Listen Here:

In this conversation you’ll hear:

• What it’s like to live as an empath
• How to protect your energy
• Tori’s favorite rituals & crystals
• The power of BELIEF & CHOICE
• How to detox DOUBT
• All about SACRED SISTERHOOD in healing

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Episode Transcript:

Tori: All of it was a choice. And so it was like, if I can make the choice for it to fall apart, I can make the choice for it to stay the fuck together. And in that decision, I was able to unravel in a really graceful way, not in a way where I needed to go back to old habits or I needed to beat myself up. I was able to just allow myself to fall apart so that something new can breakthrough.

Sarah: Welcome to the Healing Uncensored podcast. My name is Sarah Small, and I’m a health and mindset coach for women with autoimmune disease, just like you. I absolutely love helping you tap into your self-healing power, uncover the energetic side of healing, and release limiting beliefs around your body and your life. Think of this podcast is everything you wouldn’t hear at your doctor’s office. It’s a place for empowered souls to move beyond food and heal themselves on a soul level. I hope you enjoy today’s episode. Now let’s begin.

Hello tribe. Welcome to the show. In this episode, you’re going to meet one of my favourite people on the planet and a total soul sister. Her name is Tori Washington, and she is a spiritual teacher and mind-set mentor for women who struggle with self-doubt as an empath. She loves helping empathic women go from chronic warriors to spiritual warriors by activating their intuitive super powers to overcome limiting beliefs, fear and anxiety. Tori and I originally met when we were teaching and practicing at a small yoga studio in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and our paths have continued to cross over the years, and I consider her one of my very best friends. We are going to talk about living life as an empath today, as well as the power of belief and choice, how to become a super attractor, how to detox self-doubt, and what to do when life feels like it is falling apart. I know you guys are going to love this episode, so let’s dive in.

Welcome to the show, Tori. I am so glad to have you here. I can’t wait for everyone to get to know you better. Welcome. Welcome. Welcome to the show.

Tori: Thank you. I’m so excited to be here.

What it’s like to live as an empath

Sarah: So you, like me, are very much an empath. When did you first discover this about yourself and what does it mean to you to be an empath?

Tori: Oh man. I feel like my empathy has developed over time as you know. It’s kind of gone in phases. Some years of my life it was really, really strong, and other years it felt not existent at all. My first memory of it was probably -this is going to sound weird – but in the womb, in my mother’s womb. She took on a lot of pain and suffering and abuse while she was pregnant with me, and I know for a fact that I digested some of that based off of how I acted as a child, even how I show up today as an adult. I’m much more attained and I have a better understanding of it, but looking back, I have so many memories where I literally would just start crying because I could look in her eyes and see how much pain, but I was a little child. I had no idea what bills were or abuse was. I was just playing, but I couldn’t ever fully settle into the moment because I was so connected to her suffering as a child. So it’s so interesting because yeah, I don’t have a picture memory of it. I have a feeling memory of it.

Sarah: Yeah, that clairsentience.

Tori: Yeah.

Sarah: I think you may have told me before about the details of your actual birth, when your mom gave birth to you. Was that a smooth process or was it a bumpy process?

Tori: Her pregnancy was actually pretty mild. I was a really easy baby. The way that she describes my birth is super easy, like she just pushed me out in two hours and we were done. I was just ready to come out probably cause I was like get me out of here. You’re crazy. I love my mom to death, but I was like, get me out into the world.

Sarah: Yeah, you need your autonomy.

Tori: So she always described it as like this blissful experience. It was the best day of her life. It was so easy. She made it sound like she could have 25 babies after that, so her pregnancy was easy with me, but I think life within that pregnancy was difficult for her.

Sarah: Yeah. So now today, fast forward to this version of Tori. What does it mean to you to be an empath? What does that feel like in your body?

Sarah: Ooh, that’s a good question. I think I had to learn how to feel, because I turned off my feelings for a really long time because they were uncomfortable, cause I was taking on other people’s emotions. So I turned everything off and I was just kind of walking through life numb. So as I began to wake up again, it, it shows up as power now. I can hold space versus take on someone else’s challenges and struggles. So I think for me now where I’ve sort of mastered my empathy is with my work. I work with women one-on-one and I feel like I walk away from those super empowered. They’re empowered. I don’t feel depleted. I can continue on with my day without worrying about anything. I’m still learning how to be in big crowds. I’m still learning…

Sarah: Me too, girl.

