The Premise

>> Jeniffer: Hey there. I'm Jennifer Thompson.

>> Chad: And I'm Chad Thompson.

>> Jeniffer: And this is the premise where we get to the

story behind the storyteller. This is our

sixth season, folks. Six seasons.

It's so excitingiting.

>> Chad: Can you believe it?

>> Jeniffer: We've got a really amazing season lined up for

you, so let's dive in.

Deborah Rudel lives in San Diego, where she is a

college professor and participates in her city's

vibrant writing community. She is a graduate of

Hayous Writers Workshop and the Certificate in Memoir

Writing program at San Diego Writers Inc. Her work

has been published in the International Memoir Writers

Association's anthology Shaking the Tree. I

didn't see that one coming. Debeorah lives with her

black cat in a tiny house built in

1906 by a retired sea

captain. Well, that's appropriate, isn't it?

Who carves a sailing ship into the front door.

Grit and Grace, the transformation of a Ship and

Soul is her first book. Deborah, thank you so much. And

welcome to the premise.

>> Deborah: It's an honor.

>> Jeniffer: You know, this book was so fun to read because we know

each other. We were in a writing workshop together and

gosh, how long have we known each other? Like maybe seven,

eight, nine years?

>> Deborah: 2016, 2017.

>> Jeniffer: I think that'I. Think that's about right. Yeah.

So congratulations, number one, on, on the writing

and the publishing of this wonderful memoir. And

I'm excited to dive in.

Before we do that, let's talk a little bit

about Grit and Grace. The title,

it's such a compelling title. And I'm just curious

how you came to. Was it easy? Did

you, like, have a lot of different options or where did the title

come from?

>> Deborah: The title was actually my working title.

My original working title was the Elixir

Project.

>> Jeniffer: That was the name of the boat. Your sailboat.

>> Deborah: That's right. And early on,

someone mentioned to me that the Elixir project didn't

mean anything. That wasn't a very good title.

So I switched it to Grit and

Glue because I thought

that was the most fitting. Those were the most

fitting two words to use. And it

wasn't until I was publishing and my

publisher was speaking to me. And, I had wanted to put

grit, glue and Grace, but it was too

hard to say all those cheese.

>> Jeniffer: Say that three times fast. Yeah.

>> Deborah: So I wanted Grace in there

because, yes, there was lots of sanding, there was

lots of grit, inside of

having to deal with different things, but also

the grace that allowed me to get through the

whole part of my life that I, that I speak

about there was a lot of I even

magic, you know, that I, wouldn't have probably

survived if there wasn't somebody watching out for me.

>> Jeniffer: Wow. And the book starts out in a moment

where there's definitely someone looking out for

you. So I want you to take us to that moment.

But I think before we do that, we should tell our listeners what

this book is about. So it's really kind of two stories in

one. You'

I want to say fixing, but that's just not

the right word. There's this thing that Chad always says. If

you completely replace everything on a boat,

is it still the same boat? Right.

>> Chad: The ship of Theseus.

>> Jeniffer: Exactly. So you literally

replaced everything on this boat. So we're

weaving through this process and then this incredible journey on the

sailboat with your family. But at the same time, we're going back

and forth between that story and the story of joining

Nicolt, your spiritual journey. And

this book really is about. It is about grit. It is

about grace, you know, in sharing this incredible

journey of just the seeking that you're.

You're going through this entire time as you're bringing us

through these. These two. So

I want you to take us to the beginning of the book, but I'm going toa

hold on that.

How did you know that these two stories needed to be

told together? You know, as opposed to, like, writing the

story about just the boat and writing just the

story about the experience with the cult and the seeking the

spiritual side? What made you decide to put them together?

>> Deborah: I'd have to go back a little bit because

I didn't decide that that wasn't a

decision early on. As a matter

of fact, when we were building the boat, I

was taking pictures and documenting

the befores and afters, to make

articles for Wooden Boat magazine. So they were technical

articles, and that was why I had so

many photographs of this whole project.

And then when

I joined San Diego Writers, Inc.

I met with someone and

she said to me, is this a

photojournal or is this

an actual story? Do you have a story to tell?

And at that point, my heart started beating really fast because

I realized I was going toa have to tell the truth. And if I told the

truth, then that would mean I would have to actually write a

story. And I didn't really

see all that entailed. I just knew it made my heart beat

faster and my hands get a little bit sweaty.

So then she introduced me to Marnie, and I went to the

memoir classes. And it was in the memoir

Classes where I was writing about sandpaper

and different kinds of paint and what size, drift bolts,

ettera, etc. And my writing group, their

eyes would glaze over and they would say, but,

Debbie, where were you? What were you feeling? What were you

thinking? About what? What's your story?

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, I remember that.

>> Deborah: You do? Yeah, yeah. And I was

like, well, what do you mean? You know, I

was, you know, in a cult. And you were like, what?

>> Jeniffer: What?

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Wait, wait, wait, back up.

>> Chad: I led with that.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, yeah.

>> Deborah: to me, it was just sort of, like, ordinary. But I

realized by watching all of your faces that that

probably wasn't so ordinary in.

So I would have to credit my writing group

for pulling those bits out

that part of the story. And then actually,

the whole technical aspect kind of faded into the

background and became footnotes. And then it became

like a glossary at the end of the book.

>> Jeniffer: Right, right.

>> Deborah: So the book really did transform and go through

its own metamorphosis.

>> Jeniffer: And your subtitle, you know, the Transformation

of a Ship and a Soul. I mean, it really.

That. It's pretty beautiful that you have these two

things that are happening

simultaneously as we read the book. Obviously not

in real life, but really, you are going through

transformation. You. Both of these. It's kind of

a perfect fit, interestingly. And coming to

that conclusion was there that moment you were like,

oh, my God. Okay, I see.

I see how these fit.

>> Deborah: I don't know if it was a single moment. I think

it grew. It kind of grew and evolved

also. However, what

grew and evolved was my understanding

of how much my soul changed

As I wrote, I had more

epiphanies, more understanding, more realizations

of, wow, okay. And I was

able to integrate and put into place more of the

things that happened inside.

>> Jeniffer: Interesting. Isn't that amazing? I think

that's true when we're writing memoir and we're going back and

placing ourself not just in that memory,

but, like, the emotions of the memory, you know, and

we're experiencing it all over again. And we do. We have these

epiphanies like, oh, that's probably why I behave that

way and why I did that. And we come to this greater

understanding.

>> Deborah: Yeah. And. And in. In my case,

while I was building the boat, I was

part of the time in a funk a little

bit, because it wasn't really my dream

until partway through and I write about

that. It was my husband's dream,

and I just thought it was a crazy

scheme and a waste of money and time.

>> Jeniffer: He did A lot of scheming.

>> Deborah: A lot. Yeah. Ah, there was a lot

there. However, as

time went on and then as I started writing about it,

I started to realize just how much,

I was actually thinking about things and growing

and learning and as I said, integrating.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. Wow.

Okay, so let's go to the beginning of the book. There's a scene.

