Get Rooted with Robyn Moreno

How can you deepen your connection to your roots? What transformative role do community and ancestors play in your healing journey?

Get ready for a captivating episode featuring the incredible Robyn Moreno, author, teacher, and reformed #momboss. Join us as we celebrate her new book, GET ROOTED: Reclaim Your Soul, Serenity, and Sisterhood Through the Healing Medicine of the Grandmothers, a profound exploration of pause, connection, and reclaiming power. Prepare to be inspired as we delve into the journey of escaping the slippery slick, and discover a powerful daily ritual for personal growth.

In this episode, get ready to:

• Engage deeply with the value of connecting to your cultural roots for a sustainable journey of self-discovery.
• Explore the profound ways in which community and ancestors can contribute to our shared healing and growth.
• Embrace the transformative journey from susto, the loss of one's soul, to ser, the embracing of your true essence.
• Take part in a powerful daily ritual that will help you get rooted and embark on a path of personal growth.

Robyn Moreno is a true powerhouse! An Emmy-nominated TV host and former editor of Latina magazine, she left that all behind to embark on a transformative 260-day journey to reconnect with her true essence. From speaking at prestigious events like Sundance Film Festival and South by Southwest to sharing her wisdom at the Omega Institute, Robyn captivates audiences with her inspiring experiences. Her book, Get Rooted, is a testament to her unwavering commitment to personal growth and healing.

Friends, please note that we have a bit of casual swearing in this episode, so be aware of any sensitive, listening ears.

Resources:

• Robyn's book, Get Rooted released June 6, 2023. Order today or ask your favorite local bookstore or library to order it.
• Listen to Robyn's new podcast, Get Rooted and follow her Instagram.
• Curious about Robyn's interview with Dolores Huerta? You can check out the snippet of Dolores's keynote from Women & Power we mention.
• Want to practice in-person with Robyn? Join her for Get Rooted, August 25-27 at the Omega Institute in Rhinebeck, NY. Tiered pricing and scholarships are available.
• The other book Robyn mentions in the conversation and recommends is Woman Who Glows in the Dark: A Curandera Reveals Traditional Aztec Secrets of Physical and Spiritual Health by Elena Avila.

✨ You are meant to shine. ✨

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Transcript

00:00:00
             

We are absolutely thrilled to bring you this conversation today with our guest, Robin Moreno. Robin has been Emmy nominated TV host, former editor of Latina magazine, overall complete boss woman, mother, you name it. She has presented at Sundance Film Festival, south by Southwest Omega Institute, and we are talking a powerhouse of a woman. While all that appeared amazing and was amazing, she hit this point in her life where she really needed to check in with herself, go deep and do some work.         

00:00:41
             

And she leads us through that journey in her new book, Get Rooted, which comes out tomorrow, and we had the pleasure of talking to her about it. I first met Robin when I was still working at the Omega Women's Leadership Center. And when I read this book and when I had this conversation, I realized that that time was exactly during her break, and that's how she was phasing it back when I knew her. But now I know it's so much more. This was actually the whole book is dedicated to this 260 day journey that she went on that was rooted, hence the book name in getting herself back to her true essence.         

00:01:23
             

And she talks about that as her moving from suste loss to Sarah, your true essence. But the cool thing was, even though she was in that mixed inner journey, she still was at the Omega Women Empower, fully showing up and helping to empower all of the other women that were part of that community for that weekend and beyond that weekend. We talk about it in this conversation. Robin was on stage interviewing such an amazing activist, Doris Huerta, and the words that just were flowing from the stage still inspire me today. I won't ruin it because we talk about it in the interview, but it is by far, I think this has been Sarah, I don't know about you, but this has been, I think, my favorite conversation we've had so far for the podcast.         

00:02:10
             

I know we always say that, but she just got so real in the conversation with us. I think my favorite part of talking to Robin is how real she is. I said during it, I just want to have coffee and sit here and talk the rest of the day. That is what I want. You want Robin in your life because she is so relatable and so real.         

00:02:33
             

We were supposed to have Robin at our event, Love Yourself Back in March of 2020. And if that number rings a bell, the pandemic hit and we were unable to host our event, and that meant that Robin was no longer our keynote speaker. But we are hoping one day we will have another event that you can all meet her in person at. And in the meantime, listen to this episode, grab her book and enjoy. So once again, the book is called Get rooted.         

00:03:05
             

Reclaim your Soul, serenity and sisterhood, through the healing medicine of the grandmothers. So pick it up. Can get it at anywhere where you get books that includes your library. Enjoy our conversation. Thank you for being here.         

00:03:20
             

We are so excited to be reconnecting this book, get Rooted. It just blew me away. I know. Well, I'm so excited to be here with you all and I'm just so excited to talk about the book and the journey and I feel like it's really aligned with the work that you all do as well. And so that's exciting.         

00:03:38
             

Before we dive in, I just want to say I was telling Sarah this morning, so I'm originally from Texas. Oh, cool. Where are you from? Yeah, I'm from Austin. Amazing.         

00:03:47
             

And so I told her for some reason, reading your book feels like coming home. Like there's this home piece of Texas that's in there and I don't know if it's just like the dialect or like there's something about it that I was like, oh, that's nice. It is. It's a very Texas book. Like, it's funny.         

