Dead on the Vine

Dead on the Vine

by | Oct 19, 2015 | Featured

The remaining blackberries are raisinlike. Shriveled. Birds have picked over them, leaving them to winter’s dormant dream.
*
And this is how it always seems to go for blackberries. I’ve got to assume they are ok with it. They likely don’t yearn to be plucked and devoured in the warm sun, shared in pies, or sprinkled on your late night bowl of ice cream.
*
But you. You human. You do not do as well when your own fruit dies on the vine. When what you so desperately desire to share shivers away, unheard, unseen, unharvested. Unoffered.
*
I walk past this patch of berries every day, all year long. They remind me so much of our human urge to create. There’s that initial germination of an idea. Then the focused sun of our attention ripens it til it glistens with juicy fullness. The moment that stirs us to offer. To extend our hand. To raise our voice. To hit “send.” Then that sweet instant in which it is consumed.
*
Then, there are the other times. I know these well. The times when I’ve held that nearly ripe fruit so close to my heart and not let it go. When I haven’t extended my own berries to one who might be hungry. When I waited… til I was clearer, better, stronger–different. The moment of offering passes by. And to hold onto what are now wizened, wrinkled berries just seems overprotective and sad. So I drop them and pretend they were no big deal anyway. They sink back into the earth.
*
Every single one of these dried-up berries I’m looking at today was such an offering that no human, bird nor bear accepted. And that is fine.
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But what about your fruit?
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My wish for you is that the moment you sense its ripening—the moment the sun is high and the message is full—you breathe in courage. And breathe in awareness that offering it to someone is the PURPOSE of your fruit. THIS is the reason you imagined the fruit in the first place. To nourish or, maybe, delight others.
*
May you let it be easier. May you reach out your hand and say, “Here’s a berry. Please take it if you like.”

What Happens When the Truth Stinks

What Happens When the Truth Stinks

by | Feb 6, 2015 | Blog, Featured

What Happens When the Truth Stinks

 

I recently woke at 3 a.m. to a woman screaming under the bed. I soon realized it wasn’t a woman—it was Simon, the skunk who’d been living beneath our house the last few months.

The peaceable arrangement we’d enjoyed with him seemed to be over.

And, the story, as I liked to tell it, was over, too.

Here’s the way I liked to tell it: 

We tamed a skunk! He eats from the same bowl as the cat. He waddles over when we shake the kibble bag. He stands still as we pass him on the way to the car.

He’s SO amazing!

   

And here’s the way it actually is:

Twice now, we’ve burrowed under the covers as an oily, eye-burning, stomach-wrenching cloud seeps into the bedroom. Simon is just doing what he does when under duress. As for me (also under duress), I’m not quite clapping for a dancing skunk. I’m washing the floors with vinegar, burning incense, and hanging our clothes outside in the trees.

Part of me still wants the story to go a certain way. (We tamed a skunk! He’s awesome!)

The truth is, though, I’m sleeping with a lavender-doused bandana wrapped around my face while John loads peanut butter and cat food in the Have-a-Heart trap. I love this line from the author David Foster Wallace:

“The truth will set you free, but not until it is finished with you.”

If you’re like me, there’s a way I WANT to tell a story, but then the truth of it ends up to be a very different matter by the time it’s finished with me.

One of the most common things I hear from business-owners who want to share their story, is that they don’t know where to start.

So, here’s a handy little exercise, inspired by Simon, as you’re working with yours.

What’s a story you wanted to tell one way… then the truth kept coming around and telling you something different? Take a peek at your relationships, career, or just your long-held-onto-expectation that something in your life was supposed to be a certain way, until it was clear that it wasn’t that way anymore.

I promise, there is some good juice in there.

And if you’re ready to learn more about what to do when you’ve got it, just click here to sign up for a 30-minute complimentary clarity call, so you can see how this story relates to your business and your message. Here’s to the truth, no matter what it smells like, Madeleine
How do I get out of this?

How do I get out of this?

by | Oct 6, 2014 | Blog, Featured

How Do I Get Out of This?

