S2E6: From Silenced to Speaking

Annette Maria

Annette is Founder of Sanctuary Publishing, Intuitive Facilitator of Healing, Channel to Multi-Dimensional Beings & Bhakti Yogi. Her work supports women to live out their soul's unique purpose, reclaim their inner goddess & co-create their deepest desires. She wants to see the planet a place that supports everyone living out their soul's purpose, reminded of their limitless potential & able to fully feel their humanness.

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Email: hello@activationsbyannette.com

Podcast Transcript:

[00:00:00] Damaged Parents: Welcome to the Relatively Damaged Podcast by Damaged Parents were silenced, intuitive, purposeful people come to learn. Maybe just, maybe we're all a little bit damaged. Someone once told me it's safe to assume 50% of the people I meet are struggling and feel wounded in some way. I would venture to say it's closer to 100%.

Every one of us is either currently struggling or has struggled with something that made us feel less than like we aren't good enough. We aren't capable. We are relatively damaged. And that's what we're here to talk about. In my ongoing investigation of the damaged self, I want to better understand how others view their own challenges.

Maybe it's not so much about the damage, maybe it's about our perception and how we deal with it. There is a deep commitment to becoming who we are meant to be. How do you do that? How do you find balance after a damaging experience? My hero is the damaged person. The one who faces seemingly insurmountable odds to come out on the other side, whole.

Those who stare directly into the face of adversity with unyielding persistence to discover their purpose. These are the people who inspire me to be more fully me. Not in spite of my trials, but because of the. Let's hear from another hero.

Today's topic includes sensitive material, which may not be appropriate for children. This podcast is provided for informational purposes only and is not intended as advice. The opinions expressed here were strictly those of the person who gave them.

Today, we're going to talk with Annette Maria, she has many roles in her life, girlfriend on dog, mom, intuitive, goddess and more. We'll talk about how she had been silenced early in her life and how she found health and healing let's talk

 Welcome to Relatively Damaged by Damaged Parents. Today, we have Annette Marie with us. She is the founder of Sanctuary Publishing, intuitive facilitator of healing, a channel to multi-dimensional beings and does Bhakti yoga? Did I say Yogi Bhakti yogi. You guys, I'm going to get this right. Oh, welcome to this show Annette.

Thank you for letting me butcher that last little part there.

[00:02:19] Annette Maria: It is all good. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be able to finally talk to you.

[00:02:24] Damaged Parents: Oh yeah. So listers, you don't know this. We have been playing tag for maybe six months. I want to say maybe six months. And so, apparently today is the day that is aligned for us to chit-chat the universe said today, it's going to happen.

[00:02:45] Annette Maria: Yes. Today's the day. Here we are. Thank you so much.

[00:02:48] Damaged Parents: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, isn't that interesting? Sometimes we don't really know. I mean, do I really know what the next second is going to hold for me? I don't. Yeah. Like if I really think about it, which. Can be a little scary. Do you have that sentiment as well?

[00:03:06] Annette Maria: To me, it's a sense of freedom and liberation, right. Of it's scary. It holds like both sides, right? It's scary, but then it's also deeply exciting and it really just allows us to go deeper and deeper into trust and into devotion, which is what Bhakti yoga is all about is just being devotional to the universe spirit.

However you want to connect with a higher energy, right? To just trust. And that's what the unknown really is. And we're always in it. So why not start to develop a better relationship with it

[00:03:39] Damaged Parents: yeah. I heard someone, you know, I think it's Loch Kelly. He tells a story about a fish in water and the fish is going around trying to find the source of life or I'm going to, to quote the uh, what is it? Oh, darn it. It's that funny book series, you know, what's the question to life, the universe and everything.

The guardian. No, not the guardians of the galaxy. Darn it.

[00:04:01] Annette Maria: I don't know.

[00:04:02] Damaged Parents: My brain is fried today. That's okay. Somebody will know and they'll be like, oh, it's a Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy. There we go. Now you guys don't have to help me out,

 So they're there on this journey and they go looking and they come back and they're frustrated and they run into this wise older fish. And the older fish says, well, well, there've been many names for it. I call it. water

[00:04:27] Annette Maria: Hmm.

