PODCAST
She Grows with Allyson Scammell
EPISODE #4
In this episode, I talk to master certified coach Michael Trotta about original medicine or the frequency that makes us all unique. We explore what original medicine is, the four natural gifts that show up in each of our four life stages and the relationship between these natural gifts and our medicine.
Michael shares how our culture can prevent us from being in our unique and authentic frequency, and we wrap up the episode with a challenge to help you tap into your natural gifts, even if you’re brand new to this work.
Michael Trotta is a mentor and natural learning specialist , master certified coach, storyteller, fly-fishing junkie, student of native traditions and the Hero’s Journey, a proud dyslexic, facilitator of rites of passage programs, artist ,community builder, and coffee lover who helps people identify their Original Medicine so they can make a living doing what they love. It’s a well known fact that he was raised by coyotes and is now happily raising one of his own; along with cats, goldfish, and a small flock of chickens, somewhere streamside, in Westchester County, NY.
In today’s episode we explore:
- What original medicine is.
- The four natural gifts that show up in each of our four life stages.
- The relationship between these natural gifts and our medicine.
Listen + Subscribe on iTunes.
This Week’s Challenge: Look at your childhood to see if something happened where you were bigger than you usually were and look at the response from your your family or your community.
References & Resources:
- DOWNLOAD your FREE PDF guide revealing the 5 visibility blocks preventing your ideal clients from finding you.
- Find Michael online at: SagefireMentoring.com
- Purchase Michael’s book: https://www.amazon.com/Sit-Spot-Art-Inner-Tracking/dp/1493615211
- Join our community at the Soul Guide Circle HERE of over 1,100 soul-guided leaders, lightworkers, and entrepreneurs.
She Grows with Allyson Scammell
Ep #4: Defining and Embodying Your Unique Frequency
[00:00:00] Good day and welcome to the show. Episode number four. Allyson Scammell here in today’s episode. I’m talking to master certified coach Michael Trotta about original medicine or the frequency that makes us all unique. We’ll be exploring what original medicine is, the four natural gifts that show up in each of our four life stages and the relationship between these natural gifts and our medicine. The episode ends with an amazing challenge from Michael that I’m certain will inspire you to ask questions you’ve never considered before. So you’ll want to stick with us until the end.
[00:00:49] Welcome to She Grows, a podcast for soul guided women entrepreneurs ready to grow their income, impact and inspiration. Each week we’re going [00:01:00] to explore how to align to the soul of your business and grow it from there. I’m your host, Allyson Scammell. Let’s get growing.
[00:01:15] Hey there. Oh, my goodness. You are in for such a treat today. You are in the right place. I had the absolute honor and pleasure of chatting with Michael Trotta all [00:01:30] about original medicine. I referred to medicine as core gifts. As you may know, if you listen to anything I put out, but it all points to our natural genius, that genius we were born to share. And if you Google original medicine or core gifts, let me tell you, there’s not a whole lot out there. So if there’s anyone I know who knows a whole lot about this, it’s Michael. Michael [00:02:00] Trotta is a mentor and natural learning specialist. Master certified coach. Storyteller. Fly fishing junkie. Student of native traditions. And The Hero’s Journey. A proud, dyslexic facilitator of rites of passage programs, artist, community builder and coffee lover who helps people identify the original medicine so they can make a living doing what they love. It’s a well-known fact that he was raised by coyotes and is now happily raising [00:02:30] one of his own, along with cats, goldfish and a small flock of chickens. Somewhere streamside in Westchester County, New York. It was an absolute thrill for me to speak with Michael. I myself am someone who knows a bit about this topic as I coach other people to identify and express their core gifts or their medicine.
[00:02:50] But it’s always amazing to me how much I learn whenever I speak to him. So I hope you receive as much from this interview as I did.
[00:03:02] Welcome, [00:03:00] Michael Trotta. I am so thrilled that you took the time to chat with us today. Thank you so much for being here.
[00:03:10] Thank you for having me.
[00:03:12] So you are my first guest in this podcast, She grows. And when I was thinking about who I wanted to interview first, you were the first person who popped into my head. Right on. It is truly an honor. Oh, thank you. So you have been a mentor of mine for [00:03:30] some time and really taught me how to explore and understand and put words to and be my original medicine. So let’s just jump right into it. I have interviewed you before and we talked all about original medicine in that last interview. Why don’t you remind the listeners what it means?
