Being Joyfully Led: Shifting from Driven to Drawn

WSC Intro/Outro: 00:00:04

This is When Spirit Calls and you on your journey are in the right place. This show is about magic miracles and meaning shared through stories, interviews and channeled messages. We have so much to share about who you are and your divine mission here on the earth. Let's get to it When Spirit Calls is right now.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:00:32

Well hello, it's another wonderful day to release a When Spirit Calls podcast for you today and I am so excited about our guest. Oh my goodness. This woman is incredible, and I hope that you feel her love and her energy. In the interview today, allow me to introduce you to Andrea Menard. She is a highly talented Matey singer, songwriter, actor, speaker and wellness trainer who has gained immense recognition for her work as an influencer in feminine leadership. She is the founder of the Sacred Feminine learning launch, and has been named one of the women executive networks Canada's most powerful women, and that would be a top 100 award winner in 2020. Andrea trains women to lead like a goddess and helps people of all genders to reclaim and embody the qualities of the sacred feminine. She is also the author of the seeds from the sacred feminine wisdom cards. And these have been released just recently here but by mango publishing. Andrea is also an accomplished actress having been nominated for five Gemini awards, and also named actress nationals Women of the Year in 2021. She has released five award winning albums including a new chief language album, a symphony show and two television programs. Andrew has TEDx talk called Silent no more has over 128,000 views. She was born in Manitoba, and she is a proud member of the Matey nation of Canada. Her Matey family originates from St. Laurent Manitoba, which is treaty one and then they settled in the inter lakes of treaty two territory. Now please forgive me, I'm going to try and pronounce these indigenous words. I will do my best. Her name Huey and name is not to we utan it means grandmother wind. And her admission. IBM name is Su Tia at ca meaning fire woman. And Andrea has performed for various dignitaries in groups, including residential school survivors, families of the missing and murdered indigenous women, as well as world's NATO generals singing her song peace. And I think that you will probably feel that energy of peace and of course love and nourishment. As you listen in today, folks, please enjoy today's episode of When Spirit Calls.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:03:03

Oh my goodness, you guys. So you just heard a little bit about our guest today, Andrea. And I am so excited because I think Spirit led me to her in the first place. And this is why she's here today. So so excited to have her here. Thank you, Andrea.

Andrea Menard: 00:03:18

I love Danshui DeeAnne so nice to be here.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:03:21

Oh, it's so nice to have you. I cannot wait to get into your story because we really, truly just met and now I am even so much more excited for you to share with our audience a little bit more about what was the journey for you and how you ended up where you are because you're doing some really incredible things that are kind of mind blowing to me. And I want the audience to kind of understand what was the journey for Andrea to get where she is today. So why don't you take us take us away?

Andrea Menard: 00:03:53

All right, thank you. Merci. DeeAnne. Okay, so usually I like to introduce myself before we begin, so that I fully arrived me and my spirit. We fully arrived here and so I'll introduce the way I was taught. Done Shakeel Well, Andrea Menard dish Nica shown not the girl you didn't dish Nikka shown as well as Ninjago takeway. I'm a proud Matey woman from treaty one territory and the homeland of the maytee who's currently living in the unseeded traditional territory of the Squamish, the slaver tooth and the Musqueam people. So what I said was Hello, everyone. My name is Andrea Menard and I carry the names, not the Go utin in my Nikkyo name, which is grandmother wind. And my initial memo name, which I was given in ceremony as well is fire woman she's got the equation. So I want to fully arrive into this place so that we can have a good chat so thank you for having me. On your on your podcast. Oh, so What's my beginning? Okay, where where do we begin? Yeah, right. So I guess, you know, here I am on podcasts right now and I'm in this place with you, because I'm, I guess I'm in the wellness industry I'm, I'm, I'm offering my my gifts for the world, my intuitive teacher messenger gifts to the world. But I like to think of myself as a medicine wheel. You know, you're a Canadian Matey woman. So you know what that is. But other listeners that may not know a medicine wheel is a circle with four equal quadrants. And it's a very strong symbol for our indigenous worldview. And I like to think of myself as four parts of a whole, I'm an actor, I'm a singer, I'm a writer, and I'm a messenger, and that can be speaker, trainer, whatever. And those other things were very, very active in my life, I grew up my dad was the king of the kitchen party, we moved around a lot, you know, but a lot of maytee people are, are Catholic. And, and we weren't, I wasn't raised in a religious home. But I was a deep, deep, deep spiritual seeker all my life all my life, I just didn't have words for it. And we didn't have a lot of traditional teachers in our family, you know, we didn't have people who were large keepers or, or pipe carriers, anything like that in our family. And but as I grew, and as I transformed into the woman I was to be I realized that my gifts in this world, you know, before I knew I was an actor, I knew I could sing whatever, but everyone could sing like my dad, look at my mom, like my sister. But before I knew that, or when I realized, I went, I am a storyteller and a singer. And I'm, I tend to feel deeply and I am, I'm, I have an ability to move people from one emotional space to another. Hmm, I thought everyone could do that. I mean, they can if you're, you know, emotions are contagious. But, but I have a gift in being able to lift people out of things. And so I, I went into the arts, sort of by accident, you know, because I didn't know that there were industries in our community in any in any Canadian community. I didn't know about the film industry, or the theater, music industry in Canada. I thought everyone had to go to LA, or Hollywood.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:07:40

