I have a painter friend whose art sells for $10,000 a painting. She routinely paints over pieces that are for sale in her gallery. It could have been better, she says.

I’ve gotten standing ovations for speaking gigs. “Meh, I give myself a B. Coulda been better.”

Here’s the confession: I always feel like I’m failing. And succeeding. And failing. And succeeding. And failing.

I’m not masochistic. My glass is not ‘half full’, it is oceanic. I feel sturdy and ripe. But The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Thing…. it’s as steady as the green of my eyes.

If you’re committed to the sacred strive, The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Thing will always be along for the ride.

… In your speech, your craft, your work. Pleasing your lover, planting your garden, dispensing your accumulated knowledge. You can make masterpieces. Daily. You can please some people, get a raise, fire up your kundalini, you can hit it out of the park and sleep like a satiated baby that night. And then in she glides, to sit in the chair in the corner of your room: The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Thing.

She’s an angel, I tell you. An angel.
You are not insecure, neurotic, defective, obsessive, or unappreciative.
(Well, maybe you are, but not because you experience The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Angel.)
Coexisting with The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Angel is part of making art.
She is as reliable as your creative impulses.
She comes bearing invitations. To more.

The Subtle & Abiding Sense of Failure Angel is able to enter because you left your heart open.
Leave it open.
You have to.
To make more stuff.
To make it better, so that we evolve and bring one another along for the ride.
Where demons get to be angels if you look at them the right way.

you will never arrive over there
because you are
here
now
always
in truth
more light than dark
bothness
enough
wanting
more
plentiful

there is no need
to split ambitions,
my love
it’s all the same
and it’s all precise
and it’s everywhere
you find yourself

be fiercely tender
and still
grow wild

Which brings me to the present. Essentially, this is a sermon on presence. Because when you’re showing up in the now, you don’t have time to expect much. You’re focused on the give, not the get.

This fall I traveled to NYC twice in four weeks. To hustle. Name a major women’s lifestyle magazine. Name any of them. I’ve probably been to their office, in cashmere, talking about the meaning of life and how to be a fire starter. One particular meeting was, in my mind, incredibly high stakes. “If I land this, it’ll change, like, my grandchildren’s lives.” I don’t have grandchildren. Just biggie dreams. I lost sleep over that meeting. I prayed, meditated, worked with my advisor, rubbed my mala beads, strategized and agonized with my crazy sexy and out-fucking-standing soul sisters. Ready as I’ll ever be.

It doesn’t really matter how the meeting went (very well,) or what the outcome is (it’s just the beginning,) here’s the net gain:

show up.
shine.
let it go.

When I left that meeting, something shifted deep in me. Something I wasn’t, expecting. Out went the adrenaline, in streamed the calm. It was a little bit of Samadhi on Park Avenue. I got it: lay down the expectations. Be done with them. Will? Never. She’s my paintbrush, my potion, my lucidity. But, expectations shrink your shine and weigh you down with worry and equations. I’m more interested in my art and connecting with what’s in front of me.

Expectation liberation is the new black. Style up.

A PRAYER FOR RECOVERING EXPECTATION ADDICTS

Lord, Shiva, Yaweh, Saraswati, [insert your own deities here] pimp my shizzle and deliver me to where it’s best.

Yess’m, Jesus, life, cosmic intelligence, Milky Way Magi, take the wheel.

I know you’ve got my back. I know that you know how intensely my heart burns, how sweet is the honey at the center of my center, how much I am capable of. And God knows (that’d be you) how game I am to collaborate with you to make good stuff happen.

I accept my calling: to show up and shine. Unfurled and honest. Determined to be only that which I am.

I’m here to give…my all.

I trust that pure intention counts for plentiful support.

I trust we’ll get where I’m going, together — once I learn to be where I am.

I’ll go make my art now.

I have faith that you’ve got the rest covered.

Amen. Om shanti. Shalom.

You can only do what ONLY YOU can do.
Do that.
The universe will configure around your very best efforts.
Willingly.

do not wait for special occasions.
do not tuck your best away in the drawers, in the back of the closet, in your heart.
don’t wait for holidays or invitations.

declare that your today is the special occasion.

call instead of emailing. (it feels so good to connect.)
go for coffee.

quit.
take care of it.

renounce your glory days. you’ve told all of those stories more than twice.
focus forward.

wear perfume for yourself. toss your only-wear-around-the-house clothes and let your good clothes graduate to around-the-house status.

intend to feel good all of the time.

write your book.

launch.

make ecstatic sex a priority. (this deliberateness will make you more creative, productive and generally gracious. on your death bed, you will think about all the amazing sex you had this lifetime.)

