With True to Intention, I am blessed to work with messengers—visionaries who have developed solutions to massive problems in the world. These are not simple “how-to” folks. These are big picture, “we have to change this paradigm or there will some serious consequences” folks.
These messages are elixirs they have been creating their entire adult lives, most often because they needed that medicine as children or young adults. My job has been to help them distill the message medicine and make it as digestible and as delicious as possible for their audience.
But the process of distilling and then sharing on pages and stages requires time in The Middle.
When people ask me, “How long will it take to develop this (book, talk, course, business)?” I tell them it all depends on what they still have to heal, learn, and embody.
As an entrepreneur, it would be so much easier to sell if I could say,
“It will take no more than (some set timeframe),”
but the seeker, the mystic, and the witness in me
knows that it takes as long as it takes.
A few weeks ago, I could feel some of my clients’ frustration around their progress and timing inside of the programs they’ve committed to.
Not sure of the right words, I asked for guidance during a morning meditation. The first bit of guidance was to pull a card from this gorgeous new deck I’ve been using.
The Serpent?
As I read the description, the words that struck me most deeply were these: “The serpent represents the life force of Mother Earth” and “and reminds us to shed the past the way she sheds her tired, old skin.” And then a big old boom of energy raced from head to toes as I read: “Do not use your energies to seduce others, or allow yourself to be seduced, even by your own ideas.”
Hmmmm…
I walked out the door into the crisp Spring morning to move my body before a whole day of content development. Blue sky, sun blazing, and new buds and blossoms greeted me.
I thought about how crazy it was that there was literally no sign of life until the first day of Spring—how, like a switch being flipped, I woke on the 21st to new blossoms—BUT NOT ALL OF THEM.
On this particular day, as you can see, the pink ones were vibrant and huge, but the red ones were just budding.
For the last few years, here in Oregon, I’ve been struck by how the pink blossoms are always the first ones to emerge. And then the white ones. And then the next color—all of the trees with those buds bloom at the same time. As if on some pre-determined schedule, each color pops and captures your attention. The white ones shriek with happiness.
With every step, my mind swirled with all of the stories and lessons emerging for me right now—and began to connect them with what I was witnessing in nature.
Nature is showcasing a predetermined schedule—in line with the laws of nature.
This show I’m watching with Aaron right now—12 Monkeys—is exploring the question of, “Is it possible to change a story that has already been written—especially at the collective level?” It’s the age-old question of Fate vs. Free Will and our Human Potential to negotiate with, or direct, the laws of the universe. Of course, there are really important conversations around love and sacrifice; but I’ll save those for another time.
On this particular morning,
Fate and Human Potential were center stage.
There’s a lot of talk in my industry about “our power to overcome anything,” “our birthright to create the life and business of our dreams,” and “the quickest and easiest ways to achieve all of this.”
Before I share with you my thoughts from that morning’s walk, I want to reiterate what only those who walk beside me, who read my stuff closely, and who work with me actually know:
- I believe we are all powerful co-creators/co-authors of our realities.
- I believe that the inspiration to create is an invitation to realize more of who we are, and our true power. My experience in my own story, and with others’ stories, is that the invitation to more is often followed by a quick slam into our st*ries and limiting beliefs about who we are and what we can achieve. In order to do that thing, we have to BE THE PERSON who can do that; and if we have a belief that we are not that person or cannot become that person, it will emerge.
- I believe that healing and rewiring those stories allows us to more quickly and easily create and become. In The Butterfly Approach, this is the Cocoon phase; in The Character to Co-Author framework, this is The Middle.
But here’s what I was thinking about on that walk and since…
- What if, like Nature and its Spring blossoms, we and our messages and businesses have a predetermined timetable? What if some of us are designed to/meant to blossom before others?
- What if, no matter how powerful our intentions and how committed our actions, we cannot (or maybe even should not try to) speed up a process that has its own timetable? What if “the life force of Mother Earth” knows what we need and has our back?
- What if just taking the next step we see moves us ahead at the exactly perfect speed to reach our destination when we are supposed to reach it—developing our capacity to hold and enjoy it along the way?
- What if this idea of a predetermined timetable (Fate) doesn’t contradict with Free Will, but works alongside it—like a Co-Author, writing in the right characters and plot twists to help us reach the proper end of every chapter at the perfect time?
What would this way of thinking mean for us and the current stories we are telling ourselves
about the plot twists and delays we are facing in our work and our lives right now?
I’ll just speak for myself…
- I would stop feeling like it’s simply my shortcomings—my inability to manage all that life is throwing at me, my lack of knowledge and skill in certain areas, or my wounds—that are keeping me and my message from moving forward.
- I might start looking at those old st*ries and the healing process as something I could relax into instead of resist or try to take shortcuts through—“shedding the past the way the serpent sheds her tired, old skin.”
- I might even stop bitching and moaning to myself about all of the trees that are blossoming before I get to, and stop telling myself that I should be where they are already. I would “not… allow (my)self to be seduced, even by (my) own ideas” when Nature really already has a plan for me.
Just like my clients,
I know some of you are feeling
stuck in The Middle.
You are feeling absolutely sideswiped, blindsided, or even sucker-punched by your circumstances right now.
You are wishing you were further along.
Some of you are wondering if you made a mistake, trying to get “this” off the ground this year.
Some of you are beating yourselves up, telling yourselves that you should be doing more—better—than you are.
I cannot even tell you the amount of times I have had these same thoughts and feelings in the last decade-plus.
I see you.
I get it.
I know the angst.
I know the confusion.
I ask myself the same questions.
I say the same stuff to myself.
In fact, if you look to your side, you’ll see me standing right there in The Middle with you; and by my sullen expression and quiet mutterings, you should be able to tell that I AM OVER IT. I want my spring already!
And yet, if I look back—and maybe if you look back, too—I can see that every single one of the plot twists and delays were necessary for me to experience the BEST BLOSSOMING MOMENTS of my life and business.
Maybe it’s all predetermined to some degree, and our part is to just keep taking the next step in The Middle, using the tools, leaning on our allies, and keeping the faith that one day, we will blossom again—because that’s how Life works.