#106 Confusion to Clarity: Finding Your Soul’s Purpose

Transcript of Interview

Find Your Voice, Change Your Life

Podcast host: Dr. Doreen Downing

Download Free Guide to Fearless Speaking: Doreen7steps.com

Episode #106

“Confusion to Clarity: Finding Your Soul’s Purpose”

Doreen Downing  00:35

Hi, I’m Dr. Doreen Downing. I’m a psychologist and I’m the host of this podcast, Find Your Voice Change Your Life. What I enjoy about introducing my listeners to new guests is that every week it’s a new story, a new life, a new journey we get to take because each person is so unique, so different. And what does it really mean to find your voice? And what does it mean to not have a voice? And today I’m introducing you to a new friend of mine, Grace Mosgeller. And Hi, Grace.

Grace Mosgeller 00:58

Hello, how are you? Really good today.

Doreen Downing  00:35

Really good today. You’re on the East Coast. I’m here in California. And I think it’s fabulous that, , through the internet, we get to connect and I get to introduce you to my listeners, you sent me a bio. So I’m just going to go ahead and read it. Grace Mosgeller is a gifted healer and sole purpose coach, known as the sole purpose sage. She is an expert at helping women entrepreneurs align their purpose and spirit with their people and prophets. As a speaker, Grace inspires professional women to grow their business by mastering the relationships they have with themselves, money and power. And she’s had 25 years of experience in personal development, Life Mastery, and energetic healing modalities. And her journey led her to develop her own simple, quick and effective self healing methodology that helps her clients align with their sole purpose and profit. Quickly. In 2022, she published the second edition of her book, freedom to flourish, stop hustling and launch your biz to the next level. Wow, Grace, I feel like I want to sign up for your program. Fabulous. I mean, I love the idea of the deeper connection with who we are here to be and express and also offer our gift. And to do it in a business. , business is kind of a dirty word. But it’s not when we come from this more beautiful place inside. So hello.

Grace Mosgeller 03:11

Hello, how are you? That was like a marvelous introduction. Thank you so much. Yeah, I agree.  Business can be a dirty word, but it doesn’t have to be. It’s like who you are. Like, , it’s when you run a business. It’s a reflection of the people at the top and their values, and what they think is important. And then the more spiritual people, the more heart centered people that really align their purpose with their profits. That’s a good thing, because we can really influence the world in a very, very powerful way.

Doreen Downing  03:50

I’d like you’re starting to use some P’S… profit. Yes, and purpose. And so thank you that already feels like you. Were waking up our listeners to listen more fully and deeply. Let me ask because I always go there first, You’re one of my first guests I don’t know you. And this is one way I get to know you is at the same time people get to know you. So I always ask first, a little history, because today is about finding, talking about finding your voice. And if not many of us come out at babyhood and say wow, I’ve got a voice and hey, we’re on. Let me stand up, be me and give my message to you. So usually, it’s from challenges and I’m curious, just if you could give us some snapshots of early life for you.

Grace Mosgeller 04:55

Yes, so my early life on the outside really appeared like it was picture perfect. But in fact, it was picture perfect for my mom and dad and my brother and I, we just had to conform to their mold. And the classic example, because my parents were very Brainiac, and really valued knowledge, and of course, money and profit. And also contributing to the community that they were very kind of like upper middle class. And we grew up in a blue collar neighborhood. But both my brother and I got to play an instrument. And he was older than me so we got to listen to him play the viola every night. And I was really excited to tell my dad Yeah, I know what instrument I want to play, because I researched it. And it was like it was a privilege and our family have something fun. And so the day, I was my turn to sit down and say what I wanted, I told him to AD, I really want to play the saxophone. And he just looked at me and he goes, No, you don’t. And I’m like, huh, I don’t play that. Actually. I knew I did. Because no, you don’t want to play the saxophone, like, really?  And I’m, like, eight years old, like, really, but. And he says, no, no, you want to play the piano. And I really just kind of checked myself, I do.

I don’t remember saying I wanted to play the piano. And he went on, and there was more conversation. And so just being an eight year old wanting to please, parents and going along with them. I just kind of went okay, well, whatever. And then the day the piano showed up, and was delivered into the living room. And I ended up playing six years of piano. But it was that kind of parenting. That was like driving. I mean, it was fully intentional, like become a well rounded person. And, Playing pianos, or any kind of music is really good for the brain. But it wasn’t my choice.

