Wednesday Winning - Jane Mayer

Jane Mayer is a shamanic healer and ceremonialist who has studied with indigenous
healers in the mountains of Peru, the Amazon, and the highlands of Ireland. For
several years, Spirit called to her from a well of deep grief and physical pain, and
she has chronicled her mystical personal healing journey through extensive
poetry. She works with sacred cacao, dream work, sound healing and plant
medicine to support individuals and communities in transmuting their grief and
pain into embodied soul. Her deepest mission in this lifetime is to use these
ancient practices to heal the modern world, specifically women, families and
young people ages 8-18. To learn more about her work, visit www.janeislistening.com.

What happened or inspired you to start your business? 
It’s so funny to contextualize my work in that question, because it really
doesn’t feel like a “business” per se. But I think that’s what it feels like to do work
that is fully in alignment with one’s soul mission. The work I do is my sacred soul-
seed service to this planet. And so, it’s my offering, my gift, my life force, in a
“job.”

Honestly, starting this business wasn’t really a plan I had. It was a calling from
Spirit. Several years ago, I was working as a teacher in public schools in Los Angeles
and I went through a period of extraordinary grief. I had been dealing with a long-
term battle with autoimmune disease, and then on top of that, I faced death of a
loved one, infertility, and divorce in a very short period of time. When that well of
grief and surrender opened up in my life, spirits starting coming to me in my
dreams, showing me other dimensions, showing me my sacred soul work, the
nature of time, ancestral wounding, and so much more. I would wake up every
day at 3am with spirits and energies in my room. And I had no idea what to do.
Eventually, after a lot of support from human guides, I quit my job to travel and
learn from indigenous healers around the world. And Spirit started asking me to
do work to help others. I began working with sacred plant medicines in
ceremony, using the sound of my voice to heal people’s energy fields and
helping others use their dreams and other metaphoric dimensions to interpret all
of the ways that the spirits try to contact us. That’s the super short version.

How does spirituality impact your business? 
Spirituality is my business. I do shamanic healing work—which, in short, means
that I open up sacred spaces for multidimensional healing. I work to clear
ancestral, physical, spiritual and emotional blocks in people’s bodies that prevent
them from living their fullest expression of this particular (and past/future) human
life. So, really, every day, my work is to show up, clear my channel, open my heart,
ground my body and act as a conduit for Spirit to bring healing to our world and
to its people. The spirits—and the Great Spirit—are my bosses, my teachers, my guides and
my greatest fans. And they are yours, too!

How do you stay motivated through the ups and downs of owning your
own business? 
I know that this is something that people struggle with a lot—and I have moments
too, when I forget how supported and loved I am. In my humanness, I think I
have to figure it all out on my own. I forget that I am fully loved and fully
supported in my soul work by the Spirit that called me to this work.
But truthfully, as soon as I remember that I am simply a servant, the fears go
away. I know that the level of service I provide for both the Spirits and the
humans I see has so much worth. They have called me by name and asked me
to do this work, and their highest priority is to make sure I am supported so that I
can continue to serve. They have no interest in me doing anything else.
I also remember that everything in life, just like in the natural world, comes in
cycles. The moon waxes and wanes. The flowers bloom and die. There are
months where I serve cacao every week and months where I don’t serve at all.I
trust that all of the ebb and flow is for my highest good—and the highest good of
those I serve.

What would you tell the younger you just starting her business?
Oh, wow. Great question. My younger self would never have believed that I was
powerful enough or worthy enough of doing this work. Even a few years ago, I
couldn’t have believed that this would be my life. But to the woman a few years ago who sat in the midst of seemingly neverending grief and darkness, I would say, “You’re on the path, dear one. Every shadow you confront will be your greatest ally. Every demon you love will be your
greatest strength. And you are SO MUCH MORE than you have ever allowed
yourself to be. You are worthy—and you are powerful—and you are right where
you are supposed to be. Trust them—and yourself. You know what you are
doing.”

How do you balance your clients, professional projects and personal
commitments?
Honestly, this is beginning to show itself as an area for growth. Because I don’t
work for anyone else, as a boss, I realize that I really am the work I do: that my
beingness is what I offer. So my writing, my voice, my song and my heart is what
people pay me to give. The Spirits don’t have a time clock—they talk to me in the
night, while I’m driving, while I’m reading a book, so its hard to categorize
“balance” the way most people might when they think of a work/life balance.
That means it’s hard to siphon off Instagram or Facebook, or not answer
emails—or not do some form of work every day of the week. Finding that balance
is a never-ending area for reflection and growth.

I also have surrendered that my work comes in waves - I’ll be back in the States
for 6 or 8 weeks at a time, and there will be a lot of work to do here. And the
paradigm here calls for it. And then I’ll go travel and study -Peru, Ireland,
wherever - for a period of 4-8 weeks, and that’s my time to receive and listen to
the messages I need for the next phase and to attend to my own personal
healing.
So, I guess the answer is that I have had to tap into the rhythm that really works
for me - even though it is very different than what most people think a “balance”
should look like. I keep myself pretty hived off from the world when I’m here
working - I spend a lot of time alone, in nature, in sacred space, because it
requires a lot of space and time alone to stay connected to Spirit. And I’ve built
my life to allow that space.

What has been your biggest challenge and how did you overcome?
There was a period of time when I was clear about my calling—and unclear and
unsure about what to do with it. How would I really support myself doing this
work? What would I be offering to people? What exactly were the spirits calling
me to do and be? I was in the fire – and it was very, very uncomfortable, because
I knew I couldn’t go back to my old life. And I wasn’t sure how to move forward.
I cried. A lot.

And then I listened to the next step. What was the next thing they wanted me to
do? A friend gently told me that the most compassionate thing I could do for
myself was stop sitting in the pain, in the fear, in the discomfort, and just walk
forward. Just go.

And so, I listened to the messages that they had given me to write a curriculum
for teenagers and build my website. And I cleared my life to spend a month in
solitude to do those things.

I don’t even use the curriculum yet, though I know someday I will. What
happened in that time, and in that deep listening and reverence for the sacred
soul message, is that I birthed myself. I still don’t even know how it happened.
But I just listened to their guidance. And I submitted to their love. And I just took
the next step and lived in trust.

What project are you most excited about right now?
So many! I’m getting ready to take a group of people down to Peru to do medicine work
with local healers in the Sacred Valley—we have a group in December and again
in April. I am so in love with the shamanic traditions of Peru—and with the plant
medicines. They have pulled old trauma, beliefs, disease and pain out of my
body and soul like no other modality I have ever used. I truly owe them this life I
am living. It is my great honor to share them with so many people this year.
And I have an incubator in the works for next year—combining plant + herbal
medicine with ceremony, shamanic healing and cognitive coaching. 10 women.
10 months. 10 ceremonies. 10 rooted voices for a new world. I’m so excited
about this offering—and about supporting women in really rooting their work in
the Earth and in their soul mission. It is time for all of us to stop spinning around
trying to make money and fit into the moulds society has laid out for us. Our
sacred soul work is so needed right now. And I can’t wait to wake 10 women up
to that like the Spirits woke me. To learn more visit www.janeislistening.com