I'm just gonna let you describe it. Tell us what's happening in the beginning of the book.

The opening scene.

>> Deborah: And this is the opening scene because I think this

was the strongest moment

in my life to date of when I was really

up against life and death.

So when I started writing,

this is the moment that came to me

to start writing. So I'm

in the middle of the. Well, not the middle. I'm five

days north of Kauai.

It's the middle of the night, I'm in a gale. So

there's really high winds. High winds

don't just blow. They also make noise.

A lot, A lot of noise.

So you can't talk, you can't hear

anyone. And

the motion of the boat is so strong that

you have to be hanging on. You can't walk, you

can't stand, you have to be hanging on and tied

on. So it's very

physically extreme.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, sounds like it.

>> Deborah: And when you're on watch while there was somebody else on

deck, they were sleeping in the cockpit.

I was the one on watch. And so you're

alone in the dark

and you don't want to wake somebody up for no reason.

Like you're terrified, so you're going toa wake someone up.

It wasn't like that. It was like learning

seeing my terror, using all my

spiritual tools to calm down,

breathing, self talk,

relaxing, faith in something bigger than

me. All these things. Nothing worked. I was

terrified.

And my mind was

really starting to think about really terrible

things like drowning.

>> Jeniffer: Sure.

>> Deborah: And at that time then I

had, what I call like a vision.

So I didn't really see

anything, but I sensed things on the rail.

And to me those were

angels and they were just

laughing and having a good time. And I was like,

what? It was such a

change of a vibe that they were putting

out and yet I was terrified.

But, there was a distraction there. And

also the part of my mind that knows about psychology

knows that people in life threatening situations

have things happen to them. Their

mind does things to help them get through those tough

times. So I was aware of that even at the time.

Wow. And yet I was like, well, whatever, it's going to

take, you know. Thank you.

And these beings on the rails were just

laughing and assuring me that

the elements were just frolicking. There was nothing

malicious or malevolent about

this storm. These waves,

this incredible wind, the noise.

It was just the elements playing.

And if you look at it as playing instead of,

you know, oh my gosh, something's out to kill me.

>> Jeniffer: Right.

>> Deborah: It's a very different. A very different

feeling. So that was how. That

was the beginning of the book. Was that

the question you were asking?

>> Jeniffer: Absolutely, yeah. This moment where you take us, I mean,

it's. It's like life or death in this moment.

Like we're in it and. But then you

manage to calm your mind and reading it, it's

like you see something on the rail and we're not sure if you

actually see it. You tell us they're not really there, but

you see them. So you know, we're, we're with

you. And then it, it passes.

>> Jeniffer: And everything calms and you're on your way.

Yeah.

>> Deborah: Dawn comes.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: We forget when we're in. No matter what it is in

life, whether you're feeling sick or you're in bad

pain, or the world is coming

to some kind of a crisis.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: We, always think, oh, this is forever. We forget that.

Things change.

>> Jeniffer: This too shall pass.

>> Deborah: This too shall pass. And the morning came. So it

got lighter. So you could see the wind died

down. So I could hear a little bit

more than just the roar of the wind in

the rigging. Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Now there's another moment. I don't want to linger too much

on the boat, but there's some spooky things. I don't know if

that's the right word, but there's some things that happen in the book. And one

of them, is that Toashh is literally

tossed out of the sailboat.

And I want you to describe the boat. Like I keep saying boat and I don't think that's

like a fair word. So I want you to

tell us what it's like. But. So he's in another gale.

He's literally tossed out

into the storm.

>> Deborah: Ye.

>> Jeniffer: And then what happens?

>> Deborah: And, for this one, I'm onlynna say what I

heard because I was trying to catch sleep.

No.

>> Jeniffer: So you were down below.

>> Deborah: I was below. And we had three hour

watches. So you had three hours to shut your

eyes. So you did what you could in those three hours and

then you're back deck or whatever was needed

next. And

I came up from My trying to sleep,

and my son and my husband

were in the cockpit, and

before I could even say hello, you know, like, good

morning. What's the weather doing today?

My son was all excited. Mom,

you should have seen it. Tasha

washed overboard. Like, he was so excited to

tell me. And my husband, who

was really, really quite seasick, he was,

like, really out of it. He'd been sick for almost

three weeks, so dehydrated. A

lot of weight loss. He can hardly

talk like that, kind of seasick. And

he. He says, we promised

we weren't gonna tell her. He

didn't want you to know because they. Well, he knew

I'd be pretty upset, and I was. I was pretty

upset.

>> Jeniffer: But he was tossed back in by a

wave. Is my understanding is that he, like,

was tossed out and then literally tossed back in

with the next wave. He wasn't rescued.

>> Deborah: So let me. Let me go back a little bit to this storm

to help help your listeners understand,

understand this picture. So

it's hard to put in words if you haven't been at sea,

but the waves are very large.

Like, our spreaders

were, you know, 50ft high. The

masts were 65ft tall.

So when the boat is on a heel, it's on a

slant. When I look to my

left side, the wall of water

was higher than my masts.

>> Jeniffer: Wow. Okay.

>> Deborah: And when I'm looking up there, remember, this is in a

gale. It's daylight. The sun

is shining, but it's also cloudy, and

the wind is blowing big,

big masses of foam off

the tops of the waves. And the

sunlight is shining through that, and there's

rainbows everywhere.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, my God, it sounds amazing.

>> Deborah: And remember, you can't hear anything because

it's so loud.

And so I looked up to my

left, and the dolphins were jumping out of the

wave above my head, jumping

back into the wave and then going under

elixir and coming out

the bottom. So elixir is in the middle of this face.

That's massive.

>> Jeniffer: Are you sideways?

>> Deborah: we're, in a way. We're at an angle.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. Okay. Okay.

>> Deborah: We're at an angle. And when

you're. When you're doing that, you. I mean, it's

just so big. Your brain is, like, fried.

You just can't believe you're there and you're just getting

through each moment because any moment

could be your last for real.

>> Jeniffer: Wow.

>> Deborah: So anyways, what happened with that wave was the

top of one of those waves came straight down

into the cockpit. So it filled the

cockpit and washed him Out.

so we're all tied on. So he had a tether.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: So he was hanging from his tether over the

rail and his feet were above

the water because remember, you're sideways on this

face.

>> Jeniffer: Oh my God.

>> Deborah: And Gavin tried to grab his

jacket and pull him, but he was too

heavy.

>> Jeniffer: Sure.

>> Deborah: Even though Gavin was 15 and man sized,

it was just, you know, dead weight

hanging on a rope. But then the, the next

wave came and the water came up from the

bottom, picked him up and threw him back in the

cockpit.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, God.

>> Deborah: So does that give you a better idea of what that was like?

>> Jeniffer: Well, it does. I didn't realize he was tethered.

Oh, I imagined him like out

there in the ocean and then all of a sudden the ocean's like, no, you can go

back now and like him just being. But you know, this is my

ignorance of not..ing sailboats.

>> Deborah: No. As soon as you leave the dock, you put a tether

on and the only time it's off is when you're below decks.

