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Honest Feedback
Honest Feedback offers compassionate support, advice and new perspectives on navigating life's challenges.
Honest Feedback
Threshold Moments: When It’s Time to Walk Away from the Life You Built with Dayana Mendoza
What happens when the life you've carefully built no longer resonates with your soul?
In this deeply moving episode of Honest Feedback, we sit down with medicine woman and retreat facilitator Dayana Mendoza (@dayanamendoza.us), who shares her extraordinary journey from trauma to transformation. Born during the Pablo Escobar era in Colombia and raised amid violence and loss, Dayana was working as a butcher by the age of 12. She immigrated to the U.S. at 17, eventually building a life that looked like success on paper: career at Apple, marriage, children, but felt empty inside.
"I was surrounded with so many people… and I felt so lonely," she says.
We talk about the courage it takes to step away from the familiar, the heartbreak of outgrowing relationships, and the sacred process of re-remembering who you are. Dayana walks us through the threshold moment that changed everything, when she left her job, her marriage, and her social circles to walk the unknown path of healing. Through the wisdom of plant medicine—especially ayahuasca—Dayana reconnected to her purpose and ancestral roots. What followed was a complete rebirth.
This episode is a powerful transmission on:
- What true transformation really looks like
- Healing beyond talk therapy and into the body
- The difference between processing and actual change
- Walking away from what no longer resonates, even when it looks “perfect”
- The power of trusting the unknown (especially when it makes no sense)
Dayana's story will stir something deep inside you. Whether you're navigating a rock bottom or feeling the pull toward your next level, this is your reminder that healing isn’t a destination—it’s a decision to honor what your soul already knows.
Connect with Dayana Mendoza
Instagram: @dayanamendoza.us
Website: www.spiritroute.co
Explore her sacred retreats, including an upcoming Egypt Retreat on 11/11.
This episode is sponsored by The Goddess Experience
A luxury 5-day retreat in Puerto Vallarta for women ready to break free from the life that looks good on paper—but feels hollow in the heart. If you’re craving connection, clarity, and confidence to walk your next path, this is for you.
→ Apply now www.goddessbrittneyking.com/goddess
This is an intimate experience for 9 women, as of this recording there are only 4 open spaces. Early bird pricing is available until Sept 2025.
Honest Feedback was created by Brittney King and Lisset King.
Note: Honest Feedback Podcast aims to provide insights and provoke thoughtful reflection. The opinions expressed in this episode are for informational purposes only and should not replace professional advice.
Please send us your questions by leaving a voicemail at 971-895-4111, DM us on instagram @honestfeedbackpodcast or email us at thekings@honestfeedbackpodcast.com
Keep up with the podcast by following us @HonestFeedbackPodcast on YouTube
I could not work at Apple anymore. I used to feel like I used to walk into Apple and see the dead soul, wow. And then I felt like I found myself in a whole new way of not belonging, but I just didn't belong in that frequency. But there was a whole nother frequency that I did belong, a whole nother set of people experiences situations that belong in this frequency, that I had no access here. So over here it just felt like there's no hope. I'm just a robot. I'm just getting here to get paid and this is what I do. Over here. It was like open, expansive, purposeful, loving, but I needed to let go of this in order to get that Welcome to Honest Feedback, the podcast where deep truth meets bold transformation.
Speaker 3:I'm goddess Brittany King, a pleasure priestess and a transformational retreat facilitator who helps women connect to their deepest truths, reclaim their pleasure and awaken their inner power.
Speaker 2:And I'm Lissette King an emotional ninja and transformational coach who helps leaders release baggage, heal unresolved trauma and step into their most aligned, purposeful lives.
Speaker 3:We've created this podcast for spirit-led individuals just like you, Seekers of truth personal growth and meaningful connection.
Speaker 2:Whether you're navigating life's big questions, craving more joy and fulfillment, or simply looking for honest, relatable conversations, you're in the right place.
Speaker 3:Through personal stories, actionable advice and transformative insights. Our ultimate goal is to empower you to create a life that's overflowing with pleasure, purpose and authenticity.
Speaker 2:We know you're capable of incredible things, so let's make it happen together. Welcome back to Honest Feedback. We are so happy to have you here to serve you, and today we've got an incredible guest.
Speaker 3:A sister, a goddess, a queen, a dear friend. I am so, so happy that Dijana is joining us and we have like an epic question, y'all. Well, before I introduce Dijana, have you ever felt like you're at the precipice of something? Yeah, maybe it's great or maybe it's something terrible, but you know you're like right at that tipping point.
Speaker 2:Uh-huh, this last new moon felt like that, oh yes.
Speaker 3:Very much so. Yesterday, from when we were recording, was new moon and cancer, and it was a time y'all yeah it was.
Speaker 3:So yeah, I've absolutely felt that Well when I think of being on like those precipice threshold moments I know for myself it's been like scary and intimidating, and the thing that has really supported me through is having guides, guides and space holders, and those who have let me know, like, by the way, you're going to be okay, and Dijana does just that. So Dijana is the founder of Spirit Roots, retreat curator and sacred spaceholder. Born in Colombia and guided by the medicine of her ancestor, dijana supports women in reclaiming their power through ancestral healing and community. As a mother and medicine woman, she walks with deep wisdom and heart. She's led transformational retreats across Spain, mexico, colombia and Egypt, and her work has been featured in Forbes, double Blind Magazine and Yoga Journal. Dijana is here for every woman to rise and remember who they are. I am so freaking happy she is here on the show. Y'all what I get. Yeah, shall we give her a call? Let's give her a ring, good morning dejana.
Speaker 1:Good morning beautiful kings. How are?
Speaker 3:you. Oh, we are feeling so good. Y'all, we are in for such a treat. Dejana is a goddess, she's a queen, she she's absolutely incredible and we feel so honored to call her a sister and a friend. I know we just said you're like a fancy bio, and how would you say in your own words how you are serving, how you are being a light in this world?
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you for having me on this podcast. The energy is definitely reciprocating because I am also so excited and honored to be here. The reflection of love and the goddess is definitely in the space. My journey has really been through my process of transformation and awakening, so it's very, very personal, but it has been very transformational. So I would love to continue to share how indigenous medicine and plant wisdom has allowed me to like reconnect to my roots. It's almost kind of like a return home and me getting out of my own way. Like half of the work is the wisdom, is the tools, is the practices, and then the other half is me. How do I get from point A to point B?
