Why Meditation Doesn’t Need To Be So Hard – Ep#043 Interview With Energy Meditation Teacher, Sura Flow

0 (1s):
Welcome to the Soul Science Nutrition Ppodcast, where you’ll discover that when it comes to your health, you’re so much more powerful than you’ve been led to believe. And now your host, she’s a holistic nutrition and lifestyle coach, chef author, and Yogi, Christine Okezie. Hello,

Christine Okezie (23s):
And welcome to the Soul Science Nutrition podcast. Thanks so much for listening today. So my intention for my podcast is to empower you in your healing journey, by sharing knowledge, insights, and resources that can help you experience a greater sense of true wellbeing because you see there is no one size fits all, no magic bullet, no one path, the journey itself to creating your optimal health is the goal. And what I’ve come to know is that it’s a journey of compassionate self exploration into who and what we are. We are newly living in the Aquarian age, which ushered in profoundly new principles and ways of living away from the 2000 years of Piscean energies of rigidity and trenched belief systems, masculine dominance denying our physical bodies and our humanness.

Christine Okezie (1m 19s):
Today, we are called to live with greater awareness and sensitivity the tap into our own inner voices to favor wisdom over intellect, love over fear and embrace the divine, feminine, the qualities of intuition sensuality to honor our emotions. And if you’ve been listening to this podcast, you can understand how this really is the core approach to health. That lights me up and what I seek to embody in my work as a holistic health coach and Kundalini Yogi. And it’s why I know that I crossed paths with today’s special guest. Her name is Sura.

Christine Okezie (2m 0s):
Flow. SUra is a highly experienced meditation coach and trainer, who is passionate about helping people heal through the practice of meditation. Sura answered her calling to teach an approach to meditation that invites us to embrace both our masculine and feminine nature fully in her just released book Sura flow, Three Steps To Effortless Meditation and Unexpected Mmiracles. She presents an easy heart centered approach that cultivates energy flow, creativity and inner guidance for self-actualization Sura’s method has been taught to thousands of students around the world.

Christine Okezie (2m 44s):
I just loved our conversation and I know you will, too. If you’re looking for a more relaxed approach to meditation and a broader it perspective on spiritual practice, I know you’ll find her work uplifting and inspiring. So I hope you enjoy the show. And if you do like it, a he could leave a rating and review. I’d be grateful. And if you please haven’t already hit that subscribe button, please do so it helps me keep the podcast growing. Thank you. Hello, Sura. Welcome to the podcast. It’s lovely to have you here today.

Sura Flow (3m 18s):
Hi Christine. Thank you. I’m so happy to be here.

Christine Okezie (3m 22s):
So I’d love for you. If you could share, please, you’re a very inspirational story about how you found your path to meditation.

Sura Flow (3m 30s):
Oh, wow. It started pretty raw and messy. When I was in my late twenties, I was working on wall street in New York city and at the height of my career, then I was working at a boutique investment company, but I also was very depressed and lonely. I felt disenchanted with life and I was at a place pretty much rock bottom. And that’s when I had this inner prayer about, you know, God, I need to find a way to be here.

Sura Flow (4m 12s):
And I really didn’t even know if there was a God or if anybody was listening, but it was just a plea and enter plea for help. And I find that when you have those deep inner, please, the universe will respond. Yes. And thankfully I was, I found this book on Zen, Buddhism and meditation, and it was written by this woman named Cheri Huber who says, and none who had tried to commit suicide herself. And she wrote these really wonderful books that were simple truths that look hand lettered, and it really spoke to me. And I thought if meditation helped her find her life and spark and her joy that it could do the same for me.

Sura Flow (4m 58s):
So that’s how I started was just learning. I taught myself how to meditate from a book. I’m counting my breaths backward 10 to one. Yes. And that’s how it all began. And it just led me on this huge journey to want to learn more about meditation and eventually dedicate my life to the practice.

Christine Okezie (5m 19s):
You know, sometimes we have to have those, you know, we can change in moments of crisis or we’ve kind of hit that fork in the road. So, you know, it’s, what do they say? It’s those moments that, you know, bring us to our knees and all we have to look is up, you know, one of those. So it can be a real beautiful thing when we, you know, kind of things align that way. As you say, you know, we find what we need and those tough moments. So in your book, your will lovely, lovely book. You talk about the distinction in terms of what’s mostly available, or at least what’s mostly shared in the mainstream approach to meditation.

Christine Okezie (6m 1s):
You talk about the yang, the young and sort of the over dominance that you found, especially when you first started in the male dominated energy of meditation. So please share with us as that you do it so beautifully in the book. And I think it’s a really unique angle to look at what’s missing in most approaches to modern day meditation. How can we embrace more feminine energy when it comes to our meditation practice? And, and why is that important?