>> Jeniffer: Got it.

>> Deborah: Sunshine, flat sea, stormy

sea, doesn't matter.

>> Jeniffer: And before this, you'd never done sailine or

how'you been sailing?

>> Deborah: We'd been practicing sailing around the Hawaiian Islands.

>> Jeniffer: But before that, before you got the elixir.

>> Deborah: Sailed a couple of times on Kootenay Lake,

which is a, 90 mile long lake.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, yeah, that was it.

>> Deborah: In little boats, you know, 25ft

long. Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: So Tash decides, well, okay, we're gonna buy the sailboat.

And it's, it's a fixer upper, baby. We're just

gonna go do this thing for six months. For six

months, and then sail around the world.

So you, you get to the.

>> Chad: Makes sense.

>> Jeniffer: Right, Right. As anyone would do. Tash is a very

interesting character because he takes on. This isn't the

first time he'd done something like this. There was the homestead

that you describe cleaning this place. That was like

almost better to burn it to the ground. Same with the

elixir. Almost better to just burn the thing to the ground, like. But

for him, it was like a challenge. And being

in a challenge kept him alive and

excited.

>> Deborah: Yes.

>> Jeniffer: Which also probably explains how you ended up in a

cult.

>> Deborah: Maybe.

>> Chad: That was a hell of a segue.

>> Jeniffer: Well, I mean, explain yourself. Yeah, right.

What do you mean by that? It was exciting. It was different.

It felt like something bigger than him.

And I think that's, you know, and he was a dentist, like, so

he's in this very, like. I guess

this is probably really unfair to all of our dental

listeners. But, a mundane profession, you know, where you.

You're helping people and you're doing the same thing every day and reaching into

people's mouths. And he just needed more excitement in his

life. Whether that was completely

revamping, ah, an old homestead and making it livable

again. And then once it was, he's like, okay, well, now let's go do something else.

>> Chad: I mean, most dentists take up photography.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, right. Or hunting, I don't know.

>> Chad: Or blues guitar.

>> Jeniffer: W. Now that's oddly specific, Chad.

>> Chad: Well, that's like the guitar circles. Like,

the blues dentist is kind of. Kind of the guy who

goes out and buys the most expensive, Gibson.

>> Jeniffer: Or whatever I've heard Harley's too. A lot of Dennists

ride Harley's. Okay, so maybe there's something about Dennis

that, like, their're adventures. I don't know. But TSH

was absolutely an adventurer.

>> Deborah: Yes. And. And

I forget what the name is. When you're.

When you go off and do your own thing and you just.

You're rebellious a little bit. I don't know if it's maverick

or, There's a word for that. I

don't know what it is. But yeah, he just likes to.

He sees something and he'll go for it. And he's still doing

that.

>> Chad: That's called no impulse control.

>> Jeniffer: Maybe so I canate. Maybe so.

So there's so many things I want to ask you. I

don't even know where to begin. Let's

talk about the spooky things that I. That I mentioned earlier, because I think

that kind of leads us into some things. So there's a moment

in the story where

he says he's going to India, he's following

a particular guru, and correct me if I use the wrong

terminology.

>> Deborah: That's correct.

>> Jeniffer: Okay. And you're like, I don't want to do that.

So you decide. Also an adventure,

listeners. I'm gonna do my own thing. So how old

is Gavin at the time, too?

>> Deborah: He's two.

>> Jeniffer: He's two years old. Okay, and you decide to go to.

So tell us, like, what made you tell

a story of how you decided to go on this adventure?

>> Deborah: Well, he wasnn to go and find his teacher and

his guru in India with Rajnesh in

Puna. And Rajnesh was

too radical for me.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: I thought that that was too radical. So I was going to have my

own teacher. M. So I had a

dream, and in the dream

I was told that I did have a teacher

and that I Needed to spin the globe.

So I spun the globe and where my finger landed, I

would go there and I would meet my teacher.

So I spun the globe and it landed in

Belize and San

Pedro Key, which is in those

days. There you could get there by float plan, like a

small one, like, you know, a

Cessna. There was no big planes there.

>> Jeniffer: People weren't going there all the time.

>> Deborah: No, there was no streets, There was a couple of rooming

houses. There was no English

spoken there. there was a few sort

of stores. They were people in their basement had a

few groceries or things,

but there wasn't even any stores or.

Yeah, it was, it was very,

rudimentary.

>> Jeniffer: And tell us what year this is.

>> Deborah: This is

1979.

>> Jeniffer: Okay. Okay. So you pick up your two year

old son and you go to Belize and then you take

this Cessna to the small key.

>> Deborah: M.

>> Jeniffer: And then what happens?

>> Deborah: Well, I didn't realize it, but it was a

holiday thing going on there. And lucky

for me that I met these fishermen

guys that used to meet every year in San

Pedro and one of their party

hadn't been able to make it for the trip. So there

was an empty place in the Cessna and

then there was an empty hotel room. It's not

really hotel. a room and a rooming house.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, wow.

>> Deborah: Okay. So, if I hadn't run into them, I would not have

had a place to stay because in those days there was

no Internet. You couldn't arrange things

ahead of time. Yeah, yeah. So

I was, that was huge. to me, that

was, visible. And I knew it at the

time that I was being guided and I was

being told to go here and do this and look, I'm taking

care of you.

>> Jeniffer: Nice.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's time to

go. You have, it's time to go and you can't

leave because planes have been

grounded. And so you have one more day and

you're on the beach and you close your eyes and you

have a vision. Tell us what it is.

>> Deborah: It was kind of like that. I. I was

doing my rebirthing meditations

most days when I could, I'd set Gavin up with

his Legos on his bed, his little cot in our

room, and I would lay down and do my

breathing exercises. And

this day I did that. And now remember, I've been

there for six weeks and I've been expecting to

meet my guru teacher and I haven't

met anyone. And I'm thinking, well, I

guess just being here is my teacher and this is

it. So Anyways, I go into my meditation and

while I'm in my meditation, I actually

astral travel to India. And I'd

never done that before. I didn't have any

experience of it. But I was all

of a sudden in India and I've never been to India, I'd

never been to Puna. I didn't

know about the ashram or anything. I see

Tosh, I see his girlfriend.

>> Jeniffer: Which is a little upsetting because.

>> Deborah: Well, except for that's what's odd about when I

was in that meditation.

>> Jeniffer: And they're not married at this point. Listeners just so you

know, their boyfriend and girlfriend living together.

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Okay, go on.

>> Deborah: I, think because when you're in that state, it's not your

personality. So any kind of personality or

attachments that you have. This is just my thinking about it.

I don't really know about astral traveling,

but you're just open and

observing and paying attention to what's

happening. So I was observing. He

was very happy. She was very happy. I knew her name,

I knew she was German. I knew all kinds of

things. I saw what they were wearing.

>> Jeniffer: and all the people in the.

>> Deborah: All the people in the ashram. And while I'm

there, I catch eyes

with Bhagwan and

have like a darshan with him.