Speaker 3:Yeah, Ain't that the truth? Ain't that the truth? Ain't that the truth? I mean, well, for a little behind the scenes, we had the honor and privilege of traveling to Egypt with Dajana, and when we first had got this invitation it was a sacred invitation only came through like the right friends and we got on the phone with her and the other facilitator and we were like there was just this resonance of like Soul fam yeah, I mean you guys call each other Prima, yeah, they're both from Colombia but just this resonance of finding our tribe and finding our connection and finding each other in the light. And so I am so excited for you to share more about what even led you to Indigenous medicine space.
Speaker 1:Thank you for asking such a deep question. So so much to share. We share snippets.
Speaker 1:I'm from Colombia, born and raised, and I grew up in the Pablo Escobar revolution. So my childhood was very different. I grew up in a lot of violence and a lot of chaos and a lot of poverty poverty. I lost my mother at the age of four. So I grew up, my grandma raised me. I wasn't, I didn't have like the mom and the dad archetype, so I was always kind of just grandma's assistant, grandma's daughter, grandma's everything. My grandma, it feels now now understanding her role in our home. It seemed like she was like the death doula, because she was the woman that would go around the neighborhood when there was dead people on the floor and she would do basically the clearing. She'll close her eyes, she'll do the prayer and I would be her assistant. So I remember my childhood very vividly, waking up to, checking who is dead in the corner, making sure it's not our brothers, it's not our cousins, because you never know. And I remember for so long my life was just that, it was just chaos, it was violence, it was trauma, violence, it was trauma.
Speaker 1:So, growing up and coming into the States I got to the States. Finally, when I ground here to start my life here, I was 17. So my English wasn't that great. I had a lot of insecurities, I had a lot of fears, my emotional system was really out of whack. So obviously now we know that we are magnets of attraction. So I was also attracting that. I was attracting very chaotic experiences. I was attracting very low energy stuff, violence, all that stuff. So I started to realize that it wasn't the world. I started to realize that it was the chaos was within me. But that didn't really started to click in until actually I had my daughter. I had my daughter when I was 20.
Speaker 1:Blessing, blessing. Blessing because I feel like she actually gave me purpose and she gave me reason. At first I used to think why did I have her so young? But no, I needed that God needed to give me purpose, to ground me. So in that process of me being a young adult not knowing how to control my emotions, still carrying all this baggage from Colombia with a little baby, and my choice of coping was alcohol, that was the thing In Colombia. I also worked a lot. I didn't really have the privilege to go to school. So from the age of 12 to 17,. I was a butcher what Very masculine dominant world. And I feel like part of me went into that world because I needed to protect myself, because I didn't have the mom and the dad protection, so yeah, she had a cleaver.
Speaker 1:Better than knives and learning how to put a cow apart and do all that stuff. So I used to like really take pride in saying I can cut a cow in five minutes, I can take all this, I could take the organs, and that at least gave me the protection. But in my adulthood that mentality was very harmful. It was the most harmful to me. So, after situation and situation and life, when you keep walking and you're like what's going on and you start to realize that it's not the world, it's me, and I found myself in a very, very, very chaotic situation. I was actually like in a state of my life where I it was either at the point where either I was going to go to prison or I was going to continue my life, and there was many things happening because of my decisions, because of my mindset, because of everything that I was channeling in. And I was in New York and I'll find the time to tell this story. Maybe this is not it, but we'll find out.
Speaker 1:But I was in New York and I met my brother, christian, and he's my older brother, my dad's first marriage, and he gifted me the secret, the book, and it was in my most chaotic moment. So, reading the secret, in that moment, it just felt like so disconnected, like what are you talking about? What do you mean? I can control my thoughts. It seemed so far away from everything that I had lived that I was just like, wow, this is actually really interesting. Like is this really true? With the beautiful part was that like it planted a seed in my soul that I didn't know. It was like a light that I needed, like and like in light, just parked, but I just didn't know the path. It was so far alike. But the secret, reading the secret, understanding the power of the self in a very small way, I started to like carve a path for myself and then I started to realize, like, okay, it's, it's not the world, it's me, it's my habits, is the decisions, is the people. And obviously I'm growing my daughter's. Now I'm feeling a lot better because life is actually feeling better, because I'm taking responsibility for myself and I'm being more mindful with my thoughts, more mindful with my habits, more mindful.
Speaker 1:So inviting mindfulness was such a game changer. And that's the. What do you say? The trust threshold, yeah, of like, how do we get to transformation is basically like you're just so tired of your own bullshit. Like that's it. Like you're just there's, there's, it's non-negotiable, it's either this or that. Like that's it, you know. Like that's what at least it felt like for me. It wasn't like a slow process, it was just like I understand there's something different and I need to either change and I have to let go of this life, and also, during that time, I'm evolving in my womanhood.
Speaker 1:I fall in love. Well, I didn't fall in love. I continue to be in love with the man that I was in love with. I have his child. Now my life has given me more purpose. Now I have my daughter and I have my son and I now I'm like I want to be I guess quote, unquote a normal woman that is married and is honorable and like all these programs in the head. Yeah, yeah, I want to be just like the cool girls in the pictures that like family and weddings and all these beautiful things. And because I am such a good manifester, I manifested it such a beautiful wedding for myself in 2017 that it was just beyond. It was beyond everything I've ever experienced.
Speaker 1:I was so in love with life in that moment and then that was the threshold to the next level. That was like the heart opening. Yeah, it first started with like a little light that took me into like figuring out these things, and then, heart open, that changed everything. That completely changed everything and it changed the way that I looked at myself. It changed the way that I associated at myself. It changed the way that I associated with my partner at that time, my husband. It changed the way that I was connected with my friends, my work. Everything just started to feel like there's a purpose. I asked my I was like saying like, oh my God, there's a purpose. There's a purpose, there's a reason for me to be here. There is a reason, there's a bigger reason to all of this.
