Transcript EP 299 – Healing Toxic Positivity Using Radical Brujeria with Vanessa Codorniu

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Dr. Taz: Welcome back everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Super Woman Wellness, where, you know, we’re just trying to keep us all super-powered. And in that light, I have a very fascinating guest, one I think you’re really going to love, because this is really where we are all shifting to: understanding that there’s not one body, but there are multiple layers to our body. We have a physical body, an emotional body, an energetic body, a spiritual body; probably more than even I can grasp my own head around, but it’s important in healing to address them all.

Dr. Taz: So, joining me today … and I’m going to mess up this name, but it’s Vanessa Codorniu, an acclaimed bilingual Latina wellbeing activist and teacher of clinical hypnosis, intuition for business and international healing practices, with over 20 years of experience and more than 12,000 sessions. Her wellness expertise has been featured on Shape, IHeartRadio, Hola, Yahoo News, Travel Channel, Telemundo, Hip Latina … oh my goodness, and she’s the host of the Shift Network. Welcome to the show, Vanessa. Thrilled to have you here!

Vanessa Codorniu: Thank you, Dr. Taz. I am so excited to be here and talk all things positivity, brujaness, healing, wellness—

Dr. Taz: Yeah, that’s … Let’s get into it! So, you talk a little bit about toxic positivity. What is toxic positivity? Can there be such a thing as toxic positivity? Break that down for us a little bit.

Vanessa Codorniu: Absolutely. Well, anything when it’s not in moderation, anything in excess can not be good for us. Toxic positivity is the belief that no matter how dire, how difficult the situation is, people should maintain this positive mindset. It’s this good-vibes-only approach to life.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And while there are benefits to being an optimist and engaging with positive thinking, toxic positivity rejects difficult emotions in favor of cheerful ones, and they’re usually false and it’s a façade. So, it’s really enforcing this positive outlook, but we are denying our own emotions, we’re denying other people their vast human experience in emotions, and in essence we’re actually harming ourselves.

Dr. Taz: Interesting. So, what are a couple of signs that we might be displaying toxic positivity? What have you seen people do?

Vanessa Codorniu: Well, I could just speak to my own immigrant experience. My parents are from South America. I grew up with, “We can’t afford to be depressed. We can’t afford to be tired. We don’t have the time for that.” So, over time, I had to heal like, “Yes, I can be sad. I can be depressed. I can rest. I have this right to my feelings.” And so growing up in that experience has definitely been an example of it.

Vanessa Codorniu: But we hear it all the time, people who are like, “Oh my god … ” I had COVID, and they’re like, “Oh, it could’ve been so much worse.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: How about meeting people where they’re at and saying, “Oh my god, how was it for you?” instead of trying to shut them down in a way. And when we do this, when people do this, I don’t think they’re trying to harm us really; it’s their own inability to deal with their own feelings and their own worry and their own anxiety that kind of creates a projection and shuts us down to where like, “Oh, okay, I don’t want to deal with my own anxiety, so sh, be quiet with yours,” right?

Dr. Taz: Mm-hm.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, those types of examples were, “Oh, it could’ve been worse.” “Please, I don’t want any negative energy in my space.” You know, people do that all the time.

Dr. Taz: Yeah, all the time.

Vanessa Codorniu: Where you’re like, “Oh my god, I’m so disappointed about this,” and somebody just says, “You know, happiness is a choice. You can choose to feel happy.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: Well, even the New Age, come on, who didn’t grow up … especially probably around our age … with New Ageisms, right?

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: We came into the ’80s, the ’90s with all these books that kind of told us that we could think or affirm our way into good health.

Dr. Taz: I know, right? Even into the perfect career, perfect mate, you can attract it, you just have to be positive. You know, so many people will do that, but nothing happens. There’s that block. What’s happening there?

Vanessa Codorniu: Absolutely, and something that I wrote the other day was like, “We’re in love with the fruit, but we ignore the root,” right? The fruit of the action, we want the outcome, this amazing career, this amazing love life, sex life, health, whatever it may be, but we don’t want to go down into the roots of the earth, our own earth, our own existence, our own psychology, our won subconscious and really look at the multilevel reasonings or experiences or trauma that we may have had that are bringing up what we’re experiencing.

