Hello and welcome to a happy place. I'm Fern Cotton, and this is the show where we discover how to be better by meeting people who are on that same path of discovery. And so it is a great honor.

I mean, we've been blessed this series, but it's still true to welcome to the show.

Gaby Bernstein choosing to go big in this lifetime and be the highest expression of who you think you are. It's not always easy, but when you show up for the difficult times with a faith that you will come out the other side more resilient, then you can show up for that discomfort with a faith that it's all working out on your behalf. Gabby is the best selling author of Super Attracta. The Universe has your back and most recently, you are the guru.

I have devoured all of them.

I am a proper fan girl, a die hard fan. Before we meet Gabby, though, a big thanks to the sponsors of this series of happy place.

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Twenty eight stripe and stair dot com. And now here's the show.

Gabby, I'm I'm so happy that you're on the podcast, I'm a huge fan, I have been for a very long time. I find your work extremely helpful.

So this to me is an absolute joy. How do we find you today? How are you doing?

I'm actually doing really well. I feel I feel really centered and connected and all as well.

I, I love your work for so many reasons. There's a lot of practical stuff that I've taken from what you do.

But I also adore how you you're always very willing to include your own personal story and be vulnerable in that way and and talk about your own life.

And you've been on this spiritual path now for over a decade and that the catalyst was you getting sober and often much like my own sort of exploration into this area, those seismic shifts where then often come from a place of pain or or a tricky time.

Was that sort of like a light bulb moment for you to walk down this path or was it incremental and then a lot of light bulb moments along the way?

Quite a view. I think the first was when I got sober, actually, I just celebrated 15 years of recovery. So thank you for bringing it up. I just days away from my 15 year anniversary, which is amazing.

And in my sober recovery, I started to awaken to my spiritual condition and really strengthen and establish what a spiritual relationship meant to me.

So the decision to get clean and sober was kind of the first step on a journey of undoing belief systems that made me use in the first place. So, yeah, you had the drinking. The drug is the first step to really beginning to uncover why we were running, why we as addicts, why we were anesthetizing and what it was that we were trying to shut down. So that first big moment was my commitment to get clean and sober. Twenty five years old.

Fifteen years later, the best decision I ever made.

And congratulations on that, so it's a wonderful, wonderful thing. How have you stopped your your past getting in the way of what you do today?

Because, you know, a lot of us feel held back perhaps by our backstory or by our past. But whenever I hear you talk about that period of your life, it is with a great sense of peace and acceptance. How did you get to that place with it?

I have been on a devotional committed journey of undoing the fear based belief systems that I picked up as a child, which we all do, and reclaiming the space of serenity within myself. And I know that all can sound like some spiritual mumbo jumbo, but it's my devotional commitment in my life every single day of my life has been about. Getting closer to freedom, the the older I get, the more free I become because I have been in that commitment.

So that's why I can sit here and say, OK, you know, it was been 15 years and I'm so deeply grateful for the sobriety. I'm so grateful for and for the rock bottom moments that came after that as well. And there have been many for many, many, many and I and disappointment and and facing shame and facing trauma and facing the deep rooted, impermissible feeling that so many people run from for a lifetime. And for me, I think that when I signed up to come back in this body in this way at this time, if you if I if you think about things in a metaphysical way, I think I made a commitment to show up and go big and face dark wounds so that I could live to tell what it means to recover and live to tell what it means to go on the journey of reclaiming the truth of who you are today.

I have never felt more at peace. I even in the midst of everything that we're living through and all the uncertainty and even things not happening when I think they should or whatever, I've never felt more peace.

And I owe all of that to the 15 years of commitment that I have made to my personal growth and my spiritual development.

So when you look back on these times and, you know, I'm really intrigued about this because parts of my life, I'll look back on and there's an element of acceptance, but there still is like a whiff of shame.

Like I can feel that there is still a way to go to get to that piece.

So as well as being willing to stay these moments in the face, because I really have been and that's why I think I'm doing any of the work I'm doing, because I'm willing to sort of look at those dark, ugly patches in my life that I don't want to, but I'm willing to go there.

