TRANSCRIPT Oh No, Ross and Carrie! Ep. 380: Gail Thackray Heals Carrie’s Past: Trauma Faith Healing Edition

[00:00:00] Music: “Oh No, Ross and Carrie! Theme Song” by Brian Keith Dalton. A jaunty, upbeat instrumental.

[00:00:08] Carrie Poppy: Hello! Welcome to Oh No, Ross and Carrie!, the show where we don’t just report on fringe science, spirituality, claims of the paranormal. No! We take part ourselves.

[00:00:17] Ross Blocher: Yep, when they make the claims, we show up, so you don’t have to. I’m Ross Blocher.

[00:00:20] Carrie Poppy: And I’m Carrie Poppy, and I’m back from Camp Quest, where I am the director of programming for—

[00:00:25] Ross Blocher: How did it go?

[00:00:26] Carrie Poppy: Oh! It was so fun, Ross! I am so smart and so busy! But I take time out of my life every year. You know, I work at Disney animation, and I take this time out of my life to put the podcast aside, put my day job aside, and go and be with kids and teach them about science, critical thinking, and just really like give of myself for a week.

[00:00:51] Ross Blocher: (Chuckling.) I feel like we have so much in common.

[00:00:53] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. (Teasing.) Oh, do you do something like that also?

[00:00:55] Ross Blocher: Similar. Send your kids to Camp Quest next year!

[00:00:58] Carrie Poppy: Yes! A camp where I have never been, but Ross goes every year and teaches kids about science.

[00:01:04] Ross Blocher: It’s fun.

[00:01:05] Carrie Poppy: You’re back!

[00:01:06] Ross Blocher: And there’s hiking and stuff. Yeah, I’m back.

[00:01:08] Carrie Poppy: I’m back from Salem.

[00:01:09] Ross Blocher: A lot’s been going on. Oh yeah! What were you, Salem-ing?

[00:01:12] Carrie Poppy: Well, I’ve been there a few times now. This was probably like my fifth trip to Salem.

[00:01:16] Ross Blocher: Yeah. You seem like a regular.

[00:01:18] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, I really like Salem. Well, I have a good friend who lives there, and then we were there this weekend because one of Drew’s friends was getting married.

[00:01:26] Ross Blocher: Oh! That’s a good reason to go to Salem.

[00:01:28] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Yeah. So, he went for the first time, which was great. And oh, probably everyone is like, “But how’s—”

[00:01:33] Ross Blocher: Which Salem?

[00:01:35] Carrie Poppy: Oh, thank you! Massachusetts.

[00:01:37] Ross Blocher: Okay. Yeah.

[00:01:38] Carrie Poppy: Yes. Oh my god, Ross! Okay. Quick off topic.

[00:01:42] Ross Blocher: We’re just gonna catch up on our lives here real quick. Everybody just stand aside!

[00:01:45] Carrie Poppy: (Giggling.) They wanna know! They like our friendship!

(Ross laughs.)

While I was in Salem, I went to one of the witch hunt museums that I hadn’t been to—and yes, there are several. And this witch hunt museum, they kept talking about the curses that supposedly exist of the witches who got burned and then cursed their accusers. And so, they come back and haunt the cemetery.

I was like, “We have missed the point entirely!”

[00:02:16] Ross Blocher: So, wait, you think they were witches?

[00:02:18] Carrie Poppy: Right? Yeah. Like, in order to hold this worldview together, you have to think magic is real, which means you missed quite a lot about the Salem witch trials!

[00:02:29] Ross Blocher: Right, right. Because now you’re kind of affirming the original intent of the witch trials. Which was to stop this curse-ery going on.

[00:02:38] Carrie Poppy: That spectral evidence is a bad thing to rely on. Interesting.

[00:02:41] Ross Blocher: Mm-hm. Interesting indeed.

[00:02:44] Carrie Poppy: Anyway, other than that, it was a great trip, and I had a good time.

[00:02:46] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) I missed that one as well. It’s always something I feel like I need to point out to my family, that all the witchcraft, Satanism stuff that is equally invalid. Like, they don’t have magical powers. There’s no magical powers. If there were, I’d wanna see them and test them. Like, they get nervous when they see I have a Ouija board in my house.

(Carrie affirms.)

“Well, you don’t need—it doesn’t actually—oh, goodness me.”

[00:03:10] Carrie Poppy: My contention is that it does nothing. Oh! And similarly, in Salem, I went into a witchy store. They were selling a Ouija board. And a stranger, a man, walked up to me and said, “Excuse me, ma’am, have you used one of those?” And pointed at a Ouija board.

And I was like, “Yes!”

[00:03:32] Ross Blocher: You said, “Oui. Yeah.”

[00:03:35] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) I—no, I thought, “My life has led up to this moment.”

[00:03:39] Ross Blocher: “Oh, finally! Someone asked me.”

[00:03:41] Carrie Poppy: “Please, yes! Ask me about the Ouija board!

He is like, “Does it work?”

And I said, “Well—”

[00:03:47] Ross Blocher: Depends.

[00:03:48] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. “Do you mean does it talk to spirits?” And he is like yeah. And I said, “Oh, I don’t think so.” (Laughing.) And he was like—he was like oh, okay. And I said, “There’s another explanation for how it works. It’s that you’re—”

[00:04:03] Ross Blocher: Pull out your phone. You’re gonna look up the ideomotor effect.

[00:04:06] Carrie Poppy: I told him the name of it. But yeah, I said—I explained that it was like your muscles responding to your brain without your brain paying attention. And he was like, “Oh, okay. That’s interesting.”

[00:04:18] Ross Blocher: Which is cool. Yeah, interesting.

[00:04:18] Carrie Poppy: And then—’cause I was worried, because I heard that like whatever you do comes back at you threefold. So, if I—you know, have you heard this before? Like, that if you curse someone, it’ll come back at you even worse.

[00:04:29] Ross Blocher: I’ve heard seven.

[00:04:30] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Yeah. Or whatever. Whatever the number is. Um, so—

[00:04:34] Ross Blocher: No, you must forgive him 70 times 7. Oh, continue.

[00:04:37] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Yes. Fair. Bible may say otherwise, but yeah. I was like, “Oh yeah, no, that must be kind of nerve wracking.” You know? And yeah, I felt like, aw. Like, I got to disabuse this man of fear of the Ouija board. This stranger came up to me like a heat-seeking missile.

[00:04:55] Ross Blocher: Yeah! Well, that’s fun.

[00:04:57] Carrie Poppy: Anyway. Felt great. The point is, this episode is about Gail Thackray, someone who has nothing to do with any of this. (Laughs.)

[00:05:06] Ross Blocher: Great transition! Great transition. Gail Thackray. Any relation to TwinRay?

[00:05:10] Carrie Poppy: I don’t think so. Though they are celibate, I learned this week.

[00:05:14] Ross Blocher: (Singing.) Are you Thackray?

Yeah, you told me that. And I don’t know what to do with that information.

(Carrie agrees.)

Because I’ll admit, my first thought is, “Yeah, right. They’re lying about that.” But why lie about that?

[00:05:27] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. What’s that for?

[00:05:29] Ross Blocher: I don’t think anyone expects them to be celibate. This doesn’t make me think they’re more holy or worthy of my attention.

[00:05:36] Carrie Poppy: It makes me think of Ti and Do from Heaven’s Gate. It makes me wonder if there’s a closeted situation going on, but who knows?

[00:05:45] Ross Blocher: Always a welcome comparison.

[00:05:47] Carrie Poppy: Sure.

(They chuckle.)

Yeah. Not who you usually wanna emulate.

[00:05:49] Ross Blocher: Yeah. You’re not doing too well if people are like, “Reminds me of the leaders of Heaven’s Gate.” (Chuckles.)

[00:05:54] Carrie Poppy: You guys are kind of like Heaven’s Gate-y. Right? “Yeah, you’re right.” Anyway, Gail Thackray is an energy healer and past life seer.

[00:06:07] Ross Blocher: Okay! That’s her beat. Energy healer, past life—

[00:06:13] Carrie Poppy: Seer. That’s my summary of what she does.

[00:06:16] Ross Blocher: Okay. This is related to our Conscious Life Expo investigation. And you went to see two of her talks?

[00:06:24] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. I went to her free talk and then her $45 seminar the next day.

[00:06:30] Ross Blocher: I noticed she kept talking about trauma. And I thought, “Okay, this is Carrie’s beat. Her beat may be energy healing and past life regression, but Carrie’s beat is people who use the word trauma a lot.”

(They laugh.)

So, I thought, “Okay, I’m gonna let Carrie be the expert on Gail Thackray,” ’cause you already knew who she was.

[00:06:48] Carrie Poppy: I had heard of her because she had done things with Lori Spagna, who we’ve talked about in prior episodes.

[00:06:54] Ross Blocher: Right. And you sent me a video that was her interviewing?—question mark—Lori Spagna. So, that’s my only exposure is her benignly nodding while Lori Spagna does her thing less than a month into the pandemic.

[00:07:09] Carrie Poppy: Ah, okay. I am going to tell you about the free talk that I went to of Gail Thackray, today on this here episode. And then, in the next episode I’m gonna tell you about her past life regression, which was basically recovered memory therapy.

[00:07:26] Ross Blocher: So, free when you pay admission to the Conscious Life Expo.

[00:07:29] Carrie Poppy: That’s right. For the first talk. That’s right. But chronologically, whatever you watched came first. So, do you wanna tell us about that video?

[00:07:37] Ross Blocher: Okay. Yeah. Though, I’m just—while I’m still thinking of it, I’m just gonna throw out there what we meant to disclaim, which is that there was a big event this past week in the world of the things that we talk about.

[00:07:49] Carrie Poppy: And it was that Drew didn’t pass his kidney stone.

[00:07:53] Ross Blocher: Oh! I did mean to ask you about that.

[00:07:55] Carrie Poppy: Still no.

[00:07:56] Ross Blocher: Oh, man. Brutal.

[00:07:57] Carrie Poppy: I know. Were you thinking of something else?

[00:07:59] Ross Blocher: Yes. I was thinking of a congressional hearing on UAPs—what we would normally call UFOs—has for many years now been Unidentified Areal Phenomena. Though, now it’s more properly Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena.

[00:08:15] Carrie Poppy: Okay. It’s getting a little broad.

[00:08:18] Ross Blocher: Right. And on one level, I get it. Because many of us, when you would say UFO, would be like, “Well, you don’t know it’s flying. It could be a reflection on your window.” Or, you know, it could be something else. Could be a light phenomenon.

So, alright. UAP, Unidentified Aerial Phenomenon—well, still saying it’s aerial. It could still be that reflection on your window.

[00:08:39] Carrie Poppy: Okay, I’m gonna call it a IDWTYI: I Don’t Know What This Is.

(They laugh.)

[00:08:47] Ross Blocher: Right. Would be more accurate, but you still want it to be specific enough to encompass what we all think of as UFOs. So, I get the, the urge—I don’t know what committee gets to decide like, “We’re calling it this now!” But just as everyone got used to aerial, then they changed it to anomalous. So, I don’t know. It’s all over the place. What’s—

[00:09:07] Carrie Poppy: And aerial (Arial) was a perfectly good font.

(Ross chuckles.)

Font joke.

[00:09:11] Ross Blocher: Though, that was Microsoft trying to bite off Helvetica.

[00:09:14] Carrie Poppy: Oh, (laughing) of course. Of course! Helvetica rears its head again!

[00:09:20] Ross Blocher: By creating a cheaper version with slanty edges. Different conversation.

[00:09:23] Carrie Poppy: I didn’t know I would dig so deep with that! Okay.

[00:09:28] Ross Blocher: But this was an important event, and many listeners rightly reached out to us and said, “Ooh, ooh! We wanna get your take on this congressional hearing.”

(Carrie confirms.)

Where they had these known people who have been in this alien—

[00:09:43] Carrie Poppy: Investigatory—

[00:09:44] Ross Blocher: —community for a long time. And these are known quantities, and they came as quote/unquote “whistleblowers” to share all this information in front of our representatives. And it was a wild event, and we’ll definitely want to unpack it, but we’re saving that for next week.

[00:10:01] Carrie Poppy: Yes. I’ve only seen part of it. I’ve gotta watch the rest. But yeah.

[00:10:04] Ross Blocher: And we’ve mentioned that we went to the contact in the desert conference again this year. This might kind of kickstart that storytelling as well, because at least one of the key figures from that congressional hearing happening was there at the conference, and I got to hear him talk. So, yeah, anyways, just—

[00:10:22] Carrie Poppy: I made a—I’m gonna say a friend at that conference.

[00:10:25] Ross Blocher: Oh! Okay. Is it the one I’m thinking of?

[00:10:26] Carrie Poppy: Yes! That I’m overstating things, but probably. I made a friendly at that conference. We are friendly now. Yeah.

[00:10:39] Ross Blocher: Okay! Okay. So, anyway, sorry for the interruption. Just wanted to set everybody’s nerves at ease.

