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What a profound conversation this was—a real unpacking of principles, where the philosophical meets the deeply practical.
The core of this whole thing, as we dug into with Ann Cecil-Sterman, revolves around the true action of herbs, which—from the Taoist lineage we follow—comes down to pure taste, not just some chemical breakdown. It’s that deeper "flavor sensing in the stomach." My journey with Superfeast has been about living the great Yin-Yang puzzle: holding the intense contrast between deep Taoist tradition and the necessary reductionist language for Western practitioners. That dance is what yields the "pearls of reciprocity"—the philosophical gifts you get from the endeavor itself.
On a much deeper, personal layer, we dove into the conversation of living one's true blueprint—that invisible path that keeps calling you—and the absolute non-negotiable commitment to staying engaged with your purpose, no matter what external role the world tries to pin on you (like "CEO").
Finally, we hit the essential travel principles. Ann gave a brilliant reminder about how much flying is a test of our fluids. To counter the hyper-dry, sterile air of planes, the trick isn't just plain water (which is a clearer that goes straight through), but what we call slow fluids or wet food (think congees, soups, stews) to ensure that constant, deep hydration. It also requires the mental discipline of non-busyness: cultivating stillness and focusing on your main job rather than jumping into "tourist mode." It’s about being a "Fremen flyer" and absorbing the wisdom of a place by simply being still. If you’re ready for a reminder to stay engaged with your deepest purpose and learn essential travel health principles, this episode is for you.
Takeaways:
- [00:00:28] Herbal Action is Taste-Governed: In Classical Chinese Medicine, herbs act mainly through taste and the stomach’s “flavor sensing,” not chemical constituents alone.
- [00:03:46] The Yin-Yang Puzzle in Business: Balancing Taoist tradition with Western chemical language creates “pearls of reciprocity”—unexpected philosophical rewards.
- [00:04:21] Living Your True Blueprint: Stay aligned with your personal purpose and express it in any role, even as a CEO.
- [00:10:30] Travel's Primary Rule: Hydration: Air travel severely depletes fluids due to dry cabin air, making deep, constant hydration essential.
- [00:11:02] Mindful Travel: Cultivate Stillness: Avoid over-scheduling; cultivate stillness, meditate, and stay focused on your core purpose while traveling.
- [00:12:04] Classical Medicine's 30-Year Plan: Three stages—10 years of practice, 10 years of writing, and 10 years of mentoring new teachers.
- [00:17:11] Water is a “Clearer,” Not a “Hydrator”: Plain water flushes waste quickly but does not provide deep, lasting hydration.
- [00:17:55] The Power of Wet Food (Slow Fluids): Soups, congees, and stews support deep hydration through slow digestive absorption.
Practical Engagement:
- Prioritize Slow Fluids: Especially before and during travel, replace plain water with "slow fluids" or wet foods like congees, porridges, soups, or stews to ensure deep, sustained hydration.
- Practice Mindful Travel: When you travel, limit your scheduled activities (e.g., "one museum" rule) to cultivate stillness, meditate, and focus on your core purpose rather than jumping into "tourist mode."
- Sip, Don't Gulp: If drinking plain water on a plane, keep it coming in small sips continuously throughout the flight, not in large, isolated glasses.
- Cover Your Skin: Treat flying like being a "Fremen flyer." Wear covering clothes to protect your skin and minimize moisture loss in the dry cabin air.
Resource guide
Classical Medicine Academy: anncecilsterman.com
Instagram: Follow @anncecilsterman on instagram for updates.
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Check Out The Transcript Below:
Mason:
Hello, everyone, I've just quickly started, so we started having too good of a conversation about the flavor of herbs, so I thought I'd quickly hit record. And, what were you saying about the flavor of herbs?
Ann:
Well, first of all, I was congratulating you on your company, which is just incredibly inspiring, but we were… you… and you were telling me that you had a sommelier taste the… your herbs. And write comments, and And I was talking about how herbs work from a Chinese medical perspective, which really has very little to do with the chemical constituents And everything to do with the taste. So the tongue has taste receptors, but the stomach also has taste receptors. So… the… there are… you know, the various tastes that a food can have, and I guess, you know, in classical Chinese medicine, they narrow those down to 5 tastes. So each of those tastes triggers the body to act differently. For example, something that's sour. The instruction to the body is, when it tastes something sour, is to astringent. So it's like, if you pucker your lips up, anything that makes your lips pucker.
that's going to a string, so you want to give that kind of… I'm not an herb… I'm a trained… I have trained in herbs, but I don't practice them at all. But… the… but… I use this theory with food, with advising people about food, which is essentially what you're producing. The sour taste causes, for example, the liver to hang on to blood. To… to learn to store it. And not to waste it or leak it. And the sweet taste, the body is triggered to send more qi to the spleen, to strengthen the spleen, to improve digestion, which is why There's so much craving for sugar in our culture, because people have, They have really damaged their digestive tract, and so they're craving sweet to mend the digestive tract, but they're using concentrated sweetness, which ruins the digestive tract, because it overtaxes the pancreas. So…
Mason:
the flavor thing, because I've… I had to be talked off a ledge a few years ago about my purism about flavor, and I was like… I was just joking with our, distributor in, distributor in NZ, And shout out to Taylor, we were laughing, like, and Monique, but me and Taylor were talking about, how he was, like, listening to the podcast, and I was like, I refuse to do capsulation, because I need that flavor, interaction. And I went really deep into that, and then at some point, it was like I had, clinicians especially, and oncologists, and… and so… and, and G… and just… customers who were giving, herbs to their grandparents, and they were like, please, like, it… you must… must be able to put them into capsules. And the flavor… the flavor sensing in the stomach is probably what got me to be like, okay, as long as there is flavor in the herb itself. I'm… and…
I almost, you know, acknowledging, trying to be… go back to those shamanic roots of Chinese medicine, and be like, right, I need to be able to walk in an interdimensional manner, but the whole point of it is the contrast of yin-yang. If I can maintain the extremes of those, say, oncologists that want to acknowledge chemical constituency, and be able to let that be, and build, and acknowledge, and give it its respect, and then hold that complete contrast, which is… it's been a nice puzzle for me in understanding Yin Yang in SuperFeast, which SuperFeast always gives me, I call them pearls of reciprocity. as I do things that I… For my organization, that… Aren't my… path. Which is actually something I wanted to bring up, with you, is, Chiang Mai and your two articles, because I think about them a lot at the moment, in terms of what is my path, what is my true blueprint, and…
so on and so forth. Is it literal actions that I do, or is it a more an invisible path? And SuperFeast is my lesson to be like, I'm not a… I'm not a business person, I'm not a CEO, but… then… shifting that and going, no, but there's something… it doesn't matter what's going on externally. There is a blueprint, and I can find an expression of my blueprint no matter what's going on, externally. But as I… do the puzzle of holding Yin Yang. which I kind of feel like is somewhat of the point of life, to an extent of the universe, is just working with that puzzle and having some fun with it. And, and then hold the contrasts for my organization and create systems and assets that allow the two opposing ideas to be and exist and dance together. That's when I get a pearl of reciprocity from my business, like a little gift of, like, a philosophical…
and that's kind of what we've done with, like, deep… Taoist lineage, and we'll work with practitioners in their reductionism and where they're at. And it's been very interesting watching that contrast dance within my organization. Like, mouth taste buds versus stomach… soul stomach taste buds. It's been very funny.