Sura Flow (6m 29s):
That’s true. I came from a really male dominated background as well. I think I felt much more comfortable in my male energy of achievement and competitiveness and doing and that quality of yang energy. And so when I went to study meditation and some of these places that were pretty disciplined and quote unquote, hardcore, I really didn’t question it. It was just, you know, that militaristic austere approach to meditation of just almost self bereavement, right? Like, yeah, I, when I went to India, I had nothing with me. I had a couple pairs of clothes and just my backpack.

Sura Flow (7m 14s):
So I literally had nothing. That was the way I thought towards spirituality is to, you know, give it all up, give up all your worldly, belongings, everything, that’s material and sacrifice and be quiet, you know, be silent, be strong. And so I started with these at these Ostrom’s and spiritual centers of meditating from morning, till night and working meditating, you know, it’s all revolved around the yoga practice or the meditation practice. And I didn’t question that approach at all. I didn’t really know anything about meditation. I just wanted to learn more, but I just started to see a lot of patterns when I was traveling.

Sura Flow (7m 59s):
So as I’m traveling, I’m noticing that everything is very masculine dominated, whether it’s the leaders or the teachers, and then also the approach, you know, it just being this very hard and fast disciplined approach to meditation. And then I did also become aware of people not being able to handle such a strong approach. So they leave in tears sometimes at the beginning because they just couldn’t handle the rigor of it. And yeah, it’s hard, you know, like if you’re practicing yoga six, eight hours a day, your body starts to break down, you know, you can start to get really exhausted.

Sura Flow (8m 39s):
And I was just wondering about this exhaustive model, you know, we have that model in corporate, right. You just kept going until you burn out.

Christine Okezie (8m 46s):
That’s right. Yeah.

Sura Flow (8m 48s):
So it’s just, I didn’t really question, you know, having a sustainable practice where you have space to rest and to process and to integrate all the spiritual purification practices. Right. Cause that’s when you do tons of breathing exercises and lots of yoga, all your deeper, stuff’s going to come to the surface that’s right. And you really need tools to deal with that. And I didn’t see any tools for that. I didn’t see leaders of community holding space for emotional release and outbursts or, you know, things that were kind of out of the meditation, peaceful norm, you know, it was like, you always had to try so hard to maintain the peace.

Sura Flow (9m 32s):
Right. But underneath there’s a tension, that’s there an unspoken tension. Yes. And I did notice too, like people that worked at these mushrooms, they were exhausted or resentful from overworking with no pay, you know, just things like that, where, you know, the, the, the energy’s there, but nobody’s talking about it.

Christine Okezie (9m 51s):
Wow. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So we, you, you kind of, it’s interesting how you left the corporate environment. And I come from previous life as well, the investment banking world, where everything was pedal to the metal proof, proof, proof, like you said, no pain, no gain. And you kind of found the equivalent in the spiritual world. Interesting. Right. So yeah,

Sura Flow (10m 15s):
It looks sort of denying yourself, you know, you’re still sort of denying everything that you’re going through because you’re supposed to be transcending. You’re supposed to be releasing. You’re supposed to be somewhere else. You know, not in that raw, crazy messy state, which I think is a necessary part of meditation. Yes. To be in, you know, everything gets glazed over. Oftentimes, you know, it’s according to what the teacher says or the guru says, or how things schedule every hour of your day is determined for you. And I, I do think that there’s value to discipline. I think it’s very important. There’s healing and structure and there’s healing and consistency, but it needs to be balanced with the softer aspect of gentleness and compassion and softness.

Sura Flow (11m 10s):
Just things that I didn’t really see while I was traveling it just, and, and really the, the, the point of my story where it all started to change for me was when I stopped having my menstrual cycle as a woman. Yeah.

Christine Okezie (11m 29s):
Wow. So can I found,

Sura Flow (11m 32s):
And, and I’m not the only one I’ve heard now many stories of other women who went to Asia specifically India and stopped having also their period. So I was surprised cause I, I didn’t know that other women had experienced that as well, but when I had lost so much weight and my hormones became imbalanced from studying this really rigorous practice, eight limbs, it that’s when I realized, Oh, wow, this was created 5,000 years ago by men for men, women were never given the privilege to have spiritual practice or take that path towards enlightenment.

Sura Flow (12m 15s):
They were expected to take care of the kids and the family household. Right. Yeah. And then you look at all religions and spirituality, it’s all Andrew centric from a male point of view, you know, we call God him. It’s the Holy Trinity, the God, the father and the son. I mean, it’s just that male bias while people will say things like, Oh, it doesn’t matter. I know what it really, but it does matter, you know, it puts an unconscious imprint on, you know, what is a spirituality.

Christine Okezie (12m 51s):
Yes. Yes. Thank you. Almost as if your body was really just a reflection of the imbalance, that was, you were going through really experiencing, you know, on all those levels. So you talk about the, you know, the ability, the, the component of the feminine, I guess, is the, is the compassion piece, the integration piece. I like the, what you call about the raw and the messiness of it, because I think that’s one of the nuances in most, if, you know, kind of traditional spiritual practices is that all of a sudden we’re supposed to start meditation and we go into bliss blissfulness right. It just happens like that.

