic. The second one's the self sacrificer. The Self sacrificer is constantly making choices based on not wanting to let other people down, not wanting to hurt other people, so she'll abandon herself at No, no cost, no no problems, abandoning herself over and over and over again to not hurt other people, even though she's trying to control other people's reality. So she actually is hurting people by doing that. That's the irony. But the self sacrifice, or sacrifices her own desires for everyone else's. She sacrifices her own truth for how other people think she should live her life. And the third one's the isolator. Isolator is the woman who's just shut down from her truth and her feelings and has a hard time being vulnerable and actually expressing what's true. So she's a great friend, but typically doesn't really let people in. And then there's the controller, which is most modern, powerful women who are trying to control the script of where their life is going, trying to control how their relationships go in the driver's seat. But it's not the heroin in the driver's seat. It's the saboteur in the driver's seat, trying to control all the external circumstances in their life so they're perceived a certain way and so that they don't get let down, that life doesn't go according to plan. There they over plan everything to not be let down, but then they miss the magic of what's meant for them. And then the last one's a shape shifter, which is shape shifting and morphing yourself into who you think you need to be, so people accept you, like you, approve of you, choose you. And these are the five saboteur archetypes. Here's how most women are doing relationships, right? If you feel lonely on a regular basis, your saboteur is in charge of your life. If you feel lonely inside of a relationship or single, your saboteur is in charge of your life, because it means you're not actually home inside of yourself, because when you're home and you're not separate from your heart, your soul, your body, the present moment, the Earth, the divine. When you're connected, like truly connected, you will never feel lonely. You can't you cannot feel lonely. It's not possible. I mean, okay, hold on. Take that back. It's possible for the moment, but only the moment you disconnect from the truth of who you are, right? If you're not connected to both the human and the being self, if you're just in the human self, you're going to feel dense, you're going to feel lonely, you're going to feel afraid. So join me at the expanded love masterclass that's coming up. If you have done it before. It will be different this time. It's going to be super interactive, really deep, and we are going to do a Q and A at the end of every session. It's gonna be live on Zoom, so I get to see all your beautiful faces. It's $22 I'll link it below the expanded love masterclass. Every day I teach each one of those archetypes in depth so you understand how it's impacting your relationships and how to break free from that part of you leading. Because the reality is, if you feel lonely, you are separate from you. You are separate from the truth and source of who you are. And so let this episode be a reminder, an indicator, like, if I'm just gonna stay in the seat of I'm lonely and I just need a relationship, Kate and I'm just gonna choose to believe that, then you're a passenger of your life. I love you. I say this with love. You're a passenger of your life, waiting for someone else to rescue you, thinking that that thing is going to make you feel better, when in reality, it will make you feel better only for five minutes, maybe a day, maybe a week, maybe a month. But ultimately, that disconnection from source and disconnection from your own heart and soul is what you're feeling. It's not disconnection from a romantic partner. Go interview married women who are honest and find out how lonely they are too, right? I remember the Eat, Pray, Love Elizabeth Gilbert scene. She's laying in bed, and she's laying next to this man who dotes on her, loves her, has a great life, and she's like, I don't want any of this. She's so disconnected from what herself. She goes on the journey, Eat, Pray, Love, right in Italy, India, Indonesia, and she reconnects with her own heart, her own pleasure, her own divinity. And then she attracts Healthy Love, and then, you know, her life keeps going, and there's lots of twists and turns in her story. She's definitely an unscripted woman. One day, I'll have her on the podcast. But that's the thing. It is. It's the script that we think will will make us feel better, right? Those of you longing for happiness, waiting for the script to bring you happiness, longing for to not feel alone in the world and lonely in the world, thinking a partner is going to make you not feel alone. And this is not to say relationships are good or bad or right or wrong, it's nothing. Relationships are amazing. They're an amazing opportunity to grow, but it is not the thing that's going to fill you, and if you