Tori: I also realized that with my empathy, I took on the label of introvert. I’m actually not that introverted. I’m actually really outgoing with like my girlfriends and I mean, you’ve been out with me. I’m really fun.

Sarah: You like to have a good time, yeah.

Tori: In big crowds and my empathy is going all over the place, then it shrinks into that introverted shyness. So I think I took on that label as the shy girl for so long, and now that I have really blossomed and I’m stepping into my voice and my truth, no, I’m actually not shy. I just have bigger boundaries in crowds than other people.

Sarah: Yeah. Sounds like you’ve taken that empathy and made it this true superpower that you use with clients and you have these better boundaries and protection for that energy. Do you remember at any point of your life where it felt like you were broken or cursed, or this empathy was actually something that was against you?

Tori: Oh man, so many memories because I had a hard time with my friendships. My friendships would go up and down a lot because it would go from me being that girl on the phone with them for three hours trying to fix all their problems, and then I became resentful to them because they never asked how I was doing or they never flipped the script and allowed me to express. So then I would shut them out for a month at a time. And then we would connect again because as an empath, it’s super easy for you to connect. That’s actually not the problem at all. The problem is it goes too far so my friendships suffered and I would just ask myself, am I a shitty friend? Are they a shitty person? Why can’t I just have girlfriends that feel consistent and it’s mutual? I just felt like something was wrong with me, honestly.

Sarah: Yeah.

Tori: And that kind of translated a little bit into romantic relationships, family. You know how you show up in one place in your life is how you really show up everywhere. So it started to just take over and that sense of l didn’t feel safe really opening up to anybody because I started to just base my self-worth on how much I could help them and then I forgot that I have my own self-worth to worry about it, and just cause I’m not helping them doesn’t mean I’m not worthy of their friendship.

Sarah: Do you feel like you’re geared more towards your masculine energy or your feminine energy?

Tori: That’s so interesting you asked that because I am learning that. I’m trying to find that answer. I naturally ebb towards masculine. It’s easier for me to show up that way because I feel more secure. But when I’m in my most vulnerable, raw state, I’m quite feminine. I’m airy, I’m feathery and I have a lot of goddess energy within me, so I really appreciate people that can hold space for me to embrace my feminine cause it’s not something that I am totally embodying all the time because I am used to showing up masculine to protect myself.

How to protect your energy

Sarah: Me too. That’s totally where I feel like I …. masculine is my comfort zone. It is where I thrive and as I’ve become 30 and in my later 20s, I finally started to open up to my feminine energy and just like what does that look like? How can I honor it? And what you just said when people can hold space for you to be in your feminine, it’s so beautiful and so powerful. I know you’re also a ritual girl. How do you protect your energy? What do your rituals look like? It doesn’t have to be every day. What are some of your favorites?

Tori:  Gosh, it’s so many. I love rituals. I think without rituals, I’d probably go fucking insane. It used to be wake up, give myself a whole hour, so I would do… My favorites are at least 15 minutes of meditation, pull three cards, embrace my crystals as part of my meditation. I found that the crystals helped me meditate on a deeper level because it helps me calm myself and then I communicate with them. So it just gives me a different channel of connection.

Sarah: Tell us very specifically, how do you use your crystals? Are you holding them? What does that look like?

Tori: So the five crystals that I use the most are selenite, kyanite, rose quartz, amethyst, and turquoise. I’ll place them on the different chakras. The selenite really at my crown. I’ll put the turquoise over my solar plexus. I kind of just play with them on my body. I usually meditate lying down because I can breathe easier and I don’t have to worry about am my breathing right cause it feels weird when I’m sitting up. I usually am laying down and I’ll just lay them on my body wherever it feels right. Sometimes on my hands if I need literally a hand to hold during my meditation. And with the kyanite at the very end, I’ll just cut any cords that are energetically attached to me. And then I hold the selenite at my heart and let that replenish me with good energy flow, high vibes. So I work with them like little partners, like they’re little stone people.