[00:10:43] Carrie Poppy: Yes, don’t worry. We are coming back to you, alien listeners.

[00:10:46] Ross Blocher: Tell me about Gail Thackray.

[00:10:48] Carrie Poppy: Okay, Gail! So, you watched a video of hers from a few years ago. Tell us about that.

[00:10:51] Ross Blocher: Oh right! Okay, so it was April 9th, 2020—so again, less than a month into the pandemic. And it was on Gail Thackray’s channel. So, I guess she regularly has people come on her YouTube channel and just talk, do their thing. And in this case, it was Lori Spagna, who we’ve covered on the podcast. You interviewed her. I talked about her recent talk at the Conscious Life Expo. And 98% of the video was just Lori doing her thing and talking. And Gail was mostly just sitting there kind of benignly nodding, smiling.

But speaking of channels, it started with Lori Spagna live-channeling an ancient Atlantean persona, because why not?!

[00:11:33] Carrie Poppy: Oh, wow. (Laughs.)

[00:11:34] Ross Blocher: Why not? She does everything. Why not? She’s never afraid to add anything to her shtick. And in this case, she was giving all this information about how this was all kind of a template that was from the Atlantean times, and it’s playing itself out again. And it’s a masculine template that’s “turning up as covid”, quote/unquote. And it was so funny, like after she finished that whole channeling, then Gail says, “Oh, okay. And how do you know all that?”

She said, “Oh, well that was a channel. That was a live channel just now.”

(Carrie chuckles.)

And it was so funny, ‘cause Lori Spagna was doing something that felt very Bashar-like. I feel like she’s just this chameleon who just kind of eats up whatever shtick she encounters and makes it part of her shtick. Anyways, so that was just the beginning. And then, she was giving a lot of her other regular messages, punctuated with a lot of encouragement for people to ignore the doubters in their lives. I thought, “Well, that sounds like that serves you pretty well.”

(Carrie agrees with a chuckle.)

Doubt is inimical to your business model.

[00:12:35] Carrie Poppy: Right. And she’s probably talking about—I’m just guessing, since that was coming out right in the dead heat of covid, that that doubt is probably people doubting that you can think away covid with your mind or something like that.

[00:12:48] Ross Blocher: Oh, definitely part of it. Because, yeah, she was talking about ways to deal with covid, and part of it was, you know, paying for a healer. But not a healer like you find in a hospital healer. Like, Lori Spagna.

[00:13:00] Carrie Poppy: Oh, okay. Oh, okay. So, what was Gail doing? Did she have any contribution to all this?

[00:13:04] Ross Blocher: Very little.

[00:13:04] Carrie Poppy: Oh! (Laughs.) Sorry to make you watch this whole thing then!

[00:13:08] Ross Blocher: Eh! It was interesting. Just—

[00:13:10] Carrie Poppy: So, Lori brings her on, and Gail just like kind of can’t get a word in edgewise?

[00:13:14] Ross Blocher: Gail brought Lori on.

[00:13:15] Carrie Poppy: Oh! Okay. I guess that’s more fair then. Okay.

[00:13:17] Ross Blocher: And she’s just letting her do her thing. And you know, she asked a few questions here or there, but it was really minimal. It was Lori doing her shtick.

(Carrie affirms.)

So, mostly I just got sort of a visual impression of Gail, who has kind of a big, bushy tangle of blonde hair.

[00:13:33] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. She’s got that big bump effect, kind of like Mary Tyler Moore with that big like bee hivey bump at the top.

[00:13:40] Ross Blocher: From most of the pictures I’ve seen of Gail Thackray, from a distance I would’ve thought she was like Anna Nicole Smith or something. Kind of that look.

[00:13:46] Carrie Poppy: Uh-huh. Uh-huh, yeah. She has a very manicured look. Yeah. Big, dyed blonde hair, quite thin—like clearly works out a lot.

[00:13:58] Ross Blocher: Boy. Like, when I do a Google search for her, the first photos that come up, I would think she was some kind of fitness guru. Like, you know, follow her and get the ab workout video. Right. Right.

[00:14:08] Carrie Poppy: Right, right. And she’s probably in like her 60s? 50s or—late 50s, early 60s.

[00:14:14] Ross Blocher: If she is, she’s looking good for her age.

[00:14:15] Carrie Poppy: She’s looking great. Uh, yeah, I mean she’s obviously—that’s like a focus of her attention.

[00:14:20] Ross Blocher: 58.

[00:14:21] Carrie Poppy: 58! Okay. There you go. Late 50s. Yeah, I wouldn’t say that her shtick is around that hardly at all. So, yeah, you’re right. That’s interesting.

The first event that I went to was called Remove Pain and Emotional Blocks, but I would say this was her faith healing session.

[00:14:40] Ross Blocher: Oh, wow! Okay. Now, just asking blind, off the bat here. Do you think that she’s connecting your health to your emotional makeup? That like healing your body involves dealing with emotional issues?

[00:14:57] Carrie Poppy: Yes. Healing your body will deal with healing emotional issues, attachment wounds with your parents, past life issues. Like, if you got shot in the head, maybe now you get headaches. If you lost a leg in battle in World War II, that’s why you have a bad knee now in this life.

[00:15:17] Ross Blocher: Oooh, interesting. Okay.

[00:15:17] Carrie Poppy: Any complaint you’ve got, she can connect it to a prior incident that you’ve had in your life, which you probably remember and nod along with. Or! If you don’t, “Oh, well, that’s ’cause that was a past life one.” And so, she kind of deftly goes between those two options until she finds a place that you’re nodding along with her.

[00:15:38] Ross Blocher: Okay. Uh, interesting. She’ll dial that to whatever suits your particular comfort zone, how she reads you.

[00:15:44] Carrie Poppy: Yep, yep. That’s how it feels.

[00:15:46] Ross Blocher: No, sorry. I’m realizing as I google her that she has been an actress with 48 credits?

[00:15:55] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. At one point in the second talk, she said that at age 40, she had some kind of spiritual epiphany and got weird.

(They chuckle.)

And so, I think that’s when she started being more of a teacher and less of an actor.

[00:16:09] Ross Blocher: Because immediately I’m thinking of, well, Girl Ray, who we recently talked about.

(Carrie agrees.)

She had been a—you know, a small-time actress before moving into the spiritual realm. And then also, Kimberly Meredith.

(Carrie agrees.)

Also moonlighted as a, you know, nurse on TV. Okay. Interesting. It seems like this is a real pathway.

[00:16:31] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, and as we’ve mentioned so many times, a lot of the people we see are people who wanted to be performers first. That didn’t work out, and then they found sort of a different way to be a performer.

[00:16:44] Ross Blocher: Boy, she was on Baywatch.

[00:16:46] Carrie Poppy: Ah, okay.

[00:16:47] Ross Blocher: Played somebody’s girlfriend. Yeah, this looks like mostly smaller stuff. Masseuse III. Oh my.

(Carrie giggles.)

Uh, but this—

[00:16:57] Carrie Poppy: Sounds good.

[00:16:58] Ross Blocher: Oh, wow. In The Outsider, she played Wubba Wubba Girl.

(Carrie “wow”s.)

As Gail Harris. So, she had that name that she went by for much of her acting career. Anyways, sorry. This is all very interesting.

[00:17:09] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. So, she has an Australian, I believe, accent. I’m not great at accents, but that seems right.

[00:17:14] Ross Blocher: Oh, interesting. She was born in Yorkshire, England, for what that means.

[00:17:18] Carrie Poppy: Oh, okay. Completely believe she’s English. I can’t distinguish anything.

[00:17:26] Ross Blocher: Look, I haven’t been keeping up on her geographical whereabouts.

(Carrie laughs.)

She could have gone to Australia.

[00:17:30] Carrie Poppy: Have I told you about the time that I was in Guatemala, and the guy walked up to me and spoke English to me, and then I was like, “I assume you’re from Ireland,” because of his accent.

And he was like, “Did you say you think I’m Irish?” And I said yeah. And he is like, “I’m from Australia!” (Laughs.)

[00:17:47] Ross Blocher: I have not internalized this, because I’m not good at identifying accents either. And often in my mind, I’ll think, “Well, if I get that wrong, Carrie will know what the right answer is.”

[00:17:57] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) Oh no! We’ve been telling people—for ten years, we’ve been telling you—

[00:18:01] Ross Blocher: Disregard anything we’ve said about accents.

[00:18:03] Carrie Poppy: Wrong accents. Okay. So, as we all know, she had a very obvious British accent.

(Ross chuckles.)

And she had a full room, extremely full.

[00:18:13] Ross Blocher: (Sighs.) This Conscious Life Expo!

[00:18:15] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, I think she’s also got a hot topic. Like all of her—all of her descriptions had “trauma” in them. That’s a—you know, it’s a real gimme topic right now. I think people were into it.

[00:18:26] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Carrie’s handed me the schedule here. “Gail Thackray, Energy Healing: Remove Pain and Emotional Blocks. Are you blocked from money, love, or other areas of your life? Do you have ongoing health issues? Energy healing often appears miraculous, but it is a simple shift of energy that instantly releases the block. Even difficult physical pain and long-term health problems can suddenly be lifted and negative patterns in your love life, finances, and career can be immediately resolved. Gail is a reiki master and has studied with psychic surgeons and healers around the world. Gail will show you how to find and release these blocks permanently. Those practicing healing will learn techniques to use on your clients. In preparation for this workshop, write down the three main blocks you wish to release in your life. Attendees receive an Energy Clearing,”—capitalized—“from Gail and a small, blessed crystal.” Whoa! “Gail Thackray is a sixth-generation reiki master?”

(Carrie confirms.)

So, she comes from a long line of Reiki masters? People have been calling themselves that for six generations?

[00:19:36] Carrie Poppy: Oh, well, generation here just means like one reiki master gave it to the next, gave it to the next, give it to the next.

[00:19:43] Ross Blocher: Oh, duh. Okay. “And has worked with spiritual healers around the world. Gail is an exceptional medium with tremendous connection to spirit and helps people to realign their energies for better health, love, finances, and to live their soul purpose.”

[00:19:58] Carrie Poppy: I wanna call myself exceptional in my own bio I wrote for myself.

[00:20:02] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) Yeah, exceptional medium. Okay.

[00:20:05] Carrie Poppy: You know, and actually as you were reading that out loud, I was like, “Oh, you know, she doesn’t actually say trauma in that one.” She definitely talks about it a lot, but yeah, she didn’t write it down there. So, she started out by asking us how many of us had had an epiphany before?

[00:20:19] Ross Blocher: How many?!

[00:20:20] Carrie Poppy: (Chuckles.) What do you think? Have you had an epiphany?

[00:20:22] Ross Blocher: When I hear that word, I picture Saul being knocked off his horse and becoming Paul.

[00:20:28] Carrie Poppy: In the Bible.

[00:20:29] Ross Blocher: Then I immediately think, “I don’t have anything in my life that amounts to that.” So, my gut reaction is no.

[00:20:33] Carrie Poppy: Oh, okay! Not even like realizing you didn’t believe in God?

[00:20:39] Ross Blocher: Okay. Yeah. Alright. That counts. You talked me into it.

[00:20:44] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) And that’s what she can do for you todaaay!

[00:20:47] Ross Blocher: I’m healed! Thank you, Carrie! You’re exceptional.

[00:20:49] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Thank you. Yeah, but I had a similar reaction. Like, I was like, “What counts as an epiphany?” But everyone just immediately—everyone else is like, “Yeah, absolutely! Hand up!”

[00:21:01] Ross Blocher: Weird. Yeah, I just—I don’t feel any need to claim that for my life. But okay, yeah.

[00:21:05] Carrie Poppy: But then she kind of started describing it as, “We all sometimes have moments of transcendence where an insight feels perfectly worded to us or gets you just past where you were before.”

[00:21:17] Ross Blocher: I like that.

[00:21:18] Carrie Poppy: If we call that an epiphany, okay, sure.

[00:21:20] Ross Blocher: Lots of those, yeah.

[00:21:22] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. So, she said, you know, “They strike when they strike, but tonight we’re gonna just try to make it happen.” Which, yeah! It was like, oh, this is ballsy! Like, ’cause you know, like you’re standing up and basically giving a talk, and you’re like, “I’m gonna wow you!”

[00:21:37] Ross Blocher: Yeah. “I’m gonna change your life. The top three things that are holding you back? Eh! By the time you leave here, they’re gonna be like no big deal.”

[00:21:45] Carrie Poppy: “I’m gonna really impress you right now.”

[00:21:46] Ross Blocher: These are big claims.

[00:21:48] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. But she says, you know, “Sometimes you walk around, and great wisdom comes to you. Sometimes it’s when you least expect it. But those moments are when you are connecting to the divine.” And she’s like, “So, who’s had that?” And now mostly the rest of the room puts their hands up.

