The Path to Doing the Work

In this episode, I open up about the true meaning behind "doing the work"—not just as a buzzword, but as a deeply personal and spiritual journey that transformed my life. Inspired by a raw conversation in a divorce support group, I unpack some of the heavy emotional and spiritual burdens that many of us carry—especially when it comes to relationships, healing, and finding peace within ourselves. I walk you through three powerful practices that changed everything for me, and I invite you to reflect on how you can begin your own healing journey.

We talk about intuition, spiritual connection, and the difficult but necessary path of releasing external validation. I share what it really looked like to rise from the ashes during my divorce, how I built an unshakable relationship with God, and how I broke generational curses that had been passed down for decades. 

Episode Highlights:

[0:02] - Introducing today’s episode and the powerful inspiration from a divorce support group.
[1:14] - My response to the idea that “men don’t like women anymore” and the truth about unhealed trauma.
[3:04] - The three steps that helped me trust and act on my intuition.
[5:20] - Moving away from external validation and learning to rely on my own inner guidance.
[7:18] - Understanding and shifting from low vibrational to high vibrational energy.
[9:00] - How I built a direct and personal relationship with God—no prayer books or temples.
[11:30] - The three essential ingredients for transformation: trust, patience, and faith.
[12:55] - The power we hold to change painful circumstances, even when we feel stuck.
[14:16] - Breaking generational curses and releasing judgment to embrace my spiritual gifts.
[15:40] - Becoming my authentic self and using my light to help uplift humanity.

Links & Resources:

Be sure to follow, share, and leave a comment if this show resonates with you! Send me a message at podpage.com/themusicoflife to share your experiences, or to leave a comment. I'd love to feature it in a future episode.

