Hello beautiful souls! In this episode, we welcome Kris Carr, known for her remarkable health journey and resilience in the face of adversity, including her battle with cancer, and author of the new book I’m Not a Mourning Person. Kris shares with us how she has learned to navigate life’s challenges and embrace spirituality in the midst of chaos. Hopefully, this episode can help you transform pain into strength and engage in conversations with your own loved ones who may be facing health issues.

To learn more about Kris Carr and her work:
KrisCarr.com
[IG] @crazysexykris
Her book I’m Not a Mourning Person is available at all major retailers

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TRANSCRIPT

Angels and Awakening welcomes Kris Carr with a new message

Julie Jancius (01:46): Hello beautiful souls! Welcome back to the Angels and Awakening podcast. I’m your host and author, Julie Jancius. And friends, I know all of you have heard of our next guest today. Her name is Kris Carr, and she’s coming to us with a new message. A lot of times she’s talking about health, her journey with cancer in the past, and she’s written a new book called I’m Not a Mourning Person, but it’s Mourning and it’s about the loss of her dad. So, Kris, I’m sorry it’s under these circumstances, but thank you so much for being here on the show.

Kris Carr: Oh, thanks for having me, Julie. I’m a big fan, so this is very exciting.

Julie Jancius: Thank you.

Your book is about braving, loss, grief and the messy emotions

Julie Jancius (02:28): So I want to just start because I read your book and it’s just so impactful in so many different ways. You start out the book talking about how the dad that you lost was not your biological dad and that you as a little nine year old girl when he came into your life was very anti– Bringing somebody into the trio that you, your grandmother, and your mother had, but you embraced him. And I wonder if you can start there and just kind of talk to us a little bit and tell us that story.

Kris Carr (03:03): Absolutely. First and foremost, thank you for reading my book because that’s very wonderful. We do these interviews all the time and it’s never guaranteed that somebody’s actually going to read your book. It’s very generous of you.

Julie Jancius (03:16): Oh, my gosh, it was so beautiful. And the stories. Like, you are just such an open book in this book and you go so deep into your feelings, which really, really resonated with me, because and, we’ll get to this in a bit, but you talk a lot about anger too, and I’m excited to touch on that because I was estranged from my dad when he passed. And I was 33 at the time. And I had always wanted to write and be an author in my 20s. Would always pray, like, God, just bring me the book and I will write it. And I would hear, when you’re 33, you’ll know what to write about. When you’re 33, you’ll know. And he passed and I started hearing from him before I knew that he was gone, even though it was like such a beautiful way for him to come through. The amount of anger that I felt for him leaving things so broken was immense. But we don’t give ourselves permission to feel that anger.

Kris Carr (04:18): Absolutely. I would say, especially as women,

(04:30) I would love to touch on that. Let me go back to your first question and take a big step back. So I’m not a morning person. What the heck does that mean? Well, for me, let’s do the subtitle. So it’s about braving, loss, grief, and the big, messy emotions that happen when life falls apart. So every single one of us, at some point, we’re going to have what I call a rupture. It’s that moment where you feel like life kicks you in the teeth. It’s that moment where the rug is pulled out from under you, where it really feels like it’s falling apart. And if you survive it, you’ll never be the same. At least that’s what we believe in our hearts, because we’re flooded with fear and anxiety. And sometimes grief and loss can actually feel like fear, right? Because it has a similar response in our bodies and a similar response in our brains. 

(05:07) And so this was not the book that I was planning on writing, Julie. I hadn’t at the time written a book for seven years. It’s funny because this is my 7th book. And then it was like a seven year pause. And my idea was I should probably write something that’s super motivational and positive and upbeat and you go, girl, and you’ve got this. And seize the day. And here’s what was happening in my life. My father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, which would become stage four and terminal. My business was faltering. I was approaching my 20 year cancer-versary of living with stage four cancer, which I’ve been doing for the last 20 years. Beautiful milestone, but also difficult. And we were in the middle of a global pandemic, so I was really feeling the big feels. And what I didn’t realize was this work, this book, and all that we’re going to explore in it really kind of paves the way for that life that you want to create. Paves the way for that connection you want to feel. Paves the way for that alignment you so crave. 