[00:03:53] I often tell this really brief little story that comes from the Bushmen of the Kalahari.
[00:03:59] To help [00:04:00] explain to people what our medicine is, this term means. So in this Kalahari creation story, they say that when we’re born, we are born with these four thin threads that extend from the center of we are the core of who we are. One of those threads goes to the self, one to the Earth, one to others and the fourth to the ancestors. And they [00:04:30] say that during our lifetime, it’s our job. And in fact, our responsibility to build those thin threads of connection into thick ropes. And at the place where those ropes meet. We find that thing that is our core. And I’ve applied this idea of medicine to it. They didn’t call it that. I’m calling it that. So in that original medicine is the thing that we come into the world with that we’re meant to share [00:05:00] with other people. You can call it your superpower. You can call it your genius. You can call it your gift, whatever you want to call it. There’s been words to name it or describe it throughout history, throughout cultures, all over the world. And again, the idea. It is to figure out what it is within your lifetime and share it with the people who need it most. In perhaps a simpler way of describing it. I [00:05:30] just look at it as the frequency of who you are when you are truly being who you are and to look at it almost from that vibrational point, because that’s what frequency is the vibration. You can just ask yourself, are you vibrating on your true frequency or is that frequency being distorted and throughout history, cultures all over the world had things in place to help put an individual [00:06:00] into relationship with their unique frequency.
[00:06:05] I believe that our culture does a whole lot of things to prevent us from being in our unique and authentic frequency. Does that answer the question?
[00:06:18] It absolutely does. And I just want to mention that in my coaching and within this podcast, I call them core gifts. And you and I, Michael, talked a lot about the difference [00:06:30] between original medicine and core gifts. I think there are likely nuances in how we interpret them and experience them. But I define core gifts as the unique abilities we’re born to share, and I think that we’re getting towards the same thing. But I just wanted to mention that so people aren’t confused as to what we’re talking about here.
[00:06:53] Yeah, it’s semantics often, right? You know, yeah.
[00:06:59] The idea is [00:07:00] that both you and I work to help people figure out what it is that they have to offer the world. Period, end of sentence. Yeah, right. You call it a gift. You call it your medicine, you call it your mojo, whatever. The only place where I hesitate with people when it comes to that semantic stuff is talents.
[00:07:24] Certainly we all have things that we’re good at, sometimes good at naturally, sometimes good at because we’ve [00:07:30] practiced really hard. I define talents as something different than our gifts or our genius or our medicine simply because people tend notice to literalize when they’re trying to figure out what they might want to do with their life, and they’ll say, well, I’m good at this thing. So that’s probably what I’m supposed to be doing. And just because you’re good at something doesn’t mean that you need to turn that into a business or find a job that allows you to do that. Your [00:08:00] core gift and you can tell me if this matches for you or I will say your original medicine, when you know what it is, you want to share with the world and you can apply it to any job or action that you feel called to. And what that allows you to do, at least what it’s allowed me to do. I can apply my medicine to a wide variety of things. I’ve done it as a teacher. I do it as a mentor. [00:08:30] I do it as an artist. I apply it to my parenting. I apply it to my relationship. I apply it. It’s just who I am when I’m all lined up. And it can’t be taken away from me. I might be a brilliant piano player. I have a talent for piano. But if something happened to my hands and I couldn’t play any more, does that mean I’ve lost my original medicine? No, it doesn’t. It just means I may not be able to filter my original medicine [00:09:00] through my ability to play piano anymore. But I haven’t really lost the core of who I am.
[00:09:07] So that that’s partly what I use to define it so that people don’t feel trapped to have to do something that they’re good at for a living.
[00:09:18] Yes. And that’s exactly how I would define my world view of it as well. Because I I often say, like, how do you want to be an expression of your gifts? And [00:09:30] that’s exactly what you’re talking about. As a parent, as a coach, as an artist, as however you’re going to show up, you know, and to be in that expression, expression in that relationship with your gifts of it.
[00:09:42] Imagine if we were asked that when we were younger because that that’s the reason why I differentiate that is because so many of us growing up reach a certain age where we do start to think about what do I want to do for a living? And then we’re given like a set of categories and you can say, well, [00:10:00] which of your talents and desires would fit into one of these categories?
[00:10:05] And then we might pursue that category, a job in this or their career in that.