Christine Okezie (13m 30s):
And, and if it does, that’s nice. But sometimes if it does, it’s oftentimes, you know, a bypass, a bypass to what’s really going on, which is not in the direction of health and healing to your point. Right. So can you describe then the system of, you know, the energy based system that you use called syrup flow?

Sura Flow (13m 52s):
Sure. It’s, it’s really an approach. It’s a heart centered meditation approach. That’s intuitive and based on energy and energy flow. Yeah. So something I started to realize as I was practicing is that I wasn’t, I wasn’t getting meditation. I realized that something was missing for me. And it was because I kept approaching meditation from the mind. Okay. Speak more about that. That’s really important. Yeah. I kept focusing on, you know, the space above my shoulders and just meditation as a mental practice. And I kept thinking, I feel like I’m missing something.

Sura Flow (14m 34s):
And the something for me was the rest of my body, my sexual energy and my heart, you know, really bringing the heart energy in, even in yoga sutras, if you look at potentially, for example, the hearts isn’t MES ma mentioned there, that’s true. And so I just thought, I need to love myself a lot more to learn this. And, and that was a key component, was self compassion because it’s like, there’s this hardness and meditation, like, if we’re hard on ourselves, we’re going to learn it better than if we just nurture ourselves or take care of ourselves or treat ourselves as a precious being.

Sura Flow (15m 18s):
And that will allow us to go much further in our practice. So that, that led me to Sarah flow, which is more the awareness of energy instead of just sitting there in my head, including my whole body, my energy, and essentially our energy consciousness. Yeah.

Christine Okezie (15m 39s):
Yes. Thank you. Yes, no, it’s amazing. I love how you emphasize the importance, you know, in of embracing our bodies, these vessels, right. As the vehicles for self-awareness as the vehicles for self-compassion that resonates so much with me and the work that I do.

Sura Flow (15m 59s):
Yes. I think that we have this antagonistic relationship with our bodies starting oftentimes from a young age, you know, we’re expected to have certain types of bodies and, you know, we, aren’t taught to have body awareness or body acceptance, but we’re taught a lot about body hate and shame and trying to control and make our bodies different. And it’s just impossible to get into a deep place of meditation when there’s that any kind of antagonistic relationship towards your own self and your own body.

Christine Okezie (16m 36s):
Yes. Thank you for sharing that. How did meditation help you navigate and heal your own body acceptance or, or, or body image issues?

Sura Flow (16m 49s):
Well, I would say that, you know, growing up, I was a little, what I considered heavier set as an Asian person and eventually developed self-consciousness around that and wanted to be skinny, you know, wanted to be thin. And that was my goal that became my goal in my twenties was to make myself small. Right. That’s what

Christine Okezie (17m 17s):
Shrink, shrink our bodies. Yeah. Yeah.

Sura Flow (17m 19s):
Take up less space and suck in that tummy and, and then never feeling really comfortable in your own skin. And it wasn’t until I started meditating that I realized like, wow, a lot of these ideas they’re just given to us, and then I just accept these ideas. So it was just having the realization that like, why am I shaming my body? Like what, where is this coming from? Like I actually think about what is the source, me thinking that somehow I’m inadequate.

Christine Okezie (17m 52s):
Right. Beautiful.

Sura Flow (17m 55s):
And realizing that if I have this in me, that it will prevent me from going deeper because I’m focused on something that isn’t true. You know, I used to be obsessed with, you know, what I was going to eat or when I was going to exercise or this or that. And it wasn’t until I dropped all that obsession to my body, just come into balance by itself. And did I lose weight naturally? Yes. Just by allowing myself to be relaxed and allowing myself to accept my body as it is. And it’s almost like the resistance to our body that causes us that weight gain and goodness.

Sura Flow (18m 35s):
Right. It took time. It was a journey, but I think it’s a collective wound with women around the world. Absolutely. And it’s one that’s very important to heal because our body has so much wisdom and intuition that it can flow to us and their creative vessels. You know, we manifest life through our bodies, women do. So if we can really learn how to nurture and respect our bodies, then it can really give us a much more deeper connection to our spiritual practice.

Christine Okezie (19m 14s):
Oh, thank you. And again, there’s that beautiful integration that’s so missing from the aceitic practices where we’re supposed to transcend our bodies, right? Yeah,

Sura Flow (19m 23s):
Yeah. Yes. I mean, if you look at just the traditions of meditation or spiritual practice, there’s that tendency towards for the body and the mind and the emotions, our sexual energy to transcend or control that’s about transcendence restriction or control that’s right. And, and the flow method, which is what we teach it’s about allowance and that each of these things are in a sense creative powers. Right? Well, we can try to control the mind. It’s impossible, but our mind is a creative power.

