#client magazine 17

[theyellowhedgehog]

Cass and Tim

Side piece of Ripple Effect AU. Deep dive into the relationship between Tim and Cass.

What make Fanon Cass great is that, she's tiny cinnamon roll but can kill you. Lots of fanfic also write her as a representation for a sign language user. Then, I might made you mad. Look, I'm just borrowing the skin of the characters, okay? And I'm trying to teach myself to make a plot driven character development. Yes, the origin stories are changed. Thus, it is a Reverse Robin + parallel universe.

Who is Cassandra Cain in the Ripple Effect AU?

R.E Au only reverse the age of the robins. Since Cass is no Robin she will remain as her original age. However! Instead of becoming Batgirl, she instead became a mercenary. At the age of 14 she realised what her father has been training her into. So, I made her hard nut to crack. She confronted her father head on, of course young Cass cannot win against David Cain. After escaping her near death, she left to find her mother. Shiva wasn't at all different from David. Cass stayed in hope to be near someone of family. She trained under her mother for 2 months. When Shiva started to see her daughter as competition, she tried to trick Cass into drinking poison but Cass found out so she left again.

All Cass knew in her life is killing. There was no good or bad in killing. So she took on kill quests and became a well-known-no-named mercenary.

She arrived to Gotham when she accept to hunt down Tim Drake for her client.

Can Cass speak?

Cass hasn't learn any language under David, and when she escaped to her mother, Shiva didn't bother to teach her either. So as Cass travelled, she ended up in a Russia gang. They were the first one to teach Cass speech. So, you can imagine Cassandra with a thick russian accent when she speak english.😏

From there on learning language is easy for her. The russian gang also become her first real family. And under them she became a mercenary.

Will Cass succeed in killing Tim?

Of course not. I can't let the story end like that. This AU is mainly focus on Damian and Tim so.

But let me describe how she approached Tim.

This is after Tim had successfully became the Grandmaster. Naturally, he will has many enemies. One of the Court of Owl members actually hired Cass because he wanted to become the Grandmaster.

Cass became a mercenary at 17, got to Gotham at 22. Tim is 25 then.

To approach Tim, Cass actually disguised herself as a bodyguard. And surprisingly she built a really solid portfolio that she pass the screening and got the job.

The day she got the job, there were set back she could've never imagined. As soon as Gotham Magazine saw Tim Drake had hired a female bodyguard, the press had a field day -with the next day front page being :

"TIM DRAKE ROLLING IN THE SHEET WITH HIS NEW FEMALE BODYGUARD???"

"CEO X BODYGUARD ROMANCE???"

The news became so sensational that it even reach the ear of David Cain. (Of course, hearing about his daughter rolling in the sheet with some random boy, he got mad.) I'm just joking, he got furious about the betrayal and that he finally found her and set out to Gotham to kill her.

So before Cassandra had any chance to act out her plan, David Cain crash through the window of Tim's floor. (He's in a new apartment, not the Drake manor) Hooray for Tim! He survive the unknown assassination due to Papa Cain.

Cass was losing the fight against a rage filed David Cain. But girl, did she put up one hell of a fight. The fight has come to an end when David has successfully pin down Cass crushing her airway. But like all supervillain, he had a monologue prepared.

Tim took the chance sneak behind David to knock him out with a steel barstool. David Cain actually manage to block against the stool but that was all Cass needed to lunge a knife into his guts and kick him away.

After stabbing her father to death multiple times, she thanked Tim. Saying that she would not kill him and would leave him alone. Tim suggested a better idea of hiring her as a real bodyguard and paying her more than her previous client.

Cass accepted, not because of the money but because of her life saving debt she's indebted to Tim.

After David Cain died, Cassandra became the new Orphan.

Will Cassandra ever become Batgirl and join the Batfam?

No, Cass won't become Batgirl. Barbara isn't crippled yet. Her relationship into becoming family with the Waynes has the same chance as Tim. But let me make it clear, even if she join the batfam, she would be Tim's person and not one of the Wayne.

Yellowhedgehog, are you trying to set up Tim and Cass as a pair?😬

Not in this AU, no. But I bet they would make one hell of a power couple.😁

News Headline :

"CEO TIM DRAKE GOT PRINCESS CARRY OUT OF A HOSTAGE SITUATION BY HIS BODYGUARD IN SHINY ARMOR, CASSANDRA CAIN!"

"CEO x BODYGUARD ROMANCE IS ALIVE AND THE SHIP IS SAILING!!"

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Picks and Shovels Chapter One (Part 4)

Picks and Shovels is a new, standalone technothriller starring Marty Hench, my two-fisted, hard-fighting, tech-scam-busting forensic accountant. You can pre-order it on my latest Kickstarter, which features a brilliant audiobook read by Wil Wheaton.

This month, I'm serializing the first chapter of my next novel, Picks and Shovels, a standalone Martin Hench novel that drops on Feb 17:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250865908/picksandshovels

The book is up for presale on a Kickstarter that features the whole series as print books (with the option of personalized inscriptions), DRM-free ebooks, and a DRM-free audiobook read by Wil Wheaton:

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/doctorow/picks-and-shovels-marty-hench-at-the-dawn-of-enshittification

It's a story of how the first seeds of enshittification were planted in Silicon Valley, just as the first PCs were being born.

Here's part one:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/09/the-reverend-sirs/#fidelity-computing

Part two:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/10/smoke-filled-room-where-it-happens/#computing-freedom

Part three:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/11/socialism-for-the-rich/#a-lighter-shade-of-mauve

And now, onto part four!

The San Antonio girl—the daughter of a local real-estate broker—had no idea what floppy disks the president was talking about, so he showed her the catalog and she immediately called the rep in Colma. The receptionist was on the ball and passed the call on to Shlomo, who immediately grasped the catalog’s significance and approved an expensive Federal Express courier.

“Our general counsel advised us to seek an injunction and file a suit,” Bishop Clarke said.

“It would have been better to talk, of course,” the rabbi said. “Nobody wanted to drag those three little girls into court. They’re like family, even though they left.”

Up until then, they’d all been telling the same story, but something about what Rabbi Finkel said stopped its momentum. I’d been practicing my listening, trying to be like Lucille, listening with my eyes and my ears. The rabbi’s statement jolted the other two. Now we’re coming to the crux, I thought. This is the part where I come in.

“They were good at their jobs,” Bishop Clarke said, almost wistful.

“They surprised us,” Father Marek said.

“Perhaps we could find an accommodation,” the rabbi said. The three men looked at each other. How long had they been in business together, in each other’s pockets, maybe at each other’s throats? The story of interfaith harmony was such a juicy one, the stuff of magazine cover stories. Was it true, though?

“They just need convincing,” Bishop Clarke said. His smile flickered on and off. He must have had dental work. The standard-issue teeth just didn’t come that way: shining, white, perfect symmetry. On, off. Maybe he practiced it in front of a mirror.

Discovery is the part of a lawsuit where the parties can demand relevant documents from one another: memos, contracts, correspondence.

Tortious interference is the legal offense of stepping between two contracting parties in a way that induces one of them to violate their contractual obligations. Suing for tortious interference is the commercial version of a jilted wife confronting her erstwhile husband’s lover, as though his infidelity was her fault.

Fidelity’s lawyers—an outside firm with a reputation for aggression and a roster of blue-chip clients and high-profile cases, including IBM’s ongoing troubles with the Department of Justice over its alleged antitrust violations—had drawn up a complaint asserting that CF had induced Fidelity’s suppliers to violate their confidentiality and exclusivity agreements, while simultaneously inducing the company’s best customers to forgo their contractual obligations (and semireligious duty) to buy their supplies from Fidelity and its sales agents in their congregations.

These sweeping allegations gave Fidelity’s lawyers sweeping discovery powers: all documents and accounts related to CF’s manufacturing, promotion, and sales, right down to the printers who supplied their catalogs.

CF wasn’t powerless in the face of this onslaught. Their lawyers—a much cheaper and hungrier firm of lawyers, without the pedigree or track record of their opposing counsel—had secured the right to redact irrelevant, sensitive material from the documents they turned over, and, more crucially, they had convinced the judge to let them do something novel.

The bishop hoisted a banker’s box onto the table and set it down with a thud. He lifted the lid like a conjurer’s trick and brought out two thick binders of paperwork, bristling with dividers. “This is the hardcopy,” he said. “It’s almost nothing. Photocopies of handwritten memos, mostly.”

He reached back in and produced a mauve box of floppy disks, the five – and – a – quarter – inch kind that already seemed slightly quaint, compared to the small, rigid three – and – a – half – inch floppies that all the new computers were using. He produced a second box. A third. A fourth. A fifth. The pile grew.

“Ten boxes of floppy disks,” the bishop said. “No one had ever asked such a thing of our judge, but he said that two computer companies should be able to accept electronic submissions from one another. He said it was obvious that this was the future of discovery, and that we were the perfect litigants to start with, since our dispute was about their piracy of our formats and disks, so of course we’d have compatible systems.