[00:04:27] Damaged Parents: And I've also heard someone else talk about when they were meditating.

And I think they said they were reading in the Psalms and. If air was God, then they're in God breathing God and if they couldn't even get away because they'd , be running away in God, like it was really a neat perspective for me that I hadn't thought of before. And I'm thinking you've got a really spiritual from my perspective, a very spiritual, probably perspective because I don't know who else could channel multiple dimensional beings, right?

[00:05:06] Annette Maria: Absolutely. Yes spirituality has been everything for me, it has been the one thing that's really kind of held me here in this world and allowed me to move through my greatest steps and celebrate my greatest excitements and expansions in this life. And it's been the only thing that it makes sense to me because it's a simple and the world of Bhakti yoga.

And I also am studying deeper into shamanism and going deeper into different paths. They're all saying essentially the same thing, but it's that it's love being reflected back to you right. And it is, we are all beings of love, no matter what that is right. So, you know, some might hear that and be Like,

Yeah.

I love my partner, but I hate my whatever.

And even the people that we hate dislike, all of that holds the space for us to be able to share greater love for one another. And it's really an opportunity for us To notice that that person is living out their reflection of God, universe, however you want to call it. And in, if you ever know who rom dosses, he's a beautiful spiritual teacher from like the sixties, seventies he's I love him so much.

He died in 2019, but he would always say, see everyone as if they're God and drag. And that is a beautiful way of seeing it, right, because. spiritual teachings and things have said that we're all experiencing the depths of God. Like God wanted to experience the depths of itself. So it experience, it allowed us to have these human bodies, these pains, these excitements, these confusions, just all of it.

So we can experience and be in all of it. Does that make sense?

Sometimes? I don't know if that makes sense.

[00:06:49] Damaged Parents: I think what I'm hearing basically from you is that we are all part of God. And if we're all part of God, and we needed to have all of these different experiences. Then these experiences are for our own good, which means in a sense, we are here to learn and grow as God.

[00:07:09] Annette Maria: Yeah, we're here to experience the fullness of ourselves, the fullness of this human experience, which then allows, God.

the universe, however you want again, call that it allows itself to experience itself deeper. And it's also, we don't know, like, I don't know exactly. And that's something that is really important to know here is.

No one really knows even the people that we dislike or love or whatever we put these mortalities on things, right. We don't actually know why that person is the way they are. We don't know why an experience was the way it was. And I think bringing that sense of neutrality into our life allows us to have a greater understanding that we don't actually know why something is happening right now, but when we'll reflect back, it'll make sense.

You know, It's like if you've had a major experience and then that moment, it was the worst time of your life, but then now you look back and you're like, wow, that actually taught me a lot. And it brought me and you have a positive perspective on it now right. So that it's a beautiful reminder for us to hold that element that we don't actually know what this moment is holding us.

We can just be present and open our hearts to what is here for us to experience deeper.

[00:08:21] Damaged Parents: Yeah. And what you're talking about reminds me of the Chinese farmers, parable, where he's got, so there's a Chinese farmer and he's got a son and they're working the land and they have a horse. That they've worked the land with, well, the horse runs away one day and the neighbors come over and they're like, oh my gosh, the worst thing ever could have happened to you happened.

And he's like, well, good, bad. I don't know. We will see then that horse comes back with a bunch of wild horses. And of course now the neighbors are like, oh, that's the best thing ever. And he's like, good, bad. I don't know. We will see them. The son breaks his leg. So he just goes on and on and on. So is it good?

Is it bad? Do we really know.

[00:09:02] Annette Maria: No. we don't. That's the, and that's the space of unknown, right? That we started with. That's the element of not knowing. And we need to get real comfortable in that space because we never actually know. We have just been living this life. It was like fake safety. That we know what's going to happen.

If we go to college and then get married and then have children, and then retire from the job that we've had. The past 35 years, right? That's like this false sense of safety that was created and infiltrated into our brains, but really in that we don't know what's going to happen. So I think it's really a space that is being called for us.

