Jan. 18, 2021

Episode #1 All Is Not Lost

It's time for renewal. It's time for an awakening, for growth, for a return to wholeness. What parts of you are missing? We've certainly been through, and continue to navigate, a world in flux triggered by COVID, by fear, by division. Our mission - my brother, Christian, and myself (yes, we come as a double act!) - is to heal and transform grief in this world. A tall order, yes, but perfectly possible.
To do this we will be inspiring and empowering you to "refind" your superpowers of trust, healing, and transformation.To find what's missing. To let go of what you no longer need to carry.
We have an unseen team behind us. We have our personal experiences to share. We have stories to tell. We have rituals to perform. Are you ready to walk with us towards your renewal?

This week's guest is musician, poet and lightworker, Laura Gardner, who wrote our theme song - Great White Shark. There was 'Big Magic' behind its creation... I can't wait for you to hear the story!

Full show notes can be found at www.finderoflostthingspodcast.com
(Image Copyright: The Spiral - Freya Sherriffs)

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The first of the 'Emergency Grief Kit' films and the 30-film playlist Hannah mentions can be viewed here at 'The Finder of Lost Things' YouTube channel. Free access to all three of the 'Emergency Grief Kit' films is via RAISE - Chris and Hannah's online community (link to landing page).

All the films Hannah and Chris have made together can be viewed here on YouTube

Transcript

Hannah Velten 0:00
{intro} Welcome to "The Finder of Lost Things" - Exploring Your Superpowers of Trust, Healing and Transformation with me, Hannah Velten. My brother Christian disappeared in Mali, Africa in 2003. He disappeared without a trace, we lost his story. We didn't have closure, we lost so much. I was fighting and searching to find Christian when actually, I just needed to sit in stillness and attract him in. I was so resistant to doing this, but I had to surrender. It's a process of trusting and finding the lost pieces and integrating them. And this podcast will uncover the process that Christian and I went on, to find the lost things: him and to find the parts of me that were missing.

Laura Gardner 0:58
{guitar chords and Laura Gardner singing} "And we were destined from the start to tell our story into the dark, for we were born to a Great White Shark {guitar fades away}