  I just read the War of Art by Steven Pressfield. What a perfect book. He writes about Resistance, something at which I consider myself an expert. Hand me a great topic to write about that would move me forward, and watch me run outside to rake leaves or vacuum the car. But it’s been my desire to work on the issue, and this year, life doled out a few experiences to do just that… and the book got me thinking about what it all means. Here are a few moments from my resistance highlight reel: Resisting jumping into the jungle. In January, I went to Mexico with my good friend Joanne and her daughter, Manami. Joanne was in the final stages of cancer (I was really resisting that) and this trip would be her last. Manami and I went zip-lining one day. We hiked a few miles, then from high on a rickety platform, we peered down into an endless and dense jungle. Monkey-mind starts Ziplineworking: This is so high and so rickety. I am so going to plunge right into that jungle. There’s no way in freaking hell I’m going to be able to do this. This was a huge mistake. How do I get out of this? Mind you, I was standing in gloves and helmet, tied to the cable, with a line of people raring to go behind me. I wanted only to sit for an hour, getting ready to get ready, but could only resist so long. I closed my eyes and jumped. Gravity took care of the rest. It was really fun and so free. And every successive (12 of them) jump was fine. Resisting writing a eulogy, part 1. Joanne asked me to speak at her funeral. I really wanted to show her what I was going to say before she died, but it wasn’t finished. OK, it wasn’t even started—I was totally resisting writing it. The memorial service got closer and closer and I knew the story I wanted to share, but something was missing. I wrote in the car on the way to California. Not it. Not yet. JoOn the morning of the service, I still didn’t have it done, and went walking by the ocean in San Rafael. I found a trail she’d once shown me. Oh, hello, monkey mind: What the hell am I doing going for a hike? There are going to be a TON of people there. This has to be something she would love. Help me, help me, help me. OMG, I am so not the person to do this at all. This was such a mistake. How do I get out of this? I kept walking into the mounting panic. Then a poem I read when I was in my 20s dropped into my head. I got back to the hotel and Googled it. It was the perfect missing piece. I put it in. Before I got up to speak at the service, my heart was pounding so hard the friend sitting next to me said he could hear it. Then when I was up there, Jo smiled down from her big picture on the screen behind me. It all went just fine and felt so good to talk about our long friendship. And I think she would have gotten a kick out of it. Resisting writing a eulogy, part 2. Two weeks after Jo’s service, my dad died unexpectedly. We had a complex relationship and part of me had already been PRE-resisting giving his eulogy for years.Dad Though writing the obituary (thank you, newspaper deadline) and sharing stories about him was a good warm-up, on the morning of the funeral I still didn’t have a clue what I was going to say. Cue ol’ monkey mind chorus: There must be some mistake. Who am I to do this? How do I get out of this? Blah-dee-blah–dee-blah. Then, in the shower, the whole thing just dropped into my weary brain. Four qualities, four stories about him that showed the gruffness that covered his generous and tender heart. Complete. And again, heart pounding, I stood up there with my prompt words written on an index card—and it was fine. I think he might have liked it, too. In all this, here’s what I learned… Resistance to speaking the truth, taking the next step, starting the new project, etc. is very real. But that Big Moment is also real—the urgency that so many people I talk to seem to be feeling right now. A time of no turning back. The moment when your little zip-line trolley leaves the platform, when the audience’s eyes all lock on you… and there is no stopping. My mentor Heidi calls this “crossing the border” and I think that’s a perfect description. It goes something like this:
  1. You get the inspiration to create something, share your story, launch that project or just go beyond a previous limit.
  2. Welcome to the border. Resistance steps in. Monkey-mind refrain begins: OMG, how do I get out of this? Get me out of this. This was such an enormous mistake.
  3. The Big Moment. Gravity/stepping on stage/pushing “send.” Whoa, whoa, whoa. It’s happening!
  4. Ahhhhh, ok. It’s fine, I am safe, and this actually feels really good.
Now, I wish I could say that everything has changed since this summer. That resistance is gone and I’m just living in the flow. But that would be a lie. For instance, it’s taken me a solid week of procrastinating to write this article. Here’s another passage from The War of Art: Resistance is directly proportional to love. If you’re feeling massive Resistance, there’s tremendous love there too. If you didn’t love the project that is terrifying you, you wouldn’t feel anything. The more Resistance you experience, the more important your un-manifested art/project/enterprise is to you—and the more gratification you will feel when you finally do it. Today, shards of resistance glitter all around me. The internet connection is funky. I am second-guessing writing about Joanne and Dad. The newsletter program keeps giving me an error message. I have a ton of client work to do. It’s the last sunny Sunday before the rains and I would much rather hike. There is so much that feels MORE urgent.  But I know that writing this is part of a bigger dream that I love… even more than hiking. And I know it will be fine once I just press “Send.”   Feeling resistance about telling your story? Podcast2 Just click here to watch a quick video, 5 Ways to Getting To Your Story that will help you move beyond it. This snippet is from an interview I did on the Paycheck to Passion Podcast (which you should definitely subscribe to.)