Ann:
Oh, what an adventure.
Mason:
Yeah, but flavor's an interesting one, as you bring up.
Ann:
Yes. Well, you know, people do want encapsulation, that's true. But, you know… There's nothing like if you're taking herbs, there's nothing like… unwrapping the paper, so Andrew does… Andrew's a nobalist. To my right, there are hundreds of herbs in… contain… oh, let me peek, I have… Like, Pluto, I knew that.
Mason:
Yeah, moving on.
Ann:
Right, dear.
Mason:
Looking over you.
Ann:
So… There's nothing like… Unwrapping the paper. And seeing the raw, dried herbs just there, sitting there on the paper, and then they go into the pot. And… It's like a ritual, and then the smell permeates the whole house, or the whole apartment, and then you're smelling the smell, you're almost tasting it without tasting it. And it's very, very powerful. And when you do the encapsulation, you miss all that. You miss all that ritual, you miss that… direct connection to taste, so the taste receptors in the stomach are going to do that for you, so you're not really missing out, but there's There's a deeper level of registration in the body when you're tasting it on the tongue, and that's why you don't like it so much. the encapsulation.
Mason:
Yeah. Well, and also, I mean, I did acknowledge that, you know, there is a pill… a big pill culture in traditional Chinese medicine and honey pills to hide the flavor of everything that's going in, if it's like, let's at least not be purists and just get herbs into people appropriately at the same time. Just on that one… because I'm… I get… I've got, like, practitioners, Western practitioners internally who are, you know, they're the ones that are like, well, at the same time as there is everything that's going on with the DAO, we have practitioners and regulatory bodies who need to actually know about constituency, which has been very funny for me. I always talk to people about the flavor and the action being the continuum of space between the stars, or between the things, and the constituent's just been the things.
That if you isolate a thing, you've just got one star, and you don't have space. And you actually don't have depth. And it's been interesting for me then to go, like, I've felt like I've had a permission to be like, right, I'm actually going to look at polysaccharides in mushrooms now, knowing that I've got it embedded in my team, that we don't move away from what I call, like, a galaxy of constituency, and undefinable constituents and undefinable relationships between constituents, but… We've just kind of looked at… there's a lot of studies coming out around You know, the sweet, looking at the polysaccharides and glycosides of the sweet, and looking at the bitter alkaloids and flavonoids, and the sour being the organic acids, and salty, they're looking right in the mineral-rich compounds, and… At the end of the day, they're like…
and the oils is a big one, because that was the pungent, volatile oils that are present. they're looking and they go, oh, which extraction method is perfect? And it's all corroborating now on just very simple, traditional extraction, being like. Oh, it actually captures everything and…
Ann:
It's gotta make you laugh, doesn't it?
Mason:
It's so funny.
Ann:
It always comes back to principle.
Mason:
So, with principles, as I said, I mean, I'm curious, you've just done another big round of teaching practitioners overseas. You were in Australia for a while, you've been, been all over Europe as well, I believe.
Ann:
I was in 16 cities. Actually, I was across the Pacific 4 times. I was in Australia twice, 8 weeks apart, and then in Europe 3 times. And yes, it's been quite incredible.
Mason:
we might need to actually just put, like, a little stake in the ground to ask about some travel tips, because that's always… I sometimes just go over the practical things, and someone that's got your depth of insight, and in relationship with your own body, and the… you know, flying so much, it can hit us so hard. I feel like I even need a little bit of a reminder and some tips to stay healthy while I'm traveling. Maybe we'll just jump in there, if that's relevant.
Ann:
Oh, I'm so happy to talk about that. I think the main thing with travel when I was… I'm 61 now. When I was young, I could go to a city and do whatever I liked, and I could see… I could go to 5 museums and 2 concerts, and whatever, and… and it would be fine. And, that's not the case anymore. Not really because of my age, but just because of the… the sheer intensity of what I'm actually doing. And so the rule now is. for me, okay, so you're going to be in London for 2 weeks, let's say, which I was last month. You, you can see, you can go to one museum. That's it. The rest of the time, you're going to be meditating and focusing, and what happens when I do that is I always learn new things right out of the air. Just having the space and the time and being in different places. That every place that you go is full of wisdom. And you can be…
You can be completely unaware of it if you don't have stillness, if you don't have some still time in the day. And that's been a really transformational thing. So that's the first thing, not to try to do too much, and to stay focused on the job. And the job… At the moment, I don't know, last time, did I tell you about my 30-year plan? Did I tell you about that? I can't remember. I don't expect you to remember.
Mason:
I do remember, in terms of having a network of clinics that are informed with what you're doing, does that fit into it?
