by Debra | Nov 17, 2025
Responding Mindfully From a Place of Love, Not Fear
When Conversations Trigger Discomfort
Responding from love, not fear begins with awareness. We’ve all had those moments when a conversation suddenly shifts and becomes uncomfortable. Last night, I was having dinner with a friend when the topic of politics came up. I immediately noticed tension rising in my body. I did my best to stay present with her, but my anxiety grew.
Politics can be tricky—it often pulls me away from love and into fear. After a bit of back and forth, I shared how I was feeling and gently asked if we could bring the conversation back into love. She knows where I stand spiritually, and I understand her perspective, so there was mutual respect. While we talked, I focused on my breath and stayed connected to myself. Eventually, I felt my body return to a calm, grounded state.
The Power of the Pause
After the evening was over, I reflected on how powerful it is when we choose to respond from kindness, calm, and non-judgment rather than fear. That choice truly makes all the difference.
There’s always a small gap—a pause—between what happens and how we respond. That moment of stillness is where our freedom from suffering begins. By taking a deep breath and centering ourselves before speaking or reacting, we open space to check in with what’s happening inside. This space lets us choose behaviors that build bridges of connection instead of walls of separation.
How Triggers Hijack Connection
When I work with mothers and daughters or couples, this awareness becomes a major realization. In the heat of a trigger, emotions can hijack them, leading to reactive behaviors that intensify conflict. Stepping outside the moment, using the pause, and viewing the situation from a calmer internal space transforms communication.
Practicing Love Over Fear
With consistent practice, we become better at managing our emotions, sitting with our feelings, and responding from a place of peace. Today’s political climate gives us plenty of opportunities to notice when we slip into reactivity and gently guide ourselves back to love.
Emotions like anger, disappointment, and frustration often have fear at their core. Whether it’s with a partner, a teen, family member, or colleague, the way we respond when triggered shapes the energy of our relationships. Each moment offers a choice: react from fear or respond from love.
Ready to Deepen Your Healing?
If you’re ready to shift from fear to love and transform the way you communicate, I invite you to explore Family Retreats, Couples Retreats or a Mother Daughter Retreat, or look into Mentoring sessions with Sedona Soul Retrieval. Reach out today to begin creating more peace, clarity, and connection in your relationships.
Check out my book for parents What If Your Teen Isn’t The Problem? A Guide To Conscious Parenting. It’s not for parents of teens. It’s a great tools to teach you how to manage your emotions and respond rather than react through your triggers.
Testimonial From Couples Retreat Participants
“This retreat was absolutely amazing. What an eye-opening experience. I’ve been to at least 15 counselors in my life and I’ve never met anyone like Debra. An just a matter of three days she was able to uncover things in me and my partner that has taken almost a lifetime. No other therapist/counselor or life coach has been able to uncover these things that she has. I have learned so much about myself, my partner, and our triggers. I especially love the different excursions that she offers. I highly recommend the land excursion, it was so amazing my husband and I both left in tears. We are so happy we found Debra and Sedona Soul Retrieval. I promise you coming here will change your life.”
-Melissa, Wife
“Debra was fantastic. My wife and I were referred here by a family member. When we showed up we had no clue what would happen. This was the best thing we have ever done for a marriage in 17 years. After two times close to divorces over the 17 years we were married, this retreat really helped us grow, and we finally feel like we are on a new journey toward healing and closeness. I think everyone should do this- in a marriage you really get to know your partner.”
-Bruce, Husband
If you’re interested in finding ways to heal and bring calm and presence into your life sign up for my FREE CONSULT here.
Warmly, Debra
by Debra | Jul 12, 2015
Does your suffering prevent you from enjoying the good things in your life? If so, it’s time for you to go inward into your own personal retreat. If we slip into our woundedness, we need to explore it, process through it, and move back into the joy of our life. We don’t won’t to wallow in the hurt. If we don’t process through it, it will be impossible to move through it to the good stuff.
After the resolution of the trigger, you can begin to move into a place of gratitude and joy. If you try to skip the processing, the trigger will return with a vengeance and put a damper on your joy. And that’s an understatement! The trigger will do more than put a damper on your joy, it will downright destroy it!
When we don’t learn how to bring resolution through our triggers, they escalate because when we are working with the universe to evolve, the goal is to evolve. If we sweep the issues under the rug, the rug will eventually trip us up, make us break an arm or two, and spoil our fun.