00:04:06
             

It is. It is. Like, I feel like it has I don't even know, like the food or like the conversations or like the dialogue or like even I don't know if I got into the history. But yeah, it really is a very textusy book. It really is.         

00:04:19
             

And we were like crying, laughing. We have a shared note going of our favorite quotes. We are in deep in this book because you describe the healing process so incredibly well, like the journey that we're all on. And we really want to start with talking about that slippery slick at the beginning when you were walking us through your timeline in New York City. We were right there with you because we had similar lives during a similar time period of work hard, drink hard, cope mentality.        

00:04:55
             

Like, you just did everything hard with everything in. And you mentioned the waves of fear and shame that were coming that we all feel in that cycle. Right? They're already happening. But how would you say people can recognize that and start to shift it to free themselves?         

00:05:15
             

Let's see. I think it's just what you said is just recognize it. Because when you're in that cycle and the cycle that we're talking about specifically in the book, it takes place, I guess, several years ago now. It was like pre pandemic. It was like very, I feel like, boss girl mentality.         

00:05:34
             

That was really the idea. Like, boss girl, you can do it all and I'm going to be a boss. Hashtag mom, boss, whatever. And so this was the ideal. I think this was a memo that so many of us got, like, we're going to be a boss, we're going to own this shit, whatever.         

00:05:48
             

But it was leaning in and all of these things, right? But it was so unsustainable. It's not sustainable. And so that go hard and it's hard. I appreciate you said that because it was hard.         

00:06:02
             

It wasn't soft. There was nothing easy. There was nothing gentle. There wasn't anything like maybe take your foot off the brake, maybe pull the car over the side of the road and breathe. None of that was part of the dialogue.         

00:06:15
             

It was specifically and probably like y'all. I was working twenty four seven. I was working in media, which has been heavily disrupted. I was working in Latina media, which is even harder and more niche and more difficult and more personal and more loaded. I was commuting 4 hours a day because I lived just outside of New York City.        

00:06:34
             

So door to door was literally 2 hours door to door from like when I left my door till when I walked into this high rise building in lower Manhattan. I had two young children, and it was like that manic movie where I was like, kind of funny, but it's like, not that funny, where you're like, running to the train and you're like, take my kids and then you're like, please hold the door, and it just goes from there. And because I worked so unsustainably, I would drink a lot because I had such my whole body was always really hyper. I was very up here, and so to kind of just calm myself down, I would drink. That was like my way of just I needed chill out, so I would just grab that glass of wine and instantly find myself exhaling.         

00:07:20
             

But then what was really happening is I was gone. There was a level of goneness not present, right? So even when when I'm talking, I feel like I'm talking fast talking about it, because I was like at that level, like, I'm like, okay, I got to do this, this and this, and this. And then I'm going to do this, this, and this, and I'm going to go home and do this. And if I don't leave by here, I'm not going to get my kids.         

00:07:41
             

And I just felt really fundamentally that I wasn't doing anything right. Like, it didn't feel good in the body. I didn't feel like, man, I am winning at life. I felt like, I am failing here. I go home.         

00:07:54
             

I got home too late. Because what was difficult in my schedule is if I didn't leave the office at like 545 to catch like a 615, I wouldn't make it in time for bedtime, and I would forget it. I should just spend the night. And I would be in these high pressured scenarios where I'd be like, someone would call a meeting at 530 and I would be like, oh my God. And they're just talking about nothing.        

00:08:17
             

And I'm just sitting there watching the clock tick, tick, tick, tick, tick tick, knowing, and just like, getting all hyper and Can I get out of here? And then realizing that my window is gone. And then just being so depressed. And all of this is happening in real time. It was very emotional.         

00:08:32
             

And so I would just say for anyone out there that finds themselves in a state of overwhelm, that first recognition of I'm overwhelmed, it's a first step. And I know it sounds cheesy, but it's actually true because there's a point in the book where I went to this conference and I was a total badass. I gave this amazing speech and then to decompress because they were so tied together in my body. I went to drink to decompress, ended up drinking way too much, and the next morning, woke up really hungover, wearing the same dress from the night before and had this real, almost like a rock bottom moment, honestly, where I was like, looking in this mirror, just gripping it, thinking, I am not okay. This is not normal.        

00:09:15
             

This is not healthy. This sucks really bad. And I was having so much fear because I was like, oh my God, oh, my God, how did I do this? How am I going to get out of this? What did I do last night?         

00:09:26
             

I don't even remember. And it hit deep levels of shame that I think went back years and decades and probably generations. And that to me, was a real moment of I got to somehow get rooted. And you started the conversation talking about slippery slick. And for people out there listening, the Aztecs, my ancient ancestors, ancient Mesoamericans, who didn't call themselves Aztecs, by the way.         

00:09:52
             

They referred to themselves as the Meshika. I would say decades, maybe even centuries later. Like, anthropologists deemed them the Aztecs, but they never called themselves that, like the way that we call ourselves humans. And in the future, somebody might call them something different, you know what I mean? So I just want to give them proper name.         

00:10:07
             

So the Aztecmishika were amazing philosophers, and they had this concept, this saying almost, that said, the world is slippery, slick. And what that meant is that you're walking on your world, running to the train as it may be, right? Running to make the podcast, running to get through the to do list of things good and bad, and that you're going to fall. It's just the nature of life. It's just the nature of Earth.         