Ann:
Yeah, so yeah, so the first 10 years was get as much experience as you possibly can, and… and I've been in practice 20… 25 years, really, so… That was the first thing was, like, get it all together, and then the second phase… Was to write the books, because Material has to be written down for people to begin to want to know. Otherwise, it's just all in the air. And so that's… was the second 10 years, and now I'm in the third… decade of the 30-year plan. Which is to, watch the teachers emerge. And… really doing these intensive trainings and the six-month mentorship, and just watching. And in every city, there's a couple. They might not even notice that I notice, but you can pick the teachers. And what I want to happen is for…
Oh, someone said it was, like, like, poppies coming up from the ground, you know, I'd like to see that within 10 years from now, and then I could go off and paint, and I don't have to travel anymore, even though I love it. But getting back to the travel thing. The most important thing, by far, is hydration. on airplanes, and I flew… this year, I flew the equivalent of 2.7 million… oh, sorry, no, 2.7 times around the globe, the equivalent of 67. 1,000 miles, a hundred and… 101… Something, 110-something thousand kilometers in four and a half months. So, because I don't travel while I'm doing the mentorship in the first 6 months. And… When you spend a lot of time on… on airplanes. You… you expose your body to very, very dry and sterile air. And… this was brought home to me in no uncertain terms once, when I was on a plane from New York to Rome. And I was sitting in the middle of three seats.
That was the best seat I could get at that time. And the… the woman in the middle… Her husband got up on the aisle, and then she got up, and she upset a water glass. And the water glass fell directly back onto her seat and saturated the seat. And she was all upset about it. And this… the, the flight attendant came over and said, don't worry, don't worry now, you know, if you walk around the plane for 10 or 15 minutes and come back, it'll be all dry. And it was. So, that… degree of… You know, dehydration, because they think… what they're thinking is, if we make the plane dry, if we lower the humidity, we're going to have less transmission of disease. And so, it's… it's actually done on purpose. And so the most important thing is to keep drinking, sipping the whole time, sipping, sipping, sipping, not drinking whole glasses at once, but just keeping that hydration coming in the whole time.
And also, covering your skin. Not having, you know, not going… On a claim with a wife beater on?
Mason:
I bring a college shirt with me sometimes. It's kind of like, do you ever read June? The Fremen? Keeping the suit on? Oh, they're in the desert, so they've got to keep suits on the whole time, and any bit of moisture that comes out gets recycled back into their body.
Ann:
Oh, God. Well, that's part of the idea.
Mason:
Yay. So when we fly, we're Fremen. We're Fremen flyers. Got it. Oh, that's true.
Ann:
I saw the movie… I saw the movie in the cinema, which would have been in the 70s or something.
Mason:
That's them.
Ann:
Go ahead. So, the other thing is before you leave, for several days beforehand, to make sure you're fully hydrated. And hydration is one of the least well-understood aspects of health, I think. Because people think, you know, whenever I mention hydration in the clinic, people say, Oh, but I… I drink a lot of water, and their pulses say they are really dehydrated. So, there's a belief that water hydrates, and to a certain degree, it does. But mainly, plain flat water is a clearer. It clears the body, so it helps the body be able to gather all that cellular waste. Metabolic waste, and move it out through urine and feces and sweat. And when there's some kind of infection or invasion of a pathogenic factor, then… Plain flat water can help. In the short term, produce mucus, so that you can cough things up, or vomit them, or… or cry them out, right?
But as far as The profound level of hydration that you need to sustain travel, which is a conversation. there has to be, thick fluids. They have to be what I call slow fluids. Slow fluids, meaning wet food, which is what Andrew talks about all the time, wet food. Which means things like… Porridges and conjis. Congees incredibly useful. And soups and stews. Because when you drink… when you eat wet food, That… fluid. is held up in the digestive tract. It cannot go straight through. So, I remember when I was in high school. And they showed us a video of someone, some poor person, so you've got to remember this is… The… this is the mid-70s. And in those days, the dangers of x-rays were not fully known, so there were all sorts of x-rays being done, and the shot that they showed us was of a man drinking water. in front of an X-ray machine, and you could see the water going down.
So he drank it, glug, glug, glug, and you saw it going down the esophagus and through his digestive tract.
Mason:
Wow.
Ann:
it was really amazing. I mean, I hope that he didn't die an early death from cancer, but… But it really… I remember this so vividly, this video. But if you take the water as congee, or porridge, or soups, or stews, That… that cannot happen. the food… because it's food, so that food has to stop, has to stop in the stomach, then it has to go slowly through the small intestine, and be… all those nutrients have to be absorbed. The fluid is not let go. And so, you have this constant, slow hydration through wet food.
Mason:
Oh, I love it. It's such a great reminder. I… Every few years, I think we've talked last time, I'm, like, I'm… where I'm a naughty Chinese medicine boy is quite often forgetting to wear shoes when it's a little chilly. I don't do as many… I don't do… I'm not… I'm… cold plunging's never been my problem, or anything along those lines. I'm good with a scarf. I like going walking after meals, but sometimes I forget to prioritize if I'm dry. It's like, duh, it's just… about having some soups and some congees, and then I… and then whenever I do it, like, if I've got cracked heels, they just magically disappear.
Ann:
Yes, they do.
Mason:
I love it. I… can't stop thinking about… what you talked… what you talked about in terms of not busying yourself and fully going into, I guess I would say, like, tourist mode. When you… when you're traveling, but staying… I don't know what your wedding is, but, like, staying on, you know, staying on purpose, meditating, and staying, like, I guess, engaged. My, I know there's Taoist terms which completely elude me, and they've got nice flowery names for them, but, my teacher talks about it a lot, around intentional travel. And rather than going on holidays. staying engaged. And I just… I think that does tie into somewhat what I'm thinking about for the people listening. You know, we have some practitioners who listen, or maybe more than some, but…
a lot of the time, the practitioners listening are, you know, listening from the layperson point of view, and likewise, majority of people listening are just maybe people who are patients or fans of Chinese medicine. And I often think about, when I talk to, like, when I… when I… we've talked once, but when I talk to you, I always think, right, we want to get the latest Insight about how, as patients, we make life easier for the practitioner by what we can engage with. And make treatment more effective, or not burden the clinic, if… well, that's not the right word, but, you know, not come to the clinic if we can sort things out for ourself ahead of time.
And I just can't stop thinking about, like, 6 months ago, I think I read that Chiang Mai, article of yours about that channel where there's Blueprint and Path, and I feel like it ties into sometimes people wouldn't even know how to not travel As an escape from, you know, life and, you know, just to be a tourist for a while, which is nice sometimes, as you said. book a museum, every now and then, just have a trip for that. But then what it even means to feel, what it is to stay tuned in, and on your path, and meditate, and then get access to see what that place can give you that's relevant to your path. I feel like that…
I don't know, and especially with what's going on in the world at the moment, there's a lot of people getting lost in the world, rather than being able to engage with the world, but also really have their blueprint and their path emerging, and, you know, I've had a student of yours work with my mum, and, you know, and he was like, it's lovely, we'll treat, treat, treat, up to the point where it was like, right, now this is purpose time, so I'm gonna leave you now, and you can see that now it's time for you to work on that purposefulness with your mum, and here's the diet, here's the things to… can maintain, and I love that, because it's not just continuing to treat, treat, treat, treat, and something that's just not… yeah, it's a lot of things that I've thrown out there, but I'd love to just explore that.