“Somewhere in here is the evidence that they are going to fail in court, the evidence that will force them to come back to the table and negotiate, to talk, the way they should have in the first place. They’ve found some good ways of doing things, and we’re interested in that. We want to work with them, not ruin them. We could arrange a sale of their little company to Fidelity, on preferable terms, but with something in there to recognize their clever little inventions and innovations. They’d get something, rather than nothing.” The bishop spread his hands, patted the air. It’s only reasonable, his hands said.

“Better they get the money than the lawyers,” the rabbi said.

“Something is always better than nothing,” Father Marek said. “Even an idiot should be able to see that.” The other two shot him looks. He scowled at them.

“We need someone who can make sense of all this.” The bishop pointed at his precarious tower of floppy disks. “They thought that they’d overwhelm us with electronic records. That our lawyers were so conservative that they wouldn’t be able to sort through them. It’s true, they’re not set up for this. No one is, but someone could be. We think that for the right kind of person, someone who understands accounting and computers, these records will be easier to handle.”

There it was. They looked at me, three worried sets of eyes. This wasn’t how they normally operated. They were taking a risk. I wondered whose idea this was. Not Father Marek: he wanted vengeance. He’d be happy to smash CF, make an example of them. Rabbi Finkel? Perhaps. I could see that he was a thinker, someone who looked around corners. The bishop? He’d done most of the talking. But I got the impression he always did most of the talking: a Mormon bishop, after all, didn’t wear a dog collar or a beard and yarmulke. Mormon bishops are laypeople, after all. They look secular.

Check out my Kickstarter to pre-order copies of my next novel, Picks and Shovels!

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2025/01/13/wanting-it-badly/#discovering-e-discovery

[cryingpariah]

Introducing and Explaining My One Piece Oc with this meme and also just the power of Yap! No pictures yet. I cannot draw, I haven’t found the right picrew/dress up games for her style and my spine, backbone and brain aren’t rotted enough to use AI :p

Allow me to introduce to Jackie! She works for Big News Morgan and is his personal assistant at the WEJ and also Heiress Apparent to the Underworld.

Her job boils down to being a hired gossip. She’ll go from pirate ship to pirate ship to schmooze and get/swap information, all with a friendly smile and a silly demeanour! She delivers packages too heavy for the News Coos and gives special secret editions of their magazines to their highest level pirate clients (think really interesting pirates that are sure to generate BIG NEWS and of course the Yonkos! They get the most preferential treatment). She’ll be buddy-buddy with the Marines too but that’s more for practicality and preemptive damage control for when Morgan inevitably pisses them off. She occasionally works her magic on civilians to get them better deals on paper and ink.

Devil Fruit: around the age of 5, Jackie stumble across an oddly red looking pear with an incredibly unnatural swirl that wrapped around the whole fruit, only ending where it point out a the stem. It later turned out she ate the Arrow-Arrow fruit and became a Direction Woman! She can create Arrows (the symbol to be clear) and while she shoot them out at people, the real power is how it changed her sense of direction. She always knows how to get to where she wants to go and can make arrows that she can stand or sit on to take her there! For example if she wants to head back to the WE NEWS, she just has to think of Morgan and feel this pull wanting to take her there. It’s also useful for fighting! Place an arrow point up under someone’s chin and it can hit as hard as an uppercut! She can send anything and anyone up down left right or spinning in a circle all from a safe distance, as long as she can see it, she can move it.

Appearance: Medium black skin with mid-back length curly light brown hair that fades into a gray ish blonde. Has a slightly crooked nose from a fight that wasn’t reset before it healed so she wears a white bandage overtop of the bridge. Has a tooth gap. Gun metal grey round eyes, she rarely blinks honestly. Attire-wise she dresses as a cross between standard Newsies cosplay and classic aviator uniform. Her uniform is generally a frilly collared sleeveless button up with a ribbon delicately tied around the collar, a pair of dark pinstriped pants that are tucked into shin high lace up boots, finished off with some gloves that are definitely one size too big, a pinstriped paper boy hat and an aviator jacket with multiple patches from around the world covering the back and sleeves.

Personality: She’s incredibly two faced. In front of potential customers and coworkers she’s sweet as sugar but put her in a room with just the higher ups of the Underworld and all that positive energy and charm disappears. On the clock she’s very loud, comedically dramatic, and very forthcoming. The only time she’s really in off the clock mode is when she’s completely alone, where she has no one to perform for. The only person that’s ever seen both sides to her (and doesn’t hate her for it) is Big News Morgan and she…appreciates it way more than she’s willing to admit. And it’s not like the nice work side of her doesn’t truly exist, it does! It’s just so carefully folded and tucked into a corner of her heart that she refuses to acknowledge.

1. Her birthday is October 12th (International Newspaper Carrier Day).

2. 15 pre-timeskip and 17 post-timeskip.

3. Generally yes, it’s her uniform after all but she’ll change it up for a special occasion like a party or if it’s a day off.

4. British (boo 🍅🍅).

5. Lucky number 7! BNM is resolute that she’s the World Economic Journal's good luck charm! Jackie however doesn’t believe in luck of any kind and they get into debates about it all the time.

6. Wind/Outside. If you were to sniff more you’d find hints of ink and that warm paper smell.

7. A soft grey.

8. Soups and Sandwiches! She likes how they can be made out of basically anything plus it’s super easy to carry around in her thermos and lunchbox and great for on the go!

9. Heavy, creamy foods like Mac and Cheese or Chowders. They make her feel all sleepy and lazy.

10. Work mostly which means all the people around the seas all the time.

11. Often, her job is just being outside a lot and a good public image can’t be maintained if their most outgoing employee looks and smells like shit.

12. A universal donor (which I have decided to dub OX+ for the sake of simplicity.) She makes it a point to donate every couple of months.

13. Does it occasionally but everyone onboard hates it and begs her to stop.

14. If Devil Fruits are allowed? She’s winning easy. If they’re not? She’d still take like 3rd or 4th place.

15. Tomato soup! She can whip it up super easily and it’s pretty tasty if she’d say so herself!

16. Whenever she can. Her hours are incredibly spontaneous and she pretty much always on the go. Her sleep hours are precious to her and she has 4 different intricate locks on her bedroom door to prove it.

17. Comedic relief middle child who no one actually takes seriously.

18. A pigeon: half because of the whole carrier pigeon thing and half because they’re both everywhere and nowhere all the time.

19. 5’7 pre-time skip and 5’9 post time skip. A little underweight honestly, which deeply concerns her coworkers considering how young she is.

20. Y'know I’ve never actually thought of her bust size before but like…a B ig idk??

21. A simple big capital J.

22. Not super different honestly. At most she changes her uniform color palette from all whites and beiges and adds a dark magenta element (her pants and bow)

[usafphantom2]

Russia's ally, Uzbekistan considers acquiring Dassault Rafale fighters

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 11/24/2023 - 19:00 in Military

The leadership of Uzbekistan would have expressed interest in acquiring 24 Rafale fighters. However, the exact terms and financing modalities remain undisclosed.

This information was disclosed in a publication of the industry-specific French portal, Intelligence Online.

The publication Intelligence Online reported that Uzbekistan formally requested information from France about the potential acquisition of 24 fourth-generation Dassault Rafale multifunctional fighters. The matter would have been discussed during the visit of French President Emmanuel Macron to the Republic of Uzbekistan on November 2.

Despite the interest expressed, analysts are skeptical of Uzbekistan's immediate ability to secure Rafale jets. The manufacturer, Dassault Aviation, currently faces a heavy workload due to existing orders from countries such as Qatar, Croatia and Indonesia. In addition, negotiations are underway with Saudi Arabia, further complicating the production schedule.

Due to these restrictions, an alternative solution could involve France's proposal for Dassault Mirage 2000 fighters for Uzbekistan as a viable option.

Uzbekistan has the distinction of being the first country of the former Soviet bloc and, additionally, the second nation to use MiG-29, to express its intention to exchange its military fleet for Rafale jets.

A recent public disclosure revealed that, for the calendar year 2023, Uzbekistan reserved a defense budget equivalent to US$ 1.4 billion. The country's combat aviation fleet includes 12 MiG-29 and MiG-29UB aircraft currently in service, with 18 additional of the same type in storage.

In addition, Uzbekistan stored 26 Su-27 fighters for preservation. The Uzbekistan Air Force also maintains a substantial fleet, consisting of 12 Su-25 attack aircraft and 15 Su-24 bombers stored.

Tags: Military AviationDassault RafaleUzbekistan

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has work published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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[memphisbluesagain]

Pattie Boyd 1961-1962 (Elizabeth Arden, Cherry Marshall and Norman Parkinson)

I couldn’t find much detailed information about lovely Pattie from 1961-1962, so I decided to put together this long form post. Please, do let me know if I’m missing anything. Thanks!

