Chats With Susan Burrell

Ep#276 - Steward of Inspiration, An Interview with Poet, James Anthony Ellis Welcome everyone to Empowering Chats. In this episode we have a fun and inspirational conversation with poet, James Anthony Ellis.  I entered into this chat with the curiosity of an enthusiastic young child opening a present.  In this case the present is Jim’s latest book entitled, Breadcrumbs Volume 2: Poems and Prose Found Along the Sacred Path.   Jim is a writer, a documentarian and a poet. I opened this chat by asking Jim, Why Poetry? You came from a journalism background so when or how did poetry become part of your self-expression? He responded by saying that he had recently asked himself that same question. The first poem he remembers writing was at the age of 10. And it was entitled, “The Clock of My Life.”  And it was Jim’s first experience of having a big discovery moment where he responded to what he had written with a resounding, “Whoa look at that!” And this is where the unveiling of something bigger than him came throug

Ep#275 - Transcend Into Your Talent - A Solo Show with your Host Susan Burrell This is the year of BE Potential on Empowering Chats. 2024 is all about reaching for and accessing our Potential. And for the month of May we will be exploring the “T” in Potential. Talent. Our collective talent and our individual talent. How do we transcend and explore our many talents? How do we choose to live our life in community and individually? I encourage you to take a listen to this episode and explore with me where your talents might lie. You may be surprised to see what comes up. I encourage you to stay curious and allow yourself to transcend to your higher potential.  This place I am talking about requires deep listening and transcending beyond our own ego to allow for the essence of our being to show up. And doing something  artistic could be a way of opening a door to our gifts, our talents. It’s all about going within and listening and then having the courage to put action behind those thoughts. To learn more about h

Ep# 274 - Healing Through Integration, An Interview with Holistic healer and and Author Judy Tsafrir When I picked up this book, by the amazing and profound Judy Tsafrir, I was immediately taken by the title, Sacred Psychiatry. Judy is a holistic healer with a private psychiatry and psychoanalysis practice in Newton, Massachusetts. She is on the leading edge of consciousness and I am so grateful to have her here to share her story and her book with Empowering Chats. I opened this interview by asking Judy the questions: Why this title? How did it come about? Because personally, I have never seen psychiatry as sacred. Judy responded to my question by stating that traditional psychiatry is not sacred, it is conventionally practiced. It has completely lost touch with the part of that word “psyche” which has to do with our soul. She goes on to share that modern medicine has also lost the connection to the psyche and the soul. It is now based on scientific materialism and has no sense of the sacred. And the role th

Ep# 273 - The Inner Frontier, An Interview with Intuitive Teacher and Author Kim Chestney   I am so excited to welcome Kim Chestney to Empowering Chats once again. She first graced the airwaves with me back in 2021. Kim is an intuitive teacher and an author. Her latest book, The Illumination Code, Discover the Magic of the Universe is chock full of information about quantum intelligence and how we can get back into tapping into our intuition. It is set-up in a way that is easy to follow. Kim also outlines the 7 keys to unlock your quantum intelligence. Kim talks about the invisible field of energy that we cannot see but can most definitely feel – it is what connects all of us. This field is accessible to us through our intuition. This invisible energy that holds these codes can only be read and understood through our intuition.  Our thinking minds cannot make sense of it, it must be felt through the pathways of our intuition. Kim and I  both understand that the new frontier is really the inner frontier. It’s

Ep# 272 - Restoring Balance in Our Lives - An Interview with Healer and Author, Dr. Christopher Macklin We are in for a wild ride everyone. I have an amazing light leader and incredible man by the name of Dr. Christopher Macklin on Empowering Chats today.  He is a healer and an author. His most recent book is called “Centering the Mind.” Christopher’s book came out in 2019 right before lock down and the pandemic. I remember praying and hoping that people would take this time of lockdown to look within and change their lives. And instead, we came out of this pandemic with more chronic stress and it is now creating havoc. Christopher recognized that the lockdown created so much separation with family, with society and it has divided people greatly. A lot of anger has been created as well. It is apparent the collective energy is affecting all of us. Christopher explains how as individuals and as a collective society we must become aware of the energy we are feeling. We must learn to identify our personal energy