Ann:
Yes, wow. Where should we start? There's so much there.
Mason:
Well, I feel like maybe starting with in patients, what it's like as a practitioner to see that there's not an engagement with that ability to extract or bring that blueprint into awareness, and what's practically in the way of that, because I feel like that opens up such a dam of we don't have to worry about not getting engaged with the world, being in the world but not of it. It just happens because we start marching ahead and can… Yeah, get on… get on with our beat.
Ann:
So, in terms of classical… Taoism. Well, Taoism is, by definition, classical, but…
Mason:
Classical medicine.
Ann:
theory. Should we start from the beginning, perhaps, with the blueprint, in case there are listeners who… who are unfamiliar with the term? So… Is that going back too far?
Mason:
No, I think it's perfect.
Ann:
Nuts and bolts, so… So, the way the theory goes, which is a beautiful theory, and it makes 100% Absolute sense to me. is that… We come in as portions of the God Force. You could think of a human being as being a sliver of the God Force, without a body, without a mind. And without a human spirit. Just a sliver of this… Beautiful spirit. And then… That spirit rhymes around. Looking for a place. In other words, two parents. that will provide them with an environment in which they can carry out their blueprint. And the blueprint… Is the sense of purpose. Each of us has a sense of purpose, and we lose… many people lose their sense of purpose. They… they tune out, in fact, just yesterday. I was listening to an interview A very famous podcast. podcaster who, conducted an interview with a person who was, talking about how to start a business. You could…
he said you could start a business in 90 minutes, and you could make X… thousands of dollars a week, and it's very, very easy. And he came out, had all of these ideas. He said, you know, you could Rent or buy vending machines and find places to put them, and then all you have to do is find a person to stock them, and then you could, you know, you can make thousands of dollars a week doing that. You can ask AI to scour the internet and go to all the wedding sites and what they call sweep. the… personal… information, the email addresses from the brides and the grooms, and then sell them, you know, wedding arches to… I mean, it went out… it was really extraordinary, and it was being celebrated in this conversation. And… Sometimes I listen to… current, you know, very, very popular podcast, because I want to make sure that my mind is not in this bubble.
which I can easily go into, into this really amazing bubble where people come in, and you're talking about this very esoteric stuff. You know, what's going on in people's minds that are not thinking about how to heal, and what healing is? What's going on in their minds? Well… It turns out that in the culture at the moment, the way I'm reading it is that there's a… epi… an epidemic. of… People losing their sense of purpose. And… This would be… The prime cause of chronic degenerative diseases. So, going back to the theory, the spirit, finds… Oh, the blueprint. So, each of these Spirits, before they come in, before they incarnate. they… They acquire, or they agree to, having a mission. Or a blueprint. Or a plan. A plan for that lifetime. Then they look around and they find the appropriate parents.
the parents that are going to provide them with the environment in which that blueprint can be lived out. And the blueprints are… the variety in blueprints is as great as the imagination and greater. So, some people will need parents who Are very loving and nurturing, and another person to carry out their blueprint. requires, an absent father and an alcoholic mother, something like that, right? So, it… All of these things… when you put them through the Taoist point of view, the various circumstances that a spirit finds themselves in Are perfect for the blueprint. And cannot be any other way. In fact, my son… Oh. one of the first things he said, the first word he said was organic, but then the first sentence he said was. I saw you in Paris. Well, Paris was where Andrew and I met. We… we met there at… Oh, so many people know the story, and I hope it's not boring, but…
We met at 9.15, and we got engaged at 3.45 on the same day in Paris. Blind date. set up, you know, the whole thing. So… so Ravi told us, when he was two and a half, when he first started speaking. And… At the same time, I had already graduated from acupuncture school at the time, and I remembered these teachings of the spirit finding the right location, and there it was, right in my own home. This documentation of this theory. And then… Then the person is born, and they forget. They forget why they're there, because the mind is way too busy growing and learning how to pick up things and how… Learning how to be in the world. And then… When the child becomes… begins to be self-aware, and they've acquired… The physical skills and the mental skills that they need in order to be able to begin to register what they're here to do, then they start becoming interested in things.
They're interested in drawing, they're interested in martial arts, they're interested in… In running, whatever it is. And it's the job of the parents to notice these things. Oh, my child is interested in this. how can I nurture this? What… what materials do I need to get from the art store to, you know, without too much encouragement to just leave these lying around, right? And… So the, the purpose You know, when my son was… 16, he said, Mom. You didn't allow us to have any social time after school. You didn't. From the age of 5 until this year, when you allowed me to stop going to Kung Fu. You've had every single, opportunity for social engagement wrapped up in art on Mondays, and kung fu on Tuesdays, and piano on Wednesdays, and violin, and of course, being an acupuncturist, I was able to trade all these things. able to trade treatments for…
with very happy people, for them to actually come into the home and… and teach my kids all these things. And… That's one of the things, is to… to get as much exposure to different kinds of things, to take them out, and, you know, and to have… expose them to different physical challenges, too. I mean, now, in Manhattan. the playgrounds are empty, even in the summer. The children… you used to have to… 10 years ago, you used to have to line up to get on the swings. And now you don't, because children are in front of iPads and computers and phones. They have phones to, you know, really. We could talk about that for ages, because it's tragic. But… There's a point where a person realizes, oh my goodness, I'm just so interested in marine biology. It's incredible, like, someone… someone mentioned it to me, and… Then a teacher talked about it at school, and… It's fascinating. And… So that's… The…
what we should be doing, really, is raising people to notice what they find interesting, because the way in which the blueprint is made known to a being is… If we're talking mechanically… We say the essence of the blueprint, in other words, the detailed plan for that life. Is stored in the… The… we say the kidneys, but really the kidneys means the lower jowl. the region between the navel and the pubic bone, including all the reproductive tract. So the blueprint is stored there. So the creative energy that we use to create a human being is the same creative energy that we use to create our lives, to be interested in, to produce things. Even if they're not material things. And so… So that… the… Blueprint. uses the channel Chiang Mai, which is a live for people who don't know about… The lines of energy that are in the body.
