Planet Waves FM :: Conversation with Elisa Novick

Today Elisa Novick returns to Planet Waves FM. The program begins with an overview of the current astrology, including Mercury stationing retrograde, Sun square Saturn and a few other points of interest. [Tech note to listeners: the interview is in stereo! If you can only hear one of us talking, connect your other speaker or figure out how to put your system into mono.]

Elisa Novick
Elisa Novick

Today’s edition is part one of two with Elisa — our whole conversation is about two hours and 15 minutes. In this first segment, we cover the vast topic of learning to listen to your inner spiritual guidance. This is something that nearly everyone seeks and for some reason relatively few people find. Our conversation might make it seem like a more practical matter.

We find out something about how Elisa started off in her spiritual practice and how she got to where she is today (when some of her best friends are what we would call plants!). This is an unusually candid discussion of how much it’s possible to learn, and why you might want to learn it.

As with all things spiritual or which we’re told are spiritual, I suggest you bring your discernment and your curiosity with you. The two work together: if you encounter an idea that you’re questioning, or have a response you’re wondering about, your curiosity and discernment can blend into a light that will allow you to see into places in yourself you haven’t necessarily encountered before.

We last heard from Elisa in our article on Beltane called In Praise of Trees. Don’t miss the really exciting PDF connected to this article. We will be back with part two of the interview next week.

Elisa does private counseling, and she teaches some informative classes. If you can, get to the Hudson Valley for the next Tree Love workshop! You can reach her through her website Thriving Planet. If you’re curious to hear the interview we did back in October, here is the link.

Here is your program in the old player, where you’ll find the full archives and a downloadable zip file.

Enjoy! And please share your thoughts, reflections and any questions you may have. Elisa will be checking this page.

Did you know that Planet Waves offers you astrological readings for every sign in audio format including birthday reports? You’re invited to check them out in our audio store. If you’d like access to Eric’s weekly and monthly horoscopes, visit this link to access your free trial to our premium twice-weekly astrology service.

49 thoughts on “Planet Waves FM :: Conversation with Elisa Novick”

  1. Lyd: thank you so much for your lovely offer. I am very touched. I shall throw it into the mix for now and who knows. I’ve never been out east coast way and would love the opportunity to do so, so I guess we shall see in due course. Thank you again for your thoughtfulness 🙂

  2. Just back from holiday and I arrive to all the love being offered…

    Shebear: I reside in a little village in Nova Scotia…water, mega trees, and lots of room for you to just be. Just me, my dog Sam, gallery and garden. It’s here, anytime.

  3. “maybe we aren’t massive frustrated artists, we are really fine creators…” Yes, Paola, I think we might be finally shaking that monkey off of our backs and channeling some beauty out into a world that’s desperately hungry for it.

    Artists showing the way forward………..OM indeed!

  4. Yes Shebear, and therefore maybe we aren’t massive frustrated artists, we are really fine creators…
    Om!

  5. Yep, Mysti, you’re right, and truth be told, I did do some actual dissing in a private email that was written around the same time as posting here. I had that bag of thoughts jumbling around in my head this morning, hence the desire to be more clear and truer to myself in the scenario. Thank you for pointing that out to me.

    and Paola, thanks once again for your thoughts. I dig that we’re co-creating an alternative world as we breathe and write, in every continent on this precious planet, *and* making waves….;-) Ain’t that wonderful!

  6. Shebear13, honey… I spent a moment going back over your posts. There was a gurgled moment of frustration or two, but no real dissing. And besides, when we’re talking about X’s –spouses or coparents– I *always* have in mind the love/attraction/delight that began the connection. Always. I listen against that backdrop, even if it seems to have gone dark.

    I’m only speaking for myself, but maybe at one level or another we have a special category of attention for these knots. Be at peace, no harm done to your dear friend.

    ***
    **
    *

  7. Shebear,

    ‘I want to believe we are in the process of creating that alternative world right now…’

    We Are!!!!