Sura Flow (20m 2s):
Yeah. Same with our emotions. We could try to control and transcend the emotions all day long, but our emotions are there for a reason they’re energy and motion and they’re coming up for a reason. So why not be curious about them and that you can actually consciously create with your emotions there’s creative energy and power behind our emotions like passion.

Christine Okezie (20m 30s):
Yes, yes. Yeah. That, that, I, I, that totally resonates with me, you know, when it comes to as, so I come from the tradition of Kundalini, yoga and meditation. So speaky, you talked about that a little bit in your book in terms of recognizing that that Kundalini is the energy of, of creation. It’s our creative life force. And when it’s flowing, when it’s nurtured to your, to your point, it really becomes, you know, very powerful force in creating life and wellbeing, you know, in a way that aligns with our, our deepest desires. So it’s really beautiful.

Christine Okezie (21m 10s):
How you talk about that. Now you talk about, so I’d love for you to explain that a little bit more from, again, the practices that you work with with serve flow, how, how can women and folks sort of see their sexuality and their spirituality. That’s oftentimes those two terms don’t go together and you do such a beautiful job laying that out for us.

Sura Flow (21m 35s):
That actually they’re one, our sexuality and our spirituality is one. And that there’s nothing to be ashamed of when it comes to our sexuality. But unfortunately that’s a lot of what we’ve been taught is the shame and the guilt and the restriction right around our sexual energy and that as women or men, you know, that there’s this negative perception. Yeah. You know, if you enjoy the act of sex or if you do it outside of the rules of what society says is okay, and that, you know, our sexual energy is part of our life force energy.

Sura Flow (22m 22s):
It’s a natural part of who we are. Yeah. And to be central, to be sexual. I mean, that’s really what creates life. We have any shame around it or that feeling of control or guilt around sex, then it doesn’t allow that part of our energy to flow. So part of our energy will get trapped. If you think of our belief systems, they’re kind of like little blocks to our energy flow. So if we have limiting belief systems that include shame or unworthiness, guilt, you know, things like that, they can, they can really damp in our energy flow.

Sura Flow (23m 7s):
So it’s really important when we’re meditating that we’re also looking at our unconscious beliefs and the stories that are playing in the background that lead us into our everyday life, because our life is always reflecting our energy.

Christine Okezie (23m 25s):
Yeah. Yeah. And again, I think it’s that, that process of, of self-realization and awareness, that is that’s the ultimate goal is to recognize that we’re so much more than our programming. Right. We’re so much more than our thoughts and our belief patterns right. Where what’s underneath them. And then, and then if we can have the app, maybe being a little bit more choice in how to respond to what’s going around us. Yeah. Yeah. And, and, and to, to go for what we want to say, you know, say, I, I don’t want this. So how, w what’s causing me to create the conditions within myself that I keep having this experience.

Christine Okezie (24m 5s):
Right. That’s right. Yeah. That’s beautiful. So beautiful. Because you write in the book, meditation is a practice of knowing who you are. Can you tell us more about what you wrote? I think that’s just so spot on.

Sura Flow (24m 21s):
That’s really what it is. It’s self awareness and knowing who you are, who you really are and who is that? How would you, people could say that in many different ways, whether they would say a divine being God self-realization being self-realized and it’s already here inside of you. Okay.

Christine Okezie (24m 50s):
Thank you. Flip following your joy. You say serve flow is about following your joy. Tell us more about what you mean by that.

Sura Flow (24m 59s):
Following your joy. You know, joy is an interstate and I mean, just think about it, Christine, what do you, when you think of what brings you joy? What do you feel inside? Right.

Christine Okezie (25m 11s):
I feel warmth. I feel excitement. I feel vitality. Yeah. Like energy, really. Like, let’s go

Sura Flow (25m 19s):
All those qualities of energy, right? So if you listen to that and you start following and doing the things that elicit that within your being, there’s almost, there’s this kind of magical energy intelligence that is embedded within this feeling of joy and excitement and passion, and that we can trust these inner feelings. And that when we do, they lead to synchronistic experiences, they lead to our true path because joy is our natural state of being that is a state of bliss and that’s meditation.

Sura Flow (26m 6s):
So you’re acting and you’re being from bliss consciousness. That is a state, the vibration that you start to create in your life, and everything becomes malleable and magical and fluid. And you start to notice because the book is about miracles and synchronicity. You start to notice that things can come together effortlessly, much better than you could have done on your own, simply because you were acting from a space of genuine joy. Yes. There’s no mind that’s in there. The mind isn’t coming up and saying, well, oftentimes it does come up and say like, well, you shouldn’t be doing that. You need to work hard first and you need to get this done.

Sura Flow (26m 47s):
And there’s all these responsibilities. And you look at all this debt, you have to pay, you can’t just go straight to the joy. Right, right. You don’t deserve that. Right. Right. You have to earn that condition that we don’t deserve to feel joy,

Christine Okezie (26m 60s):
Meditation, manifestation, and synchronicity. How do those all fit?