(06:14) But these scary places are not places that many of us have tools to go to. We live in a grief, phobic, messy, emotions averse society. And it’s also a very binary society. We’re either winners or losers, right? It’s like, once I get this, then I’ll be set to jet. And the goal of this book is really to invite people to work with their difficult emotions, to actually, first and foremost, be able to identify them and learn how to work with them. Because as I have experienced in my own journey, especially as a patient, is that we can’t amputate any of our emotions and expect to be whole. And wholeness is the goal. To me, wholeness is what health looks like. It’s not some sort of finish line where the doctor says, Check. We can check all the boxes off on, paper. You’re glorious. Yay. You. It’s like, how do I feel in my body? How do I feel in my spirit? How can I move towards wholeness each and every day? Welcoming parts of myself back home to myself, welcoming emotions that scare me or make me feel very uncomfortable, back home to myself? And so that’s the journey we go on. And every single chapter is designed to sort of touch on some key experiences or key situations that you may find yourself in when the poop hits the fan.

My biological father left when I was conceived; I met my chosen father later

Kris Carr (07:34): Going back to your initial question, just to give people a little set up for the book. My biological father left when I was conceived. I did not know him. I did not know who he was. I didn’t know what he looked like. I met him later when I was 18 years old. Prior to meeting him, it was me, my grandmother, and my mom. Three very strong, fiery women. I really, even as a little nine year old, was like, I am the top dog of the family. And I think many of us who come from– we have traumatic backgrounds or we have loss in our lives or abandonment, right? We’re very hyper vigilant. We might be very controlling. There’s a lot of things, a lot of behaviors that we’re domesticated to take on because we come from that place where something very difficult has happened, right? And so when my chosen father, Ken, came into my life this is just when my parents were dating, I was like, who the heck is this guy? Oh, no, not on my watch, I’m, the top dog here. And so what was interesting was that this person came into my life and he refused to not love me for who I was. Boo boos, traumas, dramas and all. And our relationship was a very, very integral part of healing that father daughter wound with my chosen father. It’s a part of the book that I explore throughout, which is the relationship I then had with my biological father and how that ultimately ended again. And, the spiritual relationship that I was blessed to be able to develop with my chosen father. And for me, Julie, love is love. Oh, yeah, right.

Your book describes going into beast mode after being diagnosed with cancer

Julie Jancius (09:12): Well, and it’s so interesting because I would describe your book as cathartic when you go through it. And we’ve all had these different experiences in childhood that have left us with so many triggers and pain points. And it was wonderfully beautiful for the reader to be able to go through it, because you describe what you’re feeling, the way in which you want to hide it or stay in the shower to let it wash away your mascara so that it’s not running out in front of everybody. But in life– And as a spiritual teacher and the way that I’ve been leading my audience, unless you’re in that energy of oneness that highest vibration that is, it’s really hard to get into that vibration. If we’ve got all of this pain and these triggers within us, it can easily zap us and take us out. 

(10:03) So the book was really cathartic to go through and just be able to experience the emotions with you because we’ve all had these emotions, but you just laid them out so beautifully, have this wonderful relationship with your stepdad, your dad, and he develops cancer. And here you are, this warrior who has figured out cancer, and you talk about you and your mom going into this beast mode where you are going to figure everything out. It was such a relatable point as well, because I have a daughter who was in the hospital off and on for the first six months, but was tube fed for the first three years. I don’t know if it’s the control. I don’t know if everybody’s that way, but you’re like, if anybody can figure out what’s going on, I’m going to do this. A lot of times, the doctors that you’re seeing, they’re only in for ten or 15 minutes at most. They don’t get the full scope of what’s going on. I felt, though, in my life as I was going through that beast mode, it almost becomes an anxiety or an overwhelmed energy that’s hard to get out of afterwards. How did you– both with your cancer journey and with your dad, kind of decompress from that heightened beast mode?

Kris Carr: Such a beautiful question. I think I’m still in beast mode.

Julie Jancius: Okay.

