#71 Patty Lennon: Make Space For Magic
Johnny Burke: Welcome to Closer to Venus, I’m Johnny Burke. Today’s guest is Patty Lennon. She is a certified coach author of “Make Space For Magic” and founder of “The Receiving School. Today, we will be talking about how she blends brain science and metaphysics to help fellow humans manifest their dreams. Patty, welcome to the show.
Patty Lennon: Thank you for having me.
Johnny Burke: Very interesting background. you have a master’s in psychology and spent time as a corporate banker. How did that morph into the current path you’re on now?
Patty Lennon: Well, I left college. I had intended to go into public law. doing public defender work with an intention of going up and becoming a politician. In my final year of college, I worked in the public defender’s office and my love affair with our justice system broke my heart. When I started to understand the way it actually operated. I realized it wasn’t a place that I could participate in. So I left college without a plan and it was a terrible job market. So I got a temp job at a bank, and while I was there trying to figure out who I was going to be, I grew into a career, and I was there for 15 years.
So I kind of fell into something that I loved. but towards the end of that career, I started to really want more meaning in what I was doing, which led me to start to mentor in a more focused way some of the team and the people that worked around me. While I was doing that, I realized there was a lot going on in their minds that was affecting their performance and their ability to succeed. And I wanted to understand it better. So I started for a master’s in psychology while I was at the bank and the bank was kind enough to pay for it. The banking industry started to implode, and I had already decided that that was what I wanted to do full time. And so when the banking industry stopped really paying for that kind of work in-house, I went out on my own. Coaching was just becoming a thing back then.
So I got a coaching certification and through that journey, I felt like I was finally sort of following the path that I think the divine wanted for me. I just got into much more spiritual teachings and learning about manifestation. As I stepped into that world, there was a lot that just didn’t jive with what I knew to be true from a brain science standpoint. A lot of what I was learning in the manifestation world, although it was helpful, it was missing things. It wasn’t really built for all people. It was built for one type of person who is tended to be a more privileged person. really felt then that it was important for me to start focusing on how to translate techniques in the spiritual world that I was learning so that more people could use them.
Johnny Burke: Very interesting path, indeed. You mentioned brain science and I’m pretty sure that your intuitive gifts, you didn’t really discover them until your thirties, right? 34 35?
Patty Lennon: Yes. That was pretty wild. So there I was a type a banker and then I I left banking, but still with that type ‘A’ personality in place. But as I was working through my coaching training, I was exposed to people who had a lot more, what I would call that Woo- woo bent. And the more time I spent around them, the more I open to these ideas of the other side of the veil and how we communicate.
I was out in a retreat in the desert with some of the coaches I was learning with. And all of a sudden, I just started to know things and It just came out of the blue. I didn’t have this history where, oh, yes. I used to be able to see dead people when I was young, but people criticize me, so I stopped doing it. That became really important to me that people understand that, this idea that we have about how gifts work are really limited to a few, and that there really is an opportunity for all of us to have access to these heightened senses, these other sensory experiences of the universe and combining the brain science.
So understanding what was happening in the brain makes it easier for someone to hear this information or see this information, what needs to happen in someone’s real-life to open up to these gifts. That became a big focus of mine about three or four years into my journey with these gifts. I asked my guides once, “why did I not have access to these gifts? Why would you just open them up at 35?” And they told me that was a choice you made, you wanted to know fundamentally what it felt like to live in the world without that because that knowledge would be necessary for you to be able to teach others who feel the same way, how to transition into their day.
Johnny Burke: Now that what you just said seems to indicate that was a choice you made in between incarnations- before you actually came into this world. Is that correct or is that off base?
Patty Lennon: That’s correct.
Johnny Burke: Do you suppose a lot of people that are in the corporate world do struggle with that grind and think, “well, what about the spiritual side? Is that something I should learn about?” Or is that not necessarily true?
Patty Lennon: Most people I know in the corporate space or in an institutionalized space., whether it’s Academia or even the nonprofit sector, as much as they do good in the world. I do see that a lot of people have an ache inside of them. And I think they express it if you’re not what I call woo or “woo- curious”. So like, woo- curious is kind of like, “Hmm, that looks interesting, like maybe they get a tarot reading once in a while kind of thing, but they’re not really there.
