[00:00] Valerie Beck: Rise, renew, reconnect. Welcome to from the Ashes, a podcast where bold conversations empower healing and authentic, vibrant living. I'm your host, Valerie Huang Beck, and I'm on a mission to evolve the dialogue that moves humanity harmoniously forward.
[00:17] Nina Pullella: Shed the fire in the darkest night of Phoenix burst It's ready for flight Shadows may come try to tear you apart but you're the friend, right?
[00:29] Valerie Beck: We are on. All right, everyone. Welcome back to from the Ashes. I have Nina Pulela, the founder of Living Ayurveda Hawaii and the Wild Woman Collective, with me here today. And she's also a dear friend and classmate. We went to Ayurveda school together, and she has a remarkable story. So I'm really, really excited for you to tell that today. Nina, welcome.
[00:55] Nina Pullella: Thanks, Val. It's so, so nice to be here. I'm a big fan of your podcast, so this is a really fun and special moment for me to be here joining you and on the other side of this with you.
[01:07] Valerie Beck: So we actually have been working alongside each other for a while now on our professional journeys, and I've gotten to know a lot about you. And as we go through the trenches of developing our businesses, our practices, we've uncovered a lot about our own personal journeys and how that influences who we are and what we do. And I did not mention just yet, but Nina's also the founder of Nina Kuchina, so she is the owner of two businesses and is just a super powerhouse. But the story that I want to dig in today, that is going to have more of a from the ashes angle to it is your journey of becoming this Ayurvedic practitioner, because this is not something that we grew up with.
[02:01] Nina Pullella: Right.
[02:01] Valerie Beck: It's not something that we're exposed to at an early age. So before we go even into the main story, what was your life like before you became practitioner?
[02:13] Nina Pullella: Yeah, yeah. So I have two parents that immigrated to the US as kids, so I'm first generation American. And I think that makes growing up in the US a little bit different. My mom is from Scotland. My dad is from very rural Italy. And my upbringing was very family oriented, and it was very. It was very much based around food. I grew up in a family restaurant, like total stereotypical Jersey Italian immigrant, you know, family story. And so food cooking, cooking from scratch, it was a huge part of my life, my family, and it made a massive impact on, I would say, my values and what feels really normal for me. You know, uh, eating fresh from scratch food is a part of my life. Um, you Know, we didn't eat a lot of processed food that was just like not allowed kind of in the house. It wasn't a part of, of what we did as a family. So I think that made things a little bit different because when I left the house, you know, after high school and started meeting people, I, I moved to Hawaii after high school and went to college here and I started meeting other people and realized, oh, that's not the case for a lot of people. And I started realizing that was something really unique for me. And it makes a lot of sense that, that, that I would end up back into food and nourishing people because it's something that, it's almost like, you know, this speaking another language where you're not really taught it. You just, you just know two languages. It was like that with food for me was like I was never taught how to cook. We just cooked, you know, I was never taught. Yeah. How to eat healthy. We just ate healthy, you know, so it was very much something that was just second nature to me. So I would say that, that, that was a big part of how I grew up and how it shaped the person that I am now. And even what led me to Ayurveda and this kind of like from the ashes story.
[04:36] Valerie Beck: Yeah. So there was a foundation already built that was more maybe ancestral and innate. Well, actually, let's just go into your from the ashes story and this, this is surrounding your friend Krista and how you helped her through disease. So I'll, I'll let you have the floor with that.
[04:57] Nina Pullella: Yeah. So one of my best friends, she was diagnosed with stage four breast cancer. And she was, gosh, was she like 38, 39? I can't remember exactly, but young, really young. And oh my gosh, it's such a big story. But I essentially dropped everything, everything I had going on. I was 33. I was still in my wild era. Bartending, you know, just bartending, surfing, traveling, that was, that was my life. I would bartend, save up money and just go travel on a shoestring and rinse and repeat. And it was so fun. I had a very fun life. And Krista got sick and it's, it's hard for me to put into words that it was almost like this out of body experience where there was something outside of me that was like, you need to stop everything that you're doing and be there for her. And it was all that I wanted to do as well. It wasn't like I was being told, it was just like, now I know with the language I have now is that it was my dharmic path opening, and I was taking the first step. Um, but at the time, all I knew I was doing was stopping all the. The fun stuff and the partying and just being there for her, to take her to her doctor's appointments to help her figure out a plan, because she knew she wanted to do, like, a mix of Chinese medicine, naturopathy, as well as oncology. So I was, like, learning the language of cancer in real time, her and I together, taking her to all of these various appointments and helping her make a plan, helping her figure out how to eat, what supplements to take, and it was a massive turning point in my life.