It's funny, you had that perception? Because growing up, I thought the same thing.

Andrea Menard: 00:07:44

Yeah. Right. And then I was exposed to it, and I joined it, and my whole world opened up. But so here, I was now surrounded by artists for the first time, and I started to feel like, Oh, I'm understood here. I'm familiar here. But then it's like, I had to go a step beyond. And I realized that not everyone is here to change the world. Not everyone here is for uplifting humanity. And again, this is me talking as though it was a clear vision back then it wasn't it was a gradual realization that I will not survive in these industries. If I have the same goals as everyone else, like fame fortune, make me a star, you know, I had a terror of that, actually, I thought if I become Nope, I can't do it. So I gave over, I literally gave over my career to the grandmothers very, very early. And it's like I said, I will not survive this industry. Unless I unless I'm doing this for a better reason. Unless I'm uplifting humanity, or there's, I make the world a better place. And so with that in mind, you know, I've been in the industries now for 30 years and everything I have done five albums later to television shows, you know, or my shows, I've been lots of different series, but written by me a deck of cards just coming out, all these things have been truly my offering to the planet. It's like, this is where this is what I'm giving to the world. So. So I hope that's enough of a background. I don't know if I can told you what you asked.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:09:28

Yes, you did. And so beautiful. You know, it sounds like you came from, you know, a musical family. Obviously, that really led you down the path. But what I really love about your story is how you recognize that your goals needed to be your goals. They couldn't be the goals of the extrinsic world, you know, because, again, this happens to many of us in our lives where we think okay, my goal is to, you know, buy my first house and get a good job and do all these things, and we get lost in These false goals, and then we get accomplished, we achieve those goals. And then we're like, why am I still not happy? Why am I still feeling empty? And it's because we haven't gotten to the place within our soul to say, is this what makes my life richer? What actually makes my life richer? And it's not necessarily about the money, the fame fortune, whenever is how can I help to change the world. And I love that that was such a theme for you. Because I also believe that my what you mean everyone doesn't want to change the world for the better. You there's people that don't. But I was in that space too. And I got really caught up in trying to achieve all these goals of what I thought I was supposed to do what I thought was expected of me, and it left me feeling really empty. So the power in you being able to consciously recognize and even though it might have taken time for you, I need to make sure that what I'm doing is fully aligned, that I am ultimately always coming back to my foundation of how am I making their lives better? How am I contributing to enhancing their well being? So I love love, love that you mentioned that you had to give it away to the grandmothers. And I want to speak to that for a minute. Because the audience might be like, what does she mean giving it to the grandmothers? And so could you explain that, you know, I might say giving it to God. And and so other cultures might say giving it to the ancestors or what have you, but you specifically said grandmothers and I'd love to hear if you could elaborate on that.