think it is, you are setting yourself up for a saboteur relationship, and inside of that relationship, you're going to be so mad at times that your partner doesn't give you or make you feel how he did or she in the beginning. But the reason you don't feel that way is because the Fantasy has worn off, the chemicals have worn off, and now wherever you go, there you are. There's your disconnection being revealed again, right? So let loneliness be a barometer. It's actually a gift, like I encourage you right now to celebrate your loneliness, because your loneliness is a gift. Your loneliness is an indicator that you are disconnected from the truth of who you are so amazing, because without this information and without this awareness, where do you go from there? You cannot change, you cannot reconnect to yourself if you don't even know you're disconnected, right? So if you are feeling lonely, you are disconnected from your heart, your soul, your divinity, connected to the interconnectedness of life. That is where you're disconnected, and that's what you're longing for, right? We think Abraham Hicks talks about this. We think we're longing for this love to come rescue us, but what we're actually longing for is to feel ourselves, to feel rooted and grounded and anchored in ourselves. And let me tell you, I used to feel lonely all the time like I remember back being in my 20s, I couldn't be single for five minutes. I remember I moved to Australia for a guy when I was 2122

Kate Harlow: 00:22:18

that's the Ugg boot story. I tell it somewhere along the line, I like, met some guy at a trade show in Anaheim in California for work. I asked him to send me Ugg boots. He did. They were new in style, and he was from Australia, and I thought he could get a good deal, and he gifted them to me. And it was like this big fantasy love story. And I moved to Australia for him. And my my little wild, adventurous soul was was present back then too. And two months in, it was like I was getting smaller and smaller and smaller and smaller inside of this relationship. And I remember I was working with at this pub, and this girl invited me to move in with her, and we became very good friends. And she was always dating. She had all these guys, and I go, and I started working at this other pub, and I was around all these really young, like, 19 year old girls. I think I was 22 maybe 23 and these young girls all had boyfriends. Everyone had a boyfriend. And I was like, I need a boyfriend. I was single. Like, I left the guy moved there for a couple months in and I was single for like five minutes, and I was like, I need a boyfriend. Is it you? Is it you? Is it you? Is you? And I would, literally would ask people, and this is what I did all through my 20s. As soon as I was single, I would ask people, do you know anyone single? Do you have any single friends? Can you set me up with someone? Can you set me up with someone? I was desperate. Okay, projector, not a good look. Projectors are supposed to be invited. We're not supposed to initiate. But I was always initiating because I was so uncomfortable being alone. Why? Because I was disconnected for myself. So I couldn't be alone for five minutes. And then, when I was in a relationship, I was constantly jealous. Can needed to connect with them in all minutes. If I didn't, I felt so alone, and I was so I mean, it was torture to be in a relationship, and it was torture to be out of a relationship because I was disconnected, because my saboteur was in charge, right? This is why join the expanded love master class. I didn't even say the date, June, 23 to 27th eight to 915, Pacific. Every morning, block the time off like you're in a meeting. Come join us live. I'll be teaching the archetypes differently this time. There'll be a Q and A at the end of every day, so we can go deeper into the archetypes. It's going to be so good, and you're also going to meet a lot of amazing women. So the expanded love masterclass to learn how to have expanded love rooted in who you are. Can you imagine like someone comes along that you meet who's just sovereign, and he's independent, and he loves his life, and he loves what he does, and he loves himself, and he takes exquisite care of himself, if you're into man I'm describing, and he takes exquisite care of himself, and he honors himself, and he treats himself and everyone else with such honor and respect. But. Right? Like, how sexy would that man be, right? Versus the one that's like, oh, I need you to fill me up, because I'm lonely and I'm alone and I don't want to be alone anymore, even though we are alone. Okay, so if you tell the story lonely because you're saying, Well, how many times have you been sitting in a circle with friends at a dinner and your your saboteur stories in your mind or I don't belong, I don't fit. I'm alone. I don't belong here, like if you don't belong to yourself, if you are not in a deep, reverent relationship with yourself, you won't belong in any room. You won't feel love in any