Essential Mental Healing
Essential Mental Healing
Finding Solace: Music as a Pathway to Healing with Heather Hill
Therapy Thursday!
What if music could be your sanctuary in the storm of life? Join us as we uncover the transformative journey of Heather Hill, a singer-songwriter from the Blue Mountains of Canada. Heather opens up about her transition from a corporate career back to her true passion for music, all while balancing the demands of motherhood. Her latest album, "Twilight Mist," is an emotional tribute to herself and a testament to the power of mentorship in finding one’s authentic voice.
Heather’s story isn’t just about melody and lyrics; it’s about navigating life's twists and turns with trust and resilience. From personal anecdotes revealing the unpredictability of life to the necessity of embracing discomfort for growth, Heather’s experiences remind us that profound beauty often arises from our greatest challenges. Her album serves not only as a personal healing journey but also as a meditative and spiritual guide for listeners, intertwining elements of restorative yoga and chakra balancing.
We delve into the historical and cultural significance of music as a healing force, discussing how it has been a source of hope and comfort through generations. Heather’s live performances, where audiences practice restorative yoga while immersed in her soothing songs, illustrate music's power to offer emotional refuge. With a focus on love, compassion, and joy, this heartfelt conversation will inspire anyone seeking solace and personal growth through the magic of music. Don't miss this enlightening episode that underscores the profound impact of sound on our emotional and spiritual well-being.
Heather Hill
Taking a musical leap of love and faith in a magical leap year, accomplished and honored Canadian folk-pop singer-songwriter Heather Hill presents her captivating fourth studio album, “Twilight Mist”, a 13-song clarion call to arms providing hope, inspiration and a sonic hug in troubled times. “Twilight Mist” is a cinematic, rapturous collection of etheric songs about matters of the heart, human compassion and the mystical beauty of nature and the cosmos. Hill’s soaring, rich mezzo voice and enchanting piano melodies are expertly woven with grounded world rhythms and neoclassical swells to create a heady soundscape that is all at once earthy, percussive, elemental and transcendent. Hill combines her love of the ‘70s-eramusical aesthetic with a modern, heart and spirit-centric approach.
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Hello and welcome back to another episode of Essential Mental Healing, where I am your host, candice Fleming. Hello everyone, and joining me today, as always, minus a few because of a medical emergency, have my lovely, lovely, lovely co-host, janet Hill. Mother of all Queen, high Priestess, yes.
Janet Hale:And I love that introduction and I accept it totally, and it's so good to be back Still dealing with some medical health issues. However, it's not stopping me from being here. This is a space that I love to come to.
Candace Fleming:Thank you so much. We also have a guest with us. You guys, our guests, are so amazing. They are phenomenal and I am so grateful to have the level of great guests. And Heather Hill is here with us and she is an amazing woman who puts her healing in music and I'm going to let her tell you all a little bit about her so we can get rolling and learn so much more on this journey of healing. Hi.
Heather Hill:Heather Hi, thank you for that amazing introduction. I particularly like the one for your mom. Thank you, yeah, so I am Heather Hill and I am a singer, songwriter, and I live in Blue Mountains, canada, and I have been a musician all my life. So I was classically trained in piano and vocals and then I went into the corporate world a while and snuck down and played the piano Uh-huh, it's true, I see that bad look on your face and then I really wanted to be a mom and when I started having my kids I really moved into a lot of songwriting and kind of unwound a little that classical stuff and wrote songs really to help me through motherhood.
Heather Hill:And you know, as you know, that's it's not an easy, it's not an easy thing. Motherhood it's um, it's full of um, you know. So there's some sacrifices in there. It's hard work to keep it all glued together. So, four albums later, I just released twilight mist, and what's so beautiful about this album for me is my mom passed away recently and I that was an album I wrote where I really brought my own voice and my own authentic music and hers. She didn't write a lot but she her song is the 13th song in the album and her song really helped heal me. It was her legacy, the way she raised me, and I'm just so grateful for her leadership in music and in my life to really help me find my voice and, more than that, my freedom. So yeah, that's kind of a little nutshell about me.
Candace Fleming:Well, thank you, that's beautiful. How um how many children do you have? I have two children, and what's their ages?
Heather Hill:One is 19 and one is 16.
Candace Fleming:So when you had them, had you had any music released yet?
Heather Hill:music released yet. Yes, actually my first album I wrote and recorded New York City and it came out, I guess, just around the time I recorded it when I was nine, eight, nine months pregnant. So then it came out thereafter and that was sort of my first foray into my own music. I recorded with Steve Adabo with Shelter Island Sound and he had recorded Paula Cole and Roseanne Cash and Suzanne Vega and some of those pretty amazing ladies in his studio.