Andrea Menard: 00:11:35

Yeah, so I was taught very early on that I was given my voice came from the grandmothers and and one elder said, so don't don't be wasting it. You know, the grandmothers gave you that voice. If you don't use it wisely, they'll take it from you. And I'm like, Ah, oh, good. And that is so helped me because it allowed me to realize, Oh, good, I don't have to be famous. I don't have to use it for fame and fortune. It's like it's a gift. It's borrowed, borrowed from the ancestors for purpose. And I went, Oh, I love that. So it helped me get over myself within this industry. And it helped me get focused. But so the grandmothers are, yes, my spirit helpers that I have a deep, deep relationship with and a deep communication with so everything that I do, I just recently released a giveaway album of mischief language songs that I literally just gave away to the community so that our community can learn much of language, I traveled across them at Homeland and met with language keepers. And so I received songs with that purpose in mind prayer songs, water songs, fire songs, grandmother Moon songs, you know, so that we could have ceremony within our own homes during COVID. Right, like, we were so separate, and I wanted to make sure that we found a way to communicate and connect again. And so I was I have a deep open relationship with the grandmothers, I am an open vessel. I make appointments, saying, okay, you know, that the album, I want to create the songs. So just start start, start giving me the ideas and Yeah, and like, I'm just a receptacle of what I asked for. And I had a new I have a new play that was just that's going to be an Edmonton actually next year called Rubber boo. But that was an entire I set up a week of writing and I said, Okay, you know what to do, and it came out so it's been traveling across Canada. But the grandmothers, I have a deep easy relationship with them. But when I first started, it was more like an argument going, oh, yeah, if you want this to get done, then you have to write it. And it came out I went oh, but there's songs How come this thing is coming out of songs? Oh, all right. Okay, you know, so I it was a bit of a battle before but now it's the most I am they're bossy and loud. You know, some people's I think everybody has a muse of some sort of angels, whoever you want to call it ancestors, but not everyone has an open channel to them. And so once you open that channel, you man your life changes your life becomes better. Yeah, to match it and the grandmothers Yeah. And the grandmothers are very very clear with me because I am I have said yes to that relationship. And yeah, so no matter what I need from them or whatever, I have said I wanted they know even they have a higher perspective they know even better what it is I need so I'm just open to that perspective.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:14:40

Oh, I love that I love that I asked about this because you know a lot of people call it their spirit team or their guardian angels or they call it even their higher self and aspect of their own being. And you know, we could are the grandmothers are within you, of course, you know, but also beyond you as well. And you're right that many of us We all have it. But many of us don't know how to open that door. So what are the things that you went through in like being open channel? Because you said at the beginning, you were kind of more fighting with them a little bit like fine, you write it, you know? So what are some of the things that you did to open that channel? Because I think that's what a lot of people struggle with. They're like, they know that it's there. They know that there's more there, but they just don't know how to get to it. Are there? Were there any things in particular that happened to you or that you experienced that helped you to open that channel?

