Your dream is your soul calling you towards your actual self. Your dreams lead you towards your most authentic life, which is the life that you are here to live. Always.

This is how dreams work. All of them.

It’s actually impossible for your dream to be impossible because your dream is only leading you to yourself.

This means it?s never true that:

• you?re not good enough
• you?re not ready
• it?s impossible

Never. Those are bullshit stories that keep you stuck right where you are.

Your job is to transcend them.

Most of us soulful creative beings are also highly sensitive. We feel the pain of these stories and it can be very easy to get stuck in it. So much so that transcending can feel impossible.

Or we sense the pain in these stories so we carefully try to avoid them, which only sounds like a good idea until you discover the fact that you can only avoid them by avoiding your dreams.

Plus these stories have been going on for so long, and have so many chapters, each one leading you down a different path of dream-avoidance, that it can just be stupidly complicated to figure it all out.

So let me simplify it for you.

Any time you are feeling like you?re not good enough, any time when you wonder if maybe you can?t do it – you?re listening to the wrong voice and you’re moving in the wrong direction.

(For Creative Dream Circle members – this means get yourself into The Un-Sticking Station ASAP.? It will lead you step by step through the process of transforming the stuck and get you feeling good and moving towards what you want.)

These feelings are things to transform, not things to believe, figure out or wallow in.

The transformation of these things is the path to your dream.

I want to say that again: the transformation of these things is the path to your dream.

Do NOT fall for the assumption that having these thoughts and feelings means your dream is not possible.? EVERYONE doubts themselves.? EVERYONE feels like their dreams are impossible.?

Dealing with this stuff is just a part of the process.

You wouldn’t HAVE the dream if you weren’t ready to move towards it – I promise.

In my many years of helping people bring their dreams to life I have yet to meet anyone who wasn’t ready.? Whenever we work both creatively and intuitively to map out the path – possibilities and miracles emerge.

Seriously – your intuition will never say “Oh, you’re stuck.? Give up.”

There IS a way and you ARE wise enough to find it.

I’ve got two programs starting next week that can help:

A deep-dive energy healing of your relationship with power. With creative play and glitter markers.

Why Power?? POWER is the thing that animates all soul qualities. Think: Creativity. Authenticity. Abundance. Freedom. It brings them to life, in your life.

So the more personal power you can access, the more gorgeousness you can create in your world and in the world around you.

This makes power the fuel that brings all dreams to life.

I’ve got some amazing things to share about POWER in the Superpowers Creative Journal Class, happening October 24. Click here to read more.

 

Clarity.? Momentum.? Success.

Evolve into the best coach/healer/teacher/helper-person you can be.

Group coaching for Coaches, Healers & Teachers only: you can use this group to grow your business, create new programs, or find ways to do your work with more ease and less depletion.

Starting October 21. Click here to read more.

If you want to join SHINE but the call times don’t work for you – email me!? I’m adding a second call to accommodate people who can’t attend at this time.? If you’re feeling called to be a part of this, we’ll make it happen.

FYI For Creative Dream Circle members: I’ve posted a totally different post inside the Circle for this week’s Creative Dream Sharing Circle.

In December 2013 I made a promise to write a weekly update for all of 2014 to share the process of making a big dream real.

But it’s not feeling right anymore, because the updates (in my brain anyway) are connected to the dream I was working on when I started this – a dream which has morphed into something different.

Plus something about the word UPDATE and the energy behind it doesn’t fit with where I am right now.

Though the updates inspired the Weekly Sharing Circle, inside the Creative Dream Circle, which I adore and I don’t want to stop those.

So for the past few weeks I’ve been sitting with the fact that I don’t want to keep doing these updates in the way that I’ve been doing them.

I paid attention to how I was feeling and started to explore what I wanted to do instead.? There is too much good stuff tied up in the updates that I do want to hold onto, so I didn’t want to just throw the whole thing away.? Plus I know that if you just stop as soon as it gets uncomfortable you don’t ever get anywhere.

But now I’m starting to see a new way, so I’m ready to let go of this and start exploring the new path.

Less of an update, more of a Creative Dream Check-In.

