Living With Purpose: Timeless Wisdom for a More Meaningful Life
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Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. I don't think I've ever told you this crazy story about this experience that I had with an owl. And I'm talking like a wild animal owl, not going to the zoo or somewhere else and having a spiritual experience with an owl. I had a life-changing experience with a wild animal.

It happened almost a year ago to the date today. And I've been thinking a lot about it because the story is not only amazing because of what happened, but it's amazing because of how it impacted me and my marriage and my husband and my family for an entire year. And I've thought a lot about it. And there are five ways, five lessons, five pieces of wisdom that the whole experience taught me.

And so today it is story time on the Mel Robbins podcast. I want you to grab your coffee or your tea. We are dropping the wisdom thanks to this owl. I cannot wait to tell you the story. Let's get into it. Amika is an incredible sponsor of the Mel Robbins podcast, and they are also our exclusive insurance partner.

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Hey, it's your friend Mel, and welcome to the Mel Robbins Podcast. I am so fired up for story time today because I have one heck of a story to tell you about something that happened to me a year ago, almost to the day.

involving an owl. And I'm going to get to that in just a minute. But first, I want to welcome you to the Mel Robbins podcast, particularly if you are brand new. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to something that could make you happier, help you improve your life. That is exactly what this story about the owl is going to help you do. You're going to love this. It is going to give you chills. It is going to make you think. It's going to give you specific things that you can do in order to enrich your experience.

I kind of can't believe I haven't told you this full story before because this has been a huge deal in my life ever since it happened a year ago. It was so impactful. It's almost like I've become the owl lady, like obsessed with owls, but I'm getting a little bit ahead of myself. So here's how this whole thing started. It was my 27th wedding anniversary and my husband, Christopher, and I went out to dinner

We drove about 45 minutes from where we live in Southern Vermont. We went to this really nice restaurant. We had a date. It was really fun. We get back in the car. And as we get back in the car, now we're going to drive 45 minutes back home. It's starting to get dark. And not only is it starting to get dark, but the rainstorm looks like it's coming. And so we get in the car, we start driving, we put on the music, the sun is setting and the rain is picking up.

So we got about a 45 minute drive on the back windy roads through Southern Vermont to get back to our house. And it is pouring rain and it's pitch black. It's the kind of eerie rainstorm where it is dark, dark.

I mean, if you turned off your headlights, there would be no moon. There would be no stars. You would not be able to see the hand in front of your face dark. Plus, it is raining. And it's not just like the sprinkle raining. It's like, and your windshield wipers are, and it's almost like they're not even making a difference.

And so here we are, we're driving really slow because obviously hydroplaning, and we are coming around a corner and up and down the hills and we're up and down the road and up in the mountains. And luckily there is a car in front of us because can we agree?

Isn't it helpful when there's a car right in front of you in a dark rainstorm, you can track their taillights so you know what is right in front of you, even though you can't kind of see in front of you. And so we're all just kind of inching along. And by all, I mean the two of us, because we are in the middle of nowhere in Southern Vermont. So we come around this corner and we are coming down this hill, right?

And we can see the car in front of us. We see their taillights. The rain is coming down. And up ahead on the other side of the road, I see headlights coming. And you can kind of tell based on how far they are that as we are descending down this hill and they are coming from the other direction, we're going to kind of meet and pass one another as we get to the flat part at the bottom of the hill.

So we're going along and the rain's coming down and windshield wipers are going and the red taillights are our North Star. And I see this just flash of whiteness up ahead of the car that we're following. It's like this giant white out of nowhere from the top right side, just flying down toward the road.

And that oncoming car is now right there upon us. And it hits this white thing and the thing goes tumbling. And I realized, oh my God, that was a bird. And I yell, Chris, Chris, stop, stop, stop. And he pulls over the car and the car that we had been following just keeps going.

That car is not the car that hit the bird. The car that was coming, the oncoming traffic is what hit this bird. And there was a car behind us. And so Chris pulls off and it was so just eerie. Like, I don't know if you're into things like the Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter or Game of Thrones.

But those scenes where it's super dark and the light is somehow there and the rain is falling and I'm in heels and a dress because I've dressed up for Chris. I don't wear this stuff in Vermont, but for some reason I am wearing this tonight.

That doesn't stop me because I just have this like first responder syndrome thing in me where if somebody's hurt or some animals hurt, I'm like first on the scene. And so I've yelled at Chris, we've pulled over, the other car is gone. The car that has hit this thing has now pulled off and the rain is coming down. But here's the craziest part. Our headlights are beaming through the rain.

So if you can imagine a scene in a movie where the raindrops, every single one of them is backlit by these headlights and a car pulls up behind us and I hold up my hand and stop. I don't even know what the person is hit at this point. I just know I'm out of the car and I'm into the rain in my high heels and I am stopping traffic and I am lit in this rainstorm by the headlights.

And so I clomp, clomp, clomp, clomp, clomp through all the puddles and the pouring rain over to this mass of feathers. And it is a huge adult barred owl. And its wings are spread open. And this thing must have had a wingspan like three and a half feet long.

maybe even four, like it was huge. And it was just splayed out there, the poor thing. And the rain is coming down and you can tell that one wing is open the correct way and the other wing is flipped backwards. And you just know, oh, that is not supposed to look like that. And the bird is perfectly still and the,

I just crouched down over it. I literally step on either side of this thing and I crouched down over it and the rain is coming down and the headlights are lighting me up from behind. And at that exact moment, this owl who had been face down turns its head slowly around and it is now staring at me eye to eye.