Andrea Menard: 00:15:36

Absolutely, I would say there are, there are two major wealth, there's many major things, but I think, for me, that I could pass on to others right now is that I got very clear, emotionally, I cleaned up, like you came in with a lot of wounding, there was a lot of things that happened in our life, you know, you can watch my TED Talk and find out about that, it's called silent, no more using your voice to end violence against women. So violence was around me, and around my family, and I watched, almost every single woman I know has been touched by violence. And so I had clamped it all around my body, it's like it I shut down. But I wanted to be an actor. And to be an actor, you need to have access to all the emotions that are that a human being can access. And I realized I was shut down very, very shut down in places. And I was confused by that saying, how did that happen? What? Well, how? How do you guys feel, you know, it's like, I would touch a part of me and go, is that even awake and, and so I made a promise to myself that I would open all of those channels up, I would heal what needed to be healed. I said yes to everything that wanted to come through. And man. It was ugly, and painful and beautiful. And an overwhelming and he took me out at my knees, more times that I can count, I cry better than anyone I've ever met. But I'm also cleaner than anyone I've ever met. Yeah, and I have, I have, I made a promise to be like a baby. A baby cries with their entire being like they start with the right down to their toes, and they laugh right down to their toes. And they, you know, are frightened right down to their toes, their entire body moves with the emotion. And then it's over. Within minutes. Yeah. And that's me. That's me now. So I would say, my channel got very, very clear. When I allowed my feelings to be my barometer, when I go, like I meditate every day. So that's, that's another thing. So I open up, I move into a receptive state every day. And it's not meditation, necessarily. Sometimes it's just a listening session. Sometimes it's just a crying session, where I go, Oh, I'm really hurting, oh, anything, whatever is happening, I don't even know what it is just come on through, come on through, you know. So it's like a it's a permission, giving space wherever that is. So I get open, and I'm very aware of when things are off. I'm like, Oh, are you running from something? You've been watching a lot of Netflix and eating chips. What are you doing? What's hurting? What are you running from any and it might take me a day or two. But most of the time I'm, I'm on top of it. But my meditation space, I'll feel I will feel oh the truth. Because I'm like, Oh, you're hurting? Yeah. Okay, what's going on my girl what's going on, you know, when I have this beautiful relationship with the tender parts of me. So I allow emotions to flow through and I allow them to teach me what it is that I've been missing. Yeah, so that would be one way to help open up that channel that the grandmothers because man when we're cleaning emotionally, we are so much more available to the presence of life and to the cycle of life into the ancestors into Okay, so that's, that's one one big one, I guess to vacation. And then the third one is to connect with the land. You know, as many people as Indigenous person, land based work is everything. It we are interconnected with the planet around us, with the relatives around us. And as soon as we disconnect from that we disconnect from our source of wellness. So to me, when we create and open up the channel to Mother Earth herself, and to the winter the four winds into the four sacred elements, all of those things transform our lives. And so I am I'm very receptive to to Mother Nature's communication with me. Yeah, because it's she wants So much to love and communicate with her children. And most of us are so busy in this in the systems that exist, they're a very patriarchal, masculine base, which isn't bad, is just not balanced or tempered with the sacred feminine with a matriarchy, which is a balancing, which has a beautiful balancing act to the masculine. So my part of my work and Mother Earth is, you know, a deeply intrinsic part of that is to is to help the rise of the sacred feminine, to help rebalance our own beings, with the masculine feminine within ourselves, and then also out into the world and into the systems at large. So that's how I open up with the grandmothers.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:20:45

I love that we went there with all of this, because I think these are really valuable tools, not just for opening things up to our grandmothers or Godself, or whatever you want to call that. But even in other aspects of our life, it really connects us with our divine truth. And you know, that clearing experience of making sure that you're holding space, you know, you talked about, yeah, I'm feeling tender here, I'm feeling this grief, holding space for that, because how many of us feel a feeling and say, Oh, no, I got, I got shit to do, right? Like, we do that, right, we put it aside. And we don't hold the space for that. And then you talk about people who are you hear about people who, you know, carried anger their whole lives, and now they're going through a cancer or whatever. So it manifests in the physical form. So I love that I love that you have a daily practice of meditation, because it's something that has become a daily practice for me as well. And I think a lot of people underestimate the value in that. So I know I did. I was one of those people like, Man, I need to meditate, you know, but it has had a profound impact for me, even if it's just five or 10 minutes in my day. So I just want to remind people of that it doesn't need to look like this whole big process that can feel overwhelming, it can just be a little bit of time where like you said, sometimes it's just, okay, just a conversation, hello, spirit, you know, hello, grandmothers, you know, let me know what I need to do today. You know, whatever that is, we can create our own practice and what then define what meditation looks like for us too. And I think that's important for people to notice. And then this final piece of the land. I love this so much. And I think nature calls many of us, but we like, again, we put it away, right? We Oh, I got too many things to get done. And so one of the things that I've been practicing, since it got a bit nicer out, is every day I'm getting my hands in the dirt. So that was my that was my rule for myself, or my guideline, I'll call it for the next 90 days to get my hands in the dirt daily. And it might seem like a simple, silly thing. But you know, whether it's just picking a weed, or like whatever that is, it's become part of my morning routine. And I feel more grounded. And you write just that simple thing of like, okay, I'm going to pick a weed a day, or I'm going to put my hands in the dirt every day. It creates the grounding. And I think that we're in a society that's hyper active, hyper stimulated. And where do we where do we go to ground? Right? And it's Mother Earth, right? It's it's nature. So thank you for sharing that. The other piece that I want to talk about was that, you know, you talked about the fact that you've borrowed your voice from your grandmother's. And I really love that concept. So I want to talk to that a little bit. Because oftentimes, people say, Oh, deAnn, you have so much wisdom, and how do you do this Akashic Record thing? And I say, well, it's not me. I can't take credit. Because this is this is them. This is the divine or this is, you know, source coming through me, I just get to be the conduit. I'm the blessed conduit, right. But I love how you said that, because I felt this sense of humility, that came with that comment that you made. And it just made me feel so much more deeply connected to your true essence versus an ego self of you, you know, that needs that that you know, the accolade or whatever that is. So I thought that's another powerful piece that I wanted to bring to the surface for the listeners, so that we can understand more deeply how we can create more humility in our lives to which is also a very grounding, beautiful, graceful energy to bring to the surface. So do you want to add to that,