Vanessa Codorniu: I could also share that, in 2020, for me, I lost half my family; not from COVID, different reasons. My dad passed; four months later, my mom; four months—

Dr. Taz: Oh my god.

Vanessa Codorniu: Yeah. Terrible. Four months later, my youngest brother left, so I have a sister and a brother left. It was really intense … Thank you, thank you … but I knew that it was going to happen before it happened, being also an intuitive and a medium. That didn’t mean that it minimized it. And while I was losing my family, I also wound up buying our first home, wound up rescheduling our wedding, wound up tripling my business, and my school went off the charts. So, incredibly terrible things, incredibly positive things.

Vanessa Codorniu: But, people said, “How did you not get sick, and how did you manage this?” I was like, “Because I cried every day.” I was like, “I felt my feelings, I did my rituals, I did my ceremonies. I let myself weep every day. And I didn’t go into a depression, understanding birth, death, rebirth … That’s my belief, my mindset.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: But I allowed myself to feel lost. I allowed myself to go into the depths of what it meant, even if I could sense my family spiritually, that I’m not going to hug them again in this life, right?

Dr. Taz: Yeah. Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, that’s toxic positivity … If I had covered that, “I’m fine, I’m a spiritual and this is what I do,” and I would’ve covered it up, I don’t even know that I would be in this whole place that I am now. And I think that, in general, we’ve been guided to believe that wholeness means you’re always happy, like the love and lightness, love and light, da-da. The truth is that human experience, in order for us to feel the highest of the highs, the greatest of passions, the greatest of expansion and joy, we’re also going to feel loss, we’re going to feel grief, we’re going to feel disappointment, sadness, confusion, lack of clarity, and like, “What the eff am I doing here on Earth,” right? So, there’s this big range.

Dr. Taz: Wow. So powerfully said, and I think that’s so true, because I think even in relationships, in work experiences, we sort of do the surface business, right? It’s about pleasure, it’s about support, it’s about companionship, but that root, right? Really getting down and covering your inner desires, your motivations, your disappointments. That’s hard work, right? And many of us have been taught or trained to cover that up. So, how do we get to that root? How do we go down there and pull it all back out, knowing that we are experiencing both the negative emotions and the positive emotions? Because that’s what ultimately pushes us forward, correct?

Vanessa Codorniu: Absolutely, and the thing is we have been taught to hide, because we’ve been taught that it’s negative, “You’re Debbie Downer, you’re depressed people.” Nobody wants to be with somebody who’s having problems. But I will tell you that after the third person in my family passed, a lot of people were not reaching out to me. Students were reaching out to me, my colleagues online were reaching out to me. Some friends were actually terrified … They’re in the same age group. Like, “Oh my god, what if that would’ve happened to me?”

Vanessa Codorniu: And I forgave them, I got over it, I just really stayed in the space of, “I will receive who is ready to receive me, and I will not … ” And my mom always taught me, “Don’t look for what you’re not getting, look at what you are receiving and what is present for you.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, one of the ways that I think we can … There are so many different ways, right? One of the ways, obviously therapy. Get yourself some help. Especially so many of us, we are the ones that hold our families together, right? Super women.

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: We’re doing it, we’re like everything for everyone, and then we need someone to be there for us during these times. So, get yourself … Get thee to therapy, get thee to a healer. Get into breathwork, and if that’s not available at this time, get out a journal. Sit down, pour out your heart, let it all out. Come back to those basics that in the past maybe you’ve dabbled in or maybe you’ve gone to before. Nature, for me, especially being a bruja, is like a very big thing. Going out into nature, feeling the energy of a warm fire, writing out my pain and my sadness and throwing it into the flames. These can seem maybe funny when we’re not going through it, but when we’re in that moment, it’s a symbolic act that’s carrying energy and allowing us to release.

Vanessa Codorniu: The important thing is to move the energy through our body, so even dancing, joining an ecstatic dance group, going to church, going to temple if that’s your thing, chanting … There are so many choices. Tuning, sound healing.

Dr. Taz: I love that. Move the emotion out of the body, because when you flip to the doctor brain, we know that this emotional body, when it’s injured, does affect the physical body, right? If it stays there, if it lives there. So, you do want to do the work of processing those emotions and moving them through. Do you think the high rates of anxiety and depression that we’re currently seeing are because we are afraid to process the hard stuff?