- June 1961, Pattie leaves school with three GCE O Level passes and is living at home in Wimbledon, with her single mother and four siblings

- Late 1961, Pattie’s mother pulls some strings and gets her daughter a job at the Elizabeth Arden hair salon in London

“After school, I got a job at Elizabeth Arden in Bond Street, London - because I wasn’t qualified to do anything and my mum knew the CEO there.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

- In the new year, Pattie moves to London and begins working as a ‘shampoo girl’ / ‘trainee beautician’ on a small wage of £4.50 per week - which roughly translates to £97.53 as of 2023

“I thought: ‘I must get out, I must try and be independent’ - so I got a job and shared a flat with about five other girls.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

“I shampooed people’s hair and took their coats. I was a general dogsbody, but I must say that it was terribly glamorous because it was where I first saw fabulous magazines - like Vogue, Tatler and Harper’s Bazaar.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

“The job at Elizabeth Arden was deadly boring. I was training to be a beautician, but my heart wasn’t in it and I’m not sure I would have made the grade. Elizabeth Arden herself came in one day and berated me for my makeup. She didn’t like the black pencil under my eyes; it was not the ‘Elizabeth Arden’ look, she informed me.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

- Early 1962, Pattie had been working at the salon for roughly two months, until a Cherry Marshall Model Agency staffer took a special interest in her look

“A client who worked for Honey magazine asked me if I’d ever thought of becoming a model.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

“Imagine my excitement when a client came into the salon one day and asked if I had ever thought of being a model. I said: ‘No, but I certainly could.’” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

- The following day, Pattie was scheduled for a test shoot

“When I arrived, she had arranged for her in-house photographer, Anthony Norris, to take some test shots of me. He had set up some lights in a little studio and she gave me a couple of outfits to wear - I remember a beret and having to look sultry, smoking Gitanes. [a French brand of unfiltered cigarettes] They were black and white, moody shots, with a bit of a Parisian feel.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

- Anthony Norris sends Pattie along to a secretary at Cherry Marshall Model Agency and a personal meeting with Cherry Marshall herself is arranged - Pattie was signed to a modelling contract the very same day

“A successful model has just got to be strict with herself and lay off all fattening foods. That means no bread, butter, spaghetti or sweets! Watch out for ‘puppy fat spread’ - eat proper meals at regular times, with lots of lean meat and green vegetables.” - Pattie Boyd (April, 1965 - Letter from London)

“My fairy godmother phoned Cherry Marshall, who then ran one of the top model agencies and she said she was sending me to her. Anthony Norris went with me and told Cherry he thought she should take me on.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

“My secretary brought Pattie’s picture into me and told me Pattie was waiting outside. ‘I’ll see her’ I said - and there was Pattie, a shy 17-year-old who when she spoke, bubbles with impish charm. It would have been a mistake to change a thing about her. All we needed was to groom her rebellious hair and slim down her puppy fat. She started training immediately, the following Monday.” - Cherry Marshall, 1964

“She was shy until she started talking and then she bubbled over with enthusiasm, as she spoke of her ambition to be a model: ‘I know I’m a bit plump - but I can’t stop eating sweets!’ I said: ‘Pattie, from now on you cut out all sweets - and I want you to report on Monday at the school for training’. I wanted her rebellious hair groomed into a straight gleaming bob and she had to be taught how to apply photographic make-up. Nothing else should be changed. The name was right, the look was right and it would have been crazy to do anything to subdue her sparkling personality.” -  Cherry Marshall, 1978

- Pattie attends Cherry Marshall’s modelling school - graduating within three short months

“So that’s the advice that I’d pass on to all of you who dream of becoming models: train at a school that has proved itself - not just one of those places that give you a paper diploma and nothing else - and don’t try to sell yourself when you have qualified. Let your agent do that.” - Pattie Boyd (April, 1965 - Letter from London)

- Pattie attends test shoots and works to build her portfolio - unpaid

“I knew I had a winner - everyone in the office agreed with me and they immediately swung into action. New pictures were taken, photographers and magazines informed, casting agents bombarded, press alerted. Here, we told them with absolute confidence that Pattie Boyd was the girl for the swinging sixties.” - Cherry Marshall, 1978

“Finding an agency was easy; finding a job was the hard part.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

“We were too experienced to expect things to happen overnight, but we were impatient because Pattie was already seventeen and that wasn’t the youngest anymore. All we needed was to get one top photographer mad about her and she was made, but few of them would risk using an absolutely new girl on a job. They’d take test shots to find out what she was like and give her pictures for her portfolio, but no money. It was invaluable experience, but Pattie had to earn her living and we didn’t have much time.” -  Cherry Marshall, 1978

“My agent would phone me last thing in the afternoon and tell me my jobs for the next day and my diaries would be quite full. But not to begin with - I had to work quite hard, going around to photographer’s studios and showing them my portfolio.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

[Rayment Kirby, 1962]

“Everyday I would go out with a list of photographer’s names and addresses and trudge around with my portfolio, hoping they would like what they saw and use me on a job. And if one did, I would try very hard to get him to give me some prints at a low rate, so that I could add them to my portfolio. I must have travelled on every bus and tube in London and when I was out of money, I walked. My diary for those days is full of IOUs for the odd fiver.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

“Within three months her diary began to fill up and she (Pattie) was in constant demand.” -  Cherry Marshall, 1978

“If I had a job, I had a big, tall bag - no wheels in those days - with dark shoes, light-coloured shoes, all sorts of jewellery, wigs and hairpieces.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

“I was lucky. The trekking around worked and soon my diary was full of jobs. Modelling was fun. I loved trying on clothes and fiddling with my hair and makeup. We had to do it ourselves - there were no hair stylists or makeup artists and certainly no chauffeur-driven cars to ferry us around. We were not celebrities in the way that today’s top models are. For advertising jobs, we even had to bring our own accessories. I have my old appointment diaries about what I had to take to a shoot. Usually, it was light and dark court shoes, flatties, gloves, costume jewellery, hats or caps, boots, makeup, wigs and hair pieces. You could spot a model a mile off from the heavy bags that she was carrying.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

“I went on to do lots of lovely shoots, although I never enjoyed posing for Freeman’s catalogues. They’d book you in for three or four days in a row, which meant lots of money, but the clothes were hideous and far too big - they had to have clips on the back.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

“I rang Norman Parkinson, the king of them all - and asked if he’d see her. A model had to be really good before he could be approached, particularly as he was not impressed by an agent’s idea of who was photogenic. We knew that, superficially, Pattie had certain drawbacks - she was un-modelly in the accepted sense, her face was too round and she had a gap in her front teeth. She came back to us in tears, eyes swimming with disappointment, all set to give up. She finally blurted out: ‘He asked me if it’s fashionable these days to look like a rabbit!’” -  Cherry Marshall, 1978

“One day I went to see the great Norman Parkinson. He looked at my book, then looked at me and said: ‘Come back when you’ve learned how to do your hair and makeup properly’ I felt so humiliated.” - Pattie Boyd, Wonderful Tonight

“Seeing myself in magazines was so exciting. I couldn’t wait to show my mother and she was totally amazed, saying: ‘How on earth did you do that?’ - she had no idea that I’d been trampling the streets trying to get jobs and hopping on buses and trains to persuade photographers to take pictures of me.” - Pattie Boyd (December, 2022)

- Late 1962, Pattie began working for Honey magazine, which led to many other opportunities...

I will try to make a Pattie Boyd 1963-1964 long post soon! :)

[offender42085]

Post 1098

Before and After....... He hid the gun in a dog food bag at his house afterwards.

Yanmarkoz Jimenez, Florida inmate N61519, born 2005, incarceration intake July 2022 at age 17, scheduled for release November 2026

Homicide: Manslaughter with Cruelty and/or Negligence, Obstruction of a Criminal Investigation

In may 2022, a Hillsborough County judge sentenced 17-year-old Yanmarkoz Jimenez to five years in prison followed by five years of probation for the death of Crysi Coleman, 18. Prosecutors said Jimenez shot Coleman one night in summer 2021, then he and a friend drove Coleman to the emergency room, dropped her off and cleaned up the crime scene.

Jimenez, who was 16 at the time of the shooting but was prosecuted as an adult, pleaded guilty to manslaughter with a weapon and evidence tampering as part of a plea deal with prosecutors. He faced up to 35 years in prison for the two charges, and state guidelines called for a little more than 10 years.

Jimenez’s age and the fact the shooting was unintentional were among the factors in the plea deal, Assistant State Attorney Danielle Villamil told Judge Mark D. Kiser.

Jimenez’s attorney, Daniel Fernandez, said his client was “intensely remorseful” and sought the care of a psychiatrist after the shooting because he was almost suicidal.

“This was a juvenile reckless act playing with a firearm,” Fernandez said. “The firearm went off accidentally and this was not an intentional act in any way whatsoever.”

Jimenez did not speak during the hearing beyond answering Kiser’s questions with “yes, sir” and “no, sir.”

The shooting happened Aug. 29, 2021. About 10 p.m., police received a call about two young males arriving at Tampa General Hospital in a sport utility vehicle with a woman in the back seat who’d been shot in the head, an arrest report states.