Andrea Menard: 00:24:53

Yeah, I do because there is. There is a very odd I would say backwards way of, you know, this false humility. And to me, this humility that you pick up, that could be what you're seeing. But I would say that to me, it is it, I transform it. And what it is, is an act of service for humanity. So it's about me getting off of me. Sure, I'm the conduit like I, I have these gifts and skills and are not going to deny them, I have them. But I use them to uplift humanity. And here's it, here's a good story that I think you'll lacked. So during the pandemic, which many of us were experiencing our own stuff, and, and I, you know, I've been on this journey a long time, and I've been out of service a long time. But something really changed during the pandemic, I've been quieter in the singing and acting, obviously, everything shut down and speak. I wasn't doing much. But I was I started to come out of the spiritual closet, I guess you could say, and started doing my new moon ceremonies online and helping people through a ritual that I've created, called the four sacred bodies ritual. And I started doing these things just every week for people for free to whoever needed it, whoever's in pain, like, just come on. And I started doing it. Now every month I do it every on every new moon. So. So during that time, though, I just got over myself. And I said, yes, you're just going to help others. And then I thought, Oh, well, I'm doing this so much. Maybe I'm not going to be acting and singing, maybe I'm literally done. Oh, okay. So I just want to be of service creator, like grandmothers, I just, I get it, I get it. I helped me, lead me into the places where I need to be of service and, and then cut to the next scene. I'm in a new TV series, I have a new album, and I have a new show. And I have a new deck of cards. I went, ah, guys, I thought you were just getting started.

Andrea Menard: 00:26:59

But I was forgetting that if I really am being used, then I have to use all the skills I have. And I thought so this is the way Okay. Got it. Really get I didn't have any plans. I had inspirations. I had inspirations. And if a phone call and got picked up and said, Andrea, do you have a play? I'm like, oh, no, but I might have something you know, I have to follow where I'm joyfully led and cut to the next scene here. Here's everything. And it was all all of it is to be of service all of it. And it is such a different place than going oh, please make me famous. Oh, please, people like me. I've been there too. Don't worry.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:27:45

Yeah, you know, and we all have been, I really love that because I do believe we are here to be in service. And I don't believe being in service means to sacrifice. You know, I think that's a misconception a lot of people have, and we've talked about that on the show a few times. But you said something that was really, that really hit a sweet spot, you said, I want to be joyfully LED or something like that the word playfully LED. And I want to stick on that a little bit. Because I think that's what happens for many of us is we don't allow ourselves to be joyfully led, you know, again, we get caught up in the extrinsic of, Okay, do it this way, show up this way, you know, get this, whatever that is, instead of allowing ourselves to be joyfully LED. And I think when we allow ourselves to open that channel, and then be joyfully led, then everything we touch turns to gold, you become the master Alchemist, you know, which you alluded to, at the beginning, you said I just have the natural ability to take an environment and then turn it into this or an energy and turn it into this and you do you have this beautiful glow about you. That really does alchemize the energy just naturally without even having to try and do anything which is a special gift in itself. But that I think is the key for us is to understand if we are joyfully led then we become natural outcome misers of energy. It happens organically, where we're not having to say, Oh, that's a yucky energy, I'm going to alchemize that I'm going to change it to this energy, right? Instead, when we're joyfully led, we just get to be in that joy and be in that presence and be in that grace. And before we know it, you know, before we know it, we are shifting the energy around us too. So I just absolutely love those words joyfully led Yeah.