Chiang Mai is the name given to a line that's also translated as the penetrating vessel, but its main function It's second main function. Is to convey the blueprint The essence of the blueprint, up to the heart. So… this… Storehouse of the way that this lifetime is going to play out. is filtered up moment by moment up to the heart, and it's the heart that translates that frequency stored in Chong, that line of energy, into the feeling of interest. So then the heart says, you know, I'm so interested in cooking. I'll just… all I want to do is cook all day. And… when people… Accept that what they are interested in is important. Even when it is not apparently important to society, or they don't place very much value on it. When a person is able to hold to that, to be in integrity with their interest. In other words, to carry out, physically. That… the pursuit of that interest.
They cannot become ill.
Mason:
that interest. piece. And I think even, like, that subtle excitement, I think you wrote in your articles, that if you bring that vision to life as a child. It's the same as a child, which is… it's… this has been great for me to reflect on. We're very fortunate to have a beautiful Steiner School that we're at, where that's the core philosophy, but that's… if I'm not planning on driving it, then it's not being driven. I don't rely on the school to do it fully, and it's a nice reminder. It's like, oh yeah, that's no more to do other than that, which is really, really a beautiful framework for me at this moment. How then… I remember I've been very fortunate that I have been able to engage with that excitement, but I remember… I… whenever I talk to people now, actually at the moment, there's a lot of… there's a lot of… there's, I guess, 3… ways that the AI thing is interacting with people.
one complete hopelessness that humans are going to get replaced by AI. Then there's the kind of entrepreneurial motivation scene who's like, it's not… you're not going to get replaced by AI, you're going to be replaced by someone who uses AI. And then there's, I think, where you would be as well, and where I… where I talk to people is, like. You're gonna get… there's no comparison between AI and a human, and so if you can engage in your humanness. You will skyrocket, and you will never be touched by this, and this is… you can always use these as events for emancipation, or further freedom to go on your path. and they also respect the anxieties. Then it's the practicality of it. And I'm interested for you, like, a 30-year vision How have you gone about Feeling, excitement, engagement, and then…
filling that gap, because there are so many practical skills, there's ways, you know, there's so many things. For me, I've… I stumble because I… numbers… I can't… you know, running a company, I'm like, oh, I can't hold numbers. I literally forget major numbers. Someone asks me, is the gross profit, and I'm like, hang on, gross profit, gross margin, and then it just scatters and I forget. That's a big reason for me not to have a company. Likewise, I… when I should be in a managerial leadership zone, I sometimes get thrown out, and my frustration gets the better of me. Oh, I shouldn't be doing this as well, but I… tweak, tweak, tweak, tweak, I don't know how I do it, but I want to hear from you in terms… because so many people would be like, well, that vision's too big, and I obviously can't do that.
Then, what's that process that would enable people to find the clear path and actually go on a nice, patient, virtuous engagement with their path?
Ann:
You know, last night, I was at Philip Glass's house for a holiday party. And… he's been… He's one of these… Marvelous people who… is constantly saying that the best work comes with collaboration, and collaboration and BluePath… sorry, sorry, collaboration and Blueprint… Blue Path, I think I just did mention another…
Mason:
Was gonna say, that's a lightning bolt moment right there.
Ann:
It's impossible. The reason that we come to Earth to carry out these blueprints is that there are other humans here. There's… you cannot perform anything of great value without the assistance of another person, I remember I was having a cup of tea with him. In Melbourne 20 years ago, and I was in the in the process of writing the red book, And… He said, how's it going, Annie? And I said, well, you know, at the moment, I'm studying, fonts. And it's really interesting that… how the history of fonts and and how they look on the page, and there's a thing called curling, and there's the distance between letters, and then there's the distance between words, and then there's the distance between the lines of print. It's so amazing. And he said, Annie, Annie, Annie. Get back on track. You, you don't want to… You… There are people that know this stuff. And it was then…
and it was a real wake-up call. You don't do… What is not innately… enjoyable. Except for maybe your housework. You know, you don't…
Mason:
I would carry water reminder.
Ann:
Well, chop would carry water, but as far as Blueprint is concerned, as far as emission. What you're actually here to do on this planet. it's… sometimes you are required to whittle it down, but you just did this, Mason. You just stepped down from your position in your own company, you went sideways, and then you went up again in a completely… like, you sprouted up. In a role that you really wanted to do, and then you… you delegated what you were doing to another person, and you're much happier. This is a constant feat with the blueprint. I need to achieve this pro… you know, classic example. I, always wanted to figure out a way that I could train more people in one… at one time. And… And then, you know, Geordie, whom you know, He said to me, He said to me, you know, you've got this great plan, but… you know. This plan to create teachers all over the world.
And, I want you to know that the way you're going about it, it's just not possible.
Mason:
Oh, what a gift, when you have someone actually tell you it, it's such a gift, isn't it?
Ann:
such a gift. It was just extraordinary. And so… he said, let me do it. Let me help you. Hand it over. And in my… oh, and here's the test. Here is the litmus test for whether you're on point or not. I just realized the sun went down, and I'm… I'm no longer in light. Should I get up and turn on light? Turn a light on?
Mason:
Oh, the light's still nice, yeah.
Ann:
the sun just set here in New York. So… As he was speaking to me. And we were having a cup of tea in Q in Melbourne. And as he was speaking to me, my mind, which is the enemy of the blueprint very often, was saying, are you serious? Do you… really want to hand this over, this baby over, you're halfway through this, you're 15 years in, you want to hand this over to a kid who's 27, with no experience, who has not even graduated from acupuncture school. And, that's what was my mind speaking. And my body was relaxing. It was just… progressively just loosening. All my muscles were just… oh, my abdominal muscles were letting go, and that is… The litmus test. And so, I… I said to my own mind, yeah, he chatted with me, which I often say to my own mind. Chatter away over the shoulder, but, you know, you're not actually part of this decision-making process.
And then I immediately said to him, yeah, okay, you got it, thank you. And we came to a deal, and The rest is history. He designed the mentorship program, and You know, we've… We're just about to put Start the fourth annual one, and by the end of that, there will be about 330 people having graduated from that program.