burn your to-do list.

write poetry. one a day.

make a point to be as encouraging as possible, as much as possible, to everyone possible.

don’t look back.

if you feel like you’re always failing, consider that this is part of being an artist. let it be a divine inclination. keep going.

enter.

leave.

eat real food.

often refuse to be in the presence of people who make you feel repressed, anxious, or pull your frequency down.

do not entertain haters.

send light to the haters.

give it away. you probably don’t need it and someone else does.

turn off the tv.

let it be easy.

burn candles. during the day.

fall in love. with yourself. with the person you’re with. with the persons in your orbit.
because no one is perfect, but you can let the love be perfect for the both of you.
because everyone — everyone — is a doorway to God.
because you can get there from here.

because life is short.

Every word you speak or think lands somewhere – it’s heard by you, (and if not consciously, certainly by your unconscious mind,) by the people around you, by the Dream Fairy, The Universe, The Powers That Be.

So what kind of message does the word “hope” send out? How is Life, or your boss, or your partner supposed to interpret “hope?” Hope doesn’t tell anybody where you really stand on an issue. It doesn’t holler, Go get ‘em!, or declare, I wholeheartedly believe! or I’ll do whatever it takes.

Hope hangs out on the sidelines… just, you know, hoping. While expectation, optimism, and pragmatism are on the field playing the sport of life. Full on.

Maybe hoping is for sissies.
And if that’s true, than intention and faith are for heroes.

What if you banned the word hope from your vocabulary? Try this hope-replacement exercise. How do you feel with each of these statements?:

• “I hope I’ll get the job.” BZZZZT! Reframe it.
• “I really want to get the job.” (“Point taken,” says the Universe.)
• “I’m praying to get that job.” (Prayer is an action too.)
• “I have done all that I can do to get the job.” (Yes! Stand tall.)
• “I will either get the job, or I won’t.” (Precisely. Now you can get on with your day.)
• “I expect to end up with a job that I love.” (Excellent! Open-ended and affirmative!)

Do a Hope List. What are you hoping for? Opportunity to knock? The outcome to be positive? The test results to be negative? Replace “hope” with action words, reality words, intentional, faith-bounding, wide-open, change-agent hero words.

There are too many variables out of our control, yet many variables firmly within our control. It’s foolish to plant big desires on the sands of hope. It’s amazing what happens when you decide to not lean on hope (tho’ you may go through withdrawals at first, not having hope as dream-filler can be profoundly uncomfortable.)

When you move beyond hope, you take responsibility. You face facts. You see solutions that you didn’t see before. You stand in the present.

Hope less. Realize more.

Savasana is not so much about chillaxin’, as it is about integration. Some teachers will say that if you skip out on Savasana, you lose the benefits of your yoga session.

We rest to integrate the benefits of the work that we have done.

Creative and work cycles need Savasana time – consider it divine debriefing. This is the most under-valued practice in business and busy living. We resist. We fidget. We race forward. For similar reasons, Savasana – undoing, unwinding, letting go – is considered to be one of the most difficult of all yoga postures to master.

Right now, my career / creativity is in Savasana. Which is to say: agitation, satiation, ebullience, and fresh rushes of ambition – all at once. For Creatives (and we’re all Creatives,) this is the unavoidable, slightly uncomfortable, and sacred space between exertion and renewal. If we bypass this place, we miss the most empowering insights of all the work we have done – insights that will fuel us on the next journey.

This is the first time in two years that I haven’t been operating under an intense deadline. A few weeks ago, I delivered my final manuscript for The Fire Starter Sessions. There will be copy edits. My Canadian spelling and poor punctuation will be stripped, but mostly, I am done. I hardly know what to do with myself.

I’ve done the Downward Facing Dog of deals, I’ve done the Tree Pose of multiple product and event launches amidst gusting winds of life upheaval. I’ve sweated and twisted and floated, and I have felt the breath of angels in my lungs as I lifted my ass and aspirations to new levels. So now what? Fidget. Rest. Ready myself.

rest is productive : the savasana of creativity + work

At the end of a big project, you will be pulled with equal force in three directions:

CLEANING UP. You’ve been in the creative bubble. Your auto-responder was set to “don’t bug me,” your door mat said “Unwelcome.” Now your inbox is encrusted with emails like barnacles on an ocean-liner. There are many things that legitimately need tending to, people you care about are waiting, and you genuinely want to move into responsive mode. But you also really need…

STILLNESS. Your mind has been burning for so longing that needs the cooling effect of suspension and ambling. A nap. Reading a book unrelated to your line of work. Unscheduled time. Listening, receiving.