Speaker 1:And I remember back then I was telling my husband that I was just so excited because I had found a new purpose in life and I wanted to change. I wanted to do all these things. And I remember very clearly, almost like the disappointment in his face because he's like what do you mean? I just married you for who you are. You want to change? Yeah, and that to me was like like wow, I created a whole life in my unconsciousness which it was beautiful. I mean I'm not, yeah, nobody here. It was a beautiful life and it wasn't the life that was going to take me. That was that I had to continue on this path. It was a life that it was there to give me and nourish me and show me love and fun and excitement and all the good things. But I needed to let that life go in order to step into a whole new identity that I didn't even know existed. So it was almost like I was like a little girl again, Learning how to be an adult, but with new eyes, looking at the world from the heart.
Speaker 1:And I'm a cancer. It's your season, so it's your season. But growing up, because I'm a cancer and safety is like my number one thing and I didn't feel safe in most places, I had to activate the masculine. You would never know. You would never know that I'm nice, that actually I carry a very like mean demeanor, like don't fuck with me, don't look at me like. Because I had to. I didn't have anybody else to protect me, so I had to like create really strong boundaries. Moment heart open. I was like, oh my God life. I saw life with different eyes. I saw people, I saw my kids. It was just like unexplainable.
Speaker 1:It was unexplainable and that just led me to answer like why am I here? There's a reason why I'm here, there's a reason why I'm here, there's a reason why I chose this life. And then that took me into a rabbit hole of like very deep self-discovery, very raw, very like beyond understanding, you know. So I actually, now that I think about I feel like it was something had to do with my ex-partner that I heard about ayahuasca. I know we were working with mushrooms for the purpose of, like opening up our mind, but it was not ceremonial style, it was like us kind of having fun, microdosing, going on a hike and just kind of touching, getting into the nature and in those walks I remember hearing about ayahuasca. So I'm not exactly sure how, what, who, but I heard ayahuasca and I was like, oh, I'm the type of person where I hear something, I get excited and it's resonating Like I'm like I want to know more. I got to find out, I got to do it. So I went into like my path of discovery what ayahuasca was for me. It was like this is exactly what I needed, because back then I was actually working for Apple and I had a really good position and I had like the best therapist, best support, all of it. It was great, but it just felt like I was giving therapy to my therapist. The amount of stuff that I've been through, the amount of it was just shocking for her, like she couldn't. It was just like what you know. And then rabbit hole starts and now I'm giving therapy to her and it's just like it was nice. I feel like talk therapy was nice to process many things, but the stuff that I needed to process was like in my dna, it was in my body. It was like I need to get, I needed to purge, I need to.
Speaker 1:So I'm discovering uh, I'm reading about ayahuasca. I read that it comes to south america, colombia. I'm like it's colombia, I'm going back, this is my, my medicine. I'm like this is my roots. I'm going back home. And he's like okay, basically, if you make that choice, that's you, but I don't support it. That, to me, started to very clearly start to see like oh, okay, this work is not for everybody. This is a very personal thing and it's going to affect everything.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I decided to take a leap and sit with the medicine that completely changed my life, like that experience with Mother Ayahuasca in 2018, it was the most transforming experience I've ever had. Like I can't. There's nothing that I can put to together. Also, before I work with the medicine because I was like searching I started to understand like you have to respect the medicine, it's an energy. You have to go on a diet. You have to do all these things. You have to stop drinking, you have to stop smoking, you have to stop having sex. It was all the things I was doing. Yeah, it was all the things I was doing.
Speaker 1:I have to, like, leave my whole life. I have to be different. So the moment that I said okay, I don't know where, how or how I'm going to do this medicine, I just know I'm going to do it and I know it's going to come to me. And for now, all I need to know is how can I be in this shape so I can be in a relationship? So I was like I have to stop drinking. So that was shape, so I can be in good relationships. I was like I have to stop drinking. That was a big thing for me. I have to stop eating meat.
Speaker 1:I grew up being a butcher. Stop eating, not having meat in my plate, just having a bunch of side dishes, it was very offensive. Like how am I going to live without me? How is that? And then also I was tapping in with other medicines, like Santa Maria. So I used to work with the medicine and just partying people, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all that stuff. So I just started, little by little, cutting, cutting, cleaning, cleaning. It was basically like a six-month process of me preparing for this medicine. I still didn't know how or when or who. All I know is I had a bunch of cleaning I need to do. In this process of me cleaning myself, I met a woman after I left the gym. I went to an Herbalife club to get a protein shake and this woman holds my hand and she's like oh my God, god, there's something so special about your energy. Um, I would love to invite you to an ayahuasca ceremony oh what?
Speaker 1:yeah? Yeah, it was crazy because a little context, before, when I decided to do this, I said I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna do it for my birthday and I'm gonna have a reverse, like is and this was kind of like after the wedding.
Speaker 1:Maybe we're tapping into December. I got married in October, we're holidays December and I'm like I can't do this. This is what I have to do. So then now we're like in March and just the diet alone, just me cutting meat and alcohol, just those two things. It basically changed my whole circle. It changed my whole circle.
Speaker 1:I started to understand why people were connecting with me, why we were having these conversations, because there was something that they were also working through that they just didn't want to work through. So we'll just unconsciously like, cope together and party and whatever, bypass everything. Right, yeah, let's drink about it. Yeah, let's drink about it, whatever. But um, no, this time it was just like clear, like exactly what I needed to do and the medicine took me to the right person that needed to invite me and she said this is an ayahuasca ceremony that we're having June 22nd, for the weekend of June 22nd, and June 22nd is my birthday. I knew. I knew beyond doubt. I knew the medicine had brought me here. I knew the medicine was taking me. I just knew it. Like there was no thing for me to like question it or nothing. I had it. Set a prayer. I was already doing my diet and universe talked to me and I was like this is it, this is it, this is where I have my rebirth. So I continue my journey. I basically prepare my body six months before the journey. My teacher bless his heart I love him so much he is all about the process of ascension. So he explains like we don't live in the jungle, we're getting sprayed with stuff, there's stuff in our food, there's stuff in our water, there's all kinds of stuff. So how can we cleanse our body in order to receive the medicine in a good way? So I got invited into a five-medic medicine journey where I had to detox my body and with that we work with the medicine of combo, and I had to detox my mind, and that we work with the medicine of hoppe and joppo masculine.