They didn’t listen to me. So I had, as all children don’t, when you’re really young, don’t have the voice. And that’s how mine was squished. And there was other little abuse in there. And it was mostly, there was some sexual abuse.. But surprisingly, what was the hitch most was really overcoming and control the voice in my head. And I went through, left the house and graduated from college, and they’ve all of a sudden dropped their direction of me. Okay, you’re ready to go out into life. And I was like, Look, that’s just so lost. I had a college degree that I really didn’t want, wasn’t really what I was asking for. And they said, No, you can’t have that, you should do this. Okay, so I did what they said. And, it took a while to get on my feet. But then of course, if you have a lifetime of being who other people want you to be, then or you’re married somebody that wasn’t the right fit. I am really feeling alone in a marriage. Because I didn’t know who I was. And, and when you don’t know who you are, you do suffer depression. And, it’s very, very, very lonely. And I am at that time, I really didn’t like drugs at all. So I didn’t do that. But, that was like, probably in the 80s. And I believe that’s when all those Zoloft and things like that were coming in being very, very popular. And I tried it once when I felt like I had a libotomy. So I didn’t like that kind of control, right. And so I did diet exercise, and HTTP, which was a serotonin uptake inhibitor, so that serotonin really makes you calm, and you don’t get too detailed sometimes. But, how that relates to business? Is that something that you think you want to hear?

Doreen Downing  09:17

Well, I really want to comb through what you’ve already said, because there does seem to be a theme coming up around you, and you just repeated it by saying that you came into later life, like, into the marriage and feeling like you still didn’t have this voice. And I know, I’m gonna just wind back just a little bit. To go back to that example you gave of coming in with a sense of knowing, speaking it and not being heard. And in fact, somebody else having a different vision. So it’s got to be confusing for a child to say, oh, that’s what I know that. So that sense of, because I’m feeling like we, we understand who we are, we know who we are. If somebody mirrors back if our parents mirror back to us, what we say out loud, oh, that’s what you want? Oh, well, it’s a little. I’m not sure girls do that, but or whatever reason, or maybe you’d get more refinement, if you did the piano. I don’t know his image of you. So that, wow, you stepping into somebody else’s image. And for six years playing piano. And I know, sometimes people don’t want to and I know it’s not about blame. But you mentioned abuse and sexual abuse, sexual molestation. Could you say just a little bit more about that.

Grace Mosgeller 11:01

The only thing that I can consciously remember is my cousin coming over and fondling me during a time at my grandparents house. And I just remember being so super confused. And like, he was seven years older than me. He was my best friend, like when they would come to visit. And I’d be like, yeah, all over him, let’s play. And that happened. And then for the rest of my life, I was. If I was best friends with somebody, I would like feel either like I had to run away from I couldn’t get close, or I had to sleep with them. And I didn’t. I had values where I don’t sleep with men. So there was another confusing thing. Unless I was married. That’s confusing. And so there was a lot of Oh, hobbling. You’re just like skirting the, skirting the issue. And yeah, that was, that was pretty confusing. And then when I couldn’t skirt the issue, then I’d lay back and I might be being made love to, I think I was receiving it, but not really there.

Doreen Downing  12:17

And this is so important, what you’re saying right now about voice and about being in an environment that is, seems safe, but it’s not safe at the same time. And I’m just going to apply it to some of my listeners, because I know lots and lots of stories. And so I’ve heard from listeners or from people I’ve worked with it, this sense of an audience or, whoever you’re speaking with, doesn’t feel safe for them. That’s it’s a very scary place, because the safety issue has, they haven’t learned what safety really feels like. And I’m hearing from you. This idea that all right, here’s my best friend. Isn’t it safe?

Grace Mosgeller 13:07

Oh, no, it isn’t. No, it isn’t. Yeah.

Doreen Downing  13:11

And how that pattern repeated itself. Thank you for opening that up for us today.

Grace Mosgeller 13:18

I have sort of a lot of confusion growing up, like I don’t know who I am. And then oh, and sexuality and friendship, it’s, it’s strange, another childhood trauma. And then together, these took a long time for me to get through. And because of that, that’s why I came up with my little signature modality to make it go a lot quicker.

Doreen Downing  13:41

And I look forward to speaking about that in a few minutes. Yeah, thank you, but we’re getting the background. Now.