Johnny Burke: I noticed that you studied with shamanic practitioners also. What prompted you to study with them in the first place? ,
Patty Lennon: part of, it was just an evolution, what I was learning. Some of the teachers that I was learning through like through the Hicks team, Esther Hicks, and what she does with the law of attraction and how she channels. What she and Jerry Hicks did is a very robust, very authentic experience. But there are others out there that were teaching the felt like they were teaching to pop culture. And I started to crave learning that felt a little more grounded. And the more I reached for that, it was really teachers that came up through their gifts, and came up through their teaching through a lineage.
At first, I worked with someone who was teaching Reiki and Reiki work then kind of opened me up to more of these indigenous cultures and the gifts that they bring to Western culture now. So things that just had that deep history, felt more real to me. Even though I’m away from that type ‘A’ personality, I’m still very pragmatic and I want to know the roots of something. Another part was that I found out that I had fractured my spine, when I was a child and it was never known the fracture was there, and the way the doctors describe it, it was a ticking time bomb. I found myself drawn into the shamanic healing world to help with that because Western medicine could only go so far. And so part of it was just doing my own healing work.
Johnny Burke: the Reiki, seems to be like a non-threatening, introduction to energy healing. It’s almost like going to a massage therapist, but from there you connected the dots and say Reiki, has its roots in shamanism, which is thousands of years old. so how important is the energy healing part? how does that inform your work?
Patty Lennon: Oh, that’s such a good question. I think how it informs my work is that why? I believe I am the way I am, why I chose the life I did and why I’ve come to work in the way that I’ve come is because of. my purpose is to help others understand how much they’re loved by the divine .To understand that the playing field is fair and that, a lot of where we experience disparity or unfairness going back to my justice days is because we have a lot of wounds that we acquired through being human. In order to, make that space for someone to feel the divine love that’s available to them, or to talk to the other side of the veil requires being able to heal some things that aren’t wounds on the skin’ They are wounds in the energetic body, wounds in the psyche. A piece of it I can help them with, and when I can’t, I like to know where they can go next to get that healing.
Johnny Burke: We have brain science, manifestation, and metaphysics. What is the brain science behind manifestation? And then how is that different from blending brain science with metaphysics?
Patty Lennon: Excellent question. So the brain science behind manifestation is understanding that manifestation. in its essence, is to have a desire and to have that desire met in a way that doesn’t involve a simple human effort. Meaning,you can desire something and know you just don’t have the ability to make it happen just exclusively on your own. And then yet miracles happen every day. Right? And so manifestation is the arrival of something in the material world that happens on the energetic level, more than it happens on the human effort. So anytime we have a desire, that desire begins to be met by the universe, by the divine, if it’s for our highest good.
So when we have a desire and we ask for it simply by knowing we desire it, the universe of the divine starts to make that manifest. But if it doesn’t actually cross over the door from non-reality from energy into our reality, it is because we’re holding the door closed, and where we hold that door closed is in our mind, our mind controls that energy field.
And if it doesn’t feel safe to receive, it will not allow the manifestations. Okay. And so what that means is we need to make sure our brain is operating in a place where it feels safe and loved. And that’s where brain science comes in. What gets us into a place of fear and the amygdala, which is the center of the fear brain. That’s what generates all those fear thoughts, and always feels like it’s fighting off saber tooth tigers. You need to understand how to reprogram it and to have an open, receptive field. So that’s where that connection is.
Johnny Burke: The question about the brain science behind manifestation is that it sounds similar to blending brain science with metaphysics. You mentioned divine love earlier; when did you discover that? And, did that come first, or was that discovered along the way?
Patty Lennon: My youngest memory is that I want it to be a missionary from when I was little and the reason was I was raised Irish Catholic, so missionary work was really the only context I had when I was small, the idea that there were people out in the world that didn’t understand that God loved them, broke my heart. All I wanted to do was make sure that they knew that. So that piece of it has been with me. From the very beginning, when I even wanted to go into public defender work, it was because of the idea that there are people in our system that aren’t taking care of the same way, others are felt horrible to me.
