What I missed on the way to my dreams

What I missed on the way to my dreams

On a good day, I felt restless. On a bad day, I felt like a caged animal.

Exasperated, I came home from work to my dark, musty, basement apartment – a glaring reminder that I was not just figuratively, but literally, underground. Drowning in student loan debt, I rarely answered my phone because collection agencies were calling me daily. Trying to find my way in the world wasn’t easy. Emotional and practical baggage of difficult family dynamics and estrangement seemed to be hitting me all at once. I felt like a victim of circumstances, dealt an unfortunate hand, profoundly alone in my struggles.

The job I begrudgingly got at an Ivy League university to establish some stability, looked good on paper, but my soul was dying, a little more every day. If I had to sit through one more hour-long meeting that could have been communicated by an email, I was going to lose it. Things were done in inefficient ways for no reason other than it’s the way they’d always done it. This felt archaic to me, but rethinking conventions wasn’t welcomed or encouraged. Waiting for that clock on the wall to read 5:00 felt like an insult to my personal integrity and pride, not to mention that I’d finished my work hours earlier. And the starched button down shirt I wore, because I thought I should, felt like a straight-jacket, a costume that belonged to someone else – but not me.

I knew I couldn’t stay.

While going through the motions on all the things I thought I was supposed to do, I was losing myself. On autopilot, I’d drive to work, or the grocery store, or the gym (when I could get myself to go) feeling more and more disconnected from who I was. I wasn’t challenged. I wasn’t inspired. I felt contained, micro-managed, and caught in status quo games that I didn’t want to play.

I felt like I was drowning, and I knew no one was coming to save me.

Underneath my restlessness and frustration, was a growing sense that I was meant for MORE, that this couldn’t possibly be all I was meant to do, be, or have.

I knew I needed to take the reins and reshape my life, to reshape my reality, to figure out how to not live in a basement apartment forever, to create a life that was my own, that reflected the truth of who I was.

It was from that dark musty basement apartment, that I gazed out that teeny-tiny window with a view of the sidewalk and the tires of cars passing by … and I’d dream.

I dreamed of:

having the freedom to travel when and where I please
√ having my own location-independent company so that I could work from anywhere
a home with lots of natural light
becoming a bestselling author
wealth on my own terms
finding love
having time and energy for creativity and play
making a positive impact, serving others in meaningful ways that made their life better
being myself without boundaries.

The voice of my soul, and seeds of my own self-actualization, were surfacing.

There was a huge difference between the caged, soul-crushing, autopilot life I felt constrained and uninspired by, and my dreams. The problem was I couldn’t figure out how and where to find a bridge between the two.

A few things were missing, and when I finally figured those out, everything changed. Quickly.

What was missing was…

  • Self-trust
  • Belief that dreams my were possible – for not just other people, but for me
  • A way to see and transform my blind spots and expand my thinking

I needed to step up for myself, rather than waiting around for things to change, or others to approve. I needed to go from complaining about what my life currently was to becoming the person that COULD and WOULD move out of it.

What I needed to learn was…

  • How to manage my energy
  • What to do with fear
  • How to navigate naysayers

I needed the skills and support to take the REINS on my life, to listen to my heart, and really take ownership of the life I dreamed and envisioned for myself. To stop fear from running the show, I needed to get out of my head and shift my focus from all the seeming limits of my current circumstance to finding strategies and ways forward that I couldn’t yet see but chose to believe were there to be found.

What I needed to do was…

  • Get the right support
  • Take brave consistent action
  • Show up fully for what I was saying I wanted

I needed support from someone who’d been there. And perspective OUTSIDE what I’d already tried, a shift out of what had created the life I had, and into creating the totally different life I wanted.

So, I got support. And I changed my thinking. And I became a different version of me.

Spoiler alert: It worked.

Not only have I achieved my “impossible” dreams and the freedom I so craved, I have built a business and a profoundly fulfilling, decades-long, career around helping others rethink conventions, chart their own course, live their dreams, rediscover themselves, and realize what’s possible.

I help you create the life you think you cannot have. 

Your dreams, like mine, are fuel on your path to self-actualization.