00:10:37
             

It's just the terrain of it. It's slippery. And they have these, like, ancient codices where a mom is telling her daughter, be careful. If you look to the right, there's a cliff. Be careful, if you look to a left, there's a cliff.         

00:10:51
             

This is a jagged world that we're living on, and it sounds really unsettling. It sounds true, right? Because we know that we can be doing our best and a global pandemic, we can be planning events, amazing retreats for all the people that are going to come, and a global pandemic without our control is going to come over and just knock us on our ass or we're going to make a mistake. We're going to think we're doing the right thing by working so much, because what's wrong with that? We want to do things in the world.         

00:11:22
             

We want to have a say. We want to raise our children or not. If you don't want to. We want to be worthy and use this one wild and precious life, and yet we're going to make a mistake. It's the fundamental nature of life, which I find actually very forgiving.        

00:11:38
             

I find it to be very forgiving. And so what do you do when you make a mistake, when life pushes you, when someone betrays you, when you betray yourself? What are you going to do when you're knocked on your ass? And so that's how I started the book, in that on my knees moment. I was like, on my knees.         

00:11:55
             

And I don't know that I wanted to get rooted. I don't know if those were the words, but I was like, how can I find my footing? I'm slipping left and right. How can I find my footing? And that's how the book and really this journey that I continue to be on started.         

00:12:11
             

That is such a beautiful answer. Thank you. Robin, I loved what you talked about that goneness, like, that goneness from your body. And I noticed it, too, when you were talking about New York City, it wasn't just your voice and body that was impacted. Mine was too.         

00:12:28
             

I noticed my shoulders going up. I noticed myself, like, going in. It's such a body tie. And that's why I love that question. After you had that on your knees moment, that question that helped you to start your journey and you already know it, but I'll say it for the readers.         

00:12:45
             

Can I call back unfreeze and reclaim parts of myself so I can truly get rooted? I love that question, especially when you compare it to the goneness. So you kind of framed it as the process of moving from susto am I saying it right? Susto to Sarah, like a person's true being. So how I know that's the essence of the book, but just a little teaser.         

00:13:12
             

What was that journey like? So after many instances of goneness where I wasn't there, I wasn't there for my kids, I wasn't there for myself, honestly, I wasn't there for people that I loved because I was too busy. I was gone and too busy. Busy became also sort of an addiction for me, to be honest with you. The way that alcohol and drugs can be an addiction.         

00:13:34
             

Being in a state of over busy and overwhelm and constantly doing stuff also has a dangerous allure for me. And so I have to always be careful with that because I can think I'm doing good things, and yet I'm compromising my health, my mental health, my spiritual centeredness, and my children and my family and the people that I love. And so I began to understand that. I began to be like, what are you doing? You're missing it.         

00:13:58
             

You're missing the things that you claimed were important to you, that you worked so hard for, which was really my family and a level of stability that I didn't have in my own childhood home. They're kind of fucking it up, dude, come on. And so I quit my job. So that felt like the first next step. And I know everyone out there can't quit their job, so I'm not saying that, but I put a pause.         

00:14:18
             

I had to slow down the train. And for me, this particular job, I'll just move back to Freelancing. I was like, I'll be a freelancer. Let me just shift in this way, else I need still need to make money, but I can't work. Working full time in the city, commuting four days a week.         

00:14:33
             

It's too much. So that was the first thing I did. And I moved back to a freelance lifestyle. In that time, I also consciously was like, I knew that I needed to heal something because the reason that I was over drinking and overworking and running, I just knew it in my body was because I wasn't dealing with some wounds. There was wounds that I was running from.         

00:14:55
             

There was a reason that I was behaving in this capacity, right? I was calling it achievement, an ambition. But it really was like kind of a running away. And I knew that. I really honestly fundamentally knew that.         

00:15:07
             

And so I've always been very spiritual. I've always been spiritual. I grew up Catholic. I moved away from an organized religion, but two yoga certifications, always knowing, feeling for me in my body that there is spirit, that there is connection, there's love. There's something that connects us all into a greater whatever, mystery, the great mystery or whatever that is.         

00:15:31
             

My great grandmother was what they call a gurandera. So it's C-U-R-A-N-D-E-R-A-I believe that's how you spell gurandera. And it means sort of, I guess, direct translation, but it's like a healer. She was a medicine woman, which was not uncommon, I think, for maybe many of our great grandmothers who were born in 1896 that didn't always have access to a doctor and things like that. And so she was also it was a spiritual practice for her.         

00:16:00
             

And so people would come to her in the neighborhood and they would, like, get their cards read and she would work with the body. And she was an herbalist, but she also practiced this almost like an ancient wisdom tradition, earth based wisdom tradition called guran derisimo. And I grew up with it. I kind of had it in the background noise. That's something that my grandma did.         

00:16:20
             

But whatever. I don't know. I was like an Americanized Latina. I'm like, I don't know. She's rubbing an egg on me.         

00:16:27
             

I'm not sure what she's doing, whatever. So I found myself in this position of transitioning, of slowing down, of kind of knowing that I had to heal something. All of a sudden, I started to my cousin invited me to a Gurandarismo workshop. She was studying Guran. The dizmo.         