Vanessa Codorniu: Yeah, I think that’s part of it, and I think that … I mean, this is a whole other conversation, but—

Dr. Taz: Different episodes.

Vanessa Codorniu: We’ve been so lied to. Listen, we’ve been so lied to, and media, and government, and politics, and religion, we’re literally seeing the crumbling of all of that.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And wherever you stand on that, we’re all questioning, “What is real? Who am I in all of this? Who do I want to be?” And a lot of my clients over the last 20 years have always said, “I’ve done everything right. I’ve got the degrees. I married the right person. I have the whatever children. I’ve done this. I’m a good person, I’m part of the community, and I’m not happy.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: And that’s where I think toxic positivity could’ve come in. “Well, I’m just going to play this role,” or, “I’m going to do what I’ve been told will save me,” or, “The one plus one, that means I will thrive in society.” And I don’t blame us, because we are taught to survive. We need to figure out the game, consciously or unconsciously, and figure out how we survive in this world, right? And it can be unconscious. It could be like, “Oh, you get good grades, so then you get a good job, and then you do this, and then you’re respected, and then you have abundance, and then you can meet a better mate.” I mean, there’s all these benchmarks  and then it’s like, maybe we’ve lied to ourselves throughout the way, and I find that a lot of people, especially nearing midlife …

Vanessa Codorniu: But now, with the pandemic, a lot of people are going through this younger. I’m seeing 20 and 30-year-olds like, “Oh my god, I don’t want to get on this track. I don’t want to even do the track.” They’re dropping out of school, they’re dropping out of corporate jobs. I think we’re questioning the nature of our reality, redefining what success is, redefining what wellness is, and we’re also, we have the time to unpack ancestral trauma.

Vanessa Codorniu: We know that now science has also picked up on that, that it affects the DNA in terms of anxiety, in terms of other experiences. There are several people who have come in for hypnosis and they’re like, “Vanessa, I don’t know why, but between 2:00 and 3:00 in the morning almost every other day, I get up and I have to check on my children.” Now, this woman was Jewish. I said to her, “Pardon me if I ask: did you have any people … Did you lose any family during the Holocaust?” They were like, “Absolutely.” “Did they break in at night?” And they started weeping. And I’m like, “It can be an energetic pattern, where it’s unconscious conscious of, ‘Let me check in that they’re okay.’” And then how do we unpack that?

Vanessa Codorniu: And then, we come from so many different cultures around the world, and religious practices and paths, that taking the time to unpack that is really important. And not just the pain, right? Because we talk a lot about ancestral trauma, but there’s ancestral gifts too.

Dr. Taz: Yeah. Absolutely. So, how do we get to understanding ancestral trauma, uncovering that? Is there a methodology to that? Is it hypnosis? Is that the best way to go about it? What’s the best way to understand that?

Vanessa Codorniu: I love that question, and I think that there are so many. We could start real basic: pull out your journal. Because I love hypnosis, I’ve been doing hypnosis over 20 years. I also love ceremony, and I love ritual. But just pull out that journal and focus in on something that’s been …

Vanessa Codorniu: Sometimes business owners, they call me and they’re like, “I’m afraid. I’m afraid to charge more. When you have this gift … I think that Spirit gives me the gift, or the Universe, or it’s a God-given gift. I’m afraid to charge.” And start unpacking who said it first. How did it get passed down? Was it linked to a religion? Was there someone in your family who was a curandero, a healer, a medicine woman, or a healer in your tradition? Were they told not to charge by the church or et cetera?” That’s just one example.

Vanessa Codorniu: Someone else who calls me and goes, “Oh, well, all the women in my family get left.” I get a lot of that. “We’re all single. We all raise our children … Because men are afraid of strong women.”

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: That whole thing, right? And I’m like, “Well, some are, but not all,” right?

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And then I start asking, “How many generations back?” Four or five sometimes. And it’s going back—

Dr. Taz: What’s happening here? What’s going on there?

Vanessa Codorniu: So, when I did that, I did one of those types of hypnosis. It’s different for everyone. For one person, it turned out that their great-great-great-great-grandmother … I think it’s third or fourth … was really angry when their settlement was attacked, or their tribe was attacked, because the husband didn’t kill the people who came in to attack them, and from then on she’s like, “Men are weak. We have to do it on our own,” and she left him because they took her kids, right? But he was trying to be kind and trying not to create violence. So, it was also forgiving the self judgment, the pain, the loss; also seeing it from the eyes of maybe the men in the family.