The first step along the way to THAT life? Want the key to reclaiming what’s missing, to create everything you want for yourself, to finally make that change? >>> The Only Skill You Ever Need

xo,

P.S. Going after your dream life, finally living it, moving from your life now to the life you want to have – all of this can feel completely overwhelming! How do you know what you want? How do you GET what you want? Where do you start? How do you face all the uncertainty and that huge climb from where you are now to the life of your dreams?

There’s one skill that unlocks all the rest.

And my totally free and totally updated Only Skill You Ever Need guide and bonus chapter goes through exactly that.

Ready for that dream life of yours?

Do not ignore these signs

Do not ignore these signs

 

Creating your life is an evolution, an ongoing expression of your freedoms and your being-ness.

Your life is the embodiment of your self-actualization.

Recognizing this, is the opposite of bypassing, and the opposite of avoiding.

The act of intentionally creating your life to be the reflection and expression of your freedoms, your potentials, your dreams, and the truth of who you are, is extraordinarily BRAVE.

Your life right now is the embodiment of your self-actualization (or lack thereof).

Your life right now is the barometer for your current level of self-actualization, AND your current level of self-abandonment.

This is true for you. This is true for me.

When I was in a job that I knew was all wrong for me…
When I felt trapped in a marriage that was full of dishonesty…
When home was a darky, musty, basement apartment…
When my soul longed to travel, but I stayed put…

… all of this was an affront to my soul.

… and ALL of this was glaring evidence of my own self-abandonment.

Whatever degree self-actualization is lacking in your life, is the same degree that self-abandonment is happening in your life. 

A tough pill to swallow, but a truly powerful one too.

This is not about blame or shame. But it’s also not about pretending.

This kind of evidence-based self-inventory isn’t for the faint of heart.

Every example of self-abandonment is an opportunity to see what’s there. 

To see, observe, learn from, and find fuel for change in the tangible evidence of your life’s creation, so far.

Seeing the YOU that is smack in the middle of it all – is POWERFUL – not because you are the blame center, but because you are the POWER center.

YOU are the common denominator. And you can therefore choose to move away from self-abandonment and towards self-actualization.

You can choose to move away from what doesn’t light you up, and towards what does.
You can choose to move away from fears about not enough, and towards enoughness.
You can choose to move away from “I can’t” and towards “watch me figure it out.”

Doing this requires a whole lot of courage, self-inquiry, and self-integrity – asking, and seeing: What is aligned for me? What isn’t aligned for me? What do I really really want? If I had one year to live, what would I do with it? And if I had one year to live, what would I stop doing immediately?

Let NOW be time to get to the heart of the matter.

Objectively identifying what’s what, being fiercely honest with yourself, and then consciously deciding to grow into being the person who would (re)align what’s not, is the journey of self-actualization.

Creating a life that reflects the truth of who you are, takes heart, and hutzpah. Not the “who” the world has told you to be, but who you ARE and the truth of your desires.

The work of self-actualization is not a strategy of separation.
It is not a way to distance yourself from the life you have.
It is not about positioning yourself as the victim of your circumstances.
It is not about shame or blame or pretending. (I said that already, but it’s worth repeating.)

And, truth be told, it’s a mission that is never done.

Until you leave this Earth, it’s an ongoing creation, moment by moment.

When on a mission of self-actualization, as long as you’re alive, there will always be “lag time” between who you ARE, and the life you’re creating to be a reflection of that being-ness, that person.

It is therefore not a fixed point, and it is not a destination. It is an expression. It is an evolutionary unfolding. It’s a journey of self-responsibility, of empowerment, of healing, and of doing what’s needed to shift any aspect of your life that isn’t for you.

Ultimately, this requires that you get intimate with yourself, and intimate with your life – both as it IS and as you wish it to be.

Step one is seeing what’s there. Stepping back to see the mirror that IS your life. Facing your life, perhaps as you never have before. And then, participating fully in its evolution and ongoing creation so that it can align that much more fully with the dreams in your heart and the truth of YOU – who you are here to be.

Love,

P.S. Going after your dream life, finally living it, moving from your life now to the life you want to have – all of this can feel utterly terrifying! How do you know what you want? HOW do you get what you want? How do you face all the uncertainty and that huge climb from where you are now to the life of your dreams?

There’s ONE SKILL that unlocks all the rest. >>> And my totally free and totally updated Only Skill You Ever Need guide and bonus chapter goes through exactly that.

Ready for that dream life of yours? It’s my gift to you.