Mason:
So incredible. I meant to bring your red book, but Tani references it a lot, and so I just don't… there's some books I just don't take out of her office anymore. Thank you. They're too valuable.
Ann:
Thank you, your own copy.
Mason:
I don't touch that, because I'm… I just… then they just end up in the back of my car, and I forget to take them back. But congratulations on that. Just, like… the… the… I mean, trust in a process… the practical… Feeling and sensing, and then being able to articulate that it's that relaxing of the body. And then I imagine… a gentle and patient, non… I'm not gonna… because I've got a tendency to be like, hot potato, you take it, I'm running away. And then I go, oh, crap, my baby's not doing well. That's… I don't do that anymore, but that's what I learned about, like, 10 years ago. But then that patient handover… Because there's… I mean, it feels like there's infinite choice in what to do, but they're really… In terms of what's really, really exciting, and what's really engaging, there's… in terms of… the blueprint, there's really not that much. It stays the same. When you know…
have friends who are trying to engage, or searching, or who are really deep on the path, you see that in all of your friends. It's like, 10 years later, 20 years later, you're like, oh yeah, no, it's the same flavor of what lights you up and what you're here to do.
Ann:
Yes. Exactly. And for me, it's what I'm thinking about. you know, every morning, I wake up, and I'm… I think about my family a lot, my two children a lot. They're grown now, of course. But the very next thing I'm thinking about is the project. It's thrilling. It's just thrilling. And… and when you… When people feel lost when they come into the office and they say, you know. I'm wondering, can you help me with my rheumatoid arthritis? And… You say, when did it begin? Well, probably… Oh, what, 18 years ago, and… And… Okay, and what was happening 19 years ago? They say, oh, voila. I was in the middle of a really horrible divorce, or a company takeover, or I lost a dear friend, or a parent died, you know, 30 years earlier, or whatever it was. And then you ask them. And how have you felt since, or what are you thinking about? What interests you?
Say, I really haven't been able to think about what's interesting, I've just been trying to get over these. You know, getting up in the morning with this dreadful pain, and on they go, and they are not… doing anything. That they really want to do. they've… they've talked themselves into not being able to because of this. I don't have enough flexibility. I don't have enough time. I don't have the money, I don't have the… the, the wherewithal, I can't get organized, I can't discipline myself to put the first step in… into gear. And… All of those things can be treated with the channels, But… If you… if… what I like to ask people is. Okay, so let's imagine that you… Somehow, someone gave you a lottery ticket, and you won. You won the lottery, so now you've got no financial constraints. You can do anything that you want to do. What would it be?
People never say to me, I would buy a gigantic yacht, and I would buy a house in the Caribbean, and… excuse me, and I would buy, you know, a penthouse apartment in London, or whatever, but people don't tell me that at all. They say things like. Oh, I would get some land, and grow my own vegetables, and grow my own wool, or they say things like, well, I would paint, actually. Boys wanted to paint. Not sure if I know anything about painting, but I would just… paint, or I would just… I would, design a new surfboard. I would invest money in technology to figure out how to get an even better surfboard, because I love surfing a lot. So, they come… people come out with the most extraordinary things that they are not doing, that happen to be the things that they are most interested in. And the job of the body.
the physical body, one of its jobs, and I would say its main job, is to demonstrate to the person How they are thinking in a way that is limiting. So, a person with rheumatoid arthritis is, and I haven't come across a single case of rheumatoid arthritis, or osteoarthritis, for that matter, or lupus, or… or multiple sclerosis, or Parkinson's. Where a person is… a person's movement is curtailed because they're curtailing their own movement with their mind. I can't do that. I'm not ready to… I'll never be ready to do that. I'm not good enough to do that. I wouldn't know where to start. I need more information. I need more money. I need more… more time before I get going. I even spoke to somebody today in the office, who… We both agree well, it's not my business, but I silently agreed. She should have left the job 15 years ago. And she didn't.
And she said, oh, if only I had the courage to leave this job, and I would… I would travel, and I would collect fabrics, and I would do things with these fabrics, and… So… Then she's… now she's fired. She got fired from this job that she couldn't quit.
Mason:
Good manifesting.
Ann:
Yes, it was the best thing possible, but… Is the traveling happening? Is the collecting of the fabrics happening? No. No, there are too many things to wrap up. There's… I've got too many… I've got to get my house in order, blah, blah, blah. One thing I've learned about passion. And following the blueprint is… has come with blogs, actually, that the action of a blog. So. So, Geordie, who runs the website, and Mark runs… Mark actually runs the website, gotta give him credit where it's due. Geordie's the one that That digs the elbow in. You haven't written a blog for a month, what's up? Come on, I want one by tomorrow. I say, Johnny, the blocks don't come. They don't come with a static finger. what… but what does happen is that they come sometimes in a dream, sometimes I will wake up and the whole blog is there, which happened last Saturday. And… So… if I come out and…
So, I got up late that day, and Andrew had cooked a whole congee, and the whole kitchen was full of activity, and… and mess, and… Deliciousness. And, so I came out into the kitchen. And I said to Andrew, hi, love, money, don't, don't, don't say anything, don't say a word. I have to get this down. and boom, out it comes. But in the old days. I would come out and say, oh, okay, I'm your sous chef. And then I would start washing… washing, you know, pots and things, and putting things away. I don't do that anymore. I think if it's… if the mission calls in the moment, then I'm on the mission. And it doesn't take long. It's just so… it's there, it has to be put down, and then… And… and everyone has these experiences. Oh, I've got a fantastic idea, and all I need to do is write it down, and then you ask them about it the next day they come, oh, that… what? Oh, that!
Oh, I hadn't thought of that, yeah. But they can't remember 70% of it.
Mason:
Yeah, it's such a beautiful, respectful thing to have in a relationship. is… and… and be excited. It's because it's so… individually. You know, it's so nice, you know, we do so much together, and it's so lovely watching, you know, that individual muse, and… download or excavation happen. Yeah, I really… I love that. It made me… makes me realize, you know, that, like, oh yeah, we're really… we've really been working on that as well over the last year, and not just clicking into, like, better do my duty. It's like, the duty will be there, and you do it, so just relax.
Ann:
Yes.
