A Deep State of Trust: Stevi
Ex·pand·er: aka “seeing is believing” is a person that you identify with that’s already been where you are now and has gone on to become successful in, owns, or embodies what you want (job, relationship, house, success, friendships, relationship with self, etc). This concept is based on simple neuroscience and the creation of mirror neurons. - Lacy Phillips
You know the moment when you meet someone for the first time and instantly feel this inner knowing that they are meant to be in your life for some divinely orchestrated reason? That’s only happened for me three times. At this point, I’d say I know a divine message when I feel it. I typically decipher the reason(s) in the later years of relationship. But for now, Stevi is not only this awe-inspiring woman I’ve come to love and respect deeply. She is also someone I consider an Expander (see above for modified definition).
Usually an expander represents an embodiment of the things you want. In my case, expanders can embody the things I want, but I’m more so drawn to the journey of how. My take on expanders is interesting to me because I initially have no idea of the how aspect, so what I’m actually drawn to is essence. To my lack of surprise, the “how” aligned (in this case) to what I for sure felt in regard to the type of person Stevi is/has been. Perhaps as you read our interview, you’ll have a written account of this essence I’m referring to. Please note that these words could never do spirit justice.
California
S: I’ve have always had this love for travel and kind of seeing the world. When I graduated I went to school out in California mostly because I wanted to drive cross country and experience what that was like.
S: I broke my back when I was in the 6th grade. I was very athletic in high-school so I didn’t have a whole lot of issues with my back, but when I went to school in California and stopped doing athletics my back started giving me trouble. Yoga wasn’t a thing at all in Mississippi at that point, but in California it had been around. So I met this girl, she was a belly dancer and I was working at this natural food co-op and I don’t remember how I met her, but we came to be good friends. I told her that I was having back trouble and she invited me to her yoga class. So that’s kind of where I fell in love with yoga. I went to that first class with her and I had been in pain for at least a year, just non stop. I went to that yoga class and my pain went away, and I went again and again, and I haven’t stopped.
S: I wanted to learn more about yoga so I found this yoga commune out there. I went and I traded free yoga class and food in exchange for modeling for their pictures. I considered this breadcrumbs to decipher her reason in my life because the moments leading up to me meeting Stevi for the first time, I had no committed thoughts about working at the yoga studio. Something in me felt the need to ask about a job at the yoga studio, and to this day she’s allowed me to exchange work for classes. It’s been my saving grace.
India
S: I moved back home to the Delta. I bought a plane ticket to India because I had fallen in love with yoga; not just the physical part but the meditation and I wanted to know more about where it came from. So I moved back home. I scrimped and saved and worked, ate mustard sandwiches so that I could go (lol). I stayed in India for 5 months and it was the first time I’d been out of the United States.
D: And you went to India of all places?
S. Yea, I was 22 years old. I turned 23 in India
D: So it’s your first time out of the country and your first big solo trip, aside from driving to California. I feel like India is the type of place where you experience every high and low facet of life. What was that like for you?
S: It was amazing and it’s crazy the amount of stuff that can happen in 5 months. It was wild. I flew into Mumbai; traveled all the way down to the southern tip. There was a Sivananda Ashram there. I stayed there for a while then traveled back up the East coast to Varanasi which is one of the oldest cities in the world. It’s right on the Ganges river. There’s life and death from beginning to end all happening in this place. It was like this big spiritual epicenter. Right outside of Varanasi is where the buddha became enlightened under the Bodhi tree. I rented a one room apartment facing the river; so you could hear all the sounds of people praying, people chanting, dogs barking, etc. It was in that room that I wrote the first song that I’ve ever written. *insert funny song title*
D: What do you think was the most transformational thing for you on that trip?
S: I think really learning how to trust the moment. I was young and I’d never really been on my own or traveled on my own. It was my first time to be on my own and figure things out, and India is a different kind of place. In the states we grow up with this idea that things happen when they’re supposed to happen. There’s a dependability that happens in the U.S, and people expect that. In India, it’s totally different. No one gives a shit about your schedule. There’s what they call India time. If the bus is leaving at 12 o’clock, it may leave at 12, it may not. It’s not predictable. So being young and on my own for the first time in a country where women were not really respected, it was a real challenge to kind of find my way, but it taught me how to trust myself - like all of these things might go wrong, the world might be totally upside down, but I trust myself to figure out what to do in the next moment. It doesn’t matter what’s happening out there. All I need to do is take the next step. I think that’s the thing that I love about travel too - that it puts you into a place where you do have to figure things out, and that’s a powerful tool.
Motherhood
D: Throughout your 45 years, what are important lessons that you’ve learned that you feel are essential to instill in your daughters?
S: Pretty much the same thing actually. One of the things that I’ve noticed as I’ve observed parents parenting all around me is that a lot of parents feel like their job is to mold their children into what they feel like they should be, and I’ve really given my kids, I think, free rein. Even when they were little. I remember Riley, my oldest, going into her room, getting herself dressed - she came out in red cowboy boots, a pink tutu, she had this getup on that was really outrageous and I thought to myself, “y’know what? you do you”. Even at 5 or 6 years old, I feel like if there’s not a reason to adapt what they’re doing, if they’re coming into their own, I don’t want to stifle that. I want them to feel like they’re becoming who they’re meant to be instead of who I think they should be.
D: What’s been the best thing about being a mom for you? Or one of the best things.
S: This has mostly to do with just my kids, but it’s just amazing to watch them from childhood to adulthood becoming. The whole process of becoming has been just a gift, and to see how definite traits they were born with come through. I don’t know if all parents get to see that, but to watch their characteristics they had as a child develop as they grow older is very cool. Raina is still stubborn as hell.
Expanders
D:Who have been expanders for you?
S: I talked earlier with you about the woman who inspired me to start playing music. When I jumped into yoga, the girl that I said was a bellydancer, in some ways we didn’t really have a long relationship, but I think that there are people all around me that maybe I didn’t have a close relationship with, but I would see them and I would think, “oh wow, they’re living their life that way and I wanna try that”. So I don’t know that I even knew they were expanders for me at that time.
D: Maybe a better question would be what characteristics did these people have that helped you to expand?
S: I think living their life true to who they are without being concerned about what society expects. Growing up in rural Mississippi Delta, you have everyone’s expectations. I didn’t have many role models growing up for what I wanted, but I knew I wanted more. So I think it’s that idea of not being limited by what the majority of society is doing and think you should be doing. Once I realized I didn’t have to do what everybody else was doing, that I didn’t have to follow some trajectory that the rest of the world expected of me, it opened all sorts of doors.
Legacy
D: What do you want your legacy to be?
S: Um.. on a cellular level, there’s a part of me that’s always been a caregiver - maybe to a fault - but I’ve always wanted to try to help people feel a little bit better. Regardless of what they’re going through. We all have different struggles in our lives, and I guess I want ,when I leave this world, I want people to feel like I cared, and that I would be there for them if they were in need. I like the idea that we are all in this together. This whole thing operates better when we take care of each other.
D: Finish these sentiments.
Freedom is..
S: Fearlessness
D: Self love is..
S: Acceptance
D: I know I’m in a deep state of trust when…
S: Hmm.. self trust or?
D: Self trust.. Trust in life.. All encompassing trust
S: I know when I’m not trusting, what that’s like. I’m concerned about other things, other people’s expectations. I know that I can get caught up in that. Um. I know I’m in a deep state of trust when I am listening to my own inner guide.
D: Yoga for me is..
S: Being still regardless of what’s going on in my life
D: I am..
S: Open