Less a blog post, more a practice (though I do want to share it).

Deep communion with my dream.

And a warm invitation for YOU and your dream to join me.

Right now I need some quiet space to sort this out – it’s about a lot more than ending a series of blog posts.? There is a new way of interacting with my dreams that is ready to emerge and I’m excited to learn more about it.

Some announcements:

SHINE Group Coaching for Coaches, Healers & Teachers is starting soon.

This is a gorgeous group for working through the unique challenges you face as a helper-person.

You can use this group as a support system to help you

* create and launch a new class, program or coaching offering

* step up your business to start helping MORE people

* figure out what your next steps are in your growth as a helper-person

* find ways to do your work with less depletion and more ease

I’m happy to share anything and everything I’ve learned on my path, plus do intuitive healing work with you to support you in activating more of your unique gifts.? Click here to find out more.

 

Recently I was invited to be an expert on the 2014 Inspired Livelihood Inspired Entrepreneur panel along with 14 high earning creative entrepreneurs. UNlike many other no-cost tele-summits, no one is trying to sell you anything and none of us are making any money from this course. We?re simply openly sharing how we?ve made a real livelihood doing work we love.

I?m excited to share this with you because it completely shatters the myth of the starving artist.

In these friendly conversations we all share how we got started in turning our interest into income and what we wish we?d known when we were first starting out. We hold back no secrets about what it took to grow a successful business, the challenges we?ve faced and obstacles we?ve overcome.

You can access the whole series HERE and listen to it at your leisure.

I’m starting this update feeling like nothing really happened this week and I don’t have anything to update you about! So I’m going to the journal prompts for keeping on track with your dreams for help.

My dream is: Changing! As I’ve been connecting more with my Dream Self and learning more about how she is different from me I am getting clearer on what I want next, but I am not all the way at clarity just yet.

I want it because: I want to keep moving towards my most authentic, most free and most powerful self.

When I have it I will feel: The past six months or so I’ve noticed that feelings feel different.? Like there is more space inside me for the qualities I want.? So happiness isn’t just happy – now it has room to dance around inside me.? I feel more free, more deeply grounded, more inspired and happier.? I imagine this will just keep opening up as I keep moving towards what is true for me.

What happened in the last week?

A lot of self-care.? I’ve been sad about saying goodbye to summer and not wanting to let go of how much joy riding my bike everywhere has brought me.? (And also not willing to experiment with winter cycling – I mean I DO want to, and I could dress for it and get winter tires but I don’t want to share the icy roads with cars who can’t stop as fast as they think they can)

I’m discovering and re-discovering a lot of things to help make this better.

I’ve also been working on my new coaching programs – next week I’ll have the new dates up for SHINE: Group Coaching for Coaches, Healers, Teachers & Helper-People.? This is a 4 week group focused on helping you evolve into the best coach/healer/teacher/helper-person you can be.

How do I feel about this?

I’m really excited about the new stuff I want to do with my one-on-one work.? I am so inspired by what my clients are doing now, and want to help them reach for even bigger dreams.

What do I need now?

To be patient (ugh!) about giving what’s next time and space to emerge.? To be more OK with not-quite-knowing right now.

What does my dream need now?

My dream is a sparkling lotus that is in outer space (?).? It’s too far away from me for me to really be able to connect with it, but this is exactly where it needs to be right now.? It whispers at me to trust the process and work on my part for now.

Taking all of this into account, my next mission is: keep on keepin’ on.

Patience. Trust. Self-Care.

I can see how my new fall self-care routines (yoga before bed, meditation first thing when I wake up – 10 minutes each is enough but more is better) are really supporting what is emerging next.

I want to add that I want to do more journaling, more sewing, more art.? But I always feel that way, that I’m not doing enough.? (For Circle members: I posted some creative journaling I did with the “You’re Not Doing Enough” voice in the Un-Sticking Station this week)

So how about this week I experiment with believing that I AM doing enough?? That feels good.

Update FORTY FOUR!? I’m closing in on a whole year of weekly updates.