>> Jeniffer: What is a darshan?

>> Deborah: That's like. Do you know what shaktipa

is?

>> Jeniffer: Nope.

>> Deborah: There. Those are sort of

Hindi words for some of the energy

transference that happens between

people that have healing powers or spiritual

people or there are moments that are

very powerful. Energetic, energetically.

So. He was looking across the room. I caught

his eyes and I went into.

I had a moment,

well, another in hi word like a satori.

>> Jeniffer: Or like an enlightenment almost.

>> Deborah: Well, I didn't get enlightened, but I had like,

I was in this space of having,

just feeling amazing and connected with

everything and feeling so much love. And then

the, the other thing that happens is that your eyes

run because your emotions are all connected and

it's, it's the love in your heart

sort of. You're just overwhelmed with love.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. You describe it as like this complete

and all encompassing feeling of peace.

>> Jeniffer: And you're looking into the eyes of this person

and of course you're in Belize and he's in India

and aren't the opposite each other on the globe. Is that

right?

>> Deborah: When I, when I got home from that trip, I looked at the

globe again and, and it looked like

if I put a needle through a globe

From Belize and San

Pedro Key, specifically, it would come out

exactly in Puna,

which is like.

>> Jeniffer: Okay, okay.

>> Deborah: I thought that was. Wow. Okay.

There's. There's many things we don't understand, but

as we are learning more about quantum physics and

we're learning more about the energy

fields on the earth, like we're measuring all this, the geologists,

the scientists are all over it. these things

do have explanations, but my brain didn't know

them. It just knew that this is what was happening. And

I didn't really even have words.

>> Jeniffer: But you felt it.

>> Deborah: I felt it. And I felt it so strongly that

there was no doubt.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: You know, I couldn't doubt myself.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. Well, and then you get back to the farm

and Tasha's back, and you tell him what you saw,

and he's like, yeah, my girlfriend's name was Anna.

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, she's German. And yes, those are the clothes we were wearing.

And yes, that's what it looked like.

Was that a surprise to you or did you know? You

already knew?

>> Deborah: I knew, but I have to say that it was

validating.

>> Jeniffer: Sure. Yeah.

>> Deborah: You know, and the other thing was that I had written it all down in my

journal at the time.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: So when I saw him, you know, six weeks

later, however long it was, because again, we didn't

have phone calls, we didn't have cell phones,

email. You don't see anyone for that

long. And, I was able to show my journal

in and say,

okay, yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Here'S what I saw. Now, you know, curiously, you

decided to stay with him despite the fact that, you

know, he had a girlfriend. And

why?

>> Deborah: Well, in Pona, there's. This is. One of the

reasons I didn't want to be with Rajesh was because he's

very open with relationships.

>> Jeniffer: so tell people what col. We're talking about the

Rajesh, the full name of it and where it was.

>> Deborah: So I was in Rajnesh Purham

in Oregon, which is in

central Oregon, near Bend.

and we had a ranch there, and we

turned it into a city, and there was 10,000 people

there. We was the full infrastructure.

Airport, airplanes, road

system, all the electricity,

the sewage, power, water,

everything was. Was set up for.

>> Jeniffer: For a big city, which is incredible.

And every. You started with nothing. You started with.

>> Deborah: Right. Dirt ranch. Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, it was a ranch. Okay. So there was a building. Okay. And some fences

there.

>> Deborah: There was a barn.

>> Jeniffer: This is a well known cult. There was a Netflix show

about it.

>> Deborah: There is.

>> Jeniffer: I forget the name of it.

>> Deborah: Wild Terr. Wild. Wild Country.

>> Jeniffer: Yes. Wild, Wild country, which Chad and I both saw.

Well, you know, well, before, I knew I was going to be interviewing

you. This was several years ago. We saw,

>> Chad: And I'd known about them years prior.

I. You know, I'd run across them on podcasts

and m. Discussion about it,

so. And really, all I can remember at this point is,

like, the highlights are

poisoning a salad bar.

>> Deborah: Right.

>> Jeniffer: M. And then it was a sex

cult.

>> Chad: And the Rolls Royces.

>> Jeniffer: And the Rolls Royces.

>> Chad: Yeah, all the Rolls Royces. And,

the fact that they brought in homeless people to take over

the city council.

>> Jeniffer: That's right. To vote. Right?

>> Deborah: Vote.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. Which was pretty clever.

yeah.

>> Chad: That's like the weirdest form of gerrymandering, but, yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Right, Right. Hey, it works. So

you were not necessarily enamored with him right away

because of, you know, you'd heard about the open

sexuality and.

>> Deborah: Yeah, I liked my relationship. I didn't want to

share.

>> Jeniffer: M. Right. Yeah.

>> Deborah: And I knew that if I was involved with that, that

that was one of the ideas I had about life

that I would have to be

flexible about.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And. And that was. That was hard for me.

>> Jeniffer: And you were flexible.

And so I think what's really fascinated about the

book, you know, and reading it, is all these

decisions you made to

go to the cult or go to Rajesh. What.

What is the proper name to call it? Rajesh.

>> Deborah: Rajesh Puram.

>> Jeniffer: Rajesh Puram. In Oregon.

>> Deborah: In Oregon.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: Which was only, like, 600 miles from

the farm that you had mentioned earlier.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Now, before we go to the cult and before we go to Rajesh

Param. Let's go back to Canada.

>> Deborah: Okay.

>> Jeniffer: Because you and I have a connection.

>> Deborah: Okay.

>> Jeniffer: Kind. There's a couple connections that you and I have, actually,

and one of them is Ainsworth, Hot

Springs.

>> Deborah: Okay.

>> Jeniffer: So as a child, I was probably seven, which would have made

it 1977. We would go

to Ainsworth all the time. And it's one of

my favorite memories as a child.

>> Deborah: I had no idea.

>> Jeniffer: Right. I know. I couldn't wait to tell you.

>> Chad: Do you remember meeting any dentists there?

>> Jeniffer: Right. I know we should have, because my dad

would travel to Mexico to get his dental work done at the time.

And here we're living. We lived about 45 minutes

from the Canadian border and, you know, up in

the Pacific Northwest in Washington State, and sometimes

northern Idaho. We kind of went back and forth, and dad had

bought property up in Canada near Ainsworth. I've

got some great photos. I'll have to show you if I can find

them. And Ainsworth was

like this incredible place where there was

a pool, a public pool, and

these caves where the hot springs were

and there were no lights back in the 70s.

When was the last time you went to Ainsworth?

>> Deborah: Last year.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, my gosh. Okay. I really want to go. It's so different

now.

>> Deborah: Like, it's like 10 miles from my

family cottage where I go every summer.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: To be with my mom.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: And it's just down the road. So on rainy days

in the summertime, we go there.

>> Jeniffer: How different is it now?

>> Deborah: It's pretty different. It's actually been taken over

by first nations peoples.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: And has a new name, which I. It's

really long, so I

can't. I can't say the name in the proper

language. But, it's. Yeah, it's different.

