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the declaration of deserving…just because you’re here

I've been asking around: "What do you think you're entitled to?" "What do you know that you deserve?"

Mikki Baloy Davis, a Facebook friend nailed it with this: "I'm always curious about this question...for me it brings up the distinction between "deserving" - which implies reward or merit - and "worthy" which is unconditional." I got a witness.

Holy-loaded questions will get you some passionate answers: "I'm not entitled to a damn thing. But I deserve love." "I don't deserve anything, everything needs to be earned." "I'm entitled to be on the planet, I work for the rest." "I deserve right pay for right work...a foot rub and to be fanned and fed grapes...no less, no more than another...to be seen, heard, acknowledged...love, respect, fun, and money. Love...Love...Love..."

We're such hard workers. Hardened, some of us, from working so hard to deserve what we want. Working to earn. Earning more...work. Earning your keep is a viscous cycle, you know. Where as, believing in your implicit worth liberates you to create more value for the world you serve.

Of course, people with entitlement issues are goddamn irritating. They want more than they're willing to give upfront. They operate in a fog of hunger and conflicting intentions. Entitled types are frantic below the surface because they don't trust that they can feed themselves. What they need is a long hug and then to be sent off for some solo time, without credit cards.

Deserving and worthiness...these are the notions that get to the pulse of our consciousness and esteem.

If you don't believe you have the right to be here, there will never be enough space for your true self to show up. If you think you need to earn your actual desires, you're putting miles, years, between you and fulfillment. So many of us don't even give ourselves permission to want what we want. This is the great tragedy of a malnourished spirit.

a declaration of deserving:

You are worthy of your desires. Really wanting what you want gives you the power to get it. You were born free. (The more you try to earn your freedom, the more trapped you become.) You are worthy of love and respect. Lovable.

You deserve
: eye contact
: smiles in the morning
: food made with pure intention
: clean drinking water, fresh air
: Hello, Please, Thank you.
: time to think about it
: a chance to show them what you're made of
: a second chance
: an education
: health care, including dental
: multiple orgasms
: weekends and the summer off
: 8 hours of sleep
: play before work
: to change your mind
: to say no
: to say yes
: to have your deepest needs met
: to be seen
: to be loved for what is seen.

You deserve all this just because you showed up.
Yep, you're that monumental.

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monthly round up: october was…gripping, generous + golden

: spiritual salve for worrywarts. There's pain all around us. It's tempting to fret, pace, yank your hair...and worry yourself into the ground. But it's not pro-active. So refuse to do it. TRANSFORM ANXIETY INTO ACTION, and be helpful, instead of harrowed.

: transparency as a teaching tool. As Malcolm Gladwell says, "Authenticity is the new cool." So give details. Name names. Spell it out. And share your Big Emotion Moments. Dig into my TRIED AND TRUE transparency techniques to rock your blog, your biz, and your authenticity barometer.

: self-flagellation, posing as purity. Minimalism is the go-to trend across the blogosphere. I'm all for white space, clarity and concision -- but there's a dark side to the de-cluttering movement. Fear, loathing and self-denial can masquerade as "right action." And that ain't right. AFFIRM YOUR GOODNESS, not your lack. (more...)

 

when it’s time to stop healing and bust outta purgatory (and what my crush on ed harris has to do with enlightenment)

Jumping for joy can be counter-intuitive when you've been despairing long term. Your cells become expectant of disappointment. The repetition of compromise settles into your muscles and makes reflexes happen. Grey. Less than luminous. Not ideal. In-between half vital and half wanting more. In-between kinda dying and kinda living, a space which can very often be healing, confusing, and wonderfully risky.

Tibetan Buddhists call the place between death and rebirth the Bardo. Catholics have Purgatory. When my Priest explained Purgatory to us in Grade Two, I super-double-dipped-chocolate-vowed to get into heaven, not so much to avoid the flames of hell, but to avoid the total drag of being stuck in between worlds in the Purgatory waiting room of "not quite good enough" losers.

In-between can be terrifically uncomfortable. Like healing, which can be itchy and tight and arduous. And after a while, we can actually manage to get comfortable there, accustomed to the restraints, the warmth of the bandages, tired of how demanding it can be to take good care of ourselves. And so we keep waiting for the fog to lift, naturally. We await the will of heaven. We wait for the meds to kick in. We wait, because, you know, "time heals all things." (Time, by the way, is not the actual healer. Consciousness is.) And we keep waiting to be healed.