[07:03] Valerie Beck: I am very curious about the. The free spirit Nina as well. Right. Like, we kind of go through these iterations in life where we shed skin and we let go of parts of ourselves. The. The free spirit Nina. Like, did you feel like it was a shedding of skin, or did you feel like it was more just, you know, you were just going to do something different?
[07:31] Nina Pullella: Um, it was the shedding of skin. Absolutely. You know, now I have the wild woman collective, and there's always been a wild woman inside of me, but there's a much. That was a much less mature wild woman, which. No judgment, you know, she was 33. I'm 45 now. It's a much different version of myself. When we look at, like, the archetypes of the woman that was, like, the maiden, you know, she was young, she was naive, you know, now I would say I'm more in, like, a sage wild woman, you know, it's like this wild woman with much more intention and doing a lot more good in the world, rather than just a bit selfishly, you know, setting wildfires and walking away and going, oh, whoops, did I burn that down? So I. But there's always been this wild woman inside of me. But it was absolutely a shedding of skin. And it was. It was a massive shift because it led me to starting my new. My first business, Nina Cucina. And this first, you know, threshold that I walked through of being a caretaker was a transition out of this maiden wild woman. And it led me to entrepreneurship. It led me to my Dharma. It led me to starting my business, Nina Cucina. And that was a massive shedding, another shed. And that was where I had to really. I had to be in full surrender mode to. To just putting down, or I should say of, like, being in devotion, being in discipline, and sacrifice and those three things. Something that Nina, as the Maiden wild woman was doing. She was living joy and, you know, the. Just enjoying all of the five senses, you know, and we're just in very surface level. But I had to put that down in a way that actually really led to some pretty severe burnout down the road because there was no more fun. There was very, very little because I was so driven. And it really lit a fire inside of me. You know, from an Ayurvedic perspective, when we look at the doshas and we look at the elements, it was like the, the sacred fire, the sacred pitta inside was surfacing. Yeah, but I didn't know how to, how to work with that fire in a balanced way until I found Ayurveda. And I, I, I really burned out, you know.
[10:28] Valerie Beck: Did you pull devotion, discipline, and sacrifice from the ether, or are you pulling from yoga? Is that just something that came to you just now?
[10:38] Nina Pullella: Those are words that I've been relating to in the last couple of years when I really reflect on, on my path and where I am now. Yeah, and where I am now. I don't really, I don't resonate with discipline, but I really use the word devotion because it's a choice, because it's
[10:57] Valerie Beck: really interesting because I think these concepts are actually discussed in the yoga sutras as like, this path to Dharma. And I actually have talked about this on a different podcast with my friend Michael, who's also an Ayurvedic practitioner. And there's this. It's like, I don't like the word purification personally, but like, this uncovering of, like, the tr. The soul's true essence, like what it's meant to be doing here, that comes from the friction, right? The tapas. This, this idea of, of fire also kind of metabolizing and, and burning through to truth that I see. I mean, you could see discipline as kind of a way to doing that, right? You are keeping this, like, stone at, at the grind and like, just creating that, those sparks. And that takes discipline and devotion because it is like being able to choose your hard do. The things that are, are going to push you to your edge, but there's also a why behind it that's very, very important. And then the sacrifice piece that our mentor Kate talks about all the time is like, sacrifice means that you are making something else sacred. You're giving up letting go of certain things, identities, et cetera, that are making something else more important, more sacred to you. So I would like to hear a little bit more about your journey with Krista and how, how these things like devotion, discipline, and sacrifice played into that experience.
