Speaker Identification

Speaker 1: Opening and closing theme vocals
Speaker 2: Teresa Songbird, host of All Learning Reimagined

Speaker 1: There is another way to learn. Questions open doorways where wonder leads us home, where every heart remembers the wisdom it has known. All Learning Reimagined, where passion meets possibility, with Teresa Songbird. Come explore what learning can be. For parents, teachers, seekers, and dreamers, learning comes alive.

Speaker 2: G'day, and welcome to All Learning Reimagined. I'm your host, Teresa, bringing you a little ray of sunshine as together we're reimagining the future of education, one inspired story at a time.

Welcome back, everybody. It's so lovely to be with you again on this gorgeous day. I just wanted to give a big shout-out to BBS Radio for all of their amazing support. Don and Doug and the crew, you guys are amazing. Thank you so much, from the bottom of my heart, for everything that you do for all of the podcasts here on BBS Radio. It's like an ecosystem, a heart-centered ecosystem. I just love it. So thank you, thank you.

For everybody else, our episode today is number five in our Embodied Intelligence Series. Last week, in episode four, we looked at the body remembering life. Today, in episode five, we're going to look at this question: what am I communicating to life?

That is because life is moving through us. We need to be open to receive, open our hearts, and, of course, learn with safety in order to consider how we are communicating with life. So our signal, our coherence, and our resonance are the key words for our podcast today.

Let's get started, shall we? I can't wait. As you know, I can talk until the cows come home, but I'm really loving this series. It's fantastic, and I can tell from the number of people who have been emailing in that it's resonating with them as well. It's definitely the missing picture, which is considering how we're using our bodies and embodying learning through our body. It's not just the mind. So considering this is great.

The central question today is: what are we communicating beyond words? This is really transformational, actually. I feel today's topic is transformational.

I usually like to start with a story. I'm not really going to start with a story today, but I am going to talk about a scenario, and it is one I'm going to ask you to ponder. Have you ever walked into a room and sensed something?

Maybe you sensed a feeling or an emotion. Maybe you walked into a room and could tell that the people in the room had been arguing, because you could sort of feel that energy still there. Or maybe you walked into a room after there had been a huge party, and everything felt light, buoyant, or happy. Maybe some really amazing news had just been shared, and you could feel it even before anybody said a word.

You could either feel the tension, or you could feel the excitement. Sometimes you might feel sadness, that heavy sadness. Or perhaps it was a celebration. Whatever the emotion happened to be, my question to you is: how did you know? If no one actually spoke a word whatsoever, how do we know this?

I have observed this in schooling settings many, many times. You can tell children know as soon as they walk into a classroom, particularly in a high school setting, when they go from classroom to classroom. They can pick up on the mood of the adult in the room: the educator, the mentor, whoever it happens to be, whatever label you want to put on it. They can feel that energy and that emotion before anything is even being said. This is pretty massive when you consider it.

I think of people like some of my friends. When I'm with them, I just feel so calm, deeply calm. Without even trying, their presence helps me settle. I know pets do this too. Sometimes, when you are with a horse, a cat, or a dog, they just settle you down. Your breathing slows, your shoulders relax, and you feel grounded. It is almost as though they have not said anything, but somehow I know. What is shifting here?

What I am describing could be called a feeling or a vibe. It could be an atmosphere. It could be a presence. Whatever label you want to put on it, it is definitely worth exploring, and that is what we're going to be looking at today.

I want to give a big shout-out to this amazing woman called Catherine Mussell. I've been following her on YouTube for quite a while now, and she is actually the inspiration for this entire series. I'm learning so much from her YouTube clips. Listening to her has really made me stop and reimagine fascia, the nervous system, and how it actually affects our lives. So if you haven't heard of Catherine Mussell, I certainly urge you to go and check her out.

Something she mentioned the other day really landed with me. She was saying that the body speaks a different language from the mind. She was talking about the fact that the body translates what the conscious mind cannot register. That really landed with me. It was just like, yes, the conscious mind doesn't always register, but the body can feel it. The body senses it. It knows something is up.

The other thing that was a huge paradigm shift, and that I'm still sitting with, is the fact that the mind moves in cycles and spirals, and yet the body is more linear. So the mind and the body actually speak a completely different language. If you don't have coherence between them, then that has huge implications for learning, and even for life.

That is what got me thinking today about signal, coherence, and resonance, because it is not something that is really discussed in a mainstream learning situation. Yet it is vital. It happens everywhere.