When I set out to do these updates, my mission was to welcome 800 members into the Creative Dream Circle this year.? I started these weekly updates to share the process of holding the dream strong enough and long enough that it comes to life.

That’s not what happened.? Some would call this whole thing a failure.

I’ve just passed 200 members in the Circle and given the way I’m approaching this at this time I don’t see a way to get to 800 by the end of the year.

Though I do feel that if I still really wanted to hit 800 this year, I could do it.? I’ve learned so much about business this year and am feeling more confident than ever.

But the fact remains that I’m not going to hit my original goal.? And that’s good!

What happened instead is that I learned more about what I really want.? Which is what happens when you grow dreams from the inside out, which is exactly what I teach in the Creative Dream Circle so it would be ridiculous for me to be approaching my dreams differently than how I teach people to do it!

When you’re aligning with heart, soul and purpose (which is a MUCH bigger job than you think – most of us are (unconsciously) very strongly aligned with our limiting beliefs which we take as fact) a new story emerges.

My new story is that I’m not as ambitious as I thought.? When I read blogs written by people who DO want to work with thousands of people, who LOVE having that huge business, who see BIGGER as the only way to grow – I don’t feel anything.

I don’t feel inspired.

I don’t feel a tinge of jealousy that they have something I don’t (which would mean that of course I want what they have).

I don’t feel all high and mighty that they’ve sold out and I’m a better person for not being so ambitious (which would mean that I do want they have but I am not willing to admit it to myself).

I’m happy that they’re happy, that’s all.? There’s none of my stuff tangled up in it because that’s not my story.

Then there are other people out there with really unique and gorgeous in-depth coaching programs and when I look at what they’re doing – I feel inspired.

Because one big thing I learned this year is that I’m not as finished with one-on-one coaching as I thought I was (having 800 members in the Circle would mean not doing any more one-on-one work).

I am deeply inspired to create a whole new super in-depth coaching program, and am working on it right now.? It will plug into what happens in the Creative Dream Circle and go deeper for the people who want to go deeper.

I am also inspired to do more group intuitive healing calls with the Circle which I will be doing next year.

Dreaming of having 800 members this year was not a mistake.? It led me to knowing more clearly what I actually want.? I want to make that super duper clear because this happens with dreams all the time and too many people feel like failures as a result.

Pursuing your dreams out of alignment with your heart and soul WILL bring you to what is right for you. Along the way you usually do have to let go of your original vision and settle into what is really true for you.

The more graceful and awake you can be about this process the better as your inner critics will want to insist that you are a failure and they’ll drag this evidence along towards any other dreams you choose to pursue.? Do not underestimate how good the inner critic is at the art of IMPOSSIBILITY.

So this week I’ve been focusing on getting to know my Dream Self? better (this is the me who lives my dream) and getting clear on what I need to do to grow into this version of myself (for Circle members: this is in module 6 of the Creative Dream Incubator e-course).? This is a DreamSelf collage I made:

As I explore my Dream Self I’m learning a lot about what I want to do next and how I want to do it.

I’m making more time for art.? I’m working on my new coaching program. I’m taking lots of bike rides.? And I’m re-filling the well which is still running low, after creating The Mandala Class and moving the Creative Dream Circle to a new site this month.

Oh! The Mandala Class!? It’s going soooo much better than I’d even hoped.

Circle members are doing the most amazing mandalas, full of transformation and wisdom and healing.? Every day I pop in to see what’s been posted and I’m blown away by their stories.

So grateful to be doing this.

This week The Mandala Class started inside the Creative Dream Circle and I didn?t get anywhere near as many new sign-ups as I had hoped for.

This happens sometimes.? A small part of me felt sad but most of me was just really happy about sharing this amazing class with all the people who have already signed up.

And as soon as people started posting photos of the mandalas they were drawing and the amazing insights they were gleaning from the process I stopped caring about who didn?t sign up and was busy cheering on the people who did.

When your dream and your business collide there are certain considerations to be made.

Because the path to a dream never goes in a straight line and there are always gifts in getting what you didn’t want but at the same time I need to pay the mortgage and buy groceries, Moleskines and glitter paints.