A paramedic working at the emergency room entrance asked the pair what happened to the woman and they said they didn’t know. The two males, later determined to be Jimenez and 18-year-old Sabian Taft, then left. Coleman was pronounced dead about 15 minutes later.

Detectives learned Coleman had been hanging out at Taft’s house on the 2600 block of Durham Street in Tampa’s Palmetto Beach neighborhood. After detectives got a search warrant for the house, Taft told them Coleman had been shot in his bedroom by a 9mm Glock 19 he owned. He said he and Jimenez then drove her to the hospital.

Taft said he covered a bullet hole in his door with a sticker on one side and filled the other side with toothpaste, court records state. He also cleaned up blood from the bedroom.

Jimenez changed his account of what happened at least three times, finally admitting that he picked up the gun that was on the bed and took out the magazine, according to an arrest report. As he waved the gun around, he said, he unintentionally pulled the trigger. He said he thought the gun was unloaded and didn’t realize there was a round in the chamber. He hid the gun in a dog food bag at his house.

3v

[bunbeeplays]

The Lemon Legacy: Generation 1, Chapter 17 - Tiffing with Tiff

The next day, the band, and Tiff, go to Miko and Penny's new apartment to talk about their song choices. Penny doesn't love the white features but Miko likes how clean it looks, and love is about compromise. Penny can at least have her eclectic furniture to brighten the place up.

Miko: Thanks for agreeing to meet us here. I know San Myshuno is far from Tartosa.

Drew: No worries, it's all the same loading screen.

Miko: Uh, Tiff? Where's the other violinists? They were invited too.

Tiff: As lead, I can relay any info back to my cohorts.

Miko: Okay then. Did you all have a chance to look over the sheet music we sent you?

Ophelia: Yes! Let's pull them up.

Tiff: You young people and your technology.

Drew: It's the same technology every Sim has had since 2014, Tiff!

Penny: You guys are the experts. What do you think?

Moses: They're all great songs! Unique but not too wild. You have no idea how many times we get the same old songs to play.

Penny: You know I've gotta keep it fresh!

Miko: I vetoed some of the more... outrageous suggestions.

Penny: Looks like out ceremony music requires violin and piano. You okay doubling up, Piano Man?

Moses: I get double the pay so you know it!

Penny: Tiff, you good to learn the sheet music? I know this probably isn't the type of song you usually play.

Tiff: Already memorized.

Ophelia: I love your first dance song. I've been singing it for days. It's starting to get on my girlfriend's nerves!

Miko: Oh, you and Libby made it official! Congratulations. You've posted a bunch of pics with her on Simsta lately, so Penny and I had a hunch.

Tiff: I see. You two are... very friendly with Miss Ophelia outside of work, huh?

Penny: Well, we kind of cornered her in a coffee shop. Hard to keep things strictly business after that. Plus, who else would I constantly text asking to go to the Spice Festival with me?

Tiff: I see. Well, I have connections of my own. Heard of Ty Harper? Head writer for PlumBright Magazine? I could get him to write an entire feature on your wedding!

Penny: The scumbag from that trashy gossip rag? No thanks. You're friends with him?

Tiff: ...I'm married to him

Miko: Uh, moving on. Were there any issues you all saw with the songs for the reception?

Drew: No, everything looks good. People might have song requests but we know a ton of songs.

Ophelia: My mind is a steel trap for song lyrics, I should be good to cover most requests.

Tiff: If young Ophelia doesn't have the range for a certain song you want I'd be more than happy to fill in!

Miko: Uh, thanks, but we made sure we selected songs in her range. I'm sure requests will be fine. You're amazing at violin, we'd like you to do that.

Tiff: I can do both!

Penny: Lady, we don't want you to do both, she's trying to be nice. You're lucky you're playing at all, after the way you treated Miko during our tour! Lucky for you, my fiancée is a lot more forgiving than me!

Tiff: In my defense, teens and young adults look exactly alike!

Miko: Honey, it's okay! Tiff, we're happy with the plan we currently have. We'd appreciate if you focused on getting your team prepped. You're an amazing violinist.

Tiff: Well your taste in singers is... different than mine but you sure know your stuff about string instruments.

The elevator ride downstairs is awkward. Tiff doesn't seem to notice or mind.

Tiff: The clients' questionable choices aside, I'd say that was a successful meeting. Gotta say, that Pizzazz girl has a screw loose. Guess that's why she's such good friends with you, eh, Ophelia?

Ophelia: Do you constantly have to undermine and insult me every chance you get? I've been trying real hard to be civil.

Tiff: I'm sorry, it's just really easy to undermine you, sweetheart. You still have your baby fat.

Ophelia: It was just the holidays. This is regular fat!

Ophelia: I'm singing at this one wedding! It sounds like you're going to sing at the rest of them after this! What's the big deal?

Tiff: You KNOW the big deal. This is a celebrity wedding. One of the guests could make me a star and you just stumbled ass-first into this gig!

Drew: Tiff, you're being more ridiculous than usual. The clients made their decision. You're not going to change their minds.

Tiff: Why's everyone on her side? This was supposed to be my big break. You don't know what it's like to have something so huge taken from you!

Ophelia: You don't know anything about me! If your husband is such a big shot, just get connections through him.

Tiff: He's too good of a man to abuse his power like that.

Moses: Didn't he send paparazzi to Judith Ward's second husband's funeral? Tiff: No one asked, Moses.

Tiff: Fine, if you're determined to embarrass yourself on that stage, be my guest. Don't worry, I'll stay away from you until the wedding. Worrying about you destroying the Laurents' reputation is going to give me stress wrinkles anyway.

Ophelia: UGH! What is her damage! Does she have some sort of tragic backstory or something?

Drew: Nah, I think she just likes being a bitch.

Moses: Look, let's not worry about her now, love. We've got your back. Let's go to the venue and practice, yeah?

Ophelia: Okay. Thanks.

[eretzyisrael]

“This is not a battle of good versus evil,” Ramzi Kassem wrote in an op-ed that appeared on September 17, 2001. “The perpetrators were probably not driven to their actions by some intrinsic evil or inherent hatred of the good United States.”

He went on to argue that the Al Qaeda attack a week earlier was the result of the “resentment these terrorists felt towards the United States” as a result of “our country’s policies.”

Two decades later, Kassem, now a CUNY law professor and prominent terror lawyer, claimed in a Washington Post op-ed that, “since 9/11, the government has consistently used the law to enable, operationalize and justify the violence it has deployed against Muslims.”

And that, “the legacy of 9/11 ought to be recounted primarily through the stories of Muslims the world over who have largely paid the price of American power and prosperity.”

Next year, Ramzi Kassem was named by the Biden administration as a Senior Policy Advisor for Immigration at the White House Domestic Policy Council.

A Syrian national who grew up in Lebanon, Iraq and other Islamic terror states, arriving in this country to attend college and spread terrorist propaganda before becoming a terror lawyer, Kassem seems like a national security risk rather than a White House Policy Council adviser.

Ramzi Kassem had boasted of having “held the record for the longest delayed security clearance in the Guantánamo setting”, but even that does not seem to have dissuaded the Biden administration from bringing him on board.

While some leave behind the extremist views of their college years, Ramzi Kassem instead built a career around them, becoming a noted terrorist lawyer whose Gitmo inmate clients included Ahmed al-Darbi, an Al Qaeda terrorist and the brother-in-law of one of the hijackers who flew a plane into the Pentagon, and who was himself a key figure in the bombing of an oil tanker.

Some lawyers represent paying clients, but Kassem, like many terror lawyers, worked pro-bono, and his advocacy echoed his pre-existing support for Islamic terrorism.

In his columns, as in his activism, Ramzi Kassem repeatedly justified terrorism as a reaction to its victims. “Terrorism is but one of many reactions to oppression and dispossession and not their cause.”

While at Columbia University, Kassem co-founded Turath, an association of Muslim students, and then Qanun at Columbia Law. A fellow student described these hateful groups as having brought “under the guidance of Mr. Kassem… speakers to this campus that support violence against American and Israeli civilians… defended the genocidal program of Hamas.”

The Columbia letter noted that, “one speaker, disavowed by many of America’s pro-Palestinian activists, prior to being invited to Columbia, had said that Jews exist only to ‘dip their matzahs in the blood of Palestinian children.’”

This antisemitic blood libel didn’t seem to have interfered with Kassem’s career prospects.

Kassem’s college obsession with Jews extended even to condemning Columbia’s dining hall for serving “Israeli Wrap” sandwiches and demanding that the name be changed to the “more inclusive” Middle-Eastern Wrap. But not all of Kassem’s hostility to Jews was non-violent.

In his own columns for the university paper, Kassem boasted of throwing stones at Israel.

“On a sunny day in early August, I headed down to the Lebanese-Israeli border at Fatima’s Gate with busloads of Palestinian adolescents from the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatila, and we threw some stones,” he described. “Lebanese civilians, young and old, were playfully going through the motions… Having lived through my fair share of Israeli bombardments, raids, and sieges, I figured I might as well partake in the festivities.”