What if communication is more than words? What if we are constantly sending and receiving information through our body language, facial expressions, posture, breathing, nervous system states, and emotional states? All of these things are communicating without our even speaking.

These subtle forms of communication are something that I really feel, in the education space, are possibly not explored deeply enough. Maybe we don't know or fully understand it, or maybe there just hasn't been a lens placed broadly in this area. I am aware that there are a lot of learning environments out there that absolutely embrace this, and I salute you. I champion you. That's amazing. But I'm not seeing it everywhere I go, and this is definitely worth having this conversation and putting it on the table.

Our learners, our children, our adults, all of us, are cultivating our own experience. What I do constantly now is ask myself: is my experience demanding, or is it nourishing? What do I choose? Is this my highest excitement? Is this something that I choose? Is this my preference? Or is it a drag, a slog, something I feel I have to do?

I'm starting to really question why I do things the way that I do. I realize there are so many things I do in my life that are just a loop, a programming loop, and I have never questioned them before. I am consciously breaking these patterns.

What has helped me has been learning through some of Catherine Mussell's practices and exercises that she has been sharing. That has really helped me get clear on my own personal signal, my home base.

I am always aware that my own harmonics are very healing. Everybody's own harmonics sound like home base to them. When you talk aloud to yourself, you trust that frequency. You trust that home-base signal. It is really powerful.

I often get children I have been teaching to speak out loud. Not with someone talking at them, and not with someone speaking in another frequency or harmonics. The children do it in their own words, because it has so much more resonance in their body and creates trust with whatever it is that they are wanting to say.

That home base, that signal that each of us has, is different. But it feels alive. It is very subtle. It is quite nourishing and quite expansive.

Since the invention of the internet, and quite frankly since mobile phones ended up in every pocket, everything has been competing for attention. A lot of us out there, and I am totally guilty of doing this, have not been listening to our own home signal. I have had so much static and what Catherine calls energetic weather. I love that term: static and energetic weather.

That is what I was picking up on, because I am very intuitive. I pick up on things all the time. But now I am getting really good at discerning and asking: is this mine? Is this my signal? Is this coming from me? Is this for me? Or is it just energetic weather?

Discerning that state of static versus my own signal, my own homing beacon, has been really important in discerning what is important for me in life. Isn't that what learning is all about? Every time you learn something, whether in a formal schooling setting or informally anywhere, the questions are: how does it apply? How does it connect? Why is this important?

Being able to discern whether it is for you and resonating with you, rather than something that is being pushed on you or not even your stuff, is really valuable in the learning space.

What I have found is that the static, or the energetic weather, whatever label you want to put on it, is sometimes fear-based, expectation-based, or external. It is outside of myself. Sometimes it can feel heavy or draining, or sometimes it is just even loud.

In order to tune into or tap into my own signal, I have to get quiet. I have to allow myself space for silence, to sit and to just be. Being in nature certainly helps with that as well.

When you are around all of the Wi-Fi and the EMFs and all of that around us, all of us have some sort of level of telepathy, whether we think so or not. We are picking up on the thoughts and emotions of the collective field around us, the unified field. If you are living in a massive city, you are just swimming in that soup. How are you supposed to discern what is yours, what is your signal, versus everything and anything outside of yourself?

This is really important, particularly for learning and navigating our lives, in my opinion.

So many people assume communication is primarily through language, words, sentences, and information. When you are teaching the subject of English, it is all about sentence structure, grammar, spelling, and all of that. They talk about that as communication. But there are so many other parts to this that we often don't even discuss.

Consider tone, facial expressions, gestures, posture, energy, and intention. My discernment is getting so good now that I can pick up on people's intention. They don't have to say anything. I can feel their intention, and it is a really helpful tool to have.

Often, I do it without conscious awareness. All of us do. It is like walking in a car park and getting that prickling sensation: someone is watching me, someone is around, and I feel uncomfortable. You are picking up on that energetic emotion. It doesn't always have to be positive. It can go either way. But are you listening? Are you listening to what your body and your own signal are telling you?

I would love to use an analogy. I love analogies. They are so helpful. This one is the analogy of an orchestra.

Imagine a beautiful, big orchestra, and every instrument in that orchestra is playing. If each musician followed a completely different rhythm, the result would be absolute chaos. I am just picturing it now, because I have taught music. When students are not listening, and they are just beating their own drum or playing all over the place, it can be a little bit chaotic.