It was as if Gandalf the wizard was like, it was the craziest experience of my life. I had this one-on-one eye lock moment with a wild owl in a rainstorm on the evening of my 27th wedding anniversary. And I just stood there

And had this eye to eye intimate moment. I could tell this poor thing was in such a state of shock, but there was just this shroud of mystery and majesty to the moment. And I was in a trance. Like, like if you would have told me in that moment, Mel, this owl is here to tell you that you have wings.

Girl, just sprout them out, start flapping. I would have been convinced that that messenger in that owl was to tell me that I had angel wings and it was time to flap. Like it was that incredible of an experience. And, you know, I have to say, as I've reflected on this, if this had happened during the daytime, I'm not sure it would have had the mystery and the magical nature, but there was something about the rainstorm

And the fact that darkness was everywhere and the headlights created this just dramatic other world experience. And if you had told me that I spent two hours crouched in my high heels, dripping wet, staring into the eyes of that owl, I would have, I would believe you because it was that kind of experience where time just froze. Have you ever had an experience like that?

where everything around you just disappears and you are in that moment frozen. It was incredible. I will remember that moment for the rest of my life. Those few seconds felt like years.

And the only thing that brought me out of it, because that owl and I, man, we were not going to break eye contact. You get a chance to really have that kind of intimacy with an owl or a wild animal, you do not look away. It's like the most primal staring contest you could ever be in. And I was trying to communicate through my eyes, you're going to be okay, buddy. You're going to be okay, buddy. We're going to take care of you. You're going to be okay. And

What happened next is all of a sudden I felt the presence of other human beings behind me. And thankfully, the other driver and Chris had gotten out of their cars and the other driver yelled, hey, I've got a huge beach towel in my car.

It didn't even occur to me that I needed something to pick this owl up. I mean, like I was in full on mother earth mode about to scoop this thing up in my arms and take it to the hospital. Didn't even occur to me. This thing has a beak that could shred your jugular, Mel. It's got talons that could rip open your arms. You do not want to pick this thing up. I was about to scoop it up, but this guy's like, I got a towel.

So he runs back to his truck and he comes running back and he has this bright blue, aqua colored Caribbean blue, big old beach towel.

And without even thinking, I just dropped that beach towel on top of this bird and I scooped it up as carefully as I could. And this guy from the truck behind us helped me just as best we could tuck that poor broken wing up and underneath it. And dear God, I hope I didn't hurt that bird further because we just wanted to get it to safety. And next thing you know,

I'm sitting in the front seat of our truck holding a wild barred owl in my arms wrapped in an aqua Caribbean blue beach towel. Unbelievable. And I kind of look at Chris and

And I'm like, can you believe this? Can you believe this is happening on our anniversary? This is like a message from God or the universe. This is unbelievable. And I haven't even told you the fact that our family are crazy Harry Potter fans. And by crazy, I mean, I bet we have watched the entire Harry Potter series probably nine times as a family from movie number one all the way to the end. When our kids were little, Chris read the Harry Potter series to our kids every

every single night of their lives. Like this, I have always wanted a hedge wig. I have always wanted an owl. And now I have got this like two foot tall barred owl wrapped in my arms. And if you think about Harry Potter or any fantasy novel, owls are messengers. They go between the human world called the muggles in Harry Potter and the wizard world.

They carry messages. And so I was convinced as I sat there in the front seat of the car, this was a message. I mean, this is no accident. This is happening on our 27th wedding anniversary, which we have just celebrated. And all of a sudden, out of nowhere, this magical, incredible bird is hit in front of our eyes and we're the ones who are rescuing it. It clearly has to have a message for us, right?

And so I wrap it up and, you know, Chris is so adorable. I've got my arms squeezing this thing, but not too tight. You know, I don't want to hurt the thing anymore. And then I'm also starting to think, did I wrap its talons in this towel or are they sitting against my skirt right now, ready to go? And Chris like reaches over carefully and grabs the seatbelt and pulls it out extra wide to click it in so that the owl and I are safe and off we go, which presents a problem.

what the hell are we going to do with this bird? I mean, it's not like I am a certified animal rescue responder. It's not like I know anything about how to rehabilitate an animal. And so I say to Chris, dude, we got to figure out we're going to take this bird. Like you don't take a bird like this to the pound. What do you do?

And so Chris goes, oh, I know. We should call Dr. Bob. Dr. Bob is the world's most amazing vet. He is our vet here in Southern Vermont. We love Dr. Bob. And so we call the after hours service because we think Dr. Bob, been a vet in Southern Vermont forever. He is going to know exactly what to do. And so we get the after hours service and now we're driving. And of course, I'm holding this thing like a newborn. And so as Chris is driving, I'm like, be careful. Like what's going on?

Be careful with the bumping. Chris is like, okay, I got it. I got it. I'm doing the best that I can here. And so we get the after hours service and I got to give a huge shout out to Dr. Bob. Dr. Bob called us back five minutes later and he had this great calm voice.