Mason:
You just… the other thing you just said then, I mean, the excitement part, I'm good at getting excited, and when I now… I think I know when there's a genuine depth of excitement versus just, like, oh, that would be cool. But the… the inverse of that, which then brings… you said the word, like, when you feel… I think you said engagement, but there was a word, you know, when there's, like, an interest, that's the… genuine interest, I've found excitement I can, distract myself with… Kind of, like, false. It's like, you know, like, false… yeah, false, interest. When there's… an easing and relaxing in my body, and an engagement, and an excitement. Just, that was a nice piece of the puzzle for me to remember, because, you know, hand me all the money in the world, I'm kind of similar, my mind goes, like, alright, you know, what are we doing? You know, what would we do? And…
the excitement's there, but I find that exhausting, almost, thinking about that false excitement. And then, when I go into the ease, it's like, it's all the exact same thing, but the only thing is you're not doing is it's actually more… rest… restful if you really allow yourself to look at what the actual path and project is, which I constantly suppress, because I'm like, oh, it's too much for everybody and too much for me. It's like, no! This is actually going to allow your nervous system to chill, get it out on paper, and then you don't have to hold it anymore.
Ann:
Yeah, or whiteboards.
Mason:
My pods are so good.
Ann:
You put it on a whiteboard, because if you… when you put it on paper, the paper has to go somewhere. So, is it going to sit on the desk or the kitchen table and get lost? And put aside, or if you put it on top of the fridge, you know, it gets forgotten. If you… where would you put that piece of paper? That is so important. But if you have a whiteboard. which I do have screwed to my living room wall, then you can write on it. And you can write… you can just scribble ideas as they come, but at the top, I have the 30-year plan written right across the top of it. And then I have a marker, like a green marker, and it nudges its way across. and then it's there, and then you can't forget it. It's in front of you the whole time. You're walking past it several times a day.
Mason:
Mmm. So cool. for those listening, you know, like, those who are, like, kind of pop… being, you know, working to be poppies, I know that feeling when I'm so in the… in the… in the soil and… and waiting for my sprout moment, and also it's lovely you know, there's a blueprint feel, even through that, even though it's not a clear project or, whatever it is. You know, when you look at your students, you can see they're going through their emergence, and they don't even maybe realize that they're going to engage with these big things, like. what are those practical reminders? We call it here. We have, like, CEO, blah, blah, blah, but we have the CRO. Who's the CRO? Who's the chief reminding officer? Just keep these things going on. you create the conditions for the emergence of that clarity.
What are those practical recommendations for every listening from your CRO perspective, just to keep them on path, even if it's not clear yet?
Ann:
To practice. To… all they need to do is practice to be in it. So, when I decided to make the move to teach Thoroughly, internationally, you know, many, many cities. I thought that maybe I wouldn't have time to go into the office, maybe I shouldn't go into the office. And I very, very quickly… Realize that that's… actually not an option. You have to stay in. You have to… you're constantly learning, and you're constantly… that action of being constantly in touch with patients, and putting what you're teaching in practice, even though you've already seen, I don't know, seen tens of thousands of people… tens of thousands of sessions, right? It… their learning doesn't stop, actually. and the… The realizations, or the minor epiphanies that can happen. Happen every day. And so, that's the main instruction. Don't stop practicing. Keep practicing, and… Treat every single person.
As though you saw them for the first time, even if you've seen them hundreds of times. Because what you think is their pulse picture, as you take your pulses, what you think is probably no longer that. You need to take it again, take the pulses again with a fresh mind, and you can find a different nook and cranny. 2, 3…
Mason:
I love it. And for those, for those who aren't. practitioners, it is really just going, well, alright, well, what's the baseline work? What's the work that you… in your… that's in your, Or, you know, for your lineage, or for you, you know, for who you are, what's that like? You know, show up every single, you know, show up and keep on doing those practical things, and the… I know that for me, it's… It's about… always creating… new… educational frameworks, and assets, and teaching a handful of people, and then relinquishing it, and then moving on. And that's something, as soon as I stopped doing that. all of my wheels come off, and I get really stressed, and then I remember, and I come back to that. Is that…
Ann:
Happening from every aspect of your business.
Mason:
Yeah, well, that's happening now, and then, at the moment, then my… Now, the other thing I'm… I really… I… is a massive excitement and relaxing for me is… working with, you know, I call us, like, you know, trippers, you know, the trippers who've… who are working on growing organizations in how to then work with an organization as an ecosystem and find, then, places to put these, These things that we bring through and have organizational structure that can bend and morph and actually integrate them. grow out there into the world. That's, like… but it doesn't matter whether I'm doing it about mushrooms. or, general path with the DAO, organizational structure. It's just frameworks for flow, and frameworks for, for effective implementation of something that goes from conceptual to practical. It really just keeps me grounded, and in the sense of practice, the same. It keeps me going, like.
Oh, that's right, another little insight. Oh, here we go. No, that's actually a bit distract… a bit distracted. This is actually… and year after year, I'm amazed that I'm just like, oh wow, yeah, I didn't really have it all together, I gotta keep on showing up for that.
Ann:
May that need to stop, right? May they never stop that feeling that, oh, there's always more to open up into.
Mason:
Mmm. I've loved this conversation so much, and I really feel like everyone listening has probably got some digesting of information and life and the universe and all things after that one. Is there anything else on the tip of your tongue or heart or mind?
Ann:
Yes, the AI thing is on my mind very much at the moment, and… I think it's important for people to know Vet. If the grid goes down, That healing can happen by remote. The treatment of the channels can happen without an in-person session. So all of this can be done. over the phone, over the internet, or over the… or by pre-arranged time. If the grid goes down, there's no internet, right? But… Get your copper landlines back. It can also be done By people who have no knowledge of acupuncture, which is… so 30% of the enrolment in the mentorship program. are not trained Chinese medical people. They are from… Love that. Yeah. And so…
Mason:
It just… and even those people who haven't been in practice yet, or, you know, like, it's amazing. The fact that you leave that accessibility of this type of work is just something I just feel is difficult to land, and I think maybe why I really… I think we did it last time, just before the mentorship program, which… does it start in March? Is that from my memory?
Ann:
January the 5th.
Mason:
Oh, perfect. So this will come out before then, and, for those needing needing a leap, yeah, to be jumping in and going on this 6-month path. Maybe a little, little top-line… About Bill.