Candace Fleming:When you first got into music or first started writing your first album, you were pregnant. Pregnant, were you looking to do this full-time, and what were you doing when you were pregnant?
Heather Hill:yeah, well, I started music when I was four and at 18 I had a piano performance degree and then I went off into high-tech and then, after years of realizing what the heck am I doing, I went backpacking and then the songs started to drop in.
Heather Hill:I'm like, but these are not Bach and Rachmaninoff, these are my own songs and they were coming through my voice first, and they were mixed with poetry, because I love to write poetry. And then, in pops, this opportunity I'd met my husband and we had a chance to move to New York City and I just activated a dream which was wouldn't it be amazing to be coached by someone fantastic and to really write songs and really learn how to do this? So a woman named Ann Ruckert showed up and she was an amazing coach in New York City and helped. She started the Jazz Foundation of America because she really felt like you know, there were a lot of people that weren't paid well in music and they weren't aging well and they needed health care, and even she had some amazing stories about that and I hooked onto her wagon for three years and she really helped me develop my gift. Show me some amazing people that could help me with my songwriting and bring out my own voice. So I'll be ever indebted to her. She was a really special woman.
Candace Fleming:Oh wow, woman. Oh wow, Okay. So just so I'm clear on how things happened, when you packed up your stuff and you went hiking, were you pregnant at the time? No, so you left corporate before getting pregnant met your husband got pregnant, met someone who could mentor you and took off with your music. Did you ever turn back to corporate? Never.
Heather Hill:Awesome? No, never, Because really, when I was in corporate I heard that voice. What are you doing? What is going on? Your primary gifting is not this You're sneaking down doing your art in the lobbies, telling everybody not to tell your boss who's also upstairs please keep this quiet. Everybody not to tell your boss who's also upstairs please keep this quiet. And that was my joy. I was sneaking around like my music was an affair, oh wow, yeah, and I was secretly writing like any minute I had and it was obviously my passion and my love. But I had this story in my head that I could never make money doing music and that has been a very expensive story for me.
Janet Hale:Would you talk about the expense? What does expensive mean?
Heather Hill:Expensive, because I have maybe lied to myself a few times, have maybe lied to myself a few times. At 16 I had an opportunity to go and really full scholarship into university and music music therapy actually funny ha. And then I thought, oh, no, no, no, no, I don't what music therapy? No, I'm going to be a performer. It's going to be like the real thing, with real audiences. And then I, I chose money. I chose money because I thought how am I gonna make a living? How am I gonna put myself through university?
Heather Hill:So I picked a university where I could work and go to school at the same time, so I could afford it. But my gift was still there and still very much alive, and so that little juncture in my path was an expensive one, because I sold myself short. I never saw what was behind that door of music and I proceeded to to foster other gifts that I also had. So I ended up going down that you know English degree, tech, I love to write. But then it just it all had to come back again because I had shut my heart down. I was not at a good place in my life. I really needed to. I needed my gifts back.
Candace Fleming:Yeah, what kind of mental struggles did you go through? Was there any mental health problems? That was happening because you were torn between what you really wanted to do and making this money that you felt could sustain you.
Heather Hill:I was starting to wear a lot of black and I had migraines, and the job that I was in was a lot of tech startups, so I was on a plane and not staying in really great places. It was fairly high stress and while I made great money, I was not thriving and my heart was just aching. So you know, it was just clear once I looked at my vision for myself I was not the person that I needed to be. I wanted to be an open-hearted, more spirit-led person in this world. And who was I being? So, yeah, I'd say that was one of my first crises that I ever had. I'd maybe picked not the right path for me, but I could change.
Heather Hill:When I went to New York and I remember sitting with Ann, ann would take kids off the street and develop them, and they didn't have money in their pocket and they might even not know how to use their fork. So she would say to me teach them everything you know about music, because they haven't had the opportunity. So then I thought, wow, I can serve with my music and they have this raw, unbelievable talent and they just found their way here, despite the no money and despite those dumb stories I told myself. So she really taught me a lot about you. Have a gift. You have to do it anyway and do it in any way you can Like. If someone asks you to play, you play.
Heather Hill:If there's a wedding play, funeral play. So she said to me you got to play five, six days a week. New York city there's tons of places you can play.
Candace Fleming:That's awesome. When was your first cause? You mentioned that you knew you weren't thriving. So when was the first moment that you knew you were thriving and things had changed?