relationship. You won't actually receive the love. It'll never be enough. Because, if you're in relationship, from sacrifice or from fantasy, or from shape shifting, or from controlling, or from being pretending to be perfect, or from isolating and not sharing your true feelings, if you are in a relationship thinking someone else is responsible for how you feel, if any of your if your saboteur, and any of the aspects of your saboteur and that Wounded Little Girl are in charge of your love life. You will never receive love. That's the irony. It doesn't matter how much love someone gives you, it will never be enough. So circling back to my quest in Australia when I was in my early 20s, I did find the guy finally, in some divine moment. And he was amazing. Was a amazing boyfriend. We were together for about a year. I cry thinking about him. We had dinner in Sydney, Australia, that's where I lived when I was back there in 2018

Kate Harlow: 00:26:32

his name's Byron. He was such a love. And he loved me more than any man ever. And at that point I was only like 2223 but I'd had so many boyfriends already, and he was so present and so generous and so kind and so loving. And he, you know, okay, he had me on a pedestal, for sure, but he just adored me. And I remember this aching feeling inside, and you might relate to it. I remember this aching feeling inside like it's still not enough, like, why can't I feel His love? This person loves me. This man is so beautiful. He's such an amazing human. Why can't I feel it? I couldn't, like, fully receive the love, and the reason was, is because I wasn't home, right? I didn't know that at the time, but now, in retrospect, I wasn't home. I wasn't connected to my own soul, my own heart, my own love for myself. I was living from my saboteur and Wounded Little girl, and so I certainly loved getting the validation and attention and love from him. But it was never enough, right? It's like Pac Man or the Hungry Hippo like that. Part of you is never going to be satiated. It is a bottomless pit until you come home. So it's time to come home. My loves join me in the expanded love masterclass. June, 23 to 27th I'm also launching a community, a super low investment every month membership community in the fall. So I'll let you know about that soon. Once it's it once it has more details that I can share, but it's time or join me in one on one. I have a couple private spots coming up, opening up at the end of this month. You know, the immersion is coming up months, almost a year from now, but the immersion is such an amazing homecoming that is exactly what every woman experiences like. Oh, I know. I have a reference point now. I know what it feels like to be home inside of myself, and then you go into life and you learn how to bring that version of you into all your relationships. So it's time to invest in yourself. It's time to show up for yourself. It's time to learn to love yourself. And I had shared last week briefly a new practice that I'm doing, and I want to share it a little bit deeper you might have missed last week, so I'll share it in its entirety. But there's a new practice, and I know that it can be activating for a lot of people, and I want you to sit with this perspective, because I just downloaded this perspective this morning. I just had this thought like, oh, it's such an important reflection. So one of the ways to come home to yourself, I've talked a lot about morning practices, every morning, or maybe you don't have morning, you can do nights, or, you know, middle of the day, or whatever, find that time to carve out for yourself, but the morning is the most powerful time, right? Because everything's new. It's New Energy. Don't turn your phone on. Have it a promise to yourself for 30 days to practice not checking your emails, your phone, your your messages, Instagram, Tiktok, whatever, first thing in the morning, because that instantly puts you in everybody's world but your own. Right. If you want to stop feeling lonely, you gotta connect with yourself. You can't keep connecting with everyone else. You know, I can't tell you how many women say to me, Kate, I just don't have time to do practices, I don't have time to meditate. I don't have time to do all these things you're saying and I'm like, Okay, how much time do you spend on your phone every day, scrolling on something, or how much time do you spend watching Netflix or YouTube? YouTube, right? And the answer is a ton of time, every time. So it's about choosing you. When you're in the driver's seat of your life, you have choice, right? You have choice now to make space for yourself. If you are feeling lonely and you don't want to feel lonely anymore, it is up to you. The only one who can change your relationship with yourself as you and you can either keep believing the story that once you have a relationship, once you get married, once you have kids, once you have a house, once you have this, once you have that, once you have the other, then you will not feel