But how do you how do you eradicate the shame, the guilt, all of those feelings that do end up sort of dragging us down?

Well, right now, I'm doing something called IFES Therapy, which is known as internal family systems. And what it teaches is it really is a very helpful healing modality for becoming more consciously aware of the shameful parts of ourselves and more capable of nurturing our parts to bring them back to a place of safety. So the concept is, is that we're all multiples. We all have these different parts. And Richard Schwartz, who was a family therapist, created IFES when he was 30 years old.

This guy invented this incredible therapeutic practice. And really what it's helped me do is to identify and recognize that I have a lot of different parts. There are parts of myself. So the shameful parts, the the courageous parts, the addict parts, and that the shame parts, the parts of us that have been ashamed are often exiled parts that we we will totally do everything we possibly can to push down to anaesthetise to ignore, to run from. That's why we use drugs and that's why we act out and that's why we become workaholics or whatever it may be.

So the healthier I became, the more those shameful parts became present. And that's why I want to acknowledge you for a moment, because even being able to witness the shameful parts that you are identifying means that you've done a lot of work.

Many people walk through life not even identifying or recognizing shame.

Oh, yeah, they jumped right out of me. There's no mistake about that.

And I love what you said that. So so essentially it's less about eradicating those shameful parts and more about just acknowledging them and go, yes, they're there. And that's OK, because that, I guess, is also part of human connection that we all have those parts, just some, like you say, not willing to look or will just not notice them.

And then what it's also about and that we could do an entire hour just on IFES, but to introduce you and your listeners to this modality. But the concept is, is that our self with a capital S. is that adult resource part that has the ability to hold and nurture and respect and acknowledge those parts of shame. Yes, and the more we start to navigate our lives from that adult resource self, the easier it is to show up for those shameful parts and to sue them like we would a child.

Right. And really, they are child parts typically. So it's a beautiful practice. I mean, this is I'm studying at the moment, so I'm very fascinated by it. Hmm, and it is lovely to think of those parts as childlike, because often those parts of us that we find tricky, we're actually so horrible to we really mean to those bits of ourselves and we berate ourselves when we curse ourselves.

And actually it is about, I guess, soothing those parts. And I forget that often. So I really love that. You've just said that, you know, you you have so many varied ways of working and communicating and methods that you use in your work, many of which I found extremely helpful.

But there's one thing that the sort of thematically seems to really shine through and really resonate with people. And again, it is certainly done the same with me. And that is talking about manifestation or manifesting.

What is your definition of manifesting?

The definition that I believe to be true with all of my heart is to be a manifest or you have to be in alignment with happiness and inspiration.

So when we are in a space and energy, a belief system that is grounded and inspired and joyful, elevated, free, we are what I refer to as super attractors that can become a magnet for what it is that we desire.

And we all are super attractors. But the only thing that blocks us from that super Attracta power is our disbelief. It is our lack mentality. It is our child parts that keep us in shame and guilt. It's our inability to accept our greatness. It's our our fear of of feeling good, frankly. Yeah, that's a big one.

But that's one that some of us might not like to admit. But you know that, again, you know, I feel that one deeply that I know often I I'm not willing to let myself feel good. And that's quite empowering to realize that, like, oh, God, it's that simple. I'm just not willing to let myself feel very good.

It's crazy. It's there's a chapter in my book, Superdrug, that's called It's Good to Feel Good. And it is something that we are often most afraid of because we have this false belief system that it's that the only ways that we can achieve is to push into control and to make ourselves crazy. And that the only the only way to to stay safe is to be on edge and protective and and fearful. But the irony is that is the most unsafe place to be.

A lot of what I teach is all about reprogramming our belief systems and relying on the support of a higher power and really addressing the beliefs and stories and the thoughts that we keep thinking. Because, as Abraham says, a belief is just a thought that you keep thinking. So the more I repeat that belief, that thought, that thought, that thought, then it becomes a belief system, though, in the effort to change those belief systems. That's when we change our point of attraction.