Heather Hill:The moment I knew I wasn't thriving. The moment you knew you were thriving Okay, there was a divine moment when I wasn't thriving. The moment you knew you were thriving Okay, there was a divine moment when I wasn't thriving I actually heard a voice and that I needed to quit my job. After that I was really full of anxiety. How am I going to do that? I've worked really hard to get to here and you want me to quit all that. My parents are going to think I'm nuts. I have to. I'm going to sell everything and go travel all that. My parents are going to think I'm nuts. I have to. I'm going to sell everything and go travel.
Heather Hill:That piece was really wild. So when I was traveling, that was when I felt I was on a beach in Australia with a bunch of travelers and I was laying in the sun and I was just sitting there in peace thinking how are you go? You? That was really brave, Wow. And the women beside me were really brave. We'd all left something to vote for ourselves and our freedom, and we didn't know how. How were we going to pay our bills? How were we going to put all this together? We were in all that uncertainty, this together. We were in that uncertainty and yet we were filled with peace. That was, that was a really big peak experience for me.
Candace Fleming:I didn't need to know, mmm there mmm, there is a book called Love Does by Bob Goff and he has this. It's. I'm on chapter 25. I'm almost done. But it's stories of his life and how he just did. He just took off and did One of the stories about him going to, I want to say it wasn't Dubai, I can't think of what the country was, but he thought his friend was playing a joke on him about being able to be a commissioner there at that country.
Candace Fleming:So he ended up going through. He was like I'm just going to say yes to everything, thinking it's a joke with his friend because he had went and played a joke on his friend, went to the hotel, ran up their room service and so when he checked out they found out like bob, so he thought he was trying to get him back. So he's going through all of this. He has a meeting this guy in new york only to find out they were really asking him to come to this country and commission this country. Um, which he ended up doing. But it was just the fact that he thought he was playing along with a joke, saying yes, and he has many stories on how he just said yes, using love in the universe and propelling himself even to the point where he would take his kids they, when they turned a certain age. He would take them on an adventure that they wanted to do, whatever it was. They would pack up, go with no plans, and it was no sleeping they would I think it was 48 hours or so and they just explored whatever it was that that kid wanted to do. So if they wanted to go to, let's say, turkey, all right, we're getting on a plane, we're going to Turkey and we're just going to go and do it.
Candace Fleming:And so he has these moments in life where he just does that and you see how much comes out of just doing without the plan, and it is so feeling to read that book and to say I can do that too. I can still do what I'm doing, but I can also live my life out in a to make that money. So everything is so condensed in our lives. Our need to flourish doesn't happen. So many people get stuck in not flourishing, and I love that you use music as one of those, because I mean, honestly, you're our first music healing guest to tell you the truth, which, which is amazing, and we've been doing this for almost three years now, but I know that janet has some things that I've been talking, I've been going I had just shooting off the questions, so go ahead, but I did want to say that and check that book out. Love does, and he has another one, a follow-up to that, and I'm going to start that shortly, probably tomorrow. So yeah, go ahead.
Janet Hale:Oh wow, thank you so much for all the things. I was writing notes, I was like the first thing that you were speaking to me. Whether you knew it or not, um is following our dreams and not selling out, and that's why I asked you the question um, I think, what was it? Uh, value, uh, I don't know Something about when you weren't following your dreams and you realized that you were paying a high price and understanding that when we stop following our passion and our heart, that we are actually taking away from ourselves, and when we make the transition into what it is that we know we were meant to do, because we've always known it, however, we get caught up in the I need to be doing this and I need to be doing that, and so much gets lost in that. And so I'm so happy to hear someone talk about having to make the transition from one thing to the other, transition from one thing to the other, from the thing that is expected by society mostly, and then following our passion and our dreams. And guess what? One of the things and I'm not a religious person, everyone knows this but one of the things.
Janet Hale:My cousin took me to church with her and the guy said something that struck me. I was in the midst of going through a divorce. Guy said something that struck me. I was in the midst of going through a divorce and during that time, wasn't sure if I was going to end up in the home or not. You know, just all that stuff, right, and the man was preaching and he said this. He was talking something about something in the Bible when people getting chased and the water was, they got protected the Israelites, I think but he said the issue was that they had no address, it didn't matter, they kept going.
Janet Hale:And so when I was listening to you talk, I love that story how we don't know how it's going to turn out, but guess what, how much fun is it in doing what we want to do. And that is something that I actually needed to hear today, because sometimes I struggle. I'm going through a transition right now and sometimes I struggle with that, you know, and I'm like, oh, maybe, no, I take that back. No, there's no, maybe on that. I don't struggle with that part of it.