Kris Carr (11:30): To be honest with you, I think it’s how I’m wired, because I’m just wired that way from childhood. Right. It’s easy to go into that survival place for me because I think if we think about how our brains are designed, they’re designed to keep us safe ultimately, and they’re not designed to keep us happy from an evolutionary perspective. And so there’s a reason why we have all of these negative thoughts and they’re on repeat and all this kind of stuff, because our brain is always looking for risk assessments. And then when something difficult happens, sometimes your brain could say, See, I told you so. We had to stay hyper vigilant. We always have to be in beast mode. Otherwise it’s not safe. 

(12:13) And so I think I had a bit of that from my own history. And then when I was diagnosed, it was the first place I went. It’s like, I live with incurable cancer. If they can’t figure it out, I will. Beast mode. And there’s a lot of good things that happened as a result of that Beast mode, right? I changed my diet, I changed my lifestyle. I taught other people how to do the same. I’ve coached a lot of people all over the world and seen some really beautiful stories of healing or stability, right? It isn’t always about putting something behind you. Sometimes it’s learning how to live with something and still live a big, beautiful life, which is really my story. But the thing is, at some point, we have to learn how to soothe our nervous systems. And it’s a lifelong process, right? So even though I might be hardwired to go to that place, I have this opportunity to just be aware of it and to softly, gently through self care, through meditation, through self soothing practices. Just bring my parasympathetic nervous system back online so that I’m not just in fight or flight all the time, but I can go into rest and digest. 

(13:21) And I think that’s the key, because when the going gets tough, when you’re newly diagnosed, when the divorce happens, when your child gets sick, when you lose your job, right? We are going to go into fight, flight, freeze, or what I call WTF, right? It’s the fourth one. We’re going to go to that place. That’s natural. That’s our body’s way of keeping us safe. But then, our higher consciousness, then all that self awareness, all the tools that I know, all of your listeners have been pulling together for years. That’s when those tools need to be standing on the ready. That’s when we need to just remember we have them. Because usually when we’re going through a difficult time, it isn’t like a quick thing. For me, it was over the course of four and a half years with my father. And a lot of that triggered old grief, old fear, old loss. So all of a sudden, I’m dealing with the loss of my biological father. I’m dealing with my own cancer diagnosis from 20 years ago, and I’m about to lose somebody who’s so precious to me. So in those moments that don’t get resolved very quickly and efficiently, that’s when I think we’re called to do that work of, like, I have to come back to myself because I need the stamina to make it through this, but I also need the physical, mental, and spiritual energy to stay intact. If that makes sense.

Julie Jancius: 100%.

Kris talks about how to work through grief and trauma

Julie Jancius (16:10): I think it’s confusing because in order to be able to do this work, there is this go go and do do do, but it’s not from a place of ego. You get into this flow and I just think that some people are creators in this lifetime and you’re from a place of presence and oneness able to create and do and on top of it, do all of the other things. Be Mama. Elle’s still going through a couple of health challenges, right know, figuring all that out. There are sometimes people who come on the podcast and they’re like, no, you just have to be in the slowness of it all. And I don’t think that that’s true. I think that you can ebb and flow and that’s to your point earlier where you’re most whole and it doesn’t have to be totally zenned out or total beast mode. There is this middle place.

Kris Carr (17:08): I love that. I think that’s honestly, that’s more true to life. Because if I were to be zenned out, there’s a lot of things that I or my father would not have experienced that were good things. But I think the point is more like can you bring that Zen quality? Can you bring that consciousness? Can you bring that awareness to your beast mode? Can you understand that even beasts need to rest? So if we think about caregivers, for example, and I’m sure you can completely relate to this is like when you’re only caring for your child and you’re not giving to you. Do you start to break down? Do you start to have health issues? Is your patience worn thin? Do you snap maybe even at your child because you are afraid? That’s the kind of stuff we want to avoid 100%.

Julie Jancius (18:00): So as we’re recording this. just a couple of weeks ago, Sinead O’Connor passed away. Just broke my heart into pieces. She was like the embodiment of allowing yourself to feel divine anger at one point in time, and that divine rage. And you talk about anger in the book and how you work through anger. There are so many people who just try and stuff that anger away, or we’re supposed to be good girls and good women and not have that anger at all. But it’s so empowering to be able to work with this emotion of anger. Tell us how you did that and how you came to that.