So so with creating these moments where our desires come into fruition and, you know, things that we've been deeply wanting happen. Is that us being in control because it feels paradoxical in the sense that there's sort of an element of control, right? You have control over your destiny and what you want to happen? Yeah, there's a huge part of it which requires letting go.

And I think sometimes that's where I trip myself up.

I sort of think, am I in control or do I just have to go with the flow? And there's sort of confusion there for me often. It can be confusing, so let me demystify it for you. So what we can control is how we choose to perceive the world around us.

We can control the thoughts that we think. And I don't like to use the word control, but we can. Nurture, navigate, reorganize. But the secret to manifesting is to forget what you think you need. Yes. And to truly surrender, to truly let go, to truly allowed to enter into a place of faith that you have a desire.

But there may be something far greater on the way. To give yourself permission to give it over, often people think that surrender is giving up, but it's actually giving over. It's your desire over to a spiritual belief system of your own understanding, it's it's and in some ways even the word giving up is a good thing, giving up, giving over, surrender, whatever you want to call it. It's quite valuable to be able to release your desires because when you're holding on to them and strangling them, that's often the biggest block.

That's what I would like to refer to often as a manic manifesto or somebody who is just rambling, you know, doing all the meditations I'm doing all doing all the prayers and making the vision board.

I'm doing everything I can to attract, attract, attract. And there's nothing being attracted because your energy is so gnarly.

Well, it can border on desperate. You know, I've certainly had those situations where I've been desperately get an outcome and not understanding why it hasn't happened.

And I definitely went through my own sort of huge moment of surrender many years back where I hate this sort of block and had a huge year or two of depression. And I kind of gave everything up that I knew and what I was doing with my job previously in broadcasting, etc. and I surrendered out of necessity. So as I'd done, it will help today.

And it did lead to this really lovely stuff that I deeply care about now. But I don't know if I could have done it unless I was sort of forced into that position. But I think I guess is the answer to therefore not try and manifest an outcome that we want to acquire or experience. It's more about the feeling.

Is it is it the feeling that we should be focusing on when we're trying to attract something into our life? The key ultimately is to, like I said, get into alignment with what it feels like to be in that expression of ourselves. So if you want to manifest more abundance in your career, then the key is to feel more inspired in the work that you do, bring more inspiration into your existing job, bring more inspiration into your your your side projects, lean towards that inspiration and you will be led.

If you want to create more romance in your life, then be in the energy of romance even when you're not with a romantic partner. So that may mean finding that connection of romance in your friendships and feeling just so super lit up in your friendships or reading a book that brings that energy of romance into your world. So you nailed it. It's less about doing it.

It's much more about being and who who you be, how you show up in your being. This is what manifests towards towards you and what you ultimately attract.

So the when you were in a place of depression, though, that's a really important thing to call out right now, because a lot of people are suffering. They're depressed and they're like, well, how can I possibly be in a place of inspiration? How can I that that's OK. Often being in those bottom moments, those rock bottom moments are the catalyst for our greatest change. And it's ultimately what you just said was the best shift in my life.

So I was listening right now and they are at a rock bottom moment. Congratulations. This is a turning point. You're listening to this beautiful podcast right now. You're watching the podcast, whatever you're seeing.

And you're having a moment of opportunity to choose to see things differently and opening the invisible doors opening.

You don't have to feel great overnight, but you can in this moment reach for an even better feeling than you were a moment before. And so that better feeling may just be. That you're going from despair to jealousy, you know, like, yeah, one level up, yeah, right.

So that's what Abraham Hicks actually calls the emotional guidance scale.

And I have it I have it again in the bookstore, Protractor, and it talks about how you can't just jump from despair to joy and inspiration, but you could go from despair to, you know, I'm envious of Fern's cool sweatshirt and her necklace, and I envy that that that that is a better vibration than despair.