How Your Story is Like Fairyland

by | Sep 15, 2014 | Blog, Featured

How Your Story is Like Fairyland?

 

Fairyland

 

I’ve had this photo pinned to my office wall all summer. It’s a snippet of a very long diorama–a rainforest fairyland that we stumbled across in our last moments at Oregon Country Fair in July. It stretched about 100 feet, every single inch teeming with crafty, miniature, elven life.

I could have stared at it for hours, because in each little piece was a glimpse of a whole world… A tiny parcel of an entire story.

This weekend, I was writing something about telling our true story. Why it’s hard and why it’s so compelling…. And it suddenly occurred to me why this fairyland had me so obsessed.

Like your story, this fairyland:

  • Offers a ton of possible entry points.
  • Is riveting and complete even if you look at it from just one spot.
  • Communicates the whole in a tiny sliver.

Most of the people I work with struggle with the how of telling their story.  Where to begin. Where to go next.

Any of us could tell our story by beginning with what we ate for lunch just now, or how crushed we were when we were had to miss the 2nd Grade Christmas Pageant in which we were supposed to be singing Up On The Rooftop.

All of it matters. All of it counts.

curlicue1-new

Here are two ways to discover your story, inspired by this fairyland.

1. The trick of it is just to dive in… anywhere.

Find a place that feels good by scanning your life like I did this fairyland. I walked up and down and then just sat down at a spot that felt good—and examined everything that was going on. In this one picture, for example, you can see mushrooms, a tiny blue pond, glimmer lights outlining a mysterious cave, purple birds swarming a rock formation, ferns and moss and tiny trees….

When I have a Golden Thread session with a client, I always like to start with a single, simple story from childhood. Almost without exception, a lot gets revealed in this one story. So just think of one story from when you were small–one that you like to tell (or one you hate to have told). I bet there will be some juice there.

Here’s an example: A client told me how she loved to ride bareback with her little friends when she was 9 or 10. She felt so incredibly powerful and free. It’s a feeling she can still conjure in her dreams. And, you guessed it: Her business is helping women unblock their power and feel more free.

2. Let your story stand… it’s enough and you’re enough.

You really don’t need to explain. You can help your reader or listener by giving them a few hints and helping them connect the dots, but I promise you don’t have to give the whole blow-by-blow, first-this-happened, then-this-happens kind of tale in order for someone to get a good sense of you. (Just like I could get so much from one tiny section of the fairyland without someone telling me what else was there .)

Try it. Choose one of your key stories from childhood, then look at what your business is about at its core. See if a few of the dots don’t just automatically connect. Notice if what you felt or loved or got punished for as a kid has any connection with the offering you make today in your business. Does it?

 

Screen Shot 2014-09-14 at 3.17.09 PM

 

You know what the main thing was about this fairyland? It really was pure magic. And so is your story.

 

Have fun. And if you have questions about your story or are interested in diving deeper…

Just click here to schedule your 30-minute complimentary
Golden Thread Clarity Session.

Story Resistance

by | Jun 27, 2014 | Blog, Featured

Story Resistance

The other day a new client was walking me through her vision for her latest project.

