Noticing With Natalie

Making Meaning Through Connection: My Philosophy On The Point Of Existence… And Whether There Is A Point [S1 E1]

• Natalie Ross • Season 1 • Episode 1

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Is there an objective point to existence? And if life is meaningless, does this free us to make our own meaning? 

Welcome to this inaugural episode of Noticing with Natalie, a podcast for witchy weirdos, change-makers, Earth loving animists and others who don’t quite fit the mold. 

In this episode:

  • Natalie shares a bit about her history and worldview, including her struggles with depression and her early identification as a witch
  • How the pointlessness of existence can liberate you to make your own meaning
  • The things that bring Natalie meaning and purpose
  • Natalie’s work helping others shed the meanings imposed upon them by the systems we live in
  • Plans for future episodes of this podcast

Whether you’re brand new to Natalie’s work or a long time listener to her previous podcasts, you’ll get to learn more about her outlook and personal philosophy.


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Mentioned in this episode:

This episode of Noticing With Natalie was co-created by Natalie Ross and spirit. It was recorded and presented/channeled by Natalie Ross.

The show notes were written and the transcript edited by Leandra Maria Gil.

Natalie is broadcasting from the land of the Awaswas, Amah Mutsun and Ohlone peoples in what is known as Santa Cruz, CA

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Listen to my other podcast about connecting with nature and intuition:
Earth Speak with Natalie Ross and Friends

Hello witchy weirdos, changemakers, people who don't quite fit the mold. Welcome to noticing with Natalie. That's me and this is my new experimental podcast, where I'm sharing my noticings. Yeah that'll all makes sense more as we unfold on this journey together. Thank you for being here. And it is my intention to help witchy weirdos like you, heal trauma around sharing yourself, putting yourself out there, making your own meaning, shedding the meanings that were put upon you, so you can really experience a fuller spectrum of who you are, and perhaps who you came here to be and how you came here to be in connection and interconnection with so much more than a capitalist domination extractionist system, and instead came here, perhaps to be in connection with a sense of aliveness, even as that aliveness moves through waves of ups and downs and ins and outs, unpredictability, uncertainty. I'm gonna be sharing. I'll be your adventure guide. I'm a fellow Earth loving animist and witchy weirdo. I hope that what I share helps you feel more confident about trusting what you're noticing as you engage with the seen and unseen worlds, so that you can perhaps tap into more connection, creativity, community, aliveness. Nothing I say, or do here is meant to override your own best knowing of what's right or true for you. Take what works, trust yourself and welcome to the conversation. You can hop on over to natalie.net to sign up for my free newsletter where I talk more about how to channel the expansiveness of one's gifts into form and share them with the world. I'm coming to you from the land of the Awaswas, Ohlone and Amah Mutsun peoples in Santa Cruz, California. It's an amazing place. And if you're into it, I now invite you to join me in invoking your helping spirits. You can repeat after me or use your own words, or completely opt out if this isn't your thing. You do you. I welcome my well ancestors. I welcome my spirit guides and helpers. I welcome the earth, air, fire and water. I welcome the benevolent spirits of the land I'm on. I welcome the little people. And I welcome the spirit or spirits of this podcast to protect, guide and inspire me today and help me to share exactly what people most need to hear in ways that reweave our whole beings into the living web of wisdom with grace and ease. So be it.

