Ainslie MacLeod On Being An Old Soul

Welcome to Let It Be Easy with Susie Moore.

Susie Moore:

I am so excited to have Ainslie MacLeod on the podcast today. I became acquainted with Ainslie years ago, maybe 10 years ago, when a friend of mine bought me his book, the Instruction, which is all about understanding your soul age and your soul purpose. Ainslie MacLeod is a past life psychic, a spiritual teacher, and an award winning author. And today we're speaking about his most recent book called The Old Souls Guidebook, which I absolutely love, aim, his mission is simple. He wants to help you discover and live your purpose by informing you about your past life experiences is after I discovered Ainsley's book, the first book, I remember kind of going down a rabbit hole trying to find information about him, and I loved watching him interview Oprah and tell her her soul age and her soul's design. And then I was thrilled also to see Ainslie most recently on Ellen DeGeneres on her show, speaking about past lives.

Now, I'm not sure what your beliefs are if you believe that there are any lives before this one. And that's okay. Everything is welcome here. You'll see there'll be very many interesting guests that come on the podcast. And what I want to share is this, sometimes when we keep an open mind, there is just information that can land at the right time. And if you're listening to this, whatever your beliefs, whatever your background, whatever you think about this topic, who knows? There might be something that uncovers something within you that can be useful to you. And if there's anything I know about Ainsley is that he is generous, he is authentic, he cares about people. And if you've ever identified as an old soul, you'll absolutely love this interview. So without any more waiting, I leave you with Ainslie MacLeod. Ainslie MacLeod. Where do I begin?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Wow! What a welcome

Susie Moore:

What a joy to have you on the Let it be easy podcast. Truly, you know that I've loved your work for years, we've worked together, and I just feel as if, wow, this conversation has been such a long time coming, so thank you for being right.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Oh, I'm delighted. Thank you so much for having me.

Susie Moore:

Oh my God, can I say nothing? Gave me more joy than recently also seeing you on the Ellen DeGeneres show. Yeah, I was like, yes. Amazing that the old Soul guidebook speaking about past lives is becoming more and more mainstream.

Ainslie MacLeod:

I know isn't, it's super exciting.

Susie Moore:

So, so exciting.

Ainslie MacLeod:

It's time stuff that we wouldn't have been talking about 20 years ago. Now it is becoming more mainstream. I just hope I live long enough to see it becoming fully mainstream. I'm always concerned about leaving the legacy, getting out there, not getting any younger.

Susie Moore:

Oh, oh my gosh. I think actually I discovered you. I mean, it's hard to remember now because actually a friend of mine told me about your first book, the instruction, and then I checked out your interview with Oprah, which was so cool, and she guess what her soul type was. And we're going to be speaking about that. We're going to be explaining those, but just how you explain to her how past lives affect the present. I was just so fascinated and truly we are speaking about it. So my first question for you, Ainsley, is people might think past lives even if they're real, right? So some people, there's always questions around it. I 1000000% believe and no, but what if someone says, well past lives isn't that old news? We need to just focus on the present. I mean, you always say past lives, present purpose. Could you explain that to us, please?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah. Well, I was working with a client a few years ago and she said to me, look, I know your focus is past lives, but I only want to talk about this life. I don't want to hear about the others. Within 10 minutes, we were exploring past lives because you can't understand yourself fully in this life if you don't know. It's like you can't tell where you're going if you don't know where you've been. And I think, I mean, I've been doing this work now for about 25 years, and I say this now with confidence. I think there's nothing about we humans that isn't past life related in some way because all our fears, blocks limiting beliefs, talents, abilities, even our entire personality is all dependent on what's happened in previous incarnations. I always think of it as like the iceberg. This life we're seeing the tip of the iceberg and add a little bit on the top, all this other stuff, all this millennia of experience and trauma and heartache and good stuff and bad stuff all affecting us the whole time. One of the reasons that I think it's so important to understand past lives is that what we often see a lot of times people will say to me, well, yeah, but I had all this stuff in this life like childhood trauma,

But how we respond to childhood trauma is dependent on what's happened to us prior to that. So we come into this life with past lives that are sort of accessible and some of them may have major trauma there and they get triggered by events in life. So what happens in this life is not the cause. It's the trigger for whatever fear block or whatever we have. And I think the evidence for that is that you can get siblings, for example, raised in the same environment, same traumatic upbringing, but one sees it all in terms of maybe a rejection by the parent and the other one sees it all about its self-esteem issues. So it really is dependent on what is triggered and what's lying there in the past. And the most exciting thing is that if you find out what happened in a past life to trigger that gets triggered, you heal.

I mean, you can get incredible healing, emotional, spiritual, even physical healing happens. You find the source, and it's a very simple principle. It's like you might be on life a hundred, but your soul is on life number one throughout because it doesn't die between lives. And so it has a challenge when it comes to separating one life from the rest. Your soul sees all this one continuum where when you uncover a past life, what you're really saying to the soul is that was then this is now. Let that stuff go. You don't need to be holding onto it. And it seems to be just such a simple thing. People say to me, well, doesn't the soul have all the answers? And no, if it had all the answers, it wouldn't bother coming here, wouldn't have reincarnation if the soul had all the answers. It's coming here to learn and grow. And one of the things it has to learn is that we help it. It has to learn that that was a past life issue and has no place now, but people carry everything. I mean, low self-esteem, judgment issues, all fears, all phobias, they're all past life related. Every phobias a death, death related fear from a past life.

