Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to the Ad Heart Podcast, the podcast that inspires heart first living. This is where you'll get practical tools to reduce stress, inspire creative action, and energize your personal growth momentum, along with ways to apply these tools. And now here's your host, Debra Rosman.
Speaker 1 00:00:21 Hi everyone. I'm Deborah Rosman and a warm welcome to our listeners to the Ad Heart podcast. The purpose of the Ad Heart podcast is to inspire your forward movement and heart powered intentions. And my topic, this episode is the name of the book of my guest. You are more than you think you are. And my guest is Kimberly Snyder. Kimberly is a multiple time New York Times bestselling author who discovered HeartMath while doing research for the book she was writing, including Radical Beauty, which she co-authored with Deepak Chopra. And Kimberly hosts the top-rated Feel Good podcast. She is the founder of soluna, a holistic lifestyle brand that offers wellness products and practical enlightenment, heart-based meditations. She's worked with dozens top celebrities to feel their best, including Drew Barrymore, Reese Witherspoon, Carrie Washington, Chan Tatum, and has been featured on Good Morning America, the today's show, the Wall Street Journal, and her latest book, which was what we're gonna talk about. You are more Than You Think You Are. She calls a practical guide for connecting to the true self. Welcome, Kimberly. We are so glad to have you with us.
Speaker 2 00:01:46 Well, thank you so much, Deborah. It is my great honor to be here on the Ad Heart Podcast. I'm such a huge fan of HeartMath, so thank you for having me today.
Speaker 1 00:01:59 Well, it is delightful connecting with you since we discovered each other and it's, you know, it's so nice to feel resonance in the heart with people who are all realizing it's about the same thing. It's really, life is motivating us. An evolution, or there's a, a thrust to connect more with the heart. Yeah. We've all tried the mind for thousands of years. It's wonderful, but without the heart, uh, we're like the new artificial intelligence, but that cannot replace her heart. Scan it.
Speaker 2 00:02:32 That's right. You know, I spent, um, a lot of my life, Deborah, just feeling really disconnected from myself, very heady, you know, perfectionism, eating disorders, many ways in which I just never really was able to feel really good enough. And I think that's what drove me into the work that I do, which is wellness. I started off, I was gonna be a doctor and I went in pre-med and then I worked at a hospital and I didn't really, um, resonate with that, but there was something inside of me that was, you know, like what I, what is life like? There's gotta be more than this. Felt very limited. Almost felt like I was really trapped in my body. And then after college, I went to Georgetown, worked for a year, saved my money, and then I went backpacking for three years. Hmm. It wasn't supposed to be three years, it was supposed to be a few weeks, but I did it so inexpensively.
Speaker 2 00:03:25 Deborah, I lived out of a tent Wow. In Africa for seven months. I bought a car and sold the car back for $3,000. I, you know, just lived in all these guest houses all around Asia and India. And then I went to India for many months and it, that's where I discovered the work of Paramahansa Yoga Nanda, who's the great yoga guru who brought yoga to the west. And this is where it was like these truth bombs came into my consciousness about the true self. And it was this idea, Deborah, that we are not literally what we think we are. We are not just this physical structure of bones and skin, but we are this unique living consciousness, this energy inside of us. And so, you know, fast forward, that was when my, my mind really opened up to this idea. And then I came back and we wanted to shout from the rooftops all that I had learned on this backpacking journey. A lot of it was teaching women in particular and people to live in more intuition. So previously I was, you know, so much was about numbers, how, you know, my rank in the class and how many calories I was eating and how many carbs and all this very intensive, quantitative way of living that created so much suffering. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So then I started to teach about this way of listening to your heart. And I didn't really call it that back then, Deborah, but it was about dropping into this non-linear place.
Speaker 1 00:04:45 Yes.
Speaker 2 00:04:46 Right. And so it just kept expanding from there.
Speaker 1 00:04:49 That's wonderful story. It's very similar to mine and so many others because I think that is what we're, people pause at some point in their lives and say, it's gotta be something more. What is it? And that begins to draw more. And today, so many people are talking about becoming your best self. You know, and we hear that on the news. I hear that from people who aren't even into personal growth. They wanna know, how do I become my best self? And I, that's so encouraging. And of course, heart math tools and techniques, as you know, are being used by health professionals and hospitals and law enforcement. And it's all designed to help people, whatever their belief system Yes. You know, connect more deeply with their own heart to access more of who they really are and unfold that. And how do you see from your teaching, your experience the heart as the connection point to the true self? How do you see that?