I want to start this whole journey by sharing a bit about me because I'm here broadcasting one way we don't get to be in a live conversation at this moment, though I hope if you feel so compelled to do so we could perhaps one day engage in live conversation and connection because that is ultimately brings me so much joy and brings so much meaning into my life just to engage with others. I want to make it clear, I'm not doing this here just to broadcast and grow an audience and attract attention and whatever. I'm doing it because this feels human, it feels alive to me. There's something in me and in the way that I witness the world, my inner world, my connections with the world, my perception of the world outside of my body that I feel just wants to be shared and I'm trusting, I'm trusting that impulse and seeing where it takes me, seeing who shows up. I feel like the way that I have shown up in the world has been energetically broadcasting in a way that attracts really interesting people and experiences. And my personal energy has a way of diving really deep, exploring the nuances of existence and then resurfacing with sometimes concrete takeaways or practices. But always in a way that's amplifying the scope of connection that I have within myself, I have with others and that others may have within themselves and with others. And that's my intention and the journey is not always pretty or easy. But, hey, there's. . .that's it, that's life, that's part of my message here is that the journey isn't always pretty or easy and it's part of why I want to share, because I think we've been sold a lot of delusions around how things are supposed to be and I want to help people compost and shed whatever meanings they can. There's some beyond our control, perhaps. But there are things that I believe we can shed within ourselves that help us have more access to aliveness, more access to the present moment to the here and now, to what feels like ourselves and not just something being imposed upon us. And that's, that's what I explore, that's what I share. I'm not perfect at it. I don't believe in perfection. And yeah, come along for the ride. I think something that I haven't really shared publicly, despite having recorded hundreds of podcast episodes and held space in hundreds of groups, group calls and rituals and ceremonies, and guided many people one to one, is a little bit more about my core perception of the world, and also about some of my own mental health and physical health journeys. And I think these are things that you deserve to know as someone who is exploring and engaging in listening to this show and being in relationship with me, whether it's just through listening in this broadcast or engaging in other ways. But I think it's, it feels good to me to share this. And so I invite you to receive this and I also invite at any time, your own reflections or noticings back, you know, if you want to contact me, hit reply to a newsletter, go on my website, natalie.net and use the contact form. I'm, I'm more than, you're more than welcome to. I'm not always the fastest at getting back to people, but I will eventually. So don't take it personal if I'm not immediate. Sometimes I am. It's just, I just show up to the moment how it is. 

Let's see, I think that there is no inherent point, or purpose or meaning to existence. I think some might call this existentialism or even optimistic nihilism. We'll see, that's I'm about to get into and yeah, this can be depressing. What if there's no point, then what's the point, right? But to me, it's liberating because it's provided space for me to make my own meaning and I think that part of why I feel there's no inherent point to existence, is because I have struggled with depression. And, to me, even assigning that there is a point to existence feels. . . and again, if this doesn't resonate for you, that's fine, you don't have to accept this or believe this or take this on or agree with me. But I feel that assigning a point to existence is just too linear for me, it's too singular and I am inherently a being of waves, of spectrums, of ever changing uncertain motion. And if there ever was a point, it would be to be in the waves but even that it's like who just I don't need it to be a point. I don't care. I don't need there to be some ulterior, external, internal point that's y'know dictated or who knows. I just don't need it. It just doesn't work for me. And that has led me to make my own meaning, which I've been this way since I was a kid. I mean, I've been this way, for as long as I can remember. I grew up in a Catholic household, but never, ever, ever embraced it or felt aligned with that. I knew since kindergarten that one identity I really resonated with is that I'm a witch. I remember looking in the mirror in kindergarten, or even preschool, I don't really know which year it was because I went to the same place for both. And just looking, I had this really clear moment and looking at myself, and like seeing myself, and feeling like, ah, enough of me came through that I'm still my witch self, in this body. And I've always felt that, I've always felt this connection with the unseen worlds, the paranormal, the esoteric. And it wasn't something that was nurtured or supported in my household, but it's something that also wasn't demonized. So I did explore quite a bit. Like as a kid, my dad lived in New York City and we would go to, and this is in the 90s, so we would go to bookstores and I would head right to the esoteric section or the New Age section. And it just felt like home to me, every time I loved it. And yeah, maybe that's not even true, maybe that's. . . who knows, I don't know, I think the point is, I don't know and I really don't know anything for sure, everything is uncertain. And yet, we have to find a way or I have to find a way to function in the everyday world and make my own meaning and that has driven me. I think that, that impulse to make my own meaning despite the. . . my, my felt sense of an inherent pointlessness of existence, is what has driven me for years and years and years, forever, as long as I can remember, to explore, and to even be, I wouldn't say present, fully present, but to be engaged on some level, even through the dark voids, the very heavy depressions or challenges or pain or struggles. Because, I don't know, something in me just has that impulse to keep exploring and witnessing this experience. And yeah, my existential views have at times made it difficult to function in the world because we have to make money to survive, but it feels pointless to need to do pointless stuff to make money to keep living a pointless life and so it's a real struggle that I know many other people feel in their own words and own ways of, wow, what's the point of working so hard just to make money to feed this machine we're in and all this weird, systemic bullshit we have to deal with. It's annoying, to say the least right? But downright frustrating, and even can invoke despair. And yet, through this, and through the times that I feel powerless against things that I don't particularly agree with, because just because I don't feel that there's no inherent point doesn't mean I don't have opinions or stances or preferences and to me, I really, really feel like everyone ought to have the freedom to make their own meaning and the inherent structure of the systems we're in, don't support that, they impose meaning on people. And that really inhibits many, many people's access to their aliveness, to their own felt sense of purpose and meaning, to their own agency. And that, you know, that's something that I've been exploring. Well, how and what might it look like? How might we approach this to. . . I don't know . . . it brings me meaning, to help others who would like to make their own meaning, to help them do that, to help them shed the meanings that were imposed upon them and to help them discover what brings them meaning and find that. . . that agency, that relationship within themself. 