lonely anymore, or you can realize that that's a bullshit story. That's a bullshit fantasy, care of the fantasy addict, that one day I'm gonna feel good out there. One day I'm not. No, I don't get to feel good right now in my life. But one day, one day, when I get to the weekend, when I get to the holiday, when I get to the future, I'll feel good when I get to the relationship, when I get the new job, when I get the thing, it's just bullshit. You can choose that, though that's an option always. I support you choosing what feels best for you, or you can start to take responsibility for this state of loneliness, because ultimately it's just a feeling. And if you're to actually meet the feeling and go into your heart and actually just be with the feeling and move the energy of the feeling with music, with singing, with movement, with writing, it will dissipate. It will change states. But most people just are so attached to the story and the belief that this pain will go away if I had x, y and z, that they never do anything about it, right? And so you're basically keeping yourself in captivity, which is totally an option. So if you want to break free of this feeling of loneliness, you must devote your life to yourself and your own inner experience. And every day, you must greet yourself and what the new practice that I brought into my morning meditations and my morning rituals is I'm now working with a mirror. So I have a mirror from floor to ceiling. I don't know how much of this I said last week, but I'm just going to fully repeat myself in case you missed last week. And also, I think it's great to hear it multiple times. I'm sitting on my yoga mat. It's about five feet away. I put music on, I set the tone. First I meditate. I close my eyes, I go inward. If you cannot meditate, that is simply a reflection of being disconnected from yourself. So again, if you're lonely, you're not home. If you can't meditate, you're not home. If you can't look in the mirror, you're not home. So I start in meditation. I'm breathing, I'm feeling my sensations. I'm connecting with that, you know, place I look, kind of in my third eye, right, right between the the two eyes at the eyebrow, that's where I look when I'm in meditation. And then I just soften and I let myself just drop deeper and deeper. Sometimes I sing, sometimes I chant to kind of just do what. Sometimes I move, do what my body wants to do. But the new practice is then I open my eyes when I feel connected to myself, and I connect with myself with my eyes open, and I just eye gaze. And sometimes I sing to her, and sometimes I just look at her, and sometimes my face changes, and I look like an alien. It's really cool. I go into the quantum field, and all these things start happening. It's so beautiful. And what it feels like to me, is bathing in my own love for myself and my own love, and it's not like an arrogant love. I'm not looking in the mirror going, oh my god, you're so predatory, or you're so ugly or anything like that. There's no judgment attached to it. I'm just being with myself, right? How much time have you spent being there for everyone else, AKA your self sacrificer, because you cannot fully be with someone else if you're not home, right? So you might think you're being with everyone else, but really you're not being you're doing with everyone else. But when you're home, you're able to be this is what happens at the immersion. Women experience intimacy in a whole new arena, because they're actually home in themselves. So now the connection and the intimacy they experience with each other is way deeper than they've ever experienced before, and that's what's available to you, but it starts with you. So I can already hear you. I know so many women have resistance to being with themselves in front of the mirror. Why? Because we've been programmed to judge ourselves when we look in the mirror and to fix it, and if we can't fix it, ourselves to pay someone else to fix it, right? Oh, gotta get some cosmetic surgery, gotta get more makeup, gotta get new clothes, gotta lose 20 pounds, gotta do this, gotta do that. Here's the thing, what if you cannot be with yourself in the mirror? Here's another gift, just like loneliness, the gift in not being able to be with yourself is that is information, and the information inherent in itself is neutral. Okay, you might put judgments on that information, but if you cannot sit and be with your own eyes in the mirror and be with your own self, there is a reflection here. Mirror, that there's something incongruent about how you're treating yourself, and that's why you can't look at yourself. That's why you can't be with yourself in the mirror, right? Because the reason I can now, I used to not be able to. I for years, I used to not be able to I learned about mere practices like 20 years ago, and I could not sit with myself in the mirror. I would be like, You're fat, you're ugly, you're this, you're that, you're like, my mind would go crazy, right? AKA saboteur, and