00:16:43
             

And I was like, Guru Narismo, like that old fashioned thing that our great grandma did. She's like, yes. And so I began to read books and I don't know, something hits you when it's going to hit you, right? I was just ready at that moment to receive this beautiful medicine. I wasn't ready before.         

00:17:01
             

I simply wasn't. And so as I read this beautiful book called Woman Who Glows in the Dark, it's a beautiful book. Everybody should read it. It's about a Texas born nurse turned Gurandera who talks about healing. And she was a nurse, but she wanted to have more cultural relevancy for her Latina patients.         

00:17:20
             

And so this wisdom tradition she began to bring in, and it's really beautiful. But in there she talks specifically about a condition called susto. It's susto. And susto, the verb in Spanish means to freight. I think it's asusta.         

00:17:36
             

My Spanish is not 100, but I think it means like, to scare. To scare. But this condition is understood as more of a magical fright or soul loss. And the idea is that when you experience a shock or like a trauma, that your body is like that a piece of your soul. And this moment of this shock will leave, it'll flee or it'll freeze.        

00:18:01
             

And what happens is you have sustain and you're kind of like you don't feel like yourself. Something's missing. And you know that you have it because you don't feel right. You kind of don't feel right, like there's something missing, something's off. And so the idea is that to cure this sustain or soul loss is that you then have to go into soul retrieval and you have to get that piece of you that froze or fled and that you have to get it back and call it back gently to be reintegrated in your body.         

00:18:30
             

That's the idea. And so when I read those words, I thought, Sarah's, this is what I have. Like, I always knew that I had a wounding. I always knew I felt different than everyone else. Honestly.         

00:18:44
             

I really always felt really different than most people. I'd be somewhere and it would look really good, and I'd be doing the thing and making the speech or being on TV and performing, usually in some way. But I would always think, they don't really know me. They don't really know who I am. This is just a part I'm showing them.        

00:19:03
             

And it was hard, right? There's like a lot of shame and stuff in that. And so when I began to heal, I realized after but when I read these words, susto, I'm like, that's it. That's what I have. I felt like as if I had this undiagnosed illness and finally think after years of like, I was vegan, I ran a marathon.         

00:19:23
             

I have two yoga certifications I go to the Mega Institute, like, every weekend. I've gone to, like, eight day silent retreats. I'm quiet sometimes. It's not working. And so when I saw that, I was like, my whole body was like, it got quiet.         

00:19:40
             

Actually, it got quiet. And it said, that's the thing, that's it. And so I knew I didn't know what it was going to look like. It was harder than I thought, was messier than I thought, it was more tangled than I thought, but I thought I had the thought, I have to go back and find myself. I've lost myself.         

00:20:01
             

I'm almost 50 years old. There's so many places that all of us, all of us, we've left ourselves when the teacher yelled at us when we were five because we painted outside the lines, when our mom, well intentioned or not, said the really mean thing. And that we really took it to heart, right when someone broke our heart, when we broke someone else's heart, when we broke our own heart. Like, all of the woundings and the sustos, they add up like sticky notes. And what happens is that you can't feel yourself anymore.         

00:20:35
             

So all of a sudden you're like an outline of a person, but you're not there. And so the job is to come back and be there and also let go of things that you think are you and reintegrate into who you are. And that's what the soul retrieval was, is to go back to the places of your life and face yourself, your hurts, when you disappointed yourself, even when you don't leave yourself behind. Like, you go back and you accept all of it, the beautiful things, the hard things, the sad things, you kind of bring them back in to kind of shake it out and then you can decide from there. But that's what the process was, if that makes sense.         

00:21:15
             

Thank you for sharing that process because I think so many of us, me, I included me here, but that empty outline, I was like, yeah, got to fill it up again. I felt Sarah's eyes welling up with tears, and mine were starting to too, because it was so relatable, like, trying so hard to just be I mean, that's what it is. It's that trying, trying to like, how can I exist? I love all of that. And what I really like is that you hone in that it's not easy.         

00:21:48
             

There's a lot of perception that this soul retrieval work, this coming back to ourselves, is going to be walking through fields of flowers and doing really nice meditation and ritual. And it's a lot of really painful experiences, challenging experiences, weird kind of things. So I want to ask you about you're bearing eggs in your backyard and your husband's, like, what's going on? And you're having this awakening. And I'm.         

00:22:20
             

Saying this, I have a mirror hanging outside my house from Friday that I did a ritual and my husband's like, oh, this is what we're doing now, is it? There's these pieces that are really challenging, really hard, that go against the norm in our society that financially can be struggles. If you're not working and you're bearing eggs in the backyard, how do you keep going when people in your life are like, don't quite get this. I want to support you, but I don't get it? I think that's such a beautiful, honest question, because I think that anybody that is on a spiritual path, like a healing path, like an awakening, I guess, right?         

00:23:00
             

It can be lonely because not everyone is going to understand you. And even in this book, when I started, I wanted my sisters. I have three sisters, and I instantly believed not only do I have this sustain, this soul loss that I want to heal, I feel like I see it in them too. I don't know that it's my job. I learned later this was right.         