  8. Ah, just have to add something here that’s playing on my soul. I dissed on Chris, my “ex” yesterday, (i actually really hate that term and try not to use it if i can; he is in my life by virtue of the fact he is my son’s father and how I interact with him affects my son too; best if I appeal to his better nature from my better nature…..) and that was reactive of me and I would really rather I didn’t do that.

    I want a much more loving kindness approach and know that when I choose to employ that, he and I get along better and things can and do shift. We are Generation Jones, massively frustrated artists truth be told, and every time we try to kowtow to the PTB we seize up, howl in pain and project it out onto each other. I so desperately want to create the alternative to that system, one feeds our souls first and foremost.

    I want to believe we are in the process of creating that alternative world right now, stripping away everything, inside and out; everything that clogs the flow and I need to stay truer to myself as I take my baby steps towards a more hopeful today. No more “us and them” thinking if I can help it but something altogether brand new………well not so much brand new, cos it’s how many of our world’s aboriginal peoples live. Let’s get back to more communal living and in synch with Mother Nature and heal ourselves *together*.

    The seventh wave is here and I want to surf its momentum as best I can. That includes cutting out more dissing when I can help it!

  9. Thank you once again for the outpouring of love, you guys. Just to say this morning, I have lots to ponder so I’m going to go quiet again here to create some space for what needs to bubble up to the surface. That’s a process I’ve come to honour for myself, so just thought to let you know that’s why I’m not going to be posting in the immediate, in case anyone might worry about my silence. With the piles of stressors that surround me, I can very easily get overwhelmed and that’s never been a productive position for me to be in.

    However, I’m going to work on strengthening and toning my leg muscles for any hopping, skipping and jumping that may happen down the road, in the next wee while 😉

    Peace, love and abundant blessings on my PW family, today and always.

  10. Paola, we are in Austin, Texas. Liminali used the indigenous term “Turtle Island” to describe N. America.

    A few blocks from Toronto *8D

  11. Hey Misty, and Limi,
    I’ve found there are about four places in the world called Turtle Island… are you near Australia? (Just curious).

  12. Hey Mysti: Yep, I’m mysti-fied myself at how long my stinky relationship went on for, but until I *found* myself, I existed only in a constant state of trauma and head spinning and thought that by addressing it, I might actually drown in my deep well of buried emotions. Again, it was what I grew up with, it was deeply ingrained in my way of operating in the world; a state of post trauma that imprisoned me for so long simply because I knew of NO other way out.

    Physically I have been out of the marriage for two years now but until the financials are sorted out, I’m not free. On some level he and I did connect but yes, for sure, when someone tells you who you are and how you operate in an insidious and vile negative way, that abuse is absolutely soul destroying. I was so dead inside for a very long time but again, my Mother also stuck out a massively unhappy marriage, therefore I had no role model which to emulate, only one to perpetuate.

    I’m doing re-establishing myself now though, but it is for sure, a tough, rough row to hoe at times.

    Finally, just this Spring, I learned how to ask for help with Social Services — yayz — and really, I couldn’t believe what help was out there for me. Still don’t really, but I gaining confidence in my ability to get that help now, and to draw a very firm line with my ex around what I want to happen and how I want to be treated, so *something* is shifting. When people have experienced a world of trauma, it is a very slow and pain filled process to learn how to love and to be loved……It is a foreign vibe that can intimidate rather than nurture but I was hungry to learn a new methodology, and learn it I have. I’m really very proud of myself and my battle scars and that I took myself out of my primary environ to an entirely new culture all by myself, and if I keep mindfully tapping into my new found well of confidence, then I know I am on the right track and good energy leads the way forward as I allow myself to dance with it. Patiently and definitely much more assuredly.

    Should southern winds blow me down your way this summer, it would give me such joy to meet you and hang with yourself and Limi for a bit, taking some time to refresh my tired spirit. We shall see how this next month unfolds and what choices I find on my table. Again, thank you for showing me your concern and love; I am blessed from many corners of the world it seems!