Speaker 1:And then now, with a clean body and a clean mind, I was able to drink mother ayahuasca. Oh my God, that was like, like it basically dismantled everything I thought I knew about myself, like nothing was true. All the stories I had told myself, all the things, the way I looked at life, the way I connected with life, everything just broke, dismantled. And then, so divinely, mother Ayahuasca just put everything back together in the most beautiful way, where I, not all of a sudden, but pretty much after the ceremony, I knew I had purpose, I knew I belonged, I knew I came, I reconnected with everybody that I had to let go, but in an energetic way, and ask for forgiveness from them and then also like allow myself to continue my path.
Speaker 1:I was in a very lonely path because I was the only person in my circle doing this. I looked, I was like the weird one that is doing weird stuff and nobody understands. And now I don't want to hang out and I don't want to drink and I don't want to smoke and I don't want to do all these things. And I would hear sometimes from people like do you think you're better than us? And I'm like it has nothing to do with that. It's very rooted personal thing, like choosing the self and choosing transformation. It's a very, very intimate personal thing for some people to get triggered or to get bothered because you're taking, you're having boundaries for yourself, you're doing diets, you're taking care of yourself. That can trigger people, but that's also an invitation for their transformation. Oh yeah, that's it.
Speaker 1:You know, at first I was like, oh no, I want to be loving, I want everybody to accept me, I want to be people pleaser, people pleaser, but being in those spaces, people pleasing, I was like, oh, yeah not be here?
Speaker 1:I cannot. So it was just like situation learning expanding, feeling, situation learning expanding. It was like that learning expanding, feeling situation learning expanding. It was like that. It was like layers and layers and layers until, little by little, I basically in 2019, I could not work at Apple anymore. I used to feel like I used to walk into Apple and see the dead soul.
Speaker 1:Wow, by the time 2019 happened, I had already drank probably like three ayahuasca ceremonies. I already had like some really deep processes for myself. So I was like very deep excavating, and then I felt like I found myself in a whole new way of not belonging. But I just didn't belong in that frequency. But there was a whole nother frequency that I did belong and there was a whole nother set of people, experiences, situations that belong in this frequency, that I had no access here. So over here, it just felt like there's no hope. I'm just a robot. I'm just getting here to get paid and this is what I do, like that's it. Over here, it was like open, expansive, purposeful loving, but I needed to let go of this in order to get that this episode of Honest Feedback is sponsored by us, king Experiences, and we have an invitation for you.
Speaker 3:You are invited to the Goddess Experience, a luxury five-day retreat in Puerto Vallarta. If you have been feeling I know that there's something more for me in my life and I just don't know what it is yet, but I want support in getting there. I'm looking at my life and everything is fine, but something just doesn't feel quite right. I know I've been there. I remember just feeling on my knees in my life of like I'm depressed, I'm feeling anxious, like there are people around me but like I don't really feel connected to myself, to my purpose, to this community, and I want something else. If that is how you've been feeling, this is for you. It is five days in Puerto Vallarta and we are pouring love and we are pouring it on thick.
Speaker 2:At the Goddess Experience. We're not only going to serve you our medicine. This land itself is a space holder. We have done so much healing the owners of the land. They created it as a place for people to let go the women. At our last retreats they looked 10 years younger at the end of the retreats.
Speaker 2:They were owning their power, they were who they were meant to be. And the thing about the goddess experience. We are asking you to step in and unleash your goddess and let us serve you as the queen that you are.
Speaker 3:Yes. So if this is something that calls to you, we have just opened enrollment to the public, and so check out the link below is the invitation page and fill out an application. It is intimate. There are only nine women in this temple space. So if this is something where you feel the tug, definitely say yes, absolutely. I'm going to pause you for a second. Yeah, this is just, it's just so good. It's so good.
Speaker 3:I mean, as as everyone listening, as everyone's jaw dropped, who pulled over the car to hear about this thing. I mean, like, from the butchering to moving to a whole new country, starting a life um, driving by, I was gonna go to jail like you've had just such a rich, rich life, and so I feel so grateful that you're here to pour into our community so we can learn through your experiences and through your life. And I just want to introduce the question that came through, because I feel like you're right touching on all this stuff. So we got a question what does true healing look like? How do we know when we've crossed the threshold from processing to transformation? And when you were sharing that moment of like things being down here, not vibrating at that frequency, but then there was a whole new level of spaces Like, I guess the question that's on my heart is how did you know it was time to transform? How did you know it was time to transform?
Speaker 1:Because I was surrounded with so many people and I felt so lonely.
Speaker 2:Oh damn, I've been hit yeah.
Speaker 1:I was in a group full of loving people that wanted to love me in their way, in their frequency, but I felt so lonely and that's when I knew.
Speaker 3:And what gave you the courage to say yes? Because I know from my experiences like these threshold moments where you're just like life's good, it's good, it's not good, it's fine, it's not fine, but it's all you know. It's all you know, and I mean, like you moved country, like sometimes it's all you know is the people who love you in their way and you feel alone. But how did you have the courage to trust, to put your own self on dieta before you even met the shaman? You know what I mean. Like, yeah, what gave you the courage?
Speaker 1:I was just tired with myself, I was tired with my patterns, I was tired with my habits, I was tired with how the energy felt, like I just like I got to a point where I was like this is not it. I don't know what is, but I just know that this is not it. And I know that, little by little, I need to start making changes so I can tap in into what is it? Just for me, personally, it just got like a point where I was just like this is it? It gets black and white, like I need to make a decision and I'm gonna make this decision for myself. And I think something that really helped me was to tap into like, um, like a very deep, like belief, like trusting in the unknown. Yeah, like it was like a very rooted, very spiritual, very like knowing, like I may not know what's going to happen tomorrow, but I know the universe and god and my mom and my ancestors and all of the I know they got me.
Speaker 1:I know I'm not going through all this for no reason, like I know they got me, I know there's a purpose, I know there's a path, like. But I don't need to know what exactly. I just need to trust that I'm okay, it's okay, I'm safe. So I started creating mantras for myself, like I'm with God and God is with me. That mantra really helped me through many dark cycles for many things, because I just didn't know and the only light that really hold me was my connection to my divinity, my connection to like my mother. That connection was imprinted in me at a very young age.