Speaker 2 00:05:49 Yes. So thank you Deborah for that. And it's true. The world is looking and seeking. I will say though, I think the world is very much stuck in the head. And so we have a lot of work to do. Those of us that are striving to live more from the hearts and the amazing heart math tools and practices. So people come to me and I see in the community at large, there is confusion, right? So a lot of people think, think I need to think more. I need to get more, I need to acquire more. I need to be more, I'm not good enough. It's very, um, heady, right? Yeah. And especially for women in today's world, which is a lot of where my audience is, there's just this constant like visual comparison and life comparison. And we end up feeling depleted and stuck and confused.
Speaker 2 00:06:36 So the interesting thing about this book, you are more than you think you are, Deborah, I never sit around, this was my sixth book. I never sit around saying to myself, Hmm, time to write another book. What's it gonna be? Right? So I'm, I'm seeing all of this going on in the world, and it's the middle of the pandemic. And I'm 34 weeks pregnant with my second son Moses, right? So it's 2020 and suddenly boom, the download comes in <laugh>, right? It just feels like spirit or you know, universe is speaking to me. And it was so clear, it said, yoga Nando's teachings are needed today in the world. People need to know more about this. So it's similar to heart math. People need to know it's very powerful and practical to be in the heart. So I said to myself spirit, like, are you sure you want me to write a book now?
Speaker 2 00:07:23 I thought I was going on maternity leave. And it was like, no, no, this book needs to come through. So I actually reached out to Deepak Chopra and he said, oh, this book belongs with Hay House. I'd been with Random House before. So anyways, long story short, Deborah, I wrote, I wrote a sample chapter I presented on Zoom. I signed my book deal three days before I gave birth. And then 60 days after birth. It just flowed, right? This idea of the true self. And it's be, it came from this inspiration, this real passion, Deborah, that I think people need to know about this stuff. And the true self is this potential that's ever creating. And I think people get really stuck in looking in their life and they're like, well, this isn't really what I wanted. I'm not smart enough. I might, I must not be good enough.
Speaker 2 00:08:06 Or pretty enough, whatever it is. But what we're seeing has already been created versus this true self potential, the potential of the heart, which is contextual. It understands essence. It doesn't get bogged down in all these details and things that are very limited, right? So yoga Nando's teachings, like the teachings of heart math, which I really wanted to share, which has helped me so much in my life, is about quieting the ego, the limited belief system that keeps us really small. And finding these practices to go down into this heart, our heart, and expand. When I started learning how to do this, it's when I started writing books, I wasn't trying Deborah, I never tried to work with all those celebrities or getting get on Good Morning America. I started a free blog with my heart and it started to spread throughout New York City. And then my first celebrity found me and it was like a cascade.
Speaker 2 00:08:58 Then the book deal started coming and everything, but it came from me making the conscious decision to be of service and to be in my heart. So when people say, oh, well you know what? This sounds nice being in the true song, I'm like, no, it's practical. It will change your life. It will open up your life. It will allow you to have these creative ideas, which you could never get in your head. And it also gives us this access as you talk about in the Heart Intelligence book, Deborah, which I love so much. It talks about this coherence. And that coherence is very important from a practical health standpoint. When we have coherence, we are more resilient against stress and all these forces that are coming at us all the time, right? Physical and non-physical. So this, this ability, it's like life can be a different way with more joy and love. And I know Deborah, you feel the same way too. When you and I talk, we're like, da, da da da da, this is our mission. We are here to wake up the world to more heart, more love.
Speaker 1 00:09:59 Yes.
Speaker 2 00:09:59 Doesn't improve your life,
Speaker 1 00:10:01 You know, the heart. What we've researched and as you read about in the Heart intelligence book is like this access point because he's trying to think of what's my true self. The head and mind can hardly imagine it. But as we open our heart, a be of service care more, have more compassion, the heart qualities of love, kindness, just simple things we all value for ourselves as we give them to others intentionally, it starts to create electromagnetic field that starts to magnetize our next steps and our next steps. Yes. Just like you talked about, you didn't all the doing your podcast and the celebrities, it just opens the field for you. And that starts to connect you with downloads of who you truly are. And that's so exciting. It's really is a key to open the heart and your blueprint or your potential unfolds. Yes. So one of the things you talk about in your book, and I think you're talking about wholeness health, the four cornerstones of true health, food, body, emotional wellbeing, and spiritual growth. How do you see those working together to open the heart? What's your experience?