Grace Mosgeller 13:48

I know I’m just trying to tie it all together. So I just don’t want to sound like a lame person. But , we all are, we all don’t leave childhood unscathed. So I had friendship. So for some reason, and to this date, I still don’t know the reason. I lived in Southern California. And on the street, there was like two houses that had a swimming pool. The one house that was just off limits, and then the other house, a bunch of kids lived there. And the whole neighborhood got to go over there and swim and play. I think I swam there like once or twice and then they shut me out. They wouldn’t let me play. And then we would also play baseball. There’s probably like 20 Kids on the Block. And we play baseball. And when it was time I turned to come up to bat, they always said no, you can’t bat and then they’d put me in the outfield where nobody ever hit and I was devastated, to this day. I don’t know why. Then someone said something, but I had to do a lot of, of soul searching and really validating how much that hurt me because you put walls up around that and you isolate yourself and then you have no friends and then you’re lonely.

Doreen Downing  15:21

I liked what you just said. Go back and say that again, because that’s important to hear.

Grace Mosgeller 15:28

Okay, what did I say?

Doreen Downing  15:32

You used the example of being rejected or being on the outside. And then you said, people build walls around themselves, then they get isolated, and then they get lonely. Yes. And then how do you ever feel confident to speak and, show up and express yourself in a way that reaches people because you have your walls around you. And you’re not letting people in and you’re not letting yourself out. But so that’s what I heard. I just wanted to repeat it, because that is a dynamic that I think really traps people inside a wall.

Grace Mosgeller 16:14

There are many kinds of walls and I can say that because I had them. I had the wall where I felt like I wasn’t good enough. And then I also had a wall depending on the situation, where I was better than everybody else, which makes you arrogant. Nobody likes you.

Doreen Downing  16:38

What would be something that you felt you were better than?

Grace Mosgeller 16:41

Well, it’s embarrassing to say, because I don’t want to be arrogant. But, I came from a brainiac family, and I inherited all those brains. So I am super squid, super smart. Super quick. Yeah. I can listen to just a few words, one little story or one set of words, and understand a whole set of dynamics behind it in a millisecond. And not everybody can do that. Which was confusing to me, because everyone in my family did. And I felt that I was a stupid one. It took me until I was like, 42 before I realized, what? I’m a little bit smarter than these people around me. And because I was trained to.

Doreen Downing  17:34

What was that what you mentioned, college, what did you study? And you said, even that seemed to be somebody else’s idea.

Grace Mosgeller 17:45

So here’s another story. So my brother, , I was also brought up in the 50s, where men are treated as more important than women. And I was raised by a PhD engineer, who ran research and development for a major oil company, so very logically minded. So my brother, he got to go to Davis into Stanford, and he got to apply to MIT. And he went that path. But when it came time for me, my grades were just good enough to get into a state college. So they got off the map. This is what college you want to go to Grace. My I don’t care. I just want to be out of here. So I picked the one. I picked Humboldt. Because same story. Oh, you don’t want to go there? And I’m like, why not? He says, Well, there’s too much fog there, there’s no sunshine, it rains a lot. Oh, good point. So yeah, at least I could say good point. And then I kind of deciphered what did I want to do? And I decided I wanted to be a nurse, simply because my best friend was going and she was going to nursing school. Only because we watched General Hospital.

Grace Mosgeller 19:21

It’s been so long. I think I liked One Life to Live a little bit better. She liked General Hospital a little bit better. So the next school that had a good nursing program was Chico, which was 100 miles north of Sacramento, and that’s where I ended up going. But before I ended up there, he pointed out San Luis Obispo and there was another confusing thing he would say. Well, Grace, you could go to Chico but if you went to San Luis Obispo, the ratio of men to women there is much better. You might find a good husband there. I was so confused. Because I wasn’t supposed to find a husband. I wasn’t supposed to be with a man. But yet I was. And I was supposed to have a good career, but no, I wasn’t. So it was just all this confusing messages. So I ended up going to Chico and enrolled in the nursing program. And because High School is incredibly easy, I would just look at something, yeah, got it, and then go play and take a test and get passable grades. So that’s what I got. I like to play. So, first, I didn’t know what a syllabus was. And that’s kind of important when you’re in a college. And so I didn’t really realize when the tests were. So I flunked out of anatomy. And I said, Dad, I need another year. And he goes, Oh no, you don’t. Wow. Oh, no, you don’t, you have four years figured out. Okay. So I looked through all the requirements for degrees and I came across well, I can do agriculture. So I ended up getting a degree in agronomy. And growing five acres of wheat was my second senior project.