Speaker 1:Like I mentioned before, I lost my mother at the age of four. She passed from ovarian cancer. So growing up my grandma had and she used to put her stuff and her picture and she used to always, if I needed my mom or I was acting up or I needed something, she said go talk to your mom, go talk to your mom. So from a very young age I created an identity with spirit as my mom, but knowing that I can go to this energy-focused space and I can ask for things and I can share what's in my heart, I can ask for help, I can, you know. So in me being a little girl, not having my mom but having this energy focused space, I used to ask for safety. So then I would. She would help me hide in many things, in many places. So that's kind of how the energy helped me growing up. It was like hide over here, come over here, hide over here, like I would literally hear hide over here, like I would hear those voices here, like I would literally hear hide over here, like I would hear those voices in my head and I would just like, okay, and then I would go hide and then something would happen that chaos, violence, da, da da. And then my grandma actually used to struggle because I used to hide so well and then I used to fall asleep in my hiding space. They couldn't find me. Wow, so well, and then I used to fall asleep in my hiding space. They couldn't find me. Eventually they started to understand that was my safety mechanism and that was the way that I was like working with my mom.
Speaker 1:Well, in this times of like now I'm an adult and all these things are happening I still anchor myself to that light. I still anchor myself to her spirit. I still anchor myself to that light. I still anchor myself to her spirit. I still was like mom, just lead me, guide me, show me, protect me, you know. And maybe this feels really scary, maybe I don't know where I'm going, maybe I just need to let this go. Like leaving my relationship. That was probably by far one of the hardest things I've had to do in my life far one of the hardest things I've had to do in my life. Like not knowing how. I just married this guy, that I have his children, that he was also my first boyfriend when I was like 12.
Speaker 1:The first time I came to the state it was just so many things. I was like this was it, but Spirit was like this is not it. And I was like what, how? How is this not it when it's so beautiful? So it's just like trusting in the, in the path, even when it's uncomfortable, even when you're like that doesn't make sense, and then you're just like that doesn't make sense, neither. Stay rooted to yourself, stay rooted to your purpose. So I knew that I was here for something. I didn't exactly know exactly what. All I knew that I just needed to start healing myself.
Speaker 1:So ayahuasca took me into a very deep process of understanding me, my purpose, my journeys, and it's taken many ceremonies to, and it continued like I'm still not healed. This is nowhere near healed. I'm healing. This is my journey of healing. I think that once we get to healed, we're done. We go to another, you know. So kind of cool.
Speaker 1:It's very humbling to say, yeah, like I don't need to be healed, I don't need to be perfect, all I just need to be is me. You know where it's not. None of this is none of this is something that I cannot bypass. This is who I am, this is my feelings are real, what I want is real. All of that. And I feel like before ayahuasca, I used to bypass my needs, I used to not take responsibility or even like my feelings. You know like I used to feel, and because I didn't want to create things with people, or I just didn't want to get sticky energy, I would just not say anything bypass, bypass. And all that was affecting me, obviously, as we know. So the threshold is basically like unconditional faith, without knowing, and you just got to be tired of your own bullshit and you just gotta be tired of your own bullshit.
Speaker 3:It's so good, it's so good. I just, oh, I feel you and thank you so much for sharing just like the intimacy of your experience and these moments. Um, I have a question for you is that like we can round robin it? But something that you said that just really hit me in the heart was I decided to trust in the unknown, and so I just want each of us to kind of sink into that experience a little bit more, maybe share with people, from our point of views, how we decided to trust in the unknown. Because I know, before I had ever trusted in the unknown. When someone said things like that, or gave me the secret which sat on my shelf for years, untouched, untouched, you know I was just like I don't know what they mean, you know. Or like when someone's like, oh, you'll find love when you're not looking at it for it, it's like what does that mean? When am I not looking for it? So, babe, can you start us off? Yeah, how did you learn to trust the unknown?
Speaker 2:Well, I think, very similar to Dijana. One of the things that I experienced was I got tired of my own shit. And, speaking of thresholds, one thing that I find in my clients is they come to me when they've hit bottom or they've hit the top of what they've been able to do. So that's the threshold. They're like, well, life is going good, but something's keeping me from going further.
Speaker 2:And for me personally, on my journey, the low was so low I preferred the unknown, because what was going on was death. I didn't want to live anymore the way I was living. I felt like the Walking Dead. I felt like a zombie. I was like it's got to get better than this. I'll leap into the unknown, because at that point in time, I was, I was close to taking my own life. So I was like, well, I can fix something or I can. There's nothing. So that's that's the threshold. That I felt, and that's oftentimes what I feel when people come to me is like fuck, it's just not nothing's getting any better. And that could be on the bottom side and that could be on the upper side.
Speaker 3:That's so good. Oh, I'm saying to myself, yeah, my threshold moment also was, uh, uh, almost death. Many, yeah, quite a few times where it's like I, the way I feel about it in my head and my heart, it's like you're walking a path and things just keep getting darker and darker and darker and you're like, well, maybe, maybe it'll change. Nothing has changed except for it's become more of what it is. It's become more of what it is, the truth of what it was.
Speaker 3:And mine was in my rape when I floated out of my body and I had the moment and spirit's like you can just keep going the way you're going. I had the moment and spirit's like you can just keep going the way you're going. This might be the end for you right here, right now. Or you can make a change and it requires you to come into your body and we're going to have to start looking at things and start being with things differently. And it completely changed my life and I feel so grateful and like part of me is always like, oh, did it have to get that dark? Did it have to get that loud? You know, but like it's the yes, it's like we.
Speaker 3:Everybody has their own bottom. Yeah, everybody has their own bottom, everybody has their own experience. Where you go, well, this can't be all there is, can't be like you said. This can't be all there is, it can't just be, I mean to drinking and picking up like vomiting outside a cab and sleeping with people. It's terrible and just feeling empty and hollow and working under fluorescent lighting yeah, you know, you and I joke about.
Speaker 2:We took the rapey road to enlightenment. Yeah, I don't know if you're listening to this podcast. Some of you have too. Yes, and it's just like things had to get so fucking terrible to realize that maybe the problem is me, not, you know, this isn't about victim blaming or anything this is from. Can you take the ownership that your life doesn't have to be this bad, you know, or it can get better, and I love that. You showed the other side the perspective, like you had all this trauma you grew up with and then you had the beautiful life that you thought you wanted, and you're like this, ain't it? You know, and that that heart opening moment is just like we don't.