Andrea Menard: 00:29:40

And I love that you said it's not about sacrifice. That is an old model. And you know, I might get into if you don't mind a little bit about what I you know, when I talk about the rise of the sacred feminine that was a term I heard I'd been hearing about, you know, a lot of ceremonial people will come out lodges and saying, I got a message about, it's the time of woman or it's the time of the earth or it's a return to the circle or, but in 2012, there was a gathering of elders that took place in the sagging First Nation. Under the turtle Lodge and the late davco, Shane made a statement about what the elders wanted to share. And one of the things he said was like, boom, like a bomb went off in my head, and it was, we are entering the time of the rise of the sacred feminine. And so for me all those ceremony, wisdoms kind of clicked. And to me, that old paradigm is sacrifice and doing and goals and, you know, working hard to, you know, to exhaustion, like, basically doing doing doing ourselves right off a cliff, into I don't know, a global pandemic and climate crisis, right. So it creates imbalance. And so from all of these ceremonial people from the 90s onwards, all talking about there's a shift coming, there's a shift coming. And it's going to be led by the feminine. And now I understand that it's not women may lead it, right, because here you and I are speaking, but it's a feminine way of looking at the world, it's an indigenous way of looking at the world, which is very feminine, which is earth based, which is land based. And so all so even emotional expression, has an IS is a feminine aspect of life, and every single person has it, whether it's valued or not, is the big difference. So to me, like my deck of cards, the seeds from the sacred feminine and the work that I do my, my, as you mentioned, in my bio, the sacred feminine learning Lodge, which is my company is all about helping individuals learn how to lead in a different way how to be led in a different way. And it's all about listening and receptivity, nurturing, emotional expression, delight, fun, you know, stillness instead of doing all the time, you know, getting your hands in the dirt, right? All the things that because there's nothing wrong with masculine, beautiful aspects of life. This is not about degrading those, it's about, you know, helping the systems at large value, all the things that make their life not sweet. You know, we're bringing balanced by honoring the self, all those tender parts of self, which means we learn how to work gently with ourselves, which means we walk gently on the planet. Yeah. And we as a collective start to be led, joyfully led joyfully, we don't do things that Oh, sure, I should do that. Because that's the right thing to do. Is your cringing and pain inside and not listening to your body going? No, no, no. Oh, joyfully LED means Oh, that's a good idea. Oh, yeah, let's do that. Or oh, wouldn't that be fun? Yeah. Okay. It's that that's a joyfully lead. Yeah. And when you're joyfully led somewhere, you are on task with your spirit, you just are. And with that, you have to listen to your feelings in order to know the difference, right?

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:33:12

That is part of the discernment process, which you know, sometimes people struggle with. So we'll maybe touch on that briefly. But I do want to share that, you know, when we allow ourselves to lean into that joyfully lead into that space, it's like, more and more keeps coming. It's like, it creates the snowball effect for us, which I think is so beautiful. And as you're speaking about, you know, the sacred feminine energy, you know, one of the things that's come up for me in a lot of conversations, is the idea of mothering ourselves, this idea of, you know, becoming our ultimate nurturers within ourselves and teaching us how to do that for men and women. Right? How do we mother ourselves? So that's something interesting, I want to bring out. And then you talked about this shift of this, you know, this feminine energy and what's happening, and what I'm seeing is this real shift from being driven to being drawn?

