Kris Franken is a luminous force of nature—an award-winning author, spiritual wayshower, and creator of healing circles who blends words, wisdom, and wildness to light the way for others on their journey of self-discovery. With a heart deeply connected to Mother Nature and a penchant for stretching limits, Kris empowers those who seek to embrace their unique calling and navigate the uncharted path of authenticity. Her work is a golden thread of encouragement, guiding people to trust their intuition, honor their inner truth, and embrace a life that is both sacred and untamed. Her latest book, Wildhearted Purpose: Embrace Your Unique Calling & the Unmapped Path of Authenticity, has garnered widespread acclaim for its powerful message of self-liberation. Through her books, courses, meditations, and healing circles, Kris has created a vibrant tapestry of transformation—one woven with love, light, and magic. Her fearless spirit is evident not just in her words but also in the way she lives: rebellious, empathic, and delightfully irreverent. Join Mystic Mag as we explore what it means to live wild and free, how to follow the intuitive whispers of the soul.
Your work consistently empowers others to trust their hearts and follow their inner guidance. How do you personally stay connected to your own heart in moments of challenge or uncertainty?
I feel like that’s been such a long process for me. On a human level, when we face uncertainty and challenges, our ego instantly reacts. The ego can become dramatic and start creating stories about what’s happening. We might feel like a victim, and while that might make us feel better in the short term, it’s not a sustainable way to live a life of grace, ease, bliss, or whatever else we’re truly searching for.
What I’ve discovered is that in times of uncertainty, the ego gets very loud. From a young age, we’re taught to respond with fear and anxiety when something is unknown, so we become afraid of the unknown. That’s natural because that’s how we’re wired. I believe this fear is deeply rooted in us, likely stemming from ancestral patterns that we need to overcome. This is why we have the spiritual path—to help us overcome ancestral trauma and any other sources of fear.
So, when we’re faced with uncertainty and challenges, the ego tends to fabricate stories. However, when we start cultivating a heart connection through daily meditation, walks in nature, or any mindful practice, we eventually experience moments when the heart’s wisdom comes through. The heart doesn’t communicate in words but rather through feelings. In moments where we’re sitting under a tree, admiring a flower, or listening to beautiful music, it’s possible for wisdom, self-care, and love to reach us, penetrating through the conscious mind, then we sense something greater, bigger, and more powerful. That’s the presence of love coming through the portal of our heart.
When we take time daily to strengthen this connection—whether through somatic exercises, yoga, or simply listening to what our body is telling us beneath the conscious mind, beneath the ego, and beyond the noise—we hear more from the heart. The heart then grows in its capacity to communicate with us as a whole being, and we expand our capacity to listen. With every challenge we encounter, the ease of understanding our heart and tuning into its wisdom becomes simpler and clearer.
For me, this has meant that whenever I’m faced with a challenge, I strive to be transparent with myself: no ego, no blame, no judgment, no victim mentality. I ask myself, “What’s really going on here? How can I be responsible? How can I stay present? How can I love myself through this? And how can I find my way forward without unnecessary mental conflict?”
Instead of trying to be the “better” or “bigger” person, I ask, “What does my heart truly want at this moment?” It’s easy to connect with the heart in the good times, but in challenging times, developing trust in the deepest part of ourselves—love—is crucial. Consistently opening that channel, as often as possible, both in joyful and difficult times, is what guides us through uncertainty along the rollercoaster of life.
In your award-winning book Wildhearted Purpose, you explore the “unmapped path of authenticity.” What advice do you have for those who are struggling to navigate the unknown aspects of their journey?
That’s a great question because we’re at a point on Mother Earth’s timeline marked by a huge awakening, immense uncertainty, and where everything feels unknown right now. We have a choice: we can follow the paved path of fear and be scared of the unknown, or we can reframe the unknown as spaciousness—a place of opportunity. If we can view the unknown parts of our lives, our past, and the future of ourselves, our families, our communities, Mother Earth, and humanity as a whole through a lens of hope and optimism, then the unknown becomes a playing field.
So, what is it that you want to create right now? If you have a lot of unknown space in your life, you have the most amazing opportunity to create abundance, satisfaction, service, love, and heartfelt connections. If you’ve just moved to a new place, if you’re starting fresh, if you’ve just had children, or if you’ve lost your job, it’s easy to fall into the ego’s tricks. The ego will say, “This is scary. What are we going to do? How are we going to make money? How will we be happy? How are we going to put food on the table? How are we going to manage?”