“This sounds fantastic,” I said. “All that’s missing is you.”

“Oh, sh*t.” she said. “I have to tell my story now, don’t I?” She lowered her head into her hands. “God… I knew I’d eventually have to do this.”

Story resistance like this is common.
But it’s also futile.
Because if you’re a business owner
who is the face of your service business,
the time to tell your story is going to come.

Here’s why you want to be ready…
As she told me her story over dinner, a couple of things happened (that frequently take place in the presence of good storytelling):
1. I started telling her my story as it relates to her very specific expertise-interrupting, laughing, cutting her off and jumping in with anecdotes.
2. I realized deep down I wanted to be her client (I’d never before considered this) and sign up for her next program.
The truth about sharing your story…
It’s intimidating.
It can be scary.
It’s easy to resist and work on other things instead,
like your SEO and website colors.

But when you share your story powerfully and compellingly
with your ideal audience, amazing things can happen.

You give them the permission and possibility to recognize something in themselves they may not have let themselves see before. (HUGE.) And you show them the power and magic of the transformation you provide. (It’s a lot harder to do that with website colors.)

If you’d like to get a better handle on sharing your own story in a soulful, compelling and hard-to-forget way, come spend the day with me on June 20th.

In the sparkling high-desert air of Bend, Oregon, let’s get clear on the gold that’s hidden in your story.

Join me for the Find Your Golden Thread one-day retreat.

  • Strengthen your marketing message by discovering
    how to tell your signature story.
  • Connect the dots between your business, your past and your purpose as you discover your unique theme (that plugs right into the big, universal ones).
  • Learn to speak and write from the soul of your story.

 

Easing into Vulnerable

by | May 8, 2014 | Blog, Featured

Easing into Vulnerable

curlicue2-new

Being raw. Sharing your truth.
Connecting through your story.

Sounds fantastic, right?
And maybe a little terrifying?

I’m all about being open in storytelling. On the vulnerability scale, I’d give myself a good, solid 5. Honest, but pretty tidy and controlled.

On a retreat last week (with the inspiring Therese Skelly), we worked on visibility and what blocked us. Our task was to tell our raw story. The one we don’t want people to know. The one that is likely preventing us from really being seen because we are working so hard not to tell it.

I shared something I’ve only told a couple of friends and my husband, and managed to get through it in a weepy puddle. It felt good. Then I watched each of the others stand and tell her story. They were so beautiful. Unburdened from the old weight of not telling that story. So clear. So alive. So energized.

The next morning I woke up with what may have been the worst migraine of my life.

A mighty clamp-down after that spacious opening, perhaps? Made total sense to me.

As I lay there for many hours waiting for it to lessen, I felt for the clients I’ve encouraged to tell their most honest stories. It’s so important to do but it can be so damn hard.

How do we navigate this landscape of vulnerability?

Here’s what I came up with:

Vulnerability’s the thing, but it’s a delicate dance. While we are hard-wired to be tender and vulnerable—and to react compassionately when others are being this way, we’re also pretty hard-wired to protect ourselves at any cost.

Showing up truthfully is a good thing in this brave, new Brene Brown world we live in, but most of us didn’t grow up drawing attention to our flaws or insecurities. In fact, we worked over-time to appear like we had none of these:

Jugular. Achilles heel. Soft belly.

They were as well hidden as private parts in my early working days.

Years ago, I stumbled as I was walking past the Executive Director’s office where I worked. Actually, I face-planted on the carpet, throwing file folders and coffee everywhere. He made sure I was OK and that was that. Later that day, he was coming up the stairs as I was going down and I made some kind of half-ashamed/half-funny crack that he should watch out in case I tripped again.

He called me into my office and told me that the key to success was NEVER to draw attention to my errors, and NEVER to give someone the upper hand by admitting I’d made a mistake. Whew. Contrast that to my way, which had always been to bond with others by making self-deprecating comments that didn’t begin to cover up my sense of shame. Not exactly a recipe for wild career success—but a vague attempt at some level of vulnerability.

I was confused, yet I knew there had to be a way to tell the truth without putting myself down.