Kris Carr (18:42): Yeah, I was so surprised through this experience, and I remember it with my own diagnosis, but I think it was more visceral with my dad’s, especially because I’m older. I got a lot more experience under my belt. You know what I mean? I was very surprised by the other accompanying emotions around grief and loss. So there’s a part in the book where I really go into grief and trauma. But one of the beautiful nuggets in the book, I think, is from my therapist, and she says when the grief train pulls into the station, it brings all the cars. It brings past griefs that you think that you might be over or you thought you were over, and what the heck, it’s back. Oh, my gosh, I thought I worked through this. It brings new griefs that you may not even be aware that you would even feel that person. I wasn’t even that close to that person. Why am I so devastated by this? And it also brings these other big, messy emotions, and that’s part of the subtitle, like jealousy, rage, shame, self loathing, like you name it, they’re coming. And that was the thing I was not prepared for. I think what happens is we get– I’ll speak for myself, it’s easy to become very frightful of feeling any of those feelings, because if you let even a little bit in, they’re going to potentially take you under. Right. 

(20:02) That’s why I think in so many of the books and the grief circles and all the things that I’ve read, and certainly my own feelings, my own metaphor is like, grief and water, the waves, the tsunami. It feels like you’ll be pulled under and that you’ll drown. Now, you and I know this, and many of our listeners know this, and yet it can be really hard to viscerally feel it and believe this, but the way out is through it. If you imagine holding your arms out and you’re pushing against the ocean, you’re pushing against the waves. And let’s say you’re strong enough to hold those waves back. Let’s just say you are. But over a time, those waves start to stack up. And as the waves are stacking up, the pain becomes greater, the physical exhaustion becomes deeper. And even though you are a very powerful being, you’re not more powerful than the ocean. So that’s one way to approach it. And you know, when those waves hit, it’s going to hit even harder, right? It’s going to be like, I got some sand in my bikini. I am tossed about. 

(21:03) The other way is to take a deep breath. And even though it might be a little scary to dive through the waves, to go under, to go into that water, to go into the depth of that water and swim through it, right? And I believe that’s the metaphor that I like to hold on to is like the waves start to recede, but I’m just going to dive in and through and in and through, as opposed to shutting down, hardening my body, locking myself in fear and anxiety, being held prisoner by the fear that I might, as I say to my mom, leak, right? I might cry in front of people. It’s like, I have cried in front of so many people these last few years, and every time I do, somebody else starts crying because they needed to. You know what I mean?

Kris Carr (21:47): But let’s go to anger because I think that’s the perfect set up of setting up this idea that there are certain places we just don’t want to go or we shouldn’t go. And certainly in our society, especially for women, anger is at the top of the list. I start this chapter by telling a funny story about my grandmother and how she had all of these behaviors that she would tell me were unbecoming. Like chewing, farting– unbecoming. You know, it’s like, well, you know, Julia, I gotta fart. I know it’s unbecoming, but I just got to do it. But all these things were unbecoming. And I think in her mind it was because at some point, she hoped that I would find a good husband, right? That was her main big goal for me. And so I was like, yeah, I’m not going to be quiet. There’s a lot of things about me that are just not going to be becoming. This is just the way it goes. But at the top of her list was this idea that you never show any anger and you never cry. You never cry in public. You don’t show that emotion. You put grief and anger in the depths of your being. You lock it there. It’s like you just have a game face. 

(22:50) And bless her. Each and every one of us, we develop our own mechanisms for survival. When it came to this loss and everything that was happening, anger was not something I could lock into the basement of my being. I was enraged. And I have to say, not all the time. But there was a couple of big moments that happened throughout the course of our journey together in these last four and a half years that really triggered me. And I write about them in the book and what I’ve come to learn as a result of this work, and certainly the research I did around it, is that anger is like our fight response in grief. It’s also just information, just like all of these other emotions that we have. They’re just trying to teach us something. And it’s this instinctive response to a perceived threat. Whether that threat is real or not, it is an instinctive response, right? 

(23:44) But anger is also a signaling emotion. And oftentimes I have this metaphor in the book that I got from researchers at the Gottman Institute. And you picture an iceberg, right? You see the iceberg and you think, oh, wow, that’s so big. Look at that big chunk of ice sticking up from the water. But what you don’t realize is that underneath it, it’s so much, it’s just the tip may look big, but no, underneath it, it’s fast. So that signaling emotion is basically saying there’s something deeper going on here underneath the surface. Anger is our protector. Anger will rise up when there’s injustice. So there’s all these real reasons why we have it, and it keeps us safe. 