that's the conditioned mind, right? Because we're all conditioned that women are supposed to look a certain way, and even the way we're supposed to look changes based on the beauty standards and all the industries that are fucking with us, like it changes. You can't even keep up with it. But how ridiculous that we're all supposed to look the same. That's actually insane when you think about it, like so many women are running to get these giant lips and these giant cheeks, and it's like, want to look like the same? Why would you want to look the same? You're a unique flower. You're a unique tree. No tree is the same. That's what makes them so fucking beautiful. My favorite tree in Africa is the fig tree, and every fig tree is so different, and they're so beautiful, like, breathtaking. They're just themselves. They're not like, Oh, you're too big, you're too small, you're too this, you're too that, right? So when you look in the mirror, if you're listening to the tape, and you're judging yourself, that is the part of you that's been programmed by society. It's been programmed by all these industries that are trying to take your money. They want more money, more money, get you more addicted to all these things to make you look different or better, which only make you further away from yourself, which only make you lonelier, actually, right? Because if you have to cover up who you really are and change who you really are, you are only going to feel further away from yourself, not closer. But if you can sit and be with yourself, even if it's fucking uncomfortable, breathe through the discomfort, let the tears flow, let yourself scream, let yourself feel the pain of not being able to witness what you see. But then how can I start to clean up how I'm loving myself or treating myself? Probably at this point, you might not be loving yourself if your cat look in the mirror, because before, when I couldn't look in the mirror, I was inflamed because I was eating tons of food that was inflammatory. My I was not listening to my body. I was not doing exercise that was deeply pleasurable, that I loved, I don't even like the word exercise. I was not doing physical movement every day that was satiating me. I was not in a career that I love, following my heart and my purpose, living somewhere I love like my whole life is in devotion to love. And so I can sit with myself in the mirror now, and what I see is just a reflection of how I care for myself, how I love myself. And I'm not talking about gym punishment, right? Someone who's like rigid and punishing themselves and having to be strong and fit and lose weight, no, like that is not love.

Kate Harlow: 00:38:11

So when you sit in front of the mirror, what does it reveal? Where are you not loving yourself? Maybe it's how you talk to yourself, maybe it's how you treat yourself. Maybe it's how you don't listen to your truth when your gut is so strong and your truth is so clear, but you ignore it, or you convince yourself otherwise. You believe your saboteur thinking as opposed to honoring your heart and your truth, right? Maybe it's not taking care of your body. Maybe it's eating things that taste good to your mouth that hurt your body, right? Maybe it's drinking a lot of alcohol or doing something like, what is it a thing? What are you not listening to? Right? How am I dishonoring myself, my body, my love for myself, and how can I love myself more? And every time you make a choice, ask yourself, Is this the most loving choice I could make is this coming from love? Am I truly loving myself by making this choice? Because the more you make choices that are rooted in love for yourself, and it's a practice, but it becomes so addictive in the most beautiful way, an addictive is probably not even the right word, but it becomes like, once you really start to treat yourself with reverence and love, there's no other option I shared on last week's episode. Like right now it's like everything must go that doesn't feel good. I'm so in devotion to feeling good and to loving myself, and so when I sit in front of the mirror, what do I see? Someone who loves herself, and that's the energetic signature of me. So I can sit with myself and be with myself. And again, it's not from the ego, it's from a place of deep presence, deeply connected and just pouring love, feeling the reciprocal energy of love from me to. Me, from me to me as I'm eye gazing, as I'm singing. This might sound totally weird to any of you if it does, book a call with me and we'll talk, because your Saboteurs in charge or join us for the masterclass, but this is a game changer, because your saboteur is never going to stop feeding you stories of how the world's going to rescue you and how you need all of these things to feel better, and it's such a never ending self fulfilling prophecy, and that is an option, or you can totally transform your entire life by taking full responsibility for how you are treating yourself, how you're talking to yourself, who you're surrounding