[12:37] Nina Pullella: Yeah, I would say, watching her, I mean, she stepped into that in such a big way for me. I felt like I was just being sort of guided, like the wind was at my back. I was like. There were whispers of like, just do this. Be there for her. Take her to these appointments and, you know, and just be there and support as a friend. But she was the one that was really modeling discipline, devotion, and sacrifice because she completely changed her life to show up for herself and her own healing. She. She changed everything about how she lives and she really fought to live. The food that she ate, adopting spiritual practices, starting a meditation practice. My gosh, the amount of supplements and herbs and the potions and tonics that she was taking, really, really intense. She was in full discipline and devotion to healing her body. And she had a 8 millimeter tumor in her left breast that the doctors gave her three months to live. Or was it six months, something like that? Maybe it was six months to live. And her, her tumor completely resolved in three months, meaning it was gone in three months. So it was an absolutely stunning example of those three ways of showing up for yourself. And disciplined devotion and sacrifice.
[14:11] Valerie Beck: Let's dig a little bit more into that path from Krista to Ayurveda. How did that happen ultimately? Like what happened with Krista and. And what you've learned from that?
[14:24] Nina Pullella: Yeah, yeah. So I started Nina Cucina, as I mentioned, because I saw how difficult it was for someone who was going through what she was going through, her diagnosis and wanting to make a 360 degree change on how she was eating and how she was living. And when I wasn't able to cook for her because I did still have to work. I was only working part time at that time. But when I wasn't there to cook for her, she didn't really know what to do, what to eat. There was nothing available for her that was clean. Really, the food.
[15:00] Valerie Beck: Do you, do you mind sharing actually what that looked like in terms of, like, what does not clean look like? Like, what was she eating before? Because some of us don't really have a concept of like, what does that, what does not eating clean look like? Like, what, what is not available to most of us?
[15:20] Nina Pullella: Yeah, yeah. And I would say, you know, Christa would have said that she was a quote unquote healthy person, you know, that she did eat, quote unquote healthy, but she did not cook for herself. Cooking was not something she grew up doing. It was not something. So she was not, not nourishing herself. But she wasn't eating McDonald's either. I'm not really sure exactly what she was eating, but, uh, I don't think she was very well nourished. Um, but like I said, she wasn't, like, living off of processed foods either. Mm. So there's some subtlety there. Now when I came into the picture, she went mostly plant based. She was following some of these. God, what is it? Like, what is the. There's some, like, really famous cancer people. I can't remember their names, but one's like Christy Beets cancer or something. And a lot of these books were basically saying of, like, going plant based. And so that's what she did. And that just wasn't available. Um, not a lot of, like, whole foods that are made with just really clean ingredients. Organic was really important for her, you know, not having, like, pesticides. Um, so she could just eat as clean and have this, like, vessel that was as pure as possible that would be really strong to not only fight the cancer, but to also withstand chemotherapy and radiation so that she would recover quicker. We also discovered that sugar feeds cancer. That sugar is actually the food that cancer eats. So it's like removing all sugars. And that was. That was a big discovery of, like, realizing how much hidden sugars there are in foods. Especially if you're not the one that's doing the cooking, you don't actually really know what's in your food. Yeah. And then seed oils and things like that. So, yeah, those were more of like, the. The subtleties, I would say, that. That she was going into and realizing that things that look healthy on the surface actually have a lot of hidden ingredients. Yeah.
[17:35] Valerie Beck: Okay. So, yeah. Then to Ayurvedic practitioner.
[17:42] Nina Pullella: Yeah. So I started Nina Cucina and I started cooking. I was like, filling up this grab and go cooler at a local co op because I wanted healthy fast food. Because these were things that Krista could eat. She didn't have to cook it for herself. So it was like pre made, but super clean. I was using, like, the protocol that Krista was. Was using as my foundation of. Of what I was creating and then just making this available to people. So that was the motivation with Nina Cucina and I did Nino Cucina for about a year and a half. I started doing farmer's markets and it was growing and becoming more popular. And it was plant based. It was a plant based business. And then I was like, you know, this is great. I'm helping people eat some healthy meals. But what are they doing outside of you Know, these few meals a week. So then I decided I would do a health coaching program. And in that health coaching program, I found Ayurveda. And after I completed the health coaching program, I was seeing clients for a bit. And then I decided this is great Bio individuality, you know, not one thing is right for everyone. They were really pushing that, that framework. But then I'm like, yeah, but I want to know what is right for people. How do I. Where is there a framework that actually gives me the tools to understand what is right for an individual? And that was when I just. Ayurveda became like the no brainer option. I was like, no, this is, this is it. This is my. This is the next step for me. Yeah.
