There are Tibetan Buddhist monks in a temple in the Himalayas endlessly reciting mantras for the cessation of your suffering and for the flourishing of your happiness.

Someone you haven't met yet is already dreaming of adoring you.

Someone is writing a book that you will read in the next two years that will change how you look at life.

Nuns in the Alps are in endless vigil, praying for the Holy Spirit to alight the hearts of all of God's children.

A farmer is looking at his organic crops and whispering, "nourish them."

Someone wants to kiss you, to hold you, to make tea for you. Someone is willing to lend you money, wants to know what your favourite food is, and treat you to a movie. Someone in your orbit has something immensely valuable to give you -- for free.

Something is being invented this year that will change how your generation lives, communicates, heals and passes on.

The next great song is being rehearsed.

Thousands of people are in yoga classes right now intentionally sending light out from their heart chakras and wrapping it around the earth.

Millions of children are assuming that everything is amazing and will always be that way.

Someone is in profound pain, and a few months from now, they'll be thriving like never before. They just can't see it from where they're at.

Someone who is craving to be partnered, to be acknowledged, to ARRIVE, will get precisely what they want -- and even more. And because that gift will be so fantastical in it's reach and sweetness, it will quite magically alter their memory of angsty longing and render it all "So worth the wait."

Someone has recently cracked open their joyous, genuine nature because they did the hard work of hauling years of oppression off of their psyche -- this luminous juju is floating in the ether, and is accessible to you.

Someone just this second wished for world peace, in earnest.

Someone is fighting the fight so that you don't have to.

Some civil servant is making sure that you get your mail, and your garbage is picked up, that the trains are running on time, and that you are generally safe. Someone is dedicating their days to protecting your civil liberties and clean drinking water.

Someone is regaining their sanity. Someone is coming back from the dead. Someone is genuinely forgiving the seemingly unforgivable. Someone is curing the incurable.

You. Me. Some. One. Now.

. . . . . . .

SPREAD THE RA-RA. ADD TO THE MANIFESTO. ENCOURAGE.

Post script:

(In just the first hour of publishing this, we've got the spark of something seriously thrilling and luminous. Shall we go for 1000 encouragements? Are you with me? Spread it. xoxo)

For 21 days, we’ll be doing 5 days of yoga a week and 800 words of writing per day.

THE WRITING: The writing can be ANYTHING. Memoir, blogs, business plans, essays, fiction, free-writing, letters……ANYTHING. The point is to get writing again daily and to have the boundaries and challenge of a daily word count to reach.

THE YOGA: There are several options for you to do the yoga portion of 21.5.800 5 times in 7 days. Here are the options: 1. Go to a yoga class in your ‘hood. 2. Do a yoga dvd at home. 3. Take a 20-40 minute savasana* at home on the floor.

JOIN IN THE BEAUTY (and a bit of the brawn.) CHECK IT OUT HERE. SIGN UP. DO IT.

Follower Bindu on Twitter: @binduwiles

If consensus is overrated, I think balance is too. I have no interest in living
a balanced life. I want a life of adventure.
- Chris Guillebeau

In the end, the quest for balance is bogus. Love your burdens. Love them hard. And when your loves knock you down or your weak ankles trip you up, stop worrying about balancing – ‘cuz you’re not – and bounce.
- Kelly Diels

Life balance. Low fat cheese. Walking shoes. Small talk.
Life balance. The term makes me feel bloated and late for my own party.
Life balance. Stressful.

The pursuit of balance makes us juggle. It puts us behind (always behind,) makes us guilty, neglectful, imbalanced. It’s as useful a concept as original sin. You can never get it right.

If you want to do great things, striving for balance is a losing game. I don't think remarkable artists, scientists, activists, entrepreneurs, or generous souls set out on their giving journeys with the aim to be measured and harmonious. Meeting your potential is inherently full of tension (creative tension.) Trying to be balanced about it is onerous and futile.

Fuhget about it. Put balance on pause and feel into…

The out-of-whackness of your life – gigs, kids, commitments, projects. It’s a lot. Yes, indeed it is.
The passion in your cells - to eat life whole, to innovate, to score, to, as Emerson put it, “leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch or a redeemed social condition.”

Feel into….
The hunger to fill the hole in your soul – doesn’t matter how it got there - if it’s there, it’s there.
The aspirations that show up as dreams or strategies.
The curves of your drive.

[HOLD FOR THE PUNCHLINE:]
If you’re alive, ambitious, or depressed; inventive, in the lead, or rapturous – you are imbalanced. The off-kiltering of your life may make you gasp – in grief or in glory. You could be on the leading edge of your consciousness - thriving. You could be a total mess. Things may need to be put in proper order. Loved ones. Goals. Your well being. Your mental clutter. Your blood pressure. Your Mastercard statement. But...

[THIS IS THE PUNCHLINE:]
Getting "balanced" is not the remedy to stress.

Passion is.

