Bonus Book Content - Chapter 21
“You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.”
Rumi
My wounds had longed to be seen. With self-love and acceptance came the decision to align my life with what served, to cut away at the years of the facade as if tapping out marble to reveal a statue’s true beauty. The integration of grace and compassion helped heal shame. Through this unraveling, I realized a lot of the shame I carried had been projected onto me from culture or society and was not mine to hold. I began to shift from seeing myself as broken to stepping into an ‘I am whole’ mentality by offering love and acceptance to my shadow parts. The parts I overcompensated for or hid for years were worthy of love too, and this shift allowed me to lean into full acceptance of myself, not just merely accept my experiences or lessons.
Less than a month after arriving home from yoga teacher training, I hired a mindset and business coach, Sophie Kish, to help construct a freedom-based, online mentorship program. Sophie’s pivotal ten-week program offered accountability, mindset tools, and guidance. The weekly calls deepened my understanding of the power of inner life – how perception shapes life and how our perception can be modified to create a new reality.
The initial realignment with myself and what served took consistent, conscious effort. Through meditation, I practiced the art of being and connecting to myself. The silence created space to observe my thoughts, as if they were passing by on a sushi conveyor belt, and to consciously select the better feeling thoughts. I certainly didn’t want to feed my body bad sushi; so, I became determined to feed myself healthy thoughts, and I continued to check in with myself: How am I feeling? What do I need? How can I express or honor this need? How do I best support myself today?
Self-care filled my energetic cup and allowed me devotion to others without sacrificing my own connection. I incorporated what I enjoy and love – essential oils, books, podcasts, time in nature, exercise, hammock time, journaling – and I rubbed coconut oil over my body while verbally expressing love and gratitude for each body part. I stood in front of a mirror while awkwardly repeating affirmations until the words rang as truth. For every, this is stupid, what are you doing thought, I reminded myself that my subconscious would respond to the imagery, emotion, and repetition.
So, I caressed my body the way I wanted it to be held by another, and slowly, after weeks of repeating and gliding my hand deliberately and sensually across my body, the thick legs became limbs of strength. The hated hips became feminine curves. This created a nurturing intimacy, and I began to feel I truly owned the space my body occupied.
Sophie’s use of ‘GUS’, God-Universe-Source, helped repair my relationship with the name God. The word God used to make me cringe, stemming from years of associating the name with the religious judgment and condemnation I’d experienced as an adolescent. Journaling or talking with Gus felt a bit more like an old friend who had my best interest at heart.
One hot August day I asked, Gus, please show me a sign of a feather in some way if I’m on the right path.
A couple of days later, while walking in nature with the intention of embodying my vision of being a fully expressed woman, I played a Tim Ferris podcast episode on psychedelics. Tim told an introductory story of Katharine McCormick, a woman who had rebelled and refused to wear the required feather hats for women then by MIT.
Chills spiked across my body. All of the learnings and experiences merged into one pivotal moment. God shifted from being something that was separate to an essence that lived within. Among majestic oak trees, I felt God within me and infused in everything around me. I wasn’t walking in nature; I was nature and a part of the interconnectedness. The support and guidance radiated back in a knowing that I am divinely supported and guided on this journey. A knowingness that deserved trust.
When I launched my mentorship program that fall, my clients all held burning desires to write and create something: blogs, books, or both. Huh, interesting. And while I’d loved leading, guiding, and sharing my stories with them, something had felt amiss.
After a meditation, I knew I wasn’t living the creative life of a writer I’d envisioned since a young girl – sharing my written story to connect with others, inspiring their journey, helping them heal, or to feel hopeful and less alone on the journey. Living what The Artist’s Way calls a shadow career, I’d gravitated to the rightful tribe, but hadn’t claimed the birthright – a stealthy way of self-sabotage.
But guiding others to show up for themselves helped me show up. While coaching them to align with their creative desires, I needed to create. One evening after a session, I searched for a writing coach and set up a call for an early afternoon in December.
On our initial phone conversation, Sara Connell asked, “What’s been holding you back from bringing your story to the world?”
How others would be perceived if I spoke my truth, particularly Lonnie and Bradley.
That I’d potentially hurt them.
How I’d be perceived.
That I’d be rejected.
Unwanted.
Unloved.
“If they didn’t want to be written about, they should’ve acted better,” she said.
Sara then guided me through a visualization, and my book came to life. The salt of my tears greeted my tongue when I saw and felt the capacity of which I am capable and that of which I’d dimmed. Who would benefit if I continued dimming my creative desires?
An abandonment of writing, my soul’s sacred expression, committed the ultimate abandonment of self. And I couldn’t take one more single moment of not moving toward the desire that called from my inner depths. Finally believing in my message and my ability, I chose to collaborate with Sara and an editor, Mary Nelligan. The slow burn of inertia would no longer suffocate my joy, and to celebrate, I purchased a flight to Paris to return with someone I loved and someone who loved me – me.