All right now, with everything that's happening in the world and has been happening last year, we're being called to just stay in this moment right. Stay presently here, not get so fixated on the plans for the future or what was in the past, but to just stay present in this moment, because this moment is teaching us and allowing us to access so much of ourselves.

If we allow it to,

[00:10:06] Damaged Parents: Yeah. If we allow it to

[00:10:08] Annette Maria: If we choose.

[00:10:09] Damaged Parents: Yeah. And that's the hard one. I think that , for me that remembering that I was at my desk one moment doing just fine and the next moment not, as far as my disability. And I think sometimes that as humans before I could have made that leap to being

the saying well, we never really do know I had to have that experience and I think sometimes people need to have that experience. That's a great thing about podcasts though, is now I can share that. And , maybe someone will be able to figure it out before something happens, like that they can go, oh, okay.

You know what? We're not sure. And that's okay. I don't know.

[00:10:52] Annette Maria: Yeah, and it's okay to be fearful about it too. Right? It's not like, I'm always like, I perfectly trust this moment. Absolutely freaking out. I'm like most of the time, like what the hell is happening, but then it's also this like back inkling of, you know, that your helped you know, that you're supported and we're all

all of us are held and we're all supported, no matter what is happening. And yet, sometimes it takes massive experiences for us to be woken up

for us to realize. And like last year was a major awakening for a lot of us. And that's what we, we needed it as a humanity in this moment to open our eyes and be like, all right, well maybe the way that we're operating is not actually.

What we think it is, right. It's not actually getting us to where we think it should. And kind of just breaking down these illusions more and more and more

[00:11:41] Damaged Parents: Yeah. I mean, it was a big traumatic experience for many people

[00:11:47] Annette Maria: I think for everybody, you know, and any form it. yeah.

Trauma was definitely inflicted and we're still in it. So it's going to be hard. It's not going to be hard, but it's going to take until we can kind of be out of it to really reflect back on this and process it deeper because that's a big element with how trauma works and flows.

[00:12:05] Damaged Parents: Yeah, reconciling with it and bringing it to the table you know, inviting it with all those other parts of yourself as so hard.

[00:12:12] Annette Maria: Yeah. Yeah.

[00:12:13] Damaged Parents: Just this. Okay. So I do want to get you to your struggle though, and because I have a sense that you and I could talk about all of this stuff for a long time. So you said something I thought was really cool.

My biggest struggle I have had many, but if I was to classify it, it would be that I was silenced. And I thought that was a really interesting sentence. And I would like you to tell us all about what that meant for you.

[00:12:43] Annette Maria: Absolutely. Oh my gosh. The voice, even when you.

started speaking about it, I had to mute myself because I had to cough because my throat started to react to that sentence of me being silenced. So a lot of the times when we have. Like a somatic cue like that. Like my body is reacting to something that you're saying that is my body processing that silence more and more and more, that was kind of pressed on me.

So it's not just a cough that's happening. Cause of dust in the, air, it's a response. And if you've ever had those they're valid. But.

[00:13:15] Damaged Parents: Did you just say, if you've ever had them they're valid, right?

[00:13:18] Annette Maria: Yeah.

they're valid. Our bodies know how to respond. They're just, they're always responding to everything. But in terms of being silenced, I mean, it started from way, way back in my childhood of, I was always this wildly spiritual being, and I grew up in a Roman Catholic household and

all that. I felt made no sense with all that I was being taught. And I always felt this confliction. I always felt this fight within me and especially in religion and in spirituality, it just didn't get, I just didn't understand it. And it didn't matter how much I would try and speak my truth. It was always wrong.

It was always made that I was incorrect. So then that right, that inherently makes you down down, down and pushes you. And then you're like, all right, well, maybe I am wrong. And then that inherently made me block some gifts that I had that were developing as a kid. So I remember having these psychic experiences of seeing and connecting to spirits.

And my, especially at night time, if I like would go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I remember so clearly being so terrified because I would be seeing things. I didn't understand what was happening. So then I would push it away. I remember one day being like, please like go away from me. Like, I can't like this is bad you know? cause that was supposed to taught to me. And again, that was me then silencing myself. So that's like one example of so many others that we can also go into more of, but when others silence us, then that makes us silence ourselves more. Right. Well, where then like, no but this is my truth. This is what I think.