NEWNESS. Part of you is raring to get going on the next Big Thing. You’re wired to make stuff. It’s what you do. If I was more chemically imbalanced, I would have started my new book the day after I submitted my last book, (it crossed my mind. The next tome is burning a hole in my heart.) But I knew it was Savasana time.

Prone on the floor with your eyes closed, it’s easy to fall asleep in Savasana. Some yoga instructors discourage this because it’s not about escaping per se, it’s about integration. I used to consider it nap time. But now I listen, and I hear so much more. And I re-enter the world more energized.

The same approach applies to work. I used to wrap a project, crash hard, and then zip into the next thing. Now…I sit with both the discomfort and the enthusiasm. I stay awake and look at where I’ve been and how it relates – or doesn’t – to where I want to go.

We rest to integrate the benefits of the work that we have done.

CLEAN UP without rushing, without panic or guilt, and with respect for the patience you’ve been shown.

BE STILL in the ways that your body and mind crave.

LET THE NEWNESS ROOT. Allow yourself to be sensationally excited…without acting on it…yet.

When you rest, you have space for all of it.
And when you rise to meet the future, you will be very, very ready.

close your calendars
of regret

smash clocks and barriers
with your better knowing

throw soft light on
the doom clingers

let
your
pure
faith
burn
the
way

2011 blessings,

(Before I tell you how it went down, allow me to say that I think you should approach all meditations guided by strangers with caution. I’ve been to many a gathering where someone wants to lead us down the golden path – and while their intentions are often good, they may not be filling your airwaves with the highest quality thought forms. Guided meditations are like eating at any restaurant – you need to take small bites until you’re sure what you’re consuming.)

Back to a certain guided meditation. “Close your eyes.” (Uh huh.) “Deep breath.” (Uh huh.) “See your dream before you.” (Locked in on crystal clear.) “How does it look, sound, etc, ?” (Feels freaking suh-weet.) “Now,” [insert New Age chimes and slightly evangelical tone...] “…know that your dream is POSSIBLE! … And now, open your eyes.”

Whu? THAT’s IT?! I lean over to my girlfriend and say, “Possible?! Fuck that. My dream is a done deal.” Snort. “Ditto,” she snortled back in solidarity.

“Possible” can be magical. But magic has varying degrees of power. There’s magic sprinkles, and then there’s elixir potions, tonics of creation, galvanizing spells. Leave the sprinkles for cupcakes.

MO’ EFFECTUAL DREAMING
You can’t dream in images of possibility-maybe-could-be-perhaps and get manifestation traction. It’s profoundly unrequited. Possibility can be a lot like purgatory. You just never quite get there, not even in your dreams.

Wizardry is about conjuring up an experience of DONE (not “maybe”.) Succeeded. Achieved. Arrived. Pow!

Visualizing Possibility = striving, maybe, reach, stretch, hit or miss, up for interpretation, deliberation, incomplete, out there, the resounding feeling that there’s still so much to do.

Visualizing Done = the sensation of satisfaction, a reason to celebrate, achievement that you can walk into it, serious calm, expectation you can wrap your head around, a vision that calls you to stand up straight and be your wisest.

But here’s the coolest part about Visualizing Done: that image of success may have something to tell you – a few pointers about how it got made real. When you visual things as “done,” you can walk around the vision and see what it has to say. The image of success can reveal how-to’s and pathways to itself.

Here’s how I do it: I see a myriad of Done Deals in my cosmic atmosphere. I get myself to that state of full-on assuming that what I desire already exists in some dimension, and I just need to step into it, or pluck it out of the ethers. Done. This gives me an incredible sense of calm, and a feeling that life really wants me to win.

And then I ask the done deal to tell me how it…got done. And I hear strategies. For example, I envision my next book as a New York Times bestseller. Done. (Maybe a bestseller? Possibly a bestseller? That feels shaky, not invigorating.) And when I see that bestseller in action, I get really fresh ideas about how to make it a bestseller. Pow. Practical. Invigorating.

Sometimes I see Done Deals and I sniff them out and decide it’s not what I want after-all. Next. You’re never obligated to a dream or a belief.

The business of affirmations and visualization is a mind game, of course.
Ante up.
Play to win.
Big deal.

. . . . . .

INTERVIEWS

I got a shout out in USA Today thanks to NetSetter, who interviewed me about starting businesses, collaboration and seeing opportunities. Click here to read the NetSetter interview.