What I have found is that the best way to approach it is to see it all as an experiment and be light with it.? When you really NEEEEED something to go well and make x dollars that puts so much pressure on that everything tenses up and it gets easy for things to go sideways.

I have built my business slowly. ?And in that time I have discovered things that work for me, so if I hit a financial speed bump I feel confident that I have the tools to boost sales to get over it.

But I?m also always trying new things, following my inspiration about what I want to put out there and how I want to put it out there.? Often I am surprised? things I think won?t work so well actually work very well, and things I am sure will work well just don?t.

The lighter you can be with all of this, the more resilient you?ll be and the more likely you?ll stay in the game long enough to build a stable foundation.

And of course sometimes you just can?t afford to be light with your finances.

When I was in my 20s and trying to make a living with my art I was always hovering on the edge of financial ruin. ?While I was committed to exploring my creative gifts and learning how to make a living with them, the whole thing really was stressful and eventually I did ?give up? and get a job.

(The story from how I went from starving artist to working in a cubicle to being financially secure enough to comfortably leave my job to be a full time artist, plus tools to do the same yourself, is in The Creative With Money Kit, which is one of the classes you get in the Creative Dream Circle.)

It turned out that ?giving up? and getting a job was not giving up at all – it was the perfect move to make to build a sturdier foundation for my dreams.

So now I?ve set my financial life up to be simple and easy so I can be light with this and approach my business with an attitude of experimentation.

So, I didn?t meet my sales goal this week and that?s ok.

I did learn something really important – which always happens when you take ?failure? lightly and are willing to explore it to find the gifts in it.

I was inundated with people who wanted to sign up for The Mandala Class, but not join the Creative Dream Circle.? That’s why my sales were so low.

But the truth is, I want to work with people who are committed to creating positive change in their lives, and to bringing amazing things to life. ?These people know that it?s a journey and it takes time.

I don?t want to work with people who just want to take one class.? But my marketing plan for this year relied mostly on promoting individual classes as I added them to the Circle.

See? ?Disconnect.

These kinds of disconnects happen all the time when you are actively living with and pursuing your dreams, because you?re always growing and your dreams are always growing and so things shift and change and disconnect.

I had been braining storming what I want to do with the Circle for next year, and was already leaning towards a shift and this shows me that I am really on the right track with my new ideas.

So, as a result of not meeting my sales goal this week I?m feeling more inspired and sure than ever about what I?m doing next. ?So YAY for not meeting my goal. ?Onward and upward.

Coming back to the Creative Dream Check-In Questions:

My dream is shifting a lot right now, so it?s good to keep track of it in this way.

My dream is: To keep growing the Circle at a steady pace and to do my best to serve the members in bringing amazing things to life.

I want it because: Purpose. Fulfillment.

When I have it I will feel: Hmm, I feel like I do have it because I am doing this right now. ?It feels like spaciousness, peace, alignment and fulfillment. ?I like it.

But dreams are about guiding us into the next stage. ?So what is my next dream?

Oh, my secret project. ?I don?t want to share any details yet because it is likely to change a lot as I work on it.

I see secret project working really well with the Creative Dream Circle. ?This is how I want to grow and evolve and share my gifts next.

I want it because: I feel like something lights up in my heart when I think about it.

When I have it I will feel: Like I am serving from a place of deeper purpose. ?It feels bigger and more solid. ?I feel excited to move into this.

So that?s the new dream. ?I am writing this part of the update on Tuesday morning because I wanted to write this story while it was fresh, so this gives me my focus for the week: Secret Project.

What happened in the last week?

Oh my, after writing the update to this point on Tuesday morning it feels like all hell broke lose.

I wrote a post about Creating Space To Grow Into Who You Are Becoming As You Move Towards Your Dream.? So I’ve been doing a lot of that messy vulnerably stuff.

I cut my long hair short.? In intuition started to scream at me on Wednesday afternoon to chop it all off, so I stopped at a hairdresser that I ride past on my bike ride and sure enough – they could take me right away.

I feel like I left a whole lot of things I don’t need anymore behind, tangled up in that big pile of purple hair lying on the floor.