[00:10:10] And then we put all this work and energy into doing it because somebody said, well, you’re good at that. And then 20 years down the road, you’re so unfulfilled. This is not what I want to be doing. How did I get here? And I I think it’s because we’re not. That the focus is put on applying [00:10:30] talent to a job that needs that talent rather than learning the practice of aligning with your original medicine or your gifts and living from that place, which is fluid.
[00:10:45] Yeah. Yes.
[00:10:47] Another thing that fascinates me or I find so fulfilling about this process of discovering your medicine and possibly finding words to name your medicine is that there is [00:11:00] no other box for it. So if you take Myers-Briggs or Strength Finders or some of the other, you know, quizzes, they put you in a box. And that box might be helpful. It might identify parts of your personality or how you show up in the world or solve problems. But when you name your medicine, you’re creating the only box in the world. There is no other box. You’re the only one that’s going to fit into that. And I find that pretty exciting.
[00:11:28] Do you see it the same way? Yes, [00:11:30] big time.
[00:11:33] So being someone who’s grown up with learning disabilities, I have all kinds of where I’ve had all kinds of labels thrown on me that then. Put you in boxes, and I struggled with that. The focus was always on the disability or the thing that I struggled with that became a part of my identity. That’s the same thing way I feel about the Myers-Briggs and all of those. [00:12:00] I know that they’ve been helpful for people, so I don’t want to say that they’re, you know, they don’t come with their benefits.
[00:12:07] But I do believe that they’re limiting and they put you in a box and
[00:12:14] something gets lost in the human spirit. In my opinion, anytime you’re put into a box. And so, yes, the answer is yes.
[00:12:26] So moving on. Can you tell us about the four cardinal [00:12:30] directions and how they correlate to the various stages of our lives and our original medicine?
[00:12:37] Sure. So.
[00:12:38] For directions, I mean, again, I said a lot of what I’ve learned comes from a native lineage, so I want to name that non-threat. And so the way I look at things is often related. In a directional path, east, south, west, north, and just like I shared the Kalahari story I talked [00:13:00] about when we’re born, we have these fourth ThinThread cultures all over the world throughout history related. To nature through those directions. That said, in my own studying and learning, I took a look at the human life cycle. And if you just simply break it into four main categories childhood, adolescence, adulthood and Elder Hood. So you can apply [00:13:30] each of those to one of those directions, starting with childhood in the east, the place where all over the world the sun rises in that direction. Right. So childhood is this place of newness, of inspiration, of curiosity, aliveness, and the natural gift that comes out in people when all things being equal is the gift of play.
[00:14:01] And [00:14:00] as a teacher, I would study this as well.
[00:14:06] When we’re born, we’re born.
[00:14:11] With the instinct to play, that’s how we engage with the natural world, when we’re allowed to engage with the natural world, we play games, we make up games and. I think remarkably, all over the world, children play the same games and often [00:14:30] without really being taught them and what they are, the responses to nature and our instinct to survive.
[00:14:38] So let me give you an example of a very common childhood game would be like hide and seek if your play that.
[00:14:47] Sure have. Play it with my daughter all the time. Right. Right. Universal game. Yeah. It’s. It speaks if you look at it too to.
[00:14:58] A predator prey relationship. [00:15:00] It’s the act of hiding and of seeking. It’s the act of avoiding being preyed upon by a predator and or as a predator, which we are stalking and sneaking up and finding prey for our own survival. But we play that game. We practice that survival skill. Through play, so we receive dopamine hits because it’s so much fun, you know, to play that and to sneak around and that [00:15:30] dopamine is rewarding our efforts to play that game, which is deepening our relationship to our own survival. So play.
[00:15:40] Is a gift that comes out in all of us at a very, very young age from the beginning, really, so that we can deepen our relationship to our own survival.
[00:15:50] Makes sense. Yes. Go.
[00:15:54] As we and of course, all of this, I’m putting them in four categories, but it is on a continuum. [00:16:00]
[00:16:00] So that said, as we start to grow and mature, we move towards adolescence and our bodies shift and change and so do our brains. And somewhere in early adolescence has all of those things are going on. We start to look around the world when we start to ask questions like, who am I? Why am I here? Where am I going? What is my position in this group and community? Hey, wait. I’m not [00:16:30] my parents. I have my own mind and my own thoughts. And what does that mean? Right. It’s a it’s a time of rapid growth. Externally as well as internally and in that internal rapid growth. One of the things that is going on and what I would call the second natural gift is focused learning. No more kids playing all those games. We’re learning a ton. But it’s often not focused. It’s [00:17:00] we’re just learning a little bit of this and a little bit of that, some of this and some of that, it’s like coming at us from everywhere. But by the time we reach adolescence, we start to focus our attention on the things that most call to us and why they most call to us.