But I do not worry for them. Can’t do it. Won’t do it. Refuse to. Not because I trust in an benevolent universe to carry them (which I do,) and not because I’m disassociated (I’m anything but.) I don’t let myself worry for them because I think it’s not only futile, but it’s obstructive. Worry only gets in the way of good intentions, energy, solutions. It’s toxic.

WORRY vs. CONCERN
Energetically, there is a critical difference.

worry: to torment oneself with or suffer from disturbing thoughts; fret.
concern: to relate to; be connected with; be of interest or importance to; affect.

Worry obstructs possibility. Concern is pro-active.
Worry weighs things down. Concern can rise to the occasion.
Worry is wistful. Concern is penetrating.
Worry tangles. Concern peels back the layers.
Worry gossips. Concern enrolls.

Worry is the conjoined twin of anxiety. Of course concern can be riddled with anxiety, but it’s strong enough to turn anxiety into a constructive force.

The darkest, gnawing side of worry is this: it’s an illusory form of control that we might cling to in order to feel important and goodly. Yep, “goodly”, not “Godly.” As in, I’m a good manager, friend, mother, Christian, citizen, leader…if I express my love, smarts, interest by…worrying.

HOW TO TRANSFORM YOUR WORRY FOR OTHERS INTO POSITIVITY…
SO YOU CAN TRULY BE OF SERVICE

Stand outside of the story.
Every fearful expectation has a big “story” behind it. The trauma, the drama, the pain, the plot. Worry feeds on the gruesome details. It replays the potential saga in your head. It validates all the reasons things could go wrong by drudging up the past again and again. Worry is cleverly building a case as to why you should worry (you’re a better person if you do, you’re “on top of the details” it’s the sympathetic thing to do, things have gone wrong so many times before, it’s only logical to…worry. And on it goes.)

Don’t let yourself be pulled onto the “set” of the unfolding drama. Stay behind the camera and go where you’re needed to shed light on things. Witnessing is an act of compassion. Whether it’s with force or a light touch, you get to call the shots on how you will show up in any difficult situation.

Keep a soft gaze.
No one needs your judgment about why they got themselves into something, or all of the things that could go wrong. Gently observe what’s going on, and stick to the facts. This is really tricky because facts can be relative. Medical test results are facts. So is someone’s immense inner strength. Choose the facts that keep you moving in a better direction. Friends in pain (and we all qualify as friends who are hurtin’,) need love and optimism – critique and prognostication are big fat downers.

Let your heart be broken.
Life will devastate you if you get close enough to it. Get closer. In the cosmic fabric, your pain is mine is yours is mine… When we can share this unified space we know how to be of better service to one another – because we can better empathize.

Put a stake of devotion in the ground.
How far will you let your concern take you for a friend? (Limits are okay by the way, enlightened concern isn’t about martyrdom.) Are you willing to catch the next plane, withdraw your savings, find a lawyer, change bandages, mix herbs, listen tirelessly? Your devotion may shrink or expand as the situation unravels. But if you can declare how you intend to be truly helpful, then worry takes a backseat.

Send wishes.
This is the single most effectual way to diffuse worry and move into positivity. Worry will crop up. Don’t let it stagnate. Cleanse your worry with precise wishes.

I’m worried that he’ll stay lonely. I wish him sweet love.
I’m worried the meds won’t work. I wish her quantum healing.
I’m worried she’ll do something drastic. I wish her equilibrium.
I’m worried he’ll sink into depression. I wish him lightness.
I’m worried this will takes years. I wish for swift grace.

While you’re at it, you could do one gorgeous global wish: I wish for the end of suffering and happiness of all beings. That about covers it.

Send wishes. And more wishes. The wishes will nest in your psyche and begin to inform your concern, your words, your actions. When you’re not preoccupied with worrying, you’re free to serve, in so many ways.

. . . . . . .

OTHER WORRY-DIFFUSING RESOURCES…

If you’re still worried, check out this lovely visual of encouragement from one of my favourite beautifiers and entrepreneurs, Alisa Barry, CEO of Bella Cucina.

More?! Right on. Nathan Hangen just released Fear to Fuel. It’s an impressive collection of ambitious, creative people who clearly haven’t wasted much time worrying while they defined success on their own terms. Hot stuff.

Can’t get too much love and insight? 7.7.7. from Ronna Detrick, “7 Conversations. 7 Amazing Women. 7 Invitations.” This is a beautiful workbook, and I’m honoured to be one of the 7 along with Patti Digh, Karen Maezen Miller, Jen Louden, Dani Shapiro, Susan Piver, and Katrina Kenison. Dig in here.

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.

. . . . . . .

So…Why do you want what you want?
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xo