Episode 16 – Connect with Your Inner Goddess and Balance Your Chakras.

[toggle title = “Show Notes”]
[callout]

Purchase The Goddess Solution and connect with your inner goddess!

Today, for Keto and Energetic Balance, I brought on Lisa Marie Rankin, the author of the new and upcoming book, The Goddess Solution. She has been a writer for a couple of years now and is an inspiration to us all. She also has a blog, where you can find her at lisamarierankin.com .Recently, I read her book, The Goddess Solution, and found it to be very intriguing. Not only can you learn to connect with your inner goddess, but you will also indirectly balance your chakras.

Lisa’s Biography

Several years ago, Lisa Marie Rankin decided to follow the path of the goddess. She left her job in the corporate world to pursue her passion for writing and teaching yoga, meditation, and spiritual concepts. Lisa Marie is also an Ayurveda wellness coach and helps women optimize their health by holistically caring for their bodies, minds, and spirits. She teaches women to reconnect with their bodies, prioritize pleasure, and rely on their inner wisdom so they can become a goddess.

Lisa Marie Rankin holds an MBA and MS from Bentley University. You can find her essays in Human Parts, a Medium publication. She lives right outside of Boston with her children, dog, and a flock of chickens. In her free time, she enjoys hiking, snorkeling, and spending time with mother nature.

Here are the show notes from some of the questions from the interview:

1. Me: What inspired you to write “The Goddess Solution”?

 

Lisa’s response: 

I have always been interested in yoga and spirituality. Well, since college, anyways. In my late thirties, my marriage was ending, and I found myself less and less inspired by my day job. I began to look for happiness and validation through external factors like men, appearance, and career success. When that didn’t work, I found myself drinking habitually in an attempt to mask my feeling of unease. I remember saying to myself: “I don’t feel like a goddess.” 

Goddesses are sovereign and shouldn’t look outside of themselves to be happy

 For some reason, saying those words inspired me to start figuring out what a goddess feels like. I began to research goddesses across traditions and started a blog to explain how I experienced their presence in my life. I learned that a goddess is sovereign and whole. She doesn’t need to look outside of herself for contentment and joy – she creates it on her own. I began to practice what I was learning, and this wisdom changed the course of my life.

 I moved on from my marriage and practiced what I had learned. I ended a cycle of toxic relationship patterns and minimized my alcohol consumption. I also started to take exceptional care of myself – body, mind, and spirit. When I began to take accountability for my life, I found joy, ease, and meaning. 

Look within to find your inner goddess

Just as I was looking outside myself for happiness, I observed so many other women doing the same. Many women don’t feel good about themselves. They think they’ll feel better after they lose 10 pounds, get the guy, or make more money. But it doesn’t work that way! We feel better when we can learn to love ourselves unconditionally. That’s not something someone else can give us. 

 My book intends to teach women that they are already whole. They already possess everything they need- they don’t need to look outside of themselves. They can tap into goddess energetics to overcome challenges, experience pleasure, and create the life they were meant to live. 

The goddess is unique within us

I researched hundreds of goddesses, and the ones I selected were the ones that resonated with me the most. People will experience the goddesses and their myths differently – and that’s ok. The goddess shows up uniquely for all of us, and myths evolve to fit the time, place, and person who needs them. 

2. Me: Do you find a direct correlation between being a goddess and chakra balance? Do you find that yoga and meditation are the keys to assisting with the balance of the chakras and making women feel like a goddess?

 

Lisa’s response: I do. I think we can think of the chakra energetics as similar to goddess energetics. For example, I would consider the goddess Demeter, an earth mama representing growth, nurturance, and support, connected to the root chakra. As the root chakra, she is the energy we need to feel grounded, stable, and supported. Oshun, the Yoruba goddess of love, sensuality, and freshwater I would equate to the sacral chart. She is about connecting with our feminine energy, honoring our sexuality, and being able to receive. And we could go all the up the chakras. 

I teach meditation should bring us back to the body, rather than away

 

I think that yoga and meditation are important parts of a goddess’s practice. However, I prefer to do meditations that bring us back into the body rather than transcend it. I often tell my students that feminine spirituality begins in the body. So, it is really about reconnecting with the body, listening to what it is telling us, and treating it with exceptional self-care (I like to call it self-worship).