Susie Moore:

I found that by studying your work and connecting with you, Ainslie so much kind of makes sense. It's very soothing actually. You're able to place certain things that feel like maybe they don't entirely make sense. And I also feel like it gives you a real compassion towards people and how they live their lives too. Because you explained that there are essentially 10 soul types and 10 soul ages. And in your book that I love so much, the old souls guide book, which I'm so psyched to be speaking with you about now as well, is how you can maybe identify an older soul or a younger soul. And I find that sometimes there's a lot of frustration between soul ages, but we don't use language yet. But it's like, well, this is how I see I care about people and other people may be a bit more fearful and how they make decisions and how they show up in the world. Can you give us, in the spirit of the old soul's guidebook, what are some signs that someone is an old the soul?

Ainslie MacLeod:

There are a number of signs that, and you get to be an older soul just through experience. I mean, it's coming back here time and time again, lifetime after lifetime, you're growing up and you're learning. And the sort of ultimate goal is to learn that we're all connected. You're learning what it's to be human, but you're learning about love and these higher core values, the importance of peace, truth, that sort of thing, understanding these higher, higher core values or goals. And so one of the signs that an old soul is a greater acceptance of others because whoever you look at, you have been there. And that doesn't mean acceptance of others doesn't mean condoning bad behavior. I always stress that the soul's journey takes it from a place of self-interest to one of greater altruism. Me to we maybe from fear to love, you can describe it in different ways. So the soul doesn't mean old souls. I think people sometimes have the idea, you get to be a really old soul somehow you're all can of zen-like and

Susie Moore:

All, never a bad moment. Yeah,

Ainslie MacLeod:

Perfection's not the goal. It's like spirit of guides I work with say, if it were, you'd be here forever. But it's just a question of getting to a point where an old soul, where you've got a greater understanding, broadly speaking, some of the ways that you can tell somebody's an older soul and you can get blocked. Older souls, I have to say, people can be blocked around the heart chakra and look a lot younger than they are sometimes. But usually the older soul is just, like I say, we're accepting more, loving, a little more compassionate. There's greater empathy because if you think of having been in loads of lives and having experienced all different facets of what it is to be human, it does teach you acceptance. So that's one of the things when you get to be a really old soul, younger souls, they get their knickers and a twist about trans people, gay people.

It's like anyone who's not like themselves and so on. And the older souls, it's like who cares? I don't mean who cares as in not being involved. But younger souls see the contrast and the differences. Everything's black and white. Even the difference between genders for younger souls, it's a big deal for a lot of younger souls. Women are inferior, men are superior. They see huge differences. But after lifetimes going between male and female and in between whatever you learned, compassion, acceptance, understanding that we're all different. So the journey is one, it takes you often from a place of maybe being more religious to more spiritual, older souls are the ones more likely to say, well, I I'm spiritual more than religious conservatism is very appealing to younger soul. The younger the soul, the more kind certainty they want. For extreme young souls want fundamentalism or fundamentalism is term I heard.

Susie Moore:

Yes.

Ainslie MacLeod:

And well, it makes 'em feel safe. There's a lot of fear when your younger soul, so guns make you feel strong and safe. Of course, they want powerful leaders, powerful gods usually male and vengeful and all of that sort of thing. So the journey politically takes you more from voice of conservatism to being more progressive, more concerned about not just your own stuff, but other people's wellbeing as well.

Susie Moore:

Yeah. One way that I love how you described it in the book Ainslie, is it's almost like if you're a party, the older souls feel more comfortable because they're like, we've been here before, we know what to expect. And younger souls maybe stick together a little more. And I mean, I just love that reference because I just feel like that makes sense and I think that we can all understand everyone's kind of different position and there's just a level of comfort from familiarity being in the world,

Ainslie MacLeod:

Being for a very young soul. It is walking into a party where everybody kind knows each other and they know how to act and so on, and they're fresh here, they're not so sure about that. So there is a lot more fear

Susie Moore:

And naturally then rules feel healthy. Rules feel safe. So it's like we speak about conformity with younger souls. And you say too that when it comes to a soul's growth and development, you can tell that older souls exist when they are making decisions based out of feelings of love and creativity and not feelings of, well, if I do that, that might be wrong and I don't want to upset somebody. And there's risk here. So do you find that there's also just maybe less judgment, just less rules, more kind of frankly not taking it all so seriously? Yeah,

Ainslie MacLeod:

That's one of the signs of being a much older soul is kind of just that little more sort of easygoing kind feeling. Definitely younger souls, they do want those rules. They want to be told what to do, which is why totalitarianism is actually still popular with some. They like the authoritarian leader, leader, especially the Sabre rattling kind, because it makes them feel tough and powerful. If their leaders can all tough, it makes them feel good. So I mean, it explains everything. When you look at the total of all lives and we've all had lives of enslavement and imprisonment and being stuck in a poverty trap, being controlled by others, having a parent choose who we marry, those sort of things. So the older the soul gets, the more personal freedom becomes vital. Older the soul, the less they want to be told what to do. It's one of the signs actually, if you have been imprisoned or enslaved in past life, as I would put it to a client, you have probably thought or said many times in this life, don't tell me what to do. Because if somebody orders you or tells you what to do rather than asking you, that's a trigger. The soul then goes back to that place where you had no autonomy, no freedom of choice, and it doesn't like it.

