Were you one of the outcasts, the weird ones, the so-called ‘overly sensitive’? Did you crush, deny or hide your authentic expression to fit into the box our society just calls ‘being a good citizen’? In this episode I share something a little different…
This is a brief and vulnerable introduction to me, your host Nathan Maingard. How I arrived at this point of sharing the We Are Already Free message with you…and some of the stumbling blocks I tripped over along the way.
I hope this episode will help you to realise that your healing is not only possible, but inevitable…if you do just one thing. But I’ll leave that for the episode…
{{my-important-links}}
Thank you
See you next week
Love
Nathan
PS: if you haven’t yet, be sure to subscribe/follow, share and leave a review!
Transcript
Welcome to We Are Already Free, a podcast
Speaker:helping free DownToEarth people to live their truth and be the change, rather than
Speaker:spending so much time fighting against what they don't want one.
Speaker:Were you one of the outcasts, the weird ones, the so called overly sensitive?
Speaker:Did you crush, deny, or hide your authentic expression to fit into the box
Speaker:our society just calls being a good citizen?
Speaker:In this episode, I share something a little different.
Speaker:This is a brief and vulnerable
Speaker:introduction to me, your host, how I arrived at this point of sharing the We
Speaker:Are Already Free message with you and some of the sometimes funny, sometimes sad
Speaker:stumbling blocks I tripped over along the way.
Speaker:And my sincerest hope is that help you to realize that you are not alone, that your
Speaker:story is worthy and your healing is not only possible, but inevitable.
Speaker:Before we get started, I just wanted to
Speaker:thank you for your enthusiastic support of this podcast.
Speaker:We've had over 1000 listens in the first three weeks with over 200 subscribers on
Speaker:various platforms, and I can't even read out all the reviews.
Speaker:There have been so many like this one,
Speaker:which has filled my heart to overflowing the episode with terror.
Speaker:Had me in tears.
Speaker:Such a beautiful conversation.
Speaker:I can't wait to listen to every episode.
Speaker:Thank you for putting this out there.
Speaker:That's from Candy Crush Superstar.
Speaker:Okay, I'll read another one just because I love them so much.
Speaker:Stopped by to listen to one and ended up spending the day listening to them all.
Speaker:Thank you.
Speaker:Highly recommend.
Speaker:Thank you, Elisabeth.
Speaker:Such a pleasure.
Speaker:Okay, this really is the last one. Just one more.
Speaker:There's so many, but I'll do just one more.
Speaker:Eye opening, healing and profound.
Speaker:Nathan's podcast is a beautiful collection
Speaker:of stories from incredible people around the world.
Speaker:He hand selects each of his guests who
Speaker:have important messages and stories that I think we all need to hear.
Speaker:Had me in tears from day one.
Speaker:It's a masterpiece.
Speaker:I can't recommend enough j Joanne. So thank you.
Speaker:If you are one of the people who left a review, I read them all.
Speaker:They nourish the deepest parts of me and they definitely give me great juice for
Speaker:continuing this podcast and for just taking it to more and more heights.
Speaker:So thank you.
Speaker:Please keep them coming now onto the episode and may it serve you in living
Speaker:your truth and loving the unique miracle that you are dear listener.
Speaker:Blessings and I will see you in just a moment.
Speaker:So I was super blessed to grow up to be born into the village of Scarborough at
Speaker:the tip of Africa, Cape Town, South Africa.
Speaker:Really getting this introduction into life, of village life, of growing up
Speaker:connected to nature, to being barefoot, to being in the ocean.
Speaker:It was really amazing.
Speaker:And despite all of that beauty, which I
Speaker:really did help to shape so much of my life, I still experienced the lineage of
Speaker:trauma, both my parents doing the best that they absolutely could, and I'm so
Speaker:grateful to them, but through their own trauma, there was a lot that happened that
Speaker:was really hurtful for all of us and my father.
Speaker:The male lineage is one of violence and the female lineage is one of abandonment.
Speaker:And so I've carried these two wounds with me and as a highly sensitive person,
Speaker:I still tried when I was young to shop, I think, as we all do, just wanting to be
Speaker:seen and have fun and connect and be open and authentic, I think, really.
Speaker:Gabor Mate says that authenticity is one of the two primary needs of every human
Speaker:and it's not being met for many or most of us.
Speaker:So anyway, sharing this story that we are already free story with you today, so I
Speaker:was a very sensitive boy and I wanted to connect.
Speaker:And I quite quickly learned that that's not what society was okay with.