Doreen Downing  21:24

The stories you’re telling, in spite of the confusion, and in spite of the messages, you seem to keep on, keep on going. And I can’t wait to hear more about the method that you’ve designed and developed based on all of what you’ve already told us. So I’m going to take a quick break, and we’ll come back and get to hear that.

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Doreen Downing  21:58

Hi, we’re back now. And we’ve been hearing from Grace Mosgeller, about her history. And the word that keeps coming back over and over and over is confusion, finding your voice in the midst of other people telling you what you should think what you should play as an instrument, where you should go, what you should study makes you question who I am. And the other challenge we learned earlier in the episode was about putting up walls and what she said… there are different kinds of walls, we put up. Like walls around our self-esteem, walls that keep people away from us. But those walls keep us isolated. So from a very challenging early life, you have found, obviously, because you’re out there giving your gift to the world. And you’ve written a book. So tell us the transition, what was the wake up to the more that you’re now able to offer?

Grace Mosgeller 23:08

So the wake up call was, my children were displaying the same symptoms that I was, except for worse. And that I was acting exactly like my dad and towards them. Nope, nobody should be like that. It’s the moment I really realized what I was doing. It was pretty, like I was really angry at God, like, how dare you make me a parent? How dare you. So that was a wakeup call. And so that started 25 years of personal growth and development. And since I didn’t know, I didn’t have the role model. I didn’t know what I didn’t know who I was in the beginning. That was later. I still thought I was writing. Right? And so I just inhaled spiritual principle books Wayne Dyer, Deepak Chopra, Barbar de Angeles, Brian Tracy. , all those greats. And then all the leadership roles. John Maxwell. I walked on fire at the Tony Robbins and did his whole Mastery program. And then along the way I became a coach and did Coach University back in the early days. I had a printout and put in in binders.

What really woke me up was about five years ago, while I realized there’s something called a soul purpose. That there were categories and degrees of people profiles, like almost archetypes of people that give you a framework of who you were. And how that was helpful for me was I could identify my behaviors. And then it goes almost like put them in a chart like. Oh, that’s who I am. Who knew. And like, I didn’t know I was a leader. But that’s the sole archetype of a leader, I had all the defensive qualities. And I had no offensive qualities because I was squished. And I didn’t know I was a leader.

And so as soon as I realized that, then I did the work to integrate and accept and forgive and all that happy, happy stuff. That’s not so easy, but I made it easier because I figured if that’s hard for me, there’s no sane person in the world that’s going to go through this and still have a job and raise your kids and, and move on. And there has to be a faster, quicker, easier way to do it. So I embrace my role as a leader, the better my voice became like, you can hear my voice now. Before that, I had several brick and mortar businesses, and I did everything right. Except for the networking. I hated the networking. Like I would go to a networking event and walk in, if I could control the situation by asking everyone else what do you do, I was fine. But the moment the spotlight was on me, I would flip and fragment and leave in dismay.  I wanted to threw up. One time, I couldn’t even get out of the car. I was in an interview for an esthetician. I had my own little spa there for a while. And they put a microphone in front of me. I had a fat burning machine that came with a commercial recording, and thinking I needed a bouncy, shiny, brighter machine to bring people in. But the moment they put the microphone in front of me. I felt no anxiety. I knew what I was going to say. And she started asking me questions. When I started talking. My throat got tighter, and tighter and tighter. And pretty soon, nothing came out. I’m talking like this. Especially at the recording. And thankfully, the salesman was there. And he took over and I just stood there looking pretty. So I had the commercial.

Once I started really embracing my unique qualities like for me, I’m out of the box. I don’t think like everybody else. And I don’t like to follow rules. So I felt like my wings were clipped. So the more I let go of the rules that bound me, the freer I felt, and the freer I felt, I could self-validate myself, the more confidence I had within myself to speak my truth to speak authentically. And then the part of me that was very organized, and the part of me that had a big heart and the part of me that just loved unconditionally, and just was so super sensitive, so empathic, empathic, so intuitive, and then on the defensive side I would hide and isolate and say poor me and that’s also when you’re okay, well that’s another thing or I would be resentful in relationships where I would have given right hand and we’ve heard we don’t get back anything and so we become secretly resentful. And maybe passive aggressive, or we stop our creativity our flow I’m going to get really depressed or we become so rigid in our rules that we micromanage or in we get really upset somebody doesn’t cross the tool you’re taught which in the big scheme of things is it’s nice to be complete. And slowly, like I wasn’t really trying to get my voice back. I just really wanted to and that’s why I do activate yourselves money making genius. I just wanted to make money working for myself, I could do it if I was working for someone else following someone else’s rules. Right. That’s how I was raised. But for myself, that was the big challenge.

