What if vulnerability opened the door to experiencing more?
In this third episode of Sarah's Peru series, she reflects on the unexpected medicine of spending nearly two weeks surrounded by the mountains, the land, and a culture that experiences nature as alive and full of wisdom.
Despite struggling physically with altitude, disrupted sleep, and low oxygen levels, Sarah found herself feeling more alive than ever.
ot was quite the opposite of being in a society that expects us to keep performing no matter our challenges.
Sarah explores the power of co-regulation, the difference between living in a hierarchy of productivity and living in reciprocity, and what it means to be supported even when we're not at our best.
Episode Transcript:
Welcome to Threshold Moments. This is episode three on Peru. And I don't know if I wanna call this one mountain medicine or if I want it to be something like what's the benefit of not getting enough oxygen to the brain?
On the very last morning when I woke up Maybe it's day 13, the longest I've been away from my family ever
13 days of being at altitude, a very slow adjustment with my body. An [00:01:00] Oura Ring that is reading my vitals each day and noticing, you know, I'm not sleeping as well. I have two, two roommates. Um, changing locations a few times. And the whole time it's reading that my blood ox is at 89. It's averaging 89 or 88 at night
In general, most people will have 97% oxygen saturation of the hemoglobin in their blood, right? So each- the hemoglobin in your blood generally will be 97% oxygenated, which means we're- we generally don't have a lack of oxygen. It is then, uh, more about our CO2 tolerance. This will be a totally different episode.
It's our CO2 tolerance, so that that oxygen can be dropped off to our brain and our [00:02:00] organs, and then with each breath it gets refreshed. When we do really long breath holds, it'll get dropped off, but it hasn't been refreshed yet, and so the blood ox will go down if it's a very long breath hold, possibly into the 80s.
At altitude when the pressure isn't as high, so the exchange isn't as high, what is happening is that we aren't getting enough oxygen onto- into our bloodstream, and therefore we also don't get enough oxygen dropping off into our brain, and into our muscles, and our organs
Most people will experience with this possibly some nausea. They might get headaches. You might feel sleepy. You might not think as clearly I [00:03:00] have experienced this in Denver and going just outside of Denver, Colorado, just at between like 5,000 and 9,000 feet. Cusco is at 11,500. Uh, one of the hikes I did was at 12,500.
The town I was living in for a bit was 9,000 And I was in shock I love to see that my Oura Ring is showing that I'm often in the range of excellence for resilience, and when I'm traveling, that might go down, and then also, uh, if my kids are sick and then I'm sick after that, that'll go down. It might go all the way down to solid.
But it do- I've never seen it go below that. On the very last day of this trip, my stat showed [00:04:00] it was on the very bottom line of limited, meaning it literally couldn't go any lower. And my HRV, which is generally in the high 40s, low 50s, uh, on one of the days, I think the day that I was really sick, was close to zero
It was like in single digits, which I also was like, "Ooh." Um, and here's the amazing thing. I've never felt more alive in my life. I don't wanna say in my life. There may have been a few other times in my life where I felt that alive. And my experience, and I said this to my friend who came a week after I had already gotten there, when she was like, "Oh, man.
My sleep was such shit last night." And I said, "You might be surprised. I know that when we're at home, if our sleep is shit, the next day we usually feel like shit. You might be surprised that the [00:05:00] energy of the mountains and of this place-" may affect you in a pretty drastic way. And it was interesting to watch her and to see that she too had a similar experience to me.
It was as if these mountains were giving off waves of energy, and I had described it in a newsletter of looking out to the mountains and not being able to take my eyes off of them. The way that when you are sitting at a fireplace or you're sitting around a fire pit and you are just watching the flames dance, or maybe it's down to the embers and you're watching them turn red and then black, back to dark black, and dancing back and forth, and you...
It's mesmerizing. This was my experience there. In the first episode, I was talking about this, like, this element of looking out the window and being [00:06:00] like, "Oh, this is so beautiful," and thinking, like, "I don't need anything else." And then each day it was like I- then I realized as I'm looking up to the mountains and I open up a book, I'm like, oh, in this book about these shamans, uh, which are
They call pacos. Shamans is an anthropologi- uh, anthropological word that was put onto different people and different cultures who were called the healers, who could really work with the unseen realms. So these pacos would go up to Inti Watana. And what I didn't know as I was looking out my window, and I was like, "What is that stru- is that a structure on the top of the mountain?
And are, are those little shacks or homes built into the mountain at the exact same angle?" Days later, I would find, and actually find myself on top of this mountain, uh, like, oh, not only am I looking at these [00:07:00] gorgeous mountains, but the one directly in front of me is in the book that's by my bed that I brought with me, and that this is the location of where many initiations have happened
As each day went on, it was, I, as I, you know, have said, it was like, "Oh my gosh, I thought the downtown was like where a few little restaurants were, one restaurant, one shop." And then it goes on of, oh no, there's an entire market and there's a square, and there are these restaurants, and there are these vendors who all have their own wisdom and medicine to share.