[00:17:16] Probably has a wide variety of possibility and reasons. That is what we do, start to find things that we are most interested in. And then we ask questions about that [00:17:30] and seek to learn more about that particular thing. An example in a natural setting, a young person might find that they have a gift or a propensity for storytelling. And so they’ll start to focus their attention on their ability to tell stories by looking to those that are older than them, who are really good at it and seeing how they do it. Trying to figure it out and asking questions [00:18:00] of it. Receiving mentoring from older people who are in fact storytelling and using storytelling as an example of what it would be like, perhaps more in their native traditional setting today. That might look a little bit different today. In fact, you know, it’s kind of hard to understand how it all works out or see how it all works out, because when we’re in adolescence, we’re often told what to learn. You know, given curriculum, we’re give.
[00:18:28] We’re put in boxes and [00:18:30] handed books that are in the shape of boxes and said, this is what you need to know in order to be successful.
[00:18:36] And well, look, I can go on about the modern education system.
[00:18:41] Sorry, dad. From my experience, too. We’re forced to sit in boxes. It was really, really hard for me as a child to sit. I didn’t learn through sitting and listening. I learned through doing and moving. And that was really hard for me. So I acted up and I was very naughty. I got in trouble a lot because I just I couldn’t sit. [00:19:00] Oh, I think that was not natural.
[00:19:03] It’s not beans and rice and it’s not it’s not our modern education system. I go off forever, but I, you know, is designed off of an industrial model. It’s even if you look at schools today or, you know, when they were begun to be built. Back in the turn of the last century, they were completely designed off of the industrial model [00:19:30] to prepare people to work in factories and this antiquated system that has all of these ramifications that really work against not only these natural gifts, but who we are at our core in those traditional cultures. The idea of engaging with these four natural gifts was all the put a person into relationship with their original medicine because it was understood that a person living in relationship to their original [00:20:00] medicine was the best case scenario for the tribe. Was like, why wouldn’t you put a person into relationship with their gifts? If that’s the way that they can best serve the unit, the tribe. Today, in that modern education system, it’s not about putting a person into a relationship with their medicine, about putting a person into relationship with information that they can use that [00:20:30] information to eventually go to produce something factory oriented or whatever, you know. It’s just I mean, it’s the way is. Now, so anyway, adolescence, that’s where we left off the natural gift, this focused learning. The person would be encouraged to learn more and deepen their learning around the things that they were most interested in because it was understood that it would it would give them feedback [00:21:00] about their gift, about their medicine. When they transitioned past adolescence, they’d go into adulthood where the gift is, and this might seem weird to some people, but it’s the gift of service.
[00:21:13] It’s you. You’ve spent childhood playing and taking in all of this information and learning about survival. You’ve moved into focus, learning where you’ve honed in on those things that most call to you and develop your skill in that. So that now as [00:21:30] an adult, you can use your gift. You can use those things that you’re interested in to serve the community. And you can still see that, I mean, the people who run our culture are really people who are in their adult life stage. And then eventually and hopefully when you’re in your adult life stage, by then you’ve gone through ceremony and ritual and initiation where you do know what your medicine is. So [00:22:00] you’re like what you and I do, we help people know what that is so they can apply it to a form of work or a project or whatever it might be that not only feels good to them, but that serves other people. And you spend a lifetime doing that or your adult life phase doing that again on a continuum. So that by the time you reach that, that stage in life where you’re [00:22:30] older and. You’re perhaps ready to put down the physical efforts that come from the adult life stage. You move into Elder Hood where the gift is sight, and that is to say you have the ability. To see the gifts in others, because you’ve lived from your gift for so long and you’re now using your medicine to. Essentially bless and honor [00:23:00] and help draw out the gifts the people in the generations below you.
[00:23:06] That makes sense.
[00:23:06] It does. And just d. I understand that childhood is facing the east or starts in the east. Can you describe the relationship to the directions?
