#376 How to feel vibrantly alive and live intentionally in the present moment, with two-time near-death experience survivor Catherine Duncan.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPTION
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Catherine Duncan  0:00  
I just pray to the universe I wanted to live in could I live to be 20 years old and not long after fraying? I just I remember an afternoon all of a sudden this feeling of like energy a piece flooded my body it was just took my breath away and it was just, it wasn't knowing in that moment that I was going to live. And then I was going to be okay and it has been with me to this day it changed my life.

Agi Keramidas  0:32  
You are listening to personal development mastery, the podcast that empowers you with the simple and consistent actions you need to live a life of purpose and fulfilment. I'm your host Agi Keramidas. And this is episode 376. How would you like to feel vibrantly alive right now. Today we're talking about living in the present moment. Today's conversation is packed with practical tools for living intentionally nurturing a loving relationship with yourself and leading you to a more heart centred life. Before we dive right in this fascinating conversation, if you enjoy listening and appreciate what we're doing here, the simple free favour I'll ask of you is to hit the subscribe button. Now let's get started. 

Agi Keramidas  1:32  
Today, I am delighted to speak with Catherine Duncan. Catherine you are an integrative spiritual consultant, ordained minister and author. With two near death experiences say bring your journey your story illuminates the path to living fully. You are passionate about counselling people on what it means to be alive and how to awaken into your heart and soul. Catherine, welcome to the show. It's such a pleasure to speak with you today.

Catherine Duncan  2:06  
Great to meet you. Thank you for having me on.

Agi Keramidas  2:11  
I'm very excited for this conversation, Katherine. And we will. What I would like to really explore with you today is how to feel vibrantly alive right now, which I understand is your main message anyway. But, you know, before we go there, I really would like to find out more about the two near death experiences that you had that I can only imagine that they influenced your journey profoundly.

Catherine Duncan  2:44  
They did. The first really life changing experience happened when I was 11 years old. I had suddenly I was very, very sick, very ill. And my parents took me to the hospital. And not long after they discovered that I had a very rare childhood cancer. They didn't tell me this because I was so little. They told my parents that I had a 20% chance to live I started going through really intensive chemotherapy, radiation, multiple surgeries. And so this is back in the 70s. It was just it was a lot. It was grim. They they didn't have any anti nausea drugs. So I'd be up all night I'd be very sick. They did a lot of amputation back in the 70s. And luckily, didn't have to go through that. But they had chaplains, they had spiritual guides and ministers and no one talked to me, no one, no one talked to me about what was happening to me, my mother, I would say, religious, you know, would say to me, you're going to be fine. And that was very comforting. But there was no touch point of reality of what I was going through. And I started just to feel as I look back and remember that time that I felt like I was on the edge of life and death. I was on this tightrope walking this tightrope, and out of nowhere, I started to pray and my prayer and faith had meant nothing to me, we intermittently would go to a Lutheran church, but my prayer was Could I please live I just pray to the universe I wanted to live and could I live to be 20 years old and I thought if I could be 20 I'd see the world and not long after fraying. I just I remember one afternoon all of a sudden this feeling of like energy a piece flooded my body. It was just took my breath away and it was just it wasn't knowing in that moment that I was going to Live, and then I was going to be okay. And it has been with me to this day, it changed my life. Fast forward. I got through all the treatment and lived a pretty normal teenage life went to college. I have a lot of family, a lot of siblings, my father, entrepreneur, and so well, of course, I went into the business world, even though you know, I was so passionate all the time reading books on life and meaning and purpose and why was I alive and but I went into the business world. And this led to the second experience where I was with Time Magazine, and we were on a corporate executive trip, and we went whitewater rafting. And I have what you would say, a near death experience. And, you know, I can obviously go into that, but it just was life changing. After that experience. I even though I was doing really well in this corporate job and making lots of money, and it was really glamorous, I ended up i After that experience. I'm like, I'm done. This isn't who I am. This isn't who I want to be. So both those experience really changed me soul shaping in the course of my life. I

Agi Keramidas  6:15  
would like to find out a little bit more about the second one. But also, I want to, I want you to add to that, before you had that incident with the rafting with Did you have any clothes that you were unsatisfied with your life or until that time you thought everything was? Well? And you could feel that it was? Well?