Oh, go with it. And then maybe you're bored in five more minutes and I'm boring you with what I'm saying. And that's a better vibration than the despair you were in earlier. So being OK with allowing yourself to be in what you're in and being in the exploration of other emotions is the proactive way of giving yourself permission to not necessarily be in the best, most high vibrational state, but to recognize that you can easily move into a better vibration, even if it's not something that seemingly great.

Yes. And it goes right back to what we talked about the beginning of this, which is a lot, like you say, giving yourself permission to feel good or indeed better.

And I think so many of us who either are dealing with our back story or whatever it might be, do you feel undeserving? And sometimes that feels so written into our story.

And so a part of us that that, I guess, requires a lot of work to to see yourself in a different light, because we're all of creates a narrative around who we are.

You know, I'm bad at this. All I get to over nervous when this happens. I'm always a failure at this. And and we have to sort of rewrite our own story.

And I wonder what the first steps are in doing that.

I have a beautiful practice called the Choose Again method, and it is a practice of rewriting your story and reaching your thoughts back to a better feeling energy. And so the first step is to notice that thoughts that you keep thinking that doesn't make you feel good. Right. So notice when you're stuck in that thought and ask yourself, how does this make me feel? So that's the first step. Notice the thought and how it makes you feel. The second step is a profound step.

This is the step where you forgive yourself for having the thought. Now, what's beautiful about this is that when you forgive yourself for having the thought, you separate yourself from the thought. So the moment you can say, oh, that's just a thought that I keep thinking. I forgive myself for having that thought. You recognize that you are not that thought. You got me? Yeah, and then the third step, which is gorgeous, is to reach for the next best feeling thought.

This is the choose again step where you could say let's just say you were on this and you're like, I'm broke, I'm broke. I have no money, I'm broke. And then you notice the thought and how it makes you feel. You forgive yourself for having thoughts. You realize, OK, that's a thought that I keep thinking, but it's not the truth of who I am. I have the ability to be abundant.

And then the next thought you have is, OK, well, I'm I'm listening to this podcast and they're talking about abundance and they're giving me methods for abundance so I can be optimistic because there's some methods that are in front of me. And maybe if I try one of these methods right now, that could really help me. And I also can just open up to the possibility for abundance. There is a possibility it's maybe an old story that I keep thinking, but I could reach to think something different in this moment now.

So you're just proactively guiding yourself to a belief or a thought that you actually can hook into, that you can believe in, that feels better and then you reach for the next best feeling thought, the next best feeling, thought in the next best feeling, thought.

So I guess the other dimension to that scenario is then when outside noise clouds. So if we've got loved ones or even on a societal level, people saying you can't you can't do that, you're not capable of that or you won't do that.

And that, I think, takes perhaps even more courage and strength to not only defy your own mind and thoughts, but also those around you.

How how do you practically go about conquering that one?

Well, there's a few things I would suggest to the witness resisters in your life, people, stories, teachers, people telling you you can't, they're often reflecting back to you a decent part of your disbelief.

Yes. And you've probably seen this in your own life, in your career and other areas to the moment that you get grounded in your own belief in yourself for your ability. The world stops questioning you because you're no longer questioning you.

That's number one. So when you have a lot of resistors in your life, rather than pointing the finger and saying, you know, stop resisting evil, look back inside and say, well, what is it within myself that is still in disbelief? And how can I take the necessary steps to start to reorganize those belief systems? So that's number one.

Number two, until you have fully developed a strong foundational belief system about what it is that you want to show up as, what it is that you want to create, who you believe you are, don't talk about it until you're in that ground in place, because if you start to speak about it from a place of of insecurity or I'm not talking about, you know, if you want to if you want to create something or attract something and let's say you want to manifest a relationship and you just go into your friendships and start talking about you're going to manifest, but you don't believe it yet.

They're going to feel that vibration of disbelief and only reflect that back to you. They'll say things like be careful or it's a really hard time to date right now or whatever the hell they're going to say. And that's going to come because it's a reflection of your vibration. So you have to do your part to really be conscious of the energy that you have around your belief systems.

And if people are reflecting a negative energy or a disbelief is mirroring your own. So until it's totally developed and grounded and confident within you, I like that because that's all kind of peaceful, quiet work you can do without having to use anyone as a sounding board.