[00:23:18] Yeah. I mean it just it again, based in and native philosophies and in nature. The sunrise is a lot of it’s based on the sun. Sun rises [00:23:30] in the east childhood. The sun is in is at least here in North America. The sun is always slightly in the south during noon time. So adolescences the noon of life. The sun is most concentrated and most focused at that hour. So we associate that with adolescence. The sun is starting to come down and set. That would be a certain in the west. So we we place adulthood in the West because [00:24:00] that’s where the sun is setting. It’s also associated with each of these can be with the seasons. So if childhood was spring, newness, summer was adolescence, adulthood would be autumn. So it’s like the harvest of life. That’s where all the learning and rapid growth and focused energy has taken place already. And now we’re receiving the fruits of life so that we can use it to serve and feed the people. So with [00:24:30] the sun down now we move towards Elder Hood. You might associate that with winter hares by.
[00:24:39] It’s a time of reflection, the time of storytelling, it’s a time of not the physical work going inward to prepare for the next cycle.
[00:24:49] That would be death or whatever comes after.
[00:24:52] All right, let’s unpack this a bit. So, Michael, what’s the relationship between these life stages, say, childhood [00:25:00] and our medicine?
[00:25:02] So if you remember in the Kalahari story, it said that these forts and threads in the first one that’s mentioned is this red from the center of who we are, which I would say are original medicine to the self.
[00:25:17] But there’s this thread between our medicine and this idea of self. The natural gift is play in childhood. So the act of playing. Builds this thread [00:25:30] of self into a rope. In that we find an identity who I am.
[00:25:36] This is the sense of self, self is more than just identity even. It’s. The idea that I am.
[00:25:49] A living, breathing creation? No, I’m I’m here. And. That is built through play, through engaging [00:26:00] with the natural world.
[00:26:02] And again, on a continuum with deep in that sense of self over time, through play and with really think imperative to at least question or look at. Is that the natural way to build that sense of self is to play and not work?
[00:26:22] In our modern culture, something gets distorted where work.
[00:26:28] The putting out of effort and [00:26:30] I define work as with its synonymous with suffering for most of us.
[00:26:36] Or it has become that way. Children do a lot, they put out a lot of energy.
[00:26:43] Lot of effort in the act of play.
[00:26:47] And as that matures over time, I believe that you can still connect with your medicine, build that road to the self in the other stages through the experience of play rather than work. [00:27:00] Naming that, just put a pin in it. We’ll come back to it. So that’s essentially what it is, that childhood life stage and its connection to our original medicine is the act of building relationship to a sense of self. Play that rope. That thick rope becomes like a pipeline.
[00:27:22] Of relationship. To our medicine. And here’s the thing. I believe that [00:27:30] all of us are wounded in childhood. It’s just the nature of life.
[00:27:35] Whether that wounding is something unfortunate and horrible, if you will, that happens to us as a child or if it’s something seemingly simple, like an offhand remark from a parent or a teacher or a friend. We receive certain thing. In certain ways that that kind of take a hit [00:28:00] at that sense of self. And that’s where in childhood we give the medicine to ourselves, those wounds cause the medicine to rise up and to heal us and allow us to make it through childhood.
[00:28:17] Not on wounded, but with the ability to heal.
[00:28:22] Makes sense. It does. It does.
[00:28:26] So we go into adolescence, then I’m going to assume [00:28:30] that you’d want to know about next year. Yes, please. Well, we go into adolescence. Like I said before, because we’ve been playing as children.
[00:28:41] We’ve learned things about who we are. That sense of self, who we are and naturally just start asking, why am I here? What what am I supposed to do with all these things I’ve been learning about who I am? How can I use it? What’s the function of it? Just this kind of neat thing that happens in adolescence [00:29:00] and in a lot of native and traditional cultures. Adolescence was considered the second birth. Our first birth was when we were literally physically born. In the second birth is the birth of who we are. It’s the birth that coming out of our original medicine. What that might mean or look like is a traditional rite of passage, something that cultures all over the world had in place at [00:29:30] that second birth life stage.
[00:29:33] To help a person begin a conscious relationship with their original medicine, with their genius or whatever you want to call it superpower. We’re not return off to fully grasp what that is. We don’t have to carry the responsibility that comes with that. We’re just children playing. But in adolescence, [00:30:00] we start to move into a place where we’re ready to begin to learn how to carry our gifts, perfected it. You don’t have to go run the whole tribe or get a job necessarily. But you do need to be in a conscious mentorship or apprenticeship with your gift. And so a rite of passage. Was the traditional modality by which people were sort of [00:30:30] thrown into the fire, if you will, or we’re given opportunities to be tested to push themselves to an edge. So much so that the medicine was drawn right to the surface.