So what keeps young souls very safe and everything is something that drives older souls, nuts, restrictions. I mean, look at what's happening right now with Roe versus Wade and oh yes, Theise of that, you younger souls. Well, you can tell it's younger soul parts of the world where really it's about control as we all know.

Susie Moore:

Even Ainslie, my friend's child, I don't think he's even three said, who are you to tell me what to do? I was like, oh, okay, here we are.

Ainslie MacLeod:

So that could be a kid that's had imprisonment or enslavement in their recent past life, possibly the one before this. It could also be to do the soul type personality. If you've got a child from a very early stage, and it can also be fear driven, it can be a fear of powerlessness or something like that where you try to get the kid to tidy up their toys or something and go, damn, well not going to do it. Don't tell me what to do. So it can sometimes be, if you think that the soul has had maybe experiences of being a leader, like last life, they were leading an army and now they're being told to tidy up the toys. It's like, don't tell me.

Susie Moore:

And practically speaking, I liked how you break this down. You say that there are between a hundred and 120 lives per person and it takes between five to 6,000 years for that cycle, the entire cycle from a new soul to a level 10 who then transcends what would you say Ainsley is the biggest benefit? Because I loved when you explained to me my soul age, and then I remember my type because you break it down also, there's an amazing quiz on Ainsley's site, which I'll link to, but I remember you sharing with me that I'm a spiritualist performer, leader and hunt. Oh, leader and caregiver.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah. So I actually have it here in my notes. Spiritually former creator, thinker, leader, caregiver. It's a really good combination. You're a very old soul as well. I mean, you're right at the end of level 10, so

Susie Moore:

I know. I hope I stick around a little longer.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah, I know. Oh, this is an interesting thing. Most really old souls, when I tell 'em somebody, gosh, this could be your last life. Of course you can't tell. You don't know until you go and process this life on the ral plane when you're done with it. But I'll say to somebody, it could be your last life. And they go, oh, thank God. I just want to go home. And yet every so often I get somebody goes, oh my God, I just finally got my act together. Now you're telling me it could be over.

Susie Moore:

I really like it here.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yes, I'm actually getting to like it finally. Yeah. But these choices, whether you have to come back, for example, this is just made on a soul level and your soul's just totally pragmatic about it would just always be, well, what do I still have to do? But I wanted to say about your soul types and even your soul age plays into it. You're looking for meaning. You're looking for higher purpose. I mean, that is huge for older souls. And the less time you have ahead of you and you're really very much at the end of the journey here, the more you want to feel like you make this life count making a difference in other people's lives. You even look at the soul types. These are archetypes if you like, based on what you've learned over previous lifetimes. So you've got the leader in, you learn that through leading.

It could be anything from, like I mentioned, leading an army, or it could be just being a band leader or some front person in the band, orchestra conductor, there's just, or running a small business or whatever, or big business, it could be anything, but it's through leadership positions. You learn that you've got the performer in there that comes from lifetimes as a singer, actor, dancer, or similar. And just even those two are the sort of thing that I see in people who are doing the kind of thing that you're doing. You're reaching, every performer wants an audience.

And if you're going to do all the things that you're meant to do in this life, anyone with a performer in their soul types, they're going to have that feeling of, if I can reach 50 people, I can reach 50,000. So let's go for it. You want to have the biggest impact, the most bang for your buck in this life, so that part of your soul will go, let's just keep going for as big an audience as possible. Bang. Actually, when you're really close to the end of the journey, some people wanting to just keep their hand down, stay out of trouble, might cause not for you even. You're more full out, you're all singing, all dancing kind of. You're here to make an impact and you're doing it mean, which is fantastic. Unfortunately, a lot of times there can be past life issues around failure. People don't have the energy or the feeling. There's that feeling deep down it probably just won't work out or something. And so follow through and getting over procrastination, actually that's such a past life thing, procrastination,

Susie Moore:

And that's around fear of failure.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Sometimes you can get the two together, the failure just says, well, things didn't work out. Usually in multiple past lives, one life. And the soul kind of goes, okay, this happens from time to time, but if you have a series, maybe two or three, then it starts to think, well, we're probably not going to get things done here. And loss could be like you start a business in a past life and then you go bankrupt or war comes along and destroys everything. And then soul in this life will have the feeling of like, well, again, what's the point? Because we could be doing everything. Something will just come along and take it all away from us. So these all play into procrastination and lack of, I guess, self-realization,

Susie Moore:

People

Ainslie MacLeod:

Not really going for it.

Susie Moore:

I find too that being self-aware, however that shows up for us, becoming more aware of who we are, why we do what we do, what our motivations are, it's only helpful. It's only going to be useful. And the old quote about how the unexamined life isn't worth living, I think it was Aristotle that said that. I think why wouldn't I want to understand as much as I can about what's motivating me and where my natural strengths lean and what it is that maybe I have to offer in this lifetime. And so by studying your work, having access to so many incredible resources, this can only help us not to go, oh, well this is so interesting. I mean, of course it's naturally interesting, but it's for the present. This is for present ease, and this is a little easy podcast. It's for present ease, present insights, present success. I mean, one thing that I love that you say Ainslie, is that your destiny isn't supposed to be a secret because people think, well, what's my purpose? I'll find it one day, I've got to go to the Himalayas.