[19:25] Valerie Beck: So I want to hear a little bit about. You have this idea on prevention, right. Not waiting until a health crisis happens. And you also have also a conviction that women have permission to prioritize themselves. So I want to hear where this comes from because I think this is getting to probably the. The core of the why of things.
[19:53] Nina Pullella: Yeah, yeah. When you watch someone that you love fight for their life, it changes something in you. When someone who has a very beautiful full life like Krista did, she was super cw. She was. She was like this enigma. I mean, she walked into a room and everybody just was grab. Gravitated towards her. She was the brightest light. And she was famous. Like, she was local Hawaii nightlife scene famous. She was a dj.
[20:33] Valerie Beck: She.
[20:34] Nina Pullella: She organized all these. The best parties, the absolute best parties. I mean, and people just loved her so much. And so to watch her go from such a beautiful full life to just. All that mattered was that she lives just this purest form of. Of. Of your. Why is just to. Just to live, just to see another day. Yeah. That's where I'm like, how do we. How did we get here? How did she get here? And how could this have been different? You know, not that I think that her story happened exactly as it needed to because Krista did end up passing years later. And you know, the thing with stage four cancer is that, you know, cancer, it does come and go, right. It's metastasized in your body. So there is no being truly cancer free. Although, you know, people have different stories. And there are plenty of people who are diagnosed with stage four cancer, you know, that are really truly in devotion to being cancer free. But, well, not cancer free. Right. Because stage four. So years, you know, years later, she did pass. And I do think that that this was her. That this was like her life like she did complete the life that she was here to live. She. There was so much healing that happened in that time. Healing of relationships, healing of her mental health, healing of her spirituality. And then she was complete. And it was for those of us who really knew her, as much as we miss her and wish that she was still here with us, there is a part, I think, of us that. Yeah, or at least I should just speak for myself, that I. I knew that it was like we, we could. We could just let her. Her have that completion and, and have that happiness for. For the life that she did live. And at the same time, it really lit a fire under me for prevention because for those of us who that is not our story, what are the small things and big things that we can do now as healthy, vibrant people to stay this way and to live a life, to live our full dharma out to its fullest capacity of what we're here to do. And not only to do it, but to do it with vibrancy and vitality and joy. And that's really where my passion lies, is to help women live out their fullest purpose in their biggest, most radiant, boldest, wildest way. And you need a strong vessel to do that, a strong container. And that's where Ayurveda really shines. It really shines as getting to the root cause, creating balance now before there is imbalance. Yeah. So that's why for me, Ayurveda was. It made sense and it is the framework that I really believe in.
[23:53] Valerie Beck: So I'm going to dig a little bit into the weeds now and maybe we can just have a little bit of an open dialogue. But I actually, when I was reading my notes saying like, prevention, not, not waiting until a health crisis happens. And I. So Krista has a documentary about her journey and it touches upon mental health as well. Not in the depth that I would have liked it to, but it does mention it. And it does mention it in a way where it was getting in the way of her actually wanting to be healthy at some point. I often talk about mental health and I. I really think that mental health is so primary, not only because of my own experience, but, but. And this is the reason why I'm in Ayurveda is because of mental health, but because it, to me, mental health is. Is often overlooked when I see this, like, not waiting until a health crisis. Sometimes I think the health crisis has happened before. The one that we see, like the cancer is one that happened after something else that has already happened because we don't see the inner struggle, we don't see the inner struggle on how that actually alters the way that we one thing about ourselves treat ourselves and then ultimately how that affects our behavior about how we even go about life. So and sometimes when we don't feel good about ourselves, when we don't have self esteem, when we are not, when we don't feel worthy, it leads us to make decisions that reflect that belief and those are not always in our highest good.
[25:44] Nina Pullella: Right.
[25:44] Valerie Beck: We're not going to nourish ourselves in the same way. So with that being said, where do you see mental health playing a role in prevention and, and self nourishment?