Janet Hale:I struggle with not knowing the outcome sometimes, but I do know how important it is to follow our heart, whether it's singing, storytelling, writing, whatever that is, and I found it interesting when I heard you say how the children you ended up with children, and how they were drawn to you and brought to you to help you get back on your path to what it is that you needed to do, and how brave you were to get in the backpack and go. You know, then you find your love. You know, yeah, and now you're back at music. Yeah, and now you're back at music. Yeah, and then your last song on this last record that I'm going to listen to was For your Mother Powerful, just absolutely powerful, and I'm grateful to have you here.
Janet Hale:I think we are just picking up some of the best guests. I don't know. We're just fortunate to do it so thank you so much for that.
Heather Hill:I'm grateful to be here and you know what I love what you said and if I could just offer. You know, sometimes we get so caught up in comfort Like we don't, but you know, you look at the growth. Growth does not come from a comfortable place, it's kind of befriending discomfort. And I think when you're sitting in that transition, in that discomfort of place, we have to really engage our gifts because it brings us such peace and flow while we're in so much chaos and change, like as you look at our world right now.
Heather Hill:If ever we needed to know what our gifts were, it's now, and to sink in, let our gifts wash over us, because it inspires other people to then prosper their gifts, it's, it creates this community of connection, our gifts, if we just, you know, use our little bits of uniqueness and bind with others to access their unique pieces, like a band, like an orchestra, like everybody has their part and they make this beautiful whole. There's no real superstar in there, it's a. You know that it's all weaved together and everyone really knows where they are in that, and to me, I think we're always in transition, right, we're always in this change and we try to control it. Oh no, if I just have my job, my kids are going this direction and my, my kid just stays in the bathtub or my dog just stops barking, whatever we try to control it instead of just saying oh, this or better, you know but you know what I find about that interesting, about that part um the controlling that we think we're doing and how things end up the way that they're supposed to right.
Janet Hale:They do, you know, and so it's easier when we stop trying to control it, right. I don't know that we're actually controlling it exactly you know what I mean.
Candace Fleming:Absolutely that makes sense.
Janet Hale:Does that make sense?
Candace Fleming:it's. It's like the blueprint. I always talk about this. We have to write our blueprint in pencil because it can be changed. You need an eraser to change the blueprint and it doesn't matter what your blueprint is, as long as you're open to wherever it goes. Have a plan, absolutely. There's nothing wrong with having a plan, but be open to that plan changing, because the plan is just an outline to guide you on the journey. But if it changes, oh, ok, let me do this. Ok, this staircase need to go right here, OK, that's going to be better.
Candace Fleming:Ok, cool, I'm rolling with it. Even I know I shared with you all earlier how my daughter was in the tub and she would probably be in there maybe the whole time that we did this. However, when I went to check and make sure the house was settled, she was actually out of the tub drying herself. So she is doing something opposite than I thought would happen. But I planned also for things not to be the way I wanted them or expected them to be. I was hoping she would take a bath, wash herself, get out, and then I had already accepted there's a possibility that that won't happen. I'm not sure what will, but there is a possibility. But that also mentally frees up that when we get upset and that tension of you didn't do it the way I said, like it's getting done, we'll be all right, just let things flow and go.
Candace Fleming:But you mentioned something about being uncomfortable and how growth isn't comfortable, and when we think about things, I'm going to take it to a more tangible pain. When women grow breasts, our breasts, they're in pain as they grow. When we grow new teeth, they're in pain, that growing process, or we hear growing pains, and it may be, whether we're talking about emotional, mental, physical, those kind of things, they're uncomfortable in the moment. And then we have these beautiful things that happen afterwards.
Heather Hill:We have breasts afterwards.
Candace Fleming:We have nice pearly teeth afterwards. We have experience, we have knowledge, we have growth in that. So being uncomfortable it's going to happen, it's a part of it, literally happens to when we give birth. To get here is uncomfortable, it's uncomfortable for the mother who is birthing us. So we have to look at that and say it's okay to be uncomfortable because something great can absolutely come out of this. One more thing that you mentioned is that Twilight Mist, which is your fourth album, which is your current album, was your most authentic album or you felt like you had your voice. What is it that prevented you from bringing your true voice to albums one through three? Or do you feel that this voice? It just changed and it feels the most authentic you?