Hannah Velten 1:19
Hello, everybody, and welcome in, please come in. I've got a fire here, I'm ready to tell you some stories. I'm ready to spread the joy and the love and all the messages and learnings that I have gained through my own grief and healing journey. And I'd love to share them with you all. So please come in. Okay, I suppose I should start with introducing myself and seeing as this is our first programme and we're here for six months with you. I say 'we' - I'm going to introduce somebody to you in a minute. Not quite yet. But yeah, so my name is Hannah Velten. And I am a grief healer, a writer, and now a radio show and podcast host. So, okay, I'm going to tell you some labels that I would label myself as. And this is quite important. And it will kind of become clear at the end of the programme. But okay, so I'm a daughter, I'm a sister, I'm a wife, I'm a mother, I'm a stepmom, I'm a sister-in-law, I'm an aunt, I'm a part of a village. What else? Lots of things. As I said I'm an author (of three books), I've also been a ghost writer, I've been a journalist, I've been a farm worker, I've been a journalist on 'Farmers Weekly'. And all these labels are what we give ourselves. That's how we define ourselves. And as you'll see a lot of the programme, and what we're going to do in the next six months, is actually uncovering all those labels that we give ourselves. They kind of limit us in a lot of ways. I'm sure you've all been through, over the last year of COVID, the process of really looking inside ourselves to see what is underneath all the labels. What's the true you? Trust comes in here: trusting yourself and trusting the process and trusting what's going on around you. And what you're being asked to do is really important.  So today, actually on the 18th of January marks (it's so strange how the timing of this has come around - it's like this divine timing, which I'm going to talk about a lot over the next months). It's actually 18 years ago since I last hugged Christian goodbye before he went to Africa. And it's also two years and one day since I was told that I needed to do these podcasts and this radio show. It's taken me two years and one day to pluck up the courage I guess, to do this. This is the reason why we're here. And actually, I'm going to introduce you to the reason why I'm here. And I guess why this whole journey and this whole transformation happened and, as if by magic, my lovely producer, Olivia, will put up his photo on screen. I hope we'll... is he gonna appear? [Olivia says 'He's right there.'] Oh, man, I can't see him on the screen. Where is he? Is he there? [Olivia days 'He's there, right there.'] Ah, okay. So this is my brother, Christian. He was 27, nearly 28 when he went travelling to Africa and as you can see in the picture (this is taken just before he went to Africa so this is really the last photo we have of him). And as you see, he's a really handsome chap. And he's going to come in now. Okay, I should explain to anybody who doesn't know anything about us, Christian and I choose to continue our sibling relationship. I choose to bring Christian with me. He chooses to be with me. He comes in and out of my life. We have made films before, live Facebook films in 2018 to 2019. They're all on a YouTube channel, The Finder of Lost Things; we've actually uploaded 30 films that we've already made together so you can view them, if you fancy. But, yeah, where to start? He comes and goes. And he's going to be very much with me during these six months. So, why are we here right now? It's a time of renewal. This time of year, so late December into late January is, for me, a time of renewal. I'll talk a lot about the Medicine Wheel and the Wheel of the Year that I have a lot of, not reliance on, but I very much watch the cycles of the year and what they mean. So this is the time of renewal. And as we go into I know, in America, you've got your President Trump and President Biden changing over and in England at the moment, I'm in southeast England, we have another lockdown. We have homeschooling. It's been very chaotic this last couple of weeks. So, yeah, my preparation for the show has been somewhat lacking! We are in this massive time of change. And I see it in a very positive way as a time of renewal. We are going to tell you our story, so from 2003 all the way through to now because it's been 18 years of a journey that both Christian and I have been on. We are going to just use the ancient art of storytelling; you are going to take out what you need from each episode. We're going to try and tell the story chronologically, as it happened to us, so you can see the layers that were opened and how everything happened. We're going to start right from the beginning and we're going to be as honest as we possibly can. I don't want to hide anything because I think being honest and telling the truth, we have to do that. You will take out what you need from our stories. You can either go episode by episode or you can just dip into episodes if they speak to you on the title and I think you will get what you need from them.  So why are you here with us? We're here to tell our story. We're here to heal and transform grief in the world. We really do want to provide everybody with a grief ritual that really works, really heals and really transforms but I'm wondering why you here? What are you searching for? What have you lost? Obviously, for me it was my brother. Christian will tell you his own story about why he was exploring and what he was trying to find. But I just think we have to have a complete and fierce trust in the process, what we're being asked to do. And everything that's happening around us at the moment is there for us, these things are happening for us so that we can find our true self. And we can really use our voices and do what we're really here to do. I'm just going to introduce you to a song. It's our theme tune. It's called 'Great White Shark'. And I'm sure when you first heard the intro you wondered 'what's that about a great white shark?' I had exactly the same feeling!  The Great White Shark brings a ferocity. It brings a tenacity, plumbing the emotional depths, and using instinct and really focusing on a goal and that's what Christian and I did to find each other. And this is really a lot about what you're going to find out; having that clear goal of what you're missing, what have you lost and how you can find it. So I'm just going to ask Olivia to  play this amazing song and you will hear all about the person who wrote it and how she wrote it and what it means for this radio show/podcast.