[25:57] Nina Pullella: Well, I love it. You're, you're bringing up like a core principle of Ayurveda which is that everything that has manifested in the physical body begins in the energetic body and begins in the mind body. Yeah. So you're, you're really naming something really big here that cancer doesn't actually begin in the body. Right? Yeah. I mean that could be debated potentially. Right. I mean because that cancer is a, a very complex disease. Right. But if we do, if we do understand that everything that has manifested in the physical began in the energetic or in the mental body. Right. We have the koshers in Ayurveda, it really, it really points to exactly this, what you're saying now. It's interesting because, you know, I, Krista was one of my best friends and I did not know that she had depression. I had no idea until I became her caretaker and I was going to these appointments with her and she really started opening up to me. And you know, obviously it's, it was a vulnerable, vulnerable process. I was in a lot of very private rooms with her. And you know, I myself, I don't have experience with, with depression. So this is something that I haven't really actually considered. So I would, I would, I would be really interested to hear your take as an Ayurvedic practitioner and who, someone, someone who comes to Ayurveda from a mental health perspective would like, what is your take on Krista's experience?
[27:46] Valerie Beck: Yeah. And without knowing her full story because I only know her story through a documentary that can spin things in different ways. Right. And so I'm going to speak from a more general perspective than rather her specific story. But there's a pattern of self abandonment that happens not only with cancer patients. I think cancer patients are an extreme example. But you can see it a lot of the time that they're, they might think that they're Doing their very best for themselves or their life. But there's sometimes an unwillingness to stop the momentum of the external whatever's going on, to pause, to check in with what's internally going on. And why I really, like, I emphasize to my clients so much, is that they have to show up for themselves every day, every moment. You should be your own priority every moment. So even if I coach in a group, you're not showing up for other members. That doesn't work. You must first and foremost show up for yourself. There's a. There's a fundamental way of being that's rooted in life. When you can operate from that point, when you can operate from that perspective, when it's all about making other people happy or this, like, external validation, success, even when it comes from a really good place, right? Because a lot of people, they're working hard for their family or the community, making other people priority, seeing other people smile. Sometimes there's this. I hate to say it this way, but it. I've heard enough stories that I know that this is true for people, for some people is that they don't see it possible for themselves, so they're giving it to other people or they don't think that they're worthy of it. So they're doing everything that they can for other people and that will help them feel better. Um, and that can help to a point. Until that pattern, because it's so ingrained, it helps you ignore sometimes that you are starving in a certain way or that, you know, like you have a need that's not met.
[30:23] Nina Pullella: Right?
[30:23] Valerie Beck: We have very basic needs. And in Ayurveda, like, those needs have to be met in order to be healthy. So my interpretation of these three pillars is the food aspect is what you're intaking, like how you're nourishing yourself. It doesn't have to be real food. It can be also like, what you're taking into your senses, what you're listening to, all the stuff, right? All of that is nourishment. Then there's the sleep aspect, which I can expand upon to become like rest, the restoration of your body. How much are you willing to give yourself restoration? And what restoration offers to you is resilience, like a stable foundation, right? This is, this is also a part of keeping your nervous system stable so that your. Your entire system is stable. And then the last part, the Brahmacharya part that sometimes I think gets a little bit misinterpreted is relationship. And it's not just relationship with other people, but it's relationship with yourself and it's a relationship with your environment. It doesn't have to be human. Um, you must be solid in all three areas in order to maintain this foundation of health. So in patients who have very like chronic disease, a lot of the times I know it's because they're either, they're neglecting probably all three. Food is most obvious sometimes actually that you can go and it's actually the most tangible and easy to address because you can go plant based. And there is research in all these things. But when it comes to self esteem and mental health, it's not so well thought out. So it's like, well, why be mentally healthy except to just reach the bare minimum function level. But there's so much more than that actually with mental health because it, it determines your behavior. So how you feel about yourself determines how much rest you're going to give yourself. How you feel about yourself is going to influence how you interact with others, how much you give to others, how much you give to yourself. And over time that compounds and it, and like the effect of what you believe about yourself is exponential and omnipresent. So is it exclusive to cancer? No. Cancer is just one way that this, you know, can manifest. And again, it's not our fault, but it's like we do need to love ourselves. We do need to have that desire to live. But some, for some reason sometimes as people, as human beings, we actually lose instinct. So yeah, I said a lot. So I'd like to hear what, you know, what you heard in that.