Even more violent acts of antisemitic murder found a ready defense.

“Some Palestinians resort to terrorism for many of the same reasons that people from various backgrounds have in the past: namely, despair and much endured suffering,” Kassem argued. “One must ask oneself how and why a human being was pushed to the limit and saw no way out of a situation short of blowing himself or herself up.”

These defenses of Islamic terrorism came within the larger context of calls to eliminate Israel and accusations of ethnic cleansing, while blaming Islamic violence against Jews, even before the creation of Israel, on its Jewish victims.

Kassem was named a Paul and Daisy Soros Fellow, a project of a foundation by Soros’ brother, notorious for its cultivation of political extremists hostile to America and its values, and worked with the Center for Constitutional Rights, a former Communist organization.

After law school, Ramzi Kassem founded Creating Law Enforcement Accountability & Responsibility (CLEAR) at CUNY to provide free legal aid to Muslims accused of terrorism.

The City University of New York had become notorious for its antisemitic atmosphere and Kassem signed on to a letter in defense of antisemitic Islamist activism alongside known hate groups and terrorist support organizations like Students for Justice in Palestine, Al-Awda, Within Our Lifetime, and Samidoun: designated by Israel as a terrorist organization.

The letter accused Jews of using antisemitism to “repress activism and harass and threaten Palestinian students and Muslim students”.

Across the decades, Kassem’s college advocacy against Jews had come full circle from student to professor. And his war against this country has taken him from Gitmo to Washington D.C.

The Biden administration chose to elevate a vocal advocate for Islamic terrorists as a Senior Policy Advisor for Immigration at the White House Domestic Policy Council at a time when there are grave concerns about the penetration of terrorists through the unguarded southern border.

The Biden administration claims that it wants to protect the homeland and that it supports Israel. Putting Ramzi Kassem on its Domestic Policy Council shows those assertions to be lies. Its Policy Council includes a man who advocated for Gitmo terrorists and threw rocks at Israel.

Ramzi Kassem’s presence on driving the immigration agenda at the White House Domestic Policy Council is hard evidence that the Biden administration is putting the rights of Muslim terrorists ahead of the safety and welfare of Americans.

The White House Domestic Policy Council coordinates and develops the Biden agenda. Including a vocal activist against national security will have consequences. And the Biden administration will not be able to play innocent when one of the Islamic terrorists it allows into the country kills Americans.

This article was originally published in World Israel News and can be viewed here.

[qnewsau]

Queensland government halts hormone treatment for trans children

New Post has been published on https://qnews.com.au/queensland-government-halts-hormone-treatment-for-trans-children/

Queensland government halts hormone treatment for trans children

The Queensland government has halted any new patients under 18 from accessing hormone treatments, including puberty blockers, in the state’s health system.

LNP Health Minister Tim Nicholls (above) announced the “pause” on Tuesday alongside a new review into the evidence for stage one and two hormone therapies for children with gender dysphoria.

It comes as Nicholls announced the health department would investigate “clinical governance issues” within the Cairns Sexual Health Service.

“The Cairns Sexual Health Service delivered an apparently unauthorised pediatric gender service without an agreed model of care to 42 pediatric gender service clients,” Nicholls said.

“17… were prescribed stage one or stage two hormone therapy in a way that may not align with accepted Australian treatment guidelines.”

Tim Nicholls said an independent external reviewer would lead the evaluation. The reviewer will report within 10 months.

“The review will encourage the participation of clinicians and professionals with relevant expertise, as well as young people with lived experience and their families,” he said, per ABC News.

In the meantime, the government has stopped new patients under 18 from receiving hormone therapy in Queensland’s public health system.

“A binding health service directive will immediately pause the prescription of stage one and stage two hormone therapies to new patients in Queensland Health facilities,” he said.

Exemption for existing patients

He said patients “already on a treatment plan” in the Queensland Children’s Gender Service will be exempt from the new rule.

“I’m advised that medically that is the appropriate procedure to follow,” he said.

“The pause will remain in effect until such time as the government considers and acts on the outcomes of the broader review.”

Tim Nicholls said the Queensland Children’s Gender Service would continue all other clinical support to adolescents with gender dysphoria.

“That includes psychiatric and psychological treatment, counselling, and other clinically recommended medical interventions,” he said.

He said children “will be supported” but argued gender-affirming care is “contested” and provision of care must be “grounded on solid evidence”.

Government stops expansion of Children’s Gender Service

Last year, an earlier independent evaluation of the Queensland Children’s Gender Service was released by the former Labor government.

It found the service provided “effective care from referral to discharge” consistent with national and international guidelines. The earlier review found no evidence patients or their families were “hurried or coerced” into medical treatment decisions.

That review recommended Queensland Health consider a statewide network of regional clinics to care for children and adolescents close to home.

But Tim Nicholls said on Tuesday the Queensland Government “does not support expansion of the Queensland Children’s Gender Service”.

“[The government] has paused further delivery of the evaluation recommendations, pending further consideration,” he said.

He argued the scope of the previous review didn’t examine the “evidence base” for stage one and stage two hormone therapy.

“The evaluation that was undertaken was in the nature of how is the service delivered, not whether that service ought to be delivered,” he said.

The Queensland Children’s Gender Service (QCGS) was established in 2017 and provides care to children statewide.

As of June 2024, the service had 547 children and adolescents actively receiving care. Another 491 patients were on waiting lists that .

For the latest LGBTIQA+ Sister Girl and Brother Boy news, entertainment, community stories in Australia, visit qnews.com.au. Check out our latest magazines or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.

[tameblog]

Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife…thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I’m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link

[ramestoryworld]

Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife…thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I’m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link

[alexha2210]

Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife…thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I’m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link

[angusstory]

Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife���thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I’m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link

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Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife…thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I’m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link

[usafphantom2]

Saab delivers the first serial-produced Gripen E fighter to Sweden's Defense Material Administration

Fernando Valduga By Fernando Valduga 10/20/2023 - 09:08am Military, Saab

On Friday, October 6, an important milestone was surpassed when Saab delivered the first serially produced Gripen E aircraft to the FMV (Sweden Defense Material Administration), which will now operate the aircraft before delivering it to the Swedish Armed Forces.

In the past, two JAS39 Gripen E were delivered to FMV for use in flight test operations, but under the Saab operating license.

"I am very happy and pleased that we have reached this important milestone towards the implementation of the hunt. It is an important milestone and more deliveries will take place soon," says Lars Tossman, head of Saab's aeronautical business area.

Lars Helmrich accompanied the development of the Gripen system for almost 30 years, first as a fighter pilot and then as commander of the Skaraborg F7 air flotilla. As the current head of FMV's aviation and space equipment business area, he is impressed with the aircraft that are now being delivered.

"The delivery means that FMV has now received all parts of the weapon system to operate the Gripen E independently," said Mattias Fridh, Head of Delivery Management for the Gripen Program. "Its technicians have received training on the Gripen E and have initial capabilities for flight line operations and maintenance. The support and training systems have already been delivered, and parts of the support systems delivered in 2022 were updated in August to match the new configuration."

So far, three aircraft have been delivered to the Swedish state, used in testing operations. From 2025, the plan is for FMV to deliver the JAS 39E to the Swedish Air Force. However, Air Force personnel are already, and have been since 2012, involved in development activities with both pilots and other personnel. It is an important part of the Swedish model to ensure that what the user receives is really necessary.

“This is a very important step for deployment in the Swedish Armed Forces in 2025 at F7 Satenäs, and FMV has now applied for its own flight test authorization from the Swedish Military Aviation Safety Inspection. This is the culmination of intensive work in both development and production, where many employees have done a fantastic job."

In addition to Sweden and Brazil, which have already placed orders for JAS 39 E/F, several countries show interest in the system. Today, Gripen is operated by Hungary, the Czech Republic and Thailand through agreements with the Swedish government and FMV. Brazil and South Africa have business directly with Saab.

Tags: Military AviationFlygvapnet - Swedish Air ForceFMVGripen EJAS39 Gripensaab

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Fernando Valduga

Fernando Valduga

Aviation photographer and pilot since 1992, has participated in several events and air operations, such as Cruzex, AirVenture, Dayton Airshow and FIDAE. He has work published in specialized aviation magazines in Brazil and abroad. Uses Canon equipment during his photographic work in the world of aviation.