Sura Flow (27m 5s):
They’re really all aspects of one thing. Okay. But we relate to them separately. Yeah. So if you’re in a state of meditation, which is really the state of bliss and joy or flow flow, then you’re in the flow of life. You’re open to the flow of life. So your Kundalini energy, your life force energy is connected to the universal life force energy. So when your energy is open and flowing and activated within you, you are now acting in concert with the universe around you.

Sura Flow (27m 46s):
You’re living from a more surrendered place. And there’s a difference between being surrendered and being passive, which I can go into, but living from a surrendered place where you’re really accepting this moment as it is deeply. Yes. Right. And being deep and acceptance, you’re open to, I would say the magic of the moment, the creative power of the moment. And in the moment, you can receive anything that you need to manifest, whether it’s inner guidance or inspiration. But when, once you set that intention through your practice, it’s like sending out a radio signal, right.

Sura Flow (28m 29s):
You’re tuned into a channel, and now you can get the receiving end of what you put out. So like a boomerang, what you send out, you will get it back. If you are attuned to listening. And if you’re attuned to energy and being subtle, you can access anything. And I do think that having access to our intuition or psychic abilities is very important because not only can it save your life, it can actually help you create what you want

Christine Okezie (29m 3s):
Beautifully said. I love that. Thank you. Yes. So access to our intuitive capacity, you know, a lot of people think, well, that’s just kind of knowing things before they happen. But I think what what’s clear about this approach, working with energy, working with the mind or the mind’s tendencies is that our intuition is more it’s, it’s, it’s just a higher form of, It’s a wiser form, I guess, of navigation when it comes to our experiences, right? It’s a more intelligent form.

Sura Flow (29m 39s):
Correct? I think a lot of people that there’s tendency when we’re not awake that to be egocentric, right. And, and that’s, you know, there’s a lot of suffering that’s connected to narcissism. For example, when we see things purely from our own point of view, what meditation helps us to do is open up our perspective and to open our consciousness, to include others and people that are really different from us, who we don’t understand that we can actually start to open our minds and eventually our hearts to everybody.

Sura Flow (30m 19s):
That’s what meditation helps us develop compassion and empathy towards ourselves, towards others. And there’s in this, this capacity of when we start to develop empathy and understanding and compassion and see things from a bigger, wider perspective, that also helps us get connected to our innate intelligence. So creative life force energy is the same as our intuition. That’s the same energy. It’s like an electromagnetic energy that runs through our body like a super highway system. No, it keeps everything vital and running, but we can connect to this when we’re connected to something other than just ourselves

Christine Okezie (31m 4s):
Well said. I love that. Thank you. So, in terms of, you know, our health, you have a whole chapter on, on health there, and you talk about how to stay in good balance, eat. What are the best tips for employing taking care of our body? You know, from this space of intuition, from this space of self-actualization.

Sura Flow (31m 27s):
I think listening to our body and paying attention to this body system that we have is important because we all have different needs because we all come in differently. And what works for someone, what might be medicine for someone might be poisoned to somebody else. So it’s really, you know, paying attention to your own attunement of what brings you balance and what helps you feel at ease and in flow and balance in your own body. So it, to me, for me, the way it looks for me, I’ll just share it’s the self-love and the self permission to pay attention to myself and only myself in that respect and to drop all of the conditioning and the programming about what to eat, what not to eat, you know, to realize that it’s okay to let that all go.

Sura Flow (32m 25s):
I know there’s so many diets out there. Oh my goodness. Diets have never worked for me. But the one thing that has worked for me is deep listening to my own body. And I know that when I’m listening deeply, my body just naturally goes to balance. Beautiful, thank you, space healthy by itself. But it means, you know, I, I don’t, it’s being moderate. You know, that’s what I’ve noticed works best. So not sleeping too much or too little, not straining too much, not overeating too much. I find that just eating what is necessary is good for the body, for my body. And I can’t say what’s good for other people’s bodies, but I do think that health and being, you know, moving and exercising every day can enhance not just our spiritual practice, but our whole life.

Sura Flow (33m 20s):
Yeah. You know, it has the power to really increase the quality of our life when we feel good and healthy and balanced in our physical body. We love our body. I think it’s important.

Christine Okezie (33m 33s):
Deep listening. Yes. Deep listening sounds easy, but not simple. You know, it’s a practice and it’s a conscious choice to really be in that space of I’m going to deeply listen. Right. It’s kind of radical these days to do something like that because, because we’re also externally engaged, right?

Sura Flow (33m 54s):
Yeah. I think we’ve received so much information about diets and what’s good for us that we’re really mixed up about that. So by releasing everything that we’ve been taught externally, or a lot of things that, and just to really start over from paying attention to your own body, and what’s really working in your own body is an important, it’s part of the practice.

