You are the sum of the people you spend the most time with. They are often a reflection of who you are and how big you get to live. Join us in conversation as we recount how people have changed our lives over time and what we have learned in different seasons of life and what roles our tribes play.

Emotions are here to stay and they get many labels both good and bad. Our culture often dictates what is acceptable in terms of how we express them and when we express them. In this episode, we unpack what this culture calls ‘negative emotions’ and how they have tremendous power to serve us and heal us just as much if not more than what gets labeled as ‘positive’ emotions. Join us while we explore the giving of permission to feel all of our emotions and honor what each has to offer without...

Have you been holding on too tightly?   The more tightly we try to control things the more stressed and anxious we become.  When we can loosen our grip we can find more joy and ease and wellbeing. Joins us while we find a sense of direction and connection in all the unlikely places of perfectionism and comparison and expectations in a world that sometimes causes us to ‘white knuckle’ our way through the day.

If you are on someone else’s expected journey for you, you are not on YOUR path. In this episode, we explore how your path is YOUR path and you are exactly where you need to be. Sometimes our paths overlap or travel alongside those of others. It’s time to take back our own authenticity to walk on our own path… in our own time; without comparison or judgment. Listen and remember with us, how to let go of what does not serve you and embrace your own power. We can be the example or we can be...

There are so many things going on in the world that are ’stealing normal’. It may be more important now than ever to ask ourselves: What is normal anyway? What do we want to keep? What needs to go? How can I cultivate an experience that most represents the life I want to live? In this episode, we open the door to these questions and the idea of ‘micro’normals and how there are gifts in the chaos and uncertainty if only we are willing to explore the edges.

In this jam packed episode we explore our edges and the concept of ‘balance’. What it is, what it is not, and permission to carve your own path. Who says you can’t have your cake and eat it too? We are here to help you find your new ‘normal’ and create harmony between being a human ‘doing’ and a human ‘being’.

This past year has certainly touched all our lives in various ways with respect to limbo, impermanence and uncertainty.. While hard on the human brain and the nervous system, these things can also play a necessary transitional experience to get all the juice out of life. Join us in this episode where we unpack what it is to experience these states: the trials, the tribulations, and some real strategies for harnessing the power and the lessons in them all.

ANNOUNCEMENT: Carla and Juliet are taking a little sabbatical from Riffing on Realness for the next couple of months. We may peek in here from time to time, but, overall, we won’t be recording. Have a great summer! In this episode Carla and Juliet riff on getting real around emotions. What they’ve noticed about emotions while both going through some deep water. They get curious how we can seem to hold contradictory emotions within the same day or even hour.

In this episode, we explore what's going on when we want to help others or when others want to help us. Sometimes, well-intentioned advice can feel irritating or disempowering. In turn, we may find ourselves trying to fix other people's problems. When we look deeper at what's going on, do we need others to be okay so we can feel okay?

In this episode, full of laughter, we explore decluttering, not just our physical space but our inner emotional and psychological spaces. We get curious about what's going on when our minds or spaces are full of stuff we don't really need or want. How might we recognise what's going on and what helps us let go of the clutter?

In this episode, we explore burnout. Carla shares how she experienced burnout towards the end of last year and how she consciously took a 'sacred pause'. In practice that looked like stepping back from blogging and social media posting and focusing solely on taking care of her clients and herself. Although she had some misgivings, she realised it is perfectly acceptable to take a sacred pause when one needs to. And she sees how her business, rather than suffer, has actually grown.

In this episode, we explore how sometimes our reactivity, eg irritability, pettiness, and frustration can be disguising a deeper emotion. Carla tells the story of how grief about her mother showed up recently but she didn't recognise it at first because it's not usual for her to feel this and initially she felt petty, dramatic, and reactive. Can we get eyes for and accept what's showing up internally?

In this episode we explore interruptions. Carla's dog Pedro is poorly today and Carla has taken time out to attend to him. She's noticed how along with the distress comes irritation and getting snappy with others. She sees how comical it is that we get so easily upset by interruptions. Maybe we should accept the fact that interruptions happen and maybe we need a little more understanding and compassion with ourselves and others.

In this episode we explore re-calibration. What may be happening behind the scenes as you respond to resuming social activities after lockdown or at any time when you find yourself 'tired' by things that don't usually impact you that way. Juliet is particularly curious to explore re-calibration. Is it a time to pause and allow for the possibility, we may actually be adjusting to new perspectives, rather than assuming we are not 'up to speed'. We kicked off with a little love fest,...

In this episode we explore boundaries, a popular topic no doubt. How do they help? What are the pitfalls? What do we notice about clear boundaries in others? How we can get tripped out when setting or holding boundaries and what's up with that. Another juicy discussion to invite you to see something new.

In this episode, we explore what happens when your boat sinks (life doesn't go to plan). Carla's actual boat sank and she talks about what she saw as that experience unfolded. We meandered and pretty soon found ourselves looking at impermanence: how we know deep down, the fact that: everything changes, yet we try to live as if it doesn't. We try to control our lives, circumstances, other people, and our feelings. So if we know we cannot ultimately control life, what gets in the way of just...

In this episode, we explore one of our favourite topics: procrastination! A long-time companion for us both, we get curious about what we might see fresh about this juicy topic. It was great fun to explore how our relationship to procrastination keeps evolving. Expectations and agreements also guest-starred in this episode.

In this episode, we took our time to decide if we wanted to explore getting vulnerable. As our podcast is called Riffing on Realness, we decided to go ahead and explore vulnerability. When your primitive brain gets activated, we can get scared, dazed, and confused.

In this episode, we explore the 'upper limit' on our happiness. When things are going well we can get afraid of the 'other shoe' dropping and that keeps us from enjoying the present. Is the upper limit real? We look at trauma responses and explore what we see that might be helpful.

In this episode we explore freedom. What is freedom? We have all kinds of ideas about freedom. In the US, when we think of freedom, we often think of financial freedom. A question we might explore is 'how much is enough?'

In this episode, we explore what it is to celebrate and how we can bring more celebration into our lives. It may seem there's not much to celebrate with all that is going on in the world. When we find ourselves overly serious, celebration can be a way to mitigate that.

NOTE: We had a few technical issues with the sound. We appreciate your patience. In this episode, we explore playfulness, something we can easily overlook if our minds are full of heaviness. Research shows people learn best through play and we get curious about how we can access a more playful vibe. Even those of us who tend towards seriousness usually have a playful, silly side. Yet we can feel uncomfortable around silliness. We wanted to explore what's up with that.

In this episode, we explore simplicity in terms of material things. Rather than leaning into a political discussion about material wealth, today, we're curious about simplicity and our relationship to what we have. We get curious about what is enough and why we celebrate people with vast material wealth.

In this episode we explore simplicity. When it looks like we are up against a mountain of things to worry about, think about and manage, we often find other people's advice, at best unhelpful and often just irritating. We wanted to explore whether there is a simpler way.

In this episode we explore belonging and loneliness. We all want to belong. There seems to be so much disconnection in the world, not digitally but in our own minds, there can be a deep sense of aloneness. Without the possibility to be among people and have that physical comfort of being together, many feel isolated and lack community. But what is that desire to belong and where does that sense of belonging really come from?