[33:29] Nina Pullella: Yeah, you know, the self abandonment piece. I think that really, really nails it for, for where Krista was and, and you know, it's interesting too because I even see that though with clients of mine who are mothers. Right. If we're not, if we like zoom out of just the mental health piece. But you know, it's like this self abandonment from another perspective of just not prioritizing ourselves. So the root can be different. Right. Whether it's mental health or whether it's, you know, motherhood or, or just that I would say culture maybe doesn't give us permission to prioritize ourselves because we live in a culture where we are rewarded for, you know, we do things for others. Be selfless. Yeah. Prioritizing yourself or investing in yourself is, you know, maybe it's just, it's, it's something that we don't really see a lot of people modeling. We don't see maybe like generations, I, I should say before us like our parents, you know, it's something that is newer, I would say, in our generation as we continue to evolve as a species. And yeah, so we don't see it modeled as often, which is this sort of permission when we don't see it model who. Who am I to be investing in myself and to be prioritizing myself and to be saying no and to be going against the flow of culture. You know, it's Christmas, It's Christmas. I need to make the cookies. I need to go to two parties in one day and completely abandon the actual what nature is showing me. And the cycle of nature, which is saying go inward, get quiet, get dark. And yet culture is saying, go out, do more, spend money, be stressed. And then we wonder why we are so sick in January.
[35:45] Valerie Beck: Well, I do want to go back to the mother point and the women point because that is steeped in patriarchal culture. Because if we look at Ayurveda and prenatal care and postnatal care, and if we look at Chinese medicine, pre and postnatal care, the mother is highly, highly protected and nourished during those times. Highly, you know, in your own, like, pretty much like palace of nourishment. Like, you have nurses and you have, you know, there's. There are traditional recipes that support, like, a mother to recover after childbirth, and there's all these special practices, massages and body treatments and things that are just expected for a person to have after they've given birth. Right. In an ideal situation, yes, but.
[36:39] Nina Pullella: Right.
[36:39] Valerie Beck: Like, there's an understanding that this is required, that in our modern society we have a limited amount of maternal leave. And like, you know, and especially in America, like, dads aren't given much time at all either. So that's also blitz into the system. And. And then, I mean, we also have this double, like a. A expectation that we're not only just gonna be great mothers, but we're gonna be great career women and we gotta do it all at the same time. I think that we forget we're human and that more doesn't always equal better either. There has to be like a. There's a good time for everything. And ignoring that, like, I. It does. It works to the detriment of. Of women's health for sure. Because we have this warped view sometimes of. Of what we have to do, what we should do and what we're supposed to do.
[37:35] Nina Pullella: Yeah. And just because we can do it all doesn't mean that we should or that we have to. Yeah. And that's kind of the story that we're Being told right now. Yeah.
[37:44] Valerie Beck: So you did say also this, like, women have permission to prioritize themselves. What do you see as being the barriers to that based on, like, how you've worked with clients, that they're not
[37:55] Nina Pullella: seeing other people given permission. Right. Like, they're. They're not seeing it modeled. I think when we're not in communities where people are having conversations about what is, like, the next. What is like living a life beyond. Beyond our wildest dreams and allowing each other to dream big and to think big and not have to play small and worry about maybe offending someone or knowing you're in conversations with people who just want to complain or. Right. It's like where. Well, when I'm with, you know, my group of friends, we kind of just talk about the things that aren't going well. And that's how, as you know, we do this as women because we're vulnerable. And so when someone else is going through something, we say, okay, well, I'm going to show you that I'm, you know, things aren't great for me either. Let's, you know, sort of be vulnerable together. And then it creates relationships and circles and patterns where we're just kind of sharing how. Yeah. Kind of how things are hard and how I don't have time and I can't sleep and. Oh, geez, you. You only slept five hours. Why? I only slept four hours. And, you know, we're. We're kind of living in a. Maybe a. A culture or our friendship group where it doesn't feel. It wouldn't feel right to just celebrate and to. To share what is working. Because maybe something's, like, really not great for someone and you don't want to be boasting or. Yeah. Making them feel worse about where it is that they are. So I think lacking spaces and communities where we're able to think big and we're encouraging each other and we're celebrating. Because that's where I've gotten the permission is by being and. And mentorship and coaching. Yeah. So it's almost something that we have to, like, create.
