Special re-release: In support of authors who have lost their homes in the tragic LA fires, we will be resharing their podcast episodes.

Zibby speaks to Natasha Sizlo about ALL SIGNS POINT TO PARIS, a sparkling and adventurous memoir about her quest to find her astrological soulmate—a man born in Paris on November 2nd, 1968! Natasha talks about the difficult life events that prompted her journey, the amazing online community she grew while abroad, and how the experience strengthened her relationship with her sister (who also went to Paris!). She also talks about being the biggest cynic believer of astrology and spirits (are the voices in her head thoughts or ghosts!?) and hints at some yet-to-be-announced book updates—perhaps an adaptation?

Transcript:

Zibby: Welcome, Natasha. Thank you so much for coming on Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books to discuss All Signs Point to Paris, A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Destiny.

Natasha: Hi, Zibby. Thank you so much for having me. 

Zibby: As you know, I fell in love with this book, Coup de Foudre, if you will. I probably didn't pronounce that well, but referencing the Holly in love at first sight from, uh, from your book. Why don't you tell listeners a little bit about the book? And I'm really curious because I know that you were sort of documenting a lot of this on Instagram as you went.

And then I went back and tried to look and see if I could still find all the Instagram stuff when you knew this was a book. Versus a piece of it. 

Natasha: Got it. Got it. Yeah. That came actually after I came back from Paris and kind of the most magical way I was documenting everything on Instagram, I've taken some of it down just for privacy reasons and for, you know, just a lot of reasons.

But so I went on this journey starting in 2018. I came back from Paris at the very end of 2019. And I had been documenting everything on Instagram and through these kind of strange, like six degrees of separation, somebody told somebody else and somebody looked at my Instagram and somebody kind of reached out to me, a literary agent reached out to me at the end of 2019 and said, you know, would you ever consider writing a story?

I think you have a book in you and I had been a writer like in my early 20s as in magazine, the magazine world never had, you know, even kind of dreamed of having something this big and beautiful come into my life, especially in this kind of really serendipitous, like magical way. And my astrologer had told me your point of destiny is to tell a story and to return to writing.

And this whole story really is about astrology and, you know, kind of taking these big leaps of faith. And so that's how the writing of it started. Just somebody reaching out to me through social media, which is such a crazy thing. It's one of those things you hear stories about, but you don't actually happen to you.

And it did. And I couldn't help but notice it. And then that's kind of the journey of the writing of it. But the story itself,.. 

Zibby: Go back to the story itself. 

Natasha: Okay. So it's kind of a story of my second chance of love and life. And it started in 2018 when I was at a real all time low. In probably every corner of my life, I had, you know, weathered a pretty tricky divorce and I had short sold my home.

I had folded a business. I had filed bankruptcy. My dog died, like everything that you could imagine. And I had just broken up with. My, I thought was my second real like chance that, you know, happily ever after. And my heart was broken and my father was diagnosed with a terminal illness with pulmonary fibrosis.

And it was just, the hits kept coming and I couldn't, couldn't pick myself up anymore. And, um, my best friend in the world saw that I'm a single mom living in LA. I was trying to rebuild my career in real estate. And my best friend saw that I was just beaten down and she gifted me an astrology reading, which I thought was just absurd.

You know, the cynic and the nonbeliever in me, I was really raised by facts and logic and would normally have said no to them. But I, I decided that year that I needed to start doing something a little differently. And so I just took a leap of faith and I said, yes. And that astrology reading changed my life.

So that's how it all began. And then so, so I had this astrology reading and I actually entered it really as a cynic. And I said, you know, just so you know, I don't believe in astrology to this lovely woman, Stephanie Jordan, who's nothing like all the stereotypes that I had in my mind about what astrologers would be.

And she said, that's okay. You don't have to believe. And she gave me this really insightful. Reading about, you know, my birth chart and who I was and and she knew things that kind of defied the logic that I had been living on my whole life in terms of knowing who I was and my path and my future. I mean, she knew things about from from the way that I dress to my father's illness to my history as a writer to, you know, deeply personal things about.

Relationships and, and times in my life that were struggles. And so by the end of the reading in 45 minutes, I'd gone from cynic to full on believer. And then I asked her about that sexy, handsome Frenchman that really was such a fun post divorce romance, but wasn't possible of building a future with and I couldn't get over him.

So I said, could you just look at his birthday? And she did. And it was kind of a long story, but she basically came back to me with, you know, he's in line with your point of destiny. And the word marriage came up and the word, you know, husband came up and I thought, okay, that's not really what I was. I was hoping to be released from, from it somehow.