Hey guys, what's up? It's like 9.30 at night. Hey guys, what's up? I'm like, Dr. Bob, we have just found this barred owl that was hit by a car. And he's like, oh wow, like that's a really special thing. Thank you for rescuing it. And he immediately knew what to do.

He told us to call this organization called VINS, which is the Vermont Institute of Natural Sciences. They specialize in this. They're about an hour and a half from us up in Woodstock. And so we call their after-hours service. And there was no one available. So I'm then with one hand as I'm holding the owl, I am Googling what to do.

And I find all of these videos about how you are supposed to keep an animal safe, like an owl or a bird, when you find one injured in the wild. And so we mainline these videos as Chris is carefully driving and I'm holding this barred owl in my lap as my own personal messenger from the universe and God and the magical kingdom. And I just can't help it. I mean, this is not like a fly has hit your windshield.

This is a big freaking spiritual deal. And so we get home and what I have learned on the drive home by watching these videos online is that the best thing to do is to put the owl in something like a laundry basket because it has holes in it and it is a safe container.

And we happen to have a nice size laundry basket, just like you probably do. Shout out to the big container stores that sell these things. And so Chris runs upstairs and we get there. And now meanwhile, the kids are all home. So they come downstairs and I'm holding this thing in the front seat. They're like, oh my God. And it's blinking and it is fully present in the moment.

And, you know, people, what should we name it? I'm like, well, we're not keeping it. We can't name it anything. Like this is, this is like this incredible thing that's happening. And so now we've got five of us all shouted, like, okay, let's get the thing. Let's put it in dad's tractor barn. Cause Chris has this barn where his tractor is and where he does his woodworking stuff. And so we put the, the, the laundry basket out there and I'm now holding this thing.

And we're walking it again through the rain over to the little barn. Keep the dogs away. Get the dogs out of here. I don't want the dogs to make a thing. And we turn on the lights and we gently set the owl into the basket. And then we all stand there and look at the owl and it's looking up at us. And it's just one of these giant moments. I mean, it's pretty unbelievable.

to be that close to a wild animal. No fence in between you, no distance. And it was so still. And we all just stood there and looked at this owl. And oh my God, its poor wing. I mean, it was just like its right shoulder was just like two inches lower than the other side. And its wing was just hanging there. It was so sad.

And I was like, God, should I take the towel out? Do I leave the towel in? And Chris is like, I don't think the hell cares about the towel right now. I think we should just let it be. And so we put a piece of plywood over the top as the video from the certified rescue people showed us to do. And then we turned off the lights and we went inside. And I'll tell you what, I did not sleep a wink. If you've ever bought a new puppy home or a newborn home, you do not sleep that first night.

You lie awake and you go, uh-oh, are they okay? Are they going to make it? Are they going to, like, how is this going to work? And I remember getting up that next morning and just having this heaviness in my heart. Is that owl going to be alive? Oh my God, dear God, I will give anything for this poor owl to be alive. Please, please, dear God, let this owl be alive.

And so first thing in the morning, Chris and I go out there and if you've ever had an experience like this, you don't run. You kind of walk slowly because you have this sense that maybe it's not going to have made it, that maybe it's not going to be okay. And so we open up the barn door and I walk over to the laundry basket and I don't see any movement at all. And I'm kind of scared.

that it didn't make it. And so I carefully lift up the plywood because I'm also nervous that maybe it did. And maybe it's going to use that one wing and flap out and attack us all. Like, I don't know what's going to happen. This is a wild animal for crying out loud. And so I lift up the lid and there he is, just looks right up at me, still, I'm sure in a massive state of shock.

And I take a giant exhale. Oh my gosh, it made it. And that morning was a blast because we told everybody that we found an owl and owl got hit. And so our friends came over and they all looked at the owl. And, you know, we allowed people to take, you know, like you could lift it up a little, take a photo and we're going to leave it for an hour. And we had about four hours with the owl in that barn before the volunteers from VINZ showed up.

And when the volunteers from VINS showed up, it was sad. I didn't want the owl to leave. It was really sad. I had grown so attached to this thing. I felt like there was a message in this and I didn't know what it meant. What was this owl trying to tell me? Because this stuff does not happen by accident.

Dear owl, before they take you away to the rehabilitation center where you will live happily ever after with all your other owl friends that got rehabilitated and I will come visit you forever. What is the message? That is what every single spirit person, guide person, you know, of course, because I went on a crazy spiral on Google searching for what does an owl mean? What is the meaning of an owl? What is a spirit animal of an owl? And owls are messengers.

Owls usher in change. And so I'm sitting there as they're packing this owl up and, oh, wow, that looks like a broken clavicle. That's a really bad injury. Oh boy. Like in there. And I'm like, oh no. And I'm like, can I check on the owl? How am I going to check? You just tell them that it was an owl rescued on this date. This is a barred owl. We think it's a male. You can call, you can check in on your owl. That made me feel a little bit better, but they pack that owl up.

They put him in the back of a Subaru and off he went. And if you're wondering what happened to that owl, and if you're wondering, well, what was the message, Mel? What did you learn? I'm going to tell you in just a minute. I need to take a quick pause to hear a word from our sponsors. And when we come back, I'm going to tell you what happened to that owl. And I'm also going to share with you the five things. I don't know if this is wisdom or lessons or...

wisdom about life that I learned in the last year from this experience rescuing this owl. Stay with me.

