With many people home-bound, we may need to get creative in seeking ways to connect with the natural world. Sitting by an open window is one excellent practice for connecting with the outdoors, and it can be a powerful form of nature meditation as well.
“What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
Crowfoot, Orator of the Blackfoot Confederacy
Find a comfortable seat by an open window that looks outdoors.
Morning, during the dawn chorus when birds are most active, can be a perfect time to enjoy your morning coffee or tea as you observe a new day emerge.
Set an intention to stay present, letting go of thoughts or stories in your mind as they arise, and instead focusing your attention on whatever is fascinating in your environment.
Sit for at least 15-30 minutes if you can. Practice regularly to help alleviate stress, increase your sense of connection with your local environment, and awaken your senses.
Micah Mortali is director of the Kripalu Schools, one of the largest and most established centers for yoga-based education in the world. An avid outdoorsman, mindful wilderness guide, 500-hour Kripalu yoga teacher, and popular meditation teacher, Mortali has been leading groups in wilderness and retreat settings for 20 years. In 2018, he founded the Kripalu School of Mindful Outdoor Leadership. Mortali has a passion for helping people come home to themselves and the earth, and he is finishing his Master’s at Goddard College on nature awareness and mindfulness practices. He lives with his wife and children in the Berkshires. For more, visit kripalu.org.
Establishing a place for regular outdoor meditation and nature observation is often referred to as a “sit spot” or “medicine spot”. Like the Buddha, who found his own tree of awakening, we too can go to nature and practice being awake to the reality of the present moment. This practice can also help us become more intimate with all the qualities of the land we live with.
“If one day I see a small bird and recognize it, a thin thread will form between me and that bird. If I just see it but don’t really recognize it, there is no thin thread. If I go out tomorrow and see and really recognize that same individual small bird again, the thread will thicken and strengthen just a little. Every time I see and recognize that bird, the thread strengthens. Eventually it will grow into a string, then a cord, and finally a rope. This is what it means to be a Bushman. We make ropes with all aspects of the creation in this way.”
San bushman
Guided Sit Spot Practice
Go to a place in nature that is close to where you live and that you can visit regularly.
Take a few moments to center yourself, breathing in and out, and arriving fully in the present moment.
As you are ready begin to walk mindfully with an intention to find a spot that calls out to you, a place you can sit and deepen your relationship with this place. The spot should feel welcoming, safe and comfortable. It could be under a tree, beside a boulder or in an open space. Often, east facing spots can be nice for early morning sits.
When you find a spot that feels good, in your own way, ask permission of that place and wait to see what comes to you. If you feel invited, sit. If not, keep looking.
Once in your spot, sit comfortably and become as still as you can. Imagine that you are melting into the earth, becoming a part of the land. Sit for at least 15-30 minutes, noticing any movement, sounds, or other sensations and activities.
With many people home-bound, we may need to get creative in seeking ways to connect with the natural world. Sitting by an open window is one excellent practice for connecting with the outdoors, and it can be a powerful form of nature meditation as well.
“What is life? It is the flash of a firefly in the night. It is the breath of a buffalo in the wintertime. It is the little shadow which runs across the grass and loses itself in the sunset.”
Crowfoot, Orator of the Blackfoot Confederacy
Find a comfortable seat by an open window that looks outdoors.
Morning, during the dawn chorus when birds are most active, can be a perfect time to enjoy your morning coffee or tea as you observe a new day emerge.
Set an intention to stay present, letting go of thoughts or stories in your mind as they arise, and instead focusing your attention on whatever is fascinating in your environment.
Sit for at least 15-30 minutes if you can. Practice regularly to help alleviate stress, increase your sense of connection with your local environment, and awaken your senses.
Many years ago, a bear sat down next to me while I was meditating in the woods. It was an afternoon in mid-October in the Berkshires, and I had been mountain biking in my favorite preserve. I took a break from riding to enjoy the perfect fall afternoon. I was overflowing with gratitude. My life was going well.