And my sister called me the next day and told me that my dad had two weeks left to live. And I just hit like an even lower low. I thought, okay, well, my one shot at true love is, you know, emotionally unavailable to be in a relationship with my father, who really was a rock in my life, was suffering this terrible disease and, and going to be gone soon.

And I kind of fell to the bathroom floor and as one does, and then I got out of the shower and I saw. A photo of myself at age six and it was a time when I believed in magic and I believe in all the possibilities and all the things that I think had just been squashed over the years, you know, and, and it's when I believed in myself really, you know, and I, uh, texted my best friend and I said, you know, he's not the only one I'm going to find every other man who was born on November 2nd, 1968 in Paris.

And being the wonderful best friend that she is, she was like, yes, let's go. And then I, I really, you know, didn't know I was as serious of an action or a statement as it was until I went to go see my dad and I told him I was trying to lighten the mood because he was having a really hard time saying goodbye to my mom and to my sister and I, and he was crying.

I said, Hey dad, you know, I was thinking about going to Paris to track down my soulmate. And, you know, I told him this whole crazy adventure with his astrologer. And he said, and he was Mr. Facts and Logic. He was Mr. MIT. He was, you know, I thought maybe I would give him a heart attack on, on his death bed, thinking I'd lost my mind.

And he said, sounds to me like you're going to Paris, I'll meet you there. And it was the most generous, kindest thing he or anybody in my life has ever said to me because it's.. 

Zibby: Like making me cry just listening to.. 

Natasha: Every time I like say that sentence, it makes me cry because it was so selfless, you know, he was in a lot of pain and he was.

looking out for me and he was giving me, after he died, I, I, you know, you can't really predict what grief is going to be. And it was a really, really hard couple of months. And I remembered what he told me. And I thought, you know, he gifted me, a reason to get up and a reason to go on this wild adventure, which I did and to go to Paris and to track down every single person I could find born on this date.

And to have this beautiful story with my sister and my best friend and to heal. And so it's like a story of love and adventure and like all wacky dating in LA and Paris, but it's a story of grief and healing for me. It has been even post releasing it and talking to you and going through it over and over.

Like it's really just been my journey of healing. Yeah. Or letting go or letting in, or I don't even know how to put words to it, but it's been, it's been magic. Truly. 

Zibby: Wow. Well, it's like you believed almost in the universe, right? You were like, I'm going to put this out there and I'm going to follow this crazy dream of mine that I'm going to meet this person.

And you did all the logical things. And yet then it's like, what else can you do? You know, like you put your faith and then in return, you got so much back, which is sort of the conclusion. I'm not, I won't give anything away, but just that. Often when you, when, if you have nothing left to give and you like throw it out there, you actually get stuff back.

I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's true. It's like somehow it, it, I don't know, because the things that you got out of the experience were so profound and unexpected too. 

Natasha: Yeah. 

Zibby: That it's, it's very inspiring to, because sometimes we go after goals thinking that that's what we're going to achieve, but.

Then the universe has other plans, right? It was had far more and far bigger plans for you you touch so many people's lives and people got so invested in your quest because you posted about it and Let people in and let other people have hope I mean, there's something very infectious about that when somebody finds their hope again. It's it's really nice to be able to jump on and say like well, yeah, this is like I'm living through this person in a way 

Natasha: Yeah, yeah, it's been amazing.

The people that I connected with on the journey while I was living it and, and in the telling of it after writing the book, it's been really incredible to see that how much, you know, we need community, we need each other, we need these stories to, you know, relate and share and feel seen and feel heard. It does change things when you say something out loud or you put it in writing.

I had never done that before. I think not what I really, truly wanted for myself and in life. And then of course, yes, the universe or however you want to phrase it might not answer you in the way that you expect. Right. And you have to be ready for that. And, and it was, profound and huge. It was the first time that I was brave enough to actually kind of not care what anybody else thought and just, you know, throw it all out.

And a lot of people thought I was crazy, but more people actually were like, wait, what are you doing? This is. You know, they're rooting me on. It's really beautiful. People are, for the most part, people are good. You know? 

Zibby: Yeah. I was, I have to say, I was nervous on your behalf in seven. I was like, you're going to give all this information out to strangers.

You just need one crazy person. You know, I think I'm much more pessimistic or something. 

Natasha: Yeah. Well, luckily I have my sister on my side and she's like that too. She was like, wait, wait, wait, you're sharing too much. You're oversharing it. Like, well, I don't know how else to do it. I'm a pretty transparent person.