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Corrina Gordon-Barnes’ journey from dating guys to finding a wife…thanks to travel sickness! And of course the best food to help with travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your partner…) In addition to this story, at the end of this episode I’ll share with you the best food for travel sickness (in case you’ve already found your wife or partner). OK enough hints from me, let’s get on with the story. Our guest, Corrina Gordon-Barnes I am super excited to be joined here today for our story by Corrina Gordon-Barnes. Corrina is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships. So Corrina, welcome to the Clean Food, Dirty Stories podcast! I’m really excited to have you here today! Corrina: Thank you so much for inviting me to connect with you. Me: Oh well you’re so welcome! I love your story and I really can’t wait for us to share it with everybody. Corrina’s story, starting with being boy mad Me: Without further ado, the first question I wanted to ask you…and I’ve said a little bit about what you do now, but when you were small, or younger, how did you see your dream relationship one day? Did you have princess dreams or did you have a particular type of partner in mind before you actually met your life partner? Corrina: Well, I was boy mad. Me: Boy mad! Corrina: Boy mad, like going through my primary school years, I remember that I was the one in my class who learned about sex really early. I was the one who would get all these teenage magazines, even as a late primary school age kid, and I would be teaching my friends at school. “You can get pregnant the first time you have sex” and “be careful with your boyfriend”. Me: Oh my god! A relationship expert…in primary school Corrina: I was like this relationship expert, even at that age I was teaching my friends. Like “these are all the myths, don’t do this, do this” and so I was kind of boy mad, I was relationship mad. Getting into my teens I remember with my friends we would literally kind of go out prowling the streets. We would walk along the high street in my town where I lived and we would be looking for boys and we would be kind of flirting and coy. There was always some boy that I had my eye on. Always some guy who had my attention, I would try and make sure I was in the same place as him so that he would see me… Me: Sounds familiar, yeah. So I was definitely, I definitely wanted boys. That was very clear to me. Me: And you got engaged to a boy at one stage, right? Corrina: Yeah, so I had one really long term relationship before I met who is now my partner, and we got engaged at age 17. Me: Wow! We were gonna get married and we were gonna have all these babies and we were gonna live in this particular kind of house and have this life… That was the path that I thought I was on at that age. Me: So then what happened to take you off that path? The path to self-discovery Corrina: Well that relationship was not the right one, and so that ended 4 years later and I stayed then single for quite a while. You know, I was really wanting to find myself. So I went on this whole spiritual, personal growth journey. I read every book I could get, I did meditation, I went vegan… It had this whole kind of personal growth change in my life. Me: What do you think prompted that? Was it the end of that relationship that prompted that? I mean, what were your thoughts? Were you just like ‘Oh I think I need to take care of myself more’ or become a different person, or…? Corrina: I was in Australia and I was just there travelling for a year. And I met this guy – surprisingly enough – in a cafe. He just said “Hey I go to this meditation course down the road, why don’t you come along”. And so I went and that very first moment, that very first time in the room with that meditation teacher, she told me that I was a spiritual being. She said to me – to the whole group but I really heard this – “You are a spirit soul having this human experience, but you are a spiritual being”. It was like someone had just told me who I was. Like “oh my gosh, that’s who I am, this human life is how I get to journey and explore and have an adventure, but I’m a spiritual being”. The layers (or the clothes) fall away Me: So did you have that as like an inner knowing, or how did you experience it? Because people experience those things in different ways, right? Some people experience a physical sensation of light, other people experience it as just an inner sense of knowing… Corrina: It was like all my clothes fell off. Me: (laughs) Um…I haven’t heard that one before! Corrina: It was like this casing, this casing just fell off. I literally woke up the next morning and I was vegan, I went from a complete meat eater to being vegan overnight just like that. And I was just on this journey then to just explore and discover myself and get back to the essential nature of my being. It was like everything that wasn’t true about me just kind of fell away over the coming months. Me: Wow. That’s very cool! Corrina: Yeah, it was pretty cool, I felt much lighter, it was like clothes coming off. I was just light, I was much, much lighter, much more energized, much freer, much more joyful. Me: It’s interesting that you say that for you, all your clothes coming off, like some people might associate that with being exposed, right? Being vulnerable. And for you, you associate that with being light. So that’s really interesting. Corrina: And just free. I remember in Australia, those kind of days, weeks after that moment. It was like I was floating along the streets. I was so free, I was feeling so connected with people, like I had just woken up. On to Cambridge University…and a fated bus trip Me: Yeah. Wow! And so how did you get from there to Cambridge University? Corrina: Yeah, so I decided that I wanted to do teacher training so I came to Cambridge University and signed up for the English and Drama teacher training course here. And on that very first day in class, they sat me next to this woman called Sam. There was something about her that just immediately kind of, like something just…a light bulb went off or something just happened. It was like ‘Huh, she’s just come on my radar really strongly, why am I paying attention to her so much?’ So she was really in my awareness and we were both in the same school together so we were both placed to do our teacher practice in the same school. And on the first day of teaching practice, I got onto the bus that would take us to our practice school and I got on and she was sitting in the front seat. Now I always need to sit in the front seat in a bus because I get travel sick. So I just went over to her…I’d already clocked her as someone who was on my radar, and I just said “Oh, are you OK if I join you in the front seat?” And she said “Yeah sure, I have to sit here because I get travel sick” and I said “Oh me too!” So we sat side by side and over the months to come we became best friends. Just absolutely clicked, became best friends, incredible support through the whole teaching practice. A brave declaration Me: And was there any like physical attraction at that stage? Or did that come later? Corrina: Immediately! Immediately, I was like ‘Huh! What is this woman doing to me, what is this, what is happening here? I just feel energized around her, she lights me up, I feel excited, I feel like the world is just kind of shinier…’ Me: Wow! Corrina: Everything just felt brighter and more energized. Me: It sounds like a good, a good…I don’t know, I mean, I’ve never like taken acid or anything but (laughs) it sounds like, you know, a positive drug experience without the drugs, right? Corrina: (laughs) Totally! Totally, a kind of ‘switch-on, turn-on, I’m awake, I’m alive, oh my gosh, who are you’ kind of thing. Me: Was it the same for her as well? Corrina: Well what was so funny was that over the months that then came, was that I basically told her (laughs). I just said “Basically I’ve realized that I’m just completely in love with you. Do you feel that too?” Me: Wow! That was so brave of you cause you were friends at that stage, right? Like best friends, you don’t want to wreck your relationship with your best friend by taking the risk but you did! Corrina: I just did! And that’s kind of, you know, the kind of continuity of the whole spiritual journey for me of just like I’m free. You know, I’m free. If I feel this thing, I have to follow my heart. I have to just blurt out like “I’m in love with you, I don’t know if you feel the same way”. And to start out with, it wasn’t something that she let herself feel straight away. Determined and keeping faith Me: So what did she say when you said this? When you blurted this out? Corrina: She said “You know, I feel really connected with you, I love you a lot as a friend, but it’s not romantic for me”. Me: And how did that make you feel? Corrina: Oh, heartbroken. Absolutely heartbroken. But also there was something… it was almost like inside I was going ‘You just wait!’ (laughs) ‘You just wait. I know that you’re the one for me, I’ll just be patient, I’ll just hang on’. Me: Oh wow! Other people though could have had quite a different reaction, right? I mean some people might have, I imagine anyway, some people might have just, you know, stayed in the heartbroken phase and then just walked away, right? And lost it. Corrina: No, I believed, I really had faith that this… There was a reason I was feeling this way, I couldn’t ignore it, I couldn’t shake it, I just kept believing in it and stayed consistently just loving her and being a good friend in the months where… You know, it took 3 months basically of us staying friends and me just loving her, and loving her, and loving her. And then just after Christmas we got together as a couple. And just before Christmas… Me: And what happened? So how did that happen? Like you’re friends, it’s been like you know 3 months, she knows how you feel, did she just all of a sudden like make a move? Or did she say something to you? Corrina: Well, I made the move. Again. Me: (laughs) Oh my god! So it’s like ‘OK I’ve already been kind of rejected once, let me have another go’. Right? Corrina: Exactly! (laughs) Or a few gos! So there was that initial conversation and then there was another conversation where I basically said – this was just before Christmas – I basically said “Are you sure?” Me: Oh my god! Corrina: “I still feel this thing…” and she again was like “No really, we’re just friends”. So that was the second time and then third time lucky! I just made a move and I thought ‘You know what? I’m just gonna take a risk again, I’m just gonna be bold. What’s the worst that can happen? Rejection, right? What’s the best that can happen? I can be with the love of my life’. Me: Oh my god – yeah but that was still just so…Right, OK. That was still just so brave. Once is already like super brave, right? Braver than most people. Twice is like oh my god, you know, three times you start to think OK, hmmm… Corrina: Yeah, and it worked! (laughs) Third time lucky and it was just after Christmas and that was now 13 years ago – 14 years ago. What was she thinking? Me: And so what did she, like…You made the move and what did she then say? Was she like ‘oh I didn’t know until you touched me’ or was she like ‘oh I realized it at the same time as you’ or was she… Corrina: I think it