Christine Okezie (34m 22s):
Everything is spiritual. It sounds like in, in, in the approach with surf flow, right, you really look at everything that comes in and out of our experience as an opportunity to have more greater awareness, to have more sensitivity, right.

Sura Flow (34m 38s):
It’s all energy. So whatever you’re consuming, right. On any level

Christine Okezie (34m 44s):
Of

Sura Flow (34m 44s):
Energy. So you just think about it that way

Christine Okezie (34m 49s):
You shared a practice in your book called Morning Pages or, or Divine Nnotes, I guess. Right. Can you tell us about that? I think as people look to find new ways to build in healthy routines, this was a very powerful one.

Sura Flow (35m 3s):
Yes. I started The Artist’s Way, which was written by Julia Cameron a while ago, about 15 years ago. And in her artists white book, which is a phenomenal life-changing book for people who are creative, but for anybody who wants to live a spiritual path, she shares this tool called the morning pages, which means waking up first thing in the morning and writing three pages stream of consciousness. Okay. And I did this for over a decade. I really loved this practice. I think it is better than therapy and it’s regulatory and the nature of just this practice, but it took me a long time to get into the flow of it.

Sura Flow (35m 45s):
Yeah. I would say it actually took me, I don’t know, a couple years to really get into it. And even now I still, to this day have a hesitancy with facing a blank page, you know, creating something from nothing. And then it led me to divine notes, which is, I realized after writing the morning pages, that every, all my answers are within me. And pretty clearly if I took the time to really write that and I made myself just write on the page. So with the divine notes, anything that’s really in your heart, like deep inside yourself that maybe you’re too scared to share with even a good friend.

Christine Okezie (36m 30s):
Yes, yes.

Sura Flow (36m 31s):
You know, it could be something that’s bothering you or that you’re suffering, you know, causing you suffering and you just write down maybe one or two sentences about it. And then you wait and allow yourself to write a response. Anything that just intuitively starts to come through. And it is kind of a channeling automatic writing, but it’s really a flow state of getting into a flow state with your writing and just allowing that flow of information to come through you. Wow. And, and just trusting it so it can be messy. And it’s okay if it’s messy, nobody’s gonna read your journal that there’s no intention for somebody else to read it.

Sura Flow (37m 12s):
And you know, it doesn’t have to sound perfect, but just starting that process, it’s like conversations with God that you can speak to God directly every single day, if you want to and have that direct access. And I can tell you, it changes for me every day. I just allow it to, like, I don’t always sound completely on point and wise that’s okay. Right. That’s not the point. Yeah. And you’re like, Whoa, I really wrote that. Oh my goodness. Like, you don’t even know where that came from, but it was gifted to you just by showing up in the morning every day. Yeah. I walk like that consistently that divine flow can come to you.

Christine Okezie (37m 53s):
That’s beautiful. That’s really beautiful. And I encourage people. I know I’m going to give that a try just cause you know, there’s a lot of heaviness or, or, or rigidity around journaling. Oh, I have to journal. I have to journal, you know, and by this journal, try this journal. And there’s something about the way you described, just sort of having a conversation with the divine, you know, having conversation with your soul, you know, and being in question and, and sort of just waiting for something to come through. There’s something very beautiful and very natural about that. So I think that would be lovely and that in of itself is a meditative practice to get in the flow. Right.

Sura Flow (38m 28s):
It’s powerful and it’s empowering and you’ll be surprised at how healing it can be as well. Thank you. Anything that is burdening you or hurting you, like you have the access to the medicine.

Christine Okezie (38m 44s):
I love that. And it’s reinforcing, right. It reinforces that as you said, you know, we do have everything within us that, you know, for that healing, for the contentment, for the peace. And so just the exercise of doing that consistently enough, you know, reinforces that in our brain that, Oh yeah. Okay. I can rely on myself. There is something worth turning inward here for myself. I love that.

Sura Flow (39m 10s):
Yes. And especially when it comes to your feelings, you know, I think there’s a lot of negative stigma around having anxious or depressed or, you know, having negative emotions for example. And when we can approach our emotions, even through the divine notes, you’ll be amazed that just by allowing those emotions to come out and to be heard and to just flow them out into the page that it transforms them in it self because you’re allowing the space and the awareness for those emotions to emerge. Yeah. Yeah. And you will feel better, you know, when you don’t bottle things up and just like, keep them to yourself and internalize it, then you will feel better just through that creative expression,

Christine Okezie (40m 2s):
More flow to your point that everything is energy and we’re looking for ways to release and to clear and allow. So that’s just a beautiful practice doing it there. So what is your favorite practice for, you know, grounding into our physical bodies these days? I think, you know, there’s, there’s just a lot to manage. There’s a lot of external noise and demands and uncertainty, you know, swirling around us. And I think unprecedented levels at this point in time. So I find that grounding giving folks ways to come into their bodies. What’s your favorite practice for that?