Tori’s favorite rituals & crystals

Sarah: Yeah. Each holding that unique vibration and frequency that is powerful and the crystal cause they’re a crystalline structure. Our bodies are in this constant flux and flow and shifting and transforming, whereas the crystal maintains its integrity. And I think that’s part of why I also use crystals in meditation and healing, and a lot of people in my community want to know how to use crystals more, which is why I wanted you to just paint that picture for us. What does that look like? Any other rituals that you really love that you want to share?

Tori: Well, one thing about crystals that just came to me. Crystals are the ultimate empath, if you think about it. They are like what I strive to be because they know how to hold space. They know how to change vibration. They know how to bend time and bend energy without breaking, really. So if you are starting off with crystals, my biggest piece of advice is just listen because there is no book that’s going to tell you here’s the exact way to use the crystal. When you put it in your hand, if you’re open, because you obviously have grabbed the crystal, you’re obviously open, it’s going to tell you what to do and you’re going to be like, I don’t know why I’m putting this over my chest right now, but I’m just going to lay down and do that. And just being open to what it has to say and what it has to share. I think that it’s a much more organic process than most people think – which is the keyword here – think that it is. My rituals… so what was the original question? What’s my favorite ritual?

Sarah: What protects your energy? What do your rituals look like?

Tori: My energy, I do the selenite and the kyanite right now has been my favorite. So I cut the cords with my kyanite replenish. I do a lot of visualizations. I’ve realized that’s part of my empathic gifts – I visualize. So if there’s somebody who is more of a feeler or you hear things, my biggest suggestion is to tap into what is your biggest superpower. So I literally envision a bubble of light expanding out and coming around me and I drop into my heart and I let that completely take over. I let myself be saturated in that protection and then it just goes back to believe it. I can’t see the damn bubble, but I know it’s there, and as long as I believe that I’m protected and I’m declaring that as my center, then that’s going to guide me. That’s going to be my focal point for the day. But if I walk around being like, I put that bubble of light around me, I don’t really know about it, I’ll still be insecure and not be able to just show up and do the damn thing. So it’s a lot of this metaphysical practice, but it’s also just believing that you are that powerful.

Sarah: Yes. The power of belief I think is so, so important here in emotional and spiritual healing, and it’s interesting you said you visualize stuff. I feel like I’m more like the feeler and then I have recently become more like the clairaudient where I start to hear, but it takes so much practice and trusting yourself and not thinking you’re crazy and just being open to receiving those messages in your life. So you have been through some pretty major life changes in the last 12 months or so. Can you share with us? Can you tell us about it and what do you do when things feel like they are falling apart?

Tori: Yes. So the last year has been fucking insane. I was in a very serious relationship. I was engaged and got unengaged. This all happens within like three months. I got unengaged. I left my corporate yoga job. I started my own business and began leading international retreats and found myself just completely looking at my life like, Whoa, nothing is the same. Everything that I had thought I’d built for my future was gone. And the thing that was so interesting was it wasn’t taken from me. It was all by choice. The ‘unengagement’ was a very loving, mutual decision. It was definitely hard and still to this day is a huge challenge, but it wasn’t like someone was like, okay, I’m going to take all this away from you and then you figure it out. All of it was choice. And so I was like, if I can make the choice for it to fall apart, I could make the choice for it to stay the fuck together.

And in that decision, I was able to unravel in a really graceful way, not in a way where I needed to go back to old habits or I needed to beat myself up. I was able to just allow myself to fall apart so that something new can break through. I had to believe at the very bottom of my heart that it was all happening for a reason, and there goes the power of belief again. I knew it was happening for my soul’s expansion because the ego wants to keep us in our pattern. The ego wants so badly to protect us – the poor thing – but it doesn’t know what we’re ultimately here for. Our soul does. And I knew at the bottom of my heart, my soul wanted to expand. So I moved across the country. I sold all my shit on Instagram, which is such a good idea, by the way. If you need to get rid of stuff, just start an Instagram. I sold all my clothes, and then I sold my crystals, my main stuff that I couldn’t fit. I wanted to just leave with two bags. That really wasn’t possible. I ended up leaving a few boxes in Chicago, and then I brought my two bags to San Diego and I landed on my girlfriend’s couch and I was like, I’m starting over. And it’s really the plan was to just pause in San Diego, kind of heal. San Diego is a mecca of healing. There’s sunshine everywhere, yoga on every block. I think this is a perfect place to be, to just kind of let things fall apart for a second.