You can almost experiment with that one and get your energy aligned and then see what changes occur around you. And it can often feel quite miraculous.

I think when that happens, when you make that internal change and then, like you say, the outside world starts to reflect that, that's really encouraging. And I think really confidence boosting as well. As I said, I love how open you've been about your own story and it's helped so, so many people out there. And again, I mean, I've read all of your books, but I heard you more recently talking on a podcast again about when you were having struggles to conceive and you desperately wanted to get pregnant.

And it wasn't kind of happening on the time frame that that you had desired and hoped to manifest. And I wonder what lessons you learned through that time that have helped you with this valuable work, surrender and surrender more, right?

Yeah, yeah. I think that the greatest what are the greatest opportunities to live surrender?

Has been my son, so it took me three years to conceive my son, and in that time I had I developed a process of surrender that I have taught in talks and books, and it's something that I developed for myself first.

And like you said, I really ultimately am sharing my own vulnerable stories because that's where it starts and my own guinea pig.

And so I live these practices of spiritual steps for surrender, which ultimately got me into a place of just really focusing on what was thriving for getting what I thought I needed, releasing my timeline, trusting that the universe had a better plan than I did, knowing that what I desired was on the way and it was coming in a form at a time that I could not have possibly imagined, because it turned out while it was three years later than I wanted to be, the absolute best time had I conceived three years earlier, it would have been a disaster.

It would have been a disaster for something like your own personal situation, that there has to be a loss of hope and faith around everything as well as sort of letting go and surrendering. So if you're not necessarily religious, how do you hope and faith faith equation?

Well, to be clear, I don't actually identify as a religious person. I was brought up Jewish and I really appreciate the Jewish traditions, but I don't go to temple. My husband and I practice that religion with our family, my in-laws and my sister in law. But it's more traditional than anything.

So I identify as spiritual and the work that I teach is all non-denominational. So whether you're identifying faith through religion or spirituality doesn't matter whether you recognize faith as inner voice of inspiration, that's perfect. Maybe you recognize faith as trusting that there is a higher power that is your own belief system, your own story. Maybe you believe in it as an energy of love that's supporting you and surrounding you. Maybe you believe in angels. Maybe you believe in spirit guides and ancestors and family members that are supporting you in a different form and in a spiritual form.

Maybe you're not even interested at all in any form of faith. And that, too, is a form of faith. So for me, my faith is that there is a universal. Abundantly universal energy that supports me surrounds me, that there is a time frame that's better than mine, that the situations that don't work out are obstacles and they may be just simply detours in the right direction.

Leaning into that type of belief system and allowing the universe to catch up with my dreams has given me so much serenity and so much certainty and peace with what is. So if something isn't working out the way I expect it, I'm trusting that something much greater is coming. If something seems like an obstacle, I'm trusting that it's actually just moving me in a different, more appropriate direction. And I know that as long as I'm in alignment with that faith, I'm feeling more at ease.

And being at ease is being in alignment and being in alignment is being super Attracta.

So a lot of what I teach is really helping people identify a faith of their own understanding.

I can remember bits and superstructure of the universe has your back, but in one of those two books, I help the reader identify a faith statement and claim what that what their faith means to them. And that's really what I'm here to do. I'm not here to say this is what spirituality is and this is how you should have a spiritual practice. I'm here just to crack people open to a spiritual relationship of their own.

And in that, you will find a sense of certainty and faith that allows you to have that same freedom. And it's it's up to everybody what they what they choose to believe in.

Yeah, so so I guess faith essentially is the letting go part because that's where your free falling in saying, you know, OK, I've got that feeling, that intuition, that whatever happens, it's it's going to be OK.

I'm going to be led down the path that is right for me.

And that's obviously going to take some twists and turns, which I'm sure you've experienced loads and I certainly have. But you do end up and it's not necessarily an outcome that's like and then I ended up with the perfect job and the great house or whatever it is, you ended up feeling and understanding so much more than you would of going down the path that you'd initially desired.