Catherine Duncan  6:37  
Yeah, great question. You know, it's interesting after I lived through the experience as a young child, as a teenager, I just started reading, reading, reading, reading books on life and meaning and purpose. I was, you know, as a teenager on Friday nights home reading existentialism and human emotions by John Paul ceart. And who is manned by Abraham Heschel, I was reading all these books, because I wasn't ready to look inward. But I was like, trying to understand life and what I had just lived through, I grew up very fast. And but then, as I said, I joined I started in the corporate world, I started in advertising and on these timing trips, I would bring stacks of books and life and spirituality, my colleagues would make fun of me, they'd be like, What are you reading? So I'd say about five years into my job with Time Warner with Time magazine, I, my heart was starting to feel restless, I started to feel a nudging like, Oh, this is this it? So I was feeling unrest. Interestingly, and I and I write about this in my first book, everyday awakening, that launched last summer. I write about how, yeah, I was feeling this nudging. I thought I'd be a manager and live in New York with Time Magazine. They gave me the job to be a manager for the Midwest region. I couldn't say the words. Yes. I mean, they just couldn't come out of my mouth. And I ended up saying no, and member honestly that whole week and crying like who am I now? And what I mean, once you say no to a corporate management job, so anyway, yes, I was feeling nudging. And the experience really just was a tipping point for me. Thank

Agi Keramidas  8:31  
you for sharing that it's for I believe, for most people, and tell me if you agree, based on your experience, I think for most people, the concept of how a death the Near Death Experience can change your you know, you mentioned earlier the the phrase, like on a tight rope or you said, the end the edge of life. And so, of course, we will move on with the conversation. But I would like some more of your thoughts on this particular element. And maybe something that is a very big importance for someone listening now to understand about this.

Catherine Duncan  9:23  
In the focus of my life became after that near death experience, was listening, listening inward, like where am I being called, and that's where the call came through of. I quit my job at timing. They were shocked. I then started studying theology. Everyone in my life, including family father, were just like, what, what do you do it? But it's starting to listen, like where am I being called? And you know what led to really deeply understanding what's important in life and who am I and how do I listen inward? And when you I write about this in my book Everyday awakening, I in my therapy practice, I find two sets of people that I work with who come to that edge of life. Some people, it's an external calling, like all of a sudden there's a death in your family. There's a trauma, there's a crisis, upheaval health why something happens that shakes and open someone or internal, where there's a nudging, like something's missing. And I work with many people, many executives, attorneys, doctors, for example, who and people CAUTI from 50 to 80. Plus who say, I've done a lot, I've had a great life, but something's missing. There's something not there. And so to help people find what is that that sense of presence and aliveness, now, I think so many people are searching for that. And it's here, if you're willing to look inward, thank

Agi Keramidas  10:57  
you, I get this message that you already said the lucquin inward. And also put it in my mind, versus, you know, understanding with, you know, with our intellect, and looking inward and the word knowing that you used earlier, I think that is a very big difference in these two. Let's talk about some more or some, let's say more practical things, then now, Katherine, if we may. So in your book, I will start with this. And then we can pick a direction appropriately. But let's start with a general overview you discuss five practices for opening the heart and soul. So can you give a brief overview of this, five practices, and then we can move to some direction, which we will see. Yeah,

Catherine Duncan  11:56  
and I'll share this my book, everyday awakening, it came to me I'm very intuitive. It came to me 10 plus years ago, I just I saw a vision of writing a book and told my family, and then my teenage kids, you know, I'm gonna write a book. And they all felt great. But it was just writing a book as a calling. And it really poured through me in early 2020. So the five practices that I share are practices that I've lived organically much in my life, and the five practices are coming back to the present moment, connecting with something greater, grow your trust, embody love, and hold openness. And so that's what my book is five practices for living fully feeling deeply and coming into your heart and soul. So I talk about those five practices. But I also I, in my book, I have 42 exercises, like how do you do it? I just want to get so we're not just living head up thinking, but how do you feel it? How do you feel into the moment right now? How do you feel in your heart? How do you feel into flow? I mean, we can all do it. And there's many different ways to come at that. And so I offer a variety of ways. And I do this also in my private practice.