So I was in San Diego and then I was going to continue to travel to Guatemala and some other places. My whole dream was to be like this gypsy and kind of just hop around country to country. Well, that didn’t happen.

Sarah: Gypsy, let’s be honest.

Tori: I’m not hopping from country to country, but I still traveled a bunch. I went to the Midwest and taught in some new places. I just was saying yes to everything that came to me. So if there was an opportunity to go to a different state, I would go. If there was an opportunity to teach a new workshop, I would do it. As I started to spend more time in San Diego, I could see myself there and I was like, this is different. I wasn’t expecting myself to love this place so much and my ego is very much so challenged because it’s so badly wanting to look for that hustle. It was like wanting to look for that city life cause I had just come from Chicago and I could feel it in my bones. It was just so uncomfortable to accept this new change and I resisted it so I just kept moving. Looking back, I needed to stay still, but it was a decision that I made.

So those three months …so we’ll fast forward to August. I was in San Diego, August to December on and off. Those months consisted of some really, really dark days where I had no money to my name. I didn’t know where I was going to stay and I so desperately just wanted my old life back. Not because it was fulfilling, but just because it was something familiar and everything I was looking at felt really strange. And then there was some really bright days where people who you haven’t talked to in months opened up their doors to you, where you start to go to yoga studios and they know your name in a new state and you’re like, Holy shit, that feels good. It’s interesting because the mind is wired to look for what’s wrong, but the soul is wired to look for what’s right. And so I just started tapping into my soul and I was like, I’m going to look for every fucking good thing I can cause it’s here. I know it’s here. I already know I can find what’s wrong. That’s like default human mode. But it was a challenge that I took to look for what was right. And in those moments, I started to put my life back together. I started to stop. I stopped moving. I started to stop moving. I stopped moving as much and started being more still once I began to heal and now life looks a lot different. It’s still super unfamiliar. It’s still changing. Even just last week, I wasn’t sure where I was going to live and then another miracle happens. But I just have been getting more and more comfortable with things being unfamiliar and understanding that nothing is actually really falling apart. It’s just changing and change is inevitable and if we can embrace that change, we are on to something amazing.

Sarah: Oh, I love this because I think that there’s this parallel to chronic illness too where even me who has struggled with chronic illness, but also I lost my brother to suicide, and there are these big moments in your life that are just unraveling. They are earth-shaking. They seem like they’re shattering but really I feel like it’s more of a shake and they shake you awake and they can make you more connected to your intuitive self and your real soul’s purpose and kind of give you this reality check of you were on this path and it felt fine or it felt good, but the universe really has something even bigger and better in store for you. And I think a lot of women with chronic illness experience that too, where they’re feeling fine, and then all of a sudden they have this chronic illness or this diagnosis or the symptoms are just totally shitty and taking over their lives. And then they have this thing that feels horrible that then ends up being this little stepping stone into their ultimate best, most authentic self. And I see that happening with you and it’s so beautiful. And so I want to ask you, what are your pillars for your spirituality, your spiritual practice? What keeps you coming home to yourself, coming back to yourself and trusting herself throughout these changes and this roller coaster of life?

The power of BELIEF & CHOICE

Tori: Three things, and I’ve announced this a little bit, but sisterhood, spirituality and self-love.

Sarah: Yes.