Ann:
I wasn't saying that to sell.
Mason:
No, no, you're not. I… that's my agenda.
Ann:
I was really saying it because I want to start saying this out loud, because If… let's say AGI, which is the main concern, Let's say… That it decides that… you know, the world would be better off with the internet shut down. Let's say it made that decision. And so, now we can't be in touch with each other. Across long distances. There will be… The… the capacity to heal. Through… Indirect means. It's going to be there, and so I don't want people to worry that they're going to die, you know, that they're going to… that they're… people won't be able to take care of their chronic degenerative diseases, and… By the way, reverse them.
Mason:
Is that something… even having peace in the face of, like, these big changes, is that just something you've found has emerged as you've… maybe it's, like, whatever generic thing is about to come out of my mouth, like, connected to self, connected to the blueprint, the project, do you just find naturally that it's like, oh. that AI stuff and the tech stuff isn't as real, or whatever happens externally is very important, and acknowledging that, it doesn't shake me as much, I don't have myself or my meaning or my identity wrapped up in it, so do you just find it not shaking you as much?
Ann:
No, it doesn't shake me, but it does drive me to hurry up and get as many people as possible. It definitely does that. But it… it doesn't. I think, That we need to collect books. Books of knowledge.
Mason:
literal books, I'm just on your website, so Ancestorsmaneveryone.com, everybody.
Ann:
I'm not talking about my books.
Mason:
I know you're not promoting, but I… what happens, and it's like, if I don't… if I don't bring it up, there's always, like, about 5% of people that listen to the podcast who, like, are really going, like, I really want you to highlight what the extras are. And then, likewise, I think it's important for 95 of people might be like, oh good, I'll take that general concept of we need the books, we need to remember these projects, but I always, miss that little CTA call to action sometimes, so I'm trying to get better at that.
Ann:
Okay, so I can do that, I can do that. Thank you for the opportunity. So, we have an enormous amount of, offerings, a number of offerings. The main one, really, for people who are so-called lay people, which I just called… I call them interested people, is the Instagram. At Ancestors Instagram, and I, as often as I can, I put little lessons up there, little lessons in the principles of Chinese medicine. which many people find interesting. There's, there's also, for practitioners, there's a Facebook group, Classical Community, no, Classical Medicine Community, Classical Medicine Community. And then there are… there's… there are blogs, and the blogs are designed to teach people the fundamentals of Chinese medicine in a… in a way that's couched in day-to-day life, and that's… all that's on my website. And then there are books, and… I know, I'm forgetting things. We just…
we try to put up as many things, and there are free resources in the bookstore on the website.
Mason:
And there's such great books. I mean, I just, like, the last time we talked, you just launched Becoming Healthy, Staying Healthy. And every now and then, a book does the rounds, and that one's actually done the rounds with a few of my team members. I saw it on a few desks, so it's always, like, lovely for me to see.
Ann:
That's my most important book. Becoming Healthy, Staying Healthy, yeah.
Mason:
I agree. I mean, and also the welcoming food, Andrew's… Books are always, always, being borrowed, and I always have to remind people to bring them back, because they just want to leave them in their kitchens.
Ann:
Becoming Healthy, Staying Healthy. They're two great books, and they are focused in wet food. Wet food brings true health.
Mason:
So cool, so practical. I'm so glad we got in for the mentorship program. 6-month classical acupuncture and remote healing training. I mean. We do get a lot of, clinicians, but especially a lot of students of Chinese medicine, and I forget my CRO. I forget that a lot of people Who come in haven't been here for, say, the last 6 years of this podcast, or… tuned in to, yourself, Andrew, your teacher, Jeffrey Ewan, is that the name? Jeffrey Ewan, and the nature of the, you know, the difference between maybe a TCM university model or a classical Chinese medicine-rooted practice that has perception and everything that you're talking about. The extraordinary's been integrated into, into clinic.
For those listening, and you are like, I feel like I got a good baseline of education and had to go through the practicalities, and now I'm looking for that next place to actually reconnect with what I sense is at the heart of Chinese medicine, or healing in general, this is… Where? This is… this is it. This is… a really great option, I should say. Yeah, so I just… I wanted to just make sure I remind everyone of that, so if you know… If it's yourself listening, or friends, or, who are looking for that path, this is an… this is an option worth, sending to them, and the mentor-ship program, 6-month classable acupuncture and remote healing. Practice the classics in alignment with their intention by learning the complete teachings, the complete, complement channels of acupuncture, so… Yeah, I just… I always forget, and I'm like, that we need to remind everyone of that.
Ann:
Thank you, Mason. Where do I send the cheque? Thank you.
Mason:
Yeah, that's, there's, there's, there's karmic checks in the mail already, so that's… and it is just exciting, I've… yeah, the… It is just exciting watching, you know, watching it all, you know, all of our work weave together. I love it.
Ann:
And I'm… I'm just loving your astragalus. Your Stragulus product is just… it's brilliant. Beautiful. I use it as a tea. I just treat it like my… my tea.
Mason:
Tonifies the spleen.
Ann:
COVIDs?
Mason:
doesn't surprise me. I mean, in terms of nourishing the treasures, which is, you know, the… and cultivating the treasures and protecting them as the jam of the… like, generally, those who get deep on the path are eventually like, oh, cool, you know, jing tonics kind of fall to the side, Shen tonics kind of fall to the side, and it just becomes… the qi herbs just find their way as the permanent, because it's like, oh, we just need to maintain momentum until we get to our crescendo now.
Ann:
Yes. large collection of stuff, yeah, beautiful. Congratulations on everything you're doing, and doing it with integrity and respect for the earth, and…
Mason:
Thank you so much, I really do appreciate that. It really makes me… I really… I'm working on acknowledging what we're doing at the moment, so I'll let it in. Thank you. Well, I love your work so much, send all of our love to Andrew as well. Everyone wants to listen to Andrew's podcast. I believe he was on the podcast with Tani, a few years ago. So you can go and, if you want to jump into that food side of things, so that's, yeah, that's, that's there, and please jump on to, Anne. Cecilsterman.com, all the links are there if you need to find them, but yeah, follow the Instagram. At the very least, that is your instruction. Homework is to tune into your blueprint, everybody, and thank you so much, Anne.
Ann:
Thanks for having me, Mason. Lots of love.