I sat under a strong oak tree and closed my eyes. I asked Spirit to come and sit with me, to share in my heartfelt thanksgiving. I spoke the words aloud and immediately heard footsteps in the woods behind me. They got closer, but I continued with my meditation, until directly behind me, I heard a twig snap and a loud exhalation through a very big nose. I knew in that moment, in every cell of my body, that a bear was behind me.
My heart pounded, and adrenaline surged through my body. I was totally alert and aware. I very slowly turned my head to look behind me and saw shining black fur from shoulder to rump, close enough to reach out and touch. It was a large black bear. Immediately my mind provided options for survival. Get up and run away? Get up and yell to scare the bear away? Climb a tree? Those ideas seemed bad. Sit still, do nothing, and breathe? Yes, that made sense. And so I did. I slowed my breathing and meditated on the intensity of my body’s response to this perceived threat.
In my yoga I had learned that strong sensations and emotions, including fear, can be powerful doorways into meditation. Rather than turning away from an uncomfortable experience, I had learned to breathe into what I was feeling. In this case, the fight-or-flight response was a huge wave washing over my mind, body, and soul. Instead of making a big story about what was happening, I remembered to face the experience in all of its raw power. I had the thought, This is the coolest thing that has ever happened to me! I had another thought, too: This might be the worst thing that has ever happened to me! Many hundreds of hours, I had practiced breathing through the intense sensations of yoga postures, watching my experience without reaction and allowing things to be the way they are. All that training on the mat was now being put to the test in a pose I had never tried before, Bear Pose, or Ursasana.
For a moment, I wondered how it might feel to be bitten by a bear. That was not a helpful thought, so I returned to my breathing. Moments seemed to stretch into hours. The bear walked out from behind the tree and sat next to me. It was smelling me. Still I remained motionless. In time, the bear walked away. I turned to look as it walked away. It turned to look back at me. Our eyes met, and then it disappeared down the hill. I stood up and fell down, my legs weak and wobbly. I stood again and got to my bike. I climbed on board and pedaled out of those woods like a bat out of hell!
For days, I was in a state of profound shock and elation. My life was filled with magic, possibility, and power. Anything could happen. I felt incredibly alive. The presence of the bear stayed with me—even to this day. I have never been a thrill seeker or adrenaline junkie. I’ve never jumped out of an airplane or tried bungee jumping. I’ve always been drawn to more meditative outdoor activities, like canoeing, archery, or watching birds. But sitting in meditation with a bear gave me an unexpected adrenaline jolt.
While sitting with a bear is not likely to happen to many people, you may encounter other life-forms or elements that can help you awaken and experience a greater degree of aliveness. We long for connection with our relatives who roam the forests and wildlands, and we still find nourishment in their company. In mindful rewilding, we open ourselves up to the sensations and life-giving experiences that the land holds for us. Such moments of communion between you and the living earth can open doorways into a more magical, mysterious, and meaningful life. And it makes all the difference to have the right mental tools and preparation to help you ride the waves of powerful energies you will encounter in both the human and the more-than-human worlds.
When sitting with that bear, I used a technique we lovingly call “BRFWA”: Breathe, Relax, Feel, Watch, and Allow. You might use BRFWA on your first walk in a park or a wood that is new to you. You might use it during your first solo camping experience or when you see an animal that frightens you. I once used BRFWA when I got caught in a rip current while swimming off the Big Island of Hawaii. It allowed me to remain calm and to act skillfully, possibly saving my life. In any survival situation, the first advice is almost always to remain calm and think, not to react or panic. But how we are supposed to do that is not often explained.
By practicing mindful rewilding, you are not looking to put yourself in a survival situation, though many of these skills can help you feel more confident and capable when you’re away from the conveniences of modern society. Inevitably, the more time we spend outdoors, the more likely we are to come up against our comfort zone or find ourselves in a situation where remaining calm and being skillful are necessary. In these moments, BRFWA can be a great ally.