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Welcome back. It's your friend, Mel Robbins. You can call me the owl lady because the story that I'm telling you right now that happened almost a year ago to the day on my 27th wedding anniversary where my husband and I saw a barred owl. It turns out what was happening is the barred owl was up in the trees in the dark. And the cool thing about owls is they see in the dark.

And the other cool thing about owls is they are silent flyers. Their feathers are super unique. You cannot hear them fly. And we're going to get into that in a little bit. But this owl was probably perched up on a tree. That's how they hunt. And they can see through the dark. And I guarantee you,

it saw a frog or a mouse or something about to scurry across the road. Because now that I've gone back and thought about this moment over and over and over again, as we were getting to the point where there was a dip at the bottom of the hill, I remember seeing right before this white flush, I remember seeing out of the corner of my eye, this tiny little hopping thing

that was going from our side, crossing over into the other. An interesting fact about owls, which I have recently learned in the last year having rescued one, is that their eyes don't move. They're fixed. The reason why an owl's head can go 270 degrees, they've got twice the amount of bones that you and I have in our necks, is because they move their necks as a way to move their eyes.

See, when that owl up in that tree saw that little thing hopping across the road, it locked its eyes on that little mouse. And once the eyes are locked on the mouse, it takes flight silently because it is a deadly predator, man. It is flying down to snatch that mouse. And if it were to have to move its neck all around and move its eyes to track the mouse as it's moving, it would cause it...

to make sounds as it's flying. And so it can stay stealth and just move its neck to track the mouse, which is probably why it didn't see the freaking car that was coming. Because it came out of nowhere and swooped down because its freaking neck and its eyes were locked on that mouse, not everything else going on around it. And that's when it got hit.

So what happened? What happened to the owl? I was so curious, especially in those days. I was like, you know, a mom that sent her kid away to camp or was waiting to hear from the doctors how the surgery went. And I kept calling and calling. And finally, three days later, I speak to someone on the phone. The owl didn't make it. I was crushed.

I was so devastated. In those three days where I was waiting like an anxious parent to hear what the doctors were going to say about this surgery, I had concocted this entire fantasy of my owl, my owl, living happily ever after up at Vins and us being able to go once a year and visit the owl and meet the owl friends. And I just had this whole fantasy in my mind.

They explained the nature of the injury, how devastating it was. I was kind of angry. I was like, are you kidding me? With today's technology, you can't just amputate that wing and kind of wrap them up and let them have a one wing life. I mean, I know that's selfish of me. They did the right thing by the owl. But I think had the owl lived, my...

last year would have gone an entirely different trajectory because there was something about learning that the owl died that sent our family into, I don't know, it just triggered this...

incredible obsession for our family with owls. I mean, I've always loved owls, absolutely loved owls, but this experience took it to a whole new level. I mean, first of all, what did we do? We bought as many books as we could. We learned as much as we could about owls. They're absolutely unbelievable. We signed up, uh,

For Christmas, everybody got a little like owl statue put into their stocking. We gave Chris a book all about owl nests and how you build a quote, owl house. If you ever want to build an owl house, which is something that our family has done together, it is a three foot high plywood birdhouse with a huge opening on one side that took

Chris and our daughter Sawyer an entire weekend to build. And then you know what they had to do? They had to drag an extension ladder, like the kind of ladder that you see people using to clear out the gutters on a house, all the way through the woods on the mountain that we live on, up into the woods and up against a tree. And then Chris had to haul this thing that weighed like 40 pounds up, like 25 feet, and hang this thing up. Why?

Because we're obsessed with owls. Like we became that family. And I haven't even told you the fact that my husband's name is Christopher Robbins, as in Winnie the Pooh. And who is one of Christopher Robbins' friends? Owl. Where does Christopher Robbins and Pooh and Tigger and Piglet go to get advice? Owl's house.

And so we started as a family going, maybe we should name our house Owl's House. Like it became this whole thing. And then just a couple months ago, as it was turning into spring, we signed up and went on an owl walk. And that brings me to one of the first owl objects that we bought. Oh my God, this thing is so heavy because if you're... Oh my God. If you're watching on YouTube, you can see this.

But if you're listening, I'm going to describe this. I'm going to move this over real quick because it's a little too close to me. Okay. All right. You hear that dragging? That is probably a 20-pound cement owl statue.

which is one of the first objects that we bought to signify that you are now at the owl house. And this sucker right here sits on the front porch greeting you when you come into our home. And it's like,

It just took off from there, no pun intended. We wanted to just be around owls. I guess because we couldn't go visit our owl, we wanted to be able to be around other owls. And so the next thing that we did that was pretty impactful is we signed up for an owl walk at a local state park.

that also has this great education center. And we go on this owl walk with a bunch of other people. And if I'm being honest, I'm like, I don't want other people in my owl experience, but I learned a lot there. And this takes me to the first thing that this experience with an owl taught me in my life. And that is look up, look up. If an owl's entire spiritual message is wisdom,

that it's here to be a symbol of change. One change that I have made in my life that has made a huge difference thanks to this owl is looking up. You cannot see an owl out in the wild if you're looking down. In order to spot one, you've got to keep your eyes up and you scan the canopy and you look for something that's like a foot or so tall that's sort of shadowy. That's how you find them.