I thank God the days of shoulder pads and cover-your-ass business strategies are behind me. But that doesn’t mean this more-open world is super easy to figure out. I got a migraine after revealing my truth to just five people, after all.

I believe the world is a safe and kind place–much kinder and safer than I thought it to be 20 years ago. And I am all about sharing the truth as a  compelling and powerful way to connect. That doesn’t mean leaping into the marketplace showing only your soft belly, however.

Here are a few suggestions for easing into vulnerability:

  • Get very intimate with your story. Tell it “raw,” then tell it with the lesson learned or insight received.
  • Work through your emotions to get to the core and truth of the stories you share and why you share them.
  • Trust that vulnerability doesn’t mean you need to share every story  from every stage.
  • Look at the story through the lens of your ideal client and find the thread that reveals the unique essence of you and what you provide them.
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The Golden Thread session is a great way to explore
the raw version of your story so you can begin to craft it
into a powerful signature speech or website copy.

 

 “Wow, there is magic around you! This is super, super awesome. While reading [my Golden Thread] I experienced the curious combination of deep relief, open weeping, and laughter.  That is exactly it!”

—Dr. Heather Clark, www.myvibranthealth.com

Click here to learn more.

 

Hand ’em a lens

by | Apr 4, 2014 | Blog, Featured

Hand ’em a lens

Last week, I was very happy to attend Align It Live, the 3-day event in Las Vegas my coach, Darla LeDoux, hosted.

Align.panelSome of the beautiful truth-tellers in our mastermind group
sharing their stories on Darla’s success panel.

 

On the first morning, Darla showed a clip of Jared Leto accepting his Oscar in February. (Just click here to watch if you haven’t seen this). She asked what we concluded about the actor based on these 2 minutes of watching him. People volunteered that they determined he’s family-focused, smart, brave, calm, confident, and compassionate—someone they could trust and wanted to spend time with…

We loved him. The world loved him.

And we all made a lot of snap judgments about him, too.

As people always do.

Darla then said something that turned out to be
a game-changer for me:

 

“We don’t exist except for the lens
people see us through.”

 

A truth about our species: We’ve all got automatic and complicated lenses through which we view the world. This is not a bad thing… it’s a survival thing.

Climb down inside your ancestral self for a moment…

Your lens was a super-powerful and necessary tool. You had to rely on it to tell you who to trust and who to run from.  It helped discern quickly between “safe, known tribesperson” and “dangerous, unknown stranger.”

And today your lens still does just that. Your busy brain and gut are perpetually scanning the stranger’s shoes, smile, grimace, clothes, hair, body type, expression in eyes, posture, bumper stickers, signs of marital status,… Whew, right?

(And that’s even before she opens her mouth.)

Your lens shows you who to like and who to avoid… and who is your peer, teacher, or competitor.

Looking back at that Oscar speech, we can see where this whole idea gets meaty and interesting… especially for entrepreneurs like you who lead with your story.

Before we could really dive into all that judging, assessing and conclusion-drawing we do, Jared Leto handed us a lens.

That’s what you do when you share your story, too.

Your audience’s minds are going to start working like frantic squirrels trying to figure you out when you appear before them (whether on stage or online).

Looking through the lensSo, why not hand them a lens to help them see more quickly if you are their tribe?

One of the things I love about working with people on the theme of their story (what I call their Golden Thread) is that it gives them a lens that helps them look at their own life. So instead of seeing your life as this tangled line-up of random, tender, or embarrassing, when you look through the lens of your Golden Thread the anecdotes that are most effective to tell simply rise up and make themselves known.

Now for the game-changer. I see that the lens is not only for the storyteller…. It’s also for the audience.

Sure, people watching you are going to respond in their automatic way to your hair/shoes/car/hands/voice/sense of humor or _____(fill in blank).

But when you share your story masterfully, you may just over-ride that knee-jerk response to help them see the YOU that exists beyond their lens… and more importantly, how you connect with THEM and help them transform.

 

Darla's masterminders

A few of us past and present masterminders.
All with big messages and new insights to share—it’s good not
everything that happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

Want to find your Golden Thread?