    Len, you are *always* the gentle-man and thank you for your sweet offer of connection. I shall drop you a line over the w/e. Much appreciated 😉

    Paola, this solidarity in action you point out IS quite stupendous. I was hanging out there on the fringes for a while as I sorted myself, but really the centre is where it’s at, where the love of the commenters of this wonderful blog shine forth their light and love *so* beautifully. Your offer of an exotic place (!) is very lovely and who knows again where my compass will point over upcoming weeks but hey, it may just take me overseas and I may just land on your doorstep for a visit! Thank you very much for your thoughtful generosity.

  13. Yes. ‘We give a shit’ is a good way to say it.

    Still, when I was in the States I found a culture of solidarity and help that is completely unknown here. Sad but true.

  14. Paola, that willingness to bend around and offer *physical* help is in short supply here on Turtle Island too. I am still kind of pissed off about it, about all of it; a friend of mine in Australia keeps seeing me in the dreamstate mad-as-hell. She’s right. I am in a hissy mood about the cowering, sarcastic, butt-plugged middle-masses obsessed with how best to spend their 60K/annum salaries, and calculating just exactly *how many* people they’ll have to ignore or actively fuckover in order to keep it.

    It isn’t personal. It’s epidemic. And I spend some part of each day working to recover the *real* world. Where we give a shit.

    ***
    **
    *

  15. Shebear,
    would you like to explore ‘exotic’ places, I have a place too, at least till the end of September.
    It’s moving, for me, to see solidarity in action like this. I think it doesn’t exist here in Italialand.

  16. Shebear13. Yes. When I am *not* married, I am always amazed by how far up each other’s asses married people wander. When I am, I can’t figure out who turned off the lights. So there you go.

    It is very possible to love *difficult* people, be married to them even, as long as you do NOT allow them to tell you who you are. Once you’ve internalized that voice (and it goes for mothers too, eh HS?), it’s a helluva trick to unstick it. Tanking the marriage is usually the only out.

    Still, sometimes after decades of gnawing on each other, people snap out of it, stop beleaguring one another and notice the love in the background. It can happen. It just takes a little cold water at the right moment.

    But *that* is something of a miracle. If the better angels do not descend simultaneously (on both or all of you), that move is usually a rout. But I have seen it. Experienced it once or twice.

    So that’s my first ‘wish.’ If you would have it, make it be so.

    Second: Liminali and I live around the corner from one another. I have a little more space than I’ve had for a while. Should the southern breezes blow you hence, we could catch you for a while.

    Third: Is there someone to advocate for you in Toronto? Like Legal Aid? Money or no (they *all* swear there isn’t any… and they all lie) you still need to settle properly. Women are still paid as though they are NOT breadwinners, the balances are way off and men are automatically ‘overpaid’ to compensate for the assumption that they will be providing. You have to demand equilibrium at the end of a marriage. No one is going to give it to you, and there are moments along the way where you can more effective in making this happen. It is not always thus.

    I know the impulse to wash your hands and just walk away from it. Fight that. It is not your friend. Your dignity and material well-being will be better served by insisting on your share.

    Okay, lecture over. Call if you need us. mystes-at-humandala dot org and phone numbers will be shared.

    ***
    **
    *

  17. Sarah, again, tears in my eyes. Thanks for your offer of connection. You guys…..I love you. Yes I will contact you over the w/e as for now I’m off out shortly with some friends for a much needed fun evening out, yayz.

    and limi, earning how to make tortillas from a pro sounds great! my soda bread making for your tortillas….yum.

    hugz all round to my very loving and thoughtful PW family, from a very grateful and comforted shebear!

  18. shebear – I, too, am but an email away – just click on my name and you’ll track me down. My time and my home (albeit slightly far away from you) are yours completely. Please feel no compunction about getting in touch.

  19. What a lovely offer, Limi; I may just take you up on that, even teach you how to make some irish soda bread……..with some excellent background music — of *course*!!!

  20. dearest ursita, please come farther south on Turtle Island! You would do well here. We need you! xo limi

    ps couch with your name on it, anytime. for reals, sister.