Agi Keramidas  13:17  
If you enjoy this episode, can you find one person you think would find it useful, and share it with them? I'd really appreciate it, it helps the show grow. And you'll also be adding value to people you care about. Thank you. And now let's get back to the episode. I certainly will agree with you wholeheartedly that the practical element, the exercises, the the actions, is what is really going to change someone's life. And I mean, where you can get the information from reading the book. And you can even say, I understand it. However, if you don't, and that's my own personal experience as well. And I was telling you earlier before we started with my book also has this actionable element because that's how personal development is how that's how our development generally happens when we act on the knowledge we read. So thank you for you know, sharing that because it is very important. Let's there is the key principle out of the out of these five, I would certainly like to discuss the living in the present. Because I think if one can master that, everything else is relatively easy, I think in comparison. So tell me a bit about you know, the importance of living in the present and what stops me maybe most people to do that. And then we can discuss about some maybe practical things.

Catherine Duncan  15:07  
I start my book, The first practice first is come back to the present moment until you're here. And now in the moment. I feel like you can't access that deep presence that love that flow. So it is I think, the first step. And just knowing that we are not our thoughts, and we're not our feelings, we can step back to that silence, that stillness, that witnessing presence are that essence. That's who we are. And, and it just takes I always share this in my practice. And in my book and awareness, just awareness, where are you? Can you notice and be aware of where am i right now? It's so easy for all of us, including me to get caught in our busy thinking fast chattering ego mind. It's just so easy to live head up. And I call it people that live on autopilot. You're living on autopilot, your mind is running you so just tuning in, where am I? Can you mid morning? Maybe you take a break if you're working your home, wherever and just like where am I? Huh? I've been in my mind for the last hour, you know, we can get in these loops, worry fear anxious or star minds running us. And so it's a conscious choice, awareness. Where am I and taking a few moments practising a minute of mindfulness a minute, a presence, to bring us into just this moment, and it's one word just presence. So here's an example. Right now you and I talking and people that are listening, can you for a moment, feel the feel your hands, feel your fingers, feel the energy whatever's there and your hands, your fingers. Just notice doing that your mind stops you can't be thinking and when you come in to feel your body or feel your feet or feel your breath you know when you breathe in feel the coolness of the air when you breathe in over your nostrils and the warmth as you breathe out. You come into your body or bodies in the present moment. And it's in the moment that that deep peace and that sense of peace and ease and spaciousness and aliveness, that's where it is it's not in our minds. So that's a starting point. And I offer a range of exercises as well of how to do it how to you know, is it your breath is it through your body many different ways of how to feel into just this moment. And, and also tuning in awareness and noticing, we all have done this, I'm guessing when all of a sudden you know, something happens and you have you know, a negative thought and anxious thought a worry thought it can just take over. And we can the term neuroplasticity, we can rewire our brain, it's plastic, we can rewire it till the moment we die. So even how to work with a negative rumination, a limbic loop, you know that feeling that's eliciting all these feelings, emotions, you know, we can change that and I talked about how to do it in my book.

Agi Keramidas  18:42  
thank you first for those two practical, very simple to do things which was the, you know, the breathing or feeling the energy or the sensation between our fingers or on our fingertips? I liked you were saying that, you know, moving from being stuck to the head to move into your heart it is a conscious choice which you know, whenever when you're saying that I was thinking we are completely unconscious mode when we drift when we're allowed to our thoughts or our mind to take us to some direction we're completely the opposite it is unconscious that is happening but there is always and that's highlighted that I'm saying it of course my own interpretation that even in that train of brain unconscious, you still always have the conscious choice to stop that. And and then you know fill your fingers or take a few deep breaths because they then they will completely It makes you more conscious. So I'm sharing something from my own also personal experience, Katherine.