Heather Hill:Something happened to me during that creation of that album, with my mom sick and being with someone unwell and loving her so hard and coming to a grieving hard, and you know, some really hard things in life happened during that time which I think cracked me open A lot of the pain and the tears and the. You know how you can really experience joy in those same moments, like the deepest grief you've ever had, and then this most profound joy. I'd never been in that space before. Like you know, as my mom was passing, she taught me this. She could barely breathe and yet she's playing hide and go seek with me in her room. She just really wanted out of there and she knew she couldn't go, but she was so playful and yet in the space of a lot of pain in her body and I just thought, wow, the range of my mother. She is a strong, profound. I hope I have a bit of that in me. How did she do that? How does she hold space for such extraordinary joy? And then I watched her climb over to her piano and play this beautiful song that's on my album, the only love song she ever wrote, and it's so amazing and she could only have the breath to play part of it. The big theme of it boy did she teach me actually music is survival, music is life. Music is way bigger than meets the eye. Music was her way to survive. It was her mental health. She would say, oh, if I could just get my fingers on my keys and I'm like I am such a jerk Over on the other side. I'm thinking to myself here. I am thinking that music is something I have to put out in the world and be successful at, and he or she is surviving with her music. I need to really get under what it is she knows about this music. So that's what's different about my fourth album.
Heather Hill:These songs came from a very spiritual place in me. They were like a meditative journey for me. I wrote these songs in a prayerful space. They came through fully the words, the amazing lines. It felt otherworldly, it felt angelic, it felt you know, whatever you believe in. It felt like I was connected and tapped into a source and I just brought it.
Heather Hill:I didn't care. And the other thing is I don't even care about talking about that process now Because you know I was raised in the church and I was raised. My mom was a gospel player and well, I love that world. I don't love all of it, but I love, you know, I love all of it, but I love some of it. I love the big, open heart, I love the love and I love the compassion. There was something much bigger to me. I was interested in spirit. No, just spirit. I don't need all the stories. I just want to tap into this beautiful thing and I want to give it to other people, and I don't care how that looks. It means I'm going to be at your bedside as you're struggling on your way out of this life. Then that's where I'll be. Yeah, and that's what happened to me in this. I, unapologetically, am speaking about it.
Heather Hill:This album I was will help clear people's energy systems in their body, their chakras, from the root chakra to their cosmic chakra. It's going to wash over them and find all the places that need a hug. It's like a sonic hug. That's what the album's called. It's a sonic hug and while you're on that bridge of uncertainty, this is a beautiful thing for you to listen to, because it's going to meet you exactly where you're at and it's going to move you, and it's going to move you through a whole range of emotions because, you know, songs and keys are associated with different organs, different emotions, different frequencies. With different organs, different emotions, different frequencies.
Heather Hill:Music is a powerful way to heal and it's been going on forever. There's been tribes that have had songs for their babies. A baby would have a song and a mother would sing before they come into this world, the Maasai, I mean. If you look at different histories of music, we were doing this. We were healing through music, the beginning, the end and everything in between, to help ease our pain and to help bring grace and to give us hope. And for me, this album, hope and and for me this album, while there's been a great deal of loss, is very much about the hope.
Heather Hill:My mom is now my ancestor and my mom's mom, she's my ancestor and I hear and I feel them and I feel them in my music and I play my mom's piano and she's in my strings, she's in the notes, she's in my strings, she's in the notes, she's in the unicorda pedal, she's in, she's there. I remember even seeing her little gray head, you know playing. She was tiny and she'd play this big piano with this massive sound which is such a metaphor of her. She was a tiny, fierce and powerful woman and when she played well, she couldn't access that in the world with her voice. When she played, you're like, wow, there is a warrior. There she is, I feel her heart and she melts me and she planted that in me and I'm like if I could be like her in that, if I could access my heart and give that to you. There I've lived a good life.
Janet Hale:You mentioned the healing and we talked when we had our pre-meeting about. For me, music has gone down in the generations and so there are songs that came from my mom and my uncles that I remember and I do believe I may be the only sibling that remembers the words to most of those songs and there are songs that weren't played on radios or anything of that nature. You also made me think about during the slavery times and how they used song to escape like Wade in Water and then Meet Me Over here, and how music is just as important then now as it was then. My mother's music is just as my mother's been gone for over 20 years and her music is just as important to me and I will sing her songs that she taught me and they're, you know they're not her songs, but they were songs that I learned from her, that I learned from her.
Janet Hale:And the other thing that you mentioned mom. For whatever reason I'm on this mom thing, maybe because it's the mom Mother's Day weekend just passed, I don't know, but with our mothers, the more we learn about our mothers, the more compassion we have for our mothers, and for some of us who have not had the most pleasant childhood. The more we learn, the less anger we have, and that is replaced with compassion. And if we could add song to that and music to that, because it's all a rhythm, I think it's all a part of a dance, it's all a part of that orchestra that you mentioned, and so when I hear you talk about that, it reminds me of us being able to go home, spiritually home, because there's no other place like it.