And isn't it true that in life, you need to look up more? You spend so much of your time, and so do I, looking at your phone, looking at a computer. When you're walking, you're looking at the ground or you're looking at the phone. There is so much to see, so much magic, and you're missing it if you don't look up from your phone, if you don't look around when you're outside.

And that's the first thing that I've learned from this experience with A.L. Because now whenever I'm out in the woods, and look, it's great that I'm just getting out in the woods and I'm hiking. But before this experience, you know what I was doing? I would be out there hiking. It'd be quiet for the first 10 minutes. And then I'm like, oh, I should make a video for everyone while I'm hiking. Or I'd be like texting somebody or I'd be listening to an audio book. No, my phone is in my fanny pack now. I...

which is a whole nother problem because the dog treats are in there too. And so you got to have them in the back pocket of the fanny pack, but I digress. But I now go on hikes and I'm scanning all the time, looking. And that brings me to the second thing that's so cool about owls and what this experience taught me. Open yourself up to magic. When I go out into the woods now, I expect to see an owl.

I am opening myself up to magic. Now, I almost never see one. I have seen one owl in the wild since I had the experience a year ago on my 27th anniversary. That's how elusive they are.

But I'll tell you what, every single time I am out in the woods, every single time I step outside at night here in Southern Vermont and I hear the barred owls up on the mountain go, who cooks for you? Who cooks for you? I'm like, they're right here. They're right here. Okay, I'm going to open myself up to magic. Something magical is going to happen. And when you look for something in life, the world has an amazing way of showing it to you. And even though I...

Have only seen one owl in the wild since I've been looking every day and opening myself up to magic. Holy cow. My husband, Chris, has opened himself up to magic. He's looking for owls. Our family kind of believes he's become an owl. The man is an owl whisperer.

He steps outside at dusk and it's like they can sense him. They start calling to him. I don't know if he smells musky and the chicks are out there like, who cooks for you? Christopher Robbins around. Like, I don't know what it is, but he had this crazy experience the other day. He sees owls all the time.

And so he steps down on this hike that we do on this mountain that we live on, where he's coming up close to our house. And all of a sudden he sees a barred owl like 10 feet from him sitting right there in the tree. And he looks the barred owl in the eye, just like I did a year ago, almost to the day and has this whole experience. And then all of a sudden, check this out. That owl starts to call.

And there's another owl that starts to respond. And he's standing there as they're talking to each other. And then all of a sudden, the one that he's looking at spreads its wings and flies to another tree. And then guess what else happens? The other one spreads its wings, flies back to the branch where the other one was. And now it's staring at Chris. I can't make this up.

I was so freaking jealous. Like he's literally getting these experiences that are insane.

He's drawing them to him. I just, it's not happening for me, but I'll tell you what, it is going to happen for me because I am opening myself up to that kind of magic too. And you should too, because if you expect it and you keep looking up and you put out that energy, you will draw it to you. I know this to be true in my bones. And in fact, I was so curious about the fact that Chris just has this connection.

that I, of course, asked a psychic to tell me what is the meaning of this thing that happened on our 27th wedding anniversary. And so I want you to hear what the world-acclaimed psychic Kim Rousseau had to say about this experience of rescuing this owl on the night of our 27th anniversary. So, as you know, owls represent wisdom, right?

That's what I keep hearing as you're telling me this. Wisdom, wisdom, higher wisdom too. That's why an owl can turn its head. It sees everything. It's like a 360 view and aerial view and bigger picture. I think it's very representative. And I mean, bravo to you for doing what you did. Many people might not have done that, but it's your car was targeted and you

There's just, I take it as there's this new, especially what you just said about Chris and this new chapter opening up of the higher wisdom coming in, maybe with him, maybe with you, maybe with both of you. But I definitely feel something is a new chapter regarding, I guess, everything we're speaking about today with you and Chris. I'll tell you what, she was not wrong.

She was not wrong. This year has been the year that Chris has just taken flight. He's in the final year of his master's in spiritual psychology. Hello, Al Wisdom. He, as you probably already know, leads men's retreats, these retreats that he created called Soul Degree.

Unfortunately, they're all sold out this year. So, you know, you can check it out at soldegree.com. Those are incredible. He has also gone on this year to become certified as a death doula because he wants to sit with people near the end of their lives and help them make sense of their lives and really move through this transition of change in a powerful way. And he has become certified in holotropic breathwork.

which is basically breathing. You just breathe, he says. I've done one thing that he led that was unbelievable. You have this out-of-body experience simply using your breath. And Chris went away to this weekend certification course. And when he came back and shared with the family, wait till you freaking hear this.

He did this holotropic meditation led by these instructors for three hours. And apparently the instructor said that for two of the hours, Chris was literally flapping his arms and flying during this. I don't know if it sounds like that. Eyes closed, eye mask on. And Chris's experience was that he was an owl.

that he had this spiritual experience of embodying an owl in flight. And I'll tell you what, that dude is the wise owl in our family. I was joking the other day with our daughters and just last night, in fact, and

Kendall, who lives in Los Angeles, had FaceTimed us and she and Sawyer were reflecting, they're 25 and 24, on just how amazing dad's been. And sometimes when I hear that, I'm like, that's great, but what about me? And so they are reflecting on how dad's been great. And Kendall's telling the story that she had talked to him that morning and he was just fantastic.