Now, personally, processing and moving through triggers is where I find my fun. Seriously, doing this work is where I get my juice. I don’t see working with the universe and growing as torture. I do know a few people that just don’t want to process and bring resolution; they think they can ignore the process and just live in the joy. I don’t see this happening. Most people who are not doing their personal work are stuck in a lot of drama somewhere in their life.
Where are you stuck?
Retreat and Mentoring can help you see where you are stuck in your life and shift out of the drama that being stuck causes. I think living in drama is torturous. I would rather go inside, look around, and bring some resolve and growth to the situation and stay as far away from the story (drama) as possible.
If you’re in the story and it is creating drama, it is hard to be in the joy of life. Being in the story/drama might look like you talking to a co-worker about your boss, you talking to your friend about how your partner behaved, or how your children are driving you crazy. Talking about the story is not processing. It is drama!
by Debra | Jun 29, 2015
It’s easier to stay calm when you have small triggers, maybe from your co-workers, grocery store clerks or anyone actually outside of your core family. Have you noticed how bonkers you get when your partner, kids or parents do things that knock you off your center?
Our core family is our biggest teacher!
I am visiting my daughter and grandson this week and I am shocked at how easily I fall into taking things personally, through my little girl. I immediately recognize who is in the driver’s seat and tell her to please get in the back in the child’s seat. If I don’t pull my higher self in, she will create quite the scene, say things that blame, and inevitably there will be hurt feelings. She is not good at communication and negotiation. All she cares about is getting people to do or say what will make her feel better.
I am grateful that I have been doing this work long enough that I recognize when she is in play. If you don’t know when your inner child is up, you play out a very dramatic scene that will cause a disconnect in the relationship you are engaged in.
In a Personal Retreat you will learn how your little girl operates, how to calm her down, and act from a higher place. Ultimately we all want to be connected with the people in our lives. When we act from our little girl, we push people away. When our little girl is acting out by saying hurtful things or shutting people out and pouting, this kind of behavior will cause a disconnect and will keep you feeling separated in your life.
My grandson sometimes acts in ways that are very ME-centric. What I noticed is that my little girl takes it personally, thinking his actions have something to do with her. She feels like she did something wrong, she’s not important or good enough, etc. If I act from my little girl when she is feeling like that, she will try to get him to behave differently to make her feel better. When I’m in my higher self I know his behavior has nothing to do with me. This is very important because if I act from the place of “It’s about me,” I will blame him and he will feel bad and shut down to me and it will affect our closeness.
In my one-on-one personal retreat you will learn how to not take other people’s behaviors personally and develop closer relationships with the people in your life.
by Debra | Jun 8, 2015
How a Personal Retreat Can Help Get You Through Feelings of Loneliness
Most of my clients, friends, people I know, including myself, have had moments of loneliness or feelings of separation. Living alone, spending a lot of time alone, breaking up with a partner, or a situation that triggers old wounding can bring up feelings of being all alone.
My mother died when I was 26, six months after my divorce. My father immediately upon my mother’s death pulled away and immersed himself in his addiction, alcohol, leaving me just as if he had also died. My feelings of loneliness were overwhelming. To this day, when certain situations happen, these feelings of total separation and aloneness get triggered. Before learning this work, I would just suffer with the feelings, medicate them, stuff them and go on. The feelings wouldn’t lay dormant for long before they would be right back scratching on my open wounds again.
This is where a personal retreat would help you to identify your wounding, learn how to be with the feelings, transform the old belief so you don’t have to medicate the feelings. If we don’t understand ourselves or do our personal and psychological work to move through our wounding, we will spend our whole lives running from our feelings, which in turn leads to medicating them so we don’t feel the intensity of the pain.
I teach people in my personal retreats how to get to know them selves, shift their old beliefs and heal the wounding. Do you know people in your life that seem to always be suffering? Taking the same actions over and over and ending up right were they started? The only way to actually move forward is to do the work required to shift the old limiting beliefs we created as children. If we don’t, we will be one of those people walking in a circle, going nowhere.
I know what my path is. Do you?
I want to evolve so that I can show up for my family, friends, the world and myself in a loving way, through my heart. When we live in our hearts, we make a difference in the world. When I live through my old belief system, not only do I suffer, but the actions I may take will also create suffering in others.