Zibby: No, not the sharing of emotion. Just more like, where I'll be. But I guess I do that too. I don't know. I don't know. It's just, I just was like, God, I hope nothing bad's going to happen to her. 

Natasha: Yeah. Well, I mean. 

Zibby: You know, it was like holding my breath for you the whole ride. 

Natasha: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely like put, took a lot of risks.

I always tend to jump into the deep end. 

Zibby: I also really respected the way you talked about your relationship with your sister and how you came to realize how much she had been doing for your mom. And that almost like we can all get very myopic in our goals or our quests. And, and I feel like you, kind of realized with your sister, wait, you know, weren't we supposed to be bonding on the trip?

Like she had a very different expectation of the trip itself and you were really open about that. You know, it's good. It's great to see. I mean, we've all had times where we're more selfish than other times, usually in times of like deep self preservation. I think that sometimes you have to focus inwards a little more and maybe the people around you don't understand it, or it's perceived as something less it's perceived as something negative when it's really survival instinct, but still, I don't know. I'll just say, I think you did a beautiful job of talking, showing us your relationship with her and showing us some of the decisions, even in your trip to Paris and where you got to at the end. I don't know.

I really respected how you handled that. 

Natasha: Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. It's not always easy to write about like our least favorite versions of ourselves. At least it wasn't for me, you know, but, and even, you know, while I was writing this, it was so beautiful to have this experience with my sister. I mean, she would be in a Google doc with me and I'm like, you know, is this accurate?

What are your memory? Cause I wanted to make sure that I wasn't writing from, you know, just that I was getting it right on the page, you know, of, of everything that kind of happened in our journey. And it was very healing and she is an incredible sister and she has shown up. She showed up in, you know, the end of my dad's life and in my whole life and to this day in such an incredible way.

And we're just complete opposites, you know, so.. 

Zibby: I just, uh, I just wrote this down as like a writing assignment. So for anyone listening or now I feel like I have to go do a class or something, but I feel like everyone should write an essay about the least favorite version of themselves. That would get really good material.

Natasha: Oh my gosh. I would do one draft and I'm like, it doesn't feel right. I'm like, oh, it's because it's my fantasy version of myself. It's not, you know, it's, it's kind of like, and then, and then I realized there were some, you know, times where I was like overly self depreciating and I'm like, wow, I'm really, you know, I'm not that it's, it's, it's.

It's a process writing and rewriting and rewriting and rewriting and realize like, how do you get to the core of like, you know, who you are and how do you accept them? Every version of yourself. And that's actually something that astrology gave me. I mean, it's not a book, this is not a book about astrology and it's not trying to prove that astrology is real or not real.

But I think that astrology gave me like an affirmation that the way I was wired was fundamentally okay. I don't know how to explain why it did that, but it kind of shows you that you don't need to. I don't know. It was a way of accepting yourself and, and writing this book. It was just a way of accepting every version, like the good version, the bad version, the fantasy version, the, you know, the messy life version.

Zibby: Oh my gosh. Well, I have to say by the time I got to the end and where you left us, like in your final scene, after going through this whole journey, I just like had to sit there. with like the book on my chest, like taking it. I mean, it was such a, it was just such a profound journey to take with you. That sounds so cheesy.

Everything I'm saying is sounding, it's sounding cheesy, but I mean it all truly. I mean, it's, I read lots and lots of memoirs and I love, and it's my favorite genre. There's something about your story that it is the openness with which you told it, but I think it's just faith and it's like the faith in mankind or something faith in mankind to help and the ability to get out of the darkest times through things you choose to do and what can come from the most horrific loss.

Natasha: Yeah. It's so hard by the way. It's so hard to get out of that, but it's possible, you know, it's possible. There's, it's not grief. Any hard thing in life doesn't have to be just grief, anything, you know, I definitely am not like bright sunshine every day, but I do have faith and love and, and believe in like magic and believe in community and picking ourselves up and being there for each other.

And I did have love show up in like so many crazy, incredible ways. Because of this, because of, I don't know, it's a really magical, it was the worst year of my life turned into really the best year of my life. And it was all based on like, I guess that belief in, in, I don't know, the goodness. And love. Yeah.

And I'm just so honored that you have championed this book. I mean, you're just such an incredible, you have that bright light to you. So thank you. I didn't have any expectations kind of putting this out into the world and you just showed up as this like little angel. 

Zibby: Oh, well, it's so random too, because my, it was Melanie Goldberger, my real estate broker in LA was like, there's a girl in my office who wrote a book.