  21. Hey Mysti, I’m very moved your offer of love in action which brought a tear (or several in fact) to my eyes. It’s not an easy question to answer really….. however…..I feel I’m becoming much more clear about the hurdles I’ve been skirting around for far too long now which have been blocking any forward momentum I manage to muster from time to time, taking the wind of out my sails every-time I was attempting to leave harbour. Things kept getting stalled and sidetracked in my life because I didn’t have the wherewith-all, nor the proper support around me, to extricate myself from an extremely difficult and draining marriage. I escaped N. Ireland from an angry, challenging culture only to repeat the whole damn thing all over again, that is until I *got* it which I have. The fact that I had a son thrown into the mix has been my blessing many times over for he is a super kid and we are very connected and we both feed each others soul, but it was also torture as I did it with practically no emotional support around me. But I was determined to help him get established on the inside, unlike the experience of both my ex and myself, knowing that’s an essential part of parenting I didn’t get enough; establishing him was my drive for the better part of his 16 years on this planet but it came at the expense of my own growth in many regards which makes it quite the challenge at times to learn how to become independent myself at this stage of my life.

    All the problems I faced in my far too long painful marriage — or didn’t/couldn’t face to be honest — (which of course were a tortured repeat of my upbringing ‘cos you marry what is “family-iar”, right?0 — are finally out on the table and truth be told, I’ve made the commitment only these past 24 hours, coinciding with having the courage to hint at my predicament on PW, and I’m ready to face them and sort them head on now once and for all.

    My ex is quite the difficult entity — an profoundly smart person bordering on genius but a *complete* nightmare as far as managing life is concerned. Right now I couldn’t give a fiddlers what his particular prognosis is, he keeps whining endlessly for years now about ADD etc but as he will *not* seek the proper help, I cover my ears when he singing that awful tune. I absolutely have to find a way to deal with him, and severe this debilitating, tortured connection as soon as I am able, for it’s been choking the life and soul out of me for much too long now. There is no financial support for me whatsoever and the continued mismanagement of money from his end means the nightmare continues.

    What help do I need? Well the fact that yourself and others on PW have reached out to me today with loving kindness settles my panic in some fashion to be honest, and firms my resolve, plus in my immediate physical environment here in Toronto, there are one or two people now who are just starting get the severity of my case and are proving their mettle by providing what you are offering to me, that essential love in action but right here on the ground. All this just shifted in this past week, after a truly tortured w/e past where I seemed to have cleared out something that was very deeply repressed and after sending out a plea to the heavens for guidance, I’m quite hopeful that I’m going to sort this out now, because I’ve gotten stronger to face the music of dealing with my ex once and for all. Before, I think I just didn’t know *how* to ask for help properly and that sucked. Now I’ve learned how essential that is and I’m putting that into gear and ready to shift into turbo if needs be.

    If in a few weeks time I’m still getting nowhere, I’ll cry out for an intervention of sorts as a last resort, then should you should happen to open your front door to a wee lassie from Trawna, Canada with a Norn Irish accent, sometime down the road this summer — just coz she’s hit the highway for a while for a break from it all — perhaps knowing that a cuppa tea and an offer of a sofa to kip on for a night or two might be on offer. That will certainly bring a smile to her face and help her keep faith with her resolve to finally break free.

    Thank you for reaching out to me, from the bottom of my tender, tired heart.

  22. SheBear13… Is there anything we can DO? Are you on the West Coast, or are you somewhere in the UK (do I remember correctly that you had Irish people?)?

    There’s a time for wishing you well (pretty much always) and a time for acting. Have spent 16 weeks swimming from one ~suddenly invisible~ shore to another unseen harbor, my experience is that Action = Love.

    Let us help.

    ***
    **
    *

  23. I so can’t wait for the rest of it. Having a context and container for all these unexplainable intuitions and a path for moving forward therin gives me such a feeling of wellbeing. Thanks both of you, what a gift.

  24. LOL Huffy! I didn’t remember it, exactly, just sorta. I went back to the file, and bump, bumped it a few times, stopped, and bam, it was right there.

    I can’t tell you how many times something comes on the tv, which relates specifically, to something going in my life. Help is all around us!