That was the reason why I wanted to go the public defender route rather than the district attorney route. Even in banking, I would always try and make sure that everyone understood how to get a proper footing inside the bank. Like how do you get yourself up to higher levels if that’s what you want, how do you get promoted? I always came at it from understanding, Like here’s how to make the playing field fair for you. And I don’t think I was as conscious of the divine love in that part of my life, because it was my twenties and I was partying and I was focused on succeeding and drinking and doing all that.
Johnny Burke: like everybody else at that age and even beyond that.
Patty Lennon: Then when I did step into this world, I realized always what was holding people back is the misunderstanding that they were unsafe. .
Johnny Burke: So how does all this figure in the metaphysical world or the quantum realm.
Patty Lennon: Well, the quantum realm– all the team that we have right outside, beyond the field that we’re used to playing in this 3d, sometimes people think it’s 4 D out, beyond that there’s this entire team that we can work with and interact with. There are universal forces. But if your mind feels the only way can be safe is what it controls and what it figures out. And this is what happens when we’re traumatized at young ages where we are left, feeling unsafe at different points because we don’t receive the full safety and security ever. Every single human does not receive all the safety and support they need from the older humans around them.
We start to develop misunderstandings. We attach our relationship with the divine or the universe with the relationship of the humans that we’re supposed to take care of us. So relying on them at some point was unsafe, relying on the quantum field, interacting with things that are outside of your human control feels unsafe. So how you blend these two is, you start to watch the thoughts. You do the work to open up the mind to being supported. Some of the magic flows in, some of the manifestations flow in, but then you get blocked again Then now it’s time to go back to my mind, to go back to the amygdala, and then it’s just this constant massaging and moving and interacting.
but once you start to really have an inherent faith in this divine love or this universal love, that’s when you can trust the team. And that’s when you can hear the subtle language that they speak to you with. But when the amygdala is super noisy, it’s very hard to hear the language that the other side of the veil people, spirit team are talking to you.
Johnny Burke: if I understand this, you’re making allusions to spirit guides, angels, those type of things beyond the veil. that part of the brain that you just mentioned, that’s what you meant when you said the brain hijacks our intuitive gifts and keeps us from getting the help from our spirit friends. It’s a very interesting approach. I’ve never heard that before, but I think it, could be very helpful. So let’s talk about make space for magic and there’s also the receiving school, but I think it seems to me that to discuss make space for magic would be appropriate to discuss first
Patty Lennon: Yes, absolutely.
Johnny Burke: All right.
Patty Lennon: From a concept standpoint, the book Make Space For Magic, I developed it originally with a goal of just telling my story of going from this type ‘A’ person to now having access to regular communication with the other side of the veil, both for myself and on behalf of my clients. I wanted people to see the dips in my journey. That they involved drinking a lot when I was in my twenties, that they involved making disappointing choices, that they involved me questioning my ability to parent a kid. There are a lot of things that happen in people’s day-to-day lives that I think make them feel not special enough to have gifts. That if you’re someone that has gifts, you sort of float through life, you are always in love, in a loving, compassionate relationship with others, and it’s not the case.
The original goal of the book was just to tell the story. But the more I taught it from stages and more, I told the stories. I saw the people really had a craving for how do I make space for this magic to come in? How do I do it in my mind? But also what are the functional things I can do in my day-to-day life that actually allow me to interact with the other side of the veil, in a different way so that things are coming easier so I can rest more. So I feel like less of a failure just because I’m not perfect. And that’s essentially what making space for magic is..
Johnny Burke: it starts to make more sense when we talk about the receiving school, because, we’re talking about spirit guides and angels and our friends beyond the veil. I’ve been told, every single one of us has spirit guides literally from day one, everybody. So is the receiving school a manual for showing us how to take it in, how to receive love from our spirit guide friends?
Patty Lennon: Yes. And it’s an experiential program in that it gives you ways to interact with your life to start to notice where your resistance is because what happens is people know, ” I’m not good at receiving”. If you’re not good at receiving even compliments or help from a friend, I guarantee you the exact same block is why you can’t receive communication from the other side of the veil. What is happening in the brain to cause that block is the same. So you can be working in any part of your life to lower your resistance and open up to receiving and affect all the areas.