[00:22:04] Ross Blocher: Including you?

[00:22:05] Carrie Poppy: No, no. Actually, that makes me less sure of myself. When you’re like, “Yo, the divine’s involved,” now I’m like, oh, now I really don’t know. So, she’s going to help us cleanse whatever it is that’s bothering us. And she says, you know, “We’ve all had difficult experiences, but we actually choose all of our difficult experiences. We need to learn something.”

[00:22:28] Ross Blocher: (Doubtfully.) Okay. Hmm. I’m sorry, that’s just such a—we hear it so often, but that’s such a weird construction to be saying that you need to learn a lesson, but you’re aware of this, and you’re choosing some lesson that’s gonna come to you in your life, but then it surprises you when you encounter it in life? Like, this sort of pre-life decision making. We hear about it all the time, but it’s such a weird thing, like, “Oooh, I’m really gonna need to learn reliance upon others. So, I’m planning in this life, I’m gonna have a situation where I feel completely and utterly alone. But then, I’m gonna get a pet who’s gonna really teach me the importance of reliance.”

What’s—?! What? Why?

[00:23:10] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, I guess—I mean, from a resilience perspective, I kind of get it that there are some things you can’t learn without hardship. So, if you’re going to sort of construct your life, we wouldn’t wanna construct anyone’s life without hardship at all.

[00:23:25] Ross Blocher: But why have you be the person the who chose that for yourself? ‘Cause the person who chooses that already seems to know something about the solution. I was really wise in the pre-life when I chose this for myself. I don’t know.

(Carrie agrees.)

This feels like a conflict to me.

[00:23:41] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, I don’t think it probably happened, if that helps.

[00:23:42] Ross Blocher: Carry on. Oh, (laughs), oh, phew. Okay, that does change everything.

(They laugh.)

[00:23:49] Carrie Poppy: But we all need to learn something. Okay. So, then she starts telling this story about a healer she used to see, and she does not say the name of the healer, but I right away knew who it was, and I think you will too.

[00:24:01] Ross Blocher: Okay! John of God.

[00:24:04] Carrie Poppy: That’s right.

(They burst into laughter.)

I started saying the word “this” and Ross got it immediately. Uh, why did you think John of God?

[00:24:18] Ross Blocher: Well, I started thinking through healers. Most of the ones that came to me were explicitly Christian. And then I thought of John of God, and I was like that fits the bill. Who else could it be? Like, ’cause he is so well known, and people make pilgrimages to see him or did make pilgrimages to see him. So, I thought, this is where it’s leading. Let me guess.

[00:24:36] Carrie Poppy: So, for those who don’t know, John of God is a healer from Brazil.

[00:24:41] Ross Blocher: Mm-hm. He would do faith healings, like—

[00:24:43] Carrie Poppy: Psychic surgery.

[00:24:44] Ross Blocher: Right. Where he’d like appear to jam his hand into your abdomen and pull out, you know, what James Randi would say were chicken guts and blood and stuff like that. I knew someone personally who went down to see him, from my church. And her daughter was very sad about it. Yeah. What else can be said about it?

[00:25:01] Carrie Poppy: Is that person—? How’s that person?

[00:25:03] Ross Blocher: Oh, no longer with us. Yeah.

[00:25:05] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, you’ve got it right. Also, don’t forget: isn’t he in prison now?

[00:25:10] Ross Blocher: Oh, I thought he was dead now.

[00:25:12] Carrie Poppy: In prison or dead.

[00:25:16] Ross Blocher: Oh, no, never mind. Okay. He’s 81. He was convicted of rape, sexual misconduct, and illegal possession of firearms.

[00:25:24] Carrie Poppy: Uuh, yep! He’s in prison.

[00:25:25] Ross Blocher: 63 years. Okay, well! Now we know he’s safely in prison. That’s good.

[00:25:30] Carrie Poppy: So, here is how Gail described the healer who she would never name. She went to a controversial healer in Brazil.

(Ross titters.)

This is a direct quote. “It doesn’t really matter who he was.”

(Ross “wow”s and disagrees.)

Then she says, “It was about the inner ‘aha’ that she experienced in his presence.”

[00:25:48] Ross Blocher: I don’t know. It matters a little bit, Gail.

[00:25:51] Carrie Poppy: (Giggles.) “So, I go to see this healer,”—and again, she doesn’t say his name. And then, she tells this story that she was standing in line for half an hour at his center, and she wanted to ask him some business question that she wanted his insight for. He doesn’t speak English, so she wrote her question on a piece of paper and then his assistants read it to him. So, she’s waiting half an hour. It’s really hot. This is taking longer than she expected. Finally, she gets up there, she’s expecting this “aha” moment, but it’s sort of this anti-ceremonial, “I write this on a piece of paper, someone translates it to you. Oh, you talk back to them.” And so, it feels kind of transactional.

And then he replies, “We can help you.” And then sends her out of the room. So, at first, she’s really annoyed. She’s looking at him like you’re looking at me!

[00:26:39] Ross Blocher: Yeah. So far, I’m waiting for this “aha”, but okay. She’s also at this moment not too excited.

[00:26:41] Carrie Poppy: Right, right. Yeah, seems, um… yeah. Yeah, she’s like, “This is rude. Why did I fly to Brazil for this?” Next, they take her to a special room to pray to Jesus and Mary. And so, she’s like, “Okay, I am gonna do—you know, I’m kind of pissed off, but I’m gonna do what I’m being told to do.” So, she meditates, prays a little. She feels like she gets nothing. And then, suddenly a white light feeling came down on her, and she started bawling tears of joy. And she said she was pinned back by a white light, like she couldn’t move. The white light was so strong.

(Ross “wow”s.)

And then, she heard a voice. “A voice like a person next to me saying, ‘What is your higher purpose?’” And that’s when she realized her business question was tiny compared to the big question, which was about her true purpose!

[00:27:34] Ross Blocher: Purpose.

[00:27:36] Carrie Poppy: The theme of this conference! Con-stan-tly!

(Ross agrees.)

Yeah, right?!

[00:27:42] Ross Blocher: All I was thinking during that was just that John of God is so lucky that—you know, as far as I’m aware, all of that took place internally to Gail Thackray.

(Carrie confirms.)

And how fortunate for him. She spent all this money to come here. He didn’t quite live up to expectations, but then she had a moment—internal to herself—that coincided with just being in the right place, being receptive to this message. And it gets attributed to him, even if she’s not mentioning his name, because it doesn’t matter, because he’s a criminal.

[00:28:13] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, way you just described it may entirely be what happened. Also, possible that they take her to some room where like the air’s really thin or something and—I don’t know—you’re more prone to that kind of thing.

[00:28:23] Ross Blocher: Maybe they’ve done something atmospherically to help provoke this sort of reaction. Yeah. Who knows? But wow.

[00:28:29] Carrie Poppy: So, she’s pinned down by the white light, and she thinks, “I gotta share this with people.” Now, I actually think that’s a bit of a leap. Like, share what? But share what? Like, you’re having this subjective experience of oneness with everybody and of needing to share, but you haven’t attached it to anything yet. What are you gonna share?! Just a feeling?! You can’t just share a feeling!

[00:28:54] Ross Blocher: Yeah. I think this is where you and I are just not geared the same way, where—(chuckles).

[00:28:59] Carrie Poppy: To each other or to others?

(Ross laughs.)

Decide!

(They laugh.)

[00:29:07] Ross Blocher: See, that urge that makes you want me to decide is the same urge that Gail Thackray does not feel.

(Carrie affirms.)

I think a lot of people are just content to say, “Oh, there’s more than this. Something more than this.” And that’s it.

[00:29:20] Carrie Poppy: Ah, right. And I’m like, “Yeah, go on. What is it?!”

[00:29:22] Ross Blocher: But when you ask people who hold ardent religious beliefs oftentimes like, “Well, what’s kind of the linchpin for you that that makes you convinced that there is something more than this?” They’ll often have one story, and it’s something that could be interpreted many different ways. Like, I think of Francis Collins, who—

[00:29:41] Carrie Poppy: Oh, the Human Genome Project guy.

[00:29:43] Ross Blocher: Yeah, yeah. The lead of the NIH for so many years, the National Institute of Health. He has this story of how he was hiking, and he saw water that was frozen into like three streams, and that—for him—reinforced the truth of the Trinity.

[00:29:59] Carrie Poppy: (Chuckling.) Oh no.

[00:30:00] Ross Blocher: I was like, “Reallyyy?”

[00:30:01] Carrie Poppy: Oh no. Okay, someone needs to go back through the Human Genome Project and make sure there aren’t any big errors.

[00:30:06] Ross Blocher: Because (laughs) there’s so many other—and you know, as far as I know, he is responsible as a scientist, but—

[00:30:11] Carrie Poppy: Probably, but that’s some kooky shit. Yeah.

[00:30:14] Ross Blocher: It is! And it’s like, well, “You could have tied that to aaanything.” Maybe it makes you think of Brahma and Vishnu and Shiva or something.

(Carrie agrees several times.)

Like, just because you were raised into Christianity, you saw this thing. But for so many people that’s enough, and I don’t think for you and I that’s enough.

[00:30:31] Carrie Poppy: That’s not enough.

[00:30:32] Ross Blocher: So, okay, anyways. So—

[00:30:33] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. I don’t really doubt the Human Genome Project, by the way.

(Ross Chuckles.)

But yeah, no that’s—that almost—honestly, I hear that, and I think like, “Oh, you’re not being sincere.” That’s what I really think is like you had this moment and you, you’re like, “Phew! I wanted to protect my ability to communicate to Christians, and now I’ve got this.”

[00:30:50] Ross Blocher: Right, right. Yeah. Where you’re kind of working backwards, which makes me wonder—maybe specifically with Gail, but definitely with other people’s stories—like, did you work your way back to this? Like, “Oh, I need the good origin story. What can I make my origin story?”

(Carrie agrees.)

And it just got a little sweetened in the retelling.

[00:31:07] Carrie Poppy: Totally possible. It’s just a hot, bright room. Yeah. Okay. So, she thinks, “I want to share this with people, whatever this is.”

And the voice replied, “So be it.”

(Ross “woah”s.)

She said, “So, lots of people have had this voice in near-death experiences. Some people just have it in the shower one day, but I do think it’s rare that you get to like actually hear from them.”

[00:31:33] Ross Blocher: Now, I might have misunderstood the voice and started selling Sobe drinks. Too much of a stretch?

[00:31:39] Carrie Poppy: (Snorts.) Is that—that’s iced tea? Is that right?

(Ross confirms.)

They look so gross.

[00:31:45] Ross Blocher: Liz Blizz.

[00:31:46] Carrie Poppy: Did you pull up the Sobe website?

(Ross confirms.)

Oh man! What is this? An episode of Hidden Mickey‘s. This is so off the rails.

[00:31:51] Ross Blocher: Green tea, citrus energy tsunami. Morning patrol. Sobe-it. I’m gonna spread Sobe everywhere. Everyone’s gonna drink—

(Carrie laughs.)

Okay, but no, that’s not what she got.

[00:32:01] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Yeah. Right. So, she gets home, and she sends out an email to her whole mailing list—all of her acolytes? Accolades? Acolytes.

(Ross confirms.)

Acolytes.

[00:32:13] Ross Blocher: Who give her accolades.

[00:32:14] Carrie Poppy: Right, exactly. She sends out an email, and she tells them about her John of God trip. But of course, as she’s telling this story, she does not say that, “My John of God trip,” don’t worry. And she says, “I send out this email, but I don’t give much details. I’m basically just saying I’m back in town. I’m gonna be writing again. That kind of thing.” But! People start calling her on the phone. As soon as they get the email, they start calling—ring-ring-ring!—and saying, “When I opened your email, I was overcome with a white light.”

[00:32:43] Ross Blocher: Oh my God! Completely unprovoked. ‘Cause I’m sure she didn’t say anything about it. And I’m sure that’s exactly what they said.

(Carrie sputters and struggles for words.)

Yeah, I’m questioning multiple points along the chain of this story.

[00:32:52] Carrie Poppy: Stop! Yeah. Exactly. Stop, already, Gail, hang on. Is your phone number in the email? Are you just sending that out to all your fans and they’re calling you on your cell and they’re like, “Hey, just FYI, I opened the email and there was a white light,” and then you’re like, “Oh my god! It must be the same white light that I did not tell you about in the email!”

(Yelling.) NO! This did not happen!

[00:33:14] Ross Blocher: Yeah, it makes for a good story, but none of this is computing. Now, does she have these followers because she’s an actress of some repute, or does she have followers because she wrote a book called How to Talk to Your Pet? I assume that came after her big reveal. Her big moment.

[00:33:29] Carrie Poppy: Good chronology question. I don’t know where exactly we are in her life when she tells this one.

[00:33:33] Ross Blocher: But she has followers for some reason.

[00:33:35] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. But I assume some kind of spiritual followers, it would be really wild if she’s—what?

