Shownotes
On this episode of The Soul Mirror Podcast hosted by Shreya, Jessica Pearl Herman shares a grounded conversation about self-acceptance, identity, and the quiet pressure many people carry to “fix” themselves.
This episode is for anyone exhausted from performing worthiness while secretly feeling disconnected inside. Jessica explores how early beliefs shape self-rejection, why radical acceptance changes everything, and how reconnecting with your inner truth can feel less like self-improvement and more like finally coming home.
About the Guest:
Jessica Pearl Herman is a spiritual teacher, author, and channel for the non-physical collective Big Brain. Her work focuses on consciousness, experiential unity, and embodied self-acceptance.
Episode Chapters:
- 00:00 — Why self-love feels harder than it sounds
- 02:03 — Jessica’s spiritual awakening and channeling journey
- 04:53 — The surprising truth behind self-hate and healing
- 07:48 — How childhood conditioning shapes self-worth
- 11:14 — Hidden signs of low self-acceptance
- 13:31 — Letting go of the pressure to “fix” yourself
- 16:03 — A practical first step toward radical self-acceptance
Key Takeaways:
- Self-love begins with honest self-awareness, not perfection
- Your past shaped you, but it does not define your future choices
- Radical acceptance reduces fear, shame, and constant comparison
- Authenticity grows when you stop hiding your uniqueness
- Real healing starts when you stop treating yourself as broken
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Transcripts
00:00:00 Shreya: Love has become such a familiar phrase that we have almost stopped hearing it. We see it printed on candles, on coffee mugs, on Instagram captions. And yet, when we sit alone with ourselves at the end of a long day, most of us would quietly admit we don't actually know what it feels like. Not the version we post about, but the real one. The one that doesn't need an audience. And today's conversation is about that harder, more honest kind.
00:00:37 Shreya: welcome to the podcast, I'm your host, Shreya, and today I'm in conversation with Jessie Herman. Jessie is a spiritual teacher, author, and a channel for the non-physical collective Big Brain. Her work centers on experiential unity, consciousness and radical self acceptance. And what makes it different is that she leaves the guidance in real time. So the teachings are embodied rather than idealized. And today we are going to talk about self love, the layers underneath it. The brain has to say about it and what it really takes to come home to ourselves. So welcome, Jessie. I'm really honored and glad to have you on my show.
00:01:22 Jessica Pearl Herman : Thank you so much for having me. It's lovely to be here.
00:01:25 Shreya: Thank you so much. And before we just begin, a quick disclaimer for my listeners. Some statements reflect personal beliefs and experiences and are presented as individual views, not as medical advice. Listeners should consult qualified professionals for medical conditions.
00:01:41 Shreya: And with that, just before we step into the deeper layers, I would love to start somewhere personal. Like when you look back at the very first time, you sensed there was something bigger than you trying to get your attention. The the kind of moment that quietly redirected your life. What comes to mind?
00:02:03 Jessica Pearl Herman : So, um, I think the moment that comes to mind is when I first started channeling and I was in a space where I didn't really believe that a lot of these spiritual concepts were even real myself, but I was getting so frustrated with this sense that there must be something bigger in my own purpose in life in general, and that there was this energy that was wanting to come through me. So I really took a leap of faith and said, well, let's see what happens if instead of holding myself in a space of resistance, I just allow myself to flow. And that's really when battering came through.
00:02:41 Shreya: Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing this. And also, self-love has become one of the most overused phrases in the wellness space today, which means most of us have stopped really hearing what it means. So from your work, what is the biggest misconception people carry about about what self-love actually is?