Ainslie MacLeod:

I got to climb.

Susie Moore:

Can you speak to us about that?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah. Well, oh, there's different ways that the spirit guides I work with have described this over the years. One question they posed was, what if learning to drive a car took a lifetime? And I was, oh yeah, that would be a bit pointless. And it's the same thing here. We think that it's much harder, I think made to seem like it's harder. People make it, it's esoteric, and you have to have this training and this understanding, and you have to have to go through pain and suffering or whatever. And it is not a mystery, and it's not meant to be a secret. I mean that idea that, oh, there's a secret and only certain people get, it drives me nuts because as a spirit world, we'll say there's nothing that they want more than for us to understand ourselves better and to be able to live our lives as fully as we possibly can.

So I'm with you. I've always wanted to figure out who I am, and when I started doing this work, it was like, oh my gosh, this is great. It leads to self knowledge. I mean, I grew up never not being accepted. I was a very sensitive creator type. So the thing I heard all my life was, oh, you're too sensitive. There's a problem with it. And I even tried to sort of toughen up or pretend I was something I wasn't doing. This work made me realize, no, that's exactly who I am and what I've chosen to be for this life, and it's a damn good thing. People are in the main, not too sensitive, they're just highly sensitive in a world that doesn't honor that sensitivity a lot of the time. And

Susie Moore:

It's a superpower. I mean, look at the work you get to do because you get to tune in, and if anyone is curious, Ainslie speaks in real time to spirit guides. When he does readings, you hear him speaking to them. It's fascinating. It's like this portal you have access to, which is just, wow.

Ainslie MacLeod:

The way I get it is literally I ask questions and wait for the answer and pass it on. So yeah, very much so.

Susie Moore:

Your sensitivity is absolutely important.

Ainslie MacLeod:

It's essential,

Susie Moore:

And this is your purpose. So I always think if we have more information about our background, where we are, what our soul type is, because sometimes I think we think that maybe we're like our parents or we were good at this one thing, so that's what we should do. Because I used to have a corporate job, for example, at Ainsley, which was a lot of fun, but wasn't my life's work. A lot of things kind of make sense about just understanding ourselves, creating this intimacy with ourselves. That really uplifts us, I think, to our next level because we're like, ah, okay, yes. I remember too when you were reading Oprah, she said she thought that she'd be an educator because that would be what it would fall under, and you're like, no, no, that would be teaching the same syllabus year after year to different children. And she was like, oh yeah, no, no, no, no, no. And then you redefined it as a spiritualist, I believe, if I'm recalling correctly. So I think too, sometimes we just don't know.

Ainslie MacLeod:

I think we are all so influenced by the culture we're part of by our parents, our teachers and so on. And a lot of times who we are gets lost. We come into this world with often a strong sense of who we are. I mean, in fact, you can often look back at childhood and see the kind of things that interested you or intrigued you, and maybe as you grow up, you go, well, I can never make a living being an artist or whatever it might be. And you let other people make your decisions for you. I see that a lot with parents thinking, well, we're all lawyers, so you should be a lawyer as well, but it may not be what that person is here to do. And for that reason, it's one of the reasons that my clientele in the main people between 37 and 43, I mean, it's a huge bulk of people at that age

Susie Moore:

Really. So that's where people between those ages come to you mainly.

Ainslie MacLeod:

I would say probably like 70% of my clients would be in that. Why

Susie Moore:

Do you think that is?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Well, what's happening is that a couple of things. The soul is conscious of decade markers, so it's always kind of looking forward maybe a couple of years ahead, it's going 20, what are we going to do for our twenties? What are we going to do for our thirties, forties, and so on? You hit about 35, usually mid thirties, and the soul starts to go, okay, well, we're not getting any younger here and we can see 40 coming up. So where do we want to be? What do we want to be doing? And this is why if you don't pay attention to that, you get the midlife crisis. That's why it would usually happen. Some people get more than one midlife crisis. I talk about how I had multiple classic cars every time I had a midlife crisis.

Let's say you're mid thirties, the soul is saying, okay, it's four up. Where are we going? And then it starts to look around and it goes, okay, well maybe this person that I married straight out of college, maybe that's not really doing it for me, or this corporate job that I thought would be great because it paid so well, it's not working for me. Soul is usually around that point, especially if you're a spiritualist soul type, looking for more meaning, looking for a sense of higher purpose. And very often for people who are in more corporate kind of jobs, looking for some way to really help people, if the bottom line's just about the bottom line, it's not enough for a lot of old soul spiritualists or other soul types as well, that they're looking for something that gives them greater meaning. And this is often where the change, the shift that somebody undergoes might result them in them earning less, but it's giving more personal satisfaction, looking for the higher purpose meaning, and to benefit the world or help individuals.