Speaker:Going to school, I was really bullied and
Speaker:bullied in ways that didn't make sense to me.
Speaker:I never got it.
Speaker:I never understood the sort of casual cruelty.
Speaker:It wasn't aligned with how I wanted to be in the world.
Speaker:But I did realize that
Speaker:the way that I was trying to show up wasn't appropriate or welcome.
Speaker:So I really tried to fit in.
Speaker:I tried to crush the authenticity out of
Speaker:myself, to align myself with what I thought society was asking of me.
Speaker:As children, we're so sensitive, we're so aligned, and our brains and our entire
Speaker:being is around, how can I belong within this environment that I find myself?
Speaker:And so my belonging was to suppress the
Speaker:authentic parts of myself and to try to fit into these structures of what I know
Speaker:to be disease and destruction and dysfunction.
Speaker:And anyway, at some point in that journey, because both my parents listen to great
Speaker:music and my mom's a poet, my dad's a musician and a guitar maker, I got into
Speaker:lyrics and songs and stories and I just fell in love.
Speaker:I just fell into it as listening to Kat Stevens when her eyes like windows
Speaker:trickling rain upon her pain getting deeper.
Speaker:And I was listening to that at like eight
Speaker:years old going, oh, my gosh, she's talking about window panes and the pain
Speaker:she's feeling and her tears, which is also the rain.
Speaker:And I was like, how is this all happening at once?
Speaker:And so that is a thread that carried me
Speaker:through when I started playing guitar at about 14, writing songs with my friends.
Speaker:And yet I was also selfmedicating.
Speaker:I started trying to by trying to fit myself into the society
Speaker:the way that I thought it wanted, I got into women, basically.
Speaker:I got into this idea of if I could be a
Speaker:player, if I could be a master of seduction, then that would mean that I
Speaker:belonged and that I fitted in and I caused a lot of pain because of that.
Speaker:And I'm sorry.
Speaker:To anyone I hurt in that time, I apologize.
Speaker:Please forgive me.
Speaker:I was myself in so much pain and I was
Speaker:doing my best, but that doesn't deny that I hurt people.
Speaker:In those teenage years and into my early
Speaker:twenty s, I also got into drugs, which I don't have a problem with.
Speaker:Some drugs I don't have a problem, it's all good.
Speaker:But if it's taking away from health, if
Speaker:it's taking away from life and for a time for me it did.
Speaker:Using ecstasy was ecstasy actually helped me to feel my feelings again.
Speaker:MDMA was like, oh wow, I actually have
Speaker:emotions I was in when I was 19 or so, but things like methamphetamines, speed,
Speaker:et cetera really had a very negative impact.
Speaker:And I just spent my sort of teenage and
Speaker:early 20s running away, like trying to find myself by if I could just find a
Speaker:place where everything is just right, where everything out there just matches
Speaker:the way that I think it should be, then it will all be okay.
Speaker:And that didn't really work that way, obviously.
Speaker:And thankfully the inner voice kept
Speaker:calling and calling and calling and so I turned back inward.
Speaker:I started turning back inward with much resistance.
Speaker:And at one point I went to my first Ayahuasca ceremony,
Speaker:which was crazy because I had no preparation, I didn't know anyone there, I
Speaker:had no integration and it just blew my mind.
Speaker:For anyone who's worked with Climate, I don't recommend doing it that way.
Speaker:I think there's a much kinder way to go about it with a lot more support, a lot
Speaker:more time and practice and just easing into it in a way.
Speaker:But anyway, I did that and I also did the Vipassana ten day silent meditation.
Speaker:This is now my early 20s when actually sort of mid 20s.
Speaker:Mid 20s, yeah, when I was just needing this alternative way of being.
Speaker:And the Vipassana was interesting because
Speaker:it showed me how much hurt I was causing to myself and to others.
Speaker:It really showed me the pain that I was
Speaker:carrying and the pain I was passing on specifically in the sexual interactions,
Speaker:in the intimate interactions I was having with women.
Speaker:So I decided to be celibate for a while and really started like exploring this
Speaker:different way of being inside myself, really embodying.
Speaker:And my authenticity was this is the thing, it was always trying to shine, it was
Speaker:always there and I had beautiful friendships and I had amazing adventures
Speaker:and connections and yet I was always wrestling with that part of myself.
Speaker:I so wanted to be accepted by the greater society and I also kept shining my
Speaker:authenticity and it kept not being accepted by the kind of mainstream.
Speaker:So eventually I had to really make a decision on that over time.