00:03:04 Jessica Pearl Herman : Right. So it is a complicated little bit of a situation, because the true reality of existence is that you already are madly in love with yourself. There's no amount of bubble baths or hot chocolates or caring for yourself that is going to change that. We ultimately would not even exist if we didn't love ourselves as we are unconditionally, with every day being a new blessing to move more into the life that we're wanting to live. But the true nature of our spiritual side doesn't really match at times with the way we feel about ourselves as human beings. Maybe when we were younger, someone told us we weren't good enough, or we weren't worthy, or told us there was something wrong with us. And there are these residues of thinking that we're less than what we need to be to exist in the world. And so self-love, I think the cliche and the reason why it's so misunderstood is because it does seem like an impossible thing to do. There's only one of you. And how can you actually love yourself? But when we talk about self-love in terms of the human being coming to this space of aligning with the way that your soul already feels about you, that's when the game starts changing. When you recognize that there's no way for you to have ever been imperfect, and that every moment is a new opportunity to choose who you want to be going forward without any limitation. That's when it really starts to get interesting. But that can only happen by accepting the starting point, you're constantly pretending that you are in a space of being imperfect or in a space of being broken. Then you're already going back in time. You're not where you are today. Where you are today is a person who has infinite potential to make any new choices going forward.
00:04:53 Shreya: And when someone first encounters the version of self love, you teach what tends to surprise or unsettle them.
00:05:01 Jessica Pearl Herman : Well, the biggest thing that is surprising to them or unsettling is that when people are told that they're perfect, but they have flaws or things that they're, you know, not liking about themselves or having to try to change for a long, long time. It sounds like, well, no, that's impossible. I know that this thing that I'm doing is wrong, or I know this habit needs to be broken, or I know this behavior isn't, you know, serving me in a certain way. And I have these patterns that I keep doing. So something must be broken. But the truth is, is that even before you accept the patterns, It's fundamental to accept that there are parts of you that you don't like. You have to accept the version of you that is judgmental. You have to accept the version of you that is thinking you're broken or is trying to change you. That critical, critical version of you is yourself as well. And that part needs love first. The moment you can say to yourself, you know what? I hate myself is the first step towards self-love. Because at that point, you've no longer resisted the fact that you are trying to change something that's already perfect. Even the desired change is perfection. From that space, things start to get a little bit funny because you're going well. If loving myself means admitting I hate myself, then what's next? But it gives you just a little bit of breathing space to go, oh, actually, if nothing's wrong, even with me not loving myself, then moving forward from here, I can start to see how. MM, maybe that's not the best way to go. Maybe being judgmental isn't the best thing to be doing anymore. And if you can drop that first and drop that sense of resistance to accepting that you didn't decide to have your traumas, you can decide to have your weird habits. You didn't decide to have all your weird quirks. Then it gets a lot lighter and going, oh, okay. I didn't decide to have that quirk, but from this moment on, I decide to be a little bit different. I choose from this moment on what feels better to me. You can start to move into a version of you that is more accepting, more loving in general, and that's where real self-love comes from.
00:07:05 Shreya: I think that distinction matters so much because we have been sold self-love as a feeling like something pleasant we should be able to manufacture, but the real version is not feeling at all. It's it's a relationship. And like any honest relationship, it has weather. And let's give it that for a moment. Like underneath someone's struggle to love themselves. there is almost always a deeper, older layer running beneath the surface. So from your channel's work and your real life observation, what is the root layer that, uh, that you most often see?
00:07:48 Jessica Pearl Herman : I think that the main reason why we have such a struggle with this is simply a misunderstanding that we took on when we were very, very little. And just like any of the things that you learn when you're very little, it's very hard to unpack them and come back to something that actually makes more sense. So the majority of people think that they are directly responsible for who they are, when the truth is, is that you are no different than a tree or a rock or a divine animal, a horse, whatever it might be. You are part of nature, and therefore there are limitations that you have based upon you being a human. And there are also things that have occurred in your life, that have created the version of you that exists up until such point as you are the one putting together the building blocks of who you want to be. You actually don't have much responsibility for the clay that you've been given. You've been handed your body. You've been handed parts of your personality. You've been handed your genetics. And the misunderstanding about people with self-love is they think that they have put themselves together. Therefore, there's like a sense of responsibility to fix something. If instead you look at your human life from a space of, okay, I'm a creator and this happens to be the clay that I got. You spend a lot less time trying to fix things or change the clay, and instead you look at it objectively. You go, okay, great. There are things about this clay that are really good at creating certain aspects. And then there are things about this clay that are not going to create those other things. You get a lot more realistic. and in your realism, looking at yourself as a whole as opposed to parts that you're at fault for or you feel guilty for. Need to feel shame about what you then go, oh, look at this. I have this beautiful opportunity to work with this human being as my vehicle for experiencing my life. And this is a lot of what has helped me to understand in my own work, is that while we are responsible for everything from today onwards, it's only by understanding that up until today, everything that has been occurring has already occurred, is already complete and was already perfect. So yes, from today onwards you do have a responsibility for choosing how you're going to live your life. But everything that's occurred from today and before is just the information, the clay, the materials you've been given to be able to make your choice from now. So that really takes a lot of pressure off of it. And then you can really look at yourself with a level of self-compassion that most people don't ever get to see themselves with.