Email madeleine@inthewriteplace.com to schedule complimentary half-hour clarity session to start exploring.

Only Connect

Only Connect

by | Jan 31, 2014 | Blog, Featured

Only Connect

John with Finn in January

Today is the first day of the year of the Wood Horse.  A marked difference from last year: The Snake.

Last year I felt much more snakelike—hidden, slithery, undercover, shedding. The Horse is about power, decisions, movement, action. The Snake… well, not so much. I want to be more like the horse.

When I created a theme for life and business in 2014 I picked these words: Dare, Connect, Magic.

So far, there has been a lot of all three.

On New Years Eve, my beautiful old dog Finn collapsed. A mass in her spleen had burst and the vet told us she might last a few hours or a few days.

We took her her home.

Almost 11 years ago, she jumped into my arms at a shelter and she saved my life a thousand times since. Finn was one of those once-in-a-lifetime dogs…. at my side for breakups, our wedding, hiking, kayaking, step-parenting, every single errand I made, miles and miles of skiing.  Being abandoned once meant she stayed close to me all the time.

Elegant and attentive, Finn resembled a dog that might sit next to an Egyptian queen. But she had a way of shapeshifting. One day years ago, someone asked me if she was a Chihuahua and the very next day another person wondered if she was a Great Dane.

Despite the fact that she could not control herself around gas station attendants, highway workers or certain other female dogs—God, she could bring me to my knees with her alpha moments—I adored her.

John and I took turns sitting with her for five days. We cried into her fur and thanked her for doing such a good job caring for us and teaching the new puppy all she knew. We told her all the stories of things she’d done, great moments she’d had, the wonderful day I met her.

As she sleeplessly watched with her giant brown eyes, I felt like she was taking in her humans to remember forever. Or that she was teaching us to be ready for her to go. She grew more and more ethereal.

Magic moments started to happen. One afternoon, a crazy bird noise broke out. I went outside and dozens of crows were circling our house. I’d never seen one crow in these woods before… and for about 15 minutes tons of them flew round and round, perching in trees and cawing, and then circling more.

Finn couldn’t move but her ears flickered wildly as she listened from her spot near the couch. I swear the crows were calling her.

On her last night I carried her outside and waited with her, but she didn’t pee. She just stood, wobbly, with her head pointed up. It was a starry night and the coyotes were loud. I felt like I was watching a very intimate moment as she stared at the stars, all the howls echoing around her.

Sunday morning her eyes focused more in the distance than on us and her breath grew raspy. She hadn’t eaten in almost a week and her muscled body was all ribs and knobby spine. John dug a grave out under a fir tree.

When my vet friend Kath arrived Finn wagged her tail and tried to get up. We laid her on her favorite blanket and Kath found a vein. She said she had never seen an animal die so calmly.

We buried beautiful Finn with a note from each of us and her favorite bone.

The next morning at 4 a.m.I left for Mexico. A couple weeks earlier, my old friend Joanne had asked me to join her and her daughter for 9 days there. There was no possible way I could afford the trip or the time away.  So of course I booked a flight.
I went for Chinese food that night and got this fortune: Take a trip with a friend.

Joanne was diagnosed with cancer 7 years ago—and has survived longer than her doctors thought she would. Breast. Bones. Liver. Stage 4 now. A few months ago she felt a little better than she had in years. Enough to decide to take Manami, home from college, on an adventure.

Each morning I went out when the sky was still dove gray to get a coffee from Armando.

“How is the Mama?” he’d ask.

He fixed green juice and ginger tea for me to bring her.

Our last day there, he kissed Joanne’s hand and said, “The only thing that matters is here,” holding one palm to his big barrel chest and putting the other on hers.

One night at dinner I told Manami stories about Joanne zooming around Boston on her 10-speed, in a dress with her blonde hair flying.  Skinny dipping in Vermont waterfalls and dancing at blues clubs without spilling her Rolling Rock. Learning to drive a stick in my VW Rabbit, smoking a Camel.

Tears rolled down Manami’s face and I asked her if she wanted me to stop. She said, “No, I just wish I knew her when she was like that. Keep telling the stories.”