Ep# 271 - Observe From A Higher Awareness - A Solo Show with your Host, Susan Burrell Our theme for April is Observant. When I looked up Observant (as I often do when I am going to chat about a specific theme) here’s one definition that came up: Adhering to a particular law or ritual. When you are observant you are adhering to. Like a philosophy, an idea, a ritual. Adhering to me feels like you’re stuck, or glued to something, even when it doesn’t feel correct. When my team and I came up with the theme for the year and consequently for each month and Observant showed up, so did other words like: openness, overflowing and opportunity. I feel like being observant also brings us an opportunity to witness, to be more, and to also shift our perspective. I am also using this phrase to reflect and “see” what is going on internally as well. The observer within oneself – observe your emotions are they moving through you. Or are you finding that your emotions are stuck on constant repeat? I feel with all the movement o

Ep# 270 - Students Share Their Love and Rave - An Inspiring Chat with Some of My Students The theme for Empowering Chats with Susan Burrell for the year of 2024 is BE Potential.  And each month we are focusing on a different aspect of rising to your Potential. For the month of March, we are focusing on what it means to reach for your potential. Some of the keywords that support this theme include, power, purpose and recognizing our own worth. And so, in this episode I talk about acceptance of who we are and how we show up in the world. For me personally, 2024 has been a remarkable year so far. I have stepped back into teaching classes and it has been profound for me as a teacher. I feel I am stepping into my full potential as a Master Teacher. My Intention when I teach is to create sustainable transformation so that when people go out into their world they have the skill sets and tools they need in order stay centered and continue on their path of transformation.  I always try to create a very safe container

I am so grateful to introduce and welcome Jennifer Ruth Russell to Empowering Chats. I have known Jennifer for many, many, years and I am thrilled that she’s here to have an empowering chat with me.  Jennifer wears many hats. She is a Singer / Songwriter, a Spiritual Mentor and an Author. She is also the creator of the Angels of Abundance Ascension Academy. Her newest book is called, Opulence Infusion, A New Faith Currency, which was inspired by a calling she got directly from Mother Mary.  It changed her life.  Opulence Infusion is the latest book in the series of books she has written in deep connection with Mother Mary. Jennifer shares her thoughts on ascension explaining that in her understanding it is about coming into true oneness with the Divine. And reaching our true potential and ascending into our highest vibration while still walking our journey on earth. I asked Jennifer how her book Opulence Infusion came about and why now? It came about, she said, as a response to the many years she had lived wi

I had an Empowering Chat with this incredible individual in May of 2022 and I think it’s time to re-air this interview. If you missed this the first time around or even if you heard it when it first aired, I encourage you to listen again.  I am honored to welcome Dawn Manske, activist and CEO of Made For Freedom to Empowering Chats. Her story of courage and innovation is awe-inspiring.  You may need Kleenex by your side as you listen to her journey of how her innovative social company came to be. Made For Freedom, uses fashion to empower victims of sex trafficking and other marginalized situations. The 10 years Dawn spent in China teaching English helped her to understand the unbalance produced by the devaluation of the girl child. This was her first exposure to poverty levels she had never seen before. In 2007 she viewed a documentary about sex trafficking that deeply affected her. She desperately wanted to see this horror and injustice come to an end but she had no idea what could be done from her hometown

Ep#267 - The Healing of Trauma, An Interview with Efu Nyaki, a healer and author of "Healing Trauma Through Family Constellations and Somatic Experiencing."   The theme for this month of March is all about Potential. Our Potential. And exploring what that might look like in our lives. I am thrilled to welcome Efu Nyaki to this episode to discuss the healing of trauma. Efu is a healer and the author of Healing Trauma Through Family Constellations and Somatic Experiencing. So what is Family Constellations and why is this important in the healing of trauma? Efu describes it as a new modality that is well known to our ancestors. It is an approach that looks at problems with a systemic view. It means that when resolving conflicts within the family (or organization, community, etc.) the whole system must be looked at. In the case of a family system, the family is seen as a whole and solutions are sought through movements of the soul/spirit, as a living and active being. This type of therapy connects the family with