Transcript

Caryn Portnoy: 0:02

Hi everyone, and welcome to the music of Life. I'm your host. Karen Portnoy, before I get into this episode, please comment, ask questions, share some of your experiences, and don't forget to subscribe. You I responded to a post in one of the divorce groups I'm in on social media yesterday, and it got me thinking someone had commented that they were starting to believe that men don't like women at all. My response to her was, and I'm going to read my response. I think they've never been shown what real love feels like, starting with their parents or caretakers. So by the time they have romantic or sexual partners as adults, they don't know how to handle their emotions, and then after disappointing women, or driving women to leave them, or experiencing cheating in either direction, they end up shutting down altogether. I always say All it takes is the right person, but unless or until they heal themselves, they can't see or accept the right person, even when she's right in front of them. So you can see how defeated they feel and how they end up shutting down and throwing in the towel. Add in how unhealed many women are, and that's how you get to believing that men don't like women at all. It's a shit show in both directions. Then there are dating apps and porn, and you've got the perfect storm of relationship combustion. It's not entirely men's faults, but men and women both would do themselves and society a world of good to do some inner healing work, just my two cents. So when I talk about doing the work, I wanted to share some powerful examples of what that looked like for me, three things in particular that I did early on in my journey. I paid attention to my intuition, I trusted it, and then I acted on it. And those are three separate things that are very difficult. First, to sit with yourself and pay attention and go inward and listen to your body. And that took some time before I could start to feel things and notice things and pay attention, then to learn to trust it was a whole other level. Because how do you know that it's true? How do you know that you can trust it? How do you know it's not your mind playing games on you? Well, then I acted on it. So I would start making small decisions based on my intuition and kind of test it out. And every time that I made a decision about something based on my intuition, it always proved to me to be the better decision than if I had just made a decision arbitrarily on my own, so it built a lot of confidence once I started testing that, and it just reinforced the trust all over. So it's really a three step process in growing your intuition and becoming aware of it and relying on it, ultimately, which I found to be very empowering once I got to that point. The second thing was about not seeking external validation from other people. I took a step back whether it was a life changing decision or something small, I went within and I sat still with myself, again, relying on intuition to see how I felt about something. And you know, I think most people are very quick to rely on other people's opinions for decisions that they're trying to make. And you know, it could be something very superficial, or it could be something very life changing. And while I used to be just like everybody else in that department, I found that by not seeking external validation and relying on my own intuition and validation it made. Again, it was much more empowering for me to be able to rely on myself for that. And now I'm at the point where I don't even think about asking other people's opinions, or, you know, how to make decisions. It's just I, if something doesn't come easily to me, that that just means I have to sit with it longer until something comes up within me. And then the third thing that I wanted to talk about is, you know, the difference between low vibrational energy and high vibrational energy, and what. I've done as I was, pulling myself out of hell of my divorce for three years while living together, I took challenges, obstacles and issues, and instead of staying in a low vibrational energy, like, Why me? Why do bad things happen to me? I tried to stay in a high vibrational energy, and which is more like saying, What is this trying to teach me? What is the lesson here? What is this preparing me for so you can see the difference. I mean, these are incredibly hard things to do. Ask yourself, how would you feel taking on even one of these things? It feels insurmountable, right? I I was led to overcome these lessons, guided by God through my healing journey. And I know this because I did not make a conscious choice to accomplish any of these things, but I was open to receive whatever God had in store for me. So when I would pray, I would simply say, use me, God, whatever your will is for me, show me what I need to know. I had no idea what that would look like. I had no sense of what God would do or how he would answer me, but I remained open and receptive, and that was the key to it. Building a relationship with God doesn't happen overnight. In fact, it took about three years for me to get from the depths of hell through my divorce to where I am now. Some people read and study the Bible, some people journal, some people pray. Some people connect with nature. However it feels good to you to connect with God. That's all he cares about. Maybe you've heard the expression God will meet you wherever you are. I can absolutely confirm that that is true. I had no formal training in Hebrew school in terms of having a personal connection to God. I went to temple on the High Holy Days, read from our prayer books, sang potent and powerful songs, and that was it in my informal ways of praying to God now, no prayer books, no temple, just me and God, I feel more connected to him now than ever, and the way that I started praying to him three years ago is exactly the same as I pray to him now, it just takes longer, because I've got more to say. I so like I said, it took three years for me to really seek God, three years of building a connection and a relationship with Him. Some people pray to the angels, spirit guides, ancestors or anyone working under God, with the exception of praying to my mother at the beginning of this journey, after I would pray to God, I didn't pray to anyone else. I had and built a direct path to God. I took the express lane and never looked back. You might wonder, what happens when you become a vessel for God to work through. How does it show up in your life? Blessings come your way, opportunities, miracles, abundance in every way, peace, ease, freedom from self and any self imposed shackles that bind us, safety, security, flow. So you might ask, what is needed in order to achieve these things? I will say simply, it's three things, but there's nothing simple about them. First is trust, second is patience. Third is faith. That's it. I know it's easier said than done, but ask yourself this, what are you committed to in your life? What is it in your life currently that you're actually committed to? Is it a job or career you hate? Are you in a relationship with a partner that brings pain and heartache to you, or are you in friendships that only suck you dry of your energy and love without giving anything back to you. Or are you the victim of abuse in your family? You have the power and ability to change your circumstances yet we don't. We think that's what we deserve. That's the best we can do or have. It's easier to complain about what's wrong in our lives than to take an active role in changing them. For me, turning it all over to God was my way of getting out of what was set to destroy me through my divorce while living together, it took time, but I felt a calling, a fierce pull towards God as I had nowhere else to turn. I was totally isolated as my ex husband turned all of our friends, our community, his family, and worst of all, our daughter, against me. I was either going to perish in complete despair, which is what my ex counted on, or rise from the ashes and thrive, which he. Severely underestimated my strength and resilience. With God's help and guidance, I chose the latter. So when I talk about doing the work, this is what saved me. God saved me, and in time, I started to see how God would use me to help and inspire others who are going through something similar. My commitment to God is unshakably strong. My faith is unwavering and my trust is ironclad. I don't play when it comes to God, and I've come to understand that he doesn't play when it comes to me. There's so much more work that I've done in these last three years, but I wanted to give three things that you could start on if you're even interested in profoundly changing your life. I've also released judgment from my life. I used to be a very judgmental person, like so many other people, I had an awakening that made me understand that it's God's job to judge, not mine, and so I practiced releasing judgment and learned how to accept people for who they are without judgment in the way, plus leaning so heavily on my intuition, I embraced one of my many spiritual gifts, one being my ability to see through people energetically, if you are someone who puts on a facade in front of others, I can see right through it and see the truth of who you are, what your soul is about, not to judge you, not to control you, not to wish harm on you, but to understand you, to have compassion for you, to love You. Another spiritual gift I've obtained is a high level of wisdom. I've always been psychologically in tune and aware, and as a result, I've gained a lot of knowledge from my experiences. This is different. The wisdom I've gained spiritually is indisputably given to me by God, not anything I could have made up myself or read in books. My life's purpose and path is to help elevate humanity with everything I'm talking about here, and so much more to anyone listening who knows me or knew me. I can bet that no one would ever have known me in this way before. I wasn't this person before a spiritual transformation such as mine has helped me release the old version of myself, complete with letting go of old belief systems, thought patterns, attitudes, obstacles, challenges and people, places and things that no longer serve My highest good, all making way for the new me, which is so much more wiser, stronger, braver, more courageous, determined and peaceful. I've spent a lot of time also healing my inner child, resolving pain, overcoming struggles, learning to re parent my inner child, so we are in harmony now, honoring her, loving her and admiring her all the time. I've broken so many generational curses throughout this journey of healing. When you think of how your parents were raised and the limitations set on them from their parents, and keep considering those limitations and pain going back dozens and dozens of generations, you can see the bigger picture throughout your lineage of how no one was able to break the cycles of abandonment, betrayal, abuse, negativity, limitations or suffering, They just kept getting passed down from generation to generation, knowing that you might be able to have some compassion towards your parents, knowing that they did the best with what they had, and if they could have known better, they would have done better. So God allowed my divorce to almost ruin me on every level. He knew what I was made of, but needed me to see it for myself. And as such, I have broken so many generational curses in the process. With all that I've mentioned here, I have always been a sweet and loving person. My whole life, these traits weren't appreciated nor celebrated as I grew up, I was told I was too sensitive, too emotional, my dreams were too big and unrealistic and that I was too much for people. My light was dimmed at an early age, and I learned to become a people pleaser as a result, give them what they could handle of me, not who I was. I finally broke that persona throughout this journey, and as I finally accessed my true, authentic self, in all of my light, love and glory, I uncovered exactly who God made me to be. I no longer care if I'm too much for people, if I'm too sensitive, too emotional, if my dreams seem too big and unattainable to the. Am. I am exactly who I'm meant to be. Take me or leave me. I'm not for everyone, but sharing all that I am now is what will help lift humanity, and I'm committed to that 1,000% I invite anybody who's interested in starting a healing journey of any kind, in any way, at any level, please reach out to me. I would be thrilled and honored, and I would love to help you get started, or guide you in some way until next time. See you in the next episode. Please join me every Thursday for a new episode, you can reach my website@podpage.com slash the music of life. Feel free to leave your email address. You can also leave a voicemail and share any kinds of stories or experiences or anything that you'd like to talk about. I promise I will keep you anonymous, but I assure you that whatever experiences or stories you leave for me, you are not alone, and I would love to share that with other people who are also going through similar things. Thanks again for listening. I'll see you in the next episode. You