Tori: Every single thing that’s happened when shit has fallen apart for real – sisterhood, self-love and spirituality – and allowing those to be redefined at any moment in my life, but really to me self-love is the hands-down for chronic illness, for life falling apart, for anything self-love is the cure. Spirituality is the base and sisterhood is the medicine. So that’s my elixir right now cause the first thing I realized is I can’t do this by myself. Sisterhood. As much as I know I can cause the human psyche and we are so wired to handle tons of suffering, it’s actually quite amazing. But our capacity to handle joy is quite small and that kind of freaks me out and I’m like, I know I can get through this and struggle. That’s really familiar. But what about just had a little bit more fun. What if I had support? So the sisterhood was huge and universe delivered me so many soul sisters, you included. I just look at my people and I’m like, there’s no way this would work without you. There’s no way at all. There’s no way. So sisterhood has been an amazing healer for me and self-love is something I’ve run from my whole life. I think a lot of people intellectually understand self-love, but not many people know how to embody it because we just simply aren’t taught that. We aren’t taught how to love ourselves in school. And I give every mother and father in the world praise, but our families don’t know how to teach us how to love ourselves either cause they’re just doing what they know. They’re doing the best that they can. So it’s really our duty to understand ourselves beyond just physically. We have to start to love our whole body, every part of our emotions, every part of our unraveling.

Sarah: I think a lot of people think that self-love is like a salt bath or a piece of chocolate. I am obsessed with salt baths, but tell me what self-love really means to you.

Tori:  Yeah. I actually hate baths, but I love …

Sarah: Do you like water? Do you go swimming or no?

Tori: I do go swimming and I’ve started to love the ocean. I’m a lake girl. I love the lake. I have a funny memory. When I was younger, my grandma when she watched us, we would take baths but she never filled the bathtub up all the way to save water. So the baths were just cold. I was like, this is so bad. So now I see all this salt bath, bath bombs and that looks like hell on earth to me. I do not want to sit in the bath.

Sarah: We need to do a deep ass tub and just soak you in it.

Tori: I need a Jacuzzi. That’s what I need.

Sarah: There you go …by the lake

Tori: By the lake with a glass of red wine. I love self-care. So self-care is beautiful. My crystals are self-care, the bath bombs. All that is so stellar. And I love that it’s now being more stylized. It’s cool to take care of yourself. I’m on board with that for sure. But that’s not self-love, because anybody can go take a salt bath. I mean, you can spend the whole day spending money on yourself and still not love yourself, just like you can spend money and still be afraid of it. There’s always a polarity there. So I think self-love is a messy and perfect raw journey back to your soul. It’s looking at yourself in the eye and it’s self-acceptance really. It’s self-acceptance. It’s so hard to put into words because you feel it, like right now I’m feeling it right here in the base of my belly. I’m like, I love this woman who is speaking right now and sometimes when I’m talking – this is going to sound weird – it’s like my soul is looking through the windows of my eyes, like I hear myself but I am not this physical body. I am an essence. I am a spirit and I think when you can love that, you’re onto something truly ground-breaking because then whatever happens in your human experience is going to be fine because it’s just a reflection of your essence. And if your essence is saturated and sustainable self-love, then you have all the support that you need.

Sarah: It’s all within you.

Tori: Yeah. It’s all within you.

How to detox DOUBT

Sarah: So this plays really well into…I was going to ask you about this new self-doubt detox that you’re launching. I think that when we’re playing around with what self-love looks like, sometimes self-doubt starts to sneak in. So what message do you have for all the ladies who are listening who experience self-doubt? Feel free to tell us about your program too.

Tori: Detox, yeah. So self-doubt. I think it’s a chronic epidemic. I think it’s literally driving people insane. I’ve seen my clients that are just paralyzed by this really deep self-doubt where they just literally don’t know what to do. It feels terrible. Like to walk through the world and just not know, to constantly have that battle in your head of ‘is this right? Is this right? I could do this; I could do that. There’s this, there’s this’. And here’s the thing – we get taught to doubt ourselves. That’s what they teach us. We are conditioned to doubt ourselves and so I was thinking about it and I really want to teach women how to love themselves. But if I went out there and I said, I’m going to teach you how to love yourself. If someone told me that, I’d be like, Ooh, I don’t know. I don’t really think I’m ready for that. For me, I mean I get it, but no. So then I was like, well, what’s the opposite? It’s self-doubt. So I’m going to teach women how to conquer self-doubt, and in the process, they’re going to fall in love with themselves.