[40:07] Valerie Beck: Yeah.
[40:07] Nina Pullella: And maybe we're the leaders. Maybe we're the ones creating it. Or maybe we are seeking. Seeking people out.
[40:14] Valerie Beck: Yeah. To like, okay.
[40:16] Nina Pullella: It's like we're. We're reprogramming our mind, and then we become the people in the conversation where we're leading. Like, no, we're going to shift this dynamic. We're going to talk about what is working or what a life beyond our wildest dreams looks like. And how do we get there?
[40:33] Valerie Beck: Okay, so I got a couple of angles that I want to take this on. I'm going to just throw a bunch of questions at you. You could choose which direction to go first. I want you to talk about the Wild Woman Collective and how. Because as much as we've talked about Ayurveda today, what you're doing with the Wild Woman Collective I think expands beyond that and for a good reason. Right. Many of which you've already talked about today. But what is the Wild Woman Collective and how do you see that being the evolution of what you're able to provide for people? The other part of this question is I want to bring it back to Krista because I want to know how you would see someone like her and how she could have benefited from something like this.
[41:17] Nina Pullella: Yeah, beautiful. Okay, so I'll start with what is the Wild Woman Collective? So Wild Woman Collective is a, it's a one year membership. It's a one year journey that women go on with me, they commit to. It's a one year of learning how to live Ayurveda. Right. My, my company is living Ayurveda because Ayurveda is something that is not just learned, it's something that needs to be applied and it needs to go through seasons and shifts and you know, we kind of fall off and we get back on and things strengthen, habits become non negotiable. We're not doing everything all at once and expecting to be perfect because perfection does not exist and is not real and is not fun at all. So we're like, we're not trying to do things perfectly, but we do need time to integrate. So I have moved from the one on one, like exclusively one on one model into a business model essentially that is community based. And it has proven to be part of the life beyond my wildest dreams because it. We have so much fun together in community. We are, women are supporting each other. It's not just this practitioner, client or patient model. It's like it's a living container where women are inspired by each other, watching each other make a change or a shift or get through a block. And then it inspires others to do it. It gives other people permission, other mothers watching, watching another mother choose themselves and how they're doing it without abandoning their family, without abandoning their child. And I'm taking people on this one year long journey through the seasons because Ayurveda is very much connected to nature and we are nature. And it's a remembering of that of like well, what does that mean? How do I live aligned with nature? How do I live in sync with nature? So people get to experience this through an entire year, through going through all four of the seasons. And we're. I've created core teachings or, like, a curriculum that's based on seven archetypes of the wild woman. And we get together at each of the season changes, and we make herbal medicine together, because a big part of what I am doing is helping women to reconnect with the natural world. And so we do that through the herbs and through the earth and through the subtle, energetic body as well. You know, connecting to the spirit of the plants and the spirit of the land and honoring our ancestors and building altars, you know, and doing this really beautiful, like, earth work as well. And then we have the physical body, the food, and. And our habits, which are so foundational. That's, like, what strengthens that vessel, the chalice that we are as women. And it's like we. We can't hold more. We can't hold our dharma if that is not in integrity. So it's. It's this really beautiful journey. And of course, we do, like, seasonal cleansing as well, which is really important because we're shedding or shedding layers of ourselves, versions of ourselves, and then being really intentional and speaking into the group, into reality, of, like, what is the next thing that we are calling in this next stage of our own level evolution, the woman that we are becoming. And so it's a lot. It's. It's big work, but it's really fun. And we're actually doing a camping trip this weekend, the. Our annual wild collective camping trip. And so it's just. It's. It's just been really, truly, like, beyond my wildest dreams that I get to hold this container. And what would this have been for Krista? Well, she would have seen other women not abandoning themselves, and she would have learned self love before she was forced. I shouldn't say forced, but, you know, before the diagnosis, because after the diagnosis, she learned self love, and that was. That was a big part of her healing process. And why I felt a lot of peace in her story, because I watched her. I watched her come back to herself. I watch her. Watched her. You know, she hadn't spoken to her father in decades, and they got to reunite. You know, he came out here to Hawaii, and there was so much beautiful healing in that. And. And in the end, she did love herself. And I would have loved to have seen that happen, you know, before the sickness. But I think watching other women choose themselves, it really comes back to that permission piece. Having the permission to. To prioritize yourself.