Laura Gardner 11:58
[Acoustic guitar, Laura sings] There's a piece of me inside of you, you fan that flame 'til it burns again. There's a piece of you inside of me, my guiding light, my eternal heat. We claimed our birthright from worlds apart, live side by side, speak heart to heart, And we were destined from the start to tell our story into the dark, For we were born to a Great White Shark. When you were gone I couldn't see a way to bring you home to me. My hopes were high, but were in vain, that I would see you here again. I couldn't reach you though I tried. I told your story far and wide. I had no inkling at the start I'd find you right here inside my heart, And we were born to a Great White Shark.  I know you deeper than before, our hearts opened up the door when we were born again.  There's a piece of you inside of me, it’s loud and clear, for all to hear.  We claimed our birthright from worlds apart, live side by side, speak heart to heart And we were destined from the start to tell our story into the dark, For we were born to a Great White Shark. [song ends]

Hannah Velten 15:09
Oh my goodness, I feel emotional. Listening to that again, I first heard that song on the 15th of September last year. And my good friend - who I'm just about to introduce you to, Laura Gardner - she sent me this WhatsApp message with the recording of this song that she just wanted me to hear. And she sort of said it had come from nowhere. And there it was. And anyway, I listened to this song I couldn't believe it. It was about Christian and I and so I don't want to talk too much more about that Laura can explain it all, how this song came into being and how we met in the first place, which was rather strange, and how our lives have kind of criss crossed the last, I don't know 18 months or so. So hi, Laura, thank you very much for joining me. How are you? 

Laura Gardner 16:03
I'm good. How are you? 

Hannah Velten 16:05
Yeah, I'm good. I'm doing this first show and really enjoying it. And so I just want to go back to show people what happens around Christian and I - just all these amazing coincidences, and this sort of magic seems to happen. And you're a perfect example of something that happened. So can you kind of explain how we met? I know, you were just saying that you weren't even supposed to be where we did meet.

Laura Gardner 16:43
Yeah, so we sing in a choir together, don't we? A gospel choir. Yeah, I almost didn't go to the social after we'd done our Christmas concert in January 2019. But I did end up there. And by complete chance, I don't think we've ever spoken before and I ended up sitting down next to you. And I remember just having, you know, that first chat that you have with people, you know, what do you do? And I can remember very distinctly, you hesitated before you told me. 

Hannah Velten 17:25
And so the funny thing is that I had never really told anyone that I didn't know what I was doing, and that I was moving into the spiritual work. So there was this big gulp, my thought process wondering if Laura would be okay to tell. Anyway, yeah, carry on. 

Laura Gardner 17:47
But it's funny, because I've always been really fascinated by anything spiritual. So I'm very glad that you did tell me and I was immediately interested. And I remember you gave me your card. And it wasn't until I think the whole of our break from singing with the choir had already passed, I was going through some old papers, and I found it again. And I just felt really strongly like, I want to contact you. And you did a reading for me. And, yeah, I got to know about your story with Christian as well and was just blown away by it all. So yeah, I guess it was another, probably a year later I'd had, I think, our third reading and it was after that one, I was driving home and suddenly I started to just get this song come into my head. And I had been trying in the previous months to write songs, because I just got back into music, or having really picked up my guitar. And it just wasn't working. And all of a sudden, now I was driving back on the A27 and the song just started to come to me. And first of all, it seemed like it was about a really strong heart connection. And I had someone in mind a really good friend of mine actually, who's far, far away and despite the distance, we have this really strong heart connection, and it started to be about that. And then all of a sudden, I remember that, just this lyric came into my head that seemed to just drop into my lap from nowhere. And it was, 'we were born to a great white shark'. And I had this really distinct impression that I have no idea where it had come from, it made no sense to me, it didn't feel like it had come from my head at all. But I was just really curious about it. So I went with it. And there was just this spark of an idea at that point, I was like, I wonder if this is about Hannah and Christian. And I just followed the threads. And I just kept following it. And over the next I guess it was few weeks, the song wouldn't leave me alone. And it just would come to me when I was talking to people. And it would just keep on going round around my head. And it wasn't fully formed at first. And, you know, I've been back over little voice notes that I recorded for myself and it's morphed and changed and it feels like it really wrote itself. And I just kept on feeling compelled to just keep pushing it forward. And eventually it became this fully fledged song. And as I said, I haven't ever written a fully fledged song before and there it was - it just sort of fell out. And, and then once it was finished, it just really felt like it belongs to you. As you said, I sent you that text message. And I remember the feeling of when I'd sent it. It was just like something in me took flight and it was almost like this 'Thank you' that it was out there. And it was with the right person and it just felt so right. 