Exactly. Exactly.

It's sometimes the more uncomfortable experiences in our life that revealed to us what we still need to heal.

Yeah, we'll do as a path that we otherwise would never have contemplated if everything was working out.

So you're choosing to go big in this lifetime and be the highest expression of who you think you are or who you believe you can be. It's not always easy. It's not always it's not always seamless. But when you show up for the difficult times with a faith that you will come out the other side more resilient, more grounded, more connected, more abundant, more healthy than before. Then you can show up for that discomfort with a faith that it's all working out on your behalf.

Yes.

And also that lends itself, thankfully, to having patience because in the modern world and I was godi patience. You know, we're fast thinking we want things done quickly. We want something delivered the next day. You know, everything is so instant.

But the stuff that you talk about and the way that we have to think about life has to align with patience because it's not going to be an On-Demand delivery of our manifestations.

And and that's perhaps one of the the hardest lessons in the modern world to learn is that we need to sit back and and not even sit there and wait, I guess, but just sit there peacefully and know that it will be OK.

Well, that faith begets more patience.

So when you start to really trust in a timeline and a plan that's better than your own and you start to see over and over again the spiritual proof that, oh, yeah, that thing that I thought needed to happen three years ago was way better to have happen.

Now, the more proof that you get, the easier it is to be patient. So that's just really it's like the chicken or the egg you have to practice. Yeah. Believe in the patience to see the results of the patients. But what patients also does is it shows you out. So when you actually get into a state of patients, because as I said earlier, that manic manifestoes like pushing and controlling and trying to make should happen, that part of you is super unattractive.

That part of you is really annoying to be around. It's like so needy and Grassby and you know what I'm talking about.

Yeah, I know.

When we get grounded in a state of patience, our energy gets relaxed. And the irony is that everything around us starts to speed up.

And I was slowing down because when you get into that state of patients, you start to trust and that a trusting energy is far more magnetic and attractive than the needy energy.

And like you say, you know, you build confidence and because you see that things pan out in a different way to how you'd imagined. And that is so encouraging. And another thing that one of my favorite things that you talk about and something that I actually just have real fun with, because I think, well, especially the moment we're all lucky and fun massively.

But in life, you know, when we are working towards a goal, we have great dreams or desires.

Sometimes it does just feel like a slog or, you know, not not so much fun, essentially. But the thing for me that I adore is looking for signs and asking for them. And I think I was sort of subconsciously doing it for a long time before. But I've heard I've heard you talk about it on so many occasions now and then I've done a little experiment after and it's so exciting when you get a bloody sign. It's so good.

So can you talk to us a little bit more about how you might summon a sign and and what that might mean for you?

OK, well, you're so cute when you talk about it, so I'm makes sense.

I love it. I love a side is the best.

Oh, you love it because it's a reminder to you that you are spiritually connected and that you are aligned. And it's a reminder of the spiritual presence and energy within you that has the ability to manifest. And so it feels good, feels really good.

What we all have guidance within us and around us. And again, you will identify what that means to you as an individual.

But when you want to start to connect more deeply to whatever you call it, the universe or God or Spirit guides, well, let's let's refer to it as the universe right now. When you start to connect more deeply to that relationship, you can begin to ask the universe to reveal to you that you are indeed being guided. And so if you have a specific issue, you can say, show me a sign if I'm on the right path. And you can also just say show me to reveal to me that I am being guided.

Show me a sign, show me a sign of a butterfly or show me the more specific you are, the better like a blue butterfly or show me a pink unicorn. Show me a lily or show me a basketball hoop. I don't know, just whatever is the first thing that comes to your mind and don't overthink it. And it has to be something a little less obvious. Like you're in if you're in New York City, you're not crazy like a yellow cab, right.

That would be a little less obvious. But when you ask for that sign, then you have to surrender it and be patient pretty swiftly. You'll receive your sign. But it's important to note that if you're asking for a sign about a specific situation and you don't get the sign, that is a sign to some horrible mix that makes that up.