Christine Okezie (40m 42s):
If you could maybe share that one?

Sura Flow (40m 44s):
Well, I have a lot, but I think things that feel good for your body. Yeah. Now I know that sounds like such a simple guide, but it’s true. So if you’re somebody who a bath feels good for you or a massage feels good to you or taking a little bit of oil and you guys, you don’t have to like make it a big deal to take care of your body. I mean, you could be watching Netflix

3 (41m 12s):
A little bit of massage oil and then,

Sura Flow (41m 15s):
Oh, just massage your feet a little bit as you’re watching TV or do it and listening to music, whatever is your jam. And then just, you know, pepper that in you do a little bit of stretching when you’re watching TV or yoga or, you know, you don’t, it doesn’t have to be this whole big thing, but just something that, you know, you remember your body every day. And that’s what I talk about in the book is like, just do something where you’re moving the energy around in your body every day. So my favorite personal practice for it, to be honest for me is restorative yoga and energy healing. Those are my two kind of go to, I love energy healing cause our hands have magnetic power.

Sura Flow (41m 58s):
And it is like a magnet. When you place your hands on your body, it moves energy and allows your product to settle. And even in stillness, there’s a dynamic flow that’s there. And I like to utilize my hands as part of my spiritual practice. And I find that to be very grounding because once you place your hands, like even if you place them, let’s say hands down on your lap, you just start to feel a different sensation with that intention of I’m going to ground myself here. Yeah. Beautiful.

Christine Okezie (42m 34s):
Thank you. What is the biggest area? I would say, you know, you’re most curious about now when it comes to meditation and the work that you do,

Sura Flow (42m 44s):
I really love meditation coaching. That’s something that I specialize in, but it’s, to me what I consider leading edge consciousness healing. So it sounds pretty casual meditation coaching, but it’s really this way of raising consciousness together. So it’s, it’s not just the coach helping a client, but both people. And what’s very interesting to me, that’s tied to meditation. Coaching is what I’m currently teaching called telepathic parenting. And that that’s really based on the idea that especially today, a lot of children are suffering from the pandemic.

Sura Flow (43m 30s):
Yes. And I guess when parents come to me about their children and say, my child needs to learn to meditate, you know, really it was really,

Christine Okezie (43m 40s):
Are they learning to meditate?

Sura Flow (43m 42s):
It’s the parent, you know, the child is responding to the parents’ energy for the parents consciousness and to the parent’s nervous system. So if you have a lot of chaos and stress and anxiety as a parent, maybe you don’t show it externally. Maybe you still keep it together and you kind of like, you know, do that whole, keep it together thing. I’m fine family, but your child will feel the tension underneath and we’ll act out. So the key is to have the parents understand that the children are just responding energetically also to their inner States of being. Yeah. So if you ever do want your child to learn more calmness or grounding, understanding this, the connection between parent and child and that if a parent’s nervous starts to go chaotic, it’s going to also create that unregulated nervous system within the child.

Sura Flow (44m 39s):
So the child won’t feel safe in themselves or in their body and they’ll carry that kind of broken, unregulated flow with them into adulthood. Hmm. Fascinating. So it’s, it’s just really based on this idea that, you know, it starts from within and even in meditation coaching, it’s the same thing. You’re the fulcrum point, right? So you don’t try to get your client to be calm. You start by getting calm and grounded inside yourself. It’s the idea of the oxygen mask for yourself first on the airplane. And that, that is actually in greatest service when you’re self centered and then to serve people from that grounded centered place.

Sura Flow (45m 28s):
How important that is. So it’s a completely different system than what we’re accustomed to because we’re accustomed to saying, I want to fix what’s out there. That’s right. Versus I’m going to turn it inside. Right. And get there first and then serve from that place.

Christine Okezie (45m 47s):
I love that. Thank you for sharing that. That’s beautiful. Yeah. I mean, I work with a lot of busy women, you know, wearing many hats in their daily lives, lots of roles and responsibilities. And that goes back to, I think a very poignant shift that you’re asking is, you know, can we give ourselves permission, right. Permission to take care of permission to take time, to permission, to be okay with where we have to go. Right. First

Sura Flow (46m 15s):
That’s true. Cause we pitched to think, especially as moms, you know, because the martyr ship thing is a big, a big thing for a lot of women. Self-sacrifice right. So I’m going to burn myself out to serve my kids or to serve my family. So I’m going to deny my own needs and what nourishes me so that I can make sure my, my kids are cared for and my partner, whatever. And that’s just a tendency. It could be male or female, but what ends up happening is that what you’re actually imparting to your children is that self-sacrificial energy, not, not the true nourishment energy. So you’re teaching your child to deny their needs or diminish their needs, right.