Joanne hobbled out to the balcony to watch as Manami and I body surfed. I looked up to see her little hunched-over form, waving her cane at us. I asked her about it later—if it was hard. She really loved swimming in the ocean. She was always, always, always in motion.

She said she actually feels glad now to see others being happy and doing things. That it was a little hard to describe, but she was not full of yearning or self-pity or envy as she watched us or heard the stories of people’s lives—she just felt happiness.

Joanne, Manami, me with jugo verde.

Like I did with Finn, I felt I was watching someone become a master.

It is only 30 days into this new year.

Death. Life. Sun. Stars. Ocean. Release.

Dare. Connect. Magic.

E.M. Forster wrote, “Only connect.”

Only only only connect.

Joanne’s back in San Francisco.
Manami is at college. John strung lights
in a tree at Finn’s grave and they twinkle in the rain tonight.

The first few weeks of this year have given me an urgency to connect. And a rekindled belief in the magic of our stories.

Like a horse who can’t bear not to run, now is the time and we must get going.

It’s not too late to say what is most true for you and your work. Because your story means something. Your story means everything.

And your story’s not too tangled or too long, nor has the time passed for you to tell it.

Only connect.

I would love to talk with you about your story and your message—and how we can work together to share it in a way that’s all yours. Because now is the time.

Just hit reply if you’d like to schedule a complimentary clarity session.

Happy new year.

 

 

 

 

Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word

Sorry Seems To Be the Hardest Word

by | Oct 11, 2013 | Blog, Featured

On a camping trip to the hotsprings a couple weekends ago, I thought I’d give myself a little challenge.

A challenge NOT to say “I’m sorry…” unless I was really sorry.

I had just heard my brilliant client and friend, Lea McLeod, describe the “Sorry Syndrome”—in which women undermine their communication by overapologizing.

I knew I had the Syndrome, but figured that because we were far from many humans (to whom I would be tempted to apologize needlessly), I had this in the bag.

I didn’t.

What happened is that the trickster universe pulled out all the stops to get me to utter those two little words.

It started immediately.

1. Stopping at the registration shack, I pull out $20 to pay for a campsite. “It’s 20 bucks a PERSON,” the grumpy guy says. “Whoops!” I say as I dug out another bill. Close, but no cigar.

2. We set up camp and I’m basking in the isolation when Bodhi, our puppy, slips out of his collar. He’s small and very fast, and begins running through campsites and tents, grabbing towels and pot holders and licking whoever he can.I sprint after him in bare feet over the stubbled desert grass.

As he dashes right into one guy’s tent, I call out, “Hi, could you grab that dog?” as nicely as I can.

“No!” the guy shouts back. “I don’t like dogs. I don’t like touching dogs.”

But I don’t cave…

“That’s OK! I understand!” I yell back.

After following Bodhi through a few more campsites, I come really close to reverting to old form. I’m almost out of substitute phrases: “Excuse me!” “Excuse him!” “Oops!” “Whoops!” “Hey, thanks for your patience!”

A woman catches him and hands him to me. I want to apologize so much I’m bursting. “Thanks for being so cool!” I say instead.

3. That night there are coyotes close by and the dogs don’t sleep. I’m out walking them in the morning and pass a bleary-eyed woman, sitting by her fire, nursing a mug of coffee. “Are those the dogs that were howling all night?” she asks.”Yes, these are the ones,” I mutter, feeling like a total jerk but managing not to falter: “Thanks for being so patient with them.”

4. I  stop by the porta pots on my way back. I pull open an unlocked door to reveal a horrified man, sitting on the john, pants around his ankles. “Whoops!” I say and slam the door shut.

I could go on to describe several more of the tempting opportunities I was given, but doing this super-challenging challenge got me thinking.

It’s no secret I’m a chronic over-apologizer—all my life I have begged forgiveness for everything from harmless, normal day-to-day goofs right on up to the major  stumbles and fumbles I’ve made. I get that. But a few days of not saying “I’m sorry” made me see something bigger.

I have been apologizing for me. For being me, and taking up space.