Susie Moore:

And where does, because in the book you explore this too, where does destiny and free will intercept? Because in the book you speak about free will, destiny and intuition, and specifically how they all intersect. Sometimes I think too, we can go, oh, well, there's just a plan for my life, and I guess this is what it is. It may be in a bit of a passive way that isn't entirely healthy or helpful. I know that of course I believe in free will. There's evidence of it everywhere. But I also believe that there are some things that are meant for us and intuitively being intuitively guided. And you have these great exercises in the book too that help you with really connect your intuition. Could you speak about how those three intersect from your perspective? What's the plan? What's up to us? And then how do we know?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah, because there are myths and beliefs that are erroneous. And what is that? And it drives me nuts when I hear people say this that everything is meant to be

Well. And my answer is always well try telling that to somebody who's dangling by their ankles in a secret prison somewhere being horribly beaten and tortured, like to say, well, it's just where you're meant to be right now. No, it doesn't work like that. So we come here with a life plan, which is, it's a rough outline of people to meet, places to go, things that you want to achieve in this life, and the soul contains that memory. But a lot of times we lose that connection a little bit between the soul and the conscious mind and the body. It's almost like we forget what we're here to do, but if you tap into, this is where meditation stuff is so important, connecting with the soul, you got a far stronger sense of your destiny and what you're here to do. But the thing is, you can have, okay, so let's say your destiny is to come here, have a family and be a doctor.

Well, and you understand that where the free will thing comes in is, well, somebody's got to go to medical school. You have to actually take some action here. Actually, manifestation is really a collaboration with the spirit world as well. It's a spiritual pursuit and manifesting what you're here to do. I mean, it really does start with understanding who you are. I always say that your personality, that you choose, your entire personality, just as we were talking about your soul types, you choose that before coming here. And it's always for a purpose that if you look at what you've chosen in this life, what you're here to learn, to use your authority. So you choose the leader, but you're also trying to overcome past life issues around powerlessness. And that's actually interesting because karmically, you're trying to empower others as well as being an empowered person yourself.

But I always say who you are is why you're here. I put in the book, in the guidebook that you wouldn't choose flip flops to climb Mount Everest. Yes, it's the same thing. You choose a personality for the journey. And unfortunately, I mean, it's a very typical thing. Let's say you're a little girl and you've got that strong masculine energy of the leader in you. Well, the same way that I would get as a sensitive creator type, I would get that, oh, you're too sensitive. Strong girls are told you're too bossy or you're too strident or something wrong with you too much. Yeah. And it's somehow wrong. And I think the more you can understand yourself and your children, people around you, the more you can support them and being who they are. I mean, say who you are is why you're here. So always starts with that. As we were talking earlier about how you and I are the type who we really want to know who we are, we want to know all the details, but I actually had somebody call me for a session last year, and as we got started, she said, I don't want to know anything about my or soul types. And we just had to stop the session. It was just like, I'll be working blind and I can't not do that. I mean, it's like how can I read somebody if I can't look at who they are? The

Susie Moore:

Framework is here. Yes. So our personality is designed to be the vehicle that fulfills our purpose. So if someone is a performer or if someone is highly sensitive, or if someone is just a naturally wonderful caretaker, so your personality is prebuilt in perfectly to fulfill what it is that you've went to in your lifetime.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yes. So that would tell you about those major things that show up on your life plan.

Susie Moore:

Yeah, Absolutely. And then manifestations, I love how you said it's really a co-creation of us with the spirit world and how, because I've always believed Ainsley too, that my desires, everyone's desires. A desire is built in so long as it's for the highest good. It's not like a desire for something that's just pleasure based, but if there's a desire that's just there and it's pushing and you have this calling for something, I'm like, well, I didn't choose that. That's just built in and it's my job to allow it. Right?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Absolutely.

Susie Moore:

Can you speak just about that?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Well, there's all sorts of ways that you can know what you're here to do, and it's not that complicated. Like I was saying, destiny's not a secret. What excites you? What intrigues you? That's actually a good point. A lot of times people are told that you should be looking for their passion, and it doesn't always start with passion. It starts with what interests you or intrigues you, and then it can build into that. So I usually turn that one around and say, well, what do you like doing? Or you'll find also that, again, this is one of the things related to who you are and then relating to the activities that you will run into people like yourself,

People who have shared interests, like healers, meet healers, artists meet other artists. I've used as an example before, a friend of mine, he's a hunter soul type. I think actually you might a leader, I can't remember, but he's got that, well, all those past lives have rugged, outdoorsy kind of things. He's a soccer coach and stuff like that, but he's also a sailor and he meets sailors. He was just having a coffee one time. Some guy said, would you take my yacht? Or saying, I need someone to get my yacht from Hawaii to the west coast. Do you know any sailors? Hello? Wow. I am not the rugged outdoorsy type. Neither am I describe myself as an indoor cat. And so I don't meet people. No one's ever going to say to me, take a boat from Hawaii. It's like, no thanks, I'll take a plane. But I meet people who are interested in spirituality. I meet other psychics, me too in the odd places, just striking up a conversation one time at Gatwick Airport, and this woman's a medium and she just starts opening up to me. So I think the people you surround yourself can often tell you a lot about who you are and what you're doing here as well.