00:23:20
             

You go through a journey and you realize, like, well, it's probably not your job to tell people what they need to do. But that's where I started. I was like, oh, my God, I have it, and you have it too, and we're going to do this, and we're going to just be great. In 260 days, we're going to be so great. And it was like nothing like that, but it was hard because I did want to bring my sisters along for the ride, and they didn't understand me at all.         

00:23:42
             

They really didn't understand. Sometimes they could be mean. Sometimes they made fun of me. They sort of minimized my own trauma because some of them have experienced much greater trauma. I mean, it's never like a compare kind of situation.         

00:23:55
             

It's not hierarchical. It wasn't always understood. That hurt because it was people that are close to me. But what I realized is that the people that do love you and they do will just be like, I don't totally get you. I don't know that I totally get it, but I love you.         

00:24:12
             

And if you think you need to bury some eggs in the backyard and rub them on me, even like, all right, I'm game. If we got to just run outside or scream in some dirt and that makes you feel better, then fucking rock on, man. Go scream in the dirt. And I think that my husband so much is such like I don't think he really understood anything I was doing, honestly, ever. But he knew that I was hurting, and he loved me enough to say, trust me when I said, look, I'm going to do this.        

00:24:50
             

And it might be a little crazy, and yes, financially, we're going to make less money because I'm leaving a six figure job, so I'm going to try to bust my butt. And neither of us are wealthy. Neither of us come from wealth. So we're going to feel this. This will be felt we will not go on a beach vacation, things like that.        

00:25:10
             

But I believe it's worth it because it's going to be an investment in a different way, but it's going to be an investment. And I think I'll be a better wife. I'll be a better mother. And when you talk about breaking generational cycles, like, that's so popular, right, to talk in this capacity, I'm going to break a generational cycle like I'm a cycle breaker. What does it really look like?         

00:25:31
             

What it looks like is choosing different. What it looks like is doing different. Not saying it, but doing it every day is that you move in a different direction. You move in a way that your trauma kind of shaped me. And I developed all of these skills.         

00:25:51
             

They didn't work anymore. All of those skills that got me here were not going to get me out of here. And I had to put them down and be different. And that was so hard because you say it, but it's hard to be different. It's as hard.         

00:26:04
             

And so I had every day to almost fight against my instinct. I had to almost do the opposite. There's a quote in the book where I interview a mentor and she says, you have to act contrary to your damage. Your damage wants you to close down, and you have to stay open, right? It wants you to be, I don't know, this way or that way, and yet right, fearful, and I don't know what conniving.         

00:26:30
             

And you have to stay trusting and curious. And it was like, what the fuck? And so that's why I tell people. And at the beginning, I rewrote the intro because I'd written it. It was really beautiful.         

00:26:44
             

And yet I thought, I'm not going to be doing anyone any favors if I do not tell them that I was sort of walking into a fire. A good friend told me that when you make gold that you burn it. You burn the gold. I don't even know what it is. Maybe it's a rock.         

00:27:01
             

Maybe it's some sort of like, right mineral. And I guess there's something called dross, maybe, I don't know. It's like this impurity. And the way that you get to the gold is you burn off what it isn't, right? And it was like a little like that.         

00:27:15
             

It was a little like I had to let go of the things I thought that I needed. I had to go, let go of these habits that I thought that it was who I was. I had to be willing to be new, which meant that I had to die a little bit. And that was profoundly hard. I will say, even though I felt alone at times, I was not alone at all.        

00:27:37
             

And that this is a process where community comes in because healing is in the collective, and that is true and that is your savior. Connection is the cure. That's what we. Believe also, and that actually it segues 100% into this next question, but before I do that, I just want to Sarah, do you have any follow ups for that that was just so beautifully. Written and said, your way of articulating this journey.         

00:28:01
             

I've taken multiple deep breaths. I have been reminded in my own journey along things I needed to hear today. So I just want to say thank you. Yeah, you articulate it well, and I think that we don't talk about how hard it is enough, and that's what scares people. They start getting into it, and it's hard, and it's scary, and you want to scream into the dirt, and you find things that work, like writing on your mirror or burying eggs or burning things, and it's confusing because that's not what we're taught in so many places.         

00:28:36
             

We're just not taught. And so the way you articulate it with empowerment of like, yeah, and we can withstand this because we're worthy of being who we are. I'm worthy of letting myself shine. It's just chills. I want to talk to you all.         

00:28:53
             

Day, and you curse just like I do. I just, like all day long. Let's just stay on zoom, grab some coffee. Keep let's do it. One thing I want to say that I do think is important is that all of these ways that felt really weird and really foreign in a way, were not.         

00:29:12
             

That was actually the magic. And I do believe that everybody has old ways, that our ancestors were not the first ones to be confounded by life, to be saddened by its limitations, by our human limitations, and also inspired by the beauty. Right? We're not. We're just one generation of so many before us.         

00:29:41
             

And so I took so by going back and studying this medicine of my great grandmothers, I found connections, the ways of cleansing with an egg and then bearing it, the ways of yelling into the dirt, the ways of even going on this soul journey. It felt so unique to me, and yet I was like, Holy cow. This has been done by people. This has been done by people. I'm actually going back home.         

00:30:12
             

This is how I'm finding remember the ways that got me here, which is, like, the over busy and over drinking, okay? And this feels really weird, because now I'm like that weird lady that's rubbing an egg outside under a moon. Like, I'm that lady. Okay? I'm that lady.         