Speaker 2:For me, I don't know when it's going to happen. Sometimes I can look at someone else. I'm like it looks like your bottom. One of my teachers, valen, says she goes uh, it's a sad day when you realize the bottom has a basement. You know like, yeah, yeah, you know, and it's just like everyone finds them in their own time, but that like faith, and undeniable faith in the unknown is it's a big ask.
Speaker 1:It's a big ask and it's key. It's key because when you're in that basement and you're in darkness, there's really not voices there's, you know, even maybe the people that love you are maybe the most triggering at that point because you're going to receive. So it just has to be beyond. It has to be faith beyond knowing, beyond understanding, beyond, like for me, too, like whatever I knew, the faith of everything I knew was not it. This is, I just need to tap it into the magic.
Speaker 1:Well, what if I am magical? What if this works? What if it does? You know, what if I do have a better life? And yeah, I mean when I made that decision in 2019, I left Apple, I left my marriage, I left all my friends. I had to take a six month journey to travel and find myself, so, essentially, I had to get family support to help me with the children. My daughter went to Colombia to learn Spanish. It was like perfect, but it was also very, very, very like. It was like getting ripped away from the life that you thought you knew it. And for me, it was very important too, because in the life that I had created, I didn't have, I never created a space for me.
Speaker 1:So, I was always like I need to be with people. If I want to go eat, I want to go eat with people. If I want to go for a walk, I go with people. And for the first time in my life I was like I am okay to be by myself, I am okay to travel by myself, I am okay. I am safe to go to a restaurant and take myself out, I am okay.
Speaker 1:That happened like almost 30 years after my life. It took me so long because I had so many codependencies. I'm sure it has a lot to do with my inner child trauma where I just didn't want to be alone and all this stuff. But I knew that I needed to let go of all of that. And the moment you give yourself that permission to be alone, to be with your thoughts, to be in your darkness, to be with your faith beyond knowing, that's the moment that light within starts opening up. So it's like the light is birthed within. The light is not out and I used to think like where do I go? Where do I buy? What do I need to do? I need to get it. It's out.
Speaker 1:But the moment of that transformation allowed me to understand that it's within, it's not out. There's not so many courses that I can get. I mean, I've gone courses that I haven't even looked at or I haven't even studied. They're still sitting. And I understood that we humans, we don't really learn by the words. We learn by experiences. We need to feel, we need to experience, we need to like, understand life, you know.
Speaker 1:So I went into a beautiful journey of saying yes to myself and saying no to everything else, which was also very heartbroken for many people, was also very heartbroken for many people. You know my marriage, my children, family. It was just a lot, a lot of a lot of things that I'm still to this point, I'm still knitting together and I'm, you know, in a way repairing, but I'm sewing it with love, without the condition of them needing to be with me or needed to look the way I needed to look. It's like no, I stepped away. I did what I had to do for myself.
Speaker 1:Everybody had to do what they had to do for themselves and it's okay for me to love them from here, it's okay for them to love me from there and we don't need to do this entanglement because we're different beings, like I, have different intentions, I have different things and that was like huge for me to understand that I am energy, like I'm full everything's energy, you know. So if I'm not being mindful of the energy in my space, the energy of the people that I'm connecting to, I'm so sensitive, my energy doesn't discriminate and it just goes there. So in my path of now stepping into this other dimension of knowing myself different, understanding myself, boundaries, energy, you know, sometimes I get to a point where I'm like man, I feel like I'm an energy snob.
Speaker 3:I'm right there with you.
Speaker 1:There are these things that I'm like, things but no things. I have no tolerance.
Speaker 2:No.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because the energy is so valuable. It's the fountain of youth, it's the fountain of wellness and blessings and all the things. So it's like I can't. Saying yes to me was basically saying yes to my boundaries. It was basically saying, yes, I love you, please forgive me, thank you and I'm sorry to all the people that I made all these beautiful connections but I just could no longer take them. Because I love traveling in time, I love traveling. You invite me to travel, let's go.
Speaker 1:I understood that not a lot of people like to travel like I like to travel in time. So my path of growing completely like accelerated and I don't want to say left behind. But you know, it's like you change. You change. Yeah, there's the, there's a separation that is created between your relationships and the things, and the beautiful part is that separation creates space and that space breaks in the new people and breaks in the new experiences and brings in. So this is when all this past, like five years of my life, has been so divine.
Speaker 1:Because I said no to all this stuff. I threw myself, I went into a high mountain and I went off the cliff. I didn't know. I went into a high mountain and I went off the cliff. I didn't know, I just had to do it. And then, on the way down, I was held with so much love. I was held with so much love from like energy, my guides, everybody the universe was bringing to me. Everybody had a code, everybody had a message, everybody had a creation, everything had a meaning. Everything has a meaning.
Speaker 1:Now you know, like I don't live a life with no meaning, like even a text message, even a notification, I'm like, oh, what time is it? Oh, five, five, five. That means something. Yeah, yeah, everything has a meaning. So for me now I feel like I live in a very magical life because I given myself the permission to be in this magical space.
Speaker 1:It really started with me getting out of my own way, me really acknowledging that it wasn't the world, it was me, and giving myself permission to just unlearn, heal, stepping into this space without so much judgment for myself and others and recreate new. And in this newness I've created so many beautiful things connected with y'all. I've done Egypt, I've done many retreats around the world and it has been like the most fulfilling experience ever so far. Yet I don't know what else is coming. I'm so excited for what's coming, but so far, right now I can say the last five years, I've stepped into like a radical, purposeful, like raw, like I don't care, like yes, there's many things happening in the world.
Speaker 1:The sacred medicine made me not fully, fully, you know, in legality, like we want it to be. But we are in the process of decolonizing our minds, we are in the process of decolonizing nature, we're in the process of decolonizing the elements, the spirit, like for us to tap into that. So now the way that I see myself and us is that we're like an anchor of light and that anchor of light allows others to illuminate themselves.
Speaker 1:And that anchor of light allows others to illuminate themselves. My prayer and my hope is through my story I'm able to help either women or men, or whoever it's in that process of transformation of, like that, brooded darkness, death, that things that there is no hope. There is so much hope. There's so much hope. There's so much wellness. There's so much hope, there's so much wellness, there's so much light. You just only have to get out of your own way, because we're the only person that stands in our own way like give yourself that permission to say what if life is not happening to me?