Candace Fleming:Yeah, I use music a lot to get into a better place emotionally sometimes and I have my go to, my go to music or album said, no matter what, this is the album I can hear. And so I wonder, with your album have you, have you received any critiques from just the general listeners and, if you have, what is some of the feedback on their healing, if you've heard any?
Heather Hill:Well, the most impactful feedback I've had is in my home. I've been doing small concerts where I play the album live on my mom's piano and people will lay down or do restorative yoga at the same time as listening to the music. They go off and have their really beautiful, relaxing, restorative time. They'll say to me there's one song called Heart Song and I wrote it for my children and I wanted them to understand my love and give them a song and it's a deep love song about you know how my blood is their blood and my rhythm of my heart is their rhythm and my pulse is their pulse. Pulse is their pulse and you know the way that I'd hold them in my neck. You know nuzzling them and the sense of me and the sense of them. It's the Divine Mother I'm so. I'm so taken by that, the strength that a mother can just take a crying baby, put the baby over her heart and the baby is calm. And you know, for those that don't have moms and that you know haven't had that mothering experience, I wish that for all of them that they receive that through music in any possible way. But that particular song and there's different songs depending on what the thing is that a person is dealing with when they're listening to this music, because there's different chakra systems. Some people really resist certain songs and some people are kind of in love with the song that you know, for example, the sacral chakra is your power center, your womb is right there and it's your second chakra. A lot of women have a challenge with their sacral chakra, their voice, their power, their fierceness. So I have a song called Wings and it's a song that nurtures the sacral chakra and it was a song I used to sing to my daughter when she was having night terrors and it was. I could literally feel Archangel Michael come in with these big wings and wind would blow through and she'd immediately calm and she'd fall asleep and my husband would be like, how does that work? Like what's happening in there? You know I'd taken reiki so I hired. I understood like, oh, okay, I'm just gonna, we're just gonna put my hands on her and see what I'm gonna call in my ancestors, I'm gonna call in my guides in my the angelic realm and I'm gonna see if, if this helps, and like every time, it helped. And this song came and it's Wings and that song has a real reaction for people, because a lot of us have different needs in our bodies depending where we are, our stories, our history, the vocal chakra.
Heather Hill:There's a song called Sanctuary. It's a song that people have challenges with if they've not been able to find their voice or if they've been shut down in their lifetime and can be seen but not heard. A lot of women in that space, about going into the space of you that loves you and is clear and no darkness gets to come in. I'm going to speak of this, I'm going to write of this. Um, it's also a powerful song. And then there's you know each one.
Heather Hill:I think, if you come into the album for the first time, because I was guided that you have to kind of clear your root chakra first before you can really receive.
Heather Hill:The first song is called Sacred Cycle and it's about the cycles of life and how it's very circular, our journeys until we get the lesson. We're going to go around and around and repeat, and repeat until we get that thing. So that's what that song is. It's built in music in a cycle of fifths, which was really kind of cool that it worked out that way and it compares nature to its cyclical life and our seasons and our times of motherhood and our, our cycles, which actually free us in the end. We do it until we're done with it and then we're free and I don't know when that's going to be for you and when that's going to be for me, but I'm just going to love you until you're done with that. And I find, when I tap into my ancestors, who are an incredibly powerful mother line, and I feel them, and I feel their incredible compassion and their leadership, and they whisper I hear their whisperings about these cycles and that it's not important for me to find meaning. I am the meaning.
Heather Hill:Just love them, hold their heads. Just love is why I'm here, and to bring joy. That's it. And that root chakra if I can just dig my roots into the ground, I can't forget my roots. I need to know them and really accept them and dig in. Know them and really accept them and dig in, then I can grow and I can, I can bloom and I can give that to my children. So that's what that's the start of the album. This like deep grounding know who you are that is so beautiful.
Candace Fleming:Um, love. I know we both just want to keep going, don't we? Especially with that word love. It is a very, very rooted thing, though, once you find it and discover it within yourself. I don't think it's a big search, more so than it is just to give it's. Let me be the light to shine out to everyone else and just let it be. I don't have an agenda. I'm not trying to heal anyone or change anyone. I just want to be, and because I'm being, it just happens to bring a healing force. It happens to bring a calmness. It happens to bring those ancestors, because when you're still, they just are.