And I'm like, okay, you know, send me the link or let me see, let me read about it. I was like, Oh, that sounds amazing. But I didn't realize. You have this huge, like, amazing network. You're, I don't even know what you call it. The, so your, your ex husband's new wife is Anna Faris. So you go and do this, like, star studded launch.

And it's produced by Michael Sugar, who I knew. And I was like, wait, this is like a whole thing. This whole, you're not like some random girl in Melanie's office. Do you know what I mean? But anyway, I was just, I was happy I came to it that way. And then of course I realized I'd been pitched and I like hadn't even gotten to the pitch or something.

So anyway, it all worked out perfectly. 

Natasha: How funny. Yeah. So 

Zibby: I'm going to ask you the PS to the whole book. Like I really want the update, but I feel like I shouldn't ask you here because then it would give, 

Natasha: I know. And that's the hardest thing. I feel like I'm not allowed to kind of like share anything.

Cause it's like, you don't want a spoiler alert, but you also just want to like, I'm, I am so transparent. So I'm like, Oh my God, let me tell everybody what's happened. But I don't know, maybe that's like book too, Maybe I'll email you. Very fun adventures. 

Zibby: Yes. Yes. I had dog eared so many different parts. Let me see if I can find any great quotes, like off the cuff here, which there was so much great stuff about your dad.

Oh, you did talk about, um, I wanted to ask you about your ADD, which you read about and you wrote about, you know, even how it affects you at boarding school and how through education, how you had to manage your education through that and, and finding your way with ADD, which affects so many people. Tell me more about that.

Natasha: Yeah, that was hard. You know, I mean, it was, 1989, you know, when I was in high school and I was not able to sit still, I was like, you know, I mean, it served me very well overall in life. But at that time, and I went to, I ended up starting high school at a boarding school in Ojai. And there was a lot going on there that really wasn't right.

Um, as the LA times has recently, um, reported on. And I ended up getting expelled from that school, but there was no world where I fit in because, you know, there wasn't a, a dialogue for how to handle, you know, I'm putting quotation marks around it, you know, different ways of learning and different ways of being in different ways of thinking now there is.

And I think that that's amazing. I mean, it started, I mean, it's not even completely there, but for me, it was. It was a challenge and it made me feel as I was growing up like a failure at many, many, many different things. And I've learned now that all of those quote unquote failures, of course, are just like moments for growth.

And I don't even believe in that word, but I, I really was beating myself up for many, many, many years. Over not fitting into this like box of what the system kind of tries to put, you know, kids and adults into which we all have different ways of managing and learning and thinking. And so, yeah, it's, it's been a journey, but it's, going on this adventure and kind of understanding that I don't need to be any of the versions.

There's no perfect way to do anything. Um, it's been very freeing for me and for my kids too, who both have ADD. So, you know, and both manage it in their own ways and that's great. You know. 

Zibby: Did you ever think that this is where you would end up like a memoirist? 

Natasha: I think I had no, no. Absolutely. , absolutely not.

If you would've told me , like at any point in my life that even that I would be like sitting down with my ex-husband and his wife and talking about, you know, going on a search for astrology and writing about it. Absolutely not. But I do know that at age 15 when I did get expelled from that school, I started writing.

Mm-hmm . I was actually just going through all these letters last night, like I still have them all, and you know, I, I couldn't pick up the phone. I couldn't talk to any of my friends. So much had happened in that, um, those years when I was at that school, um, that I was just writing and writing and writing and writing.

And that's how I learned how to process the world. It became my lifeline. And I think that's when my writer's heart kind of the seeds were all planted. And I think at that point, I probably had a dream in there of being a writer. And then that's why I pursued, I studied screenwriting. And then I. you know, was a magazine journalist.

And then I gave up, I felt like a, I felt like I had failed at it and moved on to other things. And I was trying to be the perfect mother. And I really stopped writing for a good 20 years. So this has been like an incredible gift and, and also like a really beautiful reminder that you can you can have a second chance or a second life or revisit those dreams at any age.

I mean, I'm 48 and I'm just starting a new path and hopefully I'll start a bunch of new other ones like far into like as many years as I'm gifted on this planet. So it's. It's been wild and wonderful and yeah, I'm grateful that, that somebody actually believed in me that, you know, and that was my agent who just found me randomly and a lot of people like you have anybody who just kind of understands my journey and, and it has championed me on, you know, takes a lot of a community around, you know, it's not just me. It's like a whole big community. I have a lot of help. 

Zibby: Let's see. Yeah. Every, it takes a village for every book. It's not just kids. 

Natasha: My gosh, it's such a wild experience. 