But if you tune into your heart, as we mentioned before, you’ll find an abundance of answers and opportunities. There is so much waiting for us. The wildhearted part of us will always crave the wild. When we look at people who seem very self-assured, confident, with a steady job, children, and a nanny, we might think that’s what security looks like. On the other hand, having a lot of spaciousness in your life might feel like walking anxiously on rocky ground, making you wonder, “How are we going to provide?” That whole narrative is misleading because neither perception is entirely true.
The only security you can ever have is within yourself. The only groundedness, the only anchor you can drop, is within your own being. Returning to the essence of who you are—as a divine expression, as Source energy incarnate—is where you find what you’re looking for. All the answers are within. By tuning into your heart space, which is the center of your being, the portal to your Soul, and a multidimensional vortex to all that is, you access everything you need.
When we start listening to our heart, we get the answers that guide us to take action. We can then say, “Okay, what is the one next step?” That’s all we need. We don’t have to know the next ten steps or have a five-year plan. We just need to know the next step. Yes, we might have ideas about what we’d like to consider after that, but beyond that, there’s no need to spread ourselves too thin. Focus on the next step, the next seed to plant.
So, this season, how can I be more present? By anchoring into the present moment, we create a deep sense of security. Everything is available to us in the present moment. When we approach life with this mindset, everything already is abundant, and we can truly see and feel it from that space.
What type of services do you offer?
At the moment, I’ve just started offering one-on-one sessions again, which I haven’t done for a while. I feel called to do this because I love helping people discover their soul purpose. I offer one-on-one mentorship sessions called “Medicine Readings” because I love gaining insight into the unique gifts that people have brought into their human selves through their souls for this lifetime. I focus on understanding what they’re here to share and how they’re meant to serve.
Additionally, I offer monthly online cacao ceremonies. I’ve been holding cacao ceremonies for a few years now, and I consider it my primary form of medicine. It’s such a healing, heartfelt medicine that I absolutely adore. I love sharing it because I’ve witnessed incredible transformations during these ceremonies.
Besides that, I’m currently working on my next book, so that’s what I’m focused on for now. I also have some beautiful, free meditations available on Insight Timer, which can also be accessed through my website.
You’ve described yourself as “a whole lot of sacred with a healthy dose of irreverence.” How do you balance the deep spiritual work you do with this more playful, rebellious side of yourself?
I love the playful juxtaposition of having a deeply devoted spiritual life that can be very serious and focused, and yet, another side of me that is very playful and rebellious. I don’t like being told what to do, so even on my spiritual journey, I’ve had mentors offer me advice, and I’ve thought, “No, that’s not for me.” From a young age, I’ve always had a part of me that is very serious about what I love—whether it’s rituals, work, or family. I approach each of these aspects of my life with deep devotion. But then, I also have this other side that loves playfulness and spontaneity.
The universe speaks to us in spontaneous ways, moment to moment. And if we aren’t open to that—if we stick too rigidly to a schedule, whether it’s for work or spirituality or anything else—it can all become too stuck and serious. When we don’t allow time for play, exploration, adventure, and whimsy, life loses the essence of what a spiritual journey truly is: connecting with our spirit. Our spirit is inherently playful.
I’ve had times when I’ve connected with Spirit Guides and Spirit Animals and found myself laughing so hard that I was crying, because they have an amazing sense of humor. I’ve had meditations where my guides have called me out for being too serious and have done things that made me laugh. I believe that, right at the heart of being devoted to a spiritual life, if we can hold onto a playful flame—embracing whimsy, childlike wonder, and living with an openness to the moments where the universe, earth, friends, family, and life itself just want to play with us—then that’s real medicine. Lightness and laughter are deeply healing and help us shake off the heaviness of our being and the world around us.
Laughter has this ripple effect through our energy field, loosening up any density or staleness within us that might have formed from overthinking or other causes. And while density is part of being human and is normal, having access to play every day is crucial. I recommend it to everyone. It’s actually a balance to these very uncertain times—having a devotion to play, pleasure, and creating space each day to follow your heart in a joyful way. That’s the kind of self-care that is truly medicinal.