And that sounds like, no, but you're wrong again, putting that sense of morality into the space when really that person doesn't know what's right or wrong. I don't either. It's just each person's living in their truth.

[00:15:01] Damaged Parents: Yeah.

[00:15:02] Annette Maria: something. I think we need to harness a little bit more of, being able to hold each other in our truths.

But then that, from that experience that really made me walk through life questioning and doubting myself, not really speaking up when I needed something, not really wanting to go after that desire. Even though I knew I really could. I always felt like I would dumb myself down water myself down. I was never allowed myself to shine as brightly as I knew I could because of multiple experiences.

And again, were they good or bad, but they shaped me and they really, they really were a struggle for me to kind of move through a move past and to keep choosing myself. My light now is like my, my work, but vocalizing our truths that are happening internally really also reflect back to others, their opinions, their get triggered, all of that.

And it's a battle of just holding ourselves. And this is me. But that work definitely wasn't easy. If you want me to dive into a little bit more of that, I could

[00:16:06] Damaged Parents: yeah, go for it.

[00:16:07] Annette Maria: Yeah.

So, I mean, the work started with, you know, working with my throat shocker and my throat space, and really working on just being able to speak myself in the world, even how our voice is resonating out in the world really reflects.

If we feel like we can speak her truth. Right. If we feel like we are speaking like high in our throat and you're speaking more up here and that doesn't allow like you're up in your throat space, meaning that you don't feel comfortable to really take space. So when we speak from our like belly, right, that resonance out in the world, it really makes like a steak.

Oh, she's here. Right? So for a long time, I spoke like up in here. I don't know. I don't know everything was, I don't really know if whatever you want I'll do that. Like, it was always, I never was able to ask for what I wanted. I was, and that's a big key to see, like, if you're feeling silenced, do you feel like you can ask for what you want for what you need?

And it could be something as simple as asking for a water at someone's house, right? Like small things like that really reflect back to us that And yeah, There's so many facets to that. Yeah. I don't know if you

[00:17:14] Damaged Parents: Yeah, no, it's just, it's so interesting that you, attributed recognizing am I able to ask for water at my friend's house or am I capable to stand in the truth that I'm thirsty even? And the other thing that I picked up on early on was the psychic experiences.

[00:17:32] Annette Maria: Hmm.

[00:17:33] Damaged Parents: And I'm wondering if there was the sense of.

If I'm having these, maybe I'm crazy.

[00:17:38] Annette Maria: Absolutely. There was so much and that's where, that's where the silencing comes in is we think if we speak this, people will think this and then we'll be excluded

[00:17:51] Damaged Parents: right.

[00:17:52] Annette Maria: it's a basic primal human desire to be included. Like we're meant to be tribal, we're meant to being community. So if we have a threat against that basic survival need, then we'll, if we don't feel confident, then we'll just be whatever, whatever you need. Right, I don't want, you to exile me or whatever. So Yeah.

that definitely was like part of it. Am I crazy? Am I making it up? They're gonna just like make fun of me, all of that. And we have to move through all of those layers and build that confidence within ourselves to then be able to speak our truth out in the world.

[00:18:26] Damaged Parents: So at what point were you able to be more comfortable with saying, yes, I have these kinds of experiences and this is what happens. And how long did that take from that childhood experience of being like, I need to shut this down to, to be able to say something.

[00:18:44] Annette Maria: It's still evolving and growing, but it's definitely in the past. In the past two years, it's really been a opening of this as me and the world. And I know the work that I'm meant to be doing. And I, here I am doing it, but they're still the doubts, the limiting beliefs, right? The things that are still trying to push me down.

But now the work is to just keep holding myself in my light and holding myself in that space of practicing vocalization of what I need in this world. And again, it's from simply sharing my needs with my partner or any of it, it really, it's taking those like small steps then even bigger ones that you may need.