But when the instruments become aligned, something beautiful emerges: harmony, coherence, flow. I am imagining a school of fish or a flock of birds in that flow state, in coherence, in that emergence.

The same thing is true within us. When our thoughts, emotions, actions, and words all align and are not chaotic, just like all of the different instruments, we often experience greater clarity. When they conflict, then we experience greater tension.

For me, clarity is key in learning and in life. Having that clarity really, really helps us navigate our lives. But in order to do that, we need coherence within us. It can't be done outside of us. It is something we can reflect on, but the question is: are we having these conversations? Are we even aware of it ourselves as adults, stewards, mentors, or parents when we are working with learners, our beautiful, precious learners?

For me, it is a matter of deciding: what do I want to leave in my rearview mirror? I am done with that. I want to leave that alone. Even though I did things that way for so many years, I am choosing to leave that in the past. What am I stepping into that is new? How am I choosing to show up? How am I resonating, and how am I in coherence with my own clarity moving forward?

That leads me to the question: what is coherence? It is a word you are hearing everywhere. I am hearing it everywhere. Lots of people say coherence, but I am not actually quite sure everybody knows what it means. It is like frequency and resonance. People are using the words, but do they really know what they mean?

For me, coherence would possibly mean alignment. It is a state where the different parts of your system are working together rather than competing against each other. I love to have heart, mind, and gut coherence, all three brains in my body aligned and in coherence.

I can feel it when I am out of alignment. Then I have to come back and ask, what is this? I take time to pause and take a breath, and allow myself to have that space.

It is like when you say yes and you genuinely mean yes. You get that whole-body yes: I really want to do this. Or you say no, I don't think so, because you want to put your boundaries in, and you genuinely mean no. You don't want to do it. Your whole body feels it, and you are listening to it. You follow up on what the alignment is within your own body.

That is very different from saying yes when you really mean no, when you don't want to do it but say yes out of obligation, out of a martyr archetype, or whatever label you want to give it. When you are not in alignment, you are not speaking your truth, and you cannot feel aligned to your values.

This is where the homing signal comes in, your own home signal. Talk to yourself. Your body loves the sound of your own voice. Humming in your own voice is really healing for your body, for the harmonics. It recognizes your own frequency as truth.

When you speak strong, clear, and pure words aloud to yourself, whatever it is you want to say, it can help. You might say, I am safe. I can hold more of myself. I am choosing to learn something new, even though it is outside my comfort zone. It is okay. Whatever the experience happens to be, when you say it aloud to yourself, that frequency helps. It helps you feel that this is right. Everything begins to click, and it helps you align.

This, of course, ties into ancient wisdom meeting modern science. The conversation becomes really fascinating. Many traditions have long spoken about harmony, balance, and alignment. That is absolutely nothing new.

Modern science today is exploring these concepts through the nervous system, particularly regulation and heart-brain communication. The HeartMath Institute is doing so much amazing work. Then there is social synchronization, entrainment, and a lot of science emerging around this as well, including bioelectric communication.

We all have a biofield. We are electrical beings. Why are we not having these discussions around our own biofield, how this works, the field around us, and how we are picking things up? It is not just the physical body. It is also the energetic body around us. It is a different language. These are all similar questions, but with a different language, and these systems influence each other.

I find this fascinating, because it leads me to the word resonance.

When I think of resonance, I think of an experiment I saw not long ago with tuning forks. There were two tuning forks. One had a different frequency from the other. When one tuning fork began vibrating, the other responded. That is resonance.

It is like when you are with someone who has a high, pure, clean frequency. When someone is in a downstate, just being in that person's field can lift them. We are like living, walking tuning forks. We really are, because frequencies and resonance happen.

Do people experience forms of resonance as well? I would have to say yes. I have seen it. Some people leave us feeling inspired. Some environments help us feel really calm. If I go for a walk in a forest, it is just magic. Forest bathing is wonderful. Being in the ocean is wonderful. Some conversations really energize us. That is resonance of frequency.

Living systems influence each other more than we realize. This is so interesting to discuss and explore with children. They really get it, particularly when you consider animals like horses. Horses have such a huge biofield, and they are very healing. There is a reason there is so much therapy out there with horses, animals, and pets. They act like tuning forks. They can help us with resonance.

How does this matter for learning? Children are not just learning content. They are also responding. We are all like walking antennas, giving and receiving. Children are responding to relationships, emotional atmosphere, nervous system cues, and safety. They are not going to learn if they don't feel safe. They will be too busy in fight or flight.