Hannah Velten 20:58
So beautiful. The first time I heard it I was just in floods of tears. And I think every time I heard it, for ages, and even when I listened to it earlier today, I was in floods. So I'm glad I managed some composure during that bit. It was interesting what you said about the heart connection, like the heart to heart you had a friend that you have that connection with. And there's something here about... sorry, I'm going a little off piste. But there's something about one of the gospel songs that we actually sang together in that Christmas concert. And it was called 'Speak to me'. The lyric was something like, 'speak to me in a small voice, clearing pain and sorrow'. And having that clear connection - it was obviously about God, being a gospel song - but when you're in that pain and sorrow and having that quietness and using that small voice that you can still talk and communicate heart to heart with people. That was something that's just popped in. And the other thing you were saying about the idea kind of circling around and keeping coming back to you. And I know we talked about the book, I've got it here, 'Big Magic' by Elizabeth Gilbert, and she talks about having an idea that wants to come and live in you, be born through you. So we talked about that, didn't we that sort of the big magic that happens when you're being creative and getting that idea and catching it and actually allowing it to come through? 

Laura Gardner 22:37
Yeah. And I had just been reading that book, I think, even just before or just after, and it suddenly just struck me that that's exactly what it felt like. I had this idea come to me, rather than you know, from inside, it felt like it had dropped in. And yeah, I had a really strong sense that it was this idea that wanted to just come out of me, but hadn't been from me in the first place, if that makes sense.  

Hannah Velten 23:02
So what does this mean for you? How has this changed your direction in life? 

Laura Gardner 23:11
I definitely really started exploring my music more and it's given me a feeling that I can actually maybe pursue this and be creative and become that channel. And I've already sort of gone down the route of looking into that sort of ethos of being a light worker and bringing light into the world through creativity. And that's something that I'm definitely looking a lot more closely at now. So yeah, it's been a real new calling for me. 

Hannah Velten 23:48
I'm so glad! I'd love for you, if you get any other ideas that want to come and be born through you, if you'd share them with us. We're here for six months so you never know, some more songs might come in for you. Like now you're opening up, you've opened up that channel, haven't you? And actually, we did quite a lot of research actually around the Great White Shark - where does that image come from? I found some information from Hawaii, actually. I'm not even going to begin to pronounce a Hawaiian phrase, but it roughly translates as "I am finished to the great shark, all consumed by the big shark. I'm so deeply in love, that I know not what to think." And I think certainly between Christian and I, the search I did for him and even his explorations as well, we do all these things with love, without any sort of ego thought attached. It's just something you're driven to do. And it's like you with your music, you're just driven to create, and you kind of lose yourself in it, don't you. This just takes over. And you can be almost totally unaware of how emotional you're being or how you're being received. Do you feel that when you're playing your music?  

Laura Gardner 25:35
Yeah, it's something again, that I really discovered very recently, just before the song then came to me. So I had just started playing music and partly it was the result of a course that you'd introduced me to, and opened me up to being more visible. One of the things I did was just post a video of myself singing - a cover song at the time, because I hadn't written any songs at that point. And it was the sense of just absolutely being enveloped in that song in that moment. And just feeling completely lost and consumed by it. And that was the feeling that I'd not connected to for a very, very long time when I had it way back when I was a kid, you know, when it was much more accessible to me. That was the first time it occurred to me as an adult and I started to really connect with that feeling again. 