I burn a lot of omlettes. It's a regular occurrence - I'm drawing robots with my kid, I'm jotting down an idea I don't want to lose, I'm taking the call. And then the smoke alarms goes off. I "work" on holidays. Last Monday I stayed in bed and read all day. I send birthday gifts three months early or three months late - but it's just the right gift. I can eat cereal every day for a week, wearing the same clothes, never leaving the house because I want to finish a book. I like last minute trips out of town and not answering email for days. The last time I was at a monastery, I tweeted about it.

This is not a balanced life. But it works. And the more I pursue my passions, the more uncomplicated my life gets, actually. There's not much in my life that I resent. And if resentment builds, I'm swift to get it off my plate. It's not the imbalance-ness that stresses me, it's doing meaningless things that aren't taking me where I want to go.

MOTHERS + CEOs
When we talk about the whole life balance issue, working mothers are central to the conversation. How does the screw-life-balance-and-go-for-passion theory apply when you're juggling P 'n L's and macaroni 'n cheese? It's about an overall proportion in your life, not perfection. It's a work hard / play hard equation. It's about draining your reserves and filling them up again with precious moments or a stolen day. You give give give give give and give some more, and then you get. It's a wonky equation - creating works of art always is - but if you don't stress about how you "should do it", you can create the best way to do it.

When passion is a priority - passion for family, vocation, for meaning - your energy intensifies. And when your energy is more focused, more, "aimed", you begin to care less about the things that don't really matter. You avoid crappy jobs, you stop over-controlling your kids, you nag and complain much less - with everyone. You get the help you need to pull off the important things - whether you're a CEO or an aspiring freelancer, and that support takes the form of a house cleaner, a VA, or a friend or mentor to jam with.

REFUSE TO BE BALANCED
When you refuse the banality of balance and go for full on life (which includes full on productivity and full on stillness,) you'll see the inevitable mess of it all as something more beautiful and purposeful - full of peaks and valleys - an adventure. The climb can be rigorous, grueling sometimes, but the air is cleaner, and the view will blow your mind. The fruit you'll find on your own tilted path is so much sweeter - and there's so much more of it to share.

. . . . . .

POST THE POST

Coming attraction: I'm deep in my lab creating The Fire Starter Sessions vook: a multi-media program for blazing your entrepreneurial trail. Watch this space for pre-order information and sparks of inspiration. I'm so excited!

I've sent dozens of clients to web designer, Sarah Bray over the last year and a half. Happiness abounds. Sarah is doing a Gold-Digging Excursion starting April 1 to help you "dig up your website’s hidden profit-opportunities." I recommend it with all my digital love, and I bet it's going to sell out fast. Click here to visit Sarah Bray.

I'm over it. I figure I have an astral tribe of cheerleaders and there's nothing they love more than helping me plot my course to pleasuredom. Maybe some of them are are bangin' funksters, or DaVinci himself. This is what I imagine the classic angelic ones sound like... These are great songs when you're high, low, or on the outside of any door.

Kelly's strategy was partly inspired by a tweet of mine this week: "I’ll donate my full Fire Starter Session fee ($300) to Haiti causes to 1st person who books in and pays today…Please RT" and Gwen Bell's uber successful Best of 2009 Blog Challenge.

The concept and how it applies to bloggers:

1. Sign up for the Help Haiti Blog Challenge (on Kelley's site). Write about it on your blog and tag it “Help Haiti Blog Challenge“. Ask your people to join you and do the same.
2. Add the Help Haiti Blog Challenge badge to your blog.
3. Make your offer: I will donate ________ dollars to _________ on behalf of the next person who buys _________ from me.
4. Make your donation and tell us how much you donated.
5. Tweet about it using the hashtag #haitiblogchallenge. Update your facebook status with a request to pass on the message and the call to action. Send e-mails. Everywhere you are, online, talk about the Help Haiti Blog Challenge, tag it, and call your friends, family, colleagues – your people – to action.

So, what if you have a blog but nuthin' to "give away or sell" per se?

Well, Aidan Donnelly Rowley is giving away $2 every time some leaves a 2-word comment on her blog between now and January 18. The Pioneer Woman gave 10 cents for every comment on her blog yesterday. She got 25,850 comments that's...$2,585!

So what if you don't have a blog?
Just donate, dammit:
The Acumen Fund recommends: Partners In Health and Architecture for Humanity.

Canadian? In case you don't know already, The Canadian Government is matching Haiti donations up to $50 million. Find out more here. Because of that, my family is donating to Plan Canada (we also sponsor a child with them.)

May the blessings rain down.

With Love,
Danielle

Ronna Detrick looks you in the eye. And she listens. And when she speaks, you can see her pulling down wisdom from St. Theresa to Simone de Beauvoir through the filter of her own lived experience, to give you gem of grace - or grit. And, she can write - like a poet on a practical mission. Like a feminist with faith.

Women! (And the fine men who adore us,) come to the Red Tent of White Hot Truth. Ronna is in the house.

1. Let's start with a big one: how do you define feminism?

I define feminism as more of a personal characteristic than a political or social statement. It's who I am, how I am, and yes, certainly what I am. It's an honoring of the strength, power, and inherent worth in women. It's a naming of the places in which those realities aren't honored. It's a way of being that says, "I will not be silenced; I will live out loud. I will not edit or censor myself; I will tell the truth. I will not be safe; I will be dangerous, provocative, risky, and bold."