Sarah: You just don’t tell them that. That’s the bonus.

Tori: That’s going to be a secret, but you get a huge bonus. You’re going to love the fuck out of yourself. But the doubt detox is just as it sounds. It’s detoxing yourself, ridding yourself of the toxic doubt that you are digesting every single day. It’s like quit yo-yo dieting with your self-worth. One minute you’re up, the next minute you don’t know. One minute you’re taking a salt bath. Self-care, I love myself. The next minute, he doesn’t text you back and the whole world is over. You have to stop that yo-yo process and start to tap into sustainable self-love, sustainable that is everlasting, that is knee-deep, that is to the core so that these situations that are inevitably going to come up in our lives no longer rock us. We’re going to start off just like a regular detox. You’re going to cleanse. You’re going to have soul cleanses that rid you of negative thoughts, limiting beliefs. You’re going to put your phone down cause each day I’m just going to send them a 10-minute video and they’re going to watch the video, put their phone down and it’s an activity that they can do in like 20 minutes that day. And then the rest of the work is really out in the world of putting down your phone, putting down Instagram and starting to look around you and start to make decisions and take action from a place of empowerment.

And I believe that 30 days is going to be the perfect amount of time because it’s 21 days to break a habit but then the habit usually comes right back so we cushion in 10 extra days. There’s going to be live Q and A’s with me each week. You’re going to have a detox accountability partner because again, sisterhood. We could do it by ourselves, but it’s way more fun to have somebody right there with you. And I’m just so excited. The whole goal is to become a super attractor, to just start to do the damn thing. Make your dreams real. They are already yours. We just have to decide and we’re so stuck in our head that we can’t fucking make decisions. And the time is now really. I mean, even you starting this podcast, I was just so excited for you cause that’s a huge decision, and I know she doesn’t have it all figured out, but look how beautiful it is and look how amazing it is.

Sarah: Look at how many choices we make in every given day, every single fucking day You make the choice to brush your teeth, you make the choice whatever you’re going to eat. You make the choice to go somewhere or not go somewhere or call someone or not. There are so many choices we’re making every single day, and if you are living in doubt of all those decisions that you’re making. That does not sound like an aligned life.

Tori: Not at all. And you’re so right. And that’s part of the doubt detox too. It’s not just these big decisions, it’s those small ones like you just said, and making them from a conscious place because we’re usually on autopilot doing a lot of stuff, and I want to start people to start asking themselves why. Why are you doing that? And just check in with yourself cause if it’s a little bit out of whack, years and years and years of doing that, as you know, even with like chronic illness, it builds up and it starts to manifest as these other big things like anxiety and panic disorder, which I suffered from for years and still do sometimes. So if we can unlearn some of those doubts and relearn how to cleanse our soul with empowering experiences, then everybody is going to light up.

Sarah: So I want to ask you a little bit more about… you used the word super attractor … and I think that a lot of the women in my community have expressed to me that it’s challenging for them to find the people that get it, that they can relate to, that are their soul sisters and feel that genuine sisterhood. Where are these people? Where do they live? Where do they hang out? Or if I have chronic illness, maybe I’m not going out into the world too often because I don’t feel good. So do you have any advice for those people on how to attract those genuine connections into your life? How to create sisterhood if it doesn’t exist for people already in their lives?

Tori: Yes. So my biggest piece of advice is be the source of what you want to call in. If you don’t feel like you’re already your own best friend, it’s going to be super, super hard for you to call in other best friends. So sisterhood actually starts out as a solo project. It starts with you looking in your own eye and I’m even holding my own heart right now. It’s holding yourself. Get yourself a cuddle pillow. I don’t care what you got to do. Get greedy with yourself and start to love and hold yourself and become your best friend. Talk to yourself in the kitchen. Make yourself laugh. Put on some music that’s going to make you dance. Act like the imaginary best friend is there, but get so comfortable with your own body and your own soul. Then you can begin to attract other souls that are going to align. Because here’s the thing, if you’re trying to attract friendship into your life, but you feel so yucky and just shitty about yourself, you’re just going to attract energy vampires and people who don’t really align with you and people who you know might make you feel like crap after you hang out with them. So I think it’s really important to start with yourself and be the source, so then the universe has something to tap into. So you can think of yourself as a button. You push that button, what’s going to come out? You want a bunch of beautiful, dancing, laughing best friends? Your button has got to be saturated in it. If you want your friendships to be really grounding and soft and feminine, your button’s going to need to be grounding and soft and feminine. So that analogy really helped me put things into perspective.