[00:33:41] Ross Blocher: Well!

[00:33:42] Carrie Poppy: Okay, Ross is excited.

[00:33:44] Ross Blocher: I don’t know if you saw this email come in from one of our listeners.

[00:33:47] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Noooo. We have a listener?!

[00:33:51] Ross Blocher: I don’t know if she wants me to share her name or anything.

[00:33:52] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Okay. Can we pretend that it’s Jenna Fischer from The Office?

[00:33:56] Ross Blocher: Let’s pretend it. Okay, so she forwarded us this email that came from Liz from Resilient Knitter.

(Carrie laughs.)

So, there was this—for people who are into knitting—

[00:34:10] Carrie Poppy: Uh-huh, but also resiliency! Resilience.

[00:34:12] Ross Blocher: (Chuckling.) There was a knitting pattern email. And so, she forwarded us this email that came from Liz.

[00:34:23] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Who’s resilient.

[00:34:24] Carrie Poppy: I’m just gonna read it, ’cause it’s good. “Just in case you’re wondering how I got your email, at some point you signed up for one of my free knitting patterns via Resilient Knitter, but since then, I quit knitting.”

(They laugh.)

“Why? Because a few years ago, my sister-in-law passed from cancer at the age of 39.”

[00:34:43] Carrie Poppy: Oh, god.

[00:34:44] Ross Blocher: “She was only a year younger than me, and it shook me to the core. Her death and my grief sparked a spiritual journey, and in the process I realized I’m a medium! What’s that mean? I have the ability to communicate you with your loved ones in spirit and provide detailed evidence that life continues on after the physical body is gone. I know. As a self-proclaimed atheist my whole life, it still sounds crazy to me too, but it’s true. And as I’ve developed my skills over the last two years, this ability has been incredibly healing—not only for myself and our family, but it’s brought so much comfort and peace to hundreds of other clients I’ve worked with as well.”

What? In two years?! Hundreds of other clients?!

(Carrie groans.)

She’s been developing her—I’m not sure about that chronology. “Now, if medium ship isn’t for you, I get it. And you’re welcome to unsubscribe at the bottom of the page. But if you’ve experienced a profound loss and you’re longing to connect with your loved ones in spirit, I’m offering five free mediumship readings in exchange for completing a short feedback form of your experience.”

So, she goes on. But as you were saying this—her reaching out to her followers—I’m thinking of knitting lady being like, “Hey, I know you signed up for knitting patterns, but guess what? I talk to the dead now.”

[00:35:55] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) Oh, man. Yeah, that’s—oh, man. That’s such a beautiful blend of personal branding and flying off the handle. If Resilient Knitter is listening: first of all, I’m so proud of you for being so resilient.

(Ross giggles.)

But second, there are just two things I’d love you to know, just as a matter of course. One is if you’re psychosis prone, often that comes around right around age 40. That’s your second bump is right around age 40, is your second.

[00:36:20] Ross Blocher: Oh, she laid it out right for you, too.

[00:36:22] Carrie Poppy: Second psychosis risk bump. And another big thing to watch out for is what we call stress events, including the death of loved ones.

[00:36:30] Ross Blocher: Oh no! And they’re both right there in the email.

[00:36:31] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, just if Resilient Knitter is listening, that’s just one thing to think about. And you can do anything you want with that info. Okay! So!

(They chuckle.)

So, she sends out this email. She gets all the phone calls. They’re all saying, “I’m knocked over with the white light!” She’s like, “I know exactly what you’re talking about.”

[00:36:47] Ross Blocher: I’m sure that’s how it happened. Yep. That’s exactly what happened, just like that.

[00:36:51] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) “‘Cause I was just in Brazil with a healer who I shall not mention, and I felt the same thing!” Okay. So.

[00:36:58] Ross Blocher: A sexual predator. But you know.

[00:37:02] Carrie Poppy: But it does not matter. Okay! So, as she’s telling us this story, she says, “And I just didn’t know what was happening, because I didn’t do anything special with the email. I don’t know why this is happening, but it was the divine wanting to connect us.” So, that’s when she started going all around the world and doing meditations and helping people encounter these “aha” moments like she did.

[00:37:30] Ross Blocher: (Skeptically.) Uh-huh. Oh! It’s working on me! What is this white light that I see?!

[00:37:32] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Oh, that’s the overhead lighting. And she says, “If you want it, it’s there for you. Do you want that today?”

And we all go, “Yeah! Of course, we do! Make the white light happen.”

Okay. So, she says, “We all have energy blocks wherever we are challenged. And listen, they’re good. They’re not bad things. You have to learn from the vibration of that challenge and then let go of the actual experience that caused it.” Okay? It’s that same you’re gonna get a lesson out of this, or you’re gonna get some benefit out of whatever bad thing happened to you.

[00:38:12] Ross Blocher: I mean, all of that sounds—if you assume energy and all of that, you know—it sounds fairly reasonable. Okay, I’ve got some blocks in my life. I’ve got problems that I’m dealing with. Yes. Help me loosen them.

[00:38:24] Carrie Poppy: Right, right. Might not know the cause, but yeah. So, she said someone gave her an analogy that she really liked, and then she explained the analogy, and I gotta say I did not really like it. So, it was that there is a consciousness and we’re all connected. And she said, “Imagine a honeycomb, and each of us has a hexagonal part of the honeycomb, and we’re a spark traveling around the honeycomb lighting it up. And if you light up one of them, it bounces through the honeycomb.”

(They laughs.)

[00:38:54] Ross Blocher: This already got too complicated.

[00:38:56] Carrie Poppy: “It takes energy from the grid every time you do that, but you give it to the grid when you have it. So—”

[00:39:02] Ross Blocher: This is a terrible analogy.

(They laugh.)

[00:39:06] Carrie Poppy: I know! I was thinking, “Someone told you this and you retained it?!”

[00:39:09] Ross Blocher: I reformed the mental image three times, then I gave up. One of them involved Carrie like vomiting bee pollen into a hexagonal honeycomb.

[00:39:18] Carrie Poppy: It still wouldn’t work. Okay, so I think she was saying (struggling not to laugh) that every time that you have an “aha” moment and you sort of light up metaphorically with the knowledge, that reverberates through consciousness and lights up other people’s honeycomb.

(Ross affirms.)

But I just said it much better.

[00:39:38] Ross Blocher: Yes. That version of it—fine. So, she’s saying essentially, “Hey, we have this crowd dynamic here, and as one of you has an “aha” moment, that’ll spread that energy.”

[00:39:48] Carrie Poppy: Aaah! I didn’t think about it in the room, but that’s probably true too.

[00:39:51] Ross Blocher: Kind of like our spoon bending workshop. That’s why you gotta yell and get all excited as other people’s spoons are bending, ‘cause that’ll make it easier for all of us to bend our spoons.

[00:39:58] Carrie Poppy: And certainly not for the other social benefits for the leader.

[00:40:00] Ross Blocher: Nope.

[00:40:01] Carrie Poppy: Yep. Yeah, I didn’t even think of how we’re all in the room together and maybe she’s thinking about that too. I took it more as like the whole collective of humanity. If you have an “aha” moment, you’re giving that to others and raising the vibration of humanity.

[00:40:15] Ross Blocher: Even outside the confines of this LAX Hilton. Okay.

[00:40:17] Carrie Poppy: Exactly. Yeah. But who knows what she meant. Okay, so she says, “Who knows their soul purpose?” She asked the whole room.

[00:40:27] Ross Blocher: And that’s S-O-U-L purpose, rather than S-O-L-E.

[00:40:30] Carrie Poppy: My only—my only purpose!

[00:40:32] Ross Blocher: Your sole purpose! Your soul purpose.

[00:40:36] Carrie Poppy: Right. So, I wrote down that I raised my hand. So, I took that to mean something that—in the moment—I felt I had. And then, she didn’t really like acknowledge that a few of us had our hands raised. And then she said, “And who knows their purpose but don’t know how to do it? Lots of people, right?” And then, there were like a lot more hands. And then she kept talking about helping people. You know, that’s when you really light up. Whatever it is you wanna do, you wanna help people. Right? We all wanna help people. And everyone’s nodding—yes, I wanna help people.

[00:41:08] Ross Blocher: Except for the people that are like, “I wanna help animals.”

[00:41:10] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, I was thinking like, “Yeah, what about people who just aren’t—like, yeah, all of our jobs like help one another. But what if you’re like, “I’m a mathematician. Like, sure, my job has application to help people, but I’m not like in a helping profession.”

[00:41:23] Ross Blocher: Right. It’s kind of indirect.

[00:41:26] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Yeah. And that might not be like your motivating reason for doing it. Anyway.

[00:41:31] Ross Blocher: I’m sure Sylvie Sterling is leaving in a huff, like “(Scoffs.) I’m doing it for animals. The cats, specifically.”

[00:41:37] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, she should. Okay. Then, she asked for a volunteer. So, the first volunteer was a woman sitting up front.

[00:41:46] Ross Blocher: Just venturing a guess—was the audience mostly women?

(Carrie confirms.)

This is my surprised face.

[00:41:52] Carrie Poppy: I believe—(chuckles) I think I wrote down somewhere that it was one out of eight were men, in my estimation.

[00:42:02] Ross Blocher: Represent.

[00:42:03] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) What’s up? So, Gail picks volunteer number one because she says she’s very psychically sensitive. She’s always helping other people.

Isn’t that right? And the woman’s like, yes.

[00:42:16] Ross Blocher: Yeah, who’s gonna disagree?

[00:42:17] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, “I hate other people.”

[00:42:18] Ross Blocher: The Barnum statement

[00:42:19] Carrie Poppy: And that she gets drained energetically because she’s always helping other people. And so, Gail says, “Are you in customer service or healing of some kind?”

And the woman says, “I work for the state. For people.”

(They laugh.)

[00:42:34] Ross Blocher: Alright! Yeah.

[00:42:36] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. I can make it work. And she says, “Yes, so you’re helping people.” And then she turns to us, and she says, “People looove her. They can tell her all their troubles.” And the woman nods. Yep, that’s true. That’s true. And Gail says, “And she feels tired and drained after work from all of that, but she didn’t know until today that it was from that!” And she’s just nodding along. Gail is just nodding along with her own statements as if this woman has like verified all of them, but she hasn’t really!

[00:43:07] Ross Blocher: Yeah, she’s just speaking for her. And how’s the ventriloquist dummy doing during all this?

[00:43:11] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, she’s kind of like bobbing, nodding, you know, like maybe she’ll halfway approve one thing and then more vehemently nod for the next thing, and then oh, well sort of—oh! But that’s a hit. Nod, nod, nod. It puts you in this position of like—what?—are you gonna call her out and be like, “No, no, no! Stop! Absolutely not! That one was wrong!

[00:43:32] Ross Blocher: Of course not.

[00:43:33] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, of course not. So, there’s a lot of nodding. Okay, so she says, “I’m gonna do this healing on her, but it’s actually gonna work on everybody who needs this particular healing in the room. So, for some people, this kind of stress makes extra fat sit on their hips and thighs.” And then she’s like, “Who here would like a healing so, you can cure your hips and thighs right now?” (Laughs.) And there’s like several hoots. “Woo-hoo!”

[00:44:01] Ross Blocher: For some people, is that a genetic thing? Because yeah. I’m trying to figure out this connection to hips and thighs from the stress of hearing other people’s difficulties.

[00:44:12] Carrie Poppy: If pressed, I’m sure she’d talk about cortisol, but. Eh.

[00:44:16] Ross Blocher: Okay. Alright. Whatever. I’ll just accept it.

[00:44:17] Carrie Poppy: You certainly can’t work backwards from the fat sitting on your hips and thighs too.

[00:44:23] Ross Blocher: Why make that connection? But okay, okay.

[00:44:24] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. To stress. Also, it’s—now that I think of it—a little rude to the person sitting up front as the demonstration dummy.

[00:44:30] Ross Blocher: “What you’re saying that I have extra fat on my hips and thighs?”

[00:44:32] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, yeah. Like, “You’re noticing where I carry my weight? Thank you.” Okay, but who cares? She’s about to heal it permanently anyway. So, Gail’s gonna do this healing on her, but it’s gonna work on everybody. She says, “Your solar plexus chakra is shot down if you take on other people’s energy too much.” And then she grabs a pendulum, and she shows us how the volunteer’s third eye chakra is super powerful. So, she runs the pendulum up near her forehead. And whoa! It’s spinning really hard!

(Ross chuckles.)

But then, Gail lowers the pendulum to near her pelvis and, oh, it slows down! Isn’t that wild?

[00:45:14] Ross Blocher: (Jokingly.) Wow. Oh my goodness. How could you—? I can’t imagine any way to control that. Yeah.

[00:45:15] Carrie Poppy: To control something like that. If anybody’s wondering, ’cause they’ve never held a pendulum, it’s very easy to control something like that.

[00:45:25] Ross Blocher: It’s called the ideomotor effect. Oh, hey! That came up again.