Catherine Duncan  20:08  
Yeah. And I agree with you. It's a choice. How are we living all day long? It's so easy to live in our mind. And I think society really promotes that. Thinking and being an achiever and you know, who are you? Versus Can you just be here now move away from you know, doing to just being to being here now, one of my favourite authors ever is rom das be here now. I've read out everything of his from childhood. And thank

Agi Keramidas  20:40  
you, let me ask you. Let's delve into one other of the topics that you mentioned, you know, the practices and it's the importance of trust, love, openness, which I think many times it is maybe not talked about as much or maybe neglected. So I would like some of your insights about this, the importance of this and to of course, how to cultivate it. Yeah,

Catherine Duncan  21:17  
my practice embody love. I think. I think it's the essence of who we are. When we take a break out of our mind, we come into the moment we come into our heart. It's a doorway to our soul. That sense of oneness is love. I think we're all interconnected. We're all energy. We're all connected in that sense of oneness and love and I think it's a conscious choice to grow love. I really like Rick Hansen's work I've worked with him certified in his neuroplasticity model heal and he loves you use the term marinate marinate and the good grow the good and it is growing that love in our heart I think love is the healing balm in life love I think I think that's why we're here to learn to love. And I think when we all pass on we bring our ability Yeah, to how how deeply can we love and how have we loved one another and it's an ongoing, conscious choice. And it's not always easy is it? You know, especially if something happens or a friend or family member, you know is unkind or something really hurtful happens like how do you move forward? How do you How can you move through forgiveness? And how can you keep opening into love and I'll tell you that my years as a chaplain in our number one trauma hospital as well as in hospice. I was a hospice chaplain for years. The number one thing I heard was love. That's what people wanted. When they were near end of life and about to die out, that's all I heard love, everything else dropped away love, love of family, love of friends, all that matter. So I just, you know, tuning in, and I share this in my practice and in my book, but starting with how do you love yourself? A lot of people have never thought about that. How do you love yourself? It starts with how do we love deeply love ourselves and grow that love, we can only love another to the extent we've deeply loved and met ourself. And I'll share with you one of the practices in that chapter called Journey to your heart where you go into your heart. This is a practice I started when I was in my 30s when I made that big change leaving the corporate world and I grew up in a family where we didn't talk about feelings I really never heard I love you. And in my 30s I remember thinking I want to feel more love and I this meditation I worked with on feeling into my heart. I did this meditation. Every single day for 30 days, I was determined to feel my heart more and I knew that meditation said Get in bed and just go and feel my heart and open my heart. And at the end of the 30 days I remember I was in my kitchen, making some food and all sudden I felt this like fluttering in my heart I was like, and I'm like, right. I've been trying to feel my heart for 30 days. But there really truly are breath exercises. They're meditations there's practices. I love Louise Hay and her called Mirror work, looking in the mirror and saying I love you I love you. I really love you and insert your name. It's really truly works. I mean if you want to truly feel into your heart and grow that love there's many ways to do it. But I think big message it starts first with how do we love ourselves and what are you choosing every day.

Agi Keramidas  24:56  
Thank you for this very useful and To the insightful things that you shared just now, Katherine. There is another question that I wanted to ask before I start to concluding. You counsel people on what it means to be alive truly alive. And we've been talking about this. I want to bring in the very unique elements that you had of the universe in the the edge of life and death in order to be able to have this knowing and help others that did not have this experience. You mentioned a lot love which, for me, it is a very big part of the answer. But the question for me remains is that something else that your unique experience experiences have led you understand about, you know, what it truly means to be alive that someone lives in in order myself, someone who has not seen that Said's is not aware of?