I recommend that you use BRFWA regularly as a moment-to-moment practice. Using it daily will support your developing a general state of mindfulness. You can also use BRFWA to go deeper into a pleasant experience. Maybe you practice it when you take a walk or when you dip your feet in a cool stream or when you feel a fresh breeze moving through your neighborhood. Practice BRFWA regularly so that when something truly challenging happens, it is second nature for you, as it was for me when I had my encounters with the bear and the rip current.
BRFWA: Breathe, Relax, Feel, Watch, Allow
To begin working with BRFWA outdoors, try the following steps:
Go outside. Find a place where you can sit comfortably and have a view of a natural, outdoor space. (This might also be the place where you want to establish your daily nature meditation.)
Get grounded. Feel your sitz bones and imagine they are plugging in to the earth. As you ground down through your seat, also lengthen your spine and let it rise up through the crown of your head. Imagine that your spine is the trunk of a great tree and you are the bridge that connects the heavens and the earth.
Breathe. Soften your belly, and slowly deepen your breathing with each inhalation and exhalation. If possible, breathe in and out through the nose. A good ratio for this breath is to inhale for four counts and hold the breath gently for seven counts; then exhale for eight counts, and repeat the cycle. As you breathe, notice the qualities of the air. What is the temperature? Is it hot, cold, or somewhere in between? How moist or dry is the air? What can you smell? Leaves, pine needles, the smoke from nearby fireplaces? In which direction is the wind moving? What can you hear? Your breath, your heartbeat, your joints settling? Branches creaking against each other, leaves rustling in the breeze, dew dripping to the ground, chipmunks or squirrels scampering, crows cawing, pigeons cooing, an airplane passing overhead?
Relax. As you breathe, begin to consciously scan your body. Notice any places where you are holding tension. Focus on each of these places, as you continue to breathe calmly and deeply, and invite these places to soften and let go. Maybe your forehead is tense, and your brow is furrowed. Maybe your shoulders are tight and raised with tension. Perhaps your jaw is clenched. See if you can allow your jaw to relax, so that your teeth are parted. Invite your tongue to sit heavy and relaxed in your mouth, with the tip of the tongue resting against the ridge of skin behind your two front top teeth. With each exhalation, feel tension melting out of your body, mind, and spirit. Relax into the support of the earth element. Feel the earth beneath you and within your bones and muscles.
Feel. As you continue to breathe and relax, notice what you can feel. Notice your body and what your body can feel—the air on your skin, the earth against your buttocks and legs, the light on your skin or coming through your clothing. Notice your heart and how you are feeling right now, not from a place of judgment, but from a place of compassion for yourself, and from a larger perspective, from your witness. Notice how the breath moving in and out helps you to feel more. This is one of the great secrets of yoga: the more deeply you breathe, the more of your own life you can feel.
Watch. Be the witness. Observe your experience and allow as much space as you can for whatever is happening to be the way it is. Simply observe the land around you. Notice movement wherever it may be. Watch the play of light and the subtle movement created by the atmosphere’s constant state of motion. Watch everything, and be curious about any life you see, whether birds in the bushes or trees, ants crawling on the ground, or a squirrel leaping from limb to limb. When you come into the present moment using these steps, doors of perception will open to you. You will see the world through new eyes.
Allow. Let it be. Let the moment be exactly the way that it is. Let go of grasping to your idea of what this moment should be. Let go of any aversion to things as they are. See if you can simply allow this moment to be as it is, and give yourself the opportunity to experience this moment right now in its pure expression. No matter the weather, no matter the terrain, can you allow this living earth and your relationship with it to be the way that it is? Moment by moment, can you keep letting go of your opinions, preferences, and judgments? It’s not easy for any of us, which is why we practice. This awareness is something to come back to moment after moment after moment, always beginning again.