Doreen Downing  30:16

Yeah, well, I share that the listeners are following you on your journey from the challenges earlier on to now, the challenges of being who you’re here to be. And that feels like it’s a wonderful kind of self-discovery and increasing awareness. And actually, the courage to put yourself in situations and reading those books and walking on fire and the journey to find yourself, be yourself and speak authentically, I want to give people a little bit of a teaser, we’re almost out of time about your book and the process you mentioned. So let’s make sure and do that.

Grace Mosgeller 31:10

Well, here’s my book is called the Freedom to Flourish, Stop Hustling and Become Profitable. And in here, so I wrote this, about halfway through my discovery of who I am purpose or process. I work energetically with the invisible, the chakra system. And it’s not just the opening or shut or healing them. We’re healing consciousness. So the consciousness of each of the chakra levels, and it’s in a systematic. And it’s how to, I’ll go as fast as I can here. So it’s how to uplevel your powers of influence, and how to up level up the confidence to do what you love and prosper. It’s how to uplevel your personal value and deservingness and double, triple or quadruple the effects, or the actions that you take. And that comes from being in alignment with the purpose of your soul. Because when your on purpose with your soul, you’re co-creating with the divine. And we talked about your debt creators, how to make friends with your inner critic, your inner skeptic and really embrace your many shadows. Because when you do that, when you embrace, well, your dark side, your shadow sides are the part of you that you really, really want to reject the most. That principle what you resist persists, that actually frees you, to have your voice, to speak your truth and to actually create your own little version of heaven on earth.

The thought process I take everybody through and then, it’s on my website, in little bite size programs. Or they can just buy in and do on your own. But basically, I train you how to really connect with your soul’s essence, and it’s a feeling, we manifest with feeling, and a soul feeling feels like joy, feels like peace feels like unconditional love, and how to get that and vibrate that into every cell in your body. And then that’s truth. And that’s when you’re connected to heaven and to earth and to divine and you’re actually co-creating with the divine. And from that, becomes your power and your strength. And you can start right now. And then as you really call back your energy into who you are, who your soul’s personality and purpose is that becomes a self-validating tangible response. Much like when something is salty or sweet. That’s something tangible that nobody else knows that you’re feeling. But the feeling of confidence. That feeling of faith is what this first step does. And that’s the relationship with yourself and with the divine and then for actual really reconnecting to your relationships with love, intimacy and romance. Oh, I was very codependent with my children because I had a lot of guilt over how I raised them. And actually how to overcome that is all from this, these three steps and then your relationship with power.

Doreen Downing  34:59

Oh well this lining up is what you’re talking about. And the what I got was your, the soul in the way that, sometimes people talk about or we think soul is so mysterious, but in listening to you I feel like, oh, it’s it’s us saying Hello. It’s just how can we be more of who we are and what I loved about what you just said is how it goes, I guess against what happened to you early on is the way that you said, Oh, I recognize myself. Oh, there I am. Yes. As opposed to what other people are, you’re especially what you said about parenting to your parenting was that Oh, no, I’m confused. It’s like, you have come out of confusion. And I think that anybody who experiences confusion, you’ve got somebody who knows what has been very deeply confused. And who is to say, You’re confused.

And look at you now. So fully, fully in your purpose and in your passion. And in your power. Those are the three P’s that I’ll end with. So thank you very much for spending time with me today. And digging deep, I really appreciate that courage to, peal and expose some of the challenges that we all go through.

Grace Mosgeller 36:39

Oh, yeah, we all do. And it’s not easy. It’s becoming easier and easier for us to admit the more of this Dr. Doreen Downing show and expose how they got their voice. And I know it gives permission for more and more people just to step into their power. And when I say power, it’s listening to yourself and developing that relationship with your purpose. So you’re influencing yourself, influencing others and creating the life that you want. That’s power. And yeah, that’s my mission. Thank you. Thank you. I really appreciate it.

Doreen Downing  37:21

You’re seen and heard today.

Grace Mosgeller 37:25

Okay. Thank you. Thank you.