Like I didn't get my sign. That's for another one. It's like, no, you didn't get it because that's the answer. So really trusting that that the signs will come to you when the guy is. Meaning to be revealed to you? Yes, and it can be so much fun, I think, for anyone listening to this who hasn't tried before, it can just be a really lovely, fun experiment and it doesn't feel like it's too heavy, whereas some of the other stuff that we're talking about could feel like you need to walk away and sort of sit and rethink about how to apply it to your life.

But the sign one is is fun. And I absolutely love it because I loved your book. So so I read it.

I reread it again recently just ahead of this interview.

And there's so much to take away from the book. And I think looking at it thematically, what we're dealing with is and what you're saying in the book and now is when you want to attract something, whether it's an acute thing or not, it is about the energy transfer. And so you are feeling a certain way to attract more of it. And that is a profound thing in itself, because often we think, well, I'm lacking and that's why I need that, you know, like we've talked about depression or if you have OCD anxiety and any other thing going on right now and it feels impossible to get to that place of I'm going to admit to this energy to act more of it.

How do you get into that alignment?

Well, first things first. You said something that was very educated as it as it relates to the book. So you're obviously a serious super attractor reader.

Would you recognize and identify that? That we think that when I have that thing, I will be happy, but it's quite the opposite. It's when I am happy and aligned, what I desire will come to me naturally.

So the work isn't about getting things or manifesting, but it's really about a book on feeling good.

So I would say for the person who's stuck in a depressed state or in a place of any form of mental illness or any form of even if it's not a diagnosis of mental illness, but just a perpetual state of fear or addiction, I would really say that it's about the small changes, the small, subtle shifts that occur in your psyche daily that can really add up to guidance and inner wisdom and support. So, for instance, in the book I say the secret to feeling good is to decide to stop feeling bad.

Now it's suffering right now. We'll say a few. Gabbi, you know, how dare you say that to me? Because I'm how could I decide to stop feeling bad? Well, here's an example. So a year ago, I was diagnosed with post-partum depression and insomnia and anxiety, and I was suicidal at that stage, authored eight, had self-help books. And I was saying on Mother's Day, I want to kill myself. And that's how serious it got for me.

But it was my daily prayer. And surrender. Where I would literally get on my knees and say, I need help, I welcome a solution. That was the subtle shift, that was the choice to stop feeling bad, so while I didn't go from feeling like I was suicidal to feeling really healthy and happy overnight, I stayed in the emotional commitment to allowing myself to be guided, to opening up to a consciousness of solutions. And I am a solution oriented woman, and that is what we have to be if we're going to survive difficult times.

Being in the connection to a prayer practiced daily is ultimately what allowed me to fully surrender and welcome intervention and get the psychiatric support that I needed to be healthy and happy and be a well, a well human again.

So essentially, it's a willingness for change is simply a willingness to say, yes, I accept change, because often, you know, and we'll all have this. We habitually will experience the same thing again and again because we have react in exactly the same way that we have previously without change. And it is that willingness to say I'm up for something different, whatever it might be. And that's the first step. I love that song. That's simple and very, very practical.

Yet again.

How would you suggest people because you talk about this a lot in your books? My work with spirit guides, angels, deceased loved ones, how do they fit into the equation when it comes to that positive change that we just talked about or or manifesting or just simply looking for that encouragement that you're on the right path?

I in the book talk about my belief in faith in angels and archangels and deceased family members and friends and the support system that they provide because in the spiritual form, they are egoless and have the ability and the capacity to intervene when we welcome that intervention and when we need it, not without our free will. The same way our a friend or a family member could support a manifestation, so can the spirit guide. The Spirit Guide could play a song that inspires you to make that phone call that turns out to be the biggest deal of your life or whatever it is.

So there's consistent guidance that's around us in the human form and in the spiritual form. And in the book, I talk a lot about how you can develop your own relationship with spiritual guidance, whether it be an archangel or be a family member. I share a tremendous amount of stories about all of the synchronicities that I've experienced in my own life, and I do that so that I can be a power example for the reader to recognize.