That's a part of it as well of really kind of creating your stake. But it it's always, it's like a, it's a daily practice. Even me clearing my throat. Right. There's still energy in that space, but it's like, what are we going to choose? And I'm going to choose to be silent, or am I going to choose to do what I know is right and true for me.

And that is a internal battle that still happens.

[00:19:46] Damaged Parents: Yeah. And you said, know what is right and true for me and follow through, like, you didn't specifically say fall through with it, but what I'm hearing is you have to know that and then make your decision from there.

[00:20:00] Annette Maria: Yeah,

So then I guess really the catalyst for it all is getting to know who I was. Right.

Because it's hard for us to even discern what is ours, if we're in a, like, we feel like murky and we're always just taking care of other people or worrying about everyone else around us, or we're just kind of like, oh, well they told me I should do this.

So maybe I'll do it. right. Before kind of just like floundering, which I was for so long, like yeah, I'll go to college. Yeah. I'll do you know that? All of that. And Yeah. I think it's starting to harness even small, like a small way to start developing that is asking yourself, like, what do I actually want to eat for dinner?

Right. If there's someone, your partner, your family is like, what do you want to eat for dinner and and you're like oh whatever you want but if you can start to even small, like such small minute things like that, right. Get to know who you are in the sea of the people around you, and start to vocalize that little by little.

[00:20:56] Damaged Parents: So as you started to vocalize those things and become, how do I want to say this become more aware of who you were, did that make it easier to accept that you had these spiritual gifts?

[00:21:11] Annette Maria: They did absolutely did. Mainly because I know that the spiritual gifts are. Spirit working through me now, like I know I'm just, I'm here to be talking about these things, to be sharing about these things and, and not in a way to say I know something better than someone else, or, you know, it's really coming from a space of service and from the heart.

And I think that's why it feels really easy for me now, because I can discern more, like when I'm coming from a place and be like, I need to prove myself. Or if I'm like, This is just what I think like, this is just how I've been guided and it has a different energy to it. Absolutely.

[00:21:49] Damaged Parents: Is it like learning to meditate? Was that hell or when you meditate, is that helpful? I mean, Yeah, because I think sometimes we can get into our heads in meditation then, and then there's another way to, to shift to the heart. So what I'm trying to figure out is, did working on improving that tool of meditation, help you learn how to get into your heart, more about these things.

[00:22:16] Annette Maria: I think meditation is the greatest tool on this planet really , cause there's one, there's so many ways to meditate, right? It's not just sitting perfectly still and like not moving for 30 minutes. Like you can walk, you can move. Like there are different ways. But I think really just creating that awareness of what is happening in my brain right now.

Right. Who is speaking or even noticing. There is your thinking mind and just creating that discernment between the two and then also developing that connection. But I also think another part of it that really helped me to drop into the heart space is to look at how I, and how I've been. I like how I have perpetuated this and how I've been manipulated and controlled and try to have been contorted by people, how I've been silenced, how I've silenced people.

Right. Because how I said before, when someone does something to us and then it makes us small and then we do it to ourself then we pass that on. Right. It's like this never ending loop. And it's like something that we all need to look at and if we want to do the work right of this, looking at how am I perpetuating that same thing that people perpetuated to read it to me.

And it's not easy work because it's so much easier to be like that person did it. I'm perfectly fine here on my throne. Okay. Leave me

[00:23:29] Damaged Parents: alone yeah. Yeah. Well, and I think it's what I heard from you too, is it's really easy to blame and judge other people and a little bit harder to look inside and say, oh, I do that too. And I see that as part of me now, like that's just a, that's, that's a hard jump to make, I think in general, just like, even if we're looking at it from a developmental perspective, from child to adult, right.

[00:23:55] Annette Maria: Yeah. It's, it's a, it's a deep perspective to take with you. Right.

And I think it's a beautiful way to start. It's just noticing. How you look at other people around you. Like, I am judgmental. Like I know I am and I judge people because I judged myself so much. Right. And I'm not going to say that, oh, I'm not judgemental at all because I'm sometimes like, wow, I'm an ass. Yeah. I'm sorry. Right. But, so it's creating those moments of awareness, which meditation allows us to create And to notice and to stay present, even when you do things that aren't aligned with, how you want to be. Right. It still allows you to notice, like, who am I being now? So yeah.