yourself with, where like are you taking risks? Are you doing new things? Are you following your heart? Are you making choices that feel scary? This is the only way we grow. If you're just doing what you've always done, you will keep getting what you've always got. Loneliness is a choice, I'll say, and in my experience, okay, I'll tell you a story when I was at so it's, it's a feeling that can still creep in. When I was at Ola pangi, I was there for nine weeks, the second time in Kenya, writing my book and staying in the glamping tent. And there was a period of about a week where I was hanging out with only people, like the same group of people, and they were all very intellectual. They were open to, you know, my world, but very intellectual, very different worlds we come from. And these are people I love deeply, but it was feeling after a week, I was like, Oh, I miss my people, like a little part of me. I didn't, I don't think I used the word lonely, but I definitely felt like this, like little ache inside of me. So what did I do? I didn't feed the story. I went to my tent. I did some movement, I did some singing, I did some writing, I did some reconnecting to myself. And I was like, Ooh, ready for more expanded connections? And the next day and the rest of my trip, this was towards the end of my trip, the next day and the rest of my trip, one person came. Next person came. Next person. All these people came to olapengi Farm as guests, who were spiritual, who were deep. I had met this woman who was like, What's your human design? And I'm like, Are you kidding me? Yay. And it was like, My people just started showing up. And this woman that's so such an inspiring expander for me, showed up. That's from Italy, that lives in Nairobi. I think all these amazing humans came right after I had that feeling. Why? Because I didn't become a victim of the feeling. That's where most people get trapped. She's like, Oh, I'm a victim of this story. I've got the story that I'm lonely because I'm single. It's like, you're you. Fuck the label, let go of it. You're in a relationship, you're single. Who gives a shit? You're you. I'm swearing a lot today. I feel like I did last week too. I'm getting fiery. But you're you, no matter what. Who cares about the labels. I'm me, whether I'm in a relationship or not, I'm the exact same person I so I said to my friends the other day, I was like, I don't even feel single, because what does that mean? I'm still just me. I'm the same. Nothing's different. So like, burn the label, burn the story. Burn the idea that your life will get better when that is such a passive way to live life, and that is the passenger. And if you're the passenger of your life, it's not going to get better. I promise you that it might get better for one fantasy week or one fantasy month, or a fantasy three months, whatever, but it's not going to get better long term, if you are a victim of your life thinking some other things going to make you feel better, you've got to take responsibility. You've got to get into the driver's seat, and you've got to change your relationship within yourself and bathe in your own love. There's nothing more healing and more beautiful than your own love. And when you can live from that place magic happens. You become so magnetic to everything that you're meant to experience in this lifetime, rather than being a victim of thinking you're going to get something when you get into a relationship. And so even if you're a single woman who is independent and you're like, Oh, I'm good doing life alone like that is still the extreme. There's a closeness to that you like being being good at being alone versus being in deep relationship with yourself are two very different things. So join me in the expanded love masterclass. June, 23 to 27th eight to 915, Pacific. Every morning, there will be recordings as well, but try and get on live, because there'll be a live Q, a you can sign up below, tell all your friends. $22 it's going to be so good. I'm so excited to share this with you. And once you get intimate with really understanding the intricacies of your saboteur, it makes it so much easier to awaken and connect with the depth of your soul and to to come home, because your saboteur spends all its time in the pre in the future and the past, 100% of his time in the future, in the past. Your heroine is right here, right now, right and your saboteur just wants to have a. Soulmate. But you only attract soulmates in your life when you're made to your own soul, and once you're made to your own soul and your devotion to your own soul, you attract soulmates everywhere you go. It's unbelievable. So join me. Click the link below. Would love to see would love to meet you as always. Share this episode with all the women you know who are lonely and need a little boost and reminder that it's time to come home, it's time to devote yourself to your own love and your own reverence inside of yourself, and I will see you again next week. Lots of love. You.