I was in the same boat, especially coming to a new city because I have a really hard time. We talked about going out in crowds. I love to see live music, but I’m still working on that and so it’s been hard for me to meet girlfriends. So I just started to hang out with myself and honestly people will just come up to me and I’m like, oh my God, I don’t even know where you came from, but you’re still aligned. I know it sounds crazy, but meeting people who are aligned with you is probably one of the best feelings on earth because there’s no better feeling than being understood. There is simply not. There’s no better feeling than being so understood by somebody.

Sarah: They hold that sacred container for you to be yourself, and they do understand you and you are seen. You are seen and you are heard and you are understood, and it gives me all the tingles and the butterflies and the good vibrations because it feels so amazing for someone to hold that space for you. And I truly believe too that the energy that you put out into the world is what you do attract back and I have definitely attracted the energy vampires into my life before, but I’ve also been in a space where I attracted you into my life who is fucking amazing. We attracted each other into our lives. That’s super powerful. So a lot of the women who I’ve been talking with recently also have taken that kind of like shaking thing that happened in their life, the circumstances there are illness and they’re looking at this thing that again could feel like this horrible thing and they’re starting to transform it into growth and transformation. And then many of them are also interested in taking that thing and then becoming a teacher of it. So I want to hear from you what solidified for you that you wanted to be a spiritual teacher? This is what was your calling and you were going to take some of the shit that’s happened in your life and then take that as pieces of you to become the best, most amazing teacher in your life.

All about SACRED SISTERHOOD in healing

Tori: So good. My first answer, like the first thing that comes up, is that I really feel like being a spiritual teacher chose me. This goes back to something called the law of relativity. I’m pretty sure it’s the law of relativity. Everybody gets a deck of cards and that deck of cards is going to be filled with challenges and jokers, but those jokers are meant to be your teachers and that pain is meant to be your purpose. So we can either take the deck and play with the universe and dance, or we can put the deck down and say, fuck this and be miserable. So I decided to pick up the deck. I decided to dance with the challenges. I almost said, Ooh, yeah, let it all fall apart. Oh, the job’s gone? Cool. I can do the damn thing. I started to get excited about life-changing and when I started to get excited, I was like, this is different. What if every woman could do this? Like what if every woman felt empowered to say yes, even in the midst of darkness? And I just started to share; I’m a natural sharer. I think especially for many women who are listening, who are empaths, you’re already a healer. You’re already changing the world just by picking up the phone cause when people call you, that really shifts their lives. So I started to do that more and more often. I started to share, I started to see the response in people, and I started to share it because it was just so powerful. And you’ve probably felt this too, where it’s like, this isn’t even me. This isn’t even mine. My teaching is not about me. It’s so much bigger than me, and for anybody who’s thinking of stepping into the role of a teacher or a healer, let me tell you, you are absolutely qualified. You have been chosen. It is your time to step up. It is your time to speak and to be heard. And I promise you that you will realize really, really shortly that this is so much bigger than you. And then if you don’t get up and speak, there’s going to be so many people out there who don’t hear it from you, and you need to hear it from your perspective.

So there’s a second layer to that, that your perspective is so unique. And I saw that the way that I was handling change was way different than a lot of other women were handling change. So I began to create experiences for them to tap into that side of themselves. It started off with teaching yoga. Yoga is to me like the gateway to spirituality, and then you can find it from there, and for a while I hid behind the yoga. I hid behind the practical stuff because I was like, no one’s going to get the whoo-whoo – I hate that word – whoo-whoo, it’s too spiritual. We’re going to get freaked out. It’s like, no, you can’t take spirituality out of your spiritual being.

Sarah: You are a spiritual being. You don’t have to call it that.

