1KHO 848: Walking Aids Discernment | Deborah Gregory, Spiritual Wayfinding

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Welcome to The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast. My name is Ginny Yurich and the founder of 1000 Hours Outside. And I have a special guest today who has a really cool background. She has her own podcast. She's written her own book. She's got a website and also is a documentary filmmaker. So Deborah Gregory, I'm so excited to talk about all these parts of your life. Welcome.

**Deborah Gregory** (1:22)
Thank you. So happy to be here. I wish we were outside.

**Ginny Yurich** (1:25)
I know. I know. Me too.
Actually, I've been recording podcasts all day. So I really do wish. But I'm looking out the window and it looks beautiful.
So it's close. At least there's a window. I don't know. But I am super excited to talk about you, talk with you because you have got all these parts of your life. So the book that I read of yours is called Spiritual Wayfinding. This is 33 walking meditations for navigating life with embodied wisdom. So this is all about getting outside movement. I'm going to be talking about some of those different meditations today. But you're also a spiritual director. You also grew up in the mountains of Japan. You also are a documentary film maker. You're also a mother. You also have your own podcast. How are you doing all this?

**Deborah Gregory** (2:12)
I've had many lives.

**Ginny Yurich** (2:15)
Can you talk about that layered part? I think most people do one thing.

**Deborah Gregory** (2:21)
Right. Yes.
I'm not sure why I have such a layered life, but I feel like a cat most of the time. I've got many lives. And maybe it's because of the way I was raised with so much possibility. Between worlds, I grew up in Japan and the United States, and was able to see a lot and imagine a lot. So that's what I think.

**Ginny Yurich** (2:45)
Yeah.
Talk about the documentary filmmaking part. What documentary? There was one about, and I thought this was such an important topic. It was like when someone is deployed in the military, and then their wife is back in the States and having a baby.

**Deborah Gregory** (3:01)
Yes. Yes. So for years, I did documentary filmmaking for non-profits, and then I worked for ABC, and they sometimes had me do special projects. And one of them was to spend about nine months or so with military families while their spouse was deployed. And it was fantastic. And but at the drop of the hat, I'd have to go do something. I'm making Thanksgiving dinner, and then one of the women goes into labor, so I have to run to the hospital with my gear. And so it was a wild and wonderful career. I did a lot of travel internationally, but it was very spontaneous.
So it was hard to imagine raising a family that way.

**Ginny Yurich** (3:51)
And so you did make some adjustments then once you had kids.

**Deborah Gregory** (3:55)
Yes, we did. And my husband and I, many families will relate to this, but we struggle with infertility for years. And when we, and it was actually in that hospital room, filming the delivery of that baby. Four weeks later, I got the double pink line. So I have no idea what happened through that embodied experience with all these other women, with such a powerful experience of labor and birth giving.
So I was so excited that this was finally our reality. But then I went through this huge crisis of trying to reconcile my own vocational calling and like, how would I do that? Raising a family. So that was kind of a beginning part of a whole new journey for me.