She's been really struggling with her ADHD and anxiety, and we're trying to find her a psychiatrist, which, as you know, can be very difficult to sort all that stuff out. And she's also a singer-songwriter, and so Chris has a business meeting with her once a week to talk to her.

budgets and goals. And she just kind of reflected, I just, he's just so calm and so wise. And I'm so crazy. I don't know how the heck he stays so calm. And I'm like, Kendall, you can thank me because he's had to put up with this crazy for 30 years. So I've been training him for this moment to help you. Of course, I have to insert myself. But I say that because when you're really interested in something, and when you open yourself up to magic like this, I don't think we have a clue as human beings what we're capable of tapping into.

I don't think we give ourselves enough credit in terms of what's available to you as a deeper, more meaningful experience in your life. That you're not just existing on the surface, walking around with your to-do list. That there's something so much deeper going on inside of you that connects you to the universe and to other people in a much more magical way. You know, here's how you can use that in your life.

I was talking to Oakley the other day. He's off in his freshman year of college and simply waking up in the morning and saying, I'm going to meet somebody cool today. I'm going to discover something really cool today. I'm going to have a great experience today. I'm going to have a good day. Opening yourself up to that magic that life has to offer means you're calling it in. And it also means that you are focusing your own perspective.

on something cool happening, which means it's a bazillion times more likely that something cool will happen. And this feels like a good time for me to take a quick break. So don't you go anywhere. In fact, I want you to share this with somebody that you love because I think they're going to love this story as much as you are. And I know you're going to love the remaining lessons that that owl that I rescued taught me. I'll be waiting for you after the short break. Stay with me.

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Welcome back, it's your friend Mel. I am so excited and happy that you and I are spending time together today and I love telling you this story. Like I'm even getting more out of the experience by sharing it in detail with you. I love, love, love that and I hope you're loving this as much as I am because we got more lessons and that brings me to the third thing that I've learned through this whole experience.

So in researching owls, one of the things that I've discovered based on people who kind of, I don't even know if it's a field of study of spirit animals or what it is or the meaning of animals, but I love this kind of stuff, that owls are not only a messenger of change, but they are a messenger of wisdom.

And I've thought a lot about that because I think when you really think about an owl, and a lot of people really feel this affinity toward an owl and toward the wisdom of an owl and the majesty of an owl. But I've thought a lot about what that means, that they are the messenger of wisdom. And if we go back to my love of Harry Potter, owls are always bringing in messages. They are going between the spiritual world and the human world.

And what I all of a sudden realized is, wait a minute, what if the owl, Mel, wasn't the symbol of wisdom? What if this owl was trying to teach you the life-changing magic of gaining wisdom? Because as I reflect back on this last year and the fact that our family leaned in hard on the whole owl thing, right? Like we went all in.

What was happening is by leaning in and learning more, what are we gaining? Wisdom. And absolutely everything that we learned about the owl made life feel richer.

You are designed to learn for your entire life. Your brain can create new neural pathways until the day you die. You're designed to be curious. And I think one of the things that has been a real gift this year is having a subject that our family is interested in is what makes life interesting. You know, there's that saying about people that if you want to be interesting, be interested in other people.

I'm going to add, if you want your life to be interesting, find something that you're interested in and learn as much as you can about it. Because the pursuit of knowledge, the pursuit of wisdom, activating your curiosity brings just this depth to your life. I could sit here right now and tell you,

So much about owls. I'm like a walking Wikipedia about owls at this point. And I'll just say half of it's probably wrong. I don't care. It's enriching my life. Like, for example, I've learned that something I didn't know about owls, that they tend to nest, at least the barred owls do, in...

trees that are abandoned, meaning like the top is falled off and there's a rotted out center or they make their nests in holes in a tree. And that even the trees that fall and the kind of dead decay, that's where chipmunks and mice and all these other animals have their habitats.

And so it's super important. All this stuff where I used to walk through the woods, I'd be like, I wish somebody would clean this up, you know, because I want the woods to be as pristine as I want my kitchen counters to look and, you know, do, do, do, do, do everything. When I started looking up and I started opening myself up to the magic, I want to see an owl. I want to see an owl. Holy cow.

It changed everything because now I see something so much bigger around the woods around us. Don't you dare cut down that dead tree because there's a hole in the top of it. There could be an owl family in there. And that rotting thing with moss growing all over it, all the chippers are underneath there. And that owl needs those chippers. Leaning in is so important. I was talking with my friend Amy about this, who's one of the senior producers on the show. And she was saying, you know, my husband did that.

He decided to not just watch soccer, but to get super interested in it, to become wise about it. And how much richer of an experience does he have now watching soccer? And then I contrast that with my experience of watching our daughters play lacrosse for like nine years. I wasn't interested in lacrosse. I was interested in watching my daughters play lacrosse, but I didn't tap into the wisdom of it.

I still don't know what all the positions are. I still don't know why they're blowing the whistle half the time and what the foul is. Why? Because I didn't make life interesting by being interested. This is available to you. I can come up with a bazillion examples of this. I grew up in Western Michigan in a town called North Muskegon. Muskegon is the headquarters of the billiards company, Brunswick.