00:30:24
             

But that's the way these are the ways. And we all have our ancient ways. We really do. Right? We do.         

00:30:32
             

And so you talked about self worth, and it was a way that was a soul retrieval. It was an unexpected soul retrieval, honestly, was actually the process in which I did it. And the things that I rediscovered was a beautiful reclamation, which really rooted me in my own ancestry and rooted me in recognizing the resilience of the people that came before recognizing. Some of them weren't great either, but at least I had truth in that, and I can decide to do different. But there was a lot of unexpected rootedness in that way.         

00:31:05
             

And I do feel that we all have access to this. I'm not unique in this capacity. We all have this. All right, Robin, we met at Omega when you are doing Women in Power, and I love, love, love the fact that you already see to this. This is a collective journey.         

00:31:21
             

It's community care. We're doing this in collective. At Women in Power, you got to do one of the most powerful interviews I've ever seen, which is with you and Dolores Huerta, who we will link her in the notes. If you all don't know Dolores Huerta, you should. She is the most powerful activist woman that I have ever had the honor of meeting.         

00:31:42
             

And she said something that was about collective power, and I'd love to talk about it more, and that is power is like love. The more you share it, the more there is. Then she went on to say, it's about wonder women, not woman. It's wonder people. So that theme of community, of collective healing, it was so present throughout your journey and throughout the book.         

00:32:06
             

Can you share a little bit more in detail, just how that helped you get through? Yeah, absolutely. And thank you for saying that, because Dolores, when I met her at the Omega Institute and I'd met her before, she's this beautiful, amazing icon who is I think she's 92 years old, and she still is out there. She's still out there. She, along with Cesar Chavez, co founded the United Farm Workers, which fought for farm workers rights and was a precursor to so many amazing things.        

00:32:35
             

And she's been in the fight for decades. She's 92, so she's been it for a long time. And at the Omega Institute, I had the complete honor. This was top, like, one of the top moments of your life. And you're like, oh, my God, this is happening.         

00:32:47
             

I'm in it. This is one of my things. This is a woman who just embodies everything. And so I hold her near and dear, and I asked her, what's your message for young people who are still in the fight? Come on.         

00:33:00
             

It's 2023. We're still fighting. And she told me, You've got to know your story. You got to know who you are, because if you don't know who you are, if you don't know who you are, somebody will tell you who you are, and you will believe them about you.         

00:33:20
             

And that's what getting rooted is about. It's about getting to decide who you are, despite even maybe despite of society, of sustos, of your family. We get to decide. We get to decide who we are. We get to write our own story.         

00:33:41
             

We get that right. We're the writers of the Pen. So one thing that was so integral to this book. And my healing was that I was not going to do it alone, right? And even though we talked about a moment about how I felt alone, because I did, I left my job.         

00:33:57
             

I'm sitting in my backyard. It's so quiet. No one's calling me. I'm not important anymore. And I was like, Holy cow, what the heck am I doing?         

00:34:07
             

What am I doing? And so one of the first things I did is I got a spiritual teacher. And that's not easy to find. I'm not going to go on Amazon.com and find a spiritual teacher. It takes a long time to do.         

00:34:20
             

I'm just letting you all know. But I found someone who understood and practiced guru. She had actually studied with a woman, Elena Avila, who wrote that book. That was so foundational to me. So there was like a lineage, and she's from Texas.         

00:34:36
             

I just love her, and I honestly believe that she was meant to be. And so that's what I found her. But I also just started to reach out to people and say, I need help. You might think because of things I post on social media, which look very shiny, you might think because you go to Robmarino.com and I put all these amazing pictures, right, that I'm a great woman of strength and fortitude, but I'm actually really struggling. I'm actually going through I'm not sure what it's called, midlife crisis, spiritual crisis.         

00:35:11
             

I'm kind of falling apart. I might need your help, right? I might need your help in watching my kids so I could actually go away to this thing. I might need your help in giving me some work because I need money. I left this job and I need money, and so I had to start asking for help.         

00:35:30
             

And it was really hard. It was really hard because my whole life I thought that asking for help was, like, weak. Like, I can do it. Because I had learned to shoulder so much, because I had to when I was a kid, my dad died when I was young. My mom got really busy.         

00:35:43
             

Like, I had to take care of my sisters. If anything, my identity was threaded with, I can do this. I'm the one people come to. I'm the support. And so to be in that vulnerable position felt really uncomfortable.         

00:35:58
             

I was ashamed. I felt really not great. But the thing is that one of the root words of community is actually is the word common, right? Common. And what it common means, right?        

00:36:11
             

Like, we're the commons or whatever. It means communal. It means equality. It means that we're the same. It means that you're not a royal and I'm below.         

00:36:22
             

I'm not a priest standing on a mountain talking to you. It means that we are all on equal footing, that we are in right relation, that we're simply neighbors, that we're just walking each other home. I don't know any more than you do. You don't know any more. Maybe.         

00:36:38
             

Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't. Depending, but you know what I mean. But we're going to lean on each other, right? And so I had to humble myself. It's disrespectful to think it's egoistic.         

00:36:49
             

I got this, I got this. It's also disrespectful to yourself because you don't and then you're overwhelmed. And so I had to do that brave thing and ask for help and allow the helping, allow that. Maybe I don't know everything guide me. Like, I'm walking on this path.         