What if the antidote to a world coming apart isn’t a bigger plan, but a smaller, daily act of devotion?
This week, Tami Simon speaks with Tracee Stanley—teacher of yoga nidra, meditation, and self-inquiry, founder of Empowered Life Circle, and author of the new Sounds True book Living Ritual: Infuse Each Day with Purpose and Spirit—about why ritual may be the most important practice we have during what she calls threshold times.
Join Tami and Tracee to explore:
The threshold question at the heart of ritual: what within me is dying, and what is waiting to be born?
Why devotion, not discipline, is the doorway—and how to weave practice through an ordinary householder’s day without shame
Tracee’s shard of light in Cape Town, and the years it took to find language for it
The body as shrine: the origins of yoga nidra in nyasa, the ancient practice of anointing the body as a divine temple
Earth dreaming—lying on the land and letting the land dream through you
Her reframe of the four Purusharthas, turning prosperity into support and pleasure into relationship
Sankalpa as a vow that leads to dharma, not a manifestation wish list
The analog cocoon and the night school: reclaiming sleep and dream time from the phone
Why enlightenment may be less a permanent state than a moment available in the space between two breaths
Tracee also speaks candidly about walking away from a successful film career, and what a surgery taught her about the ego that refuses to let the body rest.
Tracee opens and closes this interview with a short guided ritual you can practice along with.
Listen now, and let something be reshaped. →
This conversation offers genuine transmission, not just concepts about awakening, but the palpable presence of realized teachers exploring the growing edge of spiritual understanding together, and it originally aired on Sounds True One.
Most people come to meditation looking for a break, a few quiet minutes away from a world that rarely slows down on its own. Reverend angel Kyodo williams spends much of this conversation gently taking apart that assumption, suggesting that real stillness was never about leaving the world behind at all. It’s a small shift in framing that ends up changing everything about how the rest of her teaching lands.
Rev. angel is an ordained Zen priest, activist, and founder of the Center for Transformative Change, recognized as the world’s second female Zen teacher of African descent and the author of Being Black and Radical Dharma.
Sounds True has featured her teaching across our Meditation Summit and A Year of Mindfulness precisely because she refuses to separate inner practice from outer justice, treating the two as a single continuous act rather than competing priorities. What follows traces her case for a warrior spirit built on presence rather than escape, and the meditation practice she offers as its foundation.
Key Takeaways:
Retreat Isn’t the Goal: Learn why angel Kyodo williams reframes meditation as engagement, not escape.
Effort Meets Release: Understand the meditation practice she developed for people doing social change work.
A Different Kind of Fearlessness: See what warrior spirit means when it’s rooted in love rather than force.
Retreat Is Not What It Looks Like From Outside
Rev. angel opens by naming something many practitioners feel but rarely say aloud: the pull toward meditation often comes wrapped in a longing to retreat from an overwhelming world. She doesn’t dismiss that longing, but she does redirect it, suggesting that genuine practice engages our inner fullness rather than fleeing from outer noise. What looks like withdrawal from the outside, she argues, is closer to a deepening than a departure, a distinction that reframes the entire purpose of sitting down to practice in the first place.
Effort and Release Meditation: A Practice Born From Movement Work
Rev. angel developed a specific meditation practice she calls Effort and Release after years spent working alongside people doing demanding social change work. The practice blends deliberate effort with intentional letting go, addressing a pattern she noticed constantly among activists and organizers: a strong pull toward doing, accomplishing, and pushing that rarely leaves room for rest. She describes meditation and social change as inseparable, since the way a person relates to their own mind directly shapes what they find themselves willing to engage with in the wider world.
Naming the Pattern: Many changemakers carry a constant urgency that outlasts any single campaign, even during rest.
Effort With Purpose: The practice doesn’t reject action, only unconscious, exhausting overdrive.
Release as Skill: Letting go is treated as an active discipline, not passive collapse or avoidance.