Similar things that bring me meaning and purpose are the possibility of connection. Like pretty much everything in my life is, has to do with connection. I love the meaning brought to me by the experience of connection, experiencing the spectrum of sensory possibilities, experiencing the spectrum of connection and disconnection and the cycles between them, and how they're always, even though disconnection feels disconnected, it's still connected. And I also find meaning in direct sensory perceptions, like, you know, our five physical senses and our sixth sense, I find meaning in witnessing and noticing my experience here as a human on Earth, through light, sound, colors, textures, flavors, temperatures, all that. And my embodied experience, moment to moment and how that relates to meaning making in my mind, and I love that, I love that. It's fun. It's fun to engage with that in my own inner cosmos and in interconnection with other beings from other humans to plants, animals, elements, insects, fungi, microbes, constructs. I really feel that humans do have the capability to access connection with so much, with anything in existence, and that, to me, makes my life fun and meaningful. And in this podcast, I am going to bring my experiences as transparently as I can, unapologetically straightforward as I can. I'm not trying to convince anyone, I'm not trying to make anyone right or wrong. I'm just here sharing and expressing because this sharing and expressing helps make meaning for me. And I feel that it's just something I have the impulse to do and I trust that. I'm here for those for whom this is nourishing. And people don't agree, they or want to pay attention to me, they don't have to. And even if you don't agree with me, and you want to listen, you can, I don't care. That's great. Much of the work I do in the world is helping people to decompose the beliefs that obstruct the possibility of connection within themself, between themself and others, and that includes others as humans, and other than humans, and even the spirit world. And I really, really love helping people access a more full spectrum of their potential for physiological experiences. And this will make more sense, I'll unpack this. And I also find meaning in the journey itself, and that's something that I help other people find meaning into, for those who would like to experience more connection to the journey itself. And I want to make it clear, I'm not putting connection on a pedestal over disconnection, nor am I always striving for connection and avoiding disconnection. I am in service of assisting others to navigate the waves of connection and disconnection with presence and with the agency to make meaning at each and any point of their journey, however it is aligned and true for them. And to navigate how that ripples out and reflects back to them as they move through their lives through the world. In this first season, I'll be sharing more about myself because I would like to put it out there, y'know I would like to talk about where I've come from, some of my privileges some of my challenges, and feel free to ask me questions. 

I am, in human design, I'm a reflector, a 2/4 reflector. I really, really do live at my own pace, which is, seems to be, from my experience, very different from a lot of people and yet it's worked for me. So, I'm Aquarius sun, Taurus rising and Capricorn moon, I have like, the rest of my chart is like five Capricorns and three Scorpios, so that's me. Capricorn keeping me grounded, practical. Yeah, I have a lot to share and I appreciate you being here. And just witnessing and noticing your own experiences and your own journey. So yeah, I think I'm gonna wrap this episode up. Thank you for listening. And share this with a friend, if you feel like, at any point. My ask of you would be any episode that moves you, if someone comes to mind as you're listening you think might like it, share it with a friend. That's something I want to get into is how we have our own inherent algorithms, and it can be frustrating to feel dependent on Facebook's and Instagram's algorithms and Twitter's algorithms and Tiktok's algorithms and whatever's algorithms. But we have our own networks. We have our own inherent algorithms and interconnections, and even little things such as sharing something with a friend, texting them saying I thought of you when I heard this, especially at minute, 17 and 32 seconds. . . I don't know, you do you. But just these little shares, they add up and that's something I'm curious in exploring is how do we engage in genuine connection on and beyond those tech algorithms. I don't have anything against them, I just don't prefer to hinge my relationships and connection or business or income or anything on them, so we'll get into that. And you can go over to natalie.net. That's N A T A L I E dot N E T to sign up for my newsletter and contact me and learn more about how to work with me, and whatever. Check me out. My site is. . . it is, it's an interesting place that I've been creating since 1997 in various ways, and it's also ever changing as I am, so wherever it's at when you go, cool. I hope to be in connection with you at some point and that's natalie.net. Thanks.