The receiving school is different than a course you would take where it’s telling you how to do things. And it actually just shows you how to interact with your day-to-day life so that it reveals your blocks to you. You’re not doing worksheets to try and find the block. You’re actually just going to go about your regular day and do this one thing differently. And all of a sudden that one little thing each week reveals a huge block. And then you get the pieces of the puzzle on how to release the blocks. At the beginning of the program, we’re focused almost exclusively on the material world, letting in money, love, and support. Then as we get towards the end of the program, where there’s more opportunity for you to see those blocks and release them in very tangible ways, that’s when we work on opening up to receiving communication.
Johnny Burke: Your work has a lot to do with blending traditional psychology and like to use the word metaphysical rather than spiritual because metaphysical has to do with, a way of understanding things. Whereas spiritual is more of an actual practice And I’ve heard this many, many times before where the word spiritual tends to be overused and the brand is actually watered down. If you go on to iTunes spiritual podcasts, a lot of them are just celebrities giving advice, which doesn’t have a whole lot to do with spirituality, does it? So can we assume then that what you’re doing is basically a blend of psychology and the metaphysical, or is that not quite a good enough description?
Patty Lennon: No, I think that’s completely accurate. Metaphysics leave space for you to have an opinion that the source;the universe is either neutral or benevolent. Now I personally believe it’s benevolent. But there’s a lot of people who that doesn’t match with what they know to be true in the world. Right. And so what I teach can be used, whether you believe the divine is benevolent or neutral.
Johnny Burke: It’s a very interesting point, but it does leave room for that opinion. So while we’re speaking about the divine your path, your discovery of your intuition. How has that colored, or shaped your beliefs and religion? Has it changed, or is it pretty much the same as it’s always been?
Patty Lennon: In some ways it’s, released me from a lot of guilt, like a feeling like you have to do certain practices to be good inside the scope of your relationship to God, source, whatever word you want to use. So, because I communicate with the other side, so fluidly, I know there are lots of ways to be in that relationship. I also know that the divine source wants nothing other than an intimate relationship with us. It wants our truth, whatever that is, as ugly or as angry, or as rage-filled or as beautiful, or as hopeful as it is, it wants simply intimacy, honesty. that is the part that shifted my relationship to religion or spirituality the most. Although I was raised, even though I was Irish Catholic, most of the people that influenced me to believe that God was good.
There was a lot of guilt in the way I was raised. And I know a lot of people were raised with that guilt and the communication from the other side, makes sense of all the little nuanced guilt. Sometimes I might feel critical of myself if I’m not meditating because I know a good practitioner or whatever meditates. then they’ll just talk to me and say, “no, go for a walk. You don’t need more time in your head. Your head’s not where you need to be right now. You don’t need to be working on releasing your thoughts. Just go spend time with nature. Appreciate something that has been created out of nothingness.” all of that is considered sacred When we bring love to it.
Johnny Burke: When you say all the divine really wants is our truth. No matter how beautiful or ugly it is. It reminds me of what I was told recently was that’s how the divine learns from us. Does that make sense? heard that a few times. I thought, wow, the divine is going to learn from us? when we addressed that ache that you mentioned earlier, I think that has a lot to do with what really happens when we die. Who was God? What is God? Why are we here? What’s our purpose?
Meanwhile, when we have this well-paying job, you’re making ridiculous amounts of money. You’re partying. you’ve got really cool friends and nice cars, but that’s something that’s missing. You probably feel pretty lucky that you found this path.
Patty Lennon: I feel blessed by it every single day. Absolutely.
Johnny Burke: How can the average person, going to work every day and taking care of the family and so on, how do they get there? What’s some practical advice – what’s the first step they take?
Patty Lennon: the very first baby step that I recommend anyone takes. Is when you get up in the morning, make the first interaction be between you and you. so often when people get up, they’re either turning over to their partner, responding to a child, or a pet or picking up their device, or going through their to-do list for the day. All of these things involve other people’s agendas for their life. And that’s generally our biggest block to having this point of connection. So if the first thing you do when you get up in the morning, is just breathe and follow the breath to the center of your body and out to the center of your body. I used to ask people to do this for 10 minutes. I’ve now gotten down to just three deep breaths. Three deep breaths is where I can get everyone to meet me as the commitment that I feel. 99% of the people will make. This is sort of the kind of experiential stuff we do in receiving school.