They keep the pool very nice, very nicely.

The water's clear now. It used to be cloudy. You

couldn't see through the water in the pool.

>> Jeniffer: Totally. Yeah.

>> Deborah: In the caves there are lights,

but the caves are pretty much the same.

>> Jeniffer: Wow. I have to go back.

>> Deborah: You have to step very carefully so you don't

trip.

>> Jeniffer: It's very slippery.

>> Deborah: These caves are shaped like a U, so you go

in one end, right. And around, and

there's all this. Stalactites are coming down

from the roof, but they keep them trimmed off so you don't bang your

head m. And you can

see all the mineral deposits as they come down the sides

of the cave.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And the water is up to your waist when you walk through

this place. So. And that water is

cloudy, so you can't. And it's dark, so you

can't see to. If you're gonna trip over

somebody's feet.

>> Jeniffer: Which you do often. Yeah, yeah.

>> Deborah: Or bumpy bits in the bottom of

the. Of the roadway there.

>> Jeniffer: And why were you there? So you would travel from

the farm to Ainsworth and you were doing some

meditation. There was something that you were doing.

>> Deborah: In the 70s, there was someone named Leonard

Orrr who was from Northern California, and he

taught rebirthing. M. Leonard or

has since left his body. He's not with us anymore.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: But he taught this

breathing practice, which in. When I researched

it, it's a form of.

In the ancient traditions,

Pranaya Yoga. So learning to use your

breath to have

journeys, to find out more about yourself,

to prepare your body and your

cells to be at a higher vibration. There.

There's a lot. There's a lot to this whole

science of the Breath. So

in the late 70s we

were, we took courses with him and he

came up to Canada

and gave these courses. So, my husband and I

and some of our like minded friends

all got together and would do these retreats

to do breathing. So the first one was at Ainsworth

because we had the hot water, we could breathe in the water and

we could breathe dry, which would be in the

hotel rooms. And then later on we

did the retreats at the farm.

>> Jeniffer: Okay. Yeah, yeah.

And this brings me to our third really

spooky thing that happens in the book where

you. It's sort of like a, hypnotic

state when you, when you're doing this

breath work. Right. And Tosh is guiding

you and you find yourself

in pyramids.

>> Deborah: Okay, so I'mn toa go back a

little bit.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: Yeah, we did the rebirthing and then,

a lot of our. We were working in dentistry at

this time. And at this time

in dentistry a lot of people wanted alternative

things.

>> Jeniffer: And you were his dental assistant just to.

>> Deborah: And I ran his dental office.

>> Jeniffer: O yeah, yeah.

>> Deborah: So people didn't want necessarily

to have anesthetic or they

wanted some kind of relaxation technique

before we worked on them rather than taking Prozac.

>> Jeniffer: That's so cool. We need that

today.

>> Deborah: Yes. And he trained, he did, professional training

and hypnosis.

So we were, we had the hypnosis, but

we had done the rebirthing.

So one of the things. It wasn't

rebirthing exactly, it was actually

hypnosis and it was regressions.

And we did that not

for a sensational thing. Oh, I was this one.

I, it was more like,

what is it in my past life that is

affecting this life and holding me back

from my full potential? What is it?

Is there something I need to know or you can show

me that would help me in this

lifetime? So that was the intention

going into these regressions. They were, they

were done, very mindfully.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, yeah.

>> Deborah: So, yes, I ended up doing my first

regression and I ended up, a very long time

ago and my body was in a

pyramid and my body was

mummified.

>> Jeniffer: And describe that like you could. Was it like you were

seeing the scene, you were seeing yourself there or you

in the mummified body.

>> Deborah: And how, how it is in a regression, how it was for

me anyways, is I was

there. I was there. And the

brain, and I'm speaking, but my brain

can only describe it. It can't

decide what it is. Like for example, when he said,

look at your feet, and I said, I don't have any

feet. And that didn't make sense to

him.

>> Jeniffer: Right.

>> Deborah: And, and he said, well, look, what are your legs look

like? And I said, black sticks.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: So I couldn't, I didn't know I was a mommy

like thatew that later.

Yeah, I had to be and hang out there. And the other

thing was I wasn't actually in that mummified body. I

was hanging out beside it.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: But staying that pyramid because

that was my belief in that

lifetime. And what I learned from

this too is that beliefs are so

strong that

I wasnna stay with that body until that body

came back to life. That was the

belief 4,000 years

ago of, the people

that were in the priesthood and

the people that were, you

know, they were well enough known and rich enough

and to be mummified. Yeah, yeah.

>> Jeniffer: It's like our cryogenics in the futures.

So. And did you go and do some research about

that, you know, the priests and priestesses of that

time to kind of see

or did you already know about this? Because I had no idea.

>> Deborah: No, I, I didn't.

I knew just from ancient history

class, you know, and in Canada we do

take, the ancient history a little

bit. And I didn't know

that, you know, that what the training, like I

had been trained as a priestess,

you know, in ancient. I was actually Greek

and then had been sent to

Egypt. And I didn't know about

any of that yet. Ah, that was something I

discovered as I was exploring that life.

But the most important thing really was

that belief systems are so strong that

you will. It's amazing what you'll do just to stick

to your belief systems. M so in

this lifetime, how I've used that is seeing how, you

know, we're conditioned certain ways and

we don't even realize we have that conditioning.

Yeah, you know, it'it's. Like that story

about the fish swimming in the ocean. Do

you know that story? There's

fish swimming along and one fish looks over at

the other two fish over there and he says, so

how's the water? And the other two fish

look at him and say, what's water?

It's so all around us, our conditioning that we

don't really know. We, can't separate it from who we

think we are.

>> Jeniffer: Right.

>> Deborah: So that experience was huge

lesson in, in, in that and how we

get very attached to these beliefs and

we don't know what they are. We have no idea.

>> Jeniffer: Did it feel like an epiphany at the time, like when you finally understood

it?

>> Deborah: It did and it, it, it was very, very

humbling to see because, you know, you think you're

somebody. And in that

lifetime I was somebody. I was someone very

important. And yet I had this

belief that was so crippling and held

me in that place for a

long, long time.

>> Jeniffer: And I sort of. The way I, when I was reading it,

it was almost like part of you, your light

was still back in that pyramid

and wasn't allowing you

to move forward in the way you're supposed to. You're meant

to because of that past life experience

and now you were able to release it. Do I have that

right?

>> Deborah: I hadn't thought of it exactly that way. So.

Thank you. Thank you. That

there is an element of that that's absolutely true.

>> Deborah: Yes. Very good insight.

>> Jeniffer: You had to go back and rescue yourself almost so that this

life you can have more insight.

>> Deborah: Yes, yes.

>> Jeniffer: This book is really about seeking, you know,

spiritually in so many ways. You're

looking for more

meaning. And, and I think the way you describe it in the

book often is, you know, there's got to be something more

than these material needs that we cling

on to, you know, in Canada

and I think worldwide. But you know, especially

specifically Americans and Canadians. I think,

like we live in a time where if I have a big house and I have

the sailboat and I have all the things, I've made it

and now that gives meaning to my life. And you knew,

it seems like inherently you knew that that was empty

and you, you were looking for something more.