And there was, there were so many lessons on sacred reciprocity and moving with the heart. And then when we went, eventually when we were at Machu Picchu, Deb [00:08:00] and I were standing in the same place, and our bodies were both moving, and we look at each other and we're like, "Do you feel..." We were both feeling as if we were standing on a boat and that our bodies were being, uh, were waving as it, you- hmm.
If you were standing on a boat and the boat were going over waves, and your body would be receiving that motion of the waves, that's how strong the energy felt from these mountains. So while the buildings that were erected and the villages built into the mountains were amazing, the mountains themselves were giving off this energy that was so intense that I could feel my body responding in wave-like movements to it
So on the last day, next episode we'll talk about the sacred reciprocity and how six different [00:09:00] guides who none of them knew each other were all sharing the same message. On the last day, after a full 13 days of just being in awe of one form of abundance after another, after another, after another of like I would have been happy, overwhelmingly happy with what I saw and was with in the first two days.
But every day it was like, "Oh, no, um, you know, this guy Miguel, he wants to, uh, invite you in to see his alpacas and have coffee, and he's gonna invite a local Q'ero, Q apostrophe E-R-O family down from the mountains who will teach you about their weaving and their tradition and, uh, you know, ways to give back are through listening, but also, uh, purchasing of their products as well."
Anyway, over and over a massage therapist who helped me [00:10:00] breathe in a way that I hadn't been able to breathe in a long time over and over. Wow, more and more and more So on the last day, Deb looks at me and she's like, "Sarah, are you okay?" She's like, "Your eyes look a little red. You look pretty tired." My aura ring is, like, showing I'm not okay.
And this was the first morning where, in fact, I was not feeling like I was brimming with energy. I was feeling like I just needed to crawl back into my bed, and then I realized what I was actually feeling was a deep sense of grief
I was scared to leave. I had been surrounded
for almost two weeks by a people, by a culture who all [00:11:00] understood without needing any science that the mountains are alive, that they have wisdom, that the land is alive, that it has wisdom, that it's our job to recognize this aliveness, to feel this aliveness, to thank this aliveness, to ask it questions.
And everybody lived with a knowing and a feeling of the animacy that was around them To be in a culture that is so awake and so aware and where their giving is a part of the medicine, meaning they're giving, uh, they would see us in the Western society as their little brothers and sisters, the ones who have fallen asleep, the ones that could use guidance, that their desire to share this way of life was so abundant [00:12:00] that their seeing from their hearts first was a way of living And to enter that energy, that way of being, makes it hard to leave, makes it hard to go back to a society where we need to prove everything through scientific studies in order for us to believe our own intuition, our own knowing.
I notice this even as I teach Resourced. I can say a thing, but it is helpful for the sense of safety for most people, and even myself, it's like, "Oh, isn't that interesting? Look, it was proven this way. It was proven that way." Our sense of safety often comes from saying, "This scientist proved it by doing this study," verse tune in.
What do you notice? What do you feel? [00:13:00] And allowing that to be enough I was grieving leaving that way of life, that j- like, a cultural knowing of it, and I was also grieving. Like, you know, when Deb asked me and I said, "I guess I'm really sad," and I said, "I'm really sad to leave these mountains." And I just started crying and, um, and I went back to my room, and my friend Janine came down from upstairs.
She always gets up later than me, and she's like, "Oh, I'm just gonna head to breakfast." And I said, "Hey, any chance you could just, like, cuddle me for a moment?" And we... And she, like, crawled into bed, and we just snuggled for a moment, and I started crying, and I was like, "I'm really surprised. I've been on such a high this whole trip, and I'm feeling very sad."
[00:14:00] I was, I was leaving the retreat two days early, and one of the days it was unexpected because of the way that my flights were booked that I would be leaving an additional day early, which the benefit of it was that I got to see my daughter's first lacrosse tournament. When she had written to me, "I'm so sad you're gonna miss my first lacrosse tournament."
Um, and then the other day was on purpose to get home early to be there for my sister's wedding. And I was... Here's the thing, okay, so one was the culture. The second part was that in my life, and I feel like you might be able to relate to this if you live in an area that you would consider Westernized When I have been vulnerable, when I have been physically unwell, if I don't sleep enough, if I don't et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, all of the same things that were expected of me before are still [00:15:00] expected of me.
And when I can't do them, then I'm putting it on somebody else who is already tapped out
In this scenario of not getting enough sleep of, again, on the PEMSER map of it being like, oh, physically it seems like I'm struggling and I don't have enough oxygen to the brain My heart was wide open and my feeling and sensations were amplified. And what it felt like was that the mountains were holding me.