The first thing you get up, that takes 30 seconds, but it also brings all this awareness to your right. First thing in the morning, which is the richest time to get information. . And if you want a big gigantic step to do that will really shift things is to do what I call, receive everything. If you do any manifestation learning, they’ll always say, make sure you receive compliments, receive any gifts that people give you receive the good stuff that’s coming, but receive the negative stuff, receive the difficult stuff. Like if you have debt receive that truth.
so many people think if they receive it, meaning they accept it, that they’re saying I’m going to hold onto it, but that’s not what happens when you receive it. You stop being in this resisting relationship with it. And that lack of resistance starts to flow miracles in quicker than anything else.
Johnny Burke: The receiving part, goes back to the receiving school, We need to be receivers, right? It’s like catching a pass. You have to jump up and go get it sometimes. Right?
Patty Lennon: Yeah.
Johnny Burke: Forgive me for my sports analogies. Now we get into the fun stuff. The myths and mistruths that are taught in the spiritual and personal development worlds. I’m sure a lot of us really want to hear about what they are.
Patty Lennon: Yeah. Well, the biggest one is that you manifest, you bring good stuff into your life by staying positive That there’s always, this need to be like visualizing and seeing the good stuff and transmuting everything instantly into positivity. that’s really toxic. That is the biggest mistake that’s taught. Every single human, every single day experiences, something that causes a negative emotion, I mean, short of you being in a room meditating all day long. Most likely you’re going to have some small engagement or big engagement. That’s going to get you angry. It’s going to bring you down. And if it’s on the bigger side, it’s going to be pretty heavy. And if you listen to that talk out there that you have to be positive, what happens is you’re actually going to just shove it down deep inside your body, and you’re using a tremendous amount of resistance to doing it.
You’re also messing with your mind because you’re basically telling yourself it’s not safe to be fully you, so that’s the biggest one. And the answer is, let yourself feel your true emotions. You cannot hold onto an emotional reaction for longer than 45 seconds to a minute. It’s impossible. The physiological response to emotion does not last longer than that. The reason it ends up feeling like it’s lasting for days and weeks is because,one you’re trying to resist it, and then when you’re allowing it to come up, you’re feeding thoughts into it. So if you feed thoughts into an emotional reaction, it will then start a second emotional reaction, a third, a fourth. If you push it down, your brain is going to spend all its time, trying to get you to work at it.
Johnny Burke: So in other words, denial is pointless.
Patty Lennon: Right. and on top of it, you can be feeling really bad if it’s legitimate. If someone was an idiot, cut you off, be angry about that for a minute, two minutes, but if you’re still thinking about it like three days for now, now you’re messing with yourself and then, then you do need to lean into that stay positive kind of thing. Then maybe you were really traumatized by it. Maybe you were just in a car accident the week before, right? Well then you give yourself a couple of days. ’cause you’re still processing that trauma, just because you’re processing a difficult emotion, you’re not blocking good stuff from coming in because you’re in non-resistance.
So the divine does not need you to be happy to give you the good stuff. And almost always when you’re in your low points is when your spirit team is jumping in and wanting to help so bad. So if you keep pretending you’re fine, you’re blocking their help. That’s the biggest mistruth.
Johnny Burke: That’s a great point.
Patty Lennon: Yeah, and then the other one is that if what you desire hasn’t arrived, whether it’s material or communication from the other side of the veil, This belief that you’re not doing something good enough. You’re not visualizing enough. You’re not vision boarding well enough. You’re not acting” as if” enough -completely untrue. The divine is omnipotent. It does not need a vision board to figure out that you would like to pay off your debt, that you would like to go on a vacation, right? The minute you have a desire, if that desire being met is for your highest good, it is starting to be met. Vision boards, visualization, acting” as if” work wonderfully, if you’re highly developed a right brain. But if you’re a highly developed left brain, that will never work for you because your brain will keep calling bullshit. So it does work. But if someone doesn’t understand that they’re a highly right-brained person, and that’s why it works for them, they will teach it like it’s the gospel. And they will conclude that the reason you don’t have your new cars, is because you’re not visualizing properly, but that’s not
Johnny Burke: Because quite simply, that might not be your highest and best use, does that make sense?