Waiting to be healed can be a tragic form of compromise. When we're so close to vitality and freedom, we can be lulled by the self-comfort that has served it's purposed, by the luxury of respites, by the mercy of slow death. Like I said, "in-between" can be risky business. No Buddhist wants to get stuck in the Bardo -- they want to come back to life.

The final stages of healing do not necessarily call for organic clearing, but rather, the soul skill of transmutation: intentionally altering your course. Think: wizardry, high-priestess, impassioned agents of change. Think: like God.

TRANSMUTATION, and what my favorite sci-fi movie has to do with getting on with your life...

The Abyss is one of my fave sci-fi movies of the 90's. A crew of ocean scientists head to new depths of the ocean and it gets rogue and extraterrestrial pretty fast. The scene: Mr. Sexy Sea Captain, "Bud", played by Ed Harris, and his movie ex-wife, "Lindsey", played by Mary Elizabeth Mastrantonio, are trapped in an underwater capsule that's rapidly filling up with water. It's dire.

They need to swim back to the mother ship to safety. There's only one oxygen mask and two of them. The distance is a few meters too far to make it without an air supply. Because Bud is a stronger swimmer, Lindsey decides that she will effectively let her self drown, and then Bud can wear the oxygen mask and swim with her back to the ship to quickly resuscitate her.

I searched high and low to find the complete scene for you online. I really want you to see the part where she is inhaling water and letting her body die, while Bud masks up and prepares to swim her to the ship. It's deeply moving. It is so metaphorical for the times in your life where you take a deep breath and decide let it all go - it is the intentional leap into the liminal bardo where we can only trust that we will find life on the other side.

But, I couldn't find THAT scene (and James Cameron didn't return my call.) Howevah, what you can view here is the most riveting, moving, nerve-clenching conclusion of that moment where Bud fights for Lindsey's life.

And THIS is where I get to my point about healing and Transmutation Time:

There comes a time to fight your way out of purgatory. Assess what you learned, bow to your healing process, and tear off the band-aids. Burn things. This is the time to make announcements and head out into the world even if your skin is a bit tender, even if you are limping now.

You bust out of the in-between when you declare that you.have.decided.to.live. No matter what. Such as you are, you are here, and you are ready for more.

WAIT! THIS, JUST IN! The drowning scene was sent to me after I published this post! (Thank you, Dawn). Watch this first, and then the YouTube video above: http://movieclips.com/sTUM-the-abyss-lindsey-drowns/0/132.633/

(un-copyrighted YouTube videos have a way of disappearing. If you can't view this video, go to YouTube and type in, "The Abyss movie" and you'll find this scene)

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Come to life with me and about 150 amazing chicks in New York November 12 - 14.

Rich, Happy & Hot LIVE is a 2.5 day live event held in NYC, November 12th - 14th at Donna Karan's Urban Zen Foundation. The event is Friday night 7-10PM, while Saturday and Sunday are full days. RHH LIVE is a one-of-a-kind combination of marketing and sales training PLUS the best personal development training in the world.

I'm revving up for my best presentation, ever. Check it out.

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5 books for navigating the complexities of love

This is part 3 in a 3 part series.
Read Part 1 here: 9 books that could deeply influence how you live
Part 2 here: 9 books for deepening how you create + work

relating

Reflections on the Art of Living: A Joseph Campbell Companion
Campbell's theories on romantic love (it is potentially "superior" to familial love because it is intentionally chosen,) and the ego (it will get necessarily crucified on the way to true communion and intimacy,) bolster my faith and courage.

Women Who Run With The Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype, by Clarissa Pinkola Estes
Required reading for Goddesses of all ages.

Initiation, by Elisabeth Haich
An autobiography that connects the European life of beloved yoga teacher Elisabeth Haich and her lucid memories of initiation in mystical teachings of the priesthood in ancient Egypt. A wild ride.

The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work: A Practical Guide from the Country's Foremost Relationship Expert, by John Gottman
Based on Gottman's "Love Lab" research, this book analyzes the break downs in communication that kill love. Read it before you fall in love.

Grace and Grit: Spirituality and Healing in the Life and Death of Treya Killam Wilber, by Ken Wilber
A love story.

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All of my most-recommended books on consciousness, business, and lifestyle can be found in my fancy Amazon store.

 

9 books for deepening how you create + work (part 2 of 3)

This is part 2 in a 3 part series. Upcoming this week:
Read Part 1 here: 9 books that could deeply influence how you live

creating & entrepreneuring

Beauty: Rediscovering the True Sources of Compassion, Serenity, and Hope, by John O'Donohue
"The awakening of individuality is a continual unfolding of our presence. Individuality is not a thing or a position, not the act to a fixed or stolid identity. Individuality is the creative voyage of aloneness in which the fits and limitations of real presence merge." I adore this man, a rogue priest turned poet.

Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap... and Others Don't, by Jim Collins
There are about four game-changing practices that I took away from Good to Great. I write about my favourite of them here: my dominatrix of decisions rides a hedgehog

The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich, by Tim Ferris
I'm not down with the potential detached autotron-ness of 4HWW, howevah, Ferris' reasoning and tactics for freedom-driven living inspired me to grow my lil' empire in some more effective ways.

Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America, by Barbara Ehrenreich
Never did I take my good fortune and earned success for granted. And thanks to Ehrenreich's great journalism, I never will.

The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick), by Seth Godin
"Smart people quit sooner."

Leadership and the New Science: Discovering Order in a Chaotic World, by Margaret Wheatley
"In this new world, you and I make it up as we go along, not because we lack expertise or planning skills, but because that is the nature of reality. Reality changes shape and meaning because of our activity. And it is constantly new. We are required to be there, as active participants. It can’t happen without us and nobody can do it for us."

Let Your Life Speak: Listening To The Voice of Vocation, by Parker Palmer
Parker, a legendary educator, shares his journey of deep depression toward the unfolding of his truer calling. "I lead by word and deed simply because I am here doing what I do. If you are also here, doing what you do, then you also exercise leadership of some sort."

Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life, by Anne Lamott
The Shitty First Draft... The white cards... Page by page and bird by bird. Warm touchstones for anyone who writes.

Visual Explanations: Images and Quantities, Evidence and Narrative, by Edward Tufte
Designers and scientists and engineers and the aesthetically-obsessed alike should be worshiping at the altar of Tufte.

. . . . . . .

NEW: one of my favourite recent interviews, with activist and yogini, Marianne Elliot

 

9 books that could deeply influence how you live (part 1 of 3)

I love books. Madly, passionately. I even love the bad ones because they help me sharpen my mind. But there are the very precious people-notions-theories that refined my thinking and softened my heart, and actually influenced how I did life...and work...and love.

This is part 1 in a 3 part series.
Upcoming this week: books for creating + entrepreneuring, and books for relating.

living

Total Freedom: The Essential Krishnamurti, by Jaluddin Krishnamurti
"Discipline is a tool that numbs the mind." When I read this, I felt like there was a ray of light cracking through my living room. This singular thought changed the way I approached my entire life.

Unfolding Now: Realizing Your True Nature through the Practice of Presence, by A.H. Almaas
"We want to learn how we can be here in as real a way as possible: How can I be completely here and completely myself, or as completely as possible? How can my atoms, which are scattered, vibrating, and oscillating in some kind of frenzy, slow down, collect, and settle here as what I am?"

Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living, by Pema Chodron
"Whether it's connecting with the genuine heart of sadness and the messy are of our lives, or connecting with vision and expansion and openness, what's real is all included in in well-being; it's all included in joy. Joy is not about pleasure as opposed to pain or cheerfulness as opposed to sadness. Joy includes everything." I given away ta least twenty copies of this book.

The Wisdom of No Escape And The Path of Loving-Kindness, by Pema Chodron
"Our life's work is to use what we've been given to wake up."

The Soul's Code: In Search of Character and Calling, by James Hillman
"To change how we see things takes falling in love. Then the same becomes altogether different. Like love, a shift of sight can be redemptive--not in the religious sense of saving the soul from heaven, but in a more pragmatic sense. As at a redemption center, you get something back for what you had misperceived as merely worthless. The noisome symptoms of every day can be revalued and their usefulness reclaimed."

A Brief History of Everything, by Ken Wilber. I after I read the theory of Holons, I was so aroused that I was determined to marry Ken.

"A holon is a system (or phenomenon) which is an evolving self-organizing dissipative structure, composed of other holons, whose structures exist at a balance point between chaos and order. It is maintained by the throughput of matter-energy and information-entropy connected to other holons and is simultaneously a whole in and itself at the same time being nested within another holon and so is a part of something much larger than itself. ... On a non-physical level, words, ideas, sounds, emotions—everything that can be identified—is simultaneously part of something, and can be viewed as having parts of its own."

That's a fancy way of saying we are each part of the whole.

Women Food and God: An Unexpected Path to Almost Everything, by Geneen Roth
"Freedom from obsession is not about something you do; it's about knowing who you are. It's about recognizing what sustains you and what exhausts you." BTW, you don't need to be a woman, or have food issues, or believe in God to be illuminated by this book.