When I was little, I’d get into arguments with my brothers and say, “I’m sorry for BREATHING!”

Well, I think I’ve actually felt sorry for breathing. (Not easy to admit.)

And it has come through how I write and how I share my story.

When you get emails or read sales pages or people’s bios, do you ever feel the silent “I’M SORRY” behind the words?

We all see those multi-exclamation-point-apologies sent out when someone includes the wrong link in an email or hasn’t sent their newsletter for a while. But what I’m talking about runs deeper.

And it happens when you haven’t woven your story fully together. When you haven’t owned that thread that connects your mistakes, your triumphs, your funny stories, the things you love, the things that make you cringe, and the things that you don’t want any more of ever. I call that the Golden Thread.

It’s really (really) easy not to own it. Because it takes some work and some digging… Because it can be pretty hard to find it and follow it on your own… And because it’s really a lot easier to hide and not be seen for who you are and what you stand for.

But when you find it, things come together. (It’s a thread, after all.) You feel visible and on purpose and safe in a different way than you thought possible. And you realize there’s nothing about you that you have to apologize for.

If you want to find and unravel your Golden Thread, schedule a free 30-minute clarity session by clicking here.

 

Freedom + Alchemy

Freedom + Alchemy

by | Aug 25, 2013 | Blog, Featured

Freedom + Alchemy

Last week my husband and I moved. And I got a PhD in Magic.

 

For the past six years, we lived in a magical spot: a log cabin nestled in a cedar forest alongside a roaring creek. We had found the house in a “magical” way. Our mortgage person told us she’d done some “magic” to get us approved (back at the tip-top of the market). We had big magic dreams for all the retreats and gatherings we would hold on this land. We built a sweat lodge with friends. People described the house and its setting as… yeah, you get it.

 

Magic was a word that got bandied about a lot these past few years…

 

Fast forward to this past January. After a lot of stuff happened–from stepping into my business full-time to not being able to sell a piece of land or refinance, from a few expensive medical crises to two layoffs, we’d tapped out everything in order to keep our magic house afloat. Though we kept trying to make it work, it was slowly choking us.

 

And yet for all these years, I had kept believing that there would be some magic solution. That something amazing would happen.

 

After all, the signs pointed to that, right?

 

A piece of me stopped living in the real world and started living in this world that would begin when my ship came in, when the lottery paid out, when an unexpected inheritance landed on our doorstep. Magically.

 

Exhausting, constricting and unsustainable, you say? Yep.

 

So… in January we got real. We decided to sell the house and land.

 

Then, weirdly enough, it was like the magic did start to happen.

 

We created a vision of the people we wanted to buy the property, and two weeks after it went on the market, we had a full-price offer… from a family who seemed to have every quality on our list.

 

I mentioned (to just one person) our desire to find a small house or cottage where we didn’t have to sign a long lease… and she just happened to own such a cottage. And that’s where we are living now.

 

While packing, I found all kinds of stuff I thought was long-gone, including that little “Freedom” bottle in the photo. Someone gave it to me long before we bought the house. It was almost like I had tucked away my freedom all those years ago–and then found it again… just in time.

 

So, what does this have to do with anything? Well, for a while now I’ve thought about my work as a kind of alchemy. It’s about taking what you are and what you’ve done and where you’ve been–as leaden as it might feel–and turning it into your gold.

 

This alchemy transforms what is real about you, your shadow, your story–into something you work with, instead of hiding. And in doing so, you release the burden of hoping and praying that people hear about and like you. You give up the glued-together-popsicle-stick, fingers-crossed version of doing your business–and get REAL about what your foundation really is. You put an end to doomsday thoughts like, “If only I had a masters degree” or “If only I hadn’t married my first husband” and instead see how all the threads of your story and your life matter and have prepared you to be exactly who you are and serve the clients only you are meant to serve.

 

Then and only then, so much clearer and lighter, are you FREE to experience the real magic…  Putting your message out to the world. Doing the work you are meant to be doing. Experiencing freedom.

 

That’s alchemy. And it can’t begin until we put away all that old magical thinking.