Andrea Menard: 00:34:07

Hmm, beautiful.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:34:10

And so, you know, are you being driven Are you being drawn? And so that is the question when things come to the surface and opportunities come up, you know, and I might get excited about it or see it as an opportunity. I asked myself the question, is this a driving energy or is this a drawn energy? You know, eautiful helps me to discern, that's one of the pieces that helps me to say, okay, is this in full alignment for me? Is this really the thing? Or am I just caught up in that more masculine doing energy? Right? Yeah. So I wanted to share those two, two little

Andrea Menard: 00:34:47

that is brilliant. I love that.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:34:50

So use that, you know, yeah, you say because it's been powerful for me. So, you know, I know we're coming towards the end of things but I do want Wanna talk about this beautiful deck that you made that I get the privilege of seeing in the camera, but I want the audience to kind of hear about that. But what do you think helps you with discernment? You know, when you open up to the grandmothers and you get information, you know, there's still the dilemma of the eagle mind or the logical aspect of the mind coming in saying, Well, you can't go and act on that stage, or you don't know how to sing or whatever that that negative dialogue is. So how do we discern if something is really coming from the grandmothers or from spirit? versus something that is maybe ingrained in us? Do you have any any kind of insight,

Andrea Menard: 00:35:40

Yes, I certainly do. And it all comes from my feelings. Every single thing my mind says to me, creates a feeling of some sort, right? And it either feels good, or it doesn't. And I tell you, like, my, my voice is not any that voice that can tear me to shreds, or take me out at the knees is very alive and active. You know, I know that voice very intimately. But I'm also recognizing that it's not a bad part of me, that's literally is the is I have learned to fall in love with that little that little being who's just a little, little sad, little angry little ball of hate. For no guy, you know, I have this relationship. And so one of my names is fire woman. And so the little baby version of I have a course on this actually, is Sparky. So it's the little version of my fire woman. But I have it's four sacred elements. I have a water version and a little water version. And, you know, these little these sort of splintered off pieces of my goddesses of some of my, my powerful beings. And Sparky and or whoever else is, I've got to know who they are. And I've really fallen in love with them. So for me, whenever there's a voice that resonates because there can be voices that don't hit that don't connect. Yeah, that I'm like, No, that's not true. So but someone they hit, when they hit, I'm like, okay, who's that and somebody who's not feeling loved here who's not feeling loved. And it's all about stopping the whole flow. Because in the past, I would just that voice was so continuous, it was so ignored, like, I would just go and then I would just continually feel worse and worse and worse about it. So it ends up feeling like truth. It's just a fear, it's just a pain. It's just a wound. It's just a fleeting. It could be a fleeting thought if I hadn't went, Oh, wow. That's a good one. And it's like, I grab it from the truth in the river of thoughts. And I go, Oh, I'm gonna, you know, brood over this one.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:37:52

Yeah, right.

Andrea Menard: 00:37:53

And instead, like, I every, everything goes through my feeling, body, everything. And so I have, I have grown my capacity to be compassionate towards myself in a way that is astonishing to myself, like, because the amount of cruelty that I had towards myself was, was profound. And so I needed to shift that and it was daily practice, it was daily compassion, it was facing what these little beings and you know, in a way, for instance, one of my little beings was so traumatized that like, she lives in horror, she lives in horror on a daily basis. And I was pushing her out into the darkness because I didn't want to feel it. But who was carrying that horror for me was this little tiny being so I, I made I have this ceremony where I call in the parts that need to come in, come back home to my heart I call icon. I'm like returning to the circle come home. And I actually felt the horror that these beings have been holding for me. If that isn't kindness, if that isn't love. Yeah, they may say some crap things to me. They may say some shitty things. But but no wonder, no wonder they did. I shoved them out into the dark. So bringing them home to the light. And finding love for these parts is just transforming it. So transforming

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:39:22

Yeah, I've actually given my ego name, a name, her name's Jane. And so I teach people to befriend the ego. It you know, and I think that's really what you're speaking about is all of these limited beliefs, all these anchored energies, all these traumas or whatever aspects of our ego that want to keep us safe and protected. That's what it's they're trying to do or it's trying to do. But when we build this healthy loving relationship, and we say I see you Oh, this is so hard. Yes. And we lovingly embrace that it changes the whole game, right? So here's what I Got out of what you said to you use your filter feelings as the filter. And I think that's important for the audience to hear that when we can use our feelings as the filter we can create deeper discernment of our our inner truth and our inner knowing. Absolutely. So I love that love, love love