Hannah Velten 26:33
Yeah, absolutely. That's when you know that you're on the right track, isn't it - when you get that feeling of, 'Oh, this is what I'm meant to be doing' or you just can't stop. It's such a fantastic feeling. And also that was quite interesting about using your voice because I know obviously we've talked before about me doing this radio show and speaking about what I do. And it's that fear of maybe releasing your voice. But I think both you and I, in the time we've known each other, have both been through that process of, 'Oh, we've just got to use our voice.' We have to, you know, we can't stop it. So, how did you get over the fear of using your voice? 

Laura Gardner 27:25
It was more just that a few things fell into place. And I realised how much I was blocking myself. So once I'd seen that quite clearly, I suddenly realised that it was within my control to then just liberate myself and just start to use my voice again. And yeah, that feeling of just being present and putting myself out into the world and feeling like I could do that was just so magical. 

Hannah Velten 27:56
It is magical, isn't it? And to feel safe doing it? I think you kind of have to take the step - do a Facebook Live or you have to do something, you have to do an action - and then the feeling kind of catches up with you that 'Oh, actually, this is okay'. And then it sort of changes your thought process and you'll just carry on doing it. 

Laura Gardner 28:18
Yeah, it's like releasing a cork in a bottle I think. You suddenly think there's more of this that can come out? It kind of becomes quite attractive to keep on expressing yourself in that way and to see what the effects are going to be around you as well. Like you said, you're accepted and people are happy to receive that. It's very nice. 