Vanessa Codorniu: Sometimes people leave because of systemic racism, systemic poverty. There are so many different reasons, right? So, when we can unpack that and start to understand that it’s not personal, that it’s something that’s been passed on and we’ve just adopted it, adapted to this behavior without really knowing why, just because we’ve been told, “Well, the women in our family, if you’re a strong woman, you’re not going to have that,” and then everybody just … It’s on their T-shirt, right? “Strong women do not have partners.”

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And then they shift, and then they write me and they’re like, “I’m engaged. I’m married. This person is amazing. I can be my full powerful self.” So, there is hope, there is change, but you could start it the most simplest way: the most simple way is get that journal out, take some time, or sit around with some family members, and without judgment or criticism or attack like, “It’s your fault” … none of that—

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: We want to just say, “So, what was your experience like?” I can share real quick, in my family, most of the women were not really … They didn’t get to really express themselves creatively, artistically.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: My grandmother in Argentina … born in Spain, moved to Argentina … She was a talented performer, and at 18, 19, was invited to the largest theater in town, Teatro Colón, and my grandfather is like, “We’re getting married. You can’t really do that. That’s for ladies of the night. You can’t really do that.”

Dr. Taz: Right. Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And years later … I was 19 at the time, so it was years ago; he was alive … I was like, “Grandpa, what advice do you give me when I seek out my partner, and what do you regret?” And he told me … and this is 30 years ago, right? He said to me, “Nessa, your grandmother, your abuela has never been the same. Since I told her not to go to the theater and do the work, she went into this … She closed off. She was never quite the same and I regretted it.” It was the ’30s, he said, “And I just wish I could go back in time and be like, ‘Who cares? Just do it,’ because I just loved her, but it was this pressure from society of what people will say. What will people say? What will people think?”

Vanessa Codorniu: And he said, “So, for you, I see how creative you are, and you do things your own way. You need someone who is going to support you in that.” And that stayed with me, you know? So, now I do improv as a hobby. It’s recent.

Dr. Taz: Oh, cool!

Vanessa Codorniu: Yeah. It’s so good, because my work is very serious, and I have gotten on that stage many times and just thought of my grandma. And think about it, late 40s, almost 50, who of our great-grandmothers was probably running on a stage at that time, on the weekend? And real low-key; it’s not a big deal with tickets and high-priced ticket sales or anything. We’re just getting up, joking around with people, and then coming off the stage.

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, I feel like I honor them that way. So, there are such little things we can do that just build up and create great energy.

Dr. Taz: Yeah. I love that. Well, you refer to yourself as the Biz Bruja. Can you explain that to us? What’s a bruja? What’s a Biz Bruja?

Vanessa Codorniu: Thank you so much. I love that question. Bruja is a Spanish word for a witch, and when we were colonized throughout the world, and when patriarchy took a whole other level through colonization, oppression, and also religion being placed upon all of us in different ways, Latin America … I mean, Europe as well, and other spaces, but Latin America really took a hit, where medicine women who were just practicing plant medicine, natural healing techniques connected to the earth were suddenly called witches. If people were brewing basil tea for your throat, or brewing some peppermint tea for your stomach … I mean, to this day we sell peppermint oil for indigestion, I think, or whatever digestive issues, so it was just this old folks’ wisdom that actually had some validity.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, I decided to reclaim bruja in 2019 because I was the urban priestess for 17 years in New York City, and my mom always called me ‘mi brujita’, my witch, my little witch, and that’s just a thing. We know we’re brujitas, and what that means to me is that you are a woman who has embraced her own definition of spirituality, that you connect to the elements of nature, that you believe in community, that you believe in collaboration over competition, because brujas, to me … And you can’t say bruja without saying social justice, so we can talk about that in a moment.