(24:25) The point is that we have to know when enough is enough, right? We have to be able to, first of all, take responsibility when we do stupid shit because we got angry, like it’s going to happen, be willing to say, okay, anger got out of control. I take responsibility. But also be willing to care for that emotion. Because literally, it’s pointing to something. It’s saying ow. It’s trying to get your attention and get you to be awake because something’s going on. Either something that’s coming at you that might not be safe or something that’s deep in you that is longing to be healed. And so this was a very powerful experience that I got to go on of just really, like, going, okay, this is going to be a part of this journey. And so cultivating tools to literally care for that, care for that emotion.

Julie Jancius: Beautiful.

You learned to trust yourself and your own intuition during your cancer journey

Julie Jancius (25:12): I know that when my kiddo went through just that extensive time in the hospital and you’ve got these two different health journeys that you’ve been through, one of the biggest eye opening experiences for me was to learn how to trust myself and my own intuition over anybody else. I believe that we need the medical doctors and the medical system, and we need holistic and just we need an earthbound spirit team of so many different people here. But how did you learn? And maybe was it different the second time around with your dad– trusting that intuition, really listening to it, advocating for yourself, advocating for him, when there’s so much going on and it is so heavy? How do you really tune in to that intuition?

Kris Carr: I love your questions. Let’s hang out.

Julie Jancius: Yay.

Kris Carr (26:02) : Well, it’s different for me than it was for him because one of the things I learned as somebody who’s gone the distance with an incurable disease is. The closer I am to myself, the easier the experience is, right. So healing that relationship with self, developing that relationship with self, and as you so beautifully said it, that’s where intuition comes from, of like, what are my preferences? What do I feel? What do I need? What does my wisdom say? How does this feel? How does this feel in my body? Does this idea tire me? Does this idea inspire me? These are the types of questions that I ask myself when I’m trying to get clear on what would be the best move forward for me. Now, again, in the beginning, the best move forward was driven by fear. So I was just like, I’m going to research all the things and figure it out. But as that started to settle, over time, it was more so I’m going to learn how to take care of myself, for Kris, not because I’m terrified of cancer.

Julie Jancius: Yeah.

Kris Carr (26:56): And honestly, it was that shift that allowed me to continue to go the distance with it, because there’s a very good chance that it’s always going to be with me. Right. There isn’t a cure for my disease. And it may be the thing that ultimately is the reason I leave this planet? Right? That’s also potentially true. But being able to make that shift of saying, I’m going to do these healthy things because it feels good to feel good, and I deserve to feel good, I swear to you, that just drops you right into your intuition. What does feeling good feel like for me? And then you can move forward from there. Now, that’s me.

(27:33) When my dad was diagnosed, I was ready to just jump in, semper five do or diabetes. Let’s go. Not on my watch. This isn’t taking you. And then I write about the fact that people aren’t projects. So my father was a grown ass man, and he did not want his daughter to just tell him what to do and when to do it and how to do it. And if he wasn’t doing it right, he was somehow failing or letting me down. He didn’t want any of that. And certainly it was not my intention to bring that energy to the table. But when you are in fear mode, that’s part of the energy you probably are bringing to the table. And I say maybe not you or anyone listening, but that certainly was my energy because I was afraid. And so I had to start to realize, what are his preferences? What makes him feel good? 37,000 supplements before breakfast. No, that does not make him feel good. Right. Living a strict plant-based diet. No, that does not make him feel good. Some of the things that I was like, we have to do it this way. It’s like, no, he didn’t have the energy for it. At the time he needed chemo and radiation. Things were moving very quickly, and we needed to stop it, to bide us more time. And so it was about truly accepting where we were embracing the wonders of modern medicine, blessing that chemo as it went in his body, lowering my standards, and really like saying, if the only thing I bring to this table is love, that is it. I have no regrets. If I can meet this moment with love and presence, that’s the best medicine. That was how I started to shift through that. And it was really helpful because I think all of my relationships have benefited from that of really being with someone as opposed to trying to change them.