Inner Life and Outer World as One Continuous Fabric
A central thread running through Rev. Angel’s teaching rejects any hard line between internal awareness and external action. She describes our self-talk, the noise level of our minds, and our capacity for presence as directly shaping how we show up for others and what we find acceptable in the wider world. This isn’t a metaphor for her; it’s closer to a working principle behind everything she teaches, from meditation instruction to movement strategy.
What we tolerate in the world outside us, she suggests, tends to trace directly back to what we’ve grown accustomed to tolerating within our own minds first, which is why she treats internal clarity as a precondition for meaningful external change rather than a separate, optional pursuit.
Warrior Spirit Rooted in Fearlessness, Not Force
The phrase “warrior spirit,” drawn from her earlier book Being Black, describes something quite different from combativeness or aggression directed outward at the world. For Rev. Angel, this spirit is built on truth-telling and responsibility, a foundation for genuine happiness rather than a posture of defensiveness. It asks practitioners to stay engaged with difficulty, including the difficulty of racism, patriarchy, and other inherited harms, rather than looking away or numbing out. This framing has resonated widely since the book’s original publication, offering readers across many backgrounds a way to hold fearlessness and tenderness together rather than treating them as opposites.
Truth Before Comfort: Warrior spirit requires naming what’s actually happening, even when it’s unwelcome.
Grace Alongside Fearlessness: Strength and tenderness are treated as complementary, not opposites.
Responsibility as Practice: Taking ownership of one’s own patterns becomes part of the discipline itself.
Bridging Personal Transformation and Collective Justice
Rev. angel has spent more than fifteen years shaping what she calls Transformative Social Change, a field built on the belief that lasting justice work requires equally serious inner work. She resists treating meditation as a private escape hatch separate from activism, instead framing contemplative practice as fuel for sustained, clear-eyed engagement with collective harm. Burnout among organizers, in her view, often stems from skipping this inner dimension entirely, treating stillness as optional rather than structural to the work itself. She has described this field as one she helped name and shape, watching it grow from a personal conviction into a recognized approach embraced across activist and spiritual communities alike.
What Radical Dharma Adds to This Conversation
Rev. Angel’s later book, Radical Dharma, co-written with Lama Rod Owens and Jasmine Syedullah, extends this same warrior spirit into a direct examination of race, love, and liberation within Buddhist communities themselves. The book argues that spiritual communities are not exempt from the patterns of harm found elsewhere in society, and that genuine awakening has to include an honest reckoning with those patterns rather than a spiritual bypass around them. This willingness to hold institutions, including her own tradition, accountable runs consistently through everything she teaches, from her earliest writing through her more recent contributions to Sounds True’s programming.
Final Thoughts
Reverend angel Kyodo williams doesn’t offer meditation as a rest stop from the world’s demands. She offers it as a training ground for staying present with those demands without losing ourselves inside them. That distinction, subtle but significant, may be exactly what separates spiritual bypass from spiritual maturity, and it’s the thread that ties her meditation teaching to her justice work without contradiction. Listeners who come looking for a quick escape often leave with something more durable instead: a practice for staying rooted precisely where things are hardest.
Sounds True continues sharing her teaching because our mission to wake up the world has never meant looking away from what’s hardest to face, and few teachers hold that tension as steadily as she does. Her books and audio programs remain in our library for anyone ready to bring the same steadiness into their own life and work.
Frequently Asked Questions About angel Kyodo williams
Who is Reverend angel Kyodo williams?
She is an ordained Zen priest, activist, author, and founder of the Center for Transformative Change.
What books has she written?
Her books include Being Black: Zen and the Art of Living with Fearlessness and Grace and Radical Dharma.
What is the Effort and Release practice?
A meditation method blending deliberate effort with intentional letting go, developed for activists and organizers.
Is this teaching only relevant to activists?
No, her ideas on presence and inner work apply to anyone navigating stress, urgency, or burnout in daily life.