Candace Fleming:You just are we talk about well, you didn't necessarily talk about it, but when we hear people and they talk about, God is in us and the light of God is in us. That is what I hear when you talk about your music and how it just shines out. And when people listen to it, they'll feel that because it just is, you didn't do it for fame, you didn't do it for money, you didn't do it for any reasons outside of giving your true, authentic self and letting the world hear it and whatever comes from, that is what comes from it, but it has so much meaning to you and so much love to you. I wonder do your uh-oh sorry, does your children like the music too? Are they into music at all, or do they just like to listen?
Heather Hill:They are into music. I'm still hoping that. You know that they have beautiful voices and one is starting to play with the guitar. They have beautiful voices and one is starting to play with the guitar. I'm hoping they fall into music. I mean, I sang them to sleep and woke them up with music, just like my mom did for me. Music got us through all the times, her music in particular. She lost her mom when I was born and she put me under the piano and basically played nonstop for six months. So I think of that sort of in minor keys, like she was grieving. So that's what I do If someone dies, I go to the piano. If there's a big shooting, I go to the piano. If there's something joyful new babies coming I go to the piano. If there's like, if there's something joyful new babies coming I go to the piano. If anybody wants a song, I want to write one. So you know, it's just, it's such an incredible, it's an incredible thing to be able to have and I'm so, I'm so grateful, honestly.
Janet Hale:Yeah, I wanted to say I lost my son in 2016, and he was an incredible rapper to me, I mean he was the stuff, and I have one of his CDs that I listen to and how healing listening to him talk.
Janet Hale:His rap talks about things that are relevant today, okay, and he baths in 2016. So that has been very healing and for me, I feel very fortunate that both my children and I say are, even though he's passed are very artistic. They are acting, you know, they have some kind of you know what I mean. So their mom is a hippie. I don't know if that has anything to do with it, but when you talked about song and the healing, I thought about Candace and myself, and so I often say I am not religious and, however, I do believe that there is a force in this universe that has caused all beautiful things to happen and that I have been protected all of my life, and when I say that, I mean really protected, and so when I get really into this, I'm not religious thing. Candace has kidnapped me from time to time and put on a song by Yolanda Adams.
Candace Fleming:She does it on purpose which one in the midst of it all yes that's my favorite anyway.
Janet Hale:So she'll, she'll, put that on and all of a sudden, I'm well and it's come everything. I'm wide open, I'm wide, all the way open to that. And the other song for me is Take Me to the King and for whatever, I don't know what it's something about that's even bigger than the other one.
Candace Fleming:That one gets you crying more.
Janet Hale:That just opens me all the way up. And so the other thing, this generational thing, I'm real big on. You know you're talking about your mom. I'm talking about my mom and my daughter, my son, my aunties and uncles who um struggled with um addiction and but they found peace in music and singing. You know what I mean and I get it now. You know like I understand it now, but one of the things that candace did for me and um that really touched me, there's a song that I like. Um stapleton is his name and the name of the song is tennessee whiskey oh, yeah, yeah yeah, and that is my jam.
Janet Hale:Like, oh, I turn that on and you can't tell me. I'm not a superstar. So what she did was she turned. She was in her car, she turned it on and she said did you say this is my mama's jam? I don't know what she said, this is the jam, whatever she said. And then she played it and my heart was so full, it's getting full now. It was so full, it's getting full now. It was so full because I knew that she can feel me, that she sees me and that she understands me and that she loves me. And when she did that, that's what it showed to me. You know what I mean, and I don't know if it's her favorite song, but she knew it was her mom's favorite song and she wanted me to know that. I knew that.
Janet Hale:And she played it and she had the radio and she was jamming to it and everything, and that was so healing for me, in such a loving way. And you talked about being open, for us to get open, because that music will open you up. You know, there's a music out there, you guys, I don't know what it is for each person, but there's music out there that will open up your soul, yeah, and open up your heart and open up each cell in your body and make it move, yeah, and so I appreciate that you offer that to the world.
Heather Hill:Mm-hmm.
Janet Hale:I've been fortunate enough to gain some of that through my ancestors, through my mother and my aunties, who are no longer here, but some of their music I can think of a song of them and I'm like, oh yeah, I remember when they were in the kitchen and they were singing and they was doing their thing or they were doing the bop and just those different kinds of things. Or think of my son and some of the rapping that he did and like I was really digging that you know, like I'm not as cool as him, but that was really cool. Or when my granddaughter is over and we listen to music and she knows songs, to songs that came my way when she was born and she gets in, she starts singing and playing it out, and it's just those moments. Or watching Candace, who can do a lot of things, she can act, she can do a lot of things, but when she sings to music, it's, you know, it's nice.