2. Another whopper of a question - because you're a massive spirit, Ms. Ronna, what's FAITH got to do with FEMINISM?

Mmmm. A tough one. Much I don't know. Lots of answers I don't have. But here's what I do know: the two are not mutually exclusive. Faith, whether it be in ourselves, God, Goddess, Buddha, Mohammad, or the powers of the Universe, is a potent and beautiful thing. It enables hope. It invites desire. It softens and strengthens and sings. As a feminist I want to be able to embrace and embolden every aspect of my life and my world. I want to be able to believe deeply and speak definitively. I want to be able to hope fervently and work my ass off for change. I want to have faith in "truths" beyond myself and be an agent in creating the realities I desire and deserve for myself and those I love. Maybe another way to say it is that I am a feminist with faith; indeed, I must have faith. It's sometimes all that enables me to hope, believe, and persevere!!!

3. What was the dumbest thing that you used to believe in?

I love this question! I used to believe that saving people's souls mattered. Now I don't. My understanding of theology has dramatically changed over the years and, in turn, my understanding of God's heart (no matter how that power/deity is understood). The process of people coming to believe in things greater than themselves is not mine to coerce, demand, or enforce. So, you won't see me handing out tracts, repeating any spiritual laws, or quoting Scripture to convince you of one damn thing. If I'm going to be an "evangelist" at all, it's going to be for great, honest, and provocative conversation. That's salvation at it's finest, baby!

4. What’s the best advice you were ever given in terms of business?

There are two statements I keep coming back to. Tell me if they sound at all familiar to you, as you are the one who proclaimed them on my behalf! "I don't care why you're stuck. I don't want to analyze. Let's just declare that you don't need to know why and you're going to rock after this!" and "All of this is going to be easy...let it be easy. You don't have to work so hard!" I didn't pay you nearly enough for either piece of this amazing wisdom!

6. What book(s) are you always telling people to read?

Whenever I'm talking to women who are trying to think in new categories about their faith - particularly if they've come out of a more conservative tradition, I recommend Dance of the Dissident Daughter by Sue Monk Kidd and its fictional counterpart, The Secret Life of Bees. The classic of In A Different Voice by Carol Gilligan is super important for women trying to understand their own and cultures' silencing. Favorite novels are A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith and Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. And then I always recommend The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo, Let Your Life Speak by Parker Palmer, and Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott. Oh, and now I tell everyone to download (and read quarterly) A Brief Guide to World Domination by Chris Guillebeau. It is sacred text to me these days!

7. What's your favorite belief these days?

Here's what I believe: if I follow my heart, not editing or censoring, always telling my truth, and living out loud I will know deep and profound experiences of both life and God; both are made manifest in powerful and impossible-to-miss ways when I am my most passionate, most beautiful, most alive self. Isn't that amazing? And when I actually believe it, when I actually believe in myself? I change. My world changes. EVERYTHING changes! What could be better?!?

. . . . . . .

FIND RONNA

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A MEDITATION FOR SELF PROMOTION

Meditation can take many forms. You can write this out in a journal, talk it out with a friend, or do the traditional sitting meditation. You're the master. Either way you choose to tap in, settle your mind and focus: take three deep breaths. Inhale and exhale. Slowly. Fully. (This is going to be fun, BTW. Avoid dry mind. Choose juicy mind.)

1. Imagine that you're in an empty room. It's your ideal room, so maybe it's plush and luxy, or austere and Zen. You love it and you're comfortable.
2. Waiting outside the door to that room is your business, product, service, artwork - whatever you call what you offer for your livelihood. How do you feel knowing that it's outside the door? What is the flavour of your anticipation? Anxious? Smiling? Dread? Blessed and blissy?
3. Now, invite your business/product/service/artwork to join you. Do it ceremoniously or simply. Notice how you extend the invitation. (Sheepish, commanding, open, playful, hesitantly.) How does your business/product/service/artwork take form? As a ray of light, blueprint plans, a mighty robot, a peacock, a quivering beggar, a pile of gold, crates of bestselling books? How does your business/product/service/artwork feel to you? Just noticing how you extend the invitation and the form that your business/product/service/artwork took will be useful cosmic data. If you want to stop there, do so. Put the mediation on pause and come back to do phase two another day.

   Or, go further...

   PHASE 2
   
4. Ask your business/product/service/artwork if it has a message or a gift to give you. Receive it. Notice how you receive it.
5. Ask your business/product/service/artwork how it would like to be shared with the world. You may hear or see specific strategies (like, "e-books in the Fall,") or you may just feel the how, like, feelings of integrity, innovation, steadiness.
6. Now, (and this is important) let your business/product/service/artwork enter into you. You can breathe it in, you can imagine opening your heart and it climbing in, you can envision jacking into it and downloading it into your cells like an electrical current. The point here: you and your business/product/service/artwork are entwined and grooving together - unison.
7. Now, just...glow. Radiate. Vibrate. Hum your sonic powah, baby. Envision your creative light making it's way into the world effortlessly and being received with great appreciation.