There are people listening to the podcast who are with loved ones who are sick

Julie Jancius (29:21): So there’s one part in your book that made me laugh out loud. And, you’re going to know which part I’m talking about in a second here, because every single time my husband is in a conversation, we’re at a family party and somebody starts bringing up something that he doesn’t want to talk about. He goes, so my hemorrhoids are flaring up. And it’s his signal that he just does not want to talk about whatever it is that they’re talking about. You had a moment in the book where you’re telling this story about how your dad’s hemorrhoids are flaring up. And instead of kind of talking about maybe what he wanted to talk about because it’s hard to go there, you ran out to CVS and got him what he needed to feel better. There are people listening to the podcast who are with loved ones who are at the end of life, and some people at that stage want to have those conversations. How do you help them to meet them where they’re at?

Kris Carr (30:20): With such tenderness. And so the little backstory was that I went on a trip with my dad and my mom and my husband, and we really were trying to make the most of our final years together. And so we planned all these adventures and they would get– they were very easy things because it was just what he was able to do and stuff. But it was experiences because once it was truly terminal and it’s like, there’s nothing more than we can do. The only thing we were doing was saying, well, how are you going to make the most of our time? And my dad was like, I want to have a little fun every day. That’s what we’re going to do. We’re going to have a little fun every day. And that could be a game of Jin Rummy or it could be like five minutes of Jim Rummy before he fell asleep because he was really tired. But anyway, we were on this little trip, and he looked kind of like I don’t know, he looked like his spirit was a little low. And I said, what’s going on, dad? And he said, I’m trying to set goals for myself, but I don’t know how many to set. And that hit me so hard. So hard. And there’s more to the story. But ultimately, at that time, I wasn’t really ready to have that deep conversation that he was opening the door to. I changed the subject, and I was like, Well, I hate this. It sucks. Dad, I wish that we could fix this too, but let’s fix something that we can. How are your hemorrhoids? 

(31:44) Now, granted, that was a very caring thing to do. The hemorrhoids were flaring up and bothering him. However, it was also my escape. I was not ready to talk about him dying with him. He said, I love that I can talk to you about anything. And I said, I do too. And then I went off to CBS. But as I was driving there, I thought, you can’t talk to me about anything. If you could talk to me about anything, you could talk to me about dying. I have to figure out how to get ready for that. And as you said, not everybody wants to have that conversation. But for me, I knew that he did. And so I– please, when you’re going through difficult times, get a therapist, because it’s really helpful to have somebody else to run these big picture things by that has experience with this. Because a lot of times, the people in our families, they’re in their own trauma and drama, right? We’re all having our own emotions. And so she said, Why don’t you start by asking if you can start by talking about talking about it? So you’re not having the actual conversation, but you’re going to talk about the inevitable conversation, like, this is what may happen. And I said, hey, let’s talk about talking about it. Yes, I would love to do that. Okay, so first and foremost, you have to get a yes or a no. Would you like to talk about talking about dying? Some people will say, no. Shut your trap. My dad was like, oh, full blown yes. Because he felt so lonely, because he knew this was happening. We all knew this was happening. He was afraid to bring it up because he didn’t want to upset us. And yet he’s feeling more and more isolated. There’s nobody I can talk to about what– he did with my mom, for sure. 

(33:15) But that would be my suggestion, is approach the person and say, would you like to talk about talking about it? I let him know that there’s some things that may go down. I may burst into tears. I may say the wrong things. It’s going to be painful, but I am here for it. And he was like, oh, thank you.

Julie Jancius: That you could be there for him and be that he needed at that time.

Since your dad passed, you’ve continued to build a relationship with him

Julie Jancius (33:33): So since he’s passed, you have a beautiful angel story about the roses that you and your mom received. I’m wondering if you can share with the listeners how you’ve continued to build a relationship with him, you hear him there, but it’s all just energy and what that maybe feels like to you and how you experience that relationship now.

Kris Carr (33:59): It’s a work in progress, right? We’re in a different place. And I have to continually remind myself that what you just said is possible. And that was something that I was somewhat resistant to, to be honest with you. Or I believe it and then fall out of belief. I was like I say in the book, that I have a very fickle, feral and fluid faith. And if there’s more, more totally gets a kick out of me.