Hannah Velten 28:41
That's right. Oh, well, I hope we have a continued relationship on this show, Laura, and it's been absolutely a pleasure to chat with you as always. And I think we're just going to go for a quick break now and then we'll be back later on. Thanks very much, Laura. Lots of love. {Break} The Finder of Lost Things: Exploring your Superpowers of Trust, Healing, and Transformation with me, Hannah Velten. When my brother Christian went missing, I completely denied my grief. We can either transform, and transition, or we can stay stagnant. And this podcast will uncover the process that Christian and I went on to find the lost things; him and to find the parts of me that were missing. And there are things that are missing in you that prevent you from letting go. Whether it's a person a dream, a lifestyle, that process of trusting and finding the lost pieces and and integrating them. That's where you get your sustainable transition that will carry on. Tune in every Monday at 9am Pacific on transformationtalkradio.com. You can find me at hannahvelten.online. Welcome back to The Finder of Lost Things. Laura's just pointed out that my top I'm wearing looks like it's got gills on it; so the shark theme continues! And I also wanted to bring in another person - ah, obviously they are not people - but another energy into the show. We've had the shark and I'd like to also bring in the fox, to this session. I work with lots of spirits: obviously, there's Christian, but I work with ancestors, I work with animals, spirits, all sorts come in to say hello. Fox came in and he's been around so much. He brings to me this kind of feeling of an in-between time. I know I talked about renewal at the beginning of the show, but it really does feel like this sort of in-between time during COVID, where everything's kind of slowed down, and we're all spending a lot more time with families and at home and really having to live with ourselves. And I think that COVID has triggered so much grief that has laid very deep for a long time. I'm seeing this all the time; these feelings are suddenly coming up that you maybe feel you should have gotten over by now. And they're all coming up. And it's really making us question, you know, Why do these feelings keep coming up? What missing? What am I still searching for? And I must point out I have an 'Emergency Grief Kit', which I downloaded from spirit. It's three films. I recorded them last year, but they are for you if you are in that grip of grief and fear and pain at the moment - please do go to my website and you can find out how to access them for free.  Over the years I've been doing this work, people come to me for so many different reasons. Obviously, we have the grief of a missing person. There's also estrangement, there's grief that just has never been processed. We have parents, we have children. We have all sorts of energies that come through. Christian acted initially very much as a sort of gatekeeper. And he would bring people to me, and I know he still does it. I know we've just heard Laura's song, and someone else recently got in touch who wanted to write a poem about Christian - she called it actually an epitaph to this young explorer who went off and actually, like the great white shark, he had a focus and he was so driven. He so knew what he wanted to get out of his journey to Africa and we're going to talk all about that in the next episode.  But I just wanted to say a few other things about the beginning. It's almost like we have our backpack full of the lessons we've learned, the messages we've received from spirit [there are a lot of those in the 'Emergency Grief Kit' and in the films that we've made already together]. But there's this real feeling that we have so much to share. You know, we did an awful lot of things that actually - I won't say wrong - but we made a lot of mistakes. And we took a long time, 18 years, to get to where we are now. We took a long time to process everything. And we are kind of here to give some shortcuts and to make it a lot easier for you. But there's one thing that if you're really feeling alone, like I was, and I think COVID has bought us that feeling often, then you really know who you are when you're faced with grief. You know what's missing, you know what you've got, but it's very clear who you are not. And you might think that you're all alone. And that everything's kind of lost. And 'when is this ever going to be right?' I just have to tell you that all is not lost. And you need to, gosh... there is this thing about 'soul family', like calling in help, you can't get help unless you ask for help. Okay, now that goes across [and Christian's talking to me] in whatever circumstances you find yourself in life - whether that's asking for physical help, reaching out to somebody; whether that's reaching out to spiritual help. I reached out all the time for physical help. And in the end, that physical help wasn't enough to get Christian to me. I then had to ask for spiritual help. I'd never even thought about asking for spiritual help. I wasn't spiritual in the slightest. So for anyone here who's thinking, 'Oh, Hannah must have been doing this for years. And this is what she's always done' [Christian's laughing too] I was, like people who've known me for a long time, they would never have thought I'd be doing this. Seriously. But I was desperate. I had no other way, we as a family had no other way, of finding Christian. And you know, when everything externally is going to... pot [I was going to say something else then!] and you really can't get any help from outside, you need to go within, because there's all the help you could possibly want inside. But I had a massive soul family: I have one in spirit and we all have a soul family in spirit, whether you've had people that passed over or not, you've got ancestors, you've got all your guides, but we'll talk about that in later shows. Actually a client of mine who I'm working with at the moment, she's South African and she told be about a distinction they make between 'family', for like mom, dad, brothers, siblings, and they also have (I hope I pronounced this right), it's 'horsen', which is actually like an extended family. So it doesn't necessarily have to be relatives, it can be friends who are like family. And these are the people that you can ask to support you. Okay? These are the people who you feel good around, the people who give you energy, the people who spark something in you ( like Laura is for me), and all through this journey, once I started to ask for help, these people appeared out of nowhere, like seriously. You just need to ask for help. There are so many people and energies out there who are there to help you and support you. And they might just be around for a couple of minutes, you might just meet them, but they are there to help you move forward on your journey.  