00:37:04
             

I'm falling again. I'm on my knees. I'm struggling. I could feel the waves coming in, right? I'm slipping.         

00:37:10
             

Will you help me? And then people want to yes, I want to help you because it makes me feel good. It makes me feel worthy because I get it. I get it. It allows me to say when I don't feel good, I don't feel good either.         

00:37:23
             

Will you help me? Yes, I will help you. I will help you. It's so beautiful. One of the root words.         

00:37:31
             

I'm a Gurandari small practitioner, and for the longest time, I had so much trouble coming to terms. I'm like, this is too big. I thought a gurandira meant to cure. Like, the root word was cure. Gura, cure.         

00:37:46
             

I'm like, I can't do this. I can barely brush my teeth. I shave my legs. How am I going to cure? I can't cure anybody.         

00:37:56
             

What? But I was like, this is way too much for me. But I found another definition of gura, and it's not to cure, it's to care. I was like, they said care. We thought it was cure, but it means care.         

00:38:17
             

I can do that. Sign me up for that. You want me to try to care for I can't cure you, but can I care for you? Will you let me care for you? Yes.         

00:38:28
             

I don't know that I can cure myself. That sounds like I have some great disease. No, I don't. I'm human. But can I care for myself?         

00:38:37
             

Yes. Right? That's why I call it self care. I can do that. And so it was this allowing.         

00:38:43
             

It was this allowing. It was an accepting, it was a rooting. It was an allowing and it was receiving. And that's how I actually got rooted. Never alone.         

00:38:58
             

Never was I alone. And even when I thought I was alone, my ancestors were there. Like the earth was there. People were sending me wishes without even knowing it, thinking, how is she doing? I haven't heard from her in a while.         

00:39:12
             

Man, I hope she's okay. And that steadies you, so no, we don't do this alone. I don't think it's possible to do it on our own. It's not meant to do alone. We're not meant to do it alone.         

00:39:27
             

Thankfully. Yeah, thankfully. Who thinks this is too much? Too much? It is too much.         

00:39:33
             

Come on. Too much. Oh, thank you again, such a beautiful answer. Going back to some of the practices that I love how you said these practices aren't actually new. Like, this is us coming home.         

00:39:49
             

So one of the things that really resonated with us is your use of ritual, and you guide the reader through ritual practices. So there's this feeling of like, oh, I can actually start dipping my toe into this. I can start trying some of this stuff. What would you say is one practice that people could do today to start rediscovering their worth, to start having that questioning moment? There is a call yourself back practice that I really like.         

00:40:19
             

That's so easy. It's so easy. And you can do it. I sometimes do it at night, like, before I go to bed, like, when I'm laying there and I will call myself back. It's almost like a review of your day, because what happens is that throughout our day, we interact with other people, and we can leave ourselves there in good or bad situations.         

00:40:41
             

So if we had a situation at work that was really frustrating, I don't know if our computer broke, if we had a fight with a loved one or a disagreement, if we're worried about something, a lot of times they could be like we were in the future. We're worried about, will I find the job right? Will I do this thing? Will anyone come to the thing? How is this going to resolve itself?         

00:41:03
             

We're leaving if you imagine all of our attention and our focus outside of ourselves. And so I think that leaves me very not rooted feeling because I'm still stuck there. I'm kind of scattered. I've scattered myself. And that doesn't feel good.        

00:41:18
             

So much to feel scattered, right? And so it's like, let me just gather myself. How can I gather myself? And so usually before I go to bed, if I'm laying down, I'll just begin to just bring my attention. Like, how does my head feel on the back of this pillow?        

00:41:33
             

Is it getting me right? Okay, this feels good. Can I relax the tension in my shoulders? Can I feel held by this bed? Can I release some more tension with every exhale?         

00:41:46
             

So I'm being held and supported by the bed, right? It's about that letting go and being supported, trusting that I can let go of some tension. And can I call myself back from where I left myself? So am I still in the work thing? Am I still in the frustration with the loved one?         

00:42:05
             

Call myself back and you say your name right? Sarah, come back. Come back. Sarah, come back. Right?         

00:42:11
             

Am I in the future? What am I going to do? What am I going to eat tomorrow? How is that thing going to turn out? Robin, come back.         

00:42:18
             

You're here. Your head's on the pillow. You're here. Come back. And you imagine yourself coming back.         

00:42:24
             

You really see yourself and you call yourself back gently but firmly. You're, like, commanding yourself. Come back. Come back. And you imagine yourself, okay, you're leaving the phone call.         

00:42:39
             

You see yourself and you imagine yourself, right? Like, you fly back to yourself and you like, for me, I always do this. I always imagine, like, I land on the top of my head like some sort of, like, fireman ladder. And I come to the top of my head and I'm like, okay, time to come back home. And I'm literally feel myself feeling.        

00:42:58
             

And I do a body scan, and I feel myself, like, fill up my head. Oh, I feel myself. Oh, I'm landing here in my chest. I'm really embodying my solar plexus, my back. Oh, there I go.         

00:43:12
             

Here I am. Here I feel oh, I feel the weight in my hips. Oh, I'm back. I feel myself all the back of the knees. There she is.         