[00:30:44] So it was undeniable, but that this is the thing that’s going to let you survive this experience that you’re in right now. Because rites of passage were often very difficult or very challenging. And you needed to draw on [00:31:00] some deeper inner strength. You weren’t going to just walk through it.
[00:31:06] In that strength was always your medicine. And when it came to the surface, you had facilitators that were there. To help you identify it, to say, Paul, you see that you feel that. That frequency, that strength, that power you didn’t know you had, that’s your medicine. And through ceremony [00:31:30] and in a whole bunch of other thing. The person then began that conscious relationship to it. And they began what I would call an apprenticeship to it so that adolescence was a time of focus learning.
[00:31:48] Of what your gift was that you had to share with the world.
[00:31:53] That makes sense. It does. Yes. Very different then than now, I think [00:32:00] we’re often in adolescence.
[00:32:02] Should we engage with that natural gift focused learning? It’s normally on things like S.A.T. scores or I got to get into college. The test Bramwell, that kind of stuff, like it’s information.
[00:32:13] It’s not that that stuff’s not important, right? It is. And it can be very useful, but it’s hollow, in my judgment.
[00:32:21] If it’s not in relationship to the person’s medicine.
[00:32:26] Yes. Right. You talked about this already, but it often [00:32:30] astounds me how the modern world is designed to really stunt the the knowledge that we have these gifts, our access to it.
[00:32:43] When you look how how tribes in ancient cultures were organized around helping children identify and express and cultivate. And we just aren’t organized that way now. But I always like to say I like to be optimistic that, you know, [00:33:00] you’re an example. I think I’m an example of how you can get this knowledge back. You don’t even though I would I didn’t have access to this knowledge as a child. I have access to it now. And I feel like I’m able to understand what my gifts are and be an expression of them.
[00:33:16] If what I’m saying makes sense, if you didn’t have you didn’t have access to it because you didn’t have a culture that had access to it. And I think that’s important to, again, cultural context. When I say tribes and [00:33:30] cultures, I’m talking about 10000 years ago and beyond. hunter-gatherer societies had the closest relationship to us. That’s where this is stemming from.
[00:33:40] It doesn’t mean that there were living, breathing, hunter-gatherer cultures as far back as 200 years ago and there still are some remnants of it. But about ten thousand years ago we stopped living in that hunter-gatherer culture and started moving into agriculture and then eventually [00:34:00] cities. And that’s where domination cultures began. Right. Those previous cultures weren’t what I would call domination cultures. They were seeking to put every person into their the fullness of their medicine because that’s what let the tribe thrive. But when we started to move into agriculture and then into more urban development in order to get those cities built. Which and this is [00:34:30] this is actually key. We started to move into cities and we started to move into groups of people beyond one hundred and fifty. Our brains are developed to be in relationship like real relationship with up to one hundred and fifty people.
[00:34:47] Once we go beyond that, we don’t have we start to lose the ability to track more than that to be in relationship with more than that. And so to make up for that, to compensate for [00:35:00] that loss, what was created was rules and rules have rulers and rulers got to sit on top of the triangle and everybody else below it. And so we slowly started to move step by step away from living in. Deep and conscious relationship with people. And our gift and to replace that there was rules. So all of this is to say. A part [00:35:30] of why culture isn’t designed to put people in to relationship with their medicine is because it will lose control. Not I’m not saying cast you won’t be able to control people. You won’t be able to have people to work because they won’t do work that’s out of relationship with their medicine. All right. This is how people control other people.
[00:35:56] And I think.
[00:35:58] We’re at the cusp [00:36:00] of a turning.
[00:36:02] I’ve heard it referred to as the great turning, where we’re recognizing that this control dominated based experiment isn’t working anymore, and as a result we’re seeing it in our planet, we’re seeing it in our culture. And I’m hopeful that we can move forward with an understanding of this stuff. And create [00:36:30] a new and healthier way of one being in relationship to our medicine, still having culture and society and things that allow us to be in relationship with more than a hundred and fifty people. I’m not advocating going backwards. I’m advocating taking a look at what we’re talking about here, saying how can we use this moving forward? This knowledge, this understanding so that one can live in relationship with our true gifts or frequency or medicine [00:37:00] and to do so in a good way that allows everybody to be in relationship with their medicine rather than keep them out of it for the sake of control.