[00:24:36] Damaged Parents: Yeah. And who am I being for almost as well. So as you found your voice, And part of that took the meditation. It seems to me like, then you acknowledged yourself. I'm just trying to get back into my train of thought here. And as you acknowledged yourself, then it was easier to express who you are.

[00:24:58] Annette Maria: Hmm. Yeah. And yeah, absolutely. And it was an opportunity for me to then take that out and practice, right? Like how can I hold who I am with my family versus how I am with my friends, right. How we kind of teeter and kind of hide and contract and expand around certain people. and

[00:25:17] Damaged Parents: Ooh.

[00:25:18] Annette Maria: a work in progress that is not something that.

is.

Like I have this mastered, it's something that I'm constantly trying to evolve. Like how can I hold myself to the standard of who I have cultivated inside anywhere in the world.

[00:25:35] Damaged Parents: It's almost like you're asking yourself, where in my life am I not being true to who I am?

[00:25:40] Annette Maria: Yeah, where am I still silencing myself? And where am

I still allowing other people to kind of penetrate me with their beliefs and desires and all of that.

[00:25:51] Damaged Parents: That sounds like a lot of work.

[00:25:53] Annette Maria: , I guess, because I've spent so much time. I mean, I've been really in this like spiritual self developmental space since I've been like super young. I found yoga when I was in eighth grade. Like , these tools have came to me really early. I think, because if I didn't find them, I don't know where I would be in life.

I would definitely not be sitting here okay to talk to you from everything that I experienced in my life they really saved me. So I've always just been kind of in this introspective journey. So I guess from an outside perspective, it sounds like a lot, but I'm not like always analyzing myself. It's just like these like small moments of like awareness more than anything else

[00:26:31] Damaged Parents: Okay.

So it's not really, I'm constantly questioning or wondering who am I in this moment? It's just noticing and being present for the moment

[00:26:40] Annette Maria: and

then what does the moment have to teach me right. That meditative state and

trying to bring it in as much as possible, right? Because we forget, let's be honest. We forget multiple times. And the work is to remember and to stay here. Sometimes you may be like in a fight, in a conversation or anything.

Right. And you get pulled out of their present, pulled out of your center and then you take a breath and you're like, oh, come back into center. Like, sorry, like, and , or you start to realize, oh, I'm actually not being truthful to myself or whatever it is. So really cultivating, like staying present in the body.

And then the moment I think is. What allows me to have that deeper sense of awareness throughout my days,

[00:27:23] Damaged Parents: So it sounds like what you would almost be doing is walking around in like an awakened, meditative state,

[00:27:31] Annette Maria: as best as my human can. Yeah.

[00:27:33] Damaged Parents: as best as my human body.

[00:27:36] Annette Maria: As best as this crazy mind can do that. Absolutely. .

That's the goal, right? To try and stay here, connected to the breath, connected to sensation anything really that brings you present. Right? If we connect to any of our five senses, we'll stay in this moment. When you're eating, when you feel your fingertips, rubbing against each other, your breath, your sound, right, creating some sort of sensory awareness brain less.

You stay here.

[00:28:02] Damaged Parents: Hmm. Yeah, I guess anything where I'm noticed seeing this moment, even if I just look around or like, what can I see? What can I hear and remembering to go there? Because like you said, the brain takes so much over.

Okay.

I have got to ask though, channeling multi-dimensional beings how does that happen? I mean, I'm thinking since you were able to see things, when you were younger, this is just a natural thing that happened.

How did you come into that and when did it become comfortable or is it comfortable? I don't know.

[00:28:36] Annette Maria: Yeah, absolutely. I'll I'll explain this interesting journey. So multi-dimensional beings, meaning that they're beings in the spirit realms, whether they're goddesses, God energies or just other beings, ancestors, all of, all of that is kind of what I attuned to being multidimensional beings, meaning they're not just in.

Well, we are all multidimensional beings, right? But like if they're beings that are not in their physical human body and how this started, I think. So we all have the ability to channel. I just want to like preface with that. And our channel can, is also, our intuition is a part of it. So when we get these intuitive nudges or we get kind of, we kind of, maybe sometimes you may hear something trinkle in like, yes, do that.