Speaker:Just like actually I want to live it in a different way in the world and I want to
Speaker:consciously be vulnerable and share my truth and just be myself in the world.
Speaker:I was raised on nature cure, so when we would get sick as kids, we would just have
Speaker:an enemy and do a cleanse and do a fast for two or three days.
Speaker:And we got well, I don't think any of us
Speaker:really went to the doctor much at all for some emergencies, really.
Speaker:And then when I was a young adult living
Speaker:in the UK, I tried the other way, just eating shitty food, drinking loads of
Speaker:booze and going to the doctor when I got sick.
Speaker:And I quickly realized even with all the drugs they were giving me, I was sick for
Speaker:longer and I didn't feel as good afterwards.
Speaker:It didn't really work anyway.
Speaker:So then at some point committed to music
Speaker:as my career when I was 27 years old or so, and that was a huge leap for me.
Speaker:And immediately on making that decision,
Speaker:started experiencing chronic pain, which is interesting how all that works,
Speaker:but spasms in my neck, et cetera, which I still have today.
Speaker:But the whole relationship with it has shifted and is shifting as I heal and I
Speaker:focus on where I am powerful, not where I'm not.
Speaker:But I really went through an intense
Speaker:period of depression, burnout, chronic pain, everything fell apart.
Speaker:My patreon page, which had been so well
Speaker:supported by such an amazing community of people that fell apart,
Speaker:and yet through it all, my authenticity kept shining and I kept taking that one
Speaker:step forward, even if I'd taken ten steps back, just take the next step forward and
Speaker:then maybe I'll get three steps forward before the next step back.
Speaker:And I realize now more and more that
Speaker:really what is success or what healing requires is just getting up or trying
Speaker:again or showing up one more time than I fall down one more time.
Speaker:Nathan, I fail.
Speaker:It's like I'm going to fail, I'm going to fall apart, it's all going to happen.
Speaker:And then when I have the capacity take
Speaker:that deep breath, get up again and continue on the journey.
Speaker:And so through all of that, a big part of
Speaker:it for me was in my desperation at one point.
Speaker:I mean, I was contacting a psych ward
Speaker:because I was suicidal and I was scared that I was going mad and I was trying to
Speaker:check myself in and I started seeing a therapist.
Speaker:And thankfully.
Speaker:As by the grace of the divine.
Speaker:I found my way back to plant medicine now in my early thirty s.
Speaker:And really made a dedicated commitment to that work to breath.
Speaker:Work to plant medicines.
Speaker:Working with sacred mushrooms.
Speaker:And wrote a lot of the songs.
Speaker:Like Beautiful Song Every Leaf.
Speaker:Which is all about the experience of going into the infinite and then returning and
Speaker:then realizing that this whole thing is just like a complete miracle.
Speaker:It's a complete mystery.
Speaker:And yet here I am within it.
Speaker:And there's something of a relief in that.
Speaker:So yeah, through this whole journey of
Speaker:really struggling at times, I just kept showing up.
Speaker:Kept showing up. And so by the time the pandemic started.
Speaker:I had already done so much work to
Speaker:extricate myself from needing to follow the rules that I was given by society.
Speaker:By government. By education.
Speaker:By medication.
Speaker:By all of those which had failed me
Speaker:completely in actually taking care of my deepest human needs.
Speaker:My real need for meaning and purpose and connection and vibrant health and a life
Speaker:of regenerative connection to the cycles of life.
Speaker:Birth. Death.
Speaker:Rebirth of the whole thing.
Speaker:Like our society just doesn't take care of
Speaker:any of that as far as I can feel generally.
Speaker:And so by the time the pandemic came, I
Speaker:just ignored it initially because I've ignored things like that for years.
Speaker:It's just like, that's another thing
Speaker:people are pushing out, that people must be panicked about this and we must be
Speaker:scared and there's terrible stuff like it'll just pass and then it didn't.
Speaker:And so I started sharing.
Speaker:I started sharing these little snippets of information.
Speaker:What about these statistics?
Speaker:And what about the fact that it's only people who are already past the age of
Speaker:life expectancy in most countries that are actually dying and that those who have
Speaker:comorbidities are the ones who are at risk and anyone who's healthy seems to be kind
Speaker:of completely fine generally most of the time and those kinds of things.
Speaker:But what happened was it just created massive polarity.
Speaker:I started seeing these arguments on my
Speaker:comment feeds, on my social media and I stopped.
Speaker:I don't want to be a part of that. That's not my jam.
Speaker:I don't want to create more polarity.
Speaker:I want us to be empowered and connect and feel our value in the world.