Soul Without Shame: A Guide To Liberating Yourself From The Judge Within, by Byron Brown
"What is needed is to stop the self-attacks and simply be with the emptiness, allowing it to become the spaciousness of the soul's true nature and the openness in which all needed essential qualities can arise." Liberating yourself from the inner critic, based on A.H. Almaas' Diamond Approach.

Ask and It Is Given: Learning To Manifest Your Desires, by Abraham-Hicks
The Emotional Guidance Scale is my favourite kind of new agey brilliance. Cosmic logic.

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All of my most-recommended books on consciousness, business, and lifestyle can be found in my fancy Amazon store.

. . . . . . . .

VANCOUVER!

Dr. Christiane Northrup will be in Vancouver this November 3rd at The Queen Elizabeth. "Flourishing in the Female Body" I'll be there, listening raptly.
I've been a big fan of Christiane's since her now-classic Women’s Bodies, Women’s Wisdom (and I have an article that appears in the new edition!) But she really won me over when I heard her on Oprah talking about how women need to get to know their own clitorises more. Uh huh.

BUY your Dr. Christiane Northrup Tickets here.
Perks...When you purchase tix through Ticket Master save 10% by entering this discount code: Wisdom

 

heart these people: the affiliate cake of love

Your business should be a Cake of Love, that's what I say. Lots of layers of substance to sell and serve with, and between each one, some icing of generosity. Make. Give. Make. Give. Eat. Keep finding ways to mix give-back components into your master plan.

If I sell The Fire Starter Sessions on my own, I clear $145 per program. ($5 goes to one of two charities, which the buyer chooses from.) If an affiliate sells it, my kid and I get $100 bucks, and the affiliate gets $45. I love that math, actually. We've paid out $13,971 in affiliate commissions since May of this year! I could take at least three fab trips, with spa treatments at each destination for that. But of course, I wouldn't have sold as many Fire Starters without other people's help -- the affiliate phenomenon is mighty. But that's not the only point...

Every month when I hit the "Pay Affiliates" button, I feel incredibly loving and proud. I'm all jazzy jazzed that I can add to the economy of consciousness entrepreneurs and lovers of sincerity. I extra-LOVE the 1st of the month for this very reason. And I know lot's of affiliate-offering bloggy types who feel the same way. It feels profoundly good to involve other people in your prosperity -- it's incredibly nourishing, and I highly recommend it. Your skin starts to glow. You sleep better. People buy you drinks.

If you've been waiting / wondering / waxing poetic about purchasing The Fire Starter Sessions, here are 24 super-champ affiliates who'd LOVE to be your gateway to the fire. And from October 21 to 31, they get even more love if you buy through them: 50% of every sale — aka, $75 buckeroos.

Please toodle through the list and feel out who you'd like to share some cake with. (more...)

 

the dark side of minimalism

I sat down to write an article this week titled, The Dark Side of Minimalism. My "beware of minimalism" sermon was so ready to pour forth. It was gonna go like so:

I stand in my very strong values of minimalism, anti-consumerism, and simplicity. These movements fuel my faith in human consciousness. Increasingly, we are voting with our dollars, ceasing to fill the holes in our souls with plastic stuff, and living more lightly on a highly-burdened eco-system. Uncluttering, vigilante consumerism, and simplification are outbursts of enlightenment. Howevah...

Fear n' loathing can lurk beneath "right action." We can use beautiful concepts to reinforce ugly lies about our esteem and self worth. We can use austerity to punish ourselves, and frugality to keep abundance at bay.

So...that's how I would have kicked 'er off. But I came across a post from Lianne Raymond, who is like, the Majesty of Questioning Just About Everything: Red Winkle Picker Regret and The Dark Side of Decluttering. And well, I just can't top this:

Now decluttering has gone mega mainstream. It's almost religious. It's rarely questioned. There are gurus and gospels to follow. Salvation shall be yours through decluttering. ...

There are some other really obvious reasons why the declutter cult has taken off -

1. Control - In a world that seems out of control, decluttering and organizing can provide an illusion of control. (This is my hall closet).

2. Guilt - as the world continues to shrink, we can more and more see how our unconscious consumption is linked with developing world living conditions and climate change. To purge our possessions can feel like a cleansing confession. (Go in peace and sin no more - and throw in three Hail Marys for good measure.)

3. Perfection/Salvation - all my problems will be solved, my life will be perfect and I will find eternal happiness when I get rid of all my clutter and get organized. (This is a variation on "I will be happy when I am skinny.")

4. Freedom - getting rid of stuff can give us a temporary hit of feeling free. When our lives feel full of obligation, this is alluring.