Andrea Menard: 00:40:21

and if people are stuck in their head thinking these thoughts all the time not recognizing that this feeling of I feel bad all the time is actually connected the thoughts and the right so so for me my I become aware of my thoughts because my body hurts, right? Yeah, go Oh, and sometimes I won't know the connection. So I have to slow it all down and go. Something happened what hurt you what happened yesterday did something that you have a conversation or what happened? You know, as I literally have to go What did I miss? Like something happened? Something went wrong, and I missed it. So let me know what it is. And all sudden it'll come flying back and I'll cry. I'll be I'll have these wave of tears. I go oh, yeah, that was Oh, no wonder that hurt. Yeah, yeah. No wonder you ate that thing of hog and oh, you're not really hurt.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:41:11

I'm not eating for pleasure. You mean I'm Yeah. You know.

Andrea Menard: 00:41:15

Not only do I have emotional pain now I have physical pain too. Okay.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:41:21

Okay, grandmothers, I'm hearing you. I'm hearing

Andrea Menard: 00:41:23

Oh, yeah.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:41:26

Amazing. Oh, Andrea, I feel like I could just talk with you forever. I know you have. So such a depth of wisdom. And I can't wait to deepen conversations with you and explore. But I know you've been working on this new project. So you know, you're this artist, this, this actor, you're in film and TV. And you know you they're your singer and musician, which by the way, I'm so going to find your music after this. I cannot wait to hear what you're going to bring. It's I know it's brilliant. But what about this like wellness piece of like creating this, this beautiful deck? So can you talk about your card deck and let people know how they can find you?

Andrea Menard: 00:42:11

Yes, I so appreciate that. You know, I'm sort of in love with this little deck that could you know, it's been with me this dream has been with me for about six years and, and I started it off. And the grandmothers gave me these teachings. And I wrote them down. And I contacted my sister, Lea Dorian, who's another Matey woman who works with the grandmothers through the medium of painting. And she has all these paintings that are just on believable, like when people see them, they will their jaw will drop. And so I said, Leah, do you have a painting? And she said, How about 52? And I said, Okay, and so I had the teachings already. She had the the paintings and they went shoot dates, like put together like a zipper. You know, like boop, boop, boop, boop boop, yeah. And so, I created this independent deck. I did an Indiegogo campaign. And it was so successful that mango publishing out of the US picked it up. And so it is the first meaty deck of it's kind of coming from the maytee community. It is filled with land based teachings and grandmother teachings, it's all sort of written as though the grandmothers are speaking to you. So it's full, there's a little, there's a little book inside filled with the teachings. And for those who have never really heard out, I mean, this community, you guys have heard of it. But I've been in communities where people have never heard of oracle cards or things like that. So I don't call them oracle cards, because that's sort of a Western way of looking at it. But their wisdom cards, they're a way for you to get in touch with the grandmothers or your sense of guidance, through these beautiful images and teachings that you can pick a card a day, or you can pick do a for Sacred bodies, or for sacred element directions spread. And the Yes, so I'm so excited to have them. They're just brand new, and they're just being released to the world within this month. And, and you can get them wherever books are sold. On my website, I have a whole bunch of links for wherever people are in Canada or the US or beyond. At Andreamenard.com/cards. Very simple,

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:44:18

easy, and we're gonna present in the show notes so people can easily just click on that I'm gonna go get my deck, I need to go by deck. So I cannot wait to get my hands on that that deck of cards that you've created, that the grandmothers have brought into this reality for all of us. So, Andrea, I can't tell you enough how much I've appreciated your energy. You truly have a remarkable glow and I know that the audience will just be listening but I hope you feel the love radiating from this woman. It is divine, and she is the real deal. So thank you so much for gracing us with your divine presence

Andrea Menard: 00:44:59

DeeAnne, right back at you so audience you I know why you're following this woman. She is a deeply connected soul. So really nice to connect with you too.

DeeAnne Riendeau: 00:45:09

Thank you so much. And thanks for tuning in everybody. We've got a lineup of new shows that are coming out your way. So stay tuned on the next edition of When Spirit Calls. We'll see you then bye for now.