No, do that. Right. Or you might kind of feel things like that is a sense of your channel being activated. So if you've ever experienced that, like you can always go deeper into this. It's, I'm not like special.

[00:29:33] Damaged Parents: So I think what you're saying is maybe those moments where someone has like this feeling or this sense, or they hear words or whatever it is, but all of a sudden it's like it rings true.

[00:29:45] Annette Maria: Yes. That's the channel being activated turned on. That is some energy working with. In that moment and you can, look at it in your own way. And we all have our own team of like, spirit guides and all of that. So really what started for me was in 2017, I got fired from my first full-time job out of college, my first and last office job I ever had.

And I was really, it brought me into the depths of my darkest years of my life. Like it led me into meeting all of the shadows and all of the things that kept me silence. So in that year I was like, I don't know how to function. I was super anxious. I couldn't be in public. I was just like stricken with all these fears and traumas that, were through my childhood, like being brought to the forefront

I just didn't know what else to do. And I think one day I was sitting on the floor and I already was connected to yoga and all of that. And I just heard the energy of Lakshmi who she's the goddess of abundance. And it was just a simple, she simply came through and said, chant my mantras, just like , they will bring you back up.

[00:30:56] Damaged Parents: And you didn't know these mantras before.

[00:30:58] Annette Maria: No, but then I started looking them up. So I started then to be like, Okay.

I'll chant, Lakshmi mantras. Like I always knew about her from here and there. And then I started to dive deeper and then I started to explore what chanting really was. And that was something that really, oh, that this was a big part of my silencing journey.

That was something that really unlocked my throat space because they started to sing chanting and singing, but just, mantra based songs and. I've always been told I'm a bad singer. I should stop singing. I sing too much. So then that was another way I was silenced right I don't really care if I was good.

I was just singing all the time. So then allowing myself to chant, allowed myself to awaken up that throat again and wake in that power that I felt within me and that joy really

and then the mantras have their own frequency, their own energy. So Lakshmi, her mantras are for abundance, for love, for prosperity for you to know that you are being given what you need.

And you're always being in the state of receptivity as well as you were there to give in the exchange. And that kind of just opened the doors for me, really. She was like the first. Energy I ever really connected with in that way. And then it's just been kind of like the slow progression since then, where I will have different connections with different beings, whether.

They work with me directly or indirectly. But it's always getting stronger as now. I've since 2017 really been honing in, moving through the doubts, like being like, oh, I made that up. All of those thoughts, right. Kind of weaving out all of those doubts, which are still being woven out and knowing that like spirit and these energies are working through me and to trust that

so it's definitely been a process and it's a daily, it's a muscle, right. I need to work with it and flex it every day. So it's a space that I drop into quite often, especially if I'm in a space of not sure what to do or how I support my clients. It's all kind of led through my channel. And then it's all spirit guided how I do it.

[00:33:03] Damaged Parents: Okay. So how did you get better besides practicing or what did you notice so that you knew you were hearing from, or you were in alignment?

[00:33:13] Annette Maria: Having guides and teachers that how we're able to harness their channels. That was a major part of it because for me, I always thought when I thought of someone channeling, I always thought of them like connecting out up in the ethers. And like, for me, it always felt like really overwhelming. I was like, well, where are you going?

I'm really confused, you know, like it was hard for me to conceptualize it and I had a teacher. Her name is Danielle Massey. She's a beautiful shadow working individual. And she told me I'm meant to channel downward. So if I'm meant to channel it through my body. So when I channel, I drop into a meditative state and I connect in like my womb space down in the pelvic region.

So that's how I channel. But like, we all have our unique way of connecting and of allowing spirit to work through us. But Yeah.

that was having just that awareness really kind of woke it up for me. But then there's also been times where I've cut my channel out where I feel like I don't trust this.

It didn't happen the way I thought it would shut it down. And then I would shut myself off from receiving. And this was probably like, I don't know like in the beginning of the year, like still is something that I work with and I would shut it down because it didn't happen how I expected it to, because I want to be in control.