Healing circles are an integral part of your work. What do you believe makes the energy of a group setting so transformative, and how do you foster a safe and sacred space in these circles?
I love women’s circles. I’ve been participating in them for many years, and at first, what I really appreciated about them—which is quite commonly known—is that everyone is equal in a circle. Everyone is wise and a master in their own way and each person may come with some kind of pain, trauma, or something they wish to share and alchemize. That’s the beauty of the circle: it holds a powerful energy that helps everyone feel like they belong.
What I want to emphasize to anyone who may not know this about circles is that there is a very feminine flow to them, but they require a masculine element to hold the space. For me, that masculine aspect is crucial. People who hold space for a circle often set particular rules—sometimes they’re unspoken, and it’s a flexible space, which is wonderful. In the circles I hold, I make the rules know, like there’s a rule that when someone is speaking, nobody else speaks or makes a sound unless it’s unavoidable, like coughing or sneezing. There are no “umms” or murmurs of agreement. Even though, as women, we often tend to vocalize our support for one another, in this setting, we maintain silence.
If someone is crying, no one touches them, although they can pass tissues. If you touch a woman while she’s crying, it interrupts the flow of energy. While it’s a beautiful, maternal instinct to soothe and comfort others day-to-day, in a circle, if you touch someone, you disrupt that powerful healing flow. Instead, you love them by holding space in complete silence until they are done and signal that they have finished. Only then does the next person speak. At the end of the circle, if anyone wishes to share some loving advice or something gentle, they may, but advice isn’t really the focus of a circle. It’s not therapy; we don’t go there to say, “Oh yes, I’ve experienced that too,” or to psychoanalyze, offer remedies, or prescribe solutions. We go there to listen and speak from our hearts.
For me, that is the true power of a sharing circle. I’ve seen greater transformation in a women’s circle—especially on retreats, where there’s more spaciousness and privacy—than anywhere else. I’ve never seen transformation more profound than in a women’s circle. It can be absolutely life-changing.
In response to your question about how to hold sacred space, I start the process of tending to the space of a circle the moment I wake up on the day of a gathering. I am in constant communion with Mother Cacao and Mother Gaia, reflecting on the needs of the group that will be attending. The room must be clean and smudged to clear the energy. After clearing, I bring in beautiful vibrations through flowers, music, crystal bowls, or singing. I bring in prayers, intentions, and all the elements needed to set up a safe and welcoming space before anyone arrives. The room is made to look beautiful, and the prayers, intention, and sage all help protect these women. When they come and sit in the circle, they can feel that energy—they feel safe and held. It’s not me who is doing this; it’s the Great Mother working through me, Mother Gaia working through me. I trust implicitly that these women are taken care of and safe.
When I guide a cacao ceremony, I take women on a journey through the portal of their hearts. We might explore a beautiful inner earth temple, the heart of Mother Gaia, the Great Central Sun, or even other planets. Although it may appear to be just a meditation, these journeys are very real, and we need protection during such adventures because we may encounter many different kinds of beings. I ensure that everyone is protected and safe as we travel together.
One thing that has deepened my appreciation for circles and energy work happened just a few weeks ago. I was holding a women’s circle, and after we had the cacao and went on a journey, I played beautiful music while the women lay down to integrate the medicine of the cacao and reflect on the journey they had just experienced. As they rested, I sat there, tuned in, and made sure everyone was okay—psychically keeping an eye on the space. Then, I noticed something profound.
We all have an individual toroidal field, an energetic field that looks like an apple, where energy moves up our spine, out through the crown chakra, and around us in every direction. Mother Earth also has a similar field. But for the first time, I saw it in the context of the circle. I could see that the energy was coming up from Mother Gaia through everything we had placed in the center—flowers, candles, feathers, oracle cards—and then it flowed through the middle, over the top of all of us, and held us in this shared field. I had never seen that before, and it gave me a greater appreciation for the work done before and during the circle to keep that field pure and potent.
The women who come to the circle contribute to that field. When they show up in a space of non-judgment, compassion, love, kindness, truth, honesty, and vulnerability, it impacts everyone in the circle. It’s more than what they say—it’s how they are being in that space. I love these intimate circles, and I feel deeply honored to hold them regularly. It’s a privilege to witness women coming together to share what’s on their hearts and to be open to transformation. I’ve never seen anything like it, and I am truly grateful to do this work.