  25. Aw great one, Huffy!!! One of my very favourite tunes.

    Up dancing now and shaking it OUT, lol

  26. Thanks for your comment, dawn! And for remembering the phrase exactly, “God will not inflict past our own beliefs”, cos I haven’t got time to listen again right now. Have written it out . Great!

  27. Huffy, you’re so very sweet, thank *you*!! Maybe I’m stripping down to the “bear” essentials, heh!

    I sure do have my work cut out for me but there’s a line in today’s oracle that resonated: “it will be very helpful to work from the goal backwards to the process of getting there.” I’ve become so much stronger in order to work backwards, clearing the conditioning crud that tends to weigh me down to heavily at times. Howevah, the “*bearable* lightness of being!” (great one, Sarah!) is calming the process, even demanding the necessary focus and determination. In re-evaluating my life I’ve come to recognize I have no more energy for any repair and maintenance of my superfluous material stuff, but when energy flows beautifully through me, when I’m light and plugged consciously into nurturing my inner values, that’s the magical state I’m determined to make central to my existence.

    I love your big, warm and generous heart, dear Huffy. A tender hug to you across the “internets!” 😉

  28. Huffy, I believe her words were, “God will not inflict past our own beliefs.”

    We were given free will. If we believe we can, we can. If we believe we can’t, we can’t. Whatever our beliefs are, large or small, they define us, and limit us, unless we believe we (our spirits) have no limits.

    God doesn’t tell us what our stories are to be, she allows the playing out of *our* stories, as we wish to define them.

  29. Shebear, I meant to comment before – I wish you all the best, and send you loads of light and love. “I reach the realization that it’s my inner home that shelters and nurtures me” – this is so true. You’ve got a tough journey there, but it sounds as if you’re stripping away the essentials and that you’ve become amazingly strong.

  30. I’ll have to listen again to this wonderful interview, impossible to take it all in in one listening. But just wanted to say that one of the most important messages that came through to me, that I woke up with this morning, like a thunderbolt, was when Elisa said (more than once) that God works on the beliefs that we send out, I can’t remember exactly how she put it. I think this is the missing piece I’ve been searching, nothing is clearer than this. Thank you so very much.

  31. Finally got to listen to this – trying not to drop off after a long, hot and heavy day, and lulled by Elisa’s lovely voice. I just can’t thank you both enough – everything in me kept pinging in recognition and discovery, and I believe my angels were happy, too!
    And thanks for the great astrology, Eric – which very much describes what I’ve been going though this week (wish I’d got to listen to it sooner!). Glad to say that I’ve managed to check myself everytime I’ve been about to launch into angry words, instinctively feeling that distance and calm is the best strategy.

  32. Thank you so much, Elisa and Eric for bringing this to PW! Looking forward to next week very much.

    I shop with my intuition – though, interestingly, my intuition seems to be a tad more practical and mundane sometimes. For example: I was in Tesco the other day (a UK store) and I picked up a salad, and my intuition said to me, “Well, *that’s* not going to work.” I decided to test out my intuition and took it to the check-out, only to find out the barcode wouldn’t scan. So it’s not just useful to determine nutritional intake. 🙂

  33. Thank you so much Eric and Elisa for an inspiring “chat”. It helped settle my frayed soul in so many ways, and thank you astrodome for your “20 cents” worth (!) — more like gold to be honest — with the last nugget jumping out at me.

    “Getting outside the dominant social paradigm is the key, especially in a deeply sick society like the one we live in. Those of us who can do this…we’re kind of like social antibodies if the right intentions are there.”

    My life is still putting me through the wringer and I feel I’m being asked to renounce as many creature comforts as possible these days, including once again facing homelessness for the umpteenth time in about 10 months. But I’m learning not to panic as I reach the realization that it’s my inner home that shelters and nurtures me and I may just have to adapt to living my life as a tortoise in order to concentrate more fully on developing some kind of completely new social paradigm, to hitch a ride on the approaching seventh wave.