They are responding to the enthusiasm of the person who is doing the teaching or mentoring. If that person is really enthusiastic, that is contagious. It is fantastic. And, of course, curiosity matters. The teacher's energetic state matters. So does the parent's. Whoever it happens to be, the learner's energetic and emotional state matters. So does the environment, for that matter.

Learning is relational. It is not simply information. There are relationships around the whole biofield that surrounds us and the energetic field around us. I like to call it the unified field, the natural unified field, not the energetic static of electricity, EMFs, and everything else bombarding our nervous systems right now.

It is a bit scary, actually. I can visit some cities and feel my skin prickling the moment I drive into them. I can feel it on my skin. I am quite sensitive in that way with energies. But what would I do if I lived there permanently? What would that be doing to my nervous system and energetic state? It really makes me stop and wonder.

Throughout history, many people have described experiences of knowing, sensing, and perceiving. That is nothing new, and it is beyond traditional explanations. These experiences really do belong to another conversation, because they invite us to be curious about how living beings communicate and connect.

In today's day and age, everyone is on Zoom. Everyone has social media. People are texting each other. You can go to a restaurant and see whole families sitting there with their heads in devices, not even giving each other eye contact or having any communication. They have completely shut that side of themselves down.

This really makes me feel quite sad, considering that there is so much more going on. We have never had, at least in the history I know, so much access to communication and devices. They can be convenient and efficient, and yet we have never had such an epidemic of loneliness and disconnection. That starts with the self: being disconnected from who you are.

That is also part of life, which is the whole point of All Learning Reimagined. It is being aware of life and how life lives through us, not to us, I guess. Yes, it is crazy.

Here is a quick little micro practice for this week, which I will definitely put in this week's article. For those who are new listeners, hello and welcome. Every week I write an article around whatever the topic is. I usually add one or two activities that you can take and use, adapt, or adopt, whatever resonates for your practice, and share. It is all free. I publish it, and it goes on my landing page for All Learning Reimagined.

You can go to BBSRadio.com/alllearningreimagined, and that is where you can find well over a year's worth of podcasts and matching articles and activities that go with them. I would be honored for you even to consider taking some of these micro practices and practicing them. Embed them if you are not using them with learners. Just use them for yourself and observe how they shift and change things. I do all of these things. I completely walk the talk. That is why I am sharing it with you. I am so passionate about it because it has literally changed my life. It is amazing.

This week's micro practice begins, of course, by centering yourself and pausing. Make sure you get rid of all distractions, then breathe and come into presence, basically with three slow breaths. I am not going to do this with really slow presence right now. I am just telling you how to do the micro practice at this stage.

This practice asks you four questions. The first is: what am I thinking? What am I feeling? What am I doing? And are they aligned?

You are not judging anything. You are just noticing. You are observing in your mind, in your heart, and in your body: thinking, feeling, doing. Are they aligned? This helps you see whether you have that coherence and alignment within yourself.

Of course, I have lots of reflection questions, which I don't have time to go into right now, but I will put them in the article for those who are interested.

For weekly integration, there is something you could do. Ask yourself each week: what quality do I wish to bring into this space? Particularly if you are a parent or a teacher, ask: what quality do I want? Calm? Curiosity? Presence? Respect? Connection? What quality do you want in your learning space?

Consider yourself and what you are resonating as a tuning fork. Then intentionally embody that quality. Sit back and notice how that affects everybody who comes into your field. It is really fascinating.

This, of course, aligns with the universal law of vibration. In nature, we observe movement, rhythm, vibration, music, sound, heartbeats, waves, and communication. All of this fits with the law of vibration.

I am going to wrap it up this week. I would love to say that coherence is not actually about perfection. Nothing has to be perfect. It does not have to be perfect alignment. But it is about aligning in what we know, what we think, what we feel, what we say, and how we choose to live.

That is what I would invite you to consider: whether you are aligned, and how your life is going for you, because you are in charge of it.

Oh my goodness gracious me. All right, guys, I am going to wrap it up for this week. Thank you for joining me on All Learning Reimagined. Until next week, explore, experience, express. Go out and live learning.

Speaker 1: Carry the wonder with you. Carry the questions home. Every seed of understanding has a life of its own. All Learning Reimagined, where learning comes alive. With heart, with hope, with courage, we help the future rise. With Teresa Songbird. Until next time, keep exploring, keep creating, keep remembering.