Speaker 2 00:11:19 Yes. So through my experience, Deborah, now with working with so many thousands of people and bodies, <laugh>, right? And people coming from all different types of backgrounds, I really do, you know, this came out of direct experience. I really do believe that we nurture our wholeness through this holistic lifestyle. And when we are, when we are tapped into our wholeness, then we come into our center, we're able to come into our hearts. So the cornerstones food, body, emotional wellbeing, and spiritual growth represent different aspects of our lifestyle. You know, there's a reason all the yogis, the great masters did talk so much about diet. It's in the bug of aita. It's in the ancient texts because it's a form of energy. It's not the end all be all. It's not the goal, the end goal. But it's important to realize how do we nurture ourselves to get to this place of pure potentiality?
Speaker 2 00:12:12 How do we take care of the physical body, right? With sleep, digestion, supplements and so on. And then emotionally, um, and mental health, which is where I think a lot of society is now starting to open up to this idea that we need to digest emotions. We need to have support, we need to have community. And then the spiritual growth part is not religious, Deborah. It's, you know, it's about connecting to the heart. These practices like hard math or the meditations, the practical enlightenment, meditations I teach. It's about going into the formless energy and learning to identify more with that than what form is, which is already created. So when we have this sturdy lifestyle, Deborah, if you can imagine it like a square, and it's, it's strong and it's sturdy. It anchors us. And then the edges soften and then it melts. And I, I, I've always thought of this visually, and we are creating these, um, shapes to really convey it to people beyond language.
Speaker 2 00:13:03 It really melts into a circle, the wholeness. Right now we are being, this is, this brings us into the center. This brings us into intuition. This brings us into the heart. So I love philosophy. No one loves philosophy more than me. No one sits here all day. I love to read scripture. I read Theves, I read the Opana shots over and over again. I read Rumi, I read all, you know, if you look at my library, Deborah, I'm not a screen person. I read literally all day, right? But we need practicality, which is where I think my strength is making this practical. So I know these tips and these tools for lifestyle practice, people need that so that they can learn to live a lifestyle, a heart-centered lifestyle. Otherwise, if we're bloated all the time, if we're eating difficult to digest foods, we don't feel good in our body. We're not sleeping well enough. It's hard to feel clear, it's hard to feel loving, right? When we're grumpy, when we're not nurturing ourselves. So the, the lifestyle of the four cornerstones is a practical way so that we can open our hearts more and live in this love.
Speaker 1 00:14:04 That's right. You know, in the book, heart Intelligence and the subtitle about it is connecting with the hearts intuitive guidance so that we can access what we call practical intuition. Meaning your heart is there, if we can learn to listen to it in the quiet to guide us is what would be balanced for you for food or Yes. Sleep or exercise. And there's just an epidemic as we know in mental health crises. Cuz people are so stuck in their head, which feeds back in feeling self-critical or all the things you mentioned, yes, body image problems. But if we can help people realize they have their own inner intuitive guidance, if they can align, like you mentioned, incoherence between heart, brain, body, then they can begin to access that deeper heart. Yes. Or practical intuitive guidance, which is also practical spirituality. So the practical part is really philosophy, like you said, I love it too, but it's like, how do we get down to really take it to the street with the simple tools? So yes. What practices, techniques do you recommend to help people connect to their deeper heart and true self?
Speaker 2 00:15:25 So meditation is primary, Deborah. I really, um, that is the anchor of my life. But if someone's starting out, I think it's really important that we create a simple, and even if you're more advanced, but from the beginning, what I teach clients and readers is to create a simple, practical, uh, doable morning routine. And it will touch the cornerstones. So let me give you an example. And the reason for this, Deborah, is that every morning we have the chance to rebirth, right? We have this potential, we put so much emphasis on as a society on New Year's, like it's the end all feel. But the truth is, every day we can cha we can choose what kind of human experience we wanna have. We can choose to be in the heart every day. So the morning practice I teach is as you wake up, first thing, before you go on your phone, before you get mired in emails, you pause and you make an intention for the day.