[00:45:28] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Also, you don’t even have to use that. You can just like subtly turn it if you want to consciously. Very easily.

[00:45:33] Ross Blocher: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, if you’re intending to, you can. And even if you don’t think you’re intending to, you can.

[00:45:38] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Yep. Just very responsive little device. So, we all close our eyes and ask our guides to come in. And she names some guides. They all have Latin names.

(Ross “ooh”s.)

And then she says, “Okay, we want to remove energy! We want to lose weight without diet or exercise! (Shouting enthusiastically.) Would you like this eneeeergy?!”

And so all of us are like, “YES!”

And then she’s like, “Do you feel it?! Do you feel it?!”

And some people are murmuring, “Yes. Yeah, I feel it. Yeah.”

And she says, “The weight will begin to melt off you now!” (Laughs.)

[00:46:16] Ross Blocher: Come on.

[00:46:16] Carrie Poppy: “You don’t have to take on other people’s problems! If you want to maintain this, no more taking on other people’s problems and the weight will stay off!”

We are all the same size. I am sitting before you, ma’am. I am the exact same size and so is the person next to me. I have eyes.

[00:46:32] Ross Blocher: (Stammering.) How do you get away with that?

[00:46:33] Carrie Poppy: I don’t know. I don’t know! I guess maybe the thought is like you’ll go home and now you’ll have your weight loss unlocked, and you’re gonna see it over weeks or months? I guess?! But I’d be much more impressed if just like I looked down and 15 pounds were gone.

[00:46:52] Ross Blocher: I’m just fixated on the fact that you can say that to an audience, and nobody calls you on it even—maybe not even out loud. Like, “That’s impossible!” But like just looking down at yourself and like, “Oh, nothing is changing about myself. I don’t feel different. I don’t look different.”

[00:47:08] Carrie Poppy: They probably feel different.

[00:47:10] Ross Blocher: Oh, maybe. Yeah, subjectively different. Oh yeah. Wow. But the power of suggestion is—can it cross that large a span?

[00:47:16] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. It wasn’t working for me. Yeah, I don’t know. I’m sure in that room you’ve got just like a mélange of people like me who are like, “I don’t feel anything. What are you talking about?” People are like, “Maybe I feel something. Oh, but Judy feels something, so yeah. Okay. I guess I do.”

[00:47:33] Ross Blocher: It’s working, and I just need to let that honeycomb reverberate and cross through the transcendental barriers and whatever she said earlier. But also, just the invoking of the, “How many of you want to lose weight without exercise or dieting?” Or whatever it was she said. It’s just feels like that mentality itself is a multi-billion-dollar industry in the US.

(Carrie agrees.)

Just all of us are image conscious to various degrees. We want to fix that without having to significantly change our lives. And for many people, that’s not even gonna do anything. You know, like it annoys me that whole easy answer.

(Carrie agrees.)

I don’t trust it.

[00:48:16] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Yeah. It also wears down your willpower for the next thing you try, ’cause now you’re back at square one again! When you were actually never past square one.

[00:48:25] Ross Blocher: Right. But she’s happy to capitalize on that moment of potential that won’t pay off down the road, if we follow any of these people.

[00:48:33] Carrie Poppy: I would think that’s right. But if you were at Gale Thackray’s thing, I wanna hear from you.

(Ross chuckles.)

[00:48:39] Promo:

Music: Upbeat, cheerful music.

Laura House: Hi everyone. I’m Laura House.

Annabelle Gurwitch: And I’m Annabell Gurwitch. And sometimes, it feels like the whole world is a dumpster fire.

Laura: Right? There’s too much to worry about it.

Annabelle: That’s why we make Tiny Victories! It’s a 15-minute podcast where we celebrate our minor accomplishments and fleeting joys!

Laura: And listeners call in, like Valerie—who found the perfect gift for her daughter’s boyfriend—and Adam, who finally turned his couch cushion the right way!

Annabelle: And little happinesses, like how birdsong helps your brain.

Laura: That’s science!

(Birds tweeting.)

Annabelle: So, join us in not freaking out for 15 minutes a week.

Laura: That’s Tiny Victories with Annabelle and Laura, Mondays on Maximum Fun. Whoo! It’s a tiny victory just to make a network promo!

Annabelle: Honestly.

(Music ends.)

[00:49:24] Carrie Poppy: So, volunteer number two. Gail just calls on her, “The lady in black there. Hello, darling.” And Gail says to all of us before hearing anything from this volunteer, she says, “This one’s very psychic, visually.” And then she turns the volunteer, and she says, “But you’ve been told that you shouldn’t share that. Does that make sense?”

She says, “Yes.”

And she says, “Do you see things in the reflection? Do you see things in the reflection?!”

[00:49:53] Ross Blocher.: No, I’m a vampire.

[00:49:54] Carrie Poppy: (Chuckles.) She says, (cautiously) “Yes.)

And she says, “Do you—?” (Laughs.)

[00:49:58] Ross Blocher: It sounds like she’s really good at these leading questions that she can really control the answers to.

(Carrie agrees.)

That’s a skill.

[00:50:05] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. And sort of finding a broad way to phrase it that anyone can say yes to, but it feels very specific. It’s a good Barnum creation.

[00:50:13] Ross Blocher: And putting someone in front of a crowd and creating that sense of expectation that they’re just gonna play along anyway, even if it doesn’t feel like a good match. It’s a—if it’s a shtick, it’s a good shtick.

[00:50:24] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, she’s good at it. So, she says, “Do you get migraines?” And the woman says yes. Okay. Okay. Clap, clap, clap, clap, clap, clap, clap.

[00:50:31] Ross Blocher: That’s actually—that’s a little more impressive than anything else that’s happened here.

[00:50:35] Carrie Poppy: Agree. And she says, “Ah!” Gail says, “Ah! Yeah, amazing third eye here. She is veeery psychic, and people have made her shut it down! Does anyone else here get these headaches?” People say, “Yes, yes!” Including me. And she turns to the volunteer, and she says, “You should use tarot cards more often. That’s a very good practice for you.”

And then the volunteer says, “I love tarot!”

(Ross “woah”s.)

And everyone’s like, “Oh my god! She loves tarot!”

[00:51:07] Ross Blocher: Okay! Yeah, these are pretty decent hits.

[00:51:08] Carrie Poppy: Oh, you like the tarot one? Okay.

(Ross confirms.)

I mean, I feel like saying, “You should use tarot cards more often,” is not necessarily, “You use tarot cards a lot.”

[00:51:16] Ross Blocher: Sure. Well, and for both of these, if she had said, “I don’t get migraines,” there are so many easy ways out of that as well. You could just be like, “Oh, interesting. Your third eye is absorbing this energy that for most people would turn into migraines.” You know, that’s one of—

[00:51:33] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, yeah. “Or regular headaches? Do you get other headaches?”

Oh yeah. Yes. Everybody does.

[00:51:36] Ross Blocher: There’s so many ways you could easily transition out of that. And in the same way—right, with the tarot cards—would’ve still been an interesting exchange if the woman had said, “Oh, I haven’t tried those before, but okay! I’ll look into ’em.” That would’ve been fine. But all the more exciting when she says, “Oh, yeah, I love tarot!”

[00:51:52] Carrie Poppy: “I love tarot.”

Okay, so she says, “Close your eyes, and try to visualize the room you just saw, but with your eyes closed and looking through your third eye.” So, this reminds me of something we did at the—what was that out of body experience place? The International Society of Get Out of Your Body?

[00:52:09] Ross Blocher: Academy of Consciousness. Yeah.

[00:52:11] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, International Academy of Consciousness. They had us do this, where you’d stare for a while and get that sort of imprint on your visual fields, and then close your eyes.

[00:52:20] Ross Blocher: Right, where your visual system starts to freak out at the overload of the same input continuously, and it starts to pump in the opposite. And you close your eyes—right, now you’ve got this very strong negative image.

[00:52:33] Carrie Poppy: With—yeah, with usually like sort of the opposite colors of the thing you were looking at. So, she said, “If you do this, the room will have a blue haze on it as you’re looking through your third eye. And you’ll start seeing this with your regular eyes later. It’ll start just layering on.” So, that’s what she wants us to practice with. She says, “The energy comes down in from the crown chakra, then to the third eye, and then it bounces up and down energetically, and that’s what causes the migraine. And this woman’s actually comes from a past life. So, many times you’ve been a psychic in a past life, and you were persecuted for it. So, this is gonna cure any blocks you have.”

So, to review! This woman in a past life was persecuted for her witch magickery. She—

[00:53:23] Ross Blocher: Oooh, you probably encountered her over in Salem.

[00:53:28] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Yeah. She gets migraines as a result, but the migraines will now be healed, because this lady told her to stare at a wall and then close her eyes.

[00:53:37] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) Well, thank goodness she’s had multiple lives where she has not figured this out. And now we have instant solutions!

[00:53:44] Carrie Poppy: (Singsong.) Thank you, Gail!

[00:53:45] Ross Blocher: Plus, weight is just melting off her—what was it? Her upper thighs?

[00:53:50] Carrie Poppy: Thighs and hips. Yeah. Yeah. (Laughs.)

[00:53:52] Ross Blocher: Goodness. Goodness.

[00:53:53] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Next volunteer! Volunteer number three.

[00:53:55] Ross Blocher: (Sighs.) We’re too easily pleased as a society.

(Carrie laughs.)

We all need to be a little grumpier and surlier, which is not the takeaway I want from this, but I feel like she’s just getting away with something here!

[00:54:07] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. You know, it makes you appreciate James Randi, doesn’t it?

[00:54:11] Ross Blocher: Yeah. You need a lovable grump every now and then.

[00:54:13] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, every once in a while. Alright. So, volunteer number three, A woman. So, she has an energy block on her body that Gail says suggests holding on to past relationships. So, Gail perceives that there are two past relationships that are giving her trouble, and she says all of this before this woman has said anything.

[00:54:34] Ross Blocher: Okay. Yeah, these are cold readings as far as I can tell.

[00:54:37] Carrie Poppy: Mm-hm! She says all this to the woman. The woman’s like sort of nodding, and then Gail turns to all of us and says, “Who believes in past lives?!” A bunch of people raise their hands. She says, “Great. So, you decide most of your big experiences before you even get here. You ask for a bad leg this time, or a crappy relationship, something that’s going to help you learn.”

[00:55:00] Ross Blocher: Man, this does not resonate with me at all.

[00:55:03] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) You’re also scrunching up his face, like, (grumpily) “No, there it is again! There’s that smell again!

[00:55:06] Ross Blocher: Yeah, we get—(laughs) we get this so often, I just—it sounds so stupid to me. But continue. I’ll give it a fair shake.

[00:55:10] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, that’s fair. Okay. And. Who—so, she says, “You know, lots of us ask for crappy relationships, so we’ll learn something about relationship.” And she says, “So, who here did that?” And a bunch of people raised their hands. So, they’re saying, yes.

[00:55:26] Ross Blocher: “I suddenly feel in ownership of all my bad relationships. It was so clever of me to do that for myself.”

(Carrie confirms.)

But—(laughing) okay, I’m sorry. I’m not giving this a fair shake, because I’m thinking of someone in their pre-life being like, “Okaaay, I can’t wait. I’m gonna get a lineup of really bad relationships, ’cause I have enough clarity of thought for some reason now to know that I don’t know enough about relationships. This is how I’m gonna learn.” What?! Why? No.

[00:55:52] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. I think in heaven you get—you get to be in heaven for a second with all this clarity, and then you go back through the veil and you’re dumb again.

[00:55:59] Ross Blocher: Yeah. And then you cry, ’cause you’re so sad at the lost knowledge. I heard that description once—a baby’s view, crying because they’re so upset that—yeah, they’ve gotten put into another corporeal body and forgotten everything that they just had mastery of.

[00:56:15] Carrie Poppy: Oh, man. That doesn’t seem like the explanation.

(Ross agrees.)

So, Gail asks this volunteer, “Was there financial stuff too?” And she says there was, there was financial stuff too. Yes.

[00:56:31] Ross Blocher: (Sarcastically.) Woooah! (Applauds.) So specific.

[00:56:33] Carrie Poppy: Yes. Wow. And Gail says, “We’re all probably wondering how she knew that. And it’s because she can see her energy field.”

[00:56:43] Ross Blocher: Whoa. “You’re probably all very impressed with what I just did. It’s because I can energy.”

[00:56:49] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) Was there financial stuff too?

[00:56:52] Ross Blocher: This is where we need to separate. The specifics of the reading? Not impressive. The whole delivery and this whole package? Kind of impressive.

[00:57:01] Carrie Poppy: Oh yeah. It’s being an impressive salesman. The product? Not good. Sales pitch, excellent.

(Ross agrees.)

Yeah. So, Gail will clear energy from this woman’s ex-boyfriends so she can have better relationships! Now, she also says, “Some minor physical problems are also going to get better, because they are represented in the body.” All of these traumatic experiences are now in this woman’s body.