>> Deborah: That's right. And I think

some, some kids are born like this

and, and I, I was born like by

7i, as the oldest of.

And my home life

in one way was the exact, you

know, perfect life from the 50s and 60s

M. But in another way,

you know, I didn't like it. People didn't tell the

truth. People did weird things that, you

know, like I love you and yet they were spanking me.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: You know, like, that's not the love. Like I knew

that.

>> Jeniffer: Right, right.

>> Deborah: And, and so I was, I was very much

questioning, like, what the heck, you

know, this place is not peachy.

>> Jeniffer: There's got to be something more.

>> Deborah: There has to be something more. But I also had the influence of my

grandmother. So my

grandmother was a yoga teacher in the

60s, which was very unusual.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. A white woman.

>> Deborah: A white woman. And she,

influenced me by giving me reading materials and

talking to me. So the books, one of the biggest books,

the biggest influence was Edgar Casey's book

Actually, it's Gina Soneira's book about Edgar

Casey. M. My father's house has

many mansions. And in that

book, I learned about reincarnation.

I learned about karma. I learned about

souls and the energy, body,

things that are bigger than what you

can see and touch and taste.

>> Jeniffer: And in your book, you talk about. I believe, if I have

this right, that you felt like you needed to be like

Jesus.

>> Deborah: I absolutely did.

>> Jeniffer: Where did that come from?

>> Deborah: As a.

in my. The way I grew up was with the

United Church of Canada. So it was a

Protestant denomination of

Christianity, and

in that denomination,

we had to go to Sunday school. But there was no personal

connections, really. It was pretty

intellectual, I'd say, compared, to Catholic

Church, which has got all kinds of

icons and things you can. Figures

and personalities you can relate to.

so I went to Sunday school. I learned about

Jesus, and then when I learned about reincarnation,

I thought, well, I don't want to come back

here 5,000 more times. You know, I want to be done with

this place. This place sucks.

And. And Jesus was. You know, he was

the guy.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: Right.

>> Jeniffer: Right. Yeah.

>> Deborah: So, yeah, I did have to

go through a whole thing of the difference between

being like Jesus,

being Jesus, and being

myself. And that took. Has taken me a

lifetime.

>> Jeniffer: Sure.

>> Deborah: Basically, yeah.

>> Jeniffer: So we're back at the farm. You've just returned from

Belize. Toash has returned from India.

You now understand that you know where your

guru is. And then Tash gets an invitation

to join

Rajneesh in Oregon. And he says,

okay, I will come. And to be a dentist,

join the city. And he says, I'll come if I can bring my girlfriend. Because

at the time, you're still. You're still not married. Then they say,

sure. And so you decide to go on this

journey. You get there, and the

first thing they do is separate you.

>> Deborah: Yes.

>> Jeniffer: And yet you stayed. why?

>> Deborah: Well, first of all, from what I. We just talked

about a bit ago, having a very strong

desire to do everything I can in this

lifetime, to wake up as much as I possibly can.

>> Jeniffer: Because you were seeking. You knew there was something more.

>> Deborah: I knew there was something more. And I knew that if I just

stayed in what I'd been born

into, I would be

still swimming in the water that I couldn't see.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: So by putting myself in a different

situation, in a different ocean,

a kibbutz ocean, which is

where the men have the place that they live, the women

live in another section, and then the children are in

another section, and that. It. Life

is not set up like it is in our world

here, where we have our individual nuclear families and

we go to the job every day and we deal with our own

money and we make all these decisions.

It was set up very differently.

>> Jeniffer: And you really must have had a lot of faith

in the establishment that you were part of. And you describe

it as like, we're changing the world like

this. We're doing something that's going to change

humanity forever and make it

better. And what really was your

goal? Were you hoping that the rest of the world would.

Would feel this love and this. I don't

know if you were seeking enlightenment, but it felt like it.

And you know, you and Tosh both say at one point,

like, we're doing this forever. This isn't just

we're gonna do this for a couple years, but this is forever for

us.

>> Deborah: Yeah, it was forever. It was totally

forever. And. And yeah, very

altruistic. That was part of the 60s and

70s.

>> Jeniffer: Hm.

>> Deborah: To want to break out of

whatever the establishment in air

quotes was at the time. To

live more than just this,

narrow little life for me and mine. And.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And, and see the world bigger. We already were

knowing. We read Future Shock. We

already knew that things weren't sustainable back

then.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And we wanted to actually put

our, our life where our mouth

was and say, okay, we're gonna try a different way

to live. We're gonna live in a place

that's growing the food that

is taking care of the land, that isn't using

poisons and things, that are

bad for our bodies and for the earth.

We want to live in a place where people are

helping each other, supporting each other rather than being

in competition. We want to live where

we're, supporting each other's inner growth.

We're all aware of each other's spirit

and wanting to

encourage that expression,

the expression of the soul. Not just,

oh, I have a bigger car than you, because none of us had a

car.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah. Well, you literally like gave up your lives and

invested in the community.

>> Chad: One of you had a car.

>> Jeniffer: One of you did have a car. Ra.

>> Chad: One of them had a lot of cars.

>> Deborah: One of them. Yes, but one had a lot of

cars.

>> Jeniffer: But Guan.

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: There's a moment and we all have seen photographs.

Anyone who's familiar with Rajesh Param. Am I saying

that right?

>> Deborah: Yes.

>> Jeniffer: Okay. Where he. Everyone waits on the side

of the road and there's 10,000 people here. When you're

there. 10,000 people. I can't even

imagine the energy

that you must have felt in that group of people who were

all thinking similar, similarly, you know. And

here he comes in his Rolls Royce,

which to me shouts,

what the hell? Why is he driving the most

expensive car he can possibly find? You

know what I mean? Like the opposite of, like, getting away from materialism.

And yet he's embodying that. But you didn't see that. No one

else did. You saw love and peace

and. And something way

bigger and something more.

I was. As a child, I grew up in the

Pentecostal Church. So I have

absolutely experienced what it's like to be in a

community where there is an energy that you cannot

describe. That it's bigger than you. You can feel

it. And I think we are getting answers to that

through quantum physics, actually.

Interestingly. And when you were describing

standing on the side of the road and seeing him for the first time,

I mean, tell us, take our readers to that

moment. Because it felt like you were, like,

vibrating four feet off the ground.

You were so happy. You felt nothing

but joy and peace and excitement

and talk. Bring us to that moment.

>> Deborah: No, you're doing really well.

>> Jeniffer: Stop.

>> Deborah: It was like that. And I'm glad you've had that.

So that in one way, it's difficult to

put into words. In another

way, there's many things in

this world. Like, for example, if you go to a big cathedral

and hear a pipe organ play.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, we did music too. Totally.

>> Deborah: Going to a rock concert and there's

50,000 people. And they're

all in that music. In that song with

those performers, there's something that

happens to the group energy that

is transportive totally. And the

ecstasy is one of the things that they're doing a lot of

study in neuroscience now. What that

ecstasy does to your brain chemistry.