Speaker 1:what? If life is happening through me. How can I live differently?
Speaker 3:Chills. So, so good, I'm just so inspired and feeling lit up and like, yeah, like the depth of what you've touched on, your stories have just been so meaningful and so impactful and, like I so appreciate that we've all been sharing like little pieces of being at these moments, something that I'm feeling into and open for discussion.
Speaker 3:Do you guys feel like when you're at the threshold, where you're moving up to a next level, is it the same as the rock bottom moment? Do you feel like it's different? How is it different? How is it similar? How is?
Speaker 1:it similar? Yeah, yeah, great question, and I feel like it. It feels like a bottom, but it's not rock bottom. Yeah, you know. Yeah, I'm no longer at that low, low, low point. It's no longer there.
Speaker 1:But I do feel like, as we ascend and we get tapping into different experiences and situations, we do get to those points of low, because it's levels, there's levels to the shit. So once you get into that low level, your spirit, your mind and everything is ready to recreate the new, and you have to know what you don't like and what you don't want in order to create what you do want. Yeah, so it doesn't matter how ascended, how we're moving, there's always going to be contrast, and contrast is just opening up the door for more. So I no longer see it like I used to see it. I no longer see like, oh, bottom, I'm dead. This is it, like I'm just gonna sit here and just drink my life away. Yeah, yeah, I see it like oh, oh, okay, this doesn't feel good, let me honor it. Okay, I get, this doesn't feel good. What will feel better? Yes, and then it's like, oh, yeah, that will feel better.
Speaker 1:Okay, giving myself that permission to feel into what feels better and see how can I move my needle towards that, and it might be like a full needle move. It could be just. Maybe we can start with journaling, maybe we can start with talking to some magical beings Like yo, maybe we can go for a hike, or maybe we could take a nap, maybe we can eat some nutrition food. What gets me to feel better? And in that better state, what is the next step? Building blocks, building blocks. So I feel like we're always supposed to feel that's the spectrum. We want to be here in the middle, right, but this is pressure, density, contrast and this is like enlightenment. We can't always be here and we can't always be here, yeah, so it's like a good middle of like acceptance, joy, understanding, unconditional love. Anchoring to those frequencies allows me to walk my days knowing kind of like the world is is like falling apart.
Speaker 1:The world is falling apart, but I am no longer falling apart and that's because before it was me falling apart and the world was here, but it was me falling apart. Yeah well, even in my low moments I no longer fall apart. I I can identify like, I have the tools and I have the energy to separate myself and then see where I want to go forward. So yeah, those moments always come and they're going to come and I'm sure when I get to like my most enlightened self, I'm going to have that the pressure, but that's going to take me to the next level. So I no longer, I'm no longer scared, I don't longer see it as a bad thing. I'm like pressure's here, yay, fear's here, yay.
Speaker 2:Yeah, to circle back on your question, I think what it comes down to is motivation, energy, right? So when you're at the bottom, you have away from energy. You're like, well, I don't want to feel this, so you get away from it. And then, when you're away from it enough, you're like, well, at least I'm away from it. And then the old patterns sink back in. And then I think, when you're at the top of the threshold, it's the toward energy. You're getting pulled toward a higher vision. And I think that's why I am really big on listening to my avatar, like my version of myself 10 years from now, because I listen to that and I go what would that 10-year version of me do today? How would she live her life and all that. And then that's where I could feel my top, that's where I could feel my threshold, that's where I could feel my threshold.
Speaker 2:You know I quit drinking. I just celebrated a year of sobriety, of no drinking, no smoking weed, and you know I respect everybody's decision, is their own decision. I don't think I'm better than anyone. This was what I chose for me, right? And it's been a year of sobriety.
Speaker 2:And then I was like, oh, a year passed and I still want more in my physical temple, like now I'm on a health journey, now I'm on a working out journey, and now I'm like, oh how, if I'm someone who moves energy for a living and helps people move their energy, then this temple needs to be so dialed in and so that I have that vision of me pulling in Rich, rusted, shredded Brittany and I I'm like, okay, we're doing better on, rich, arrested, but the shredded needs to come in, you know, and and it's pulling me and I, but I realized the top. I was like, okay, my mind's clear, but my body can hold more. And I now I want what's next. And so I think, when you're the discipline, discipline is sexy, abs are sexy. You can't buy them. You can't buy them. What they could do with the medical industry is long, but it's sexy because you show up to it, and that's what I think the difference of the top is. You go, this is good. I'm inside my dream. Let's dream bigger.
Speaker 3:Let's dream bigger. Let's dream bigger. Yeah, something that just came into my mind while you guys were sharing about this is you know, butterflies, the caterpillar goes in there, goes in the thing I'm not sure if you know this part, but it actually has to impale itself. It has to stab itself and that's what turns it into goo, I know so. It has to, it has to willingly.
Speaker 3:Yeah, jones goes in and then, you know, it becomes goo, it's reforming and then it has to make its way out, and usually that requires a lot of that, that juxtaposition of like force and surrender, force and surrender. So it's like this I'm pushing, I'm letting go, I'm pushing, I'm letting go, and so, like this, who that I feel like sometimes the universe is supporting us with and sometimes we forget. Oh, my God, I've gone through this transformation experience before. I'm familiar with these energy and like I'm just getting birthed to my next level and I know for myself it's been this thing of like. You're like I'm out of the cocoon and you're like good, so I'm out forever, right, and then the universe goes mostly, except for spread you know, and so honoring the rhythm and cycles of like.
Speaker 3:If there's nowhere to get to and we're never done, you know there's no like, there's no door.
Speaker 2:That says enlightenment and just yeah, there's no doors as enlightenment.
Speaker 3:It's like it's Buddha and Christ and they're just sitting there not having tea or whatever you know. Like, if we're just in this cycle, how can I be more open and honoring the cycle and like when you're like, oh, the fear is here, oh, the challenge is here, yay, and get like you teach us. In Huna, the Hawaiians used to celebrate when baggage came up, cause it's like great, it's time for you to let it go. If you're, you're at a new level, you're on the new threshold. So, honoring these rhythms and cycles of like, hey, y'all, they're a continual threshold and mine are not like my bottom, I started listening to Spirit when there's whispers instead of screams or loud thuds, you know. But honoring that I might always be in this cycle of the caterpillar to the butterfly, and like each time I'm birthing myself as a new butterfly, but that everything is for me, the like push and the surrender is for me.