We're all about regaining balance. So obviously, Christian going missing, all the grief and there might be people listening here who haven't been able to say their farewells to people during COVID properly, they might have got COVID and still be living with the effects of long COVID. I kind of see this time as when a sort of helmet is put on you, and I also have this image of a grief cage that you sort of sit in, and the heavy feelings that come in when grief is around. We'll talk a lot more about this, but I just want to give you a little something that was given to me - a little tip, I guess: if you kind of visualise yourself and plant yourself in the ground, and the heartbeat that you can hear. So the earth, the heartbeat of the Earth is the same all around the world. So even if you're not near the people that you love, or you're feeling all discombobulated, or you're feeling helpless and out of control, just kind of ground yourself and listen to that heartbeat of the earth. It really does bring you back into balance. And that's what I was saying about the Wheel of the Year and the balance of nature and the cycles of nature and this time of renewal, where things are really being broken apart, and new growth is appearing. And it's ... just breathe, just breathe and be out in nature as much as you can as well.  The other idea that I wanted to talk to you about is the importance of finding balance. I could never have reached Christian if I hadn't been able to lift myself out of my sort of low vibration, that sort of grief cage and helmet of grief; they really constrict everything in life. Regaining that balance and climbing upwards. I don't have time to go into this fully now, but recently over Christmas, our family dog died, and she was nearly 13 years old. And we had to literally climb our way up and out of the low vibration of grief to actually reach her. I'll tell you about that another day. But this whole thing about bringing gratitude and joy and balance back into life is so important. It just clears so much and allows so much to come into you. And I must just finish on the labels that I was talking about at the beginning - all those labels that we give ourselves. Okay, so we are here to create our own story, okay, we have so many limitations placed on us, you know. If anyone had said to me, 'you will be able to find Christian, you will be able to heal your grief, you will be able to transform him and you', I would have never believed that it was possible. In our culture/society, it's not possible to find missing people without a body, without proof. It's just not possible. But I guess Christian and I are here to tell you, 'anything is possible'. If you put your mind to it, and you commit to making changes, it really is up to you. These things are possible. Anything can happen, anything can happen. And we are capable of so much more than we think. So these labels that we put on ourselves... there is so much more to you, there's so much more to me, that we're going to find out over the next six months.  We'd love this to be a real community around this radio show and this podcast, so if you’re listening and anything interesting happens to you, please come and share your story. I mean, we're gonna have lots of other guests that are going to come on and share their stories. But I would really, really love to have a real transformation here with people really finding their own way of dealing with their grief, with fear, with pain that truly heals and truly transforms. These things are possible. So we have a kind of website around the podcast called finderoflostthingspodcast.com where you can come and you can comment, you can leave us a voicemail, you can ask us questions. Yeah, we'd just really love some input. You really can make the choice, whatever physical situation you're in, you really can change the situation. And you do that by changing your thoughts. But as we said with Laura, you do really need to start taking the actions. So I hope something in this show has made you maybe think differently about your situation, maybe about your relationships, maybe about what's possible.  And there's another something I just wanted to share. I have this image of a spiral and it really is a process of drilling down into really 'What is missing? What do you have that you can rely on? And then what is missing? What is it really are you searching for? and that relies on the quiet time. And it relies on going within. And I know that's really difficult. I resented and resisted that for so long, but just maybe taking a few moments of your day, just five minutes of your day, maybe just to sit in quietness and just see what comes up. We are all here to learn and to grow. Energy doesn't sit still, you know, cycles in nature. Nature doesn't sit still; it's always moving. Christian was always moving, he was an explorer, obviously. And he was walking 1000s of miles. Well, he was supposed to be, anyway. But he never stopped moving. And there's this Latin saying, translated as "it is solved in walking'. And grief keeps you very stuck, and very solid, and heavy. And it saps that movement from you. And a lot of healing is about starting to walk again, starting to move again, allowing the ideas to come into you, like with Laura, using your voice, singing, dancing. Whatever it is, it's allowing, it's breathing. It's just allowing everything to get moving and to start to rise. So you have to kind of drill down into what's going on and reach that emotional depth using the great white shark. But then it's also softening and opening up and rising and rising. And also, I