[00:57:29] Ross Blocher: I’m sorry, I’m sensing another plot hole here. So, you chose these bad relationships so you could learn this—

[00:57:32] Carrie Poppy: (Amused.) Oh, we’re back to this? Okay. Mm-hm. (Chuckles.)

[00:57:36] Ross Blocher: —important lesson in life. And now, this blonde lady comes along, and she’s gonna help heal you of these bad relationships? You chose those!

(Carrie affirms.)

Because you needed to learn the lesson! What if you chose five bad relationships, and she’s trying to heal you of this after two? You’re not learning the lessons that you set yourself—

[00:57:52] Carrie Poppy: Oh, right! That’s—okay. That’s—now I’ve got an “aha” moment!

[00:57:59] Ross Blocher: Take that, Gail! Oh, I’m seeing the light! Ohhh nooo, she wins!

[00:58:01] Carrie Poppy: I think you’ve really hit on something, because the two things in opposition are the resilience version of it—or the resilience interpretation that, yeah, we need to go through lessons and challenges in order to become stronger and better people. And there are some things you can’t just be taught. Versus, the learning style, the “aha” moment, the download, the sudden knowledge. Those are in opposition!

[00:58:23] Ross Blocher: Why can’t you get that in the afterlife in between your lives?

[00:58:27] Carrie Poppy: The “aha” moment?

(Ross confirms.)

I think you do. I think she’s saying you basically do, but she brings it down to earth. But you’re right. Then, she’s fucking the system! This is the resilience place!

(Ross agrees.)

This is the resilience place! “Aha” is for the afterlife!

[00:58:41] Ross Blocher: This woman’s trying to mess with my plans that I so carefully crafted before I came to this earth.

[00:58:46] Carrie Poppy: The Resilient Knitter would never let this pass!

(Ross cackles.)

Okay, so Gail’s gonna clear energy from those ex-boyfriends. Okay! “So, everyone put your hand on your pelvic area, because that is where you are carrying your relationship traumaaaa! That’s right. Put your hand on your pelvic area, and you can feel that old relationship just sitting there!”

(Ross gets steadily more confused.)

“Think about that person who has hurt you and say, ‘Okay, I had that experience. I understand that I agreed to have that experience. I’m gonna release that, so I don’t have to have that energy anymore.’” Okaaay! (Laughing.) And then she says, “Are you ready to release the energy from these relationships?”

And we say, “YES!” And we take a deep, loud breath. She wants us to go (gasps in and out). We do that. And then she says, “Let’s see if it’s working now.” And she pulls out her pendulum. She waves the pendulum over her volunteer, and now it is swinging forcefully over her pelvis!

(Ross “wow”s.)

And Gail looks at her and says, “So, now you’re ready and open for a good relationship.” (Applauds.)

[01:00:00] Ross Blocher: Wow. Wow! All the things she did there. Okay. Now, if she really believed this—this instant melting of the pounds—she’d have them stand on a scale where you could see the readout. Something like that.

[01:00:14] Carrie Poppy: Oh yeah. That’s a good idea.

[01:00:16] Ross Blocher: But I don’t think she believes in it that much herself. And this is so weird. She’s like suggesting some sort of body map, where she could like draw little arrows to all the little parts of the body and say, “This is where fat accumulates for this. And you know, emotional trauma, and this is where it accumulates for abandonment. And this is where it accumulates for—” You know, X, Y, or Z. I wonder if she has this kind of mental map in her mind.

[01:00:41] Carrie Poppy: Oh, she does. We will hear about the other parts of the body and what kind of emotional trauma they represent.

[01:00:48] Ross Blocher: Oh, goodness. Ugh! Oh, what a horrible mixture of like insecurity with your body and tying it to insecurity about your emotional life. And I don’t like—I don’t like any of this.

[01:00:57] Carrie Poppy: And like the haunting aspect of it. You know, whatever you went through years ago is like alive inside you, inside your body.

[01:01:04] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Like the body’s keeping the score.

[01:01:06] Carrie Poppy: It’s keeping the score or something. That sounds terrible.

[01:01:11] Ross Blocher: (Chuckles.) Oh, I really don’t like this.

[01:01:12] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. So—right. Yeah. This is called body memory. She’s not using that term, but like I hear it a lot in trauma influencer world.

[01:01:20] Ross Blocher: And I feel like this would instantly fall apart if you actually asked people independently about their emotional needs and then tried to correlate that with their body type. I’m—

[01:01:31] Carrie Poppy: Mm. And actually blind the process. Mm-hm.

[01:01:33] Ross Blocher: Right. I have a deep feeling that there would be no correlation whatsoever.

[01:01:38] Carrie Poppy: That seems very possible. I mean, there are some things that happen if you’re—if you go through really prolonged stress where you’re genuinely flooding your body with cortisol for a long, long, long time, then some stuff starts to pile up. But even then, I think you probably couldn’t work backwards from like how much fat is on your stomach.

[01:01:56] Ross Blocher: Primarily, it’s our genes. I feel like our genetics really are the number one factor there—not like at even parity with environment.

(Carrie agrees.)

I feel genes are way outsized.

[01:02:09] Carrie Poppy: Totally. Especially in behavioral health. That’s definitely true. Okay, so she hits to volunteer number four. (Chuckles.) This woman is just raising her hand and—

[01:02:19] Ross Blocher: They’ve all been women so far?

[01:02:20] Carrie Poppy: Yes. And Gail turns to her and says, “So! What’s up with your lower back?” Okay!

[01:02:25] Ross Blocher: Ohh! We get a hit? We get a hit?

[01:02:28] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Yep. So, this is a woman in probably like her 60s or so. So, you know, lower back pain. Not a bad guess. But this woman says, “I have a Harrington rod in my back.” So, that’s like something they used to put in the back of people with scoliosis. But now we know it’s not a very good treatment and it could actually like exacerbate your pain. I think they stopped using it in the 1990s. So, okay. Gail, stop! That’s a hit. Hear the hit. Receive the hit. Work off the hit. Oh, no? You didn’t?

Instead, Gail’s like, “Well, yes, there’s a lot of spinal stuff here, but a lot of it is related to your family.”

[01:03:11] Ross Blocher: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Yeah, she’s throwing away a really good hit! Okay.

[01:03:17] Carrie Poppy: Yeah! So, Gail asks her if she has a problem with her father. So, again, why aren’t we talking about the Harrington rod? This was a hit, but now we’re gonna talk about her dad. And she says, “No, I was a daddy’s girl.” Okay. Alright.

Gail replies, “Okay. Well, then who was the father-like figure in the house who was very controlling?”

[01:03:40] Ross Blocher: Interesting. That doesn’t feel like a good flex to me, but it does give us an indication of how she rolls when she gets a disconfirmation.

[01:03:48] Carrie Poppy: Yep. So, this woman says, “I don’t know.”

(Ross laughs and affirms.)

Gail switches to addressing the audience. She’s floundering.

[01:03:54] Ross Blocher: Like just don’t even finish that sentence. Just say, “Who was the father figure who was creating trouble? Or “Who was the male figure in your life who was creating trouble?”

[01:04:04] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. “I sense some sort of male troublemaker, who’s this?” Yeah. Okay. So, Gail switches to addressing the audience, which she’s really good at. When she’s kind of losing it with the volunteer, she comes back to us, and then—it’s very clever timing.

[01:04:18] Ross Blocher: And like John Edward can do that too, ’cause he has people in an area, and he’d be like, “Oh, who am I getting that energy from? Somebody else.”

[01:04:24] Carrie Poppy: Ah, right. Over here. Yeah. So, Gail talks to us, and she says, “You know, lower back issues are often about our base of support, but it can also be about finances.” Now, she’s turning back to this woman who’s like kind of nodding like, “Sure, we all got—we all got that, right? Sure. To some degree. Okay.” But again, Gail, did you forget there’s a rod in her back?

[01:04:51] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) You’re really upset about this.

[01:04:54] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) This is my hiccup. Uh, it could be difficulties with finances, or it can be having to support somebody else.

[01:05:03] Ross Blocher: Ah, physical support for your upper body or metaphorical support.

[01:05:08] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. How can we possibly decide whether our lower back pain is finances, supporting everybody else, our daddies, or the (shouting) Harrington rod in our backs?!

[01:05:20] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Or the fact that we evolved to be upright relatively recently, and our backs just aren’t really built for this.

[01:05:27] Carrie Poppy: Sure. So, as Gail’s saying this, the volunteer starts to sort of help her, nodding along when Gail stumbles upon her situation, you know.

[01:05:35] Ross Blocher: Yeah, it is funny that she’s working so hard to figure out what this whole back problem thing is.

(Carrie laughs.)

‘Cause it’s been pretty conclusively resolved.

[01:05:42] Carrie Poppy: It’s the Harrington rod!

(Ross cackles.)

She has scoliosis!

[01:05:47] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I get it. I’ve internalized it now. I am equally upset about this.

[01:05:52] Carrie Poppy: (Laughing.) Thank you. Okay, so Gail’s still kind of fawning around for a situation that matches. And finally, she hits upon it. It’s that she’s supporting other people financially. So, this woman’s rich.

(They titter.)

Her financial problem is, “I gotta help all these people!” Okay, so, Gail turns back to her and is like, “You don’t need to do this to yourself. The universe is already willing to give abundance to those other people if they’ll just open their hearts to it.” She’s like talking her out of whatever generosity that she wasn’t even complaining about!

[01:06:27] Ross Blocher: Oh, goodness. “Sorry, Steven? We’re no longer sending Nancy to college. I talked with the spiritual woman. I saw a white light, and Nancy’s on her own.”

[01:06:38] Carrie Poppy: “It turns out it’s selfish of me to give away money to that.”

[01:06:43] Ross Blocher: I’m just wondering what person in Gail’s system would be considered just perfectly financially balanced. Because I feel like you can make it an argument for anybody that they’re gonna feel like they have financial issues.

[01:06:58] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, in our next episode we’ll talk a little about Gail’s divorce. But we’ll get there. So, she says we don’t have to create it ourselves to be able to help everybody else.” So, the universe is gonna provide for your loved ones.

[01:07:15] Ross Blocher: (Doubtfully.) Okay. Great.

[01:07:16] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Oh, should I just tell you about her divorce now? I have it in my notes here.

(Ross agrees.)

Okay. Well, since we’re talking about riches. It turns out that Gail divorced her ex-husband in 2011, and according to his legal complaint, she sold a bunch of his collectibles without his permission. (Laughing.)

[01:07:31] Ross Blocher: Oh no. One of those.

[01:07:32] Carrie Poppy: Here’s a list of things that Gail’s ex-husband owned.

[01:07:35] Ross Blocher: My mom’s one of those kinds of people. Get rid of your important collections without ever telling you.

[01:07:42] Carrie Poppy: Oh no! Oh, sorry. Okay. Well, in this case it was a messy divorce, and it’s kind of funny. But they included a ski mask and polo gear, seven Brooks Brothers suits, a zoot suit, a Mark McGwire rookie card, a gumball machine, and an Obama hope poster.

(They laugh and Ross “wow”s.)

Okay. Anyway, that’s how Gail got a bunch of money.

[01:08:06] Ross Blocher: An original Shepherd Fairey design.

[01:08:09] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Anyway, back to the healing.

[01:08:11] Ross Blocher: The zoot suit really sells it. That’s pretty good.

[01:08:13] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Yeah. Okay. Back to the healing. So! She tells us to put our hands on our back. With this healing, we’re all gonna finally get abundance.

[01:08:21] Ross Blocher: Imagine a rod straightening your back.

[01:08:24] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Or your daddy, or finances, or supporting others, whatever hits for you.

(Ross laughs.)

So, she prays to the universe for abundance and for our lower backs. (Laughs.) “We want to—” This is what she says. “We want to be in the flow of abundance and we wanna release all physical tensions in our back.”

Everyone says, “YES!” We inhale. We exhale. (Breathes heavily.) She has her volunteer stand up, and she asks, “Do you feel better?”

She nods. “Yeah. Yeah. I feel better.”

She says, “Alright, wonderful, darling. Now, we’ll see all those checks coming in the mail, all that money flowing.” It’s like Peter Popoff!

[01:09:02] Ross Blocher: Yeah, there’s a lot of similarities to Peter Popoff here. But also, the woman’s problem wasn’t needing checks to come in the mail! You were—

[01:09:11] Carrie Poppy: No! She could support others!

[01:09:12] Ross Blocher: You were encouraging her to stop helping others.

[01:09:14] Carrie Poppy: That’s right. I think that maybe the checks are gonna come in the mail to those people?! So, you don’t need to send them anymore.

[01:09:20] Ross Blocher: Oh, okay. Didn’t say that they were addressed to. And who sends checks anymore? There’s not many checks.

[01:09:25] Carrie Poppy: That’s the major problem!