[46:34] Valerie Beck: Yeah, that's really beautiful. And I want to leave it at that today because it's funny, I asked one of my members that graduated recently, what do you think it would take for some of the people that you have been seeing that are along the journey with us to actually embrace themselves? Right. Because I think part of the struggle sometimes is this self love piece. It actually is quite elusive. So you know, what he said is like, I think they need to suffer more. So I want, and he said this with a lot of love. I don't want to, like, it's not like he wants them to suffer, but sometimes we are not willing to see how much we aren't taking care of ourselves. That it takes an aha moment or a wake up call for us to really be able to see that we are in control of our journeys. Like we are able to to an extent. This self love piece is so essential and yet sometimes it's just so hard to grasp. So that's a thinking point. What will it take for you to choose yourself? And so one of the things I do want to leave people with whenever I have these conversations is that this giving permission to self, to prioritize self is always within your grasp. It's always within your capability to say yes or no. But it doesn't mean it's easy. So thank you, Nina, for, for sharing that. I think there's just so much to think about in all of this. You know, we touched upon some things that like, are big statements, right? Like mental health having a role in, in disease and like the health crisis before the health crisis. But at the end of the day, what we really both want is for people to live in their full capacity and to love life and to love themselves. And we're holding space for that. So I hope that if you're out there listening and you are looking to do that, to like step into more of who you are, that you come and talk to us. Because we're here, we're here to hold space for that.
[49:04] Nina Pullella: Yeah.
[49:05] Valerie Beck: So as a closing, Nina, do you have any last thoughts and where can we find you?
[49:10] Nina Pullella: Yeah. Oh, well, let's see. Any last thoughts? I just think that, you know, part of my as, as our mentor Kate would say, fractal is like, how do we make things fun? I love to make things really fun. And it's like, how can you make this fun? Like, this doesn't have to be daunting and again, this like, idea of perfectionism, I think really gets in the way of that. But it's like, how could you make, I don't know, showing up for yourself a little bit more actually fun and find joy in that and even just in the sense of, like, shifting into a sense of joy is healing, you know, like spontaneous dance, whatever that might be like living a life, you know, living Ayurveda, all of this. It's like, it doesn't have to be perfect. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that that's something that I. That people are, when they're in my community, they're a bit surprised to hear me say because they think I attract a lot of Pittas. So these are people who have perfectionist tendency. It's like fire sees fire, fire's drawn to fire. And it's something that I say over and over and over again. And I can see people first that I'm a little bit surprised, and then they just relax, like, oh, I don't have to be perfect. No, that's so boring. Right. So that's what I would just take leave with people. So to think about in their life. And then how do you find me? Well, I am living Ayurveda Hawaii on Instagram and my website is living ayurvedahawaii.com. yeah. And I'm. I've been showing up a bit more on social media, so. So you can find me there.
[51:07] Valerie Beck: Amazing. Well, thank you, Nina, today for joining me in this conversation and for telling your story.
[51:15] Nina Pullella: Yeah, yeah, thanks, Val. It's really nice and it's. It's really fun to get to honor Krista and get to tell her story.
[51:24] Valerie Beck: Absolutely.
[51:25] Nina Pullella: So thank you.
[51:28] Valerie Beck: Thank you for tuning in to from the Ashes. If what we talked about today resonates, if it feels on point with something you've been ruminating on by yourself, that's exactly why I'm here. From the Ashes exists for people who are tired of protecting, pretending life is fine and are ready to explore what it takes to truly embrace the road to who they really are. Every conversation is an honest, unfiltered account of someone's real life and the path they're walking toward. A life they actually align with. If you want to explore this further for yourself, come join me in my vibrant visionary newsletter. It's a bi weekly letter filled with the reflections, podcast updates and what I'm contemplating between episodes. You can find the link in the show notes below. Thank you so much and I'll see you next time.