What does warrior spirit mean in her teaching?
A fearless, truth-telling posture grounded in responsibility and grace, not aggression or combativeness.
Has Sounds True featured her in other programs?
Yes, she has appeared in Sounds True’s Meditation Summit and A Year of Mindfulness series.
What is the Center for Transformative Change?
An organization she founded connecting inner personal work with large-scale social transformation.
Where can I hear more conversations like this one?
Explore our Insights at the Edge Podcast for further interviews on mindfulness, justice, and social engagement.
Michelle Cassandra Johnson is an author, activist, spiritual teacher, racial equity consultant, and intuitive healer. She is the author of six books, including Skill in Action and Finding Refuge. Amy Burtaine is a leadership coach and racial equity trainer. With Robin DiAngelo, she is the coauthor of The Facilitator’s Guide for White Affinity Groups. For more, visit https://www.michellecjohnson.com/wisdom-of-the-hive.
What happens when the world around you feels like it has lost its grip on truth, and you’re left wondering how to hold onto faith anyway? That question sits at the heart of the exchange between Tami Simon and Iyanla Vanzant, one of the most trusted voices in personal empowerment today.
Over 40 years, we at Sounds True have been devoted to bringing you the living wisdom of teachers like Iyanla Vanzant, an author of five New York Times bestsellers and a familiar face to millions as the host of Iyanla: Fix My Life. As the world’s largest living library of transformational teachings, and home to Tami Simon’s Insights at the Edge, we exist to preserve these conversations in their true, unscripted form.
What Iyanla and Tami uncovered reaches into territory many of us have been quietly longing to name: intimacy with the divine, the erosion of trust and integrity, and the calling that shapes who you really are.
Key Takeaways:
Faith Is a Practice, Not a Belief: Intimacy with the divine is a relationship you return to daily. Iyanla Vanzant reminds us that faith in difficult times is the practice that keeps you grounded when certainty runs out and the path forward feels unclear.
Reclaiming Values We’ve Lost: Integrity, accountability, and trust are slipping quietly from modern life. Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon reflect on what this costs us personally and collectively, and what it takes to reclaim these values through honest daily living.
Your Calling Reveals Your True Self: Rather than searching for purpose separately from identity, Iyanla Vanzant teaches that answering your calling is what gives birth to your most authentic self, with truth as the light that makes the path visible.
Cultivating Intimacy With The Divine
At the heart of what Iyanla Vanzant shares is something many of us long for but rarely name aloud: an intimate, ongoing relationship with God. A living connection you return to daily, the way you would a trusted friend. This is where everything else begins.
Iyanla Vanzant reminds us that faith is lived, returned to moment by moment, a practice built most steadily through the very times when doubt feels easier than trust. That distinction matters more than it might first appear. Trying times reveal whether your faith is a story you tell about yourself or a relationship you live inside, moment by moment, choice by choice.
We invite you to sit with that difference for a moment. Where in your life are you being asked to move from believing in something to actually leaning into it, even when the outcome is not yet clear, and even when trust feels like the harder path?
Values We’re Losing And Why They Matter
Beyond the personal work of faith, Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon turn their attention outward to something both women see slipping away in modern life. It is a quiet loss, the kind that shows up in small daily interactions long before it becomes a headline. Their conversation names three specific casualties worth sitting with:
Integrity
Iyanla Vanzant speaks to integrity as something deeper than simply telling the truth. The alignment between what you say, what you believe, and how you show up in the world each day. When that alignment breaks down, even in small ways, something essential within a community begins to quietly erode. A person who values honesty but withholds difficult truths from the people they love is already living out of alignment.
Accountability
Accountability emerges as a value that seems increasingly rare: the willingness to own your actions and their consequences without deflecting or minimizing what happened. Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon reflect on what it costs a society when people stop holding themselves responsible to one another and to the truth. When accountability disappears from daily life, trust erodes alongside it, and the small moments of honesty that rebuild it become more vital.