[00:37:11] So just to finish up, because the question was how how do each of these life stage relate to our original medicine? The idea is that by the time we’re adolescents, we’re initiated and we know it. We understand it. We’re building relationship to it so that we can apply it to the things that light us up that feel [00:37:30] like an adult version of play. Rather than work and use that to serve the people like you can actually do the things you love doing. And serve other people doing it. I mean, that’s the premise of everything I do workwise today, helping people figure out what they love doing, what their medicine is, so that.
[00:37:53] Work become something very different than how we experience it now. So let’s say person goes into adulthood. [00:38:00] You’re using that to serve others in their natural relationship is to the opposite direction, which is children. And so it’s adults who have children who raised children, who give them that space to play and and engage with their natural gift. Likewise, elders in the north, they have a natural connection to adolescence in that they are the ones that are there to hear the adolescent stories, to [00:38:30] ask the questions, to deepen their focus. Learning to because remember, they’re the ones with sight. They’ve lived all of the life stages, so they know naturally how to support and serve and mentor. Youth who are in that focused learning, who might be struggling to really go deep into a relationship with their medicine. I think I said it earlier. They if not to you before. We [00:39:00] live in this sort of distortion culture where adults, people in the adult life stage. Are are now doing almost everything and we’ve sort of pushed our elders. To the edges, if we even have elders and that creates an imbalance in this natural flow, it’s like. I think it’s worth looking at.
[00:39:28] I totally agree [00:39:30] that it is definitely worth looking at. And I think we can all feel I think everyone who is an adult and and certainly who has kids can feel this imbalance that there’s too much stacked on us, at least as we, you know, tried to be all things to our kids, you know. So the last question I have for you, Michael, and then I want you to tell us how people can find you. And that is, how can we cultivate a relationship with our medicine [00:40:00] or develop but daily or weekly practice to connect to it so we can get to know our medicine a little better?
[00:40:09] Actually, I just did a blog on it. It. Have you ever had that pair of jeans that just feel awesome? And when you wear them, you feel like you’re just like. On top of the world like that, I use that example because I think most of us have had that experience, whether it’s jeans or the outfit or car or whatever it is. It’s something [00:40:30] that just lets you instantly feel like, yeah. Like, I just feel great.
[00:40:35] Well. That’s the feeling of what it’s like when you’re aligned with your original medicine.
[00:40:40] So the simplest practice is to start to say yes to things that feel more like that for you.
[00:40:47] And no to things that don’t feel like that for you. You might have a meal that is just when you eat it. When you think about it, you’re like, yeah. Like, I really want that. OK. Say yes to those things.
[00:41:00] Or [00:41:00] you might be like, and I don’t want it. I don’t know why I eat that stuff. I like yes, I like the way it tastes. But every time I feel gross afterwards, start saying no to those sorts of thing.
[00:41:10] It’s a frequency. And the idea is that you continue to align yourself with other frequencies that bring that out in you and no to things that don’t. Again, there’s more to it. Obviously, we’ve talked about a whole bunch of things. That that is one simple practice that [00:41:30] people can start to do. Now that I think they can do without any help right away, any. And of course, things will come up. Challenges will come up as a result of that.
[00:41:42] And that’s where they can seek mentors like you and me for help.
[00:41:45] Right. And without I know that is an excellent, excellent practice. And I’m just taking notes here. I like to ask the people I interview to also then leave the [00:42:00] listeners with a challenge. So you just gave us a practice which has a challenge embedded in it. But can you also leave us with a challenge?
[00:42:12] Ok. So this idea of here’s the challenge. This idea of original medicine. In stories myth all over the world. And it’s funny because it’s archetypal and it comes out in even modern stories, not even eat, not just ancient one. As a person is moving through childhood toward adolescence [00:42:30] to that place where the medicine really wants to start coming out. It normally makes an appearance before the main appearance.