And my dad, when we moved to Muskegon, probably because one of the ways he made side money in college and medical school was by hustling pool. He loves pool. He's a phenomenal pool player. Do not ever take a game with my father and definitely do not put money on it because he will smoke you. So he became very interested in

the history of billiards because of where we lived. And now he has become a billiards collector. When you walk up to the room above our garage in North Muskegon, Michigan, it is like the American Museum of Billiards History. There's an antique pool table. There are five antique pool racks with cues. I was just home a couple of weeks ago and he pulls one out and he's rolling it on the table. And he's like, you know,

When mom and I die, you better make sure you get somebody who knows what they're doing to come in here and appraise this. This pool cue is worth $11,000. I'm like, what? Does mom know you spent that much money on that thing? So I'm telling you this because being interested in something makes your life interesting. And it also makes you interesting. And it's not just the owl that symbolizes wisdom.

but that wisdom itself is something that's available to you if you lean into it. And that brings me to the fourth lesson, and that's a warning. You gotta be very careful when you become interested in something because it goes so fast from something that is magical and meaningful and that is making you wiser to something

a bunch of garbage all over your house. I got to tell you, I went from loving owls to becoming the outlady.

It started with the 20-pound cement statue that we put on the entryway to mark that this is now the Owl House. And then it moved to, I've got show and tell for those of you on YouTube, but I'm going to describe it as you're listening, because we've gone crazy. Like, if you go from liking something to all of a sudden it's now everywhere in your house, this is a problem. So we have puzzles. So let me just show you some of the things.

You will now see there are little owl statues. I'm holding one right now that are all over our house. Anything we buy that has an owl on it. It's like I feel obligated to buy this thing. We're a puzzle family. I love Liberty Puzzles. It has an owl. Oh, you're coming home with us. We actually have two puzzles that have owls. Swim trunks. My husband has swim trunks that have owls all over them. Socks. Owl always love you. And

I knew that I jumped the shark on this just a couple days ago. Because a couple days ago, we were coming back from dropping our son off at college.

And I went to see a friend and her store. And whenever I go and I see a retail store or a restaurant that a friend of mine has started, I love to support them. I love to buy something. And so, of course, I walk in. There's thousands of incredible things I could buy at Addison West in Middlebury, Vermont. But you know what I bought? The Albel.

The owl bowl. This now sits on the kitchen with the puzzles and the statues and the mugs. I have said to the family, no more owl stuff. You know that it's a problem when other people then start to buy you objects based on your interest.

Please do not do that with me. If you are listening to this and you had that like moment where you're like, oh, I should send Mel an owl sweatshirt. Oh, I should send Mel that. Do not do it. And I'm going to tell you why. There is a huge difference between having something that is an experience that has meaning for you and then turning it into clutter in your house. And what I've come to realize is that one or two things

is very symbolic and ceremonial. But when you start crossing into the dozen things and the socks and the napkins and the mugs and the bowls and the objects and it's on your clothing, you're diluting the meaning behind this thing. If you're a collector, great. But if you want to concentrate the meaning of something in your life, just have one or two things. Just one or two things.

And so I declare official moratorium on owl objects for the Robbins family. And that brings me to the final thing that I've learned about this whole thing. Life is not about objects. It's about experiences. You're never going to see a Hertz driving to a graveyard, pulling a U-Haul. You cannot take all that crap with you. And for a lot of my life, I've wasted so much money on things.

And there is so much more to life and it's really in the experiences. I will never, ever, ever forget the night of my 27th anniversary. I can't tell you what I did on my 23rd anniversary or my 11th anniversary or even my second anniversary, but I will never forget the experience of rescuing that owl.

And the impact that it had on my life and my marriage and our family because we allowed it to have a deeper impact. We leaned into it. And that's what the experiences of your life are there to offer you. Life is about experiences. It's not about stuff.

And I've wasted a lot of my life chasing stuff, working hard, trying to buy stuff. And the truth is, it's the experiences that enrich your life. It's the experiences that you remember. And that brings me to what my husband and I did to celebrate our 28th wedding anniversary. So it was our 28th wedding anniversary just a couple days ago.

And, you know, when you celebrate your 27th with the experience of rescuing a wild animal, you have a lot to live up to on the 28th. You know what I'm saying? Like that was a big one. That was the biggest anniversary of our life. And so I'm like, what the heck am I going to do? We've just sent our son off to college. I don't want to go away. I don't want to sit home. Like, what are we going to do? And I thought, I don't know. Why don't I just go to Google and

And I type in owl experience Vermont. Who knows, right? Is there such a thing as an owl experience Vermont? There is. There's a place in Woodstock, Vermont. They're not paying me to say this. I just know that we're going to get slammed in the inbox asking for information about this called New England Falconry.

And this is an educational institute that can teach you about falconry. They can teach you about birds of prey. And they have an owl program where they're using all of the training and the standards that they've used with traditional birds of prey. Only this New England falconry has included owls. And would you believe that on a Sunday afternoon at 2.45 a.m.,

The day after our 28th wedding anniversary, they had a private session open and it was totally reasonably priced. It was like this 90 minute thing where you could have an actual experience with owls.

