Ziv: Hey, I’m Ziv and this is “On the Journey”. Every week “On the Journey” expose the intersections of wellness, spiritual inquiry, mental health, personal growth, and purposeful living through the eyes of the people we interview.

Karmen, I’d love to hear about your journey.

Karmen: Hi, my name is Karmen Pent, and I’m originally from Estonia, but currently living in England, old good England. Where it is a little bit mad now, but the same with the rest of world.

Now, about my journey. I come from the last days of the Soviet Union, when basically all country was really depressed and, half gone, at least, was drunken.

They didn’t see much clear day because they didn’t have any purpose, any good idea how to live further because all job was gone. And same with my mom, unfortunately, and my stepdad. I basically lived through my childhood in a really challenging environment, because I saw things that one little girl should not see.

I got a lot of physical abuse, mental abuse, and so on.

Luckily, I had teachers who basically were mothers and fathers for me. Then, one of my teachers gave me a book and told me to start reading. The more you read, this gives you freedom. And I start to read. Basically I start to read books.

Then in one point, I start to coach other children. I didn’t know at that time that I was coaching them. I thought that I just support them. I just give them good advice, how to turn their lives better.

And then, I got my own children.

Ziv: Karmen, I’m curious, what was that book that was so significant?

Karmen: Actually, for me was really. Sorry, some of English words still for me is a struggle.

Ziv: Same here.

Karmen: It was Pollyanna.

Ziv: Pollyanna?

Karmen: Yes. It is a children’s book. Back when I was a child. It talks about one girl who lost her parents and then she need to move on to her aunt, who was really strict and old. She didn’t want that Pollyanna will be like on her path.

Luckily, Pollyanna was really happy a girl inside. And she played this game that no matter how bad things are around her, there must be something good in these bad things. And then all this small town start to play some game.

And then she fell down from the first floor. And she broke her legs or spine. She was extremely stressed and had depression and she thought that she never will walk. But all villagers came up and told her that actually she changed their lives and they are giving her back.

When I read this book, I remember I start to cry. Then I start to look at my awful life. I start to think that, “Oh, at least I have freedom when they are drunk, I can go outside and play whatever I want.”

We lived in the village, so I had a huge playground. I didn’t have just this small like here in England, we have just our garden. But there were basically two or three villages where I played.

Ziv: So, what you like for Pollyanna was that in every situation, you can see the good things that you have and dive into what is good in your life and that gave you strength.

Karmen: Yes. Example, if you don’t have legs, at least you have arms. If you don’t have legs, no arms, at least you have mouth and you still can draw whatever you want or learn to write.

Ziv: Like Helen Keller, she’s like maybe one of the most famous example, right? That she was a mute, deaf and blind and still she was able to develop herself and do amazing unbelievable things.

This is a superpower to be able to see what is good and to be there. To be in what is good in our life. And it gave you lots of power right here.

Karmen: Yeah. Then a couple years ago, I found out that I have my own disability. I had. I don’t have anymore. I had post-traumatic stress disorder because of my childhood and also I have ADHD.

Also, this discourse and knowledge in my childhood. So now I need to do it myself, all this work, and then I went on the therapist.

And I thought that, I cannot drive here in England. I cannot do some of my job.

And then he told me that, “You know what, take this book and read this book”. And I read this book. This was “Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway” by Susan Jeffers. And, you know, first week when I read this book, I start to drive. The second week when I continued to read the second book. This was, by the way, the first book in English that I read.

So, the second book, we went to the mountains. I climbed on top of this mountain.

Usually, I feel myself a little bit dizzy after the third floor. And now I’m free of this also. I climbed on top of a castle tower and I look around and say “Oh, how beautiful”.

Ziv: Wow.

Karmen: Usually this is not me.

Ziv: What was there in these books that gave you so much strength?

Karmen: I think this message was for me. No matter again what is around you. In you, is this power? And actually, if you don’t give this power away then you can make whatever you can. Basically, you can make even a miracle happen.

I have joked that if you use your powers, you can even do that and a flame can jump up.

Ziv: Of your palm.

Karmen: Exactly.

Ziv: Or even more. So, you believe that we have so much power in us.

Karmen: If somebody says, “I don’t believe this”. I’m saying, “No, I don’t believe, I know”.

Ziv: You know.

Karmen: Because, you can believe lies, but you know the truth.

Ziv: So, you know about this enormous amount of power we have inside of us. How do we unlock it? What do we need? So, we talked about seeing the good and living the good part of our life. Is there anything else that we need to be able to unlock this power inside of us?

Karmen: We need to calm down all this noise that is around us and start taking inside us.

I know that some people will go to church, but in church, they’re saying that you need God. But I’m saying that God lives inside us. We don’t have to search it somewhere out. We need to search it inside.

You need to be honest with yourself, because if you don’t, then everybody would lie to you. All start with ourselves.

Ziv: Everything starts inside.

Karmen: Exactly. You first and then others.

Ziv: Definitely. And it resonates with me tremendously.

Karmen, thank you so much for this interview, for reminding us that there’s always good and to concentrate on the good is so good for us.

Karmen: Actually, for me it was a world changing a couple of weeks ago when I found myself this idea that all bodies around us, this is a huge illusion.

So, we’re all playing, nothing is real. Neither our children, neither our relationship, whatever they are. All of these are illusion, we’re just playing. And we don’t know yet what is real. So, until this all is illusion, we can just play. Even though outside is Corona, doesn’t matter.

You just need to stop worrying. You need to stop thinking that, “Oh, all this is bad. Disaster. Government is bad.” Stop it. Look inside you. You need to take your back from your victim hood.

Ziv: I would take that, “You are a hero, you are here”. It’s really powerful.

Karmen, thank you a lot for your time for this interview, for your perspective, for your really powerful way to see the world in our situation.

Thank you very much.

Karmen: Thank you for calling me.