Speaker:And at that time, I was actually
Speaker:processing some work of finding my why, which is this process of working.
Speaker:Like when my gifts and the things I'm skilled at and the things people need all
Speaker:align, what does that look like when I'm at my best?
Speaker:What happens in the world?
Speaker:And my wife became that I inspire and help DownToEarth seekers to live their truth so
Speaker:that we can all feel, heal and grow a beautiful world together.
Speaker:So basically that when I am in my center, in my most truest self, the
Speaker:result is that people feel safe enough to be their authentic selves.
Speaker:That that is my gift in the world.
Speaker:So realizing that, I was like, okay, so I have my truth and I want to speak it and I
Speaker:want to support people on this journey, so what can I do?
Speaker:And again, I didn't want to polarize things because I just felt crap.
Speaker:It just wasn't exciting at all.
Speaker:And then I started writing for the first
Speaker:time ever and again, I've been a songwriter since I was 15 years old, and
Speaker:I've written poems here and there, but I've never really written long form poems.
Speaker:And I definitely had never written spoken word poetry.
Speaker:And that's what I started doing.
Speaker:I started writing these long form poems.
Speaker:And I think the second or third one of those poems was We Are Already Free.
Speaker:When I shared that poem, I didn't expect I
Speaker:mean, I just felt like, yes, this is my truth and it feels good to share.
Speaker:And I didn't expect that it would go viral, which it did.
Speaker:And that's probably how you listening found us in some way, is like through that
Speaker:process on Telegram or Instagram or WhatsApp, or all these various places.
Speaker:And it's been such a gift to realize that
Speaker:I don't have to fight against something I don't want.
Speaker:It's good to know what it is.
Speaker:The shadow is critical. We have to know the shadow.
Speaker:We have to integrate the shadow.
Speaker:That is such a key part of this work.
Speaker:And then where are you putting your energy?
Speaker:Where am I putting my energy?
Speaker:Energy is power, right?
Speaker:So what am I empowering with my energy?
Speaker:It's like we are these light beings that are generating
Speaker:electrical energy with our attention and our awareness and how we move and how we
Speaker:breathe and what we eat, what we think and who we hang out with.
Speaker:We're generating this energy
Speaker:and then what we plug that energy into with our attention and with our actions.
Speaker:That is what we literally empower.
Speaker:That's what we give power to through our energy, and that's what we get more of.
Speaker:So once I'd written that poem, it really felt so clear to me that We Are Already
Speaker:Free is a mantra for our times, for those of us who are on this journey of
Speaker:reclamation, of returning to our inner sovereignty, to the inner being, to the
Speaker:power of just what it means that we are intrinsically free.
Speaker:Even if we have forgotten that, even if it
Speaker:has been physically removed from us by force, we are still there is a part of me
Speaker:and a part of you listening that is inescapably liberated always.
Speaker:So this brings us pretty much to the end.
Speaker:I'm going to share the poem itself with you now that We Are Already Free poem.
Speaker:Thank you so much for all the responses.
Speaker:And to everyone who has resonated with
Speaker:this, it has been such a gift for me to be able to just share my truth and to have it
Speaker:connect with you and for us to be dancing this dance together.
Speaker:Now, I want to acknowledge that some of the things I say in this poem might be
Speaker:triggering for you, and they might be challenging, they might cause discomfort.
Speaker:And that's okay. I think it's really wonderful if we can
Speaker:meet in a place where it's okay to disagree, it's okay to not have everything
Speaker:truly aligned and I'm not judging you if your choices are different to mine.
Speaker:All I'm saying, as you're hearing the
Speaker:poem, is that we are sovereign beings and our choice is our own to make and that
Speaker:should not and cannot be taken away from us.
Speaker:So please enjoy this poem.
Speaker:Thank you for being here.
Speaker:If you believe that you can vaccinate
Speaker:yourself to health or consume your way to wealth, if you think nature is a fool
Speaker:because you're not a part of the pool of life in all its branches, then I sincerely
Speaker:wish you blessings and I think you're taking chances.
Speaker:Though I would never dictate how you choose to feel great, I'd only ask the
Speaker:same weight for my perceptions and the actions I choose to take.
Speaker:Imagine if I told you that for the good of
Speaker:all, you could no longer eat a takeout, drink Coca Cola or consume fear.
Speaker:Sorry, I mean media globally owned by five corporations.
Speaker:But perhaps let's say that for a future explanation.