was less of a thought thing. It was just, you know, when it happened then it just felt right. Like ‘oh this is where I was meant to be, OK, got it’. Me: And that’s what she felt too? Was that how she verbalised it to you? Corrina: Well and to give her credit here, so she’s gay and I’m bi, right? So for a gay woman, if a bisexual woman says ‘I’m in love with you’, there’s gonna be a sense of ‘hmm, OK maybe you’re just trying this out, maybe actually this is just a kind of short-term thing for you and really you’re gonna want to be with guys’ Me: Yeah, I’ve heard that, yeah. Proving her love Corrina: So it’s a real credit for her that for those months she was, you know, guarding her heart for that, because you don’t know what’s gonna happen, if that person declaring their love for you is gonna be constant. So I had to kind of prove that actually I meant it. When I said I loved her, I meant it and I was gonna be in it for the long haul. Me: So do you think that a part of her was not testing you, but kind of like unconsciously perhaps waiting? You know? Corrina: Yeah. Me: Oh OK, that makes a lot more sense. Cause in my mind I was imagining somebody who, you know, was neither gay nor bi and who maybe had, I don’t know, only gone out with guys or something and so then for somebody like that it would be much more of a 180, right? Corrina: Yeah, no she’s gay through and through. Me: Well, fortunately for you as it turns out, right? (laughs) The human being behind the coverings Corrina: Well that’s the thing for me as a bisexual woman. For me it’s not about the fact that I like men and women, it’s the fact that I like people and the gender is just irrelevant. And that’s kind of part of what happened in that spiritual awakening moment in Australia. It was like all of the coverings, you know, whether it’s our bodies or our personalities or any of that is kind of what covers the essence of us. And actually for me the essence of someone doesn’t have a gender. So I fell in love with her like I might have thought or indeed fell in love with guys in the past because I just fall in love with the person, you know, that essence of the human beings behind all the trappings. Me: That’s amazing because I feel the same way. It’s kind of weird how that works, right? It’s kind of like yeah, you feel the essence of the person. Seeing into the soul I mean I even had one guy say to me – this was like in a totally different context and we did not get together in the end but I do remember him saying to me at one point, I mean he wasn’t the right person for me but he was kind of freaked out at one stage. Because he was like “It’s like you want my soul!” and I was saying “It’s not that I want your soul, it’s that I see it!” I believe that I see it, right? And I think that you know, some people… I mean, credit to Sam as well because she’s obviously a really strong person too in that, you know, some people would be freaked out by that, right? Some people would be like ‘oh well…it’s the real me here that’s being…I don’t know if I want to say exposed but seen, right? Some people…we use those trappings to cover stuff up, right? As we all know, so…That brings a level of intimacy that’s probably quite cool I would imagine, right? Corrina: Yeah, and you know, don’t get me wrong, I love that she’s a woman as well. I love her long hair and her soft skin and her blue eyes, all the things that make her a woman as well I love. So it’s not like I don’t see those things, but that was never gonna be a filter, like I would only go for… The spectrum of sexuality Me: Yeah. I mean it’s really interesting because I…for me, I��m sure, I would imagine perhaps for you as well, I see the whole homosexual/heterosexual thing as this big spectrum and I have a really good friend who…Well I do playback theater and one of my friends, she’s in a playback theater troupe where they’re all either bi or gay or whatever, and then we did a workshop at one point. They were inviting guest playbackers to go. And one of the exercises they did that was…I just thought it was really cool. They said ‘put yourself…if stage left is like totally 100 percent gay and stage right is totally 100 percent heterosexual, put yourself on the spectrum, place yourself physically where you think you are’. It was really cool to see people, you know, all along the stage, all at different points. I just thought that was very normal, right? Because we’re all…for me, anyway, in my mind we’re all spiritual beings and so as you say, there’s no gender there, right? Corrina: And for some people there are. You know, that’s the thing, people who are that kind of 100 percent on the spectrum, brilliant, they’re really clear that they only want people of the opposite or the same sex. Yes, spectrum is beautiful. What Corrina does now Me: Yeah, wow! So now I really want to know more then about how… (laughs)…how you went from, well, what you do now to help people with their relationships. Because obviously you have a lot more knowledge than when you were in primary school and I know you’re helping people with a lot more than how to not get unwanted pregnancies and things! (laughs) Corrina: (laughs) Absolutely! Me: So what do you do now with people and how do you help them have these beautiful, deep relationships? Corrina: Yeah, and my work is around all relationships that are important. So it’s…my clients, some of them it’s really about their partner relationship but for others it’s about their relationship with their mom or their daughter or their brother. For me, connection…it’s a kind of cliche but connection is what we’re hard wired for. We as human beings love to connect, we love to love people with our full hearts. But there are so many things that stop that from happening within us. We get resentful, we get frustrated, we get disappointed, we feel let down, we feel indignant, all of this. And I over the course of my own personal journey have found a very, very miraculous way of dealing with all those blocks. So it’s the process of questioning your thoughts, questioning your stories, that block connection. An example of our made-up stories So let’s say I’m with Sam and let’s say she’s saying something that sounds critical. My story in my head goes, ‘she’s criticizing me, she doesn’t love me, she’s being mean to me’. You know, ‘I want her to be kind, I want her not to point out my flaws’, all of that. That is all story. It’s all mental. It’s all… Me: Yes! It’s all made up. Corrina: It’s all made up! And we don’t realize it, we think, ‘no but this is true, she’s criticizing me, this is what’s happening’. And so what I am so blessed to have come into contact with a number of years ago is the process of questioning those thoughts. Just sitting with those thoughts and asking them, ‘Is this true? Is this accurate, is this the correct interpretation of what’s going on?’ Not just is it true that that’s what’s going on, but is it true that I would be better off if it were happening differently? Me: OK… Corrina: Like am I sure? So let’s say your loved one is truly critizing you. They’re saying to you “you’re a stupid, ugly, whatever, whatever”. Can I be sure that my happiness depends on them not saying that? Can I be sure that I can only feel good about myself and peaceful if they stop doing that? Because it sets up a very limited version of life if I’m always waiting for someone else to give me something, to give me what I think I need in order to be peaceful and happy. It’s like I delay my peace and my happiness until other people and other circumstances arrange themselves in just the right way. Our rules…and our scripts Me: Yeah, it’s like our rules, right? Where we all have these rules about what has to happen for us to be happy and the more…the easier it is to be happy, then the happier we are, right? Corrina: Exactly, exactly. I talk about our scripts. It’s like, I realized pretty early on with Sam that I had a script, that if she followed this script and she said and she did exactly what I, you know, expected her to do then I would feel happy, but if she went off script then I wouldn’t be happy, I’d be pissed off. She really helped me see this, she said to me one day “Why don’t you just give me your fucking script Corrina! Give me your script, tell me what I need to do”. And I was like “How dare you! This is just what you’re meant to do, you’re my wife, this is how you’re meant to treat me”. Then it kind of dawned on me a few days later, like ‘oh my gosh, my script is the source of all of my unhappiness. Every moment that I want her to be doing something other than what’s reality, I am causing my own unhappiness’. Corrina’s ‘big work’ Me: Right. So then your relationship was, I guess, far from…I don’t want to say far from idyllic, but you had to work through some of this stuff in your relationship with Sam? Corrina: One hundred percent. I wouldn’t be doing this work if I hadn’t had to…if this hadn’t been my big work. You know, so yes like I was completely besotted with her in the beginning, and we got together and it was blissful, and then all my stories started to kick in. ‘Hmmm, well she’s not this’ and ‘hmmm, she said that and that’s not OK’ and ‘would I be better off with someone who did this’ and you know, all those stories eroded what I had imagined would be this perfect relationship. So it’s like I had to work on that, I had to take those stories and stop those stories from sabotaging this beautiful relationship that we had underneath all those stories. Me: Yeah. It’s good that you managed to do that, thank goodness, right? Corrina: I mean, it saved my marriage. It saved my relationship. A daily practice Me: And did it take a long time? Corrina: Yeah, it’s a daily practice. It really is a daily practice, it’s like if you want to be fit, like you’ve done today (laughs), you go to the gym, you go for a run, you do your yoga. You don’t just be like ‘oh I’ll do it one time and then it’s done’. If you want a healthy, thriving, fit relationship with anybody, whether it’s your son or your dad or your sister, there’s daily practice to do. There’s daily work to do every time you get triggered, every time something gets in the way of you being totally, wholeheartedly connected with the human being in front of you, you’ve got something to look at there. Me: Yeah, but at least you can…I mean, what am I trying to say, there comes a time when you catch yourself, right? At least, you know, having done a certain amount of work, then you can get to the point where you see what’s happening, right? As an observer almost and you can go ‘OK hang on, I’m doing this again, this is my script’. Whereas at the beginning, you know, when people aren’t even aware of their scripts, I imagine it takes them a little bit… well it depends on the person I guess, right? How much time it would take them to start to see and to start to implement I guess the tools that you give them, right? Corrina: Absolutely, yes, you’re completely spot on. When you get triggered And you know, now I’m at the point where I get triggered and it could be like anything, right? It could be I’m on Facebook and I see a message from someone and I feel like ‘oh they should have, you know, complimented me rather than give me negative feedback on something’. Right? Instantly, ‘oh! OK, there’s a trigger! A button’s gotten pushed’. And now I’m at the point where I’m like ‘Oooh, good, what’s here for me?’ Me: I do the same thing, that’s really funny! Yeah, I had something that happened the other day that made me so angry and then I’m like ‘OK if this is making me this angry and, you know, the other 30 people in the room are not angry, they actually think it’s quite cute…’ (laughs) We all get triggered, even by 8-year old authors I’ll tell you what it was, it was quite funny. I was at this day workshop with an amazing speaker and there was this little girl, she’s like 8 years old and she’s written a book. Actually she’s written 3 books, right? Corrina: Wow! Me: And it made me so annoyed! And I just thought…you know, not only envious, obviously envious, you know, 3 books at age 8, but also annoyed because, you know, her mom was there and I knew what it was. It brought up all the old scripts of, you know, stage mothers because I did theater before and so I had a good friend who had a stage mother who was just absolutely unbearable whereas, you know, my mom was the opposite. So I see what you mean, you get these reactions, right, that are completely irrational because the people around me were applauding her and they were like ‘oh isn’t that wonderful’ and I was like inside going ‘this is making me so angry!’ But we all get triggered, don’t we, right? Examples of tiny triggers Corrina: Oh, everyone. And it could be like the tiniest thing, that’s what I always find fascinating. It could be just one line in an email. Or it could be just the way that your partner, you know, turns over in their sleep, just the tiniest little things. Often my clients say to me “Oh, you know, I can’t bring this to you today, it’s just so small” and I’m like “No, no, that’s exactly what to bring!”. The fact that he put tofu in the stir fry rather than kidney beans, you know. There was something, there was some offense against you. So there you are with that 8 year old girl, that offense that she’s committing against you in that moment that’s kind of violating something is like, you know, ‘she’s further ahead than me’ or ‘she’s achieved one of my life goals’ or, you know… Me: Yeah, and she’s 8 and I’m 55! Corrina: And she’s 8! It’s just to be so compassionate with ourselves that ‘oh look, there’s this part of me that feels in some way threatened or violated or hurt by this, let me just so lovingly look there and heal that part of myself’. Being compassionate with yourself Me: Ah, yeah, that’s a really key point there that you brought up so I just wanted to emphasize it, yeah. That being compassionate with that part of ourselves, right? Rather than being like, OK, you know, with that kind of…what’s the word, forced smile on our faces, going ‘Ah, another beautiful part of me to transform’, you know (laughs), right? Right? And we can be quite hard on ourselves with that, right, and be like ‘OK what’s at the bottom of this!’ and take a kind of like pickaxe to it. At least that’s what I would do or could do rather than choosing to as you say, acknowledge with love that part of ourselves and treat it as part of, you know, part of the inner child or whatever you want to call it, that needs love and compassion. That’s a really interesting point that we don’t want to forget. Wow! That’s very cool. How to work with Corrina So when you work with people, I would love to hear just a bit more about what the different ways are that you…Do people come to see you in an office, or do you do things online, or how does that work? Corrina: Yes, so right now it’s one to one. There’s a potential of me offering something else in the kind of group workshop, retreat way, but not for now. What I do is I do free videos, everyone can just watch a free video every week, all about relationship hotspots and how to move past them, and then if people feel inspired and really like they’re wanting that support, they can have the one to one coaching. And for now that is by Skype or by phone, and I’m just starting to also offer that in person as well for people who I’m unable to physically meet with. Me: Yeah. That’s really fantastic, well thank you so much. What I’ll do is, I’ll link to everything that you do in the show notes but where’s the best place for people to look online to find out more about what you’re doing and more about you and to get access to the videos and things? An online video library…and a 7 Day Relationship Challenge Corrina: Yeah, so if they go to corrinagordonbarnes.com, I’ll just spell that out, and if you go to the blog page that’s where I’ve got all the videos and articles that have happened so far. So that’s a really good place just to go, it’s like settling into a library of relationship wisdom and gems, just settling in and watching some of the videos and just seeing if the approach makes sense to you. The right people for this work are people who watch a video and go ‘oh my gosh, that makes so much sense!’ And they apply that tip that I’m sharing and they come back and they say “Wow I had this incredible experience with my mom! Because I did the thing that you…” I do like challenges in the video so they’re like “I did the challenge that you set and I had a completely different experience with my mom this week, thank you!” Me: That’s brilliant! Corrina: It’s so good, it’s so satisfying. So on the blog page that’s where people can look at all the videos so far. And on the homepage people can sign up for the free 7 Day Relationship Challenge. 7 days to feel more connected Me: That sounds intriguing for sure! Corrina: Yes! It’s 7 days to feel more connected, that’s the overarching focus. How can you feel more connected? That beautiful feeling of just wholehearted connection with the person in front of you, and I give a number of challenges that you can actually implement to help you feel that way. Me: That is really fantastic! Well, I mean yeah, because as you say, we’re all starving for connection and I mean, we could do a whole episode just about the different ways people connect, right? Through food and smoking and alcohol, and, you know, apart from people, right? Corrina: Facebook! Me: Facebook! There’s so many…it’s a massive, massive topic but…so I wish we had more time! But thank you so much for being here to share your story, because I love your story and I love your journey and I really, really love what you’re doing right now, so I’m really grateful that you took the time to share that with us, so thank you so much! Corrina: You’re very welcome, thank you so much! A food to help with travel sickness So now I mentioned at the beginning of this episode that I’d share with you one of the best foods you can eat for help with travel sickness. And I think it will come as no surprise for most of you anyway to hear that that food is…ginger! Ginger has so many benefits it’s ridiculous. Not only can it help with travel sickness, but it’s also beneficial for other causes of nausea, like morning sickness, and it can help with pain relief as well. Why ginger is so helpful So this powerful little root contains loads of antioxidant and antiinflammatory compounds, including curcumin and capsaicin which are also found in turmeric which is another superfood. They’re part of the same plant family, turmeric, ginger and cardamom. Ginger also contains a ton of vitamins and minerals, including calcium, potassium, magnesium, phosphorus, niacin, iron, zinc and folate. A big list, right? And ginger is a great way to warm us up, because it’s a diaphoretic (that was my new word for today), which means that it heats the body from the inside out. So if you live in a cold climate for example, ginger can literally help warm you up inside. It also helps promote sweating, which is why it’s so good to have ginger tea if you’ve got a cold and you need to sweat out some toxins. Ginger even helps with pain relief But did you know that ginger can also help with pain relief? Two examples are exercise-induced muscle pain (so if you work out, eat some ginger), as well as menstrual cramps. So the next time you’re feeling crampy (I don’t know if that’s a word but I’ve just decided it is!), make yourself some strong ginger tea and see how you feel. Ginger can also help reduce inflammation, so scientists are looking to see if it can help with cancer, and particularly colon cancer. Ginger also is showing promise for helping treat that as well as inflammation caused by osteoarthritis. I’ll link to an article in the show notes that has more information about ginger’s many properties and benefits, it also includes links to the actual research in case you’d like to know more about that. And in addition I’ll link to an article that has some overall tips for avoiding travel sickness, including using ginger. So how do you eat ginger? If you need help with travel sickness and you want instant relief, well, you can definitely try peeling the root and gnawing on a piece…although I haven’t done that myself. Ginger’s pretty strong stuff. What I do is I usually juice a small piece of ginger with some carrots and apples for a really zinging morning juice. It tastes really, really good. Or you can pop a piece into your blender with other veggies and maybe some fruit for a green smoothie or a soup to give it a bit of a zing. It also helps you use less salt because it’s got a really strong flavor. Other people prefer to slice a few pieces into some very hot water and let it steep for a while with a slice or two of lemon to make ginger tea. And you can also grate ginger into soups, curries and other savory dishes. Or even just chop it finely and use it in stir-frys. I’ll link in the show notes to some recipes that I’ve got in my 5-Minute Mains recipe ebook that use ginger too, such as my Green Thai Curry. One thing for sure that I definitely recommend is that you use fresh ginger root wherever possible, rather than powdered ginger or capsules. I say that because the fresh vegetable is so easy to use and it’s always best I think to have the actual vegetable rather than some dried out version in a plastic capsule. But then again if capsules are all you have access to, better that than no ginger! If you do try something new with ginger, or something else that you feel can help with travel sickness, definitely share in the comments because I want to know! Have YOU got a story to share? Which brings us to the end of this week’s story – and if you’ve got a true story to share (and you’d like to know what food could have saved the day in your situation), I’d love to hear from you! Got a question, or a comment? Got a question, or a comment? Pop a note below in the comments, that would be awesome. You can also subscribe to the podcast to listen ‘on the go’ in iTunes. I hope you have an amazing day. Thank you so much for being here with me to share in my Clean Food, Dirty Stories. Bye for now! RESOURCES Link to 5-Minute Mains and other recipe ebooks: Article with nutritional information on ginger as well as links to scientific studies: Article with general tips to help with travel sickness: Corrina Gordon-Barnes is a Relationship Coach who’s committed to a world of happy couples and happy families. She teaches her clients how to be really good at relationships – how to love full-heartedly, let go of resentments, forgive, accept and live from power not victimhood. She lives in Cambridge, England with her wife, Sam.You can find Corrina at her website, on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. Source link