Susie Moore:

And is that part free will and part destiny, because I think it would be easy for me to have just stayed with my corporate friends, for example, and never really made new friends back. Actually, I don't think there's a world where really that's possible with the work that I do, but I feel as if it's also, it's my intention to meet people like me, and there's so much joy and growth and expansion in that, but is it really important for us to fulfill our soul's purpose to be around people like us?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Hugely important. Almost every soul, with very, very few exceptions, all souls are looking for community. They're looking for belonging. They're looking to soothe any damage in the heart chakra by being around loved ones, being connected to others. Something that's an interesting thing. You would probably have encountered this because you're a spiritualist soul type, is that your path, the trajectory of your life is like that. You are growing all the time. You're learning. It's especially, I won't ask you to reveal your age here, but

Susie Moore:

I'm 38

Ainslie MacLeod:

Really going to be going to very much picking up speed. I mean, that thing of approaching 40 units, it's like you're really, I mean, it's accelerating all the time. I'm sure you notice,

And everybody else is like that. So you are kind of going up like that. Other people are on that sort of the other axis and not and so on. So it's a very common thing for an old soul spiritualist like you, as you're growing, growing, growing, to just the longer time goes on, there's just the bigger that golf is. So between you and people, there used to be people you got and connected with. Time goes on and you realize, I'm really not getting anything from this connection, this friendship. Sometimes people find that difficult. Again, it could be to do with a past fear of rejection or something, but it can be a good thing to review your friendship sometimes when you're on that trajectory and say, well, is this person really supporting me? I mean, with somebody who's going, oh, all that woo woo shit you're doing, please me down. Well, maybe they're no longer wanted on the voyage. It can also make room for drawing the people who are really more supportive. And ideally, we should all be supported on our journey. And it's so important to be around people who are encouraging are cheerleaders. And one of the worst things is when if you're around people who are tearing you down all the time, diminishing your achievements or disparaging you or whatever, I mean, that can be very, very destructive. Oh

Susie Moore:

My gosh.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Compared to I was saying somebody who goes, yeah, go for it. You can do it.

Susie Moore:

Yeah, and I believe too, I'm very conscious and intentional about seeking out the people for me, but I also feel like I've been gifted so many people to really speak about the balance of what's given to us and what's our job. You have this lovely quote in your book, and I've written it down here where you said, oh, it was around, I've got so many quotes here. I can't find the exact, it was how, oh, the soul is the map. Is it the soul? Is the map. Okay. The soul of the conscious self. Were a very powerful team. One has the map, the other can act quote from your book. I'm like, that makes, I said that. Nice gross. That's good.

Ainslie MacLeod:

It's really good. I, I'll be quoting myself now.

Susie Moore:

I know I've, the thing is, if you saw my notes, you see I have so many highlights here, but yeah, the soul of the conscious self or a powerful team, one has the map and the other can take the action that the other connects. And I believe that I'm like, there's a guidance that I always feel supported no matter what, even in challenges, but it has to be up to me, and I've been given, I feel like I've been given, I'm equipped with what's required in this lifetime. It's just up to me to take courage and to keep love at the forefront of what it is that I'm doing. And really, isn't that just our only job?

Ainslie MacLeod:

Well, yeah. I mean it really is. The job is to make sure that you are doing things that are always taking you towards that ultimate goal or where you're meant to be. Yeah, I think, well, as they say, the biggest regrets people will have at the end of this life are the things that they didn't do, not the things they did, however they work out. At least you tried.

Susie Moore:

May I quote you once again? Got the book here, got my highlights. You say, because this is so good. Oh, you say, look, my page is sticking together no soul. It's on page 123. So easy to remember. Well, 1, 2, 3 of the old Soul guidebook, no soul wants to wind up on its deathbed, regretting not having done the things it longed to do. As I mentioned before, there are a few things worse for old souls than to have missed out on fulfilling their life plans.

So good. And I always think, gosh, regret proofing my life, staying true to myself. That's my job. And I also feel like I attract people who are me in my work, especially the communities that I grow. And I love to always say, look back, what would impress your 85-year-old self? What would make her thrilled today? What is it that you can do? And I feel like that's the perspective that you bring us. It's seeing it from a real stand back, greater picture, not just today, this problem, this hurdle, this thing in the news. It's such a larger way of looking at our experience and our contribution, and I think that too makes us more generous. Would you agree with

Ainslie MacLeod:

That? I agree. I just wanted to go back a step. There's a really powerful exercise for a lot of people getting a sense of their destiny. Looking into future is pretty hard to do, but this exercise is where you picture yourself a hundred years old if you like, sitting there in your rocking chair, reflecting in your life from this point on. So for you it would be 38. What do you want to say? If you're telling a friend in the senior center or whatever, telling a friend what you did in this life

From the age that you are now to 99 or a hundred, what would you want to be telling them? It's almost like then you're looking back rather than trying to see into the future. And then you think, yeah, I'd love to be able to say, I traveled to every country, or I did this and I did that, and I had a sort of epiphany before I started doing this work, and I didn't know what was going on, but it was a really challenging situation, and I really was visited by the spirit world basically giving me a choice and get out of this mess that I was, terrible relationship and stuff that I was in.