Sura Flow (47m 1s):
When you think that you’re giving on the outside, but you’re actually teaching them that well, my needs and my purpose and my creative joy is not important. So now they’re going to grow up with that consciousness centers. Do you see how that works? Absolutely grew up with that consciousness energy. It’s the same thing. It’s like parents, when they stay together for their children, now their children learn what it’s like to be in a Loveless relationship. Right. That’s what they’re actually learning. Yeah. It’s a know your intentions are positive. What are they really receiving?

Christine Okezie (47m 35s):
Right. What’s the energy, you know, what’s being transmitted to your point, right. Because it’s the energy and the, the underlying emotional issues that are going on that are really having the impact, you know, in our, in our experience. So yes. Thank you for tying that all together. So I’m going to ask you, I asked this question in the last couple months, what’s the most important thing that you learned in 2020?

Sura Flow (48m 3s):
What did I, the most important thing trust yourself.

Christine Okezie (48m 10s):
Yeah. That’s kind of hard, right? We have to really hard. Yeah. We have to employ a lot of tools and practices to get in the flow, to see ourselves as our own ally. Right. To see ourselves as weren’t, as, as trustworthy. Right. Yeah. So why would you say that’s the most important, like thing that you learned? What again? Yeah,

Sura Flow (48m 34s):
I think 2020, I received the message at the beginning of the year that it was going to be a year of expansion. And so, you know, to my surprise, the pandemic happened early in the year and I was thinking, wow, expansion, like, cause it was like, you’re going to get out there, right? Like to get out there and it’s expansion, it’s growth. And then all this compression happened and there’s lockdown and people are freaking out from the pandemic, but it was true. What ended up happening was it was true. It caused our business to expand. So now people wanted more meditation services and they wanted to learn and they were there.

Sura Flow (49m 14s):
We were already set up online. That message ended up being true, not in the way that I saw it. Right. Unexpected that way. And then towards the end of the year, I had started to complete the book. And what ended up happening was that I had a different title for my book. It was called the power of energy flow

Christine Okezie (49m 36s):
On Instagram. I’m so glad you changed them. You didn’t. Yeah. I’m so glad you went with it. Go ahead. Tell the story.

Sura Flow (49m 42s):
And, and in the back of my mind, I’ve loved the power of energy flow is dancing up and down when I got that title, because that’s exactly what the book is about. But when other people I hired a book team and they read the book, they said, this is supposed to be Sarah flow. And I kind of already knew that in the back of back, back of my mind, in a way like it was, you know, buried deep, but I didn’t want my name to be out there. Right. Like it’s very egotistical. Right.

4 (50m 16s):

Sura Flow (50m 16s):
So I just, and I, so I fought, we fought about it. And then I finally surrendered to that being the title, but it was about trust and it was like, trust yourself. It’s okay to have name out. Like it was just this permission. I love, I love even surrendering. The title of the book is part of that path that I would like to share with others that helps to create that effortless flow in your own life. And sometimes the universe speaks to you through other people and they will elicit your own deeper inner knowing.

Christine Okezie (50m 53s):
Oh, thank you so much. And Sarah, was there anything that maybe I should have asked you, but didn’t at this point?

Sura Flow (51m 1s):
No, but if you would like to close or anything with a few heart breaths and a bit of meditation, I’m happy to do that. But you as a community, we would love that for tuning in. Yes, please. This is a lovely practice and only takes a few minutes, but it just helps you feel more centered and in your heart connected to your own inner guidance. So you can just find a comfortable seat and relax your entire body, bringing your awareness through all parts of your body, Gently drawing your attention to your heart center.

Sura Flow (51m 49s):
And if you’d like, you can place a hand on your heart is to connect more with the energy of your heart space. And we’ll take three breaths together, breathing in through the back of your heart and breathing out to the front side of your heart.

5 (52m 17s):
Breathe in peace

Sura Flow (52m 23s):
And breathe out. Calm One more breath like that. Breathing in peace and exhaling, calm. Just letting your heart be sta surrendering to this sense of stillness.

Sura Flow (53m 11s):
When you’re ready, you can gently hope in your eyes.

Christine Okezie (53m 16s):
Wow. That was lovely. Thank you so much. You’re welcome. Beautiful reset. Okay. And so we can learn about at your website, right? And we can get your book on Amazon. So we’re going to go out and do that. Is there anything else that you would like to share or how they can find you?

Sura Flow (53m 35s):
My website is CIRA flow.org. So you’re welcome to find it there as to U R a F L O w.org. And I invite you to come check it out. There’s a free mini course that you can sign up for. And it’s a five-day mini course that introduces you to this energy flow meditation and also how to learn healing and how to manifest your intentions through your practice.

Christine Okezie (54m 11s):
Beautiful. All right. Well, thank you for your time. This has been a gift to have you on the show and thank you for all that you’re doing out in the world.

Sura Flow (54m 18s):
Well, thanks so much for having me, Christine. It was a wonderful interview. Thank you. Bye everybody. Thank you.