Ep #265 - Exploring The Frontiers of Your POTENTIAL - A Solo Show with your Host, Susan Burrell As we enter into the month of March I am exploring the theme of “Potential” which is our theme for Empowering Chats for the month. And of course, I had to look up the word. Here are some dictionary definitions of Potential: Possible as opposed to actual. Capable of becoming or considered a worthwhile possibility. I recently taught a workshop entitled, “Are You A Light Leader?” And in this class, we talked about the frontier of our boundaries. The boundaries being the stable thing of our awareness of what we are willing to do or not do. And I believe our boundaries can also be an extension to the frontier of where we are willing to go. Sometimes I think we need to move a bit through this fluid state of living and extend our boundaries. Think about what it means to move into a new frontier, to move beyond what was. I believe POTENTIAL is not about the outward incentive of, for example, “I need to become the CEO of my

Ep #264 - You Are Enough – An Interview with author and love activist, Scott Stabile What a joy it is to welcome, author and love activist, Scott Stabile to Empowering Chats, The first thing that caught me was the title of Scott’s book: Enough As You Are. That alone says so much. Scott shared that the title came about as a way to show that love and you are always enough. No matter where you currently sit in your life you are always enough as you are. Scott is a love activist and sees love as the most powerful force we have to work with. Love is the umbrella term he uses to encompass kindness, empathy, compassion and all the other words and things we do to give and receive love.  Scott believes it is the one energy that can actually create healing in the world. Scott and I also shared a conversation about our relationship with self. It is an everlasting one, it is our foundation and the more we come into wholeness with ourselves the more we will be able to offer that to those we come in contact with. It is act

Ep #263 Boost Your Energy - An Interview with Intuitive Energy Healer, Dr. Mary Sanders. We are continuing our theme of Eternal for the month of February. And so with that I also want to include the embracing of the Eternal and welcome my guest, Dr. Mary Sanders. Dr. Mary is an Intuitive Energy Healer and is stunning in her vibrancy. We shared a deep, Empowering Chat about the Energy Patterns that we hold and how that manifests in our lives. Much of what manifests is our soul’s essence, it is the original blueprint we came into this planet with. Dr. Mary works with her own wisdom and intuition acquired in energy to help women over 40 bounce back from burnout. She is a doctor of Chiropractic with an emphasis in Functional Nutrition. She also has a Certification in Positive Psychology. It is through the integration of all of her practical experience and life experience that she is able to help others heal themselves. The pathway of Dr. Mary’s work is to ground the discordant energy. She recognizes that we are a

This Episode of Empowering Chats is about grief. And this month’s theme is “Eternal.” I intentionally placed this interview under this theme.  I believe that all of us have an eternal essence, an eternal soul and an eternal energy that stays in the hearts of those we come in contact with even when we have left our physical bodies. My guest, Emily Thiroux Threatt is here to talk about grief and how to find our happiness within the folds of losing someone close to us. Her latest book is called, The Grief and Happiness Handbook, which is also a guidebook.  This handbook has exercises to help guide you out of your grief. Emily lost 2 wonderful husbands who ironically both died of the same thing. After losing her first husband who was sick for 2 years, she never thought she’d marry again but then she met Ron, her second husband. He was a new thought minister and together they practiced living in the moment. And after his diagnosis she thought that practice of living in the moment was going to make all the differen

EP #261 - Embracing the Eternal, A solo show with your host, Susan Burrell In this episode of "Empowering Chats" we investigate what it means to be eternal. What does it mean to embrace eternality? You all know me so well by now so you know I always like to give the dictionary definition of the special word I am focusing on. This month that word is "Eternal." And many of the guests that I will be interviewing this month will be around the theme of eternality. So here goes. Eternal is defined as: Without beginning or end. Lasting forever. Occurring again and again. Enduring. Endless. Unchanged by Time. Ask yourself, what if I could embrace my eternal spirit? What if I could live my potential from that eternal spirit? From that space where there is no beginning or end. This is a large concept to take in. What does eternal actually mean to you? Does it mean living a very long life? Eternity is life infinity. It is infinite. That is where I believe potential lives. In the infinite. When I know that I am aligned w