And I wrote a little list. There was probably about 20 things that I wanted to do in my life. And then I just started that day or the next day just started kind of biting them off and also thinking as well, if I want to do this well, I need to start working towards that. I was living in London at the time. I'd always seen myself in the states where I'm now, but I didn't know how I was going to get there, but I wrote this list. It was one morning and put at the top of the list, I want to go to America. I was about your age, maybe, sorry, 7 30, 8. And so I said, no, this is it by 40. I want to be in the States. That afternoon I went to see an immigration lawyer and he's saying, oh, it's going to be really hard. But then circumstances took over. I kept putting it out there, this is what I'm going to do. And it was a rip this list of things. I wish I still had the list because I can't remember all the stuff that was on there. I would

Susie Moore:

Love to see that old list of yours.

Ainslie MacLeod:

So it was, once I had it really down, and we can all do this, just really think about, well, what do you want to do? I saw, for example, with we often learn from the positive things from a parent. I learned a lot of positive lessons from a negative behavior. So with my father, one of the things with him was that he was always talking about things that he was going to do. I'm going to make this, or he was going to write a book when he retired, but he was alcoholic. He was just every day, it was just drinking himself into oblivion rather than achieving anything. And what I took away from that was if I say I'm going to do something, I'm all going to do it. I do not want to be that person who's kind of on their deathbed going, oh, I had this great idea and I never did anything with it.

So it's really helped me to get that follow through because I don't want to be like that. I want to be going over to the astral plane after this going, oh, I missed out on these opportunities. I mean, I end up almost doing too much. It's so much that I want to do. It's a problem for a lot of people who are here to get a lot done. I mean, as you can see from the paintings behind me, I played bass, I play guitar. I've got a lot of stuff that I'm here to do. I have to do triage on it. Books still to write. I got classes to deliver because I'm working with spirit guides. I have a really easy time now, particularly in the last three years, connecting with them. I had heart surgery interestingly to repair, repair a leaky valve. That was about three years ago.

The soul resides in the heart, kind of literally, it's in the heart chakra here, which of course is why we get heartache and heartbreak and feel our emotions in that part of the body. What happened is after I got the repair, I mean literally night of the surgery, I had surgery in the sort of morning and early afternoon, and by six in the evening I'm calling for a sharpie and paper because I've got all these things, ideas and I'm connecting. I mean, it was high on painkillers and stuff as well, but I was channeling. And then in the last three years, reading, people become so easy for me. It's like that physical shift has resulted in something more spiritual as well. So much of what we do and how we act is related to the heart chakra. We can be shut down, we can block intimacy, we can have issues around rejection and so on. It's all heart chakra stuff. And the more healing you do around the heart, the more connected you're going to be. And of course, the more connected you are, the more you heal. Interestingly, and hopefully it's not too much of a tangent,

Susie Moore:

But there are no tangents.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Love it.

So when my last book came out, which is now probably just around the time I had the surgery, so about three years ago, I did a lot of podcast interviews and I found that every single person who was interviewing me was trying to in part, overcome a past life issue around rejection from abandonment, death alone, that sort of thing in the past life. And they were none of us conscious, but what they were doing by podcasting is they're bringing people together. They're creating community. And that is, like I said earlier, with very, very few exceptions, we're all here to be connected, to be part of something. It could be family, just organizations, clubs, churches, whatever. We're all here to be a part of something bigger. I mean, I'm working on it myself. I mean, it's why I have my soul world membership. It's why I play in a band, for example. It's like it's really looking for love. So like I say, with very few

Susie Moore:

To love and be loved, isn't that it? To love and be loved it.

Ainslie MacLeod:

And podcasters bring people together. They're creating this opportunity for people to feel like they belong and they're part of something and heal their well. In fact, the podcaster heals their heart chakra and helps other people to do the same.

Susie Moore:

I know, it's beautiful. It's the emotional thinking about it. It's so lovely. I have to say, Ainslie, I'm a little jealous. I wish I could tap into spirit guides and have them directly tell me stuff.

So I'm sure people are like, wow, listening. You have this incredible access. And of course you can work with Ainsley one-on-one. He has books, resources. We'll link to everything. But if someone's thinking, can I connect to my guides? Are they available for me? And I know we speak a lot about intuition too. What would be a step if someone's like, I don't know, maybe I'm on a crossroads. We've had a difficult couple of years, the whole world. We're now halfway nearly through 2022, and people come to me with a lot of questions. Is this the right thing or is that the right thing? Or what should I do next? I'll often turn the question around. I'll just say, what do you think? What's coming up for you? If someone is unsure about what to do next or if they want to be able to access their own guides, what's the best way? What's the best way to start doing that?

Ainslie MacLeod:

There are a couple of things. I mean, one is that if you want to communicate with, well, first of all, we all have spirit guides because people sometimes say, oh, I don't think I have spirit guides, or I think they're mad at me, or They're not,

Susie Moore:

No, none. Show up for me.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah. And of course what I get from the spirit guides is I'll say, well, God, we're yelling and we're not being heard

Susie Moore:

Always

Ainslie MacLeod:

With the reception, not from their side. So sometimes she's not even accepting or understanding that we have less help on the other side, which is all there, I mean 24 7, helping you to make better decisions. The key is meditation, because you need to calm yourself and you need to find tranquility. It is very, very hard. If you've got a life that is just all noise and chaos and drama and whatever, you need that peace and tranquility. It is really hard when you got, so many of us have the TV on all the time, and how are you supposed to hear your spirit guides with all that rack? So if you can find a little corner sanctuary, any place it can be in nature, just any place that's tranquil, you can go into a little meditative state, tell your spirit guides. What you want to do.