Speaker 2 00:16:18 And mine is usually quite simple. My intention is to live in love, kindness, and compassion today. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But you anchor your energy, you direct it. And then physically, Debra, I recommend drinking hot water with lemon. This is an Ayurvedic practice. It's an act of self-love. It's an act of hydration, putting vitamin C enzymes in your body to support you for your work, your service for the day. And then taking your S B O probiotics, right? Very practical gut health. And then you meditate. And then I offer, you know, I have my whole library of, they're free, they're free for everybody. The guided, the heart based meditations that I also teach Deborah through are seven minutes. So people in the morning can anchor into the heart before you go into the day. And I always believe in the yogis teach this yoga Nanda teaches this energy builds over time. It builds with consistency. So in, in that very simple morning practice intention, hot water with lemon probiotics, meditation, we're touching all aspects of ourselves, right? So we're coming into this wholeness, we're coming into our center, and then we can build, right? We can build with journaling, we can build with longer meditations, we can build with more practices. But in the beginning I find that giving some, some someone something very simple and tangible to do these. Stick with it, Deborah. And then we build Yes. One start the day in the heart,
Speaker 1 00:17:37 <laugh>. That's right. It's what people feel they can pull off committed to do. Cuz that's the key is practice. That's how we form habits and that's how we form new habits. And then, then the intentionality, it can happen faster. Yes. Geez, these days, the acceleration, the unexpected changes people how fast life is changing. We can harness that energy to be able to facilitate making those habit changes. Maybe we felt we couldn't pull off or tried and it hasn't worked. And we're gonna close this wonderful interview with, I'm gonna lead a heart meditation on adding heart coherence to becoming your best self. And as we do that, we are gonna harness that energy to be able to make that progress in areas perhaps we couldn't before. Listening to your heart's intuitive guidance for your next steps, which may be different than someone else's, but your heart really knows. So let's do it. Center in the heart. Now shift your focus tension to the area around the heart, and just pretend your breath is flowing in and out of the heart or chest area. Breathing a little slower, a little deeper than usual. And as you do this, find an easy rhythm that's comfortable and just breathe in love or gratitude or kindness for a few minutes as you do this to warm your heart and it'll increase your heart rhythm. Coherence
Speaker 1 00:19:46 Now radiate your heartfelt love and gratitude to the people in your life that you value. Radiate it to your own self and your intention to practice more heart qualities consciously, like love, compassion, care, kindness, forgiveness, patience to lift your spirit as this creates deeper access to your hearts intuitive guidance. These heart qualities are keys. They're not just sweet philosophy or spiritual things. They are keys to open your heart to intuitive guidance. Now ask your heart's intuitive guidance where you could practice more compassion and kindness, more non-judgment for others and for yourself. And radiate your heart's love and commitment towards becoming your best self. Now ask your heart's intuitive guidance for any clarity or inspiration or areas of your life you'd like to see a positive change. And just listen in. The quiet answers can come now or later, but you set the energy in motion with that intention to genuinely ask your heart's intuitive guidance now. Now let's radiate our hearts love and compassion to people in areas of the planet that are experiencing stress and duress to help serve the greater whole and lift the planetary vibration. See the collective heart purpose, to raise the global vibratory rate, to draw more intuitive solutions and higher outcomes to our personal, social, and global challenges through collective heartfelt cooperation.
Speaker 1 00:24:31 Now let's close by co-creating a reservoir of hard energy that each of us can contribute to as we do heart meditations. And each of us can access to draw from as needed over the next month when you want extra hard energy or to connect more with your heart's guidance or direction. So just send hard energy into this reservoir. Thank you so much for sharing that hard time with me and with Kimberly. Kimberly, is there anything else you'd like to share with our listeners before we close?
Speaker 2 00:25:54 No, I felt so great from that meditation. Deborah, thank you so much for leading us through. And the last closing thought I wanna sh I wanna share is that I think that, you know, we really need to wake up Deborah to this idea that, you know, heart based living gives us what we really are seeking. This is the real success, inner peace and joy. It doesn't matter what our lives look like, how simple or how elaborate the inside is, where the success is. And so I'm, I'm just so grateful, Deborah, for these tools and far heart math and for this awakening in society because this is the game changer. This is the love that we're all seeking. It's already inside. You just have to connect to it. This is the real success.
Speaker 1 00:26:42 Going to agree more. Thank you so much that wake up, we're all waking up to that next level. And it is an adventurous time and we need to do it together. And you know, as a gift to our listeners, you can get free access to the HeartMath experience, which is an online amazing video course to learn several practical intuition techniques for connecting with your deeper heart's guidance and your next steps in Ford's heart-based living. The chapter one is called Heart-Based Living and what it is and why. It is the next level of intelligence, heart intelligence for humanity, combining mind intelligence, heart intelligence, body intelligence to become more of who we truly are. Hmm. And I wanna remind you that third Tuesday of every month we publish a new episode. So be sure you subscribe so you don't miss our next guest and topic. Thank you so much. Thank you Kimberly. Thank you for everyone listening to this and take care.
Speaker 2 00:27:54 Thank you so much.
Speaker 0 00:27:57 Thank you for listening to the Ad Heart podcast. Be sure to subscribe so you can catch the latest episodes. If you're wanting even more heart inspired content, find us on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and LinkedIn. Look for HeartMath and also the HeartMath Institute. Both organizations are committed to helping activate the heart of humanity.