And by changing the brain chemistry, it

changes how your brain actually works. Your

frontal brain, your lobes, your temporal. All of those

things have different things

that work together to put you into that

ecstasy.

>> Jeniffer: Have you heard of Tom Campbell?

>> Deborah: I don't know.

>> Jeniffer: So he wrote, A. He's a physicist. He worked at

NASA. He was recently on Joe Rogan, actually.

>> Deborah: Okay.

>> Jeniffer: Talking about quantum physics. And he has a book called the

Theory of Everything that I'm

just going toa read here. That poses. Our reality

is a virtual simulation where consciousness is

fundamental and reality is created by

information with experiments designed to

test these hypotheses. It's

pretty fascinating stuff. And

I haven't read the book yet, I'll be honest, but I'm fascinating

by Tom Campbell. And this idea

of Quantum physics and how it explains,

like, there's so much we don't understand about the universe, and

yet you and I have both experienced something that is

so beyond us that, you know,

there's something more. It doesn't. Doesn't matter if it sounds

ridiculous to other people. And I know it sounds ridiculous to

Chad, because sometimes he looks at me like,

you, my wife is crazy. And

you don't say crazy. He's not that dismissive. But. But yeah,

like, to experience him, like you

said, like a rock concert. So many people in

a room and that energy. And I know you felt it.

And I don't want to actually give too much away of the book because I

want people to read it and, you know,

experience this with you. But, like, at what point did you

feel like this isn't what

I signed up for, like it was starting to break down?

>> Deborah: I would say that even if there were little

warning signs, I had

to go into denial because I had so much at stake.

>> Jeniffer: You had a lot invested.

>> Deborah: I had a lot invested. However,

when Sheila left and then

Bhaguan left,

both in the middle of the night, a month or two

apart. And this was in 1985, so

I'd already been there for four years.

That rocked everybody. So we

had an instant wake up call.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: So even if we'd been putting stuff kind of in the back

burner and. Oh, it's not that. Whatever.

We had to wake up. We had to say, okay,

this community is no longer happening.

Now, if the National Guard hadn't come and

invaded us and, shut

everything down, like all our money and all of our,

corporations and stuff were all frozen,

locked. so we couldn't do

anything. We couldn't just stay there without the

leadership.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: Anyways, so it really was literally shut

down.

>> Jeniffer: But do you think you could have, like, if the National Guard hadn't shown

up and Sheila and Bu. Buhwan.

>> Jeniffer: If they had left, you think you could have, like, stayed

and continued the dream?

>> Deborah: I think that there would have been some people who

would. And it would have kind of petered along.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: However, the main reason we were

all there was to be with an enlightened master.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And by having a common thing that you're looking

at that brings people together and keeps

the unity.

>> Jeniffer: Right.

>> Deborah: So that you can get things done without a lot

of different factions all fighting and

arguing and deciding whose idea

is better, which is. Yeah,

we have a great example of that right now in our world.

>> Jeniffer: Yes, we do.

>> Deborah: And. And we also. And this has been going on for quite a

few years realizing, you know, even in our government,

that things, when people are all

having such polarized ideas, nothing

can happen. Things just stay

still. And not only that, infrastructure

falls by the wayside 100%. So,

so this is just a fact of, of how

communities work, how populations work,

how the world works.

>> Jeniffer: And Sheila was really thrown under the bus. She was

blamed for everything.

>> Deborah: She was. And, and Sheila was not a

saint. I'll make that clear,

however, by

using blame. And, and I do talk about this in

the story that as spiritual

seekers, our goal is our

freedom. And if you have any part of

yourself that is looking

to blame something or someone

else for any part of your life, no matter how

small or insignificant you might think it is,

you are in bondage. You

will not find your freedom. And if

freedom is your goal, then you want to find those

little areas where you're blaming. So it looked very

proper to just say, oh yeah, this is

Sheila. It's all Sheila's fault.

However, then what about

me? I'm just going toa talk about myself. What about

me? My goal for my

personal freedom. I chose to

be here. I chose to be part of this

experiment. I chose

to, take Bhagwana as my

master and follow his

teachings. And this is where

I am now. What would I like

to see going forward? You know, what's the

next step?

And as long as I'm thinking, oh, someone else did something,

I'm off the rails as far as my own responsibility

goes.

>> Jeniffer: And a lot of people, you know, friends of yours, continued

to follow Bhagwan.

>> Deborah: And to this day do.

>> Jeniffer: Wow.

>> Deborah: Yes.

>> Jeniffer: And Bwan was sent, he fled to India.

But he was never actually spent any time in prison, right?

>> Deborah: He did.

>> Jeniffer: Oh, he did.

>> Deborah: They arrested him on that eastern seaboard and then

they put him in prisons and he was

transferred from prison to prison to prison and then

eventually deported.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: yeah.

>> Jeniffer: What, what do you think went wrong with him?

He, he did such a good job. I mean, clearly there was

a connection. I mean, you saw in

his eyes and felt him from across the

globe. He, he had 10,000 people

following him and would literally and did

literally give up everything, including their

children.

>> Jeniffer: So he had this power, like, what do

you think happened?

>> Deborah: And, and that's another

sort of avenue or roadway that I,

I try not to spend it at first. I

spent a lot of time there.

>> Jeniffer: Trying to figure it out.

>> Deborah: Trying to figure it out. But that's his path.

>> Jeniffer: Okay.

>> Deborah: That's his path. Fair and from my side. What I

see is that as a spiritual teacher, he

fulfilled his. His role.

His role for me. Go ahead.

>> Jeniffer: Do you separate his spiritual side, the

enlightened side of him, and his

human side? Maybe the side that, like, can't help

himself.

>> Deborah: Where I am sitting now, I can see that there's two

sides. At that time, he was just

on a pedestal. He was enlightened. He knew

everything. remember, back

then, we saw the world very differently.

We have a lot more understanding just generally,

everyone.

>> Jeniffer: Right, right.

>> Deborah: You know, and an example of that is blame.

We all know that word. We all know

that we don't want to do that, you know, that we want

to find a way, a different way. In the

70s, we didn't know that word. There was

no such thing. The word was there, but it was,

like, very,

hardcore. Like, you kicked

that table, you put that denintt there. It

was material, not the

energetic kind of ramifications of blame.

But now everybody knows that. There's books about it,

there's courses about it, there's taking

responsibility, all of that. But back then,

our development wasn't.

Wasn't there yet. We. We didn't have that

understanding. And we forget that because

we've been ye on the path. We've

evolved a lot.

>> Jeniffer: Boy. Yeah. Right. And thinking of how much

has changed since the 70s to now is pretty

incredible.

>> Deborah: And knowing that, you know, the energetic world is different than the

physical world. M. You know, just.

It was just kind of all a big mush. When I

think back to my 70s self.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: And that was one of the things that was very hard for me to

learn to sort of differentiate

and navigate.