Right. And that's the thing is being a channel doesn't mean I'm in control. Doesn't mean I know something bigger or better. It just means that I am able to connect to those who are, unseen to us in the moment.

[00:34:41] Damaged Parents: Yeah. Now I'm a little bit of a science buff. So I actually recently read a book called the unconscious universe. I think it's by Dean Raden. So I had never even known that they were doing studies for the para. What is it called? para psycho- psychological studies that. Yeah. So there's actually science that shows some of these things are real, that there is something else that we don't know about and that, and it's actually been taboo for so long and

I was surprised to hear your story be in kind of alignment with , what I know religiously happened as far as the history of religion and things like that. And then where you grew up from, and then learning to trust, it's almost like that struggle to even trust is so difficult because how do you really know that

that's what's happening. And, like in some religions it's trusting the holy spirit in other religions it's you don't have access to that only the Bishop or only whatever they are called or the pastor or whatever has access to that. So how did I just, I'm fascinated by, by your journey

[00:35:59] Annette Maria: Hmm. Yeah, it's definitely been an interesting one. And I'm curious to read these studies because I think it's so important. You know, Especially for little children to understand this, because they are so tapped into these other spaces and dimen- like we have no, when they're having imaginary friends and they're doing all these creepy things that we think are crazy and we tell them, no, don't do that.

And little kids have these experiences more than anyone else. And then they get shut down by the people who don't understand them, who doesn't matter who they are, their family, their teachers any of it and

then that deems them as wrong, but really it doesn't make them these far out beings. It just means that they're connected to something that's not able to be visually seen, which again, , we can't deem.

I can't deem that as invalid and it's being able to trust is something that it just needs to happen every day. And it's also just checking in with yourself. Am I trying to control this person, this situation? Am I trying to prove, like I know something, right? Cause that's your ego coming in. That is not, you.

Channeling something through that is you trying to be in control and to act like, and I'm speaking from experience, right? That like, that is something that happens. And that's something that needs to be worked through if you want to further develop the space. And I know that I still have more, that needs to get comb through, and it's not something that's always like super easy.

Right. But it's something that I just always am working on because for me, it's, important to live a life that. For myself for the work that I do that is led , by spirit in whatever way.

[00:37:34] Damaged Parents: Yeah. And by love really? Cause I think you were saying earlier, we are love.

[00:37:38] Annette Maria: Yeah, absolutely.

[00:37:40] Damaged Parents: And so that would be really important. Okay. Three tips or tools, anything that pops into your mind that you want to leave the listeners with for today?

[00:37:49] Annette Maria: Hmm, three tips or tools. The first tip would be to connect to your breath three times a day. Inhaling and exhaling slow and long and into the belly. Right? Really kind of shifting the nervous system. The second would be to have fun, to do something silly as hell. Like, go jump in a puddle, go play with some dirt, go like splatter paint on the floor.

When you told you couldn't whatever. Right? Like go do something silly and fun. And the third is asked for what you need in your relationships, asking your partner, your family, voicing what you need to feel seen and supported by those around you.

[00:38:32] Damaged Parents: Thank you so much, Annette Marie I'm so glad I got to have you on the show. You can find her. Oh, it's Maria. Holy moly. I just realized, I said that wrong like many times

[00:38:47] Annette Maria: All good.

[00:38:48] Damaged Parents: I am so sorry. You can find her on Facebook at Shakti Rising Collective. There's a Facebook page on Instagram. It literally is. @Its.AnnetteMaria. She is also on podcasts. She's on Insight Timer. She's many places. Her website is activationsbyAnnette.com. Thank you so much for being on the show today.

[00:39:14] Annette Maria: Thank you so much. Thank you.

[00:39:16] Damaged Parents: Thank you for listening to this week's episode of relatively damaged by damage to parents. We really enjoy talking to a net Maria about how she was able to find her voice. We especially liked when she talked about how even the people we dislike, show us, or teach us how to have greater love for one another to unite with other damaged people, connect with us on Facebook.

Look for Damaged Parents. We'll be here next week still relatively damaged see you then