started on this journey because of my children; I could quite easily have left Christian in Africa as a lost person. But that wasn't what was supposed to happen. And, yeah, the reason I really had to do what I did was because of my children asking about Uncle Christian, and I just couldn't talk about him without crying. And there's lots of people who are probably listening to this show who have known me for quite a long time and I never mentioned Christian's name. They didn't know I even had a brother. And once the children started to ask questions about Uncle Christian, I just knew I had to find out what had happened to him. And I made a commitment to doing it. I had to find out. And you will see how all this unfolded from the stories we're going to tell. Yeah, we will start right from the beginning. We will talk about what happened when Christian went missing. He can tell his side and I'll tell our side. But yeah, I could not let Christian just be almost a romantic figure that had gone missing. I didn't want my son, particularly, to feel that he needed to go and find Uncle Christian. I'm sure most people don't know about Mungo Park, who is the explorer that Christian was inspired by, and in whose footsteps he was treading. I'm hoping to tell you a lot more about Mungo and his extraordinary story as well. But yeah, I didn't want my son and any future generations feeling that they had to go and do the same trip. And as I've gone on this journey, you do realise that you are part of a long chain of ancestors. There's a beautiful saying: You have seven generations behind you, and you have seven generations ahead of you. And if you are the one to decide to heal a longstanding family rift, or mystery, or grief that's been passed down, it's like you are the hope of the generations, because when you heal, as our story will show, you can affect all the generations backwards, and in your actions you affect all the generations forwards. I'm just getting something about... we were talking earlier about having a grief ritual that really works. And I know, having talked to so many people, particularly recently, that grief is such a weight in the world, it really is. And we can see it now. There is almost getting to be dangerous proportions of separation and fear that are in the world. And we just need - as a culture, as a society - to learn how to grieve, to have a ‘good grief’, and be able to pass that on to our children. I don't know how long I've got now, probably not much longer, but I was just saying about our family dog who we had to ‘put to sleep’ on Christmas Day night and I was able to help my family through that process. It was such a relief to actually be able to take them through this ritual that has allowed them to also keep Duffy with them. You know, for each one of us, she is still with us, and still part of our lives. And actually Christian sits on my left side, but Duffy also sits by my side (on the right) as well now. So we would all love to really make a difference now. And you know, Christian, is no longer this lost explorer. He's here, he still is able to connect with people - I know he does that still. And, you know, this physical life that he had hasn't been wasted. I know Mum would always say that, you know, it was such a waste losing Christian like that. But actually, it's not because he's here now. And we can still make something out of this, which we will. He’s just saying, ”Yes, we totally will!” And the other thing I really want to talk about very, very quickly at the end is that our story is not quite complete. We'll talk about all this is another episode, but we have one thing that is still missing in our story. And that is some camera cards. When Christian went off to Africa, he had a stills camera and he had a film camera. And he was attacked in Kita, near Bamako, in Mali. This came out during our films that we made together; those are still out there. I know they're coming to me. Right at the top of the show I said it's taken me two years and a day to do this podcast and at that time, when I was told I had to do a podcast, I was also told that these camera cards will come back to me and it will kind of like - not prove - but just so that we can kind of really close the story. And so they're coming. I don't know when they're coming. They're coming at exactly the right time. So it would be lovely if they're part of this show. But yeah, that's just something I wanted to put in there. So look next week, we're going to definitely talk about Christian and I think Christian is probably going to take over a lot next week. And we're going to go right back to the beginning of the story which starts way before 2003. But yeah, I think that's all I need to say. So lots of love and if you want to join us, do come to finderoflostthingspodcast.com where you will find show notes and transcripts. And I hope you've got something out of this episode and if you have, we'd love to know, do come and have a chat with us. So that's all we need to say. And we'll see you next week. Lots of love. Thank you very much for listening. [outro] Thank you for listening to ‘The Finder of Lost Things’. I think we've been triggered so long and so hard by COVID and it's going to carry on. People are getting used to stillness and they're getting used to more solitude. But how do you use that time for the highest good? This process that we're going to explore will bring back the joy and purpose to life; that wholeness, you know, that sort of harmony and flow and togetherness. People are really ready to find their lost parts now. You can find me at hannahvelten.online.

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Laura GardnerProfile Photo

Laura Gardner

Creator of ‘Great White Shark’ - our theme tune

Laura is a musician, poet and lightworker on a journey to live life by listening to the small voice within. Having been drawn to creative expression from her early years, Laura is now consciously embracing the intention of her soul to create. After more than a decade on a conventional career path, she has broken free from the corporate world and is opening to possibilities. Laura's intention is to share her gifts for words and music to bring love, light and peace to the hearts of others.