Janet Hale:But to have that happen it's still joyful. It's such a joyful moment to be able to have that happen. It's still joyful. It's such a joyful moment to be able to have that, to have the power of song, of music, in my life. I'm just very grateful for that and grateful for you being able to offer that to others who may not understand it, but once they get it, their soul can be on fire.
Candace Fleming:Heather, I want to thank you for your time and what you are giving to the world. Thank you, thank you. Continue to keep doing it until you can't, no matter what's to come out of it. Doing it until you can't, no matter what's to come out of it, because even if it's just one person who needs your music, who needs to heal, that's one person that you saved in the world, which is the mission. It's just get one if you can get one, and you've already done that. So just continue to do. What you do is healing for yourself and its own, and that's automatically going to make it more healing for others. So thank you for that. I do want to give. The suicide prevention lifeline is in Canada. I would love to make sure that we cover that. If not, I will put it in the show notes and we can definitely get that for everyone. I can find out.
Heather Hill:I know here we dial 911 if we're in some trouble and they automatically put you through to this line. But let me just see.
Candace Fleming:OK, so 911 would definitely be a place to be redirected for National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.
Heather Hill:Is there any.
Candace Fleming:I'm sorry, it's 988. Oh, so it's 988, us and Canada. Perfect, that makes everything easy. So, um, if you guys are struggling with anything, you can definitely call or text that line. Um, is there any last things you guys wanted to give before we wrapped up? We are at the end, of course, um, but anything that you guys want to share or give to the audience before we take off?
Janet Hale:I want to say something. Of course, candice goes. Yes, I am glad to have our guest today to provide a different type of healing, because this show is about healing, and we do talk about the prevention of suicide prevention line, because we understand that some folks are suffering and may need additional assistance. We have found this way to help you in your healing process, because we have to learn how, if we can, how to laugh as we cry, how to grow, how to get past it. What do we do? Who do we talk to? Is it okay to talk about it?
Janet Hale:So, sing about it, play about it, listen to music, whatever it is we need to do. So I'm just really grateful for this platform. I'm grateful to be able to be on the platform with my daughter and to share this moment, because I won't always be here, but these will be here. You'll be able to look back at these tapes and hear your mother and see your mother as we interact with different people, who is bringing peace and healing to others. So that's all I have to say and thank you so much for being our guest today.
Heather Hill:Thank you both. I just I love who you are and who you're being in this world and I just you know, I want to say to your audience that you are so loved and you are loved in so many ways and there's, you know, know, I know when you're struggling and going through hard times the pace is very slow, you can't handle a lot of things. It's overwhelming and that if you just put on your favorite song, it's really simple. Just take the space and put on your favorite song, that one that you just remember there's hope or it's because your mom loved it or someone you know loved it. But you know, it's just that offer to find that song for you that gets you through. And put that on and, yeah, just know you're loved, thank you.
Candace Fleming:You can sure feel it from YouTube, so you're out there spreading it, thank you, where can people find your music, where can they get the album and what are your social handles?
Heather Hill:So my website is heatherhillca easy C-A for the Canada piece, and you can find me on Spotify or Apple or any of the platforms under Heather Hill. So I'm there and all my music is there and easy to find, and YouTube as well Heather Hill Music. So it's all out there and you know if you find your way there. That's just wonderful.
Candace Fleming:Well, thank you so much, Heather, it has been an absolute pleasure. Of course, if you all are looking to reach me, you can find me at CandiceFleming at EssentialMotivationcom. If you're looking to be a guest EssentialMotivationcom, I will be rolling out a mentoring program soon so you guys can check that out as well. Yeah, so Facebook, instagram, essential Motivation LLC and Essential Motivation for Facebook. And, of course, we are just grateful, so grateful, to have you, to have mom, to have me to have the show, to be able to put out something for healing in a non-traditional way, to see that there are ways to deal with whatever it is that you are going through.
Candace Fleming:We don't have to stay stuck in a rut in any way. It's okay to acknowledge that rut and find ways to move past it. Change that blueprint, go get your pencil and it's okay, it's going to change a little bit, but be open to whatever that change in life is. Find the joy in it, find the goodness in it, find the lesson in it, the message in it, whatever it is, acknowledge that and find ways to move past it, whether it's music, meditation, yoga, therapy, church, whatever that form of healing looks like brothers even watching movies with your family, whatever that is for you. Take that time to unwind and let things go, find your happy place, tap into your love, tap into your light and with that I leave you all to love hard, forgive often and laugh frequent. Thank you, guys, so much. Bye, thank you, bye-bye baby.
