What does it actually mean to become more fully yourself without becoming self-absorbed, disconnected, or consumed by your own inner world?
In Part II of my 2026 birthday reflections, I'm continuing a conversation about healing, spiritual growth, individuation, devotion, and what it means to build a life around what has genuinely been entrusted to you.
I begin with something I've been thinking about a lot lately: what it means to be a "regular person." Someone whose choices have consequences. Someone who still has to participate in mundane reality, interact with other human beings, navigate limitations, relationships, money, health, work, and systems that don't disappear just because we've done healing or spiritual work.
We also get into some of the messages many of us have absorbed through capitalism, entrepreneurship, self-help, and spiritual spaces about being exceptional, special, unique, or set apart — and what I'm discovering after years of experimentation about simply knowing what works for me, what doesn't, and what I'm actually here to tend.
The full episode breakdown:
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Being a "regular person" in a culture obsessed with exceptionalism
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Consequences, privilege, and material reality
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Accessibility, generosity, and learning not to overextend yourself
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Reciprocity, resentment, and what happens when giving becomes unsustainable
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The messages capitalism and entrepreneurship teach us about being special
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Knowing yourself through experimentation and lived experience
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Why becoming self-centered is different from becoming self-absorbed
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Personal storytelling as a form of teaching and transmission
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Oral tradition, relational healing, and learning through story
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Journaling as a practice of processing rather than archiving
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"Tending the nucleus" of your life
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Jungian individuation and becoming more fully yourself
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Sufi devotion, polishing the heart, and returning to the Beloved
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The overlap between individuation and spiritual practice
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Becoming particular without making yourself the center of the universe
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Living your life as a form of devotion
This episode is for anyone who has spent years healing, growing, questioning inherited beliefs, or trying to become more fully themselves who's interested in doing that in a way that deepens relationship, devotion, discernment, and participation in ordinary human life rather than pulling you away from it.
Thanks for tuning in!
Connect with Elizabeth:
Website: elizabethdialto.com
Instagram: @elizabethdialto
YouTube: youtube.com/@elizabethdialto