    Quoting a line from the Beatitudes: “So those who are last now will be first then, and those who are first will be last.” As the centre of our world where the 1% operate implodes then those that were marginalized to the fringes will be asked to show the way forward…….Best we get prepared with the healthier alternatives as that time is looming closer and closer on our horizon.

  34. I must say, I wasn’t sure I would like Elisa’s interview, but I try to give everything due consideration to see how it meshes with me or not. Her message, her journey, her life’s work, her ongoing discovery of the inter-connectedness of Life is – Magical.

    It was like hearing Truth. Not ideas to be thought about, but Truth which is felt. One hears some things and one knows. That is Real, that is Divine Truth. I understood where she’s coming from.even though I am unfamiliar with the methodologies she’s schooled in.

    I’ve always talked to plants and animals, sending them my love, but now it seems I must learn to listen to them.

  35. This recording has gone way beyond last year’s, simply because it integrates everything so cogently. I am left with the very clear message about the energy possessing sentience and our human sentience feels like some small but crucial rudder for steering the energy into its optimum (and therefore liberating) paths.

    Thanks Eric and Elisa for bringing this conversation forth at this particular time.

  36. That’s great, Amanda! Good for you. Really hope to be able to have sessions with her too one day. Still have had no time to listen – hope to find some time on the weekend (frustrating).

  37. I’ve had that sense of bringing peace to ancestors with my inner dissolving work. It strengthens compassion to realize that the wounded men who wounded me were basically keepers of an abusive flame that followed from parent to child maybe all the way from Europe.

  38. “When it comes to intuition, trust but verify. That’s how you learn to trust more.”

    thanks for the reminder, astrodem! i’m still learning to hear — and then heed — my intuition. and great points all around (but did you *have* to get “kokomo” stuck in my head? damn you!) 🙂

    i’ve been doing some work with elisa one on one. i haven’t had a chance to listen to this interview yet to see where it goes, but i can say this: she is amazing to work with. and for someone who tends to be put off by a lot of the more “woo woo” new-agey stuff and its trappings, this was a big step for me.

    but eslia does not feel “woo woo” to me — she is completely real. also, sometimes you just feel drawn to something, and when it’s the right time to begin “work” (and sometimes it feels playful), it’s clear. that was the case for me (with a little shout-out to Mars Rx in Virgo, and eric for bringing elisa to my attention).

  39. My two cents (okay, maybe ten cents):

    > My calendar has the Moon occult Jupiter on over the weekend at 8 Gemini.

    > Also, Uranus stations (you might have mentioned that; I forget).

    > I heard an argument this week that the nature of our elections hasn’t really changed in 230 years — technology has just amplified and honed what they already were from the beginning.

    > Varuna. Jamaica. Oooo I wanna take ya…. (sung to the Beach Boys “Kokomo”)

    > The Dark Knight Rises comes out the same weekend as that Mars/Uranus/Pluto aspect. I know this because I have tickets to see it with some old co-workers. I don’t know why this is significant, but it feels relevant.

    > Totally agree about the interconnectedness of all things. The trees I’ve talked to have verified that. There is no separateness — separateness is an illusion.

    > When there is legitimate cause for fear, intuition shows up as a kind of chilly darkness — it really feels like evil. But when that happens it almost never has anything to do with my own life in an immediate personal way. When there’s a warning about something in my life, the intuition comes with enough specificity or directionality that I can figure out what the issue is and if it’s legit or not. When it comes to intuition, trust but verify. That’s how you learn to trust more.

    > Objectivity matters but it’s not the end-all, be-all. It’s the dominant way. But it’s not the only way. As you know, it’s really hard getting most people to understand the limits of objective thought. In my opinion, this is just the inherent difficulty of getting people to move outside of the dominant social paradigm.

    > That last story about asking permission from the veggies in the garden is great! It’s very much in the spirit of Rick Tarnas in my esteemed opinion.

    > Getting outside the dominant social paradigm is the key, especially in a deeply sick society like the one we live in. Those of us who can do this…we’re kind of like social antibodies if the right intentions are there.

Leave a Comment