A great exercise is to say, I want to figure out five-year plan. I want to get a sense of where I'm going to be five years from now. And it's partly aspirational. You want to think about what would I really like to be doing? Again, you can go to a hundred years old and look back and do it that way. And then if you say, well, gosh, I've always wanted to spend a year living in Paris. Well, if in five years time you're seeing yourself in Paris, what tells you that? Now maybe you want to brush up your French or you want to start thinking about, well, how do I do this? Save your money or whatever. But it's important to be in the moment. We all kind of know that. But it's also really important for souls to have goals as well, things to look forward to. A lot of people with what's called a mission of exploration, where they love travel and love doing things. One thing the spirit world says is, when you're coming back from your trip, you should be planning the next one. Always think about things that you want to do. It's exciting. It gives you something to look forward to, the sole response very much to that.

Susie Moore:

And it keeps you out of the nonsense too. Ainsley, don't you think if I'm working on goals and I've got projects, I'm not gossiping I'm, I'm not worrying about all things with me going wrong in my life.

Ainslie MacLeod:

It really does help you to focus on the positive and achieving what it is you're here to do.

Susie Moore:

Yeah. And like you said with the Paris example, because people say things to me, this to me all the time, I want to live in Bali. Or is that also, if that's a sturdy, constant desire, would that also mean then in the spirit world that there's something for you there? There is some,

Ainslie MacLeod:

A lot of people, especially if they have a mission of exploration in their life plan, well, they enjoy travel, and they usually have a story. Think Alaska. Ask a client, where do you live and did you grow up there? And often, I'm fishing a little bit because I know there's a mission of exploration. And that's where they say, well, I went to college on the other side of the country and then I spent three years in Europe and then I did this. And it's so looking for maximum growth by being in different places. There's few challenges around the location thing, and it can be confusing because we often get drawn to a place because we've been there before. We've had multiple past lives somewhere. And so we feel real affinity with the place. And other times we feel that affinity because we're meant to be there and it can be hard to separate out, am I meant to just visit this place and get some warm, fuzzy feelings related to the past life, or am I meant to live there?

I did that with Hawaii. I thought my interest in Hawaii music and stuff like that was sure sign that I was meant to live in Hawaii. But I went to visit there, and that was actually where I had quite an epiphany, really connected with the spirit world. So I certainly guided to go there. I needed that tranquility that I was talking about, and I found it there, but I wasn't guided to live there. And it didn't feel right even, and it was kind of like a lovely place and everything, but it just didn't feel like my destiny was there. Whereas where I am now in the west coast of the states that this has allowed me to do the work that I do. I live in a very tranquil place and I have wonderful connections with people, some really good friends who I was meant to meet. So it is hard to figure it out sometimes. If you've had a good experience in some place in the past life, it can be good to go and visit again. Just get that warm fuzzy thing. And same way, if you've had a really horrible experience, if you've tortured and imprisoned in a past life somewhere, you're probably not going to feel like you want to go there again.

So I've seen people with ridiculous examples of this, like the woman who spent an hour in France and couldn't stand it. I was telling her about an awful experience in France. She had another life, and I said, have you ever been there? And she, oh, yeah, I've traveled all through Europe, but I only lasted an hour There. Had to get one hour.

Susie Moore:

I hope you come back on the podcast. I could talk to you...

Ainslie MacLeod:

Absolutely.

Susie Moore:

for ages. I mean, you have so much wisdom, so much knowledge. Of course, the Old Soul's guidebook is a must read because sometimes too, I think us old souls maybe feel a little different, especially if masses don't always agree with us or maybe even our family. And I think you give such generous, incredible insight and content into what we can do and how we can navigate our life. You're on earth today, and where else should people go to? Check you out, Ainslie. I know you're on the Gram. You've got your amazing quiz.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Yeah. If you go to, well, I have a membership program and doors are closed right now, but we're opening up soon. If you go to soul world.com,

Susie Moore:

Soul world.com. Yep.

Ainslie MacLeod:

Also, we have, my wife and I do a free broadcast every Sunday, soul World Sunday we call it. So if you go to soul world sunday.com, that's a three half hour every Sunday.

Susie Moore:

I'm writing this out myself. You need better marketing. Okay. I didn't know

Ainslie MacLeod:

The word out right. Otherwise, you can learn about me@ainsliemcleod.com.

Susie Moore:

Ainsleymacleod.com, soulworld.com, soulworldsunday.com and I'll include links to everything. Of course. Thank So Ainslie, thank you so much. What a joy to speak to you again. I hope you'll come back.

Ainslie MacLeod:

I'll be asking, don't you worry. I insist on it. I feel it's unfinished. There's so much to talk about.

Susie Moore:

I know we just got started.

Ainslie MacLeod:

It's been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much.

Susie Moore:

Such a pleasure. Thank you so much, Ainslie, and of course you'll be hearing from me again. Absolutely. Thank you, Ainslie. Thank you everybody for listening.