Catherine Duncan  26:07  
I first would just say, reiterating what we just said, just how are we choosing to live every day? Is your mind running you? Or are you running your mind? And what choices are you making? And I make these choices I you know, I have a busy life with my practice and being public speaking and podcasts. It's managing a lot, but it's like taking time, every single day, I have time for meditation and some breathing. And from the moment I wake up, I start with some gratitude and just throughout my entire day, but I've had from a habit woven that in I'm really conscious of how I'm living my life every day and making what choices Am I making. And I also understand that we truly fully alive we live in multi dimensionally. I mean, I'm present right now with you, I feel that sense of presence and energy moving in my body, I'm using my mind. And I'm a mystic, I see spirits. I mean, like, I'm seeing all these levels of feeling multi-dimensional At the same time. And it's possible, and that's what it means to be fully alive. And one other comment, I guess, will be unique with my experience, from my childhood, but then also companioning, hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people at end of life as a chaplain and as a hospice chaplain, I would share with you that death is not an end. I think we're a spirit in a body for a short time. And then our spirit goes on. I don't go farther, like, where do we go, what happens? But I'm really clear that I see I see energy I see have spirits, I've seen so many people who've come back after they've died to see me and for a few moments. So I know in the depths of my heart that death is not an end, and that our spirit does go on, and that there's so many layers between us, you and I right now. I do believe in spirits and angels. And I've seen angels and there's just, there's a lot but so the question is, Are you open? And can you be open to what it is for you. And I think every one of us gets guidance we get guidance is in a sense, we have gifts, every one of us sensing, feeling hearing, but these gifts and tuning in come when we're not in our mind, but we come into our body and feel and open into that. And I invite listeners right now how open are you? Can you be open? What does that path look like for you?

Agi Keramidas  28:43  
Thank you this. This was a wonderful answer. Thank you, Catherine. I do have a couple of last quickfire questions which I always ask my guests. Before I do. Please share with the listener one where they can find more about your show where they can get your book. So

Catherine Duncan  29:04  
my book is called everyday awakening and you can go to my website everyday awakening.com I am on Amazon Barnes and Noble target I'm all over so you just Google everyday awakening Catherine Duncan, lots of choices. Were my books available. Thank you and I'm on Instagram Catherine Duncan ma BCC My Facebook is learning to live which is my company name and I'm even now on tick tock.

Agi Keramidas  29:33  
Yeah, that's the last frontier for me. I'm not resist.

Catherine Duncan  29:39  
Yeah, I have a media person helping me not me. It's a lot things you

Agi Keramidas  29:44  
got to let me ask you then my two quickfire questions and the first one is What does personal development mean to you?

Catherine Duncan  29:55  
I think choosing yourself are you choosing yourself How are you choosing to live? And it? I do think it takes courage and it takes strength it does life can be hard and messy. But can you keep choosing yourself? Can you keep choosing to open and grow and learn through all of life? I think that's deep inner inner work and a reflection. So choice and what are you choosing again, and

Agi Keramidas  30:25  
hypothetically speaking, if you could go back in time and meet your, say, your 18 year old self, what's one piece of advice you would give her

Catherine Duncan  30:38  
that just trust all as well. I love that famous phrase from Julian of Norwich mystic. All as well, I'll be well and that trust how the path is going to unfold. You're exactly where you're meant to be. And it will all unfold.

Agi Keramidas  30:58  
Catherine, I want to thank you very much for this conversation over leverage was very illuminating in many ways. So I appreciate the the insights and the value you shared with us. I want to wish you all the very best with your journey and your mission. Any last parting words?

Catherine Duncan  31:21  
Thank you so much for having me. On your show delight to meet you. I can see your spirit and your sparkle. So let's see two blessings to all the listeners. Thank you so much blessings.

Agi Keramidas  31:37  
And before I end today's episode, an open invitation to you listening right now. I invite you to find me on social media and send me direct message about anything you prefer. You can tell me who your favourite guest has been so far, or who you would like me to interview next or what topic you would like to hear on the podcast. So drop me a line and I look forward to chatting with you. Until next time, stand out don't fit in!