Patty Lennon: right. Or you may be in so much resistance to it that it’s not able to come through, but the resistance isn’t fixed bay vision board for most people, resistance is fixed by the stuff I talked about already, which is honoring your true feelings. Allow all the gifts in- bad and good. Honor what’s true for you. Connect to yourself in the morning, in the day.
Johnny Burke: Also in your work, you mentioned the vibration of the planet is opening all humans up to increased spiritual metaphysical connection. Is that the same thing as the Ascension or is it different?
Patty Lennon: it’s a symptom of the Ascension. 40 years ago the vibration on this planet was such that not everyone could communicate with the other side of the veil easily. The vibration we were all operating in, made it very hard for us to get to a vibrational level that would be a match for the communication. As we are ascending as a people, , that look like they don’t even know that we are all connected, right?, that fervor that we’re all feeling. That’s actually natural in the process of evolution. The lowest part of the evolution body is going to resist it And fight it. A rising tide lifts all boats. So the vibration is rising on the planet because we are evolving as a people. And because we have that higher vibration, is why we all have access to the other side of the veil
Johnny Burke: So in other words, the veil is actually becoming thinner.
Patty Lennon: I know that’s how a lot of people describe it. I would say our perception that there is a veil is getting thinner. The veil is the vibrational difference, It’s just that border between the human earth-based vibration and then the vibration of the upper dimensions. Because ours is getting higher, doesn’t look so thick anymore
Johnny Burke: Can we just say that more access to the veil than there was 30 or 40 years ago?
Patty Lennon: Yeah. The perception of the membrane is just different.
Johnny Burke: Now that we know that, and many people have been talking about this in the past few years, what are some simple ways for us to connect with spirit guides, angels, and our loved ones that, are not here anymore?
Patty Lennon: The best way, because no matter where you are in that, woo woo- curious- I don’t believe at all spectrum, is signs. I think signs are the easiest way. And in order to get signs, asking for them with specificity really helps. If you feel very doubtful, if you really question, is anyone there for me? Make your sign that you want to see answer a particular question, whether it’s” are you their grandpa ?”Or, ” spirit guide, should I take this job?” if I should, show me this sign and make it really outrageous, you know, a dancing Shamrock with a purple hat, right.? Something that you just don’t think you’ve ever seen before.
if you’re not in that level of doubt, then having something that’s a regular sign that a loved one, or your spirit guide can give you when you need assurance is great, and having a personal connection to it can really help. So for instance, my father, we are Irish and he was very attached to his Irish heritage. So when I see shamrocks, real shamrocks, I know he’s there and my mother, her favorite flower was daisies , so when I see daisies pop up, in an unexpected way, you kind of get this whoosh of warmth inside of you when you see it- that’s your proof that it’s a sign, versus just another daisy. That to me is the easiest way. Even if you’re not out of your mind yet, like, your mental game? Your mind can see signs, it can take them in.
Johnny Burke: I think that’s. Practical advice to see the signs, you’re convinced that, that there, that’s obvious I think people do have to be open to it. They have to be receivers. If they don’t believe in anything, then it’s probably not going to happen.
Patty Lennon: I actually no, I’ve turned complete cynics around because of this practice.
Johnny Burke: Really? That’s encouraging. I like that. So, tell us what can we expect from the space for magic podcast?
Patty Lennon: My goal in The Space For Magic podcast is to share both my journey as I’m learning. So I’m live teaching my own personal journey. I try and stay in the moment with the energy that’s happening on the planet like right now. So for instance, at the moment we’re recording this, there is a very intense, chaotic, energetic storm happening. It’s very hard for people who have been able to rely on their gifts to hear and see clearly. I’m talking about the tools they can use, the alternative tools that you can use when things are really unclear. Also, guests who have developed techniques, or have had unique journeys and opening up to space for magic, so that listeners get a chance to learn from other people’s journey on how they navigate this being one foot in the real world, and yet also knowing that there are other foot is truly the soul that they came with.
Johnny Burke: that sounds really, really cool. I’m going to make sure I put a link to that along with, your other information in the show notes and the transcript, Patty, thanks so much for joining us today. Speaking of which, how can our listeners find out more about you online?
Patty Lennon: Thank you for having me Johnny, the best place to go is www. Patty lennon.com/ makespaceformagic . You’ll see where to order the book, whatever free offerings we have out right now all be there on the page.