00:43:19
             

Okay, I'm back. And you're fully back, right? And so you're just in the present moment, you're just where you are. I'm doing it at night, but if you have to do it, wherever you are, I'm fully here. And there you go.         

00:43:33
             

And you're back. And so I just feel like that calling yourself back practice is like a mini daily soul retrieval. And if you can do it more and more, you come back to yourself, you're able. And power is in the present moment, right? That's really where you can have power.         

00:43:51
             

You know what I mean? That's where you can or go, rest, ease, breath, right? And so whatever you need to do with this, like, if you just need it all yourself back so you can fully sleep, go to bed. If you fell yourself scattered during your work day, you could maybe go to the bathroom and bring all of your attention back, especially if you just had a weird interaction with someone, who knows. And then when you're fully back, you move from there, and it's a moment by moment.        

00:44:18
             

And so you're slowing down. Time really is what it is, and you're bringing yourself back to the present moment. So it's a practice I do every day, basically. Thank you. That feels so doable, which I think is one of the big things on this journey, is to make practices that are obtainable that we can do and integrate into our daily lives.         

00:44:38
             

So for listeners, if you're listening to this on the day the episode is dropping, go order your book right now and it will come out tomorrow, so you will get it right away. And if you're listening to this later, go and buy get Rooted. It is available anywhere where books are sold. At least that's what it looked like. Check out your independent bookstore first.         

00:44:57
             

But yes, it is on Amazon as well. We'll have a link for you guys in the description. And Robin, before we get off, we're super excited because you have a busy summer coming up. You probably have some stuff with the book tour. I don't know if you're doing a book tour, but we know you're going to Omega.         

00:45:11
             

Do you want to share how people can stay in touch with you? Absolutely. So if you go to Robinmoreno.com, I usually have my list of events there. You can send it for my newsletter if you are on the socials. Robin n.         

00:45:23
             

Moreno and it's Robyn. And then another N for Nicole. And then Moreno. But yes, I'm going to be having a book reading in Green Point on June the 6th. I'm going to be in New Mexico, which I'm really excited about, on June the 23rd.         

00:45:40
             

And then I think I'm going to be in Aspen for a festival like a week leading, I think the third week in August. I know for sure. I'm going to be in California and Long Beach at A. We all grow. It's a conference.         

00:45:54
             

I think it's the weekend of October 21 and 22nd and there'll probably be more things to come. But I'm also really excited because I'll be leading a weekend retreat at the Omega Institute and I believe it's the very last weekend in August. I think it's the 25th through the 27th. It's a Friday through a Sunday. And if you haven't been to the Omega Institute, it's so beautiful.         

00:46:14
             

It feels like home. Like, walking on that campus is really rooting. It's beautiful. The food is amazing. It's gorgeous.         

00:46:23
             

I mean, there's acres and acres of lakes and a grandmother tree. You can go hiking, there's a garden, there's a sustainability center. And so we'll be together in Circle and Community talking about ways that we can get rooted. So basically, if you enjoyed this conversation, we'll be doing more of these practices all weekend with the intention of all of us getting rooted together in community. So hopefully we'll see you there.         

00:46:48
             

But yeah, I'm excited. I also have a podcast that we'll be launching very soon. It's called get rooted with Robin Moreno. And we will have all of these linked. Robin, this is a little too soon to share, but Sarah and I are hoping that we're going to be there in August.         

00:47:02
             

Oh, my God, that would be amazing. I hope you guys could be come. That would be so cool, right? It would be amazing just reading your book, and I hope all of you feel that same connection if you felt inspired by this, I cannot tell you how much more nuggets of wisdom, actual full length rituals that you can do and incorporate into your life that Robin's book has. So please get it and then join us at Omega in August.         

00:47:27
             

Yay. We're going to just have a big old party. Yeah, it'll be great. And what I love about it is we always make sure that it's financially available to people. And you actually chose to have tiered pricing for that Omega workshop.         

00:47:40
             

Yes, and thank you for saying that because that is so important. Yeah, most of the work that I do is usually sliding scale. Just because I know what it's like to not have money, to not be able to pay hundreds of dollars or $100 for a session or something. It's just not sustainable for many people. And so I absolutely get that.         

00:47:58
             

So most things that I offer, offer sliding scale. And so Omega does have tiered pricing, and they also have scholarships. I think we have five scholarships available, which means that you would come for free. I think you would just have to get your own transportation. And so, yes, thank you for saying that, because accessibility is really important, and I think it's actually a really good deal for the price.         

00:48:18
             

We're trying to make it as accessible for people as possible so we could be together. Yeah. And it actually is like, people that have looked at Omega before, take a look at it, because we are really surprised by just how affordable you were. Able to make it. So thank you.         

00:48:32
             

Yeah, that's the idea, right? That's the idea. So thank you all. Thank you for mentioning that. That's huge truthfully.         

00:48:39
             

We've talked so long, it's going to be longer than our normal episodes, but everything that you said was so powerful and so on message. I was completely riveted the whole time, so it wasn't me, too. I was super engaged. Yeah. I loved it.         

00:48:54
             

Ladies, thank you all so much. This was like a really beautiful it was a beautiful podcast. And I really appreciate the support. I appreciate you sharing on social and a growth opportunity for me. So thank you all.         

00:49:05
             

I appreciate the help.