[01:09:26] Ross Blocher: Yeah, that’s right.

(Carrie laughs.)

She should be using Venmo or PayPal as her medium of conveyance of abundance. Though, now I have myself wondering if any spiritualists out there teach people to dance the abun-dance.

[01:09:41] Carrie Poppy: Oh, I bet they do! I bet they do. If you are the owner of an abun-dance dance studio, please let us know.

[01:09:47] Ross Blocher: This is just like—before we started recording, I was wondering if there are any festivals called the Mani-Fest?

[01:09:54] Carrie Poppy: I think there—I think there is one that I’ve seen at Conscious Life Expo.

[01:09:55] Ross Blocher: Good. All I want—

[01:09:57] Carrie Poppy: It’s a good feeling to know you don’t have to start that.

[01:09:59] Ross Blocher: Yeah, yeah. These puns need to exist in the world, but I don’t always need to be the one who creates them, so all of you work on the abun-dance and the mani-fest.

[01:10:07] Carrie Poppy: Okay, so volunteer number five. With this person, she has a lot of tension. So, she’s like, “Yeah. Oh, I’ve just been—I’ve been sore everywhere. I have tension in my jaw. I have tension in my muscle. I have tension in my pussy.”

[01:10:29] Ross Blocher: Woah!

(Carrie laughs.)

The—the volunteer said this?

[01:10:29] Carrie Poppy: First of all—yeah, yeah, yeah. First of all, I love just saying “my muscle”. I have tension in my muscle.

[01:10:36] Ross Blocher: I have tension in my muscle!

[01:10:37] Carrie Poppy: I don’t need to know which one! A muscle. I love that you have one that’s your favorite. But second of all, getting up in the front of this whole room and saying you have pussy tension, A+ move, thank you volunteer five.

[01:10:48] Ross Blocher: I like this volunteer. Yeah.

(Carrie agrees.)

You’re number one in our mind.

[01:10:54] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) So, she describes her pussy tension, and I looked this up later. It looks like she was describing something called pelvis floor tension myalgia, which is just like the floor of the pelvic—the pelvic floor muscle’s like getting really tight. But Gail has another explanation! Gail is, first of all, completely shocked by this woman’s revelation.

[01:11:17] Ross Blocher: That she said that. (Gasps.)

[01:11:19] Carrie Poppy: And the way she phrased it. Yeah. She’s like, “Oh! I thought you were gonna say like your knee was all tense, but my goodness!” And then she says, “Well, everybody, shall I bring her up to release the pussy tension?!”

And everyone’s like, “WOOO!” (Laughs.)

[01:11:35] Ross Blocher: We’re owning it. Yeah!

[01:11:36] Carrie Poppy: So, this gets a big laugh for a long while. She brings her up, and she says, “Okay, who would like to do a pussy release?” So, there’s a big whoop from the crowd.

[01:11:44] Ross Blocher: Wow! Okay! This room just got a lot more interesting.

[01:11:48] Carrie Poppy: Okay, so she says, “This is about repression, about holding onto things, not moving forward when we should. And the root pattern is overthinking. It’s planning, but never getting going. Procrastination! You need to think bigger.” Then she turns to the volunteer, and she says, “Is that resonant?”

And she says, “Yeah, that’s resonant.”

And then, Gail comes back to the crowd, and she says, “Does anyone have anything similar?” Which again, now is tension in the muscle, jaw, or pussy, or procrastination, or feeling stuck in any way.

[01:12:26] Ross Blocher: Does anybody—

[01:12:27] Carrie Poppy: Does anybody have the—oh my god! Hands are raised. Okay.

(Ross “wow”s.)

So, she says, “The problem is we all need to see our soul purposes.” And for those of us for whom this doesn’t resonate, she also has a biological interpretation. She asks, “Do any of us have pain in either of our knees?” Okay, now we have more people who are like, yeah, my knees. Sure.

[01:12:50] Ross Blocher: Now, I’m thinking of somebody who feels the urge after this meeting to move to South Korea, and that is their Seoul purpose. Hey-oh!

[01:12:58] Carrie Poppy: Ha-ha. ‘Cause of the city.

(Ross confirms with laughter.)

I’m thinking of someone whose purpose was to work at Pixar when they made a movie that was just okay.

[01:13:08] Ross Blocher: (Laughing.) It’s their Soul purpose. Yeah. Someone who wants to breed fish.

[01:13:13] Carrie Poppy: Okay, here we go!

[01:13:14] Ross Blocher: It’s their sole purpose. Okay, continue.

[01:13:16] Carrie Poppy: Someone wants to make shoes!

(Ross cackles.)

Okay. Okay. So, if you have pain in either of your knees, listeners listen up! There is an interpretation. Yes, even for you. Your right knee pain is an emotional block. It means you can’t move forward emotionally, whereas a left knee pain is a physical block. It means you’re not changing something physical, like a job or career.

[01:13:40] Ross Blocher: Something physical, like a job or career. Okay.

[01:13:43] Carrie Poppy: I don’t get it. How is that physical?

[01:13:46] Ross Blocher: Yeah, yeah. My brain did the same thing.

[01:13:46] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But she’s already moved on. And this is where you and I are for two and a half minutes.

[01:13:51] Ross Blocher: You’re—oh, you’re not gonna close that loop?

[01:13:53] Carrie Poppy: What does that mean, physical?

[01:13:55] Ross Blocher: Something physical, like a job or career.

[01:13:56] Carrie Poppy: Aah. My brain is thinking of a lot of stuff, and now I’m coming back, and you’re healing something.

[01:14:00] Ross Blocher: I can’t hold my career in my hand!

[01:14:02] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, that’s not tangible! Yeah, she would say this a few times though. “Oh, your physical block, like your career, like where you live.” I kind of got a sense for it. Things that are really external, I guess. Anyway.

[01:14:15] Ross Blocher: Yeah, things of the real world rather than purely psychological.

[01:14:18] Carrie Poppy: Right. Right. Yeah. So, now we’re gonna do the healing for anybody who has pussy pain, muscle pain, jaw pain, procrastination, stuck in place, emotionally stuck in place, physically, right knee pain, or left knee pain! All the same healing!

[01:14:39] Ross Blocher: Geez, if you don’t have one of those, get out of here!

[01:14:43] Carrie Poppy: (Giggles.) So, she has us put our hands on a part of our body that symbolizes the problem we have identified. So, she says, “You can put ’em on your knees. You can put them on your pussy if you want to.”

[01:14:52] Ross Blocher: Does anybody do that? That you can see?

[01:14:56] Carrie Poppy: I think the woman up front. So, now nearly everyone is identifying with this applying to them. So, now we do a pelvic release, which don’t worry is not what it sounds like!

(Ross laughs.)

So, we close our eyes. We think about what we need to dream bigger. How are we stuck? And she’s really starting to sound like a prosperity gospel preacher to me at this point.

Like, she’s saying, “How big can you get? Like, whatever’s stopping you, we’re gonna take that away! Nothing’s too big for you.” And then, she asked us to do that big deep breath and release (breathes heavily), and she says, “How do your knees feel?” People are nodding, but she’s not asking anyone in particular.

[01:15:35] Ross Blocher: Yeah, this is a faith healing!

[01:15:36] Carrie Poppy: Right?! Yeah, totally. And she asked volunteer four, “Do you feel less tense?” And she’s nodding, and she’s like, “Okay, darling,” and she sends her back to her seat. We’re all healed. That woman’s pelvic pain is gone. Or is it? Who knows! What’s her name? I don’t know! No follow up.

[01:15:54] Ross Blocher: Yeah. I’m feeling like there needs to be like a law, where, you know, if you bring someone up for a public demonstration like this, that there needs to be like an official follow up. We have you write your name down, your contact information. And we have a bureau of people who follow up later to see if your pelvic floor is feeling better or if your money has increased. Or how is the weight around your hips doing? Because I wanna be able to look these things up later and have them tied to the original event!

[01:16:22] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Well, one thing I’ve told you about but haven’t really told our listeners about is a case study that I tracked down that was pretty misrepresented. And it hits on those same issues. You know, if we just show where a client is the week after the medical intervention, we really don’t know all that much. Yeah.

(Ross agrees.)

Okay. Volunteer number six. This is someone with shoulder pain.

[01:16:48] Ross Blocher: Let me guess. They’re trying to shoulder too many of other people’s burdens.

[01:16:54] Carrie Poppy: (Faking awe.) Oh my god, you are psychic!

[01:16:57] Ross Blocher: (Chuckling.) I know where this is going.

[01:16:58] Carrie Poppy: She always takes on things for other people and does nothing for herself!

(Ross laughs.)

And the woman agrees. Yep. Yep. She never does things for herself except for going to this conference. And Gail asks her, “Do other people put you in second place?” And she says yes. I think like a lot of people have to put you second or lower, right? Maybe one person puts you first, but that makes sense. Okay. So, Gail says, “We all have spirit guides, and they are a part of our team. And when we deny our own confidence, we are denying them. So, there are these spirits following you around; they’re always wishing you well.” And hey, you’re like the president of the—you know, you’re the representative. And if you are saying that you’re shit, you’re saying that the boss of all this team is shit!

[01:17:40] Ross Blocher: Oh. So, all these angels following you around, they’re your secret service. And you’re like, “I’m not the president.”

They’re like, “Well, then what are we here for?!”

(Carrie agrees.)

See, that’s an analogy, Gail! That’s me making an analogy. Doesn’t involve any hexagons.

[01:17:54] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. It was nice and clear, nice and crisp. So, she says when you see orbs, like in photography and stuff, those are your spirit guides.

[01:18:03] Ross Blocher: Or they’re just tiny particles of dust reflecting light back at a camera with a flash and they don’t show up when you don’t have a flash.

[01:18:12] Carrie Poppy: Or…b. (Orb.)

(They laugh.)

[01:18:13] Ross Blocher: Oh, that was good. That was a good moment, there. Thank you.

[01:18:18] Carrie Poppy: (Chuckles.) Okay. So, you’ll often see orbs in important, joyful moments like parties and weddings, because that’s when your spirit guides are really loving being part of your identity.

[01:18:33] Ross Blocher: Or people have been doing the abun-dance at your wedding and kicking up dust in the air.

[01:18:38] Carrie Poppy: Oh, yeah. I was thinking of—

[01:18:39] Ross Blocher: You have a flash on your camera. And that flash has reflected back on those dust moats.

[01:18:44] Carrie Poppy: Also, famously, a place that people throw things. They’re throwing bouquets, they’re throwing rice, they’re throwing pebbles. You’re—it’s a throwing party!

(Ross agrees.)

Alright, so. “Ask yourself if you’ve done something for your team today, taking a bath, really taking care of yourself. If someone asks you to do something fun, say yes! Do it for the team!” So, she has volunteer five put her hand over her heart, close her eyes, and Gail asks her, “Is there anything stopping you from receiving and loving yourself? Anything we’re denying, any pure happiness and joy that you’re denying yourself? Release that. Fill your heart with joy and love. CAN WE DO THAT?”

We all say, “YES!” Deep breath. (Gasps in.) Exhale. (Breathes out.) “Angels and guides, remove everything from her shoulder!” Now, she makes the volunteer raise her arm like up and up and up and up, and she keeps pushing it up. She did not do any before testing. We did not see her lift her hand at any other point. But now, she’s lifting it above her head and Gail’s like, “Look at this!”

[01:19:51] Ross Blocher: “Look how high she can—” (Laughs.) Okay.

[01:19:53] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Yeah, she’s doing a normal thing. Yeah.

[01:19:57] Ross Blocher: Wow. The chutzpa. It amazes me. Okay.

[01:19:59] Carrie Poppy: I know! And Gail says, “If you go to a healer and you don’t have that problem anymore, it’s not that it’s a miracle, it’s that you finally allowed that in yourself. You could always do it before you even encountered me. You just finally allowed someone to.” And that someone was Gail Thackray.

[01:20:19] Ross Blocher: “And that’ll be $200 for the half hour session.” I don’t know what her rates are, but.

[01:20:26] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, good question. I don’t either.

[01:20:28] Ross Blocher: It wasn’t me, but it was. So, I was paying for this.

[01:20:30] Carrie Poppy: So, then we pass around the cards from the description that you read from the schedule where we write down three things we want information about, and she suggests career, soul purpose, family, an answer you want to something. “And then on the back, write your name and an email so I can actually read it!” She doesn’t like all this illegible handwriting. And then she passes out these little crystals, and she wants us to hold those and identify the “aha” spiritual connection feeling. “Because love is the same as ‘aha’.”

[01:21:04] Ross Blocher: Whoooa, that sounds profound.

[01:21:04] Carrie Poppy: Mm-hm. Mm-hm. Stay there. Stay there!

[01:21:10] Ross Blocher: Okay, okay! Before I call it a deepity, you’ve got more?

(Carrie denies it with a laugh.)

Okay, I would write down my purpose as being I want to study the sun. That is my sol purpose.