Vanessa Codorniu: We were like, “Oh, Ana doesn’t have any corn. Hey Maria, do you have this? Juanita will bring that,” and just this collaboration of … That saying that says it takes a village to raise children, well, that’s kind of the way it is in our countries, right? I mean, I don’t know about in yours, but back in my country, you’d always see mothers and women, and there’s a lot of children around, and everybody is checking them out.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, bruja, for me, was a big reclamation of my South American ancestry and my roots, my indigenous roots as well, and just what I grew up with. I grew up getting cleansings every month … it’s called a limpia … with an egg, and brujeria and bruja is very much linked to mixing indigenous wisdom with Catholicism. Because what happened is we hid it under the Catholic guise. So, even though we’re saying an Our Father and a Hail Mary, and we’ve got the crucifix there, we’re still calling on the ancient animal spirits, et cetera, and that’s a way of working with spirits. You have people working with nature and medicine of the earth, plant medicine. You have Santería, which is working with the saints, and it’s more Afrocentric. And there’s many more.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, for me, I grew up with an altar. In fact, across from where we’re speaking is the photos and many different artifacts that represent the lineages of my family. I’ve had that since I’m 21, since I moved out. And I grew up lighting a candle, telling stories about my family. So, I reclaimed it because it was time.

Vanessa Codorniu: And a business bruja is somebody who helps people heal their ancestral curses, challenges, patterns to tap into their intuition and their ancestral power so they can thrive in their business. I really believe that … I mean, not everybody is meant to have a business, right? Not everybody wants to. I particularly didn’t want to, by the way. I was just a healer, okay?

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: In my own way, and I was all—

Dr. Taz: I fell into it as well. I was like, “What just happened?”

Vanessa Codorniu: Right? You’re just like, “What is happening?” And next thing you know … But having a business is also a deep invitation and initiation into our own spiritual path, right?

Dr. Taz: Yeah, you face your strengths and your weaknesses, right? Your vulnerabilities and your things that can shine, and the wounds of your childhood, and the wounds … I don’t know about ancestral wounds, having that part, but the wounds of your childhood replay themselves in the business setting. It’s very interesting.

Vanessa Codorniu: Absolutely. It’s been such a huge teacher, and so that’s what a business bruja is, the Biz Bruja. My guides were saying it in 2019. I’m like, “I don’t know!” But I went with it, and it’s been really incredible to witness.

Dr. Taz: Wow.

Vanessa Codorniu: But I wanted to add something else. Even though I’ve been doing … I grew up in this work, I recently discovered I didn’t know where my indigenous part of my family was from. I figured they were from Argentina, but through 23andMe I found out they were actually from Peru. And I was born there, but when people asked, I was like, “Well, my parents are from Argentina. I was kind of born there.” I never claimed it. But then I found out they’re actually from there, so I just completed a whole year of training with the Inca Medicine School and Maestro Apaza.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, that’s been really, really wonderful. People are like, “Why are you doing that? You already sat in sweat lodge for 18 years with Beverly Little Thunder, and you did this,” and I’m like, “It’s a South American connection that I still needed, obviously.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah. Well, Peru is the home of natural medicine, shamanism, right? There’s a lot of that in Peru as well, and Spirit, and all that other stuff, so that’s fascinating. How are you able to help clients? How are you working with clients? You have the business intuition, you’ve got the hypnosis, you’ve got all these different tools. How do you bring those together for a client?

Vanessa Codorniu: Well, thank you for that question. The School of the Healing Arts, which supports the next gen of BIPOC and LatinX healers, has all the trainings, all the certifications. And then the way that I work with clients is, someone shows up, they’re like, “I’ve done the therapy, I’ve done the coaching. I’m still blocked. I’m doing the green juice. I’m doing everything.”

Dr. Taz: Yep.

Vanessa Codorniu: “I just don’t know what’s going on.” And I will probably start with an Akashic Record reading, so we open the records, listen to their guides, and information comes out that’s very specific to their lineage, to their life, to their story. From there, if they decide to do coaching, we work together for about four months and we move organically through what they’re needing. So, we’re going to flow through the psychic reading, then we’re going to do ancestral hypnosis healing. When I actually look at their business, I’m also an astrologer, so we look at the astrology of their natal chart. It’s a combination of all the gifts that I’ve been developing over time, and then good old-fashioned coaching and practical steps.

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: Because I’m not into the metaphysical … I don’t like the metaphysical blah-blah.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: It has to serve us now, right?

Dr. Taz: Exactly.

Vanessa Codorniu: You have to be really rooted and grounded in the present moment. I don’t think Spirit really wants us to sit around and just shoot the shit. It’s like, let’s put roots to this. Let’s grow, let’s blossom, let’s thrive on Earth, and then let’s keep creating more great waves and more great healing for this planet.