00:10:36 Shreya: Yes, I think that goes right to the heart of it. Like most people are not feeling that self-love. They are just trying to love themselves while quietly believing they have to earn the right to do it. And I want to bring this into real life. Like, walk me through what a lack of self acceptance actually looks like in someone who appears on the outside. Uh, to have it all together. The smart, the capable, the kind person who who never say, I don't love myself out loud. So what science is? Are there daily life giving them?
00:11:14 Jessica Pearl Herman : Yeah, actually, it's really quite tragic because someone who is in a space of not loving themselves ends up shutting themselves off to much of the beauty of life. If you're not in a space of radically accepting yourself, you're in a space where you cannot trust anyone else. You cannot love anyone else, and no one else can love you. And I'm not saying that you can't learn love through other people's reflection, but what I'm saying is, is it's really a shame because you will always be in suspicion of other people and say, well, what do they see in me that is so fantastic? What is it they're trying to get from me, etc.? Because fundamentally you're not accepting your own humanity, your own imperfections as perfection, right? So if existence created you in any way that it's created you, then you're already exactly where you need to be and you have the ability to move forward from there. So ways that this can manifest, it can manifest in insecurity. It can manifest in competition. It can manifest in greed or jealousy. It mostly manifests in fear because only when you randomly accept yourself do you get to that state of knowing faith in yourself and having real confidence, knowing that whatever comes your way, you will be able to navigate it because you have the tools and the instruments within yourself to navigate complicated situations. But up until that point, if you're, you know, suspecting that you're not good enough or that you have to earn your worthiness or earn your existence, your main theme in life will be attempting to ensure the fact that you're here. And that's so funny because you're here anyway, whether you're spending all your energy attempting to ensure that, or whether you're enjoying your life. So in my opinion, it makes much more sense to just simply radically accept yourself from here, understand how much power you have to shape your life in whatever direction you want to go from today, and then to start working on that, as opposed to constantly trying to prove your worth and the reasons why you're here.
00:13:15 Shreya: Yes. And I think that deeply and also like what is usually the moment they finally see it, like the small experience that makes the truth impossible to ignore.
00:13:31 Jessica Pearl Herman : My experience when people finally understand that they are not the ones. For example, you enjoy certain flavor of ice cream, right? And there's so many flavors of ice cream. Fifteen in the case, let's say you enjoy vanilla. Someone else enjoys chocolate. Now, there is no logical explanation for you having chosen to enjoy vanilla over chocolate. It is simply what it is. It's simply what you were given. You were given flavor centers that have. You have a preference for vanilla. Or maybe you had a grandparent that always gave you vanilla ice cream. Whatever reason, you have a preference for that ice cream. That is simply you. That is simply some building block for your existence that you've been given, which means that you'll favor vanilla ice cream every time, which means that you might meet someone else who likes vanilla ice cream. You'll have something that you can talk about, and that's the person you fall in love with. Whatever it is, when people understand fundamentally that they didn't choose their desires. They didn't choose the things that they're attracted to. They didn't choose their hobbies. They didn't choose many aspects of their personality. They didn't construct it, in other words. Then a thought has to come into your mind at some point. So if I didn't create this, if I didn't choose this from my human level, from my mind level, then something or someone must have done it. And if that's something chose for you to like vanilla ice cream, then it is one hundred percent correct for you to like vanilla ice cream. It's only when we believe that we have to take responsibility for everything in our lives that we end up with this pressure, this really strong pressure of having to fix things. What if there's nothing wrong with the fact that you like vanilla ice cream? There's nothing wrong with the fact that you're antisocial, let's say. Or what if there's nothing wrong with the fact that you want to have ten kids instead of two kids, or no kids instead of fifteen kids. Whatever it is, right? You don't want to be fixing ourselves. And as soon as you realize, wow, there must be some magnificent reason why I am this unique being no one else like you on the whole planet at all, then you really begin to go, wow, existence wanted me to be this one, to be this person, to see the world in my way, to see the world in my perspective. And that really makes the shift. When people understand, really, that they're the only one like them. Then they go, wow, this is precious.