OK, this is possible. I mean, there's this crazy stuff could not just be happening by accident.

So and it's fun.

And the stories are so, so full of the proof and richness of the faith that I have had to allow the presence of spirit to be in my life and show me where to go and what to do.

And as you've already begun to develop in your own life, that connection and I can already tell the more present it becomes for you. It's like any friendship. If you don't call your friend, they don't they don't really pick up the phone that easily. Right.

So, yeah, that's a great analogy. Absolutely. It's like flexing that muscle, isn't it? And and using it again, I'd love to start. It was like I'm not loving rounding up this conversation and talks. I want it to go on forever.

But I would love to sort of feel like I need your number and we can be friends. God, we, I, I'm definitely there. I will give you my number, my home address. You can have it all.

I really do. But I can't get to that. I would like not weather. Well I know because it is so annoying for me because for this series it normally I am face to face with the people I interview and it's such a lovely experience sitting with someone that I don't know and having a beautiful chat. And it's still lovely, but it's not quite the same on the same. We're making it happen. But in the future I want to be sat with people making eye contact.

I, I'm craving it, but I really want to talk about gratitude now. It's really obvious for all to be grateful for what we have in life.

But one of the most fascinating things I found from your book Super Attractive, was the need to have gratitude towards things that we don't like in our lives, challenges, tough times, people that are tricky.

Can you talk to us about the importance around that?

Yeah, I think that. We will there's two things I'd like to say about this, so first is I often say that one of the secrets to surrender is actually to be focused on what's thriving and grateful and appreciative of what's currently thriving in your life. Because if you're for instance, when I was I'm benefit. I'm trying to manifest another baby. Right. And it's been taking some time and it's had some obstacles along the way and covid and all these things.

But I've never let myself get into a bad place about it at all.

Furn not even slightly, because instead of focusing on the lack of this second baby and the fact that I have had you know, I haven't gotten pregnant and I've been trying different ways, I just focus on the love and the mad love that I have for my son.

So the more I focus my energy into the thriving relationship with my son, the closer I get to manifesting my next child or or it's not really about time. The more I relax, the more I surrender, the more I trust that that baby's coming whenever he or she feels safe to be in this world. And look, you know, I can look back now. It's been about five or six months since I've been trying to conceive.

I can look back and be like, yeah, that timing would not have been right, you know, so it's really focusing on what is thriving allows you to be in the presence of what presence of what is and be patient with what is coming. So let's talk about it from that standpoint.

And then I don't really I don't see that we should necessarily be grateful for. I would say this.

We can be grateful for the tough stuff because it reveals to us what we still need to show up so we don't have to be shaming of our difficult emotions or our difficult experiences or our addictive patterns, but instead say thank you for guiding me to be so uncomfortable that I have a chance to change.

And that perspective actually will be a much faster way to get out of the addiction or much, much faster way to start to resolve the the deep wound that you need to to heal, because it's when we stay stuck in the shame that we revert back to the pattern, because the pattern is really placed there to numb out the shame.

Yeah. For me, I feel that, like, there's so much to sort of take away from that and think about and apply to a couple of things going on in my life at the moment. And it's it's deeply helpful, I think, to always, you know, give peace a chance by doing those sorts of things. Really lovely, lovely way of thinking about it.

Um, Gabby, I am so thrilled that we've been able to speak for this episode today. It's just going to be a lovely thing for people to listen to. And I'm I'm so grateful. So thank you. And next time, face to face, let's hope. Oh, yeah.

And I'm super psyched to be your friend. So let's do.

Oh, what an amazing experience. Thank you so much, Gabby are my new best mate. Her new book, You Are the Guru, is available now, right? Next week, more happy place, of course. But in the meantime, you should definitely check out the album I have been banging on about.

It's Out right now and features Larry Pink, The Human Emily Sunday, some Fender, Ludovico Renaldi and more. Thanks against Gabby to the sponsors of Happy Place. The series Stripe and Stare to the producer might help rethink audio until lovely lot for listening.