Tori: But I’m sorry, I made a start dustbin. So I started to fearlessly move past that and just started how I hear it from the universe, and it’s going to sound spiritual because we’re in a spiritual world. You might’ve noticed like two years ago, I started to come out of the closet a little bit. I call it the spiritual closet. I just started to say it like it is and it’s still no bullshit. It’s still super practical, but I feel like I have this duty and it’s not really even me. Yes, my life has fallen apart and I guess some shitty things have happened, but they weren’t happening to me. They were happening for me. I just saw this the other day and I loved it. It was like this was all just warrior training. I was just going through this training and now it’s my time to speak out about it, and I think everybody has gone through warrior training. You’ve gone through warrior training and you’ve created this amazing community of women, and I can’t wait to see them step up as healers because each of them, I’ve seen them in your group. They each have something to say and something to contribute and I just want to remind everybody that now is your time.

Sarah: Drop the fear and just start and I think it’s what really true for me what you just said is that you have something to say and I think so many of us have something to say. We just don’t know how to express it quite yet because of self-doubt and fear and this low self-confidence. We just have to find that courage to really just open our throat chakra and our expression and start to share our story because sharing your story is not egotistical. It’s not narcissistic or anything. It is so powerful. It not only helps heal you, it also helps you heal everyone that reads your story. I think I struggled with that in the beginning because I was writing about myself all the time and I was like, this happened to me, this happened to me, but then I shifted the script to them. This happened for me, this happened for me, this happened for me, and show people the lesson in it so it wasn’t doom and gloom. It was more like uplifting and inspiring. And it gets easier over time and now I feel sharing is just something like you said, comes really naturally. I love to share. I love to tell my story. I love to inspire other people and I know you do too. So, any other main messages, inspiration that you want to tell autoimmune tribe today?

Tori: Well, one, I love your story, Sarah. I mean, your story is just so fucking powerful and amazing. I can’t say that enough, but you said something really important there that it was all doom and gloom and it was always talking about what happened to you. And so my last little nugget is there’s only so much you can do in the dark. At some point, when you pull that story and you bring it into the light, you’ll start to realize that you don’t have to stay stuck in your pain. You can write out the pain. You don’t even have to really talk about the pain. And I think your story has shifted so beautifully because yes, you’re sharing these really big, dark moments, but you are full of light while you’re doing it. And so I think sometimes people are afraid to share their story because they think that it’s going to lock them into the darkness even more, just dig deeper into the wound. It actually does the opposite. When we don’t tell our stories, we stay in the dark. When you start to speak out, you come into the light and that is your life’s purpose. That is the whole reason why we are here. So my biggest message to the autoimmune tribe is to step out, to speak out, and come into the light cause we all need you, and I’m so in awe of the community that you’ve created. I think that it’s gorgeous and I am so happy to be a part of it.

Sarah: Yeah. Amen sister and thank you so much. So I just want you to tell everyone where they can find you on all the social medias and in the world and how they can work with you.

Tori: All the social media handles are I am Tori Washington @IamToriWashington. Doubt detox is live on my website, ToriWashington.com, and mostly on Instagram. I’m slowly starting to get back onto Facebook, so if you have your phone out right now, go to I am Tori Washington. Let’s hang out. And then I’m also in the autoimmune tribe sometimes, so you’ll see me looking in there, here and there.

Sarah: Yeah, you guys can tag Tori in the group. Tori Washington, definitely go check her out. She has a beautiful Instagram and such a powerful message to send, so thank you girl. Thank you so much for joining me today. Always a pleasure to talk to you.

Tori: Thank you so much for having me.

Sarah:  Thank you so much for joining me for today’s episode. If you loved this episode and want to support the creation of future episodes, please leave a five-star review. I also love to hear from you on social media. Screenshot this episode and tag me on Instagram or Facebook at Autoimmune tribe. Thanks again for listening. See you next time.

You can find Tori here:

www.toriwashington.com/sisterhood-heals

instagram: @iamtoriwashington

Connect with Sarah:

Instagram | Facebook Community | Pinterest | YouTube

Work with Sarah:

Online courses | 1:1 coaching | Send show requests to sarah@theuncensoredempath.com!

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