Holy cow. So I sign up for this thing and then I find this awesome hotel nearby and I surprised Chris. I let the kids on it. They're all excited. Are you going to do this whole thing? This is so incredible. I had no idea what to expect. And so the first thing that happened that was crazy is we get to the hotel and

And we check into our cabin and there on the bed is this giant box that is a welcome gift. And so you open up the box and there's like typical Vermont things. You've got your wax covered cheese. You have, you know, the fancy journal with the emblem of the hotel on it. You got kind of a cool pencil that's tucked into the journal. And then there's this box in there.

And the box had a bow on it. And it's kind of this square box about this big, probably like three and a half, four inches wide and tall. And I hand it to Chris and he unties the bow and we open it up. And then inside there is this tissue wrapped thing. And we're like, what the heck is this? So we reach in and grab it. And even pulling it out with the tissue,

You could tell it was like one of these little like pottery square plate things, kind of like, you know, if you ever go to somebody's house and they have a nice guest room and they have like a little dish for your rings, kind of like a thing like that or a hotel that does that. So I'm like, Chris, open it up. So he starts to open this thing up and he pulls out this piece of pottery. I kid you not. There is a hand painted owl on the piece of pottery. I kid you not.

They did not know that we were going to do this the next day. I just about died. I couldn't believe it because the other thing is I quickly then, of course, ran down to the gift shop because I'm like, do they give everybody an owl? Is this like a thing here? No, they've got 12 different animals that are painted on these things. And somehow, magically,

checking into this hotel on the 28th anniversary. This was the one for us. And I'm going to start crying because I actually think our owl made this happen.

Like that's the kind of magic that is available to you in your life if you're willing to see the connections, if you're willing to lean into it. There is no doubt in my mind that every time I bought an owl puzzle or I bought the owl swim trunks, I'm not buying more objects. That's not what this is about. Every time I went out into the woods and I said, I'm going to magic, I'm looking up, I'm going to allow magic in, and I didn't see one, but I went the next day, I was creating magic.

the opening for this kind of thing to be present in my life. And you can do this too. You absolutely can. And so, you know, the experience was absolutely incredible. If you're ever in New England, put this on your list because you go first into a barn and they introduce you to a burrowing owl. It's like four inches tall. And Chris and I stood there

eight feet from one another inside a barn. And all you do is you literally raise up your little glove and the bird flies to you. And then the other person raises up their little glove and then it flies to them. And it goes back and forth and back and forth. And it is the coolest thing. And then we stepped outside.

And the trainer, Anastasia, brought a gorgeous barn owl. Now, these are not native to Vermont. Of course, I'm like now wise about owls. Here we go. I'm about to tell you everything I know about owls. And we learned so much about owls. It's absolutely incredible. And you, again, would raise your hand and she would fly to you. And then she'd all of a sudden be like, I'm off. And she'd do these huge circles. And if you kept your hand down by your side, she just kept flying.

And then when you were ready, you could raise your hand again. There she was again. It's freaking unbelievable. And then, and to be that close to such a magnificent creature and to learn about them. I mean, it was incredible. But even just holding that owl and learning about it and being that close, it was just insane. And that's why experiences matter.

You're not going to remember the bowl or the puzzle or the 13th wind catcher that you buy or figurine that you buy, but you will always remember the experience that inspired you to buy it. And in life, the more you prioritize investing your time and your money into experiences, I think the better your life is going to be.

And that brings me to a really big problem. What on earth am I going to do for my 29th wedding anniversary? I'll think of something. And if you think of something, would you let me know? And if you have somebody in your life who loves owls or who needs a little more magic in their life or who could benefit from these five things that this experience taught me, and I'm going to say what they are again because I think they're really important. Look up.

They'll spend your whole life looking at your phone and looking down. Look up. Look up and you'll be surprised at what you start to see. Second, open yourself up to magic. You know, when you allow yourself to believe that something great is going to happen or that you're going to do something rare, like one of these days you're going to actually see an owl in the wild, it happens. You draw it to you. Wisdom. Owls are messengers of change and they represent wisdom.

but wisdom represents an enormous opportunity in your life. Pick something to be interested in because it's going to make your life more interesting. You're meant to learn things your whole life and leaning into learning and getting wise about something is such a cool way to improve your life.

Don't forget lesson number four, be careful. Do not go overboard. Do not turn these experiences into objects and clutter and click clacks and knickknacks and garbage that's all over your house. One or two is all you need to cue you of that extraordinary experience. And finally, life is not about the stuff. It's about the experiences that you have.

If that's what you prioritize in your life, you spend your time, your money on things that you can do rather than the stuff that you have, there is no doubt in my mind that your life is going to be better. And one more thing, in case no one else told you, I wanted to be sure to tell you that I love you and I believe in you and I believe in your ability to take all of these lessons that that owl taught me and use them to create a better life.

Alrighty, I'll be waiting for you in the very next episode. I realize you never told this crazy story about a thing that happened to me and an owl last year. And it wasn't, it's not just a story about the thing that happened, but how this has impacted me and my marriage for an entire year. Are they over there?

Although we probably hear him right there too. That's a loud mower. All right. So we'll just sit here for a second. What was that last sentence, Sam? And Kevin's getting his room tone. How are we doing on timing? Is that too loud? Probably.

Oh, and one more thing. And no, this is not a blooper. This is the legal language. You know what the lawyers write and what I need to read to you. This podcast is presented solely for educational and entertainment purposes. I'm just your friend. I am not a licensed therapist. And this podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional.

Got it? Good. I'll see you in the next episode.

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