Vanessa Codorniu: So, that’s part of the way that it works, so it’s a whole journey. It’s different for everyone, but I can say that the people who have gone through it tend to come in and they’re like, “My business! It’s all about my business!” And then they’re like, “Oh my god, my grandmother! My love! My sexuality! My soul! I’ve been lying to myself!” And then they go through this big change where I’m like, “Let’s put the business aside for a minute.”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: “She’s there, he’s there, it’s there. Let’s focus on you.” And when we focus on that, then we return. And I think that a lot of people feel like their business is them, and I just would like to invite everybody to think that it’s a separate thing. There’s a fear when we rest … I know I’ve had it … when we take time off from our businesses, that they’re going to die or something’s going to happen to them, right? Trust me. I took a few weeks off this year and I was like, “Keep your hands off the keyboard, Vanessa. Step away from the Zoom,” you know? And it actually created more good juju, more good vibes, more interest, like, “What’s she up to?”

Dr. Taz: Yeah.

Vanessa Codorniu: “What’s happening?” And some things kept flowing … but they were downloadables … but the others, we also need that rest, so I encourage us not to over, like, “It’s my child! It’s my baby!” And even our children are not our children, right?

Dr. Taz: Right. Fascinating! I love this! Well, you mentioned five steps … and maybe we can leave with some practical advice here … five steps to finding your independence from your family’s beliefs; money, sex, marriage, having children, and more. Give us those five steps.

Vanessa Codorniu: Oh, those five steps. First, sit down, take a breath. Allow yourself to connect to your own self, and really feel into what are your actual real beliefs. What do you really believe aside from your family, and what is really true for you? Two, invite yourself not to take things personally. They’re going to repeat what they’ve been told. They thought they were doing the best they could. It’s really not as personal as it feels. It does feel personal, right? But just allow yourself to be like, “Well, it’s not personal, but it feels like this.”

Vanessa Codorniu: Three, that we’re allowed to disagree. We can love people and not have to agree with them. We also don’t have to go into battle with them. We also don’t have to convince anyone of anything. We don’t have to convince people of our beliefs. We think that we’ll feel better if someone agrees with us. Maybe, maybe not; I don’t know because I don’t spend a lot of energy trying to get people to agree with me. I just kind of flow and then people are like, “Hey, I really like what you’re doing. Can you share it with me?” So, I don’t know where we are now. I think we’re on three?

Dr. Taz: I think you’re on four.

Vanessa Codorniu: Okay, four.. get around some good support. I’ll talk about therapy again. Get a healer, get a book club, get a group where people are like-minded on a similar journey, where you won’t feel like the odd person out who has a different belief system, a different way of looking at things. Again, don’t waste your time like hot air with people who just don’t … who are just not going to see it.

Dr. Taz: Right.

Vanessa Codorniu: And fifth, I would say ground yourself into something practical that brings you joy. It could be dancing, it could be weaving, it could be singing, chanting, riding your bike, whatever it is. Healing doesn’t happen from the neck up. It’s not only a mental thing, or just in the heart, where it’s all emotional: it’s a fully embodied process where, getting back to what we said earlier, we’re going to move it through, so make sure that you’re coming back into your body. Do that yoga, do that running, that walking, the swimming, the dancing, whatever it may be that allows you to feel good within yourself, and I hope that that serves.

Dr. Taz: Oh my gosh, I love that. All right, last question, and then I promise I’ll let you go. What’s your superpower?

Vanessa Codorniu: My superpower, hm. I feel like there are so many, but let me go into one of them. I think that I have the power to be firmly rooted in the gifts of where I come from, and then have enough clarity and openness to hold space for others to find themselves.

Dr. Taz: That’s an amazing superpower. I love that. Well, thank you so much for taking time out today to join me. You know that I’m so interested in the work that you’re doing, and probably we’ll connect with you on that. If anyone wants to reach out and connect with you, what’s the best way for them to do that?

Vanessa Codorniu: The best way is to go to thebizbruja.com … that’s B-R-U-J-A. Also Instagram, TheBizBruja, and there’s a summit coming up, so I’ll have all the information up soon.

Dr. Taz: Okay! Awesome! Well, thank you, and thanks everyone else for watching and listening to this episode of Super Woman Wellness. Remember, you can rate and review it, and share with your friends. We’ll see you guys next time!