It’s been a super roller-coastery week.? Super super happy and sure.? Self-doubt and sadness.? A great big mess in the Dream Loft as I sort through it all.? All the usual stuff of personal and creative growth.

How do I feel about this?? Right now I am bubbling with enthusiasm about what comes next.? Like I still have preparations and packing to do but I am so ready for this journey.

I actually feel TALLER.? This is something that has happened before when I’ve been in a bit of an inner-growth spurt.? I like it.? It gives me a new perspective and makes bigger dreams feel more me-sized.

What do I need now?? To be gentle with myself and the process.? To not rush.? To pay attention to how I’m feeling and follow my intuition.? To remember that everything is possible for me.?

What does my dream need now?? My dream is smiling sweetly at me from the top of a mountain. ? It’s happy I’m making the journey and waiting for me to get there.? It’s not time yet for us to be together, I have to first grow into the me who can carry this dream, before we can journey together.

Taking all of this into account, my next mission is:?

Keep meeting with this dream and getting to know it while focusing most of my time and energy on supporting the new qualities that want to emerge in me and my life.

The part of this that is challenging is that I want to dive into the Secret Project but I really do need to focus on this inner work first but I get so impatient.

That’s what the Dream Loft looked like yesterday.

I posted this photo on Instagram and said:? Total chaos as I re-arrange the entire Dream Loft. Sometimes personal + creative growth comes with a need for new space to play in.

I’m going through all of my things.? Getting rid of a lot (which is weird, but because I got rid of half of everything when I moved in here so I don’t really have that much “stuff” to start with).? Changing other things – a coat of paint or a re-purposing.

Monday when I borrowed a friend’s extra-tall ladder to start putting the Giant Papier-Mache project up.? (I haven’t blogged about this yet, but have been sharing pics of it on Instagram as I go)? This is a Giant Project and will take another few months (at least?) to complete.

But Monday I started to put some of it up, very high up:

Which, of course, changed the feeling of the space – which is exactly what the Giant Papier-Mache project is all about.? Which helped me get a stronger sense of who-I-am-growing-into as I grow into new dreams.

Having a dream come true on the outside is always about growing into a new part of you on the inside.

I’ve been talking a lot lately about building the internal capacity to hold a bigger dream.

It’s also about inviting in new qualities and ways of being.? Which spill out into every aspect of your life.

(For Circle members there’s a ton of stuff on this in Module 6 of the Creative Dream Incubator e-course which is about growing into the you-who-lives-your-dream)

Some of the qualities of my new dreams are: alignment, trust, spaciousness, soul-sparkle.

So I am looking at ways to bring them into my space.? I’m looking at ways to set up my space to support these qualities in emerging in my day-to-day life.

All things tell stories.

As I’m looking for things in my space that do not support the emergence of these qualities,? I’m looking for things in my space that tell my old stories.

Like the book that old boyfriend gave me that shows how he never actually understood me or those shelves I bought because I couldn’t afford anything nicer.? Or those lights I bought and spent wayyy too much money on and it turns out I don’t really like them but I feel like I somehow should like them because of how much they cost.

These are not the stories I want to live in.

Changing the stories is dirty & exhausting work.

Literally, because I moved into the Dream Loft kind of early, so the construction crews kept coming into do more work which piled dust everywhere which I still find in corners and strange places when I move things.

But mostly emotionally as I confront each story and choose a different ending for it.

Which includes sometimes falling into the old stories which is kind of dangerous.? I’ve got a lot of sad stories and a lot of stories where I was not very powerful.

I’ve cleared out so many of these stories over the past decade.? But it’s obnoxious how these little story fragments can hang on and stay alive after a decade of no air.

I’m building extra-strong time boundaries that keep me in the present and keep the stories in the past as I pick them up, dust them off, and send them off to their new homes.? But sometimes boundaries fail.

I have a whole bunch of work to do.

I have a few new projects that are jumping up and down and begging me to play with them.? But I need to do this part first: to create space for the new me who can successfully bring those projects to life.

The bigger the new project or dream or change of any kind you want to invite into your life, the more space you need to make for it.? If it would fit in your life as it is, it would already be there.