>> Jeniffer: Was there a point where you were at risk of losing

your. I almost want to call it

this innocence,

the seeking to find

true meaning. Did you ever feel like you were

at risk of becoming a

pessimist?

>> Deborah: You know, like, oh, my gosh, I totally did lose

it.

>> Jeniffer: You did?

>> Deborah: I did lose it. When we left the ranch, I had

to weear off anything

spiritual.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: Anytime my brain wanted to say, oh, God'll take care of

that, or, have that nice, warm, fuzzy

feeling that there was something bigger than me. I had to stop

myself. It was like cutting myself

off from a heroin drip.

>> Jeniffer: Wow. Wow.

>> Deborah: And that's what it was to me. And this is

another thing that happens to a lot of spiritual people.

It's another form of a drug.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah.

>> Deborah: Because it kind of. You don't have to kind of deal with some

hard issues. You don't have to deal with your own

self. You can kind of put it off and say, oh, that's

spiritual. But you're avoiding a

whole big mess of stuff.

>> Jeniffer: Right.

>> Deborah: so it really was very important. And

that's why I think Bagwan was successful in

being my master, because he kicked me out of the nest.

Hard, cold, strong,

you know, like real cold turkey.

>> Jeniffer: What do you mean kicked you out of the nest?

>> Deborah: Well, I couldn't be part of the commune anymore. I couldn't be

part of the group anyore.

>> Jeniffer: At the end of the ranch, yeah.

>> Deborah: I was on my own. I had to find another way.

>> Jeniffer: You were all kicked out of the nest?

>> Deborah: We were all kicked out, yeah. Some people, some

people make. Made another nest just in a

different place.

>> Jeniffer: Right? Yeah.

>> Deborah: So very, very important to

really, look at,

look at your spirituality, look at what your beliefs

are and don't have

any, you know, like, what did they call

them? Sacred cows.

>> Jeniffer: Yeaheah. I love using that.

>> Deborah: Be willing to just, you know,

question everything. Don't have anything that if people

talk about it, that they'all of a sudden say, oh, you can't

talk about that. That's special, you know, like, well, then that

means you better look there.

>> Jeniffer: Yeah, right. But you did come back

to spirituality. I mean, I consider you a very spiritual

person. Do you think rebuilding

the ship was part of that journey to

find a different kind of

spirituality and how you looked at life?

>> Deborah: I do, I do. And. And

I think that having those four years and having the

nature around me, I was, you know, in

Kauai, which is a healing island,

historically,

was really, really

important for me. And where I

live now, in this house, I live now also

very important for me. I've got wildness and

trees all around me.

>> Jeniffer: Do you live on a canyon?

>> Deborah: It's not a canyon, but it' it's an

undeveloped property with, you know, it's

pretty overgrown.

>> Jeniffer: It's a great area.

>> Deborah: Yeah.

>> Jeniffer: Here in San Diego, we have a lot of canyons and a lot of

nature that, you know, you wouldn't think that in the city.

>> Deborah: No. Yeah, it's a blessing.

>> Jeniffer: It s a blessing in writing the book. I know it

was incredibly healing for you because we've already talked about

that.

But what do you want people to get out of it, Readers

to get out of this journey that you took.

>> Deborah: I would really like for people

to know that

any dreams that they've had, no matter how crazy

or insane or how much other people are

saying, don't ever do that, or you can never do that

m that they don't listen to that,

follow your heart. If you have something you really

want to do, you do it.

And even if it's just a little step at a time,

do it. And know that things happen

that make it possible that you could never have thought up

for yourself.

>> Jeniffer: Right? Yeah.

>> Deborah: And I think that's important. And the second one is about

freedom, what we were just talking about

really. If you want your freedom and not

everybody has this burning desire and that's

okay. But if you do have that

desire, take the time and the energy

to go into self

introspection, to,

to expose yourself to

different ways of thinking and put

yourself in situations that make you uncomfortable.

>> Jeniffer: I love.

>> Deborah: So that you'll grow a little bit and,

and really find the areas where

you're holding back and that you are

bound to ideas, thinking,

belief, lifestyles that aren't, aren't

serving you.

>> Jeniffer: Absolutely. That's beautiful. That's really

beautiful. You said something earlier

when you realize that maybe there was a story that you needed

to tell and your heart started to beat faster and

it's like your body knew, oh, this is going to be

uncomfortable, but we're gonna do it

anyway.

>> Jeniffer: That's awesome. I always tell my clients, you know,

there's magic just past the threshold of your comfort

zone. Just past that threshold.

There's something special there. And if we can push ourselves just a little

bit, we might be delighted at what we find.

And you've done that your whole life. You

know, you've been like, okay, we're,

we're gonna do this and I'm going to put everything I have into

it. And that's, that's really,

that's really cool.

>> Deborah: Including publishing a book. I just have.

>> Jeniffer: Including that, yes.

>> Deborah: That this last year being on the publishing train has really

pushed me beyond all kinds of

comfort zones, I bet. Including

speaking in a podcast or

having my picture up places or.

>> Jeniffer: Which is beautiful. I love your headshot. It's really pretty.

>> Deborah: Thank you. Thank you.

>> Jeniffer: Speaking of. Well, in your recording, your audiobook right now too, in your

voice.

>> Deborah: I am.

>> Jeniffer: Which I'm really excited. I think that's going to be fantastic.

I mean, this is such a personal story, I can't imagine anyone else

reading it. So I know you're pushing

yourself because I know how hard it is to read an audiobook

well. And I want to tell our listeners that you got to go to Deborah's

website because there's so many photos that she said in the beginning

you were documenting this, rebuilding this

boat. And so you have. And

I Remember, I didn't know that. So when I was looking at the website, I

was like, this is incredible. It's like you're documenting it.

Well, you literally were. So that makes sense.

>> Deborah: I was.

>> Jeniffer: Well, thank you so much for joining us today and being on the

premise. I really appreciate it.

>> Deborah: Thank you for having me and thank you for your questions.

They were very thoughtful,

introspective, pulling things out,

uncomfortable a little bit that we're

stretching, you know, ye. And finding words to

say things that are, a little.

We don't really have words in our vocabulary for some of

the things and pushing the envelope there.

So thank you.

>> Jeniffer: Well, thank you. Thank you for being open to

it. It, you know, the. Everything in

this book is, is pretty incredible, you know, and so when, our

readers read it, you're going to be like,

oh, my God. The things you've experienced and

the ways you've pushed yourself are pretty

intense, enlightening for sure. And I

hope it does encourage people to push themselves a little bit. I

think that's really, really, really

beautiful. Well, listeners, you can

learn more about Deborah Rudell on her

website at do deborahruudel.com.

we have how to spell that in the show notes. You can follow her

on Facebook and Instagram.

Debah Rudell Author, this has

been another episode of the Premise. You can visit

us online@the premisepod.com

and subscribe and rate or review the Premise

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Grace or follow me on Facebook at Jennifer

Thompson Consulting until next week. Thanks

for listening. Goodbye. Bye.