Do activities to bring you back to the body

 

It’s also about knowing when to push your body and when to slow down. Yoga is a great practice to get into the body, but so is strength training, making love, and dance. The key is to get back in it doing something you find pleasurable!

 

I also think pranayama is essential to help us balance our chakras and expand our consciousness.

 

3. Me: What are your thoughts about mantras and affirmations? Do you hold firm in believing that they can help move energy if there is a congested chakra?

Lisa’s Response: Mantra is a great way to connect with a deity in sound form. The word mantra roughly translates to “mind protection.” Mantra is a part of my practice, as is chanting. Right now, I’ve been working with the Adi Shakti mantra. 

 

Affirmations are great as well. They can help to rewire limiting beliefs that we tell ourselves. For each of the goddesses in my book, I have a suggested affirmation. I recommend taking some time to pick a goddess, and mantra, to work with for a little while. 

 

I do believe that mantra can help move a congested chakra, though I might not be the best person to speak to this.

4. Me: Can you explain the masculine and feminine energies? I think some of this is pertinent for men and women to embrace their inner goddess. 

 

Lisa’s Response: Yes! Feminine energy is intuitive, receptive, and nurturing. Masculine energy is protective, generous, and active. In a relationship, these energies complement one another. However, you might have also experienced the shadow or wounded side of these energies. Powerlessness, neediness, and manipulation show up in the wounded feminine. Dominance, aggression, and criticism are traits of the wounded masculine. Becoming aware of these characteristics allows us to heal old wounds (many have their roots in childhood) to form healthy, interdependent relationships.

We all embody masculine and feminine energy

 

We all embody both masculine and feminine energy, and we need both to successfully get along in the world. But generally, there is a dominant one in each of us. We can consider it our core essence. Sometimes we overcompensate in one area to get ahead in love or work (many of us have taken on more masculine energy). Sometimes we haven’t even spent the time identifying which energy makes us feel more at ease. Our dominant energy doesn’t have to match our gender, where we are on the gender spectrum or our sexual orientation. It’s an innate feeling or desire. 

 

Understanding and managing our energy is important to feel at ease in our bodies and also to understand and work with the dynamics in our relationships. 

 

5. Me: What are your thoughts on fasting? Do you think that it can help people reconnect with their inner goddess by going into ketosis? 

 

Lisa’s response: I don’t know enough about fasting or ketosis to talk about this, but I know that it is difficult to connect with your inner goddess when you feel sluggish or have a lot of build-up in your body.

Agni versus Ama

In Ayurveda, there is the concept of Agni and ama. Agni is your digestive fire, and it’s the ability to digest and transform your food (and life experiences). It’s a key tenet of Ayurvedic health to keep your Agni high. You do this by not snacking, eating at the same time every day, eating the largest meal at lunch, and of course eating seasonal, local, whole foods for your body type.

 

Ama is the build-up we get if we’re not eating healthy – too much sugar, salt, or processed foods. It’s sort of like toxic build-up. It manifests as the white coating on our tongues in the morning, body odor, and a feeling of lethargy. We don’t want Ama! We can decrease our ama by eating clean foods and making sure we keep our Agni high (our digestive fire stoked).

Connection with your inner goddess begins in the body

Connecting with your inner goddess really begins in the body. Ancient traditions like Ayurveda and Tantra say that we are divine – we are also messy, fallible humans. But we’re both. We need to care for our bodies as if we were truly a goddess. That means considering how we move it, what we put into it, how much sleep we get, and with whom we have sex. If our body is a temple, these are all rituals!

In Conclusion

Overall, it is important to tend to your body and learn how to take care of yourself to become a goddess. If you are interested in learning about goddess teaching and how to reach YOUR “inner goddess”, then please purchase Lisa’s book, the Goddess Solution. I also recommend that you learn about each of your chakras to get to where you need to be. You can start by going here and listening to my podcast on Keto and Chakra Balance for your health. After you listen to that, then you can listen to all of my podcasts on the different chakras.

If you want more information and exclusive updates to your inbox, then sign up for my email list. I will send you updates on the keto diet, chakra balance, fasting, and more!  I would love to have you join our tribe!

 

[/callout]

[/toggle]