Trust
Perhaps most tender is their reflection on trust itself. Iyanla Vanzant speaks to how trust, once assumed as a baseline of human connection, now feels harder to extend and even harder to earn back. That raises an honest question about what it truly takes to rebuild something so foundational to how we relate.
Your Unique Calling And The Self It Reveals
The exchange moves toward something deeply personal: the idea that every person carries a calling that is theirs alone to discover. Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon treat this as a truth available to anyone willing to sit with it. Three related threads open from there:
Everyone Carries A Calling: Iyanla Vanzant speaks to the idea that a calling is not something reserved for the chosen few. It belongs to every person, waiting to be recognized rather than invented. This reframes the search for purpose as less about creating something entirely new and more about quietly uncovering what was already there within you all along.
Calling As The Birthplace Of Authenticity: Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon reflect on how answering your calling is what gives rise to your most authentic self. Purpose and identity are born together. The calling gradually shapes who you become, gently and surely, as you live in closer alignment with what you are here to do. Many of us spend years trying to figure out who we are before we feel ready to act.
Truth As The Light That Reveals The Path: This is where Iyanla Vanzant on Truth Is Light offers its most grounding insight: truth is the light that makes your calling visible. Living honestly, with yourself and with what you believe, is what allows your calling to come into focus, clearing away the confusion and doubt that keep it hidden.
Final Thoughts
What stays with you is a felt sense of what it means to live honestly, with yourself, with the divine, and with the people around you. Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon remind us that faith in difficult times is about staying in relationship with something larger than the moment you are in, even when that moment feels unresolved. The quiet challenge they leave us with is this: notice where integrity, accountability, and trust have faded in your own life, and consider what living in closer alignment with your true calling might look like.
The teachings Iyanla Vanzant brings forward are part of a larger body of work we have been honored to carry for over 40 years. At Sounds True, we believe that wisdom shared becomes wisdom lived. Wherever these ideas meet something real in you, we encourage you to keep going. Our courses, community, and programs are here to hold you as you do.
Frequently Asked Questions About Iyanla Vanzant On Truth Is Light
Who is Iyanla Vanzant?
Iyanla Vanzant is an author and television host known for five New York Times bestsellers and her role as host of Iyanla: Fix My Life, along with several audio programs created with Sounds True.
What is this Iyanla Vanzant episode about?
This episode is a conversation between Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon exploring intimacy with the divine, fading values like trust and integrity, and the unique calling that shapes your most authentic self.
How do I hold onto faith when life feels hard?
Iyanla Vanzant reminds us that faith is not something you simply have but something you practice daily, especially when life gives you every reason to doubt and lose your footing.
Why do integrity, accountability, and trust matter so much right now?
Iyanla Vanzant and Tami Simon reflect on these values as ones quietly fading from modern life, and what is lost personally and collectively when we stop holding each other accountable.
How do I discover my own calling?
Iyanla Vanzant teaches that your calling is uncovered through living in truth with yourself, not invented from scratch. Our online courses offer structured paths for going deeper into this kind of work.
What does it mean to cultivate intimacy with God?
For Iyanla Vanzant, intimacy with the divine means a living, ongoing connection you return to daily, much like a trusted friendship, rather than a distant faith reserved only for hard times.
Where can I listen to more conversations like this one?
You can hear the full episode on Insights at the Edge, and find more conversations like it through Sounds True One, our community membership for ongoing teachings.
Michelle Cassandra Johnson is an author, activist, spiritual teacher, racial equity consultant, and intuitive healer. She is the author of six books, including Skill in Action and Finding Refuge. Amy Burtaine is a leadership coach and racial equity trainer. With Robin DiAngelo, she is the coauthor of The Facilitator’s Guide for White Affinity Groups. For more, visit https://www.michellecjohnson.com/wisdom-of-the-hive.
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