00:16:03 Shreya: Yes. And also, your work is not just philosophy. It's a embodied you. You leave the guidance, the channel for from the brain in real time. So for someone listening who genuinely wants to begin practicing radical self-acceptance, not in theory, but in the next twenty four hours, what is a real grounded first step you would offer them.
00:16:27 Jessica Pearl Herman : So my suggestion to someone who wants to start embodying it right now is to get really, really real with yourself and understand that your soul and you can feel this. Everyone can feel this within themselves. Your soul already loves you. Now we like to ignore this because we do favor fitting in, and we do favor what our moms and dads told us when we were kids. But there is a spark inside of you that has a deep knowing of your value and of your worth. And you can connect with that spark and just allow yourself one concession of sharing something that's uniquely yours to anyone, anything at all. As you begin to allow yourself to share what's uniquely yours, and you can have that reflection back to you with people saying that, you know, either they don't care about that thing or that they're not interested in in it or that, you know, even if they reject it, it's your own courage that you're building up and allowing yourself to be you that will eventually show you how beautiful you are. Now, every single one of us is fundamentally beautiful and fundamentally perfect. Even if you've made a million mistakes, even if you're a horrific character on the external side. So allowing yourself to tune into the version of you that first, even before you were born, made your heart beat, allowed you to have life flow into this physical body. You can just tune into whatever will that was to exist in the first place. Then that's how it starts. And then showing up day after day as you whether it's good or bad, uh, beautiful weather or rainy weather, like you said, that is really the practice. You have to really show up as you.
00:18:21 Shreya: Yes. I think that's such a tender truth. And thank you for sharing all this information on your knowledge or your experiences with us. Um, and if there is one thing I'm taking from this conversation is that self-love is not something you summon or your your best days. It is something you slowly stop withholding your hardest ones. And the moment you stop withholding from yourself, life starts to feel less like a performance and more like a homecoming. And Jesse, after this wonderful conversation, my listeners want to connect with you and want to learn more about these topics. Want to learn more about your work, your books, uh, then what's the best place to find you?
00:19:07 Jessica Pearl Herman : Sure. So you can go over to w w w dot JP, Herman dot com, that's J c h e r m a n dot com. And there you're going to find information on my one on one sessions on my books that I've published on events that I have coming up, both free and ticketed events, courses on self-love, and on many other topics, and so much more. And for the free offers for you. So head over there as soon as you can and check it out, because that is really where you can find me most on Instagram. It's Jesse underscore B a g r e I n, and I'm on YouTube at J p Herman, so check us out everywhere you would like, and I'd love to be in service to you.
00:19:56 Shreya: Yes. And I will make sure to attach all these details and links below in the show notes so that the listeners can find them easily and get in touch with you. And to all my listeners, the Soul Mirror is built on one white idea that the truth of who we are is often hiding in the moments we least expect to find it. So here is something to carry with you from today. You don't have to become someone new to be loved by yourself. You just have to stop running from the one who's already there. Thank you for being here. I will see you in the next reflection. And do not forget to hit the follow button. Subscribe and feel free to share your thoughts because your ears deserve premium content. Thank you.