Zibby: So is this, has this been adapted or what's going on with the film?

Is there a,.. 

Natasha: There's nothing that I can announce, but there's very exciting things on the horizon, but I have nothing that I can speak to, but that's, I mean, listen, it's. It's really like a dream come true in the most wild way, you know, just to have given up on a dream and to not have written for 25 years and then to all of a sudden have a book being published and then, you know, go through all of this and to have yet to be announced information.

I'm like, who did this happen to? It's weird. 

Zibby: It's not weird. It's great. It's so great. Yeah. I'm just saying what I'll say. So much stuff. Hold on. There's something here. Oh, I liked this part too. When you talk to the spirits. And you said, I put my phone down and looked around my living room. I know this sounds strange, but to all the spirits here who are not on board with this plan, who do not believe in magic and love, who keep telling me I'm crazy and to give up.

I command you to leave. Stephanie had told me about the dead people in my living room and the voices in my head and it finally all made some kind of sense. I could choose to listen to the doubts or I could ask them to kindly get the fuck out. And to all the good spirits, the believers, the dreamers, the lovers, I officially need your help.

Pack your bags, ghosties. We're going to Paris. 

Natasha: Yeah, I still talk. I talked to the spirits right before we hopped on this Zoom, Zibby. 

Zibby: Really? You did? 

Natasha: I'm holding crystals. I've got like the whole thing. 

Zibby: Oh my gosh. 

Natasha: I'm like the biggest cynic believer that you'll meet. I'm like, well, this sounds like a bunch of BS.

Let's do it. It needs to work. And so, yeah, I mean, Stephanie told me in my first reading that I was incredibly psychic and that my house was filled with spirits and I'd probably just think through the voices in my head. And at first I thought, well, okay, I can't believe I'm talking to this. You know, having these conversations right now, like what is this?

And then I thought, well, I do have voices in my head and a lot of them are not positive. They're the ones that are saying you can't do this. You're not good enough here. And whether it's a spirit in my home or if it's the doubts. In my head for me to say, like, I want to call in my highest and best today, anyone who, you know, is not serving my highest and best or your highest and best, you know, whether it was sitting down to write, like, help me on the page today, or, you know, how can I be the best communicator today?

Or how can I champion love or spread a message of hope and faith and goodwill? Maybe those are just affirmations. You know, maybe I'm just, you know, pep talking to myself. Maybe I'm talking to spirits. Maybe there are guides here. Maybe my father's right by my side, maybe both and all of those things are possible, which is what I believe in.

I mean, I've become very spiritual in the course of four years, but then one of the days when I have my doubts, you know, and so then that's just me, you know, walking through life and just trying to hold space for all the positive sides. So, yes, there are. Ghosties all over the place here and hopefully only the good ones.

I asked the negative ones to leave this morning. So 

Zibby: Well, I know we're almost out of time already, which is crazy, I have like a thousand more things I, but anyway, I also thought it was so funny how you wrote about your mom who was very practical and just, you know, pull herself up by the bootstraps. And when you talk to her about destiny and how she said to you originally, you want to know what your destiny is.

Your destiny is death. 

Natasha: Yeah. 

Zibby: And here you are on the complete opposite of the pendulum. Oh, like I'm dancing around spirits today in my living room. It's uh, it's funny how we take what our parents believe or what they say and do and react and all this. 

Natasha: Yeah. And she's really changed by the end of this too, by the way, she's like, well, you're right.

Zibby: You know, everybody was going through a hard time and you know, yeah. 

Natasha: Yeah. So that's, that's what life's about. You know, we can reinvent ourselves. We can have so many different versions of ourselves and, and there's always like the next chapter and the next, the next, next everything. 

Zibby: I feel like sometimes it takes having someone that you're super close to, to pass away until you're aware of or open to the idea of, of spirit, more of the spiritual and communication signs and all of that. I think sometimes if you don't have anybody you're looking for, you might not see it. 

Natasha: Right. Right. And once you see it, you kind of can't unsee it. Yeah. Yeah. 

Zibby: I'm in your camp. Well, okay. Next time I'm in LA, I would like to hear the whole conclusion to this, uh, to this book from 2020 on.

Natasha: Deal. Deal. 

Zibby: And congratulations. I've been just watching your, your trajectory here and just like so cheering you on. I'm so excited for you. 

Natasha: Oh, thank you, Zibi. You're such an inspiration to me and to all of us. So truly thank you for everything you do. 

Zibby: All right. Have a great day, Natasha. I'll talk to you.

Natasha: Okay. Bye.