EP #260 - The Healing Path for Adoptees, An Interview with Author and Podcast Host, Michelle Madrid. Welcome to this episode of Empowering Chats with Susan Burrell. I have a very special guest today. Her name is Michelle Madrid and she has recently penned a book called, Let Us Be Greater: A Gentle Guided Path to Healing for Adoptees. In her book, Michelle documents her own story of being an International Adoptee who was born in the UK to an English Mom and a Spanish Father. Her biological mom was married with 3 kids. Michelle was the product of her mother’s affair with a Spanish man, her biological father. Ultimately Michelle was placed in foster care in the UK when she was about 8 weeks old. She was eventually adopted by an American Family when she reached her young toddler years. Michelle’s journey to learn how to deal with being an adoptee began when she was in college. She explored her relationship with her biological mom who would often dispense advice like, “C’mon time for you to get a stiff upper lip a

EP #259 - Thriving with Cancer, An Interview with Jan Adrian, author and Executive Director of the non-profit, Healing Journeys.   I am not only honored but so grateful to have Jan Adrian as a guest once again on Empowering Chats. I last interviewed Jan about 2 years ago and since that time she has written a memoir entitled, Coloring Outside the Lines, Surviving and Thriving with Cancer for 30+ Years.  In this powerful chat Jan shares her life journey about living with cancer for over 30 years and how she came to understand and accept that she was never going to "beat" the cancer. She learned to accept her diagnosis and the many times it continued to show up in her body, even though her initial response was usually, "Oh S**T" she always found her way to the silver lining. Jan never intended to write a book, she felt there were too many books already written about cancer. However, after much prodding from her friends and those she worked with at her non-profit, Healing Journeys, she realized there had never be

Ep#258 - Time for Brave Action, An Interview with Life Coach, Clara Chorley   I am honored to welcome, author and life coach, Clara Chorley to Empowering Chats. We jumped right into this chat with a new way of defining bravery. And then pulling apart how to access it in our everyday life. Clara defines bravery by first stating what it is not. It is not what is portrayed in the movies, like the Indian Jones character fighting his enemies in the jungles of South America or the warrior with his sword going off to war to battle the “bad” guys. It is not any of those things but rather something more subtle and powerful. According to Clara true bravery is very personal and can be very complicated. It is personal because only you can know where it is you need to be brave. It is not what society deems to be brave but rather what your inner voice is calling you to be brave about. It is that ever powerful inner knowing of what you need to do to shift, change or enhance your life. This sort of bravery requires you to go

Ep#257 - Reaching For Your Highest Potential, A Solo Show with your host, Susan Burrell. Welcome to 2024. I am excited to jump start 2024 and share with all of you what my team and I came up with for our theme this year. As we were brainstorming at the end of 2023 the word potential kept bouncing around in my head. And so that is how we came to settle on: BE Potential as the theme for Empowering Chats for 2024. The definition of Potential is as follows: Capable of being or becoming. Other words that showed in the definition included: Inherent, hidden, budding future, unrealized and undeveloped. So as you enter this new year I invite you to take a few minutes or more, maybe 15 or 20 to sit in the quiet and listen. If you journal, have that handy as well. And ask yourself: What is my potential? Am I living it?   OR Is it undeveloped? Or hidden? Does it feel safe or daunting to step into my potential? For me personally, I believe that becoming my full potential takes a lot of bravery and courage. And yet as

Ep#256 - From Cradle to Career - An interview with Nadine Templer, Senior Director of Volunteer Programs for the non-profit, HOPE Worldwide. This is the month of giving and every year in December I like to focus on ways we can give to others in our life that do not necessarily involve material gifts. One of the ways I do this is by including discussions and interviews with people who are involved in the nonprofit world. So in that vein I am honored to introduce Nadine Templer, the Senior Director of Volunteer Programs for the non-profit, HOPE Worldwide. This organization has been around since the 1990s.  It has been serving people since the AIDs epidemic in South Africa. They are an international organization that serves many people all over the world.  Nadine lives in Nepal and works specifically to impact the people of Nepal. For the last 30 years HOPE worldwide has run a sustainable educational program for the poor and under-served children of Nepal. The school teaches the children that are the poorest of