[00:42:44] When it does it, it often comes out in a way. That really causes us to step back, for it causes the adults in our lives to step back. And it’s not uncommon. [00:43:00] For us to either be punished or to be told in some way, shape or form that that medicine is too big. Put it away. Right. Because we’re an unconscious culture, we’re not actively looking for the appearance of one’s medicine. And just to get out, like I often use this as an example. Harry Potter, just so many of us know the story in the first Harry Potter story very early [00:43:30] on. I think even in the first chapter, Harry goes to the zoo with his aunt and uncle and cousin whom he’s living with, the dursleys. And there’s this scene where his cousin banging on the glass of this great big, huge reptile. And actually, this is how it’s done in the movie. And he’s screaming at the snake to go snood, you know, like taunting it. And all of a sudden the glass disappears. And he falls through. And in the tank [00:44:00] with the snake and then the glasses back there and. Nobody knows. Not even Harry knows how this happened. This is where Harry’s magic, the magic within makes its first appearance, and this theme of this first appearance of of magic is archetypal, archetypal for a reason because it happens really with all of us. So my challenge would be to take a look at childhood. Probably somewhere between the age [00:44:30] of, I don’t know, 8, 9, 10 in there a little bit. And take a look to see if something happened where you were bigger than you usually were then you knew yourself to be. And look at what the response was from your your family or your community around that. Was it noticed? And were you praised for it? Or was it noticed and you were most likely punished for it? And then what did that [00:45:00] tell you? In that moment about being in relationship to your medicine, did it enhance it?
[00:45:08] Or did it tell you to put it away and don’t ever let that out again. Too damn dangerous.
[00:45:14] And unfortunately, I think most of us had that experience. The latter. And we’ve been struggling to to let it out ever since.
[00:45:26] So good. So that is an amazing challenge [00:45:30] that can really, I think if you’re not already on the path of a conscious exploration of your original medicine. It’s a great way to get on the path or if you’re already on the path to deepen your understanding and maybe start to change some of the stories that you might have been you might be telling yourself or have been telling yourself about your medicine that might be in service to you to change [00:46:00] those stories to something different. Yeah, totally.
[00:46:04] And I just want to say, it’s because of that event often that people who come to me often go. I don’t know.
[00:46:10] Mean, does everybody have an original medicine? Yes. Everybody has an original medicine. And when you know what it is, you wouldn’t want anybody else’s. So you see somebody and you’re jealous of how they’re shot.
[00:46:24] Then you’re just not connected to yours, because once you know what yours are. It’s like it’s like the best pair [00:46:30] of jeans in the world. Like nothing else beats it. You couldn’t imagine wanting anyone else’s. And a lot of it stems from those early stories about hide it, put it away. Yours isn’t valuable. Whatever other B.S. that we picked up.
[00:46:46] Yes, yes, yes.
[00:46:49] Oh, my gosh, Michael, this has been so amazing, so educational. I’ve been part it a member of your tribe learning from you for the past five, six years now. And I feel [00:47:00] like I always continue to learn from you again and again and again. So I’m so grateful for your time. You’re such a gifted teacher and coach and speaker and motivator and artist and all the things that you show up to do to be an expression of your medicine. Please tell listeners how they can find you if they want to learn more.
[00:47:20] Call and find me at sage via mentoring dot com s.a.g. e f i r e mentoring dot com.
[00:47:29] The whole lunch [00:47:30] information on there about how they can get in touch with me. But that’s the best place to start. Awesome.
[00:47:36] Well, I want to thank you so much for your time. You’ve been so generous. And I’m. This episode has just exceeded all of my wildest text dictations. And I’ve worked with you twice now, and it’s been both times it’s in. And to specifically explore my original medicine. And both times it’s I guess the way to describe it is mind blown. [00:48:00] And so you talk about this, Michael, a lot. The fact this journey to being in relationship to your original medicine, is that a journey? And you can’t you’re always going the next level deeper. It’s never like you’ve never just arrived and it’s done. And I certainly have experience that every every time I think I have a good handle on things, I go to that next level. And it’s such a rewarding journey and process and discovery.
[00:48:28] So thank you so [00:48:30] much for everything you do to make this world a better place. That’s for sure.
[00:48:38] Thanks so much. Again, to Michael, thank you for tuning in and listening. And if you’re digging on this content like I hope you are, then I kindly ask you to hit subscribe wherever you’re listening. I also invite you to head on over to my Web site. Allison Scammell dot com. That’s a l l y s o n sca m m [00:49:00] e double l dot com. Or you can sign up to my newsletter and you will receive three soul guided meditations to help you get a vision of where you want to grow your life and business two in six months and where you need to place your focus today to shift into alignment to that vision. I’ve offered a lot of freebies on my Web site, but this is the one that has generated the most positive feedback as it’s really producing results for people. So head on over there and sign up to [00:49:30] get your first meditation today. Thanks again for listening. And until next time, let’s grow there together.