Speaker 1:Exactly that happens to you. Yes, for you.
Speaker 3:Yes, I love happening through it.
Speaker 1:That's a crazy little difference, but it makes everything. It allows you to really understand, like man, you're not the victim. Yeah, you're the creator. We are the creators of our lives. We could live in victimhood, but that can only last us for so long. No, it's like. Now we're done with this.
Speaker 2:Mm-hmm.
Speaker 1:We're next. That's that. That's the transformation. That's when you stop when being a victim. It no longer serves you. Yes, the victim is actually annoying yeah, I feel this so right.
Speaker 3:I feel like we're in a sometimes we're in a society where it's like who can be the bigger victim? You know even our legal system. It's like who's the bigger victim in it. And so when you have made the decision that the benefits of being a victim where you want to go is actually higher than what those benefits can offer you, and you put that down and step into I am the creator and what I can create is better than what victimhood was creating.
Speaker 1:That's the threshold.
Speaker 2:Yeah, oh, such a good conversation, yeah. So, dijana, you have been such an incredible force in our life. You have taken us to Egypt. You've done things. How can people get a hold of you if they want to experience your medicine?
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I'm out there, I'm in the socials. So if you want to find me on Instagram, it's DajanaMendozaus. If, through my Instagram profile, mendozaus. Um. If, through my instagram profile, you'll be able to see my website. I have a website that I offer my services, um, it's called spirit routes and that is very connected to my path. If, like, really understanding that I don't have much control, that this is, spirit is routing my way. So I found a very beautiful connection with that name. So, through spiritroutesco, you'll be able to see my services, my offerings, the retreats I offer and the Egypt experience that we're offering this year for 11-11.
Speaker 2:Oh gosh, oh yes, Egypt is incredible. Cannot recommend it enough. Yeah, I mean.
Speaker 3:I just want to say Dajana is an incredible, incredible space holder. She gifted us a beautiful experience of being held by her in medicine right before our wedding. Huge threshold moment. Huge threshold moment. Everything created the space for myself to truly transform and release things that were really stuck at the root. So like, if you are looking for support, if you want someone who fucking holds the ground, this girl got you like on the friend tip. These stories just scratch the surface Like she will hold you, yeah, yeah, your stuff.
Speaker 2:Yeah, she's like yeah, just get a pillow, we're a piece of shit. Yeah.
Speaker 3:You're soft. Yeah, she's like just get a pillow, we're good she holds it down.
Speaker 2:My experience of Dijon is like you're like a tree, you're unmovable, no matter what I was experiencing, no matter what my partner was experiencing. You held us and like. I looked to you and I was like, oh, we're good, no matter what's happening in the room, we were so good and so um cannot recommend her enough.
Speaker 1:I send all of my, send all my best clients to her. You know, yes, all likewise, I'm always sending my clients to you too. Okay, there's enough plant medicine. You need to go do a breakthrough.
Speaker 2:Yes, yes, yes. We love it combined it's a village.
Speaker 1:It works together.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and thank you for just being the light and supporting us all, because when one of us rise, all of us rise, and it's an honor to hold light with you and be light for the world.
Speaker 1:It's an honor to hold this light with you. It's an honor to be co-creating. Spirit knew exactly what Spirit was doing when we connected in Egypt. Out of all the places in the world, we did all the magical things and I'm just in, like I'm in awe. It's an honor. I actually just finished my Huna intro, which I'm so, so excited because I've been like really like honing into, like a new practice and it's so beautiful. So, yeah, both of you are so inspiring.
Speaker 1:Brittany, seshur, goddess, priestess, everything oh my God, you're still helping me heal. There's still so much work that I know I'm identifying that I'm working through you, um. So thank you. And lissette, oh my god, emotional. India, prima family. Both of you are just so amazing. So I'm just so grateful and, yeah, let's continue to work together because this journey is of transformation, of awakening, of healing your divine, feminine, tapping into your sensuality, or letting go of the baggage, letting go of the things that blocks us, maybe allowing ourselves to tap into indigenous medicine, like all of this are the tools that we have when we're in those sticky moments.
Speaker 1:So, if you find yourself, if you're listening to this podcast and you're in this sticky place, know that first, you're not alone You're not the only one that this has happened. This is the process, and if it's happening, it's because there's blessings coming. There's so many good things coming. You just have to keep doing that inner work, and there's many ways to do it. Like I said, there's a plethora of options, of ways to go through your healing. Just do it, yeah, just do it. Don't. Don't not do it. Yes, do it. Do it because it's going to help you. Staying in the darkness, staying in the basement, is just death and hey, if that's what you want to do, if you want to die, we've got to honor that too. Yeah, respect, yeah.
Speaker 2:Free will.
Speaker 1:Yeah, if you believe that there is hope, there is hope. The three of us here are hope, so yes, oh thank you for being a light on the path.
Speaker 2:There are many ways to the light and you are absolutely one of the lights on the path.
Speaker 1:Thank you it's an honor. Thank you for hosting me in this podcast.
Speaker 2:Dijana, she served, she always does. She absolutely does she does. One of the things I love about her is she's such an epic storyteller. She was here over the weekend for Huna and she got into some stories we were jaw dropped watching. She barely scratched the surface of what she's been through and what she's gone through to be the person that she is as a space holder, and she's unbelievable. Cannot recommend her enough.
Speaker 3:That was just such a beautiful and enlightening conversation, and I feel so grateful that this texter wrote in about this, because how often have we been in these moments where it's like the road diverges. You're at the threshold, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It's like do I, do I not? And like the thing that really moved me the most was about I chose to trust in the unknown.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's where all the magic is.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Everything that you want is in the unknown. Yeah, that's where all the magic is. Yeah, everything that you want is in the unknown.
Speaker 3:Yes.
Speaker 2:And then the body does what it does. It's so powerful, so powerful, and if you like what you heard and you want your question answered, give us a call at 971-895-4111. And make sure that you hit that like subscribe, share. Share this with a friend, share this with someone who needs a little bit of inspiration and knows that they want to step into the next phase of their life, or they just want to hang out with us. So, and until we meet again, be honest with each other. Bye.