[01:21:20] Carrie Poppy: Nice. Nice. S-O-L. Yeah. Yeah. Good, good, good. “The ‘aha’ is a very powerful version of love.”

You know, I actually thought this was interesting, because I loved Daniel Dennett’s Breaking the Spell, which basically argues that religion is a form of falling in love. Like, in a—it’s an almost non-poetic argument for such a poetic point. But like, he really argues like this is very likely an evolutionary adaptation of love.

And I think it’s a really interesting argument. And I was feeling like, oh, she’s feeling something similar here if she’s connecting “aha” and love. You know, that feeling of spiritual transcendence and love. So, she says to think of someone you love, preferably someone who’s in spirit or could be an animal. You want someone who you have unconditional love for, which I thought was interesting that she knew that would limit us to the dead and pets.

[01:22:18] Ross Blocher: Because those living humans, I don’t know.

[01:22:20] Carrie Poppy: My child? Uh-uh! Uh-uh! (Chuckles.)

[01:22:24] Ross Blocher: They can really get on your nerves.

[01:22:27] Carrie Poppy: (Chuckles.) So, of course, I pictured Ella and Golly, my doggy and my kitty. So, then we held our crystals over our heart. She told us to relax and to picture ourselves connecting to the grid. So, we’re gonna surround ourselves with white light as we hold that and think about that person we love and things you did together when they were alive. And now I’m like, “They are alive. You’ve forgotten about pets already.”

(Ross laughs.)

“Imagine that they’re here in the room with you. Make it real. Picture them right here and feel that love. Now, find a physical area where you need healing, and move your hands there, and call on your energy to go into that area.” So, for me, with my headaches, maybe I would put a crown on my head or something, and “We’re going to remove any illness caused by dense energy there.” She says, “You have the right to be completely divine and to be completely whole and healthy. So, picture that person or that pet, put your hands on that area as a proxy.” And then, she gave us some examples. So, maybe you would put your hands over your heart for grief or for negativity toward your family members or resentments and say, “I don’t wanna have that anymore. I wanna have good relationships with my family.”

[01:23:39] Ross Blocher: I mean, all that sounds pleasant and nice. And I feel like we should have a space in society where we can do that kind of thought exercise. Put our hands over whatever part of our body needs attention and channel these thoughts. But I feel like you can do that without making any extraordinary claims about healing.

[01:24:58] Carrie Poppy: Totally. Yes. Yes. Completely agree. Uh, then she talks about the sacral chakra. Is that your butt? Oh, belly button.

[01:24:06] Ross Blocher: Oh, interesting.

[01:24:07] Carrie Poppy: I think the sacral chakra is around your belly button or maybe right below it.

[01:24:09] Ross Blocher: The second chakra. Okay, so just above the root one? Yeah.

[01:24:11] Carrie Poppy: Sacral. Yeah. Yeah, kind of around your belt, around your navel, more or less.

[01:24:17] Ross Blocher: Right where you would gaze.

[01:24:18] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. Maybe you would put your hands there if you wanna heal old romantic relationships, especially if you have triggers regarding your past relationships. If thinking about them makes you upset, tell yourself it’s time to release that and say thank you. You needed that experience, and this is a good time to even say the name in your mind of that person who left that imprint, that body memory on your sacral chakra.

Yes. Ross, you’re raising your hand.

[01:24:43] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Not important, but this chart I’m looking at identifies the sacral chakra with the hips and says that the solar plexus chakra is two inches below the navel.

[01:24:54] Carrie Poppy: Okay. Okay. Then there’s the base chakra. You would touch this if you’re trying to heal family relationships or your hips or your thighs or your lower body or your mom or your dad or early relationships or your siblings or teachers.

[01:25:07] Ross Blocher: And the pussy lady yells out, “Your anus!”

(Carrie laughs.)

“We’re saying the words that people don’t wanna say!”

[01:25:14] Carrie Poppy: How are there this many things to heal at once in the base chakra?! Once again, that’s hip, thighs, lower body, mom, dad, early relationships, siblings, teachers at school, and parents.

[01:25:26] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) Wow. Okay.

[01:25:27] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, so she says, “If you try to heal the base chakra, it usually will trigger old memories to come up, but allow that. Give it permission and release it.”

And then, she of course mentions—of course, the lower back. That’s also finances. Then the knees, again, those are being stuck. Right is emotionally stuck. Left is physically stuck. The third eye is for migraine, overthinking, physical eyesight. And the throat chakra for wanting to speak up, be heard, write a book, or express yourself.

[01:25:59] Ross Blocher: She’s just building another one of these. Like phonology charts.

(Carrie agrees.)

I’m just picturing some little diagram with all these little arbitrary lines and grids drawn over the body.

[01:26:10] Carrie Poppy: It’s body memory. Yeah. So—

[01:26:12] Ross Blocher: And I haven’t heard of this particular system. It seems like either she’s invented her own or adopted some system.

[01:26:18] Carrie Poppy: It seems like it’s her own in the specifics, but this concept of body memory is like very en vogue right now. And—

[01:26:25] Ross Blocher: Okay. But wow, does it actually turn into this kind of grid system where like this area is tied to this?

[01:26:30] Carrie Poppy: Sometimes. Yeah, I’m thinking of—there’s a woman named the Workout Witch, who will cure—(laughs) will cure your trauma by like helping you work on like hip exercises or lower back exercises. Yeah. So, sometimes, yeah. But this is probably more brazen. Yeah.

[01:26:52] Ross Blocher: Okay. “Let’s work out that need for a promotion. We’re going to do stretches on the right flexor on the abs.” (Laughs.) Weird. Weird.

[01:27:00] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, right. So, I knew that I was going to come back the next day and guess what? I had drunk so much water that I couldn’t hold it in anymore, (laughing) and I went and left and went to the bathroom and came back and she was gone.

[01:27:14] Ross Blocher: Oh!

[01:27:14] Carrie Poppy: Hopefully everyone’s healed now!

[01:27:17] Ross Blocher: Wow! Like the room had vacated?

[01:27:19] Carrie Poppy: I mean was emptying or whatever. It was over.

(Ross affirms.)

So, and then I went back the next day.

[01:27:25] Ross Blocher: Alright. So—okay, you got more Gail coming?

(Carrie confirms.)

[01:27:28] Ross Blocher: But interesting. Did you expect a healing session?

[01:27:33] Carrie Poppy: Yeah. I mean, when I saw “remove pain emotional blocks” and I kind of knew her thing, I think I kind of knew. But not that it would be so blatantly what I have been watching for the last 15 years of faith healing. You know?

(Ross agrees.)

I was just like, “Oh my god. It’s like watching Peter Popoff all over again, but he’s a lady. And he’s just doing it slightly different.”

[01:27:54] Ross Blocher: Yeah. Very much variation on a theme. But you have to think that there’s—I was gonna say many—most people who are watching her and just don’t have that foreknowledge to kind of recognize this is a performance and we’ve seen it before.

[01:28:09] Carrie Poppy: Right. Totally. And it’s working. But we’ll be back to hear about past life regression and recovered memory therapy with Gail Thackray next time.

[01:28:22] Ross Blocher: Okay. We’ll recover those memories from you.

(Carrie affirms.)

Though we may interrupt that with a congressional session on UAPs.

[01:28:30] Carrie Poppy: Sounds great.

[01:28:31] Ross Blocher: Excellent. Well, thanks for sharing that.

[01:28:33] Carrie Poppy: My pleasure!

[01:28:34] Ross Blocher: I mean, my lower back feels pretty good after hearing all that.

[01:28:38] Carrie Poppy: Nice. You know, I’m lucky. I don’t really get too much back pain. It doesn’t happen often.

[01:28:44] Ross Blocher: Yeah. I feel very fortunate as a runner. You know, everybody hears you’re a runner and they have a few things that they say to you. And one of them is like, “Oh, well, what about your knees? Are your knees okay? Oh, better watch out for those knees.” And my knees have been fine. So, I’m just going to—I’m gonna enjoy life while I can. Run my little heart out.

[01:29:02] Carrie Poppy: So, you’re not stuck emotionally or physically? ‘Cause both of your knees don’t hurt?

[01:29:07] Ross Blocher: Not ready to commit to that, but sure.

[01:29:08] Carrie Poppy: (Singsong.) It sounds like you’re noooot! What does hurt for you? We’re gonna make this about your family.

[01:29:17] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) I feel pretty fortunate, like generally I’m mostly pain free. Right? Let me think about this. I get—well, I get bad acne from time to time. And occasional acid reflux.

[01:29:30] Carrie Poppy: Acid reflux! There we go! Okay. Now, we’re in the middle of the body.

[01:29:33] Ross Blocher: You can work with this?

[01:29:34] Carrie Poppy: That helps. That helps. Uh, okay. What would that be? What would that be? Heart. Okay, grief, negativity toward family members, and resentment for something they did to you.

[01:29:45] Ross Blocher: Are you getting this from Gail?

[01:29:46] Carrie Poppy: Yeah, because that’s around the heart chakra. Or acid reflux, it could be the throat. You could need to speak up, be heard, write a book, express yourself.

[01:29:56] Ross Blocher: (Chuckling.) One or both of those things—very different things.

[01:29:59] Carrie Poppy: (Laughs.) Write a book about your family. Write a book about how much you hate your family.

[01:30:04] Ross Blocher: Solve two problems in one fell swoop. Alright.

[01:30:08] Carrie Poppy: That’s it.

[01:30:09] Ross Blocher: Excellent. Well, thanks for healing me.

[01:30:11] Carrie Poppy: You’re welcome.

[01:30:12] Ross Blocher: Nice little side benefit there. Well, I guess that must be it for this episode.

[01:30:15] Carrie Poppy: Our theme music is by Brian Keith Dalton.

[01:30:18] Ross Blocher: Our administrative manager is Ian Kremer.

[01:30:20] Carrie Poppy: You can support this in all our investigations by going to MaximumFun.org/join.

[01:30:24] Ross Blocher: Now, a co-op owned by the workers.

[01:30:26] Carrie Poppy: Hell yeah!

[01:30:27] Ross Blocher: Yeah! So, support them and support us. MaximumFun.org/join. Also, tell a friend, give us a positive review. That really does help.

[01:30:36] Carrie Poppy: Watch Presommar on YouTube.

[01:30:39] Ross Blocher: (Laughs.) Oh, and again, if you’re in Santa Cruz, meetup on August 10^th. It’s literally on Meetup.com for the Santa Cruz Skeptics.

[01:30:48] Carrie Poppy: Woah! Meetup.com. Still out there. Wow.

[01:30:50] Ross Blocher: Still going. They have a Facebook group too, I think. But yeah, join us August 10^th. It’ll be fun. 6:30 to 9:30. I’ll be hanging with my new friends.

[01:31:00] Carrie Poppy: And remember—

[01:31:01] Clip:

Gail Thackray: Anybody have anything similar?

Speaker: Yes, I do.

Gail Thackray: Where we don’t feel like we are getting where we wanna go. You feel like you’re burnt out. Is it worth it? Let’s dream bigger today! Okay? Let’s think about your—where you wanna go with your soul purpose, and let’s release any tension that we’ve got in our body that’s holding us back. In some of you, it might be in your knees. You know, not moving forward. And your right knee’s gonna be more of an emotional thing. Your left knee’s gonna be physically not moving forward—like changing jobs, changing your career. Your right one’s more of an emotional feeling, but it could be all over your body. Wherever you feel like you’ve got tension. Okay? So, you can put your hands on your knees. You can put your hands on your pussy if you want to.

(Laughter.)

And let’s do a pelvic release!

[01:31:50] Music: “Oh No, Ross and Carrie! Theme Song” by Brian Keith Dalton. A jaunty, upbeat instrumental.

[01:32:03] Promo:

(Animal noises.)

Music: Cheerful, upbeat music.

Alexis B. Preston: Are you tired of being picked on for only wanting to talk about your cat at parties?

Ella McLeod: Do you feel as though your friends don’t understand the depth of love you have for your guinea pig?

Alexis: When you look around a room of people, do you wonder if they know sloths only have to eat one leaf a month?

Ella: Have you ever dumped someone for saying they’re just not an animal person?

Alexis: Us too.

Ella: She’s Alexis B. Preston.

Alexis: She’s Ella McLeod.

Ella: And we host Comfort Creatures, the show where you can’t talk about your pets too much, animal trivia is our love language, and dragons are just as real as dinosaurs.

Alexis: Tune into Comfort Creatures every Thursday on Maximum Fun.

(Music fades out.)

[01:32:39] Sound Effect: Cheerful ukulele chord.

[01:32:40] Speaker 1: Maximum Fun.

[01:32:42] Speaker 2: A worker-owned network.

[01:32:43] Speaker 3: Of artist owned shows.

[01:32:45] Speaker 4: Supported—

[01:32:46] Speaker 5: —directly—

[01:32:47] Speaker 6: —by you.

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