The War Without, the Peace Within — A Conversation with Taryn van Schalkwyk

How do we find peace within ourselves when the world around us seems anything but peaceful?

In this expansive and heartfelt episode of Conversations for Change, Becky sits down with Taryn van Schalkwyk—a South African of Lebanese descent now living in Bahrain—for a conversation about spiritual awakening, inner transformation, surrender, heart-centered living, and finding purpose in a rapidly changing world.

After a 19-year career as a lawyer in South Africa, Taryn found herself confronting a deeper question: Who am I without all the titles? Her move to Bahrain created the space for an unexpected spiritual journey that challenged her analytical mind and opened her to intuition, energetic sensitivity, healing, and a growing awareness of a larger purpose.

Living amid uncertainty and conflict has also brought Taryn face-to-face with a powerful contrast: the war without and the peace within. Together, Becky and Taryn explore what happens when we stop allowing external circumstances to determine our internal state—and begin discovering the still, grounded center within ourselves.

Their conversation moves through surrender, fear and faith, heart-mind coherence, connection with nature, imagination, consciousness expansion, and the growing realization that perhaps we don't transform the world by trying to change everyone around us.

Instead, transformation begins within.

As we become more grounded in our authentic selves, we can stop trying to fix or persuade others and learn instead to hold space, remain present, and allow our lives to become an invitation.

And perhaps we can meet the unknown with something else as well: curiosity.

Drawing on her experience with improv theater, Taryn offers a wonderfully simple way of approaching life and everything we don't yet understand:

“Yes, and...”

An invitation to remain open to possibility—and to a future we may not yet be able to imagine.

Topics discussed

• Spiritual awakening and inner transformation
• Finding peace amid uncertainty
• Surrender, fear, and faith
• Discovering who we are beyond our roles
• Intuition and inner knowing
• Heart-centered living and heart-mind coherence
• Holding space rather than fixing others
• Consciousness expansion
• Imagination and conscious creation
• Meeting the unknown with curiosity