I just wanna say, as I've recorded this podcast, I've seen two different bald eagles flying by Wow
[00:16:00] It's hard to put to words, and so I'm wondering if you're listening like, "What is she talking about? She's still talking about this."
Imagine being vulnerable. Imagine being physically not at your best
And the sense of mountains, it's concrete in this example, but it's also metaphorical of a society and a structure that shows up to give back to you even when you're down So in a society that we could call a supremacy society, there is a hierarchy. And when you're thriving, you get to move up the hierarchy.
And when you're having a hard time[00:17:00]
you start to move down the ladder and there's no guarantee that you'll then be able to pay rent or that you'll then be able to buy food or that you'll then be able to give your kids the things they need. So it really feels life or death for many people. And even if you're wealthy, most people got there, even if they inherited it, it becomes inherited genes that you have to work harder, longer, faster than everybody else so that you don't become vulnerable.
This was a place and experience where my vulnerability gave me the superpower to be able to feel with my heart, to be an overwhelm, overwhelm, overflow. But I was overwhelmed. I was overwhelmed by the beauty. And that day after getting to just hug a friend, guys, [00:18:00] co-regulation, how often are we totally alone when we're feeling our feels?
And then
Uh, we went... I was like, "Oh man, hiking to a waterfall, I don't have it in me. I'll just do the smallest little piece." And there's another thing. We walk out from where we're staying, and we just take a road that we haven't taken before, and we walk maybe 200 yards up the road, and we look up the side of the mountain, and there is a massive waterflow, waterfall.
Massive
And again, jaw open, totally in awe
I was able to lay on the ground when we got to the waterfall, and [00:19:00] again, it just felt like filling up with earth energy. I was able to make an offering to a massive rock before we entered the path there. I was able to make an offering to the waterfall. I was able to listen to other people sing at the base of the waterfall.
And I found my body getting filled up with more and more energy, and then I was like, "Ah, I'm gonna hike a little further." And I hike a little further, and then even more of the waterfall is exposed, and then I get to feel it coming down on my face. And I just had the most epic time with two of my closest girlfriends.
And again, it is just a sensation of to be so held and so met, even when I'm not on the... like, at the top of my game, was a new experience for me. When I got home, I had an experience. One, I'm not gonna-- it's a little [00:20:00] too personal to share, but I had an experience where something happened that felt like a violation in some ways, and I found this inner panther come out of me and my body show up in a way I have not shown up in my life maybe, where this ferocious and steady and clear part of me stepped in and put my body physically in between two people, and was able to energetically, with my eyes and my body, send that person back a little bit.
And they said the next day, "Thank you so much. I felt something rewire in me. I feel so much clear, clearer. I feel the clarity, and I know, you know, what I will do and what I won't do again." And later, in a different scenario with a [00:21:00] different person, I also got to request, like, "Hey, could you show up as a mountain for me?
Not just in this way, but in could you be an emotional mountain?" So that when... I, I think that I often tend to be the co-regulator, the emotional stable line in many relational dynamics. And this was a person in a place where I could call them in and say, "I would love for you to consider the possibility of extending your stability, not just in these ways that you generally have and typically have, but also as an emotionally safe center point [00:22:00] for this crew."
And so now I'm really aware of that. I am aware of where I've gotten to be the mountain for others, and also what relational dynamics do I have in which I can allow other people, other places to be the same? And how often when I'm at home do I look at nature as something outside of me? And what can I bring forth from this trip, from this wisdom, from being surrounded by people who know the aliveness, who know the wisdom, who feel one with the energies of nature, and who as they give with sacred reciprocity, they are receiving at the very same time
Thank you for listening. [00:23:00] And my question to you might be: Has there ever been a time in your life where you have been vulnerable and somebody has shown up like a mountain for you? If there has been, I would invite you to amplify that time. Remember it, remember the details, fill it out And then if there hasn't been, I would invite you to say, "Show me.
Show me examples of that online. Are there any stories of people who show up for others like that? Do I see it in any other people's friendships? Could I read about it anywhere? Could I see it in nature? Could I see it with humans and animals? Show me examples where [00:24:00] vulnerability is met with layers of support so that the richness and the feeling with the heart and the seeing with the heart can be sustained When we're at peak performance or even just peak fast output we often can start to move into brain-based living Which is when it could look like we're thriving on the outside, but on the inside we start running out of gas, falling apart.
And then when the falling apart happens We have the opportunity sometimes to then amplify what we can feel and see on the energetic, on the spiritual, on the emotional, and start to clarify. So show me. Show me the possibilities of richness [00:25:00] even when my physical body is having a hard time. Show me possibilities of metaphorical mountains when I am the valley Thank you so much