Speaker:Imagine if I said that the science was in, living a life of joy, natural food and
Speaker:movement was the solution, and you would no longer be allowed to spend your days
Speaker:inside your house on your couch, wrapped in fear.
Speaker:But you'd have to come outside, sit around
Speaker:the fire, make love, music, laughter and tears.
Speaker:Give your time to serve earth and your relations for all your years.
Speaker:How would you feel if I dictated your state from my external place?
Speaker:It wouldn't work, would it?
Speaker:Because it's your body, your choice now.
Speaker:The same folk who say it's okay to poison the well have you heard of Glyphosate?
Speaker:Look it up. It is living hell.
Speaker:Those same people are saying they only
Speaker:care for getting back to normal and your health when they sit on the boards of the
Speaker:corporations selling the medication that increases their wealth.
Speaker:Hidden in their words is a grain of truth.
Speaker:This society seeks to homogenize you to
Speaker:normalize the way life comes through until you are nothing more than a resource
Speaker:consumable, disposable, broken like a wild horse saddled bridled with no conceivable,
Speaker:recourse, drained, debrained your energy a devoured force until it's too late.
Speaker:And you say, I wish I'd bucked sooner for my children or the next course.
Speaker:So here's an invitation from the heart of love in action.
Speaker:Take a breath and let it go.
Speaker:Feel your gut reaction.
Speaker:Step outside with bare feet, begin recalibration.
Speaker:Be a rebel, share a hug.
Speaker:Remember you're in heaven.
Speaker:And if all that is not enough, then please, please, stop blaming those of us,
Speaker:the millions of us hidden under all that noise and fluff.
Speaker:We who electrify our lives with truth beyond the lies.
Speaker:Healthy people are not responsible for disease.
Speaker:That's not how nature works.
Speaker:So let us go.
Speaker:We are already free.
Speaker:So thank you again for joining me on this we are already Free journey.
Speaker:It's such a pleasure and an honor to be
Speaker:here with you to be navigating this wild unfolding of society, of transformation.
Speaker:What a time to be alive, what a challenge, what an invitation.
Speaker:And I couldn't think of a better way to do
Speaker:it than navigating it with someone like you.
Speaker:I love being me with you.
Speaker:And if you're listening to this then for sure we have a vibe.
Speaker:So the final request that I have for you
Speaker:before we part ways today is that you can connect with me.
Speaker:The strange thing about podcasts is that you're probably listening to this.
Speaker:Doing the dishes or driving your car or
Speaker:doing some exercise and I don't know who you are.
Speaker:I just see stats on my player that says this many people are listening.
Speaker:This many people have followed.
Speaker:Which is great and I'm so grateful and
Speaker:please keep doing all of that but I don't know who you are and I would
Speaker:love to and I would love to share something of you with this.
Speaker:We are Already free community here on this podcast.
Speaker:So if you feel aligned, please send me a voice note.
Speaker:You can send it to me either on my Instagram or Telegram or wherever you use.
Speaker:You just need to go to Alreadyfree me and you'll see buttons there to leave
Speaker:reviews and to leave voice notes, et cetera.
Speaker:But really just taking that action, leaving me a voice note, letting me know
Speaker:how are you navigating your freedom, how are you embodying the person you came
Speaker:here to be, how are you living your truth and being the change?
Speaker:And what are your challenges?
Speaker:What is it that you're coming up against that you don't know what to do about it's?
Speaker:In sharing that we find healing, I really
Speaker:more and more, especially through working with plant medicines, I realized that we
Speaker:are collaborative beings, that this whole reality is a collaboration of infinite
Speaker:energetic particles coming together and all saying yes to this reality.
Speaker:So it's okay if you're struggling because some other people have the reflections
Speaker:that you need to move through your struggles in the same way that your
Speaker:struggle can serve others to realize that they are not alone.
Speaker:It's all one knowing unfolding within itself and coming to know itself.
Speaker:So let's do it together.
Speaker:Let's do it together.
Speaker:We are not alone.
Speaker:You are not alone.
Speaker:And I hope that this podcast episode has helped you to remember that and I wish you
Speaker:all the blessings and I look forward to many more episodes.
Speaker:Now we have some beautiful guests coming up.
Speaker:I just wanted to take this moment to
Speaker:really introduce myself, say hello to you and I will see you next week.
Speaker:And for now just go to Already Free Me and leave me a voice note.
Speaker:It can be private or one that I can share on the podcast in a future episode.
Speaker:You just let me know about that and thank
Speaker:you again for the blessing of your presence.
Speaker:I'm so grateful to be me with you. And I'll see you next week.
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