When you dig deeper into any of these, you will likely find fear. And if you do have a lot of junk in your life and dig into why you ended up with it in the first place - guess who's coming to dinner? - fear. So if you are purging from the same mindset that you had while procuring - well, that's just the other side of the same coin, honey.

Lianne's lucid, provocative piece goes as deep as asserting that our urge to purge is "pathologizing the feminine in favour of celebrating the masculine" Uhhuh. Like I said, I can't top that.

Dig it yourself: Red Winkle Picker Regret and The Dark Side of Decluttering

Yours in self-love and the kind of minimalism that affirms your goodness, not your lack.

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love match winners!

The following fortunate (and strategic) lovelies are the Love Matchees / winners of The Fire Starter Sessions program!

Kai Soremekun, Patsy Kay Kolesar, Tessa Zeng, Kimberly Gill, Maia Duerr, Brittany Jade Trubridge, Holly Smith.

Yay one n' all!
xo

 

transparency. when it works and when it bombs.

Someone recently made my Transparency Barometer go ding-a-ring-hell-yay-ring-RING! Baker. Adam Baker. An introduction:

Adam Baker is ManvsDebt.com He's been here before (read our interview.) He recently posted this: How to Suck at Launching a Product. Whether you give a toss about launching info-stuff on the internet doesn't matter. What matters is Baker's thoroughly honest account of his tribulations, emotions, and learnings of being an entrepreneurial human. He bares it. All. And he does so methodically, and with an intention: to be useful.

And this is how I think you truly serve.

First, and primarily, you intend to teach; and then you do so with very thorough and relevant honesty.

(Malcolm Gladwell said it. "Authenticity is the new cool." Uh-huh. Interesting times we live in, eh?)

At it's worst, transparency without the intention of teaching can amount to a lot of diarist wanking. Which has it's place, of course. Voyeurism and art are great lovers, and there's a deep translation of shared humanness that happens when we get all bloody and exposed in our creations -- and when someone else is provoked by our outpouring, or even more profoundly, relates to it, then, well, it's a divine kind of wow.

But I'm not talking about that sanctity of pure art and self expression. I want to talk about peddling your expertise -- the place where plenty of art meets plenty of commerce, in which case:

You need to keep your art focused.
You need to have a point to your story.
If you're going to get naked, it better be relevant to your mission.

TRANSPARENCY AS A TEACHING TOOL

1. Be on the other side of the dark side. Which is to say, be on the light side, the logical, happier place when you tell your story.
Do not, I repeat, please don't "teach" about your personal learning when you're in the hell of it. Keep your pants on. Get through it first, THEN turn it into a "10 Steps To Survive Hell" presentation. It's better that way because it's less about you and more about what you're offering. If you want to bleed, gather your inner circle or paint it out. If you want to teach, do us the favour of walking us through your steps to awareness, from beginning to end.

2. Share the actual Big Emotion Moments
If you read Baker's I-bombed-so-hard story, I bet you'll walk away with this image that he shares: "On no sleep for three days… at the moment that was suppose to be one of the best for my business… I put my head down and cried." THAT registers. When I speak to audiences about the day I got canned from my own business, I describe driving home, and having to clench the steering wheel because I was shaking so hard with rage. It doesn't get more truthful and illustrative then those Moments. If it's a moment you'll never forget, it's a moment that carries resonance for someone listening to you.

3. Give details
In the drama of sweeping life lessons (which can range from a pet dying, to a fender bender, to bankruptcy) it can be easy to lose sight of the wee nuts n' bolts that unhinged along the way. But we need to hear some details. Anchor your transparency to some facts and sequencing.

4. Name names
Talk about the other people involved in your learning (anonymously if necessary.) We fail and we succeed together. We want to see how the people around you were aiding your inevitable wipe out, epiphany, or overnight success. Give us their opinions, their hesitancy, their reasons.

4. Give yourself credit - unabashedly
Claim your license to teach. You've been around the block and you're hear to tell the tale. You know a few things. In this matter...you are wise.

5. Go to the trouble of spelling it out
Go to the extra-refined mile not because you're writing Three Days to Enlightenment for Dummies, but because you care deeply about your audience and you want to be of as much service as you possibly can. Fine points, and how-to's, and summaries are incredibly respectful and loving.

A metaphor to close out with: A playbook is not the same as a journal. Journals evolve into playbooks. Playbooks are tried and true and have victory and loss to back up each play. Tried. And TRUE. And we all wanna peek at THAT, brothah.

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Vancouver, Seattle, New York, Portland, and online... check out my upcoming speaking gigs.