Listen
Interview with Rick Wilkes (1:00:53)
Interview with Cathy Vartuli (1:01:44)
In these separate Attune Magazine Radio
interviews, Jean Maurie and Maggie Lukowski talk to both Rick and Cathy about Emotional Freedom Techniques (EFT), spirit, guidance, how we use tapping, sex, love, and relationships.
Jean Maurie is a member of the Thriving Now Circle and tapping coach (and an all-around awesome person! -Rick & Cathy). She can be reached at Jean Maurie’s website and on Facebook at her Facebook page
Companion Guide
Personal empowerment is not becoming invulnerable, endlessly positive, or self-contained. In these paired 2013 interviews, Rick Wilkes and Cathy Vartuli explore empowerment as embodied self-acceptance: telling the truth about what you feel, staying connected with your body, choosing authentic relationships, setting boundaries, and co-creating from mutual respect.
This Guide Helps With
- replacing a polished mask with calibrated vulnerability
- allowing the body to participate in emotional and spiritual truth
- expressing powerful feelings without abandoning responsibility
- distinguishing empathy from taking over another person’s pain
- discovering yes, no, and a genuine space for exploration
Acceptance Is More Than a Positive Sentence
A statement can sound uplifting while the body answers, “Really?” Tapping begins by affirming the experience that is actually present: “Even though I feel alone,” “Even though I am grumpy,” or “Even though my stomach is scared.”
This models a deeper relationship: you can be painfully human without being expelled from your own care or from whatever loving Source, spirit, or community you experience. When the words and body come into greater congruence, positive possibilities become less like a mask.
Vulnerability Creates Contact
Cathy describes the old expectation of a polished exterior: figure out what others want, present the acceptable version, and hide the rest. When two masks interact, there may be approval without much intimacy.
Vulnerability does not mean disclosing everything to everyone. Begin gently, notice the other person’s capacity, name awkwardness, and choose people who can meet honesty with respect. Courageous authenticity can also help others risk showing up more fully.
Powerful Emotion Still Carries Responsibility
Anger, rage, and the impulse to protect yourself are not evidence of spiritual failure. If you may harm someone who is not actively threatening you, leave the space and get support. If you damage something or affect another person, regulation is followed by repair, accountability, or a clearer boundary.
Self-shaming after an intense reaction does not repair the situation. It consumes the energy needed to make things right and understand the pattern.
Co-Creation Needs Yes, No, and Maybe
Whether the subject is work, friendship, sexuality, or spiritual community, empowerment includes knowing what is a definite yes, a hard no, and an open play area where you are willing to explore. Other people are not mind readers. Preferences change, and feedback is part of co-creation.
The same is true for empathy. Feeling another person’s pain does not require fixing them without consent. You can offer presence, ask what support is wanted, and regulate the part of you that needs their distress to stop so you can feel okay.
Tapping: Letting the Mask Soften
Side of the Hand: Even though I learned to present the polished version and hide what might be judged, I accept why that felt safer.
Even though vulnerability can feel awkward and exposed, I am open to sharing something real with people who have earned that trust.
Even though part of me wants to fix everyone so I will feel useful and secure, I can ask what kind of connection is actually wanted.
Top of the Head: I have been wearing this mask.
Eyebrow: Trying to guess what everyone wants.
Side of the Eye: Hiding the parts I feel ashamed of.
Under the Eye: It takes so much energy to split myself this way.
Under the Nose: I am afraid authenticity will cost me belonging.
Chin: I am afraid other people’s pain will overwhelm me.
Collarbone: No wonder I reach for polish or fixing.
Under the Arm: These strategies helped me feel safer.
Top of the Head: I can reveal myself by choice and degree.
Eyebrow: I can notice who responds with respect.
Side of the Eye: I can feel empathy without taking over.
Under the Eye: I can ask before helping.
Under the Nose: I can name my yes, no, and maybe.
Chin: I can express anger and still take responsibility.
Collarbone: More of me can be present in this relationship.
Under the Arm: I welcome co-creation rooted in safety, curiosity, and mutual respect.
Take a breath. Notice where you want more authenticity and what amount of vulnerability feels both alive and appropriately safe.
Practice Empowerment Relationally
Choose one relationship and complete four sentences: “What I appreciate is…,” “What I want is…,” “What is not a yes for me is…,” and “What I am willing to explore is….” Tap with the body response before deciding whether and how to share.
Empowerment for the soul is not power over another person. It is the capacity to inhabit yourself more fully and meet others as real, choosing beings.
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