Julie Jancius: And part-time atheist, right?

Kris Carr (34:28): Yeah. Ah, at times, mostly on Sunday. And yet I have a very deep connection to myself and to energy and to love. And so every single one of us, I feel that we find our way to the spiritual realm when we’re ready, and it changes over time. And the one thing I can tell you is that I am absolutely open to the mystery and the miracle. I would love to be delighted at the time of my passing. I would love nothing more than to be like, no way, this is it, right? 

(35:01) But I don’t live in a place of unless that’s going to happen, it’s going to stink, or I’m scared or any of that because I kind of feel like life is so great, and if there’s more, that’s like a bonus. But anyway, losing my dad, of course, that’s a major rupture. And it’s one of those moments that for me, gave me an opportunity to tune back in. And tuning into this place, for me, is a place of tuning into comfort. And I just talked to him, hey dad, here’s what’s going on. I really try to have a relationship like we did, and he’s so deep in my life and in my thoughts and the way I make decisions and the way I move through space and time that it still feels like I can hear him, what he would share with me. And I do get signs. In the book, I talk about a bunch of the signs I get and also really thawing to that and sort of saying, okay, what would it be like to turn my life into a treasure hunt? I’m just like asking for the signs, seeing the signs, noticing the synchronicity, noticing. And I think that was probably the biggest shift for me, which is this idea that there’s probably a lot going on around me all the time, but I’m just not tuning into it because I don’t have the awareness to tune into it. And so that’s why I said I am a work in progress. Julie, take me under your wing. Here’s the thing. We’re all seekers, and I think that’s the part that’s so exciting to me. The second I have all the answers, life is going to get very boring. And I just love that we get to continue to unfold..

Julie Jancius (36:33): I think that our dads are over there together bringing this together. When my dad came through, what happened was I would brush my daughter’s hair, and she was preschool at the time, and he and I were estranged. I loved him. He was such a philosophical thinker. We were very, very deep and have deep conversations very young. But he cheated with our next door neighbor, and I took a hard moral line to safeguard my mom. When he passed, nobody called to let us know. It was an entire month. The day he passed away, this voice started coming into my consciousness, where every single time, very clairtangent, too. So when I’d have my hands on my daughter’s head, I’m brushing her hair. I’d hear, and it sounded like my own internal dialogue, say, she needs a hairbrush like I used. She needs a hairbrush like I used. And legitimately the entire month. Every time I would brush her hair, that would repeat. And it was so confusing to me because I’ve only ever used a big old paddle brush. But a month later, I, was at work. My sister keeps calling over and over again. Family had tracked us down that he passed. Immediately out of my third eye, I get this vision of being in my childhood bathroom. My dad worked night, so he would get us ready in the morning, and he was using this wooden handlebar brush with these boars bristles, and it totally clicked. She’s got his exact hair texture. But my consciousness split in that experience, and I became the observer of my thoughts, and I could see them very clearly, and I learned how to decipher what was them and what’s us. I think that ties into all of it, too, because as soon as you can figure out that voice within yourself when you’re saying, hey, dad, here’s what’s up in my day to day life, here’s what’s going on, and then you’re asking for feedback, he’s talking back. He’s just talking through that internal dialogue.

Kris Carr (38:43): That’s so beautiful. I love that. I’m going to take that, and I can’t wait for sandwiches with you.

Julie Jancius (38:50): Yay. Oh, me too. Yay. Well, Kris, thank you so much for being on the show. Your book is called I’m Not a Mourning Person. We’re going to send it out via email to everybody, put it up on social media. It is just such a cathartic experience to read this book. I think that anybody who does is going to peel back different layers of themselves and just have a better awareness of who they are and how to navigate these life challenges that all come for all of us. So thank you so much for your bravery, your courage, and your willingness to put your story out there. Thanks.

Kris Carr: Julie. Thank you.

Julie Jancius: And where can people find you? For more information and more chris.

Kris Carr (39:35): Yeah. For more Kris, you can go to KrisCarr.com. You can find me on Instagram @crazysexykris and the book is available everywhere. Books are sold.

Julie Jancius: Yay. Thank you Kris, for your time and for being here.

Kris Carr: Bye honey. Thank you.