Usher wows the crowds, spins around the stage on roller skates, and gives a shout out to his Mama. Meanwhile, the teams are in the locker room. Half the Super Bowl is over. They’re warmed up. They know their strengths, their opponents, and their focus is on the second half of the game.
When interviewed about his half time show performance Usher said it was, “One performance 30 years in the making.” For the players going back into the last 30 minutes of play time it was their chance to showcase their decades of practice, play, and dedication.
I turn 51 today. I realize I may have passed “half time” a few yards back. 50 still feels like halfway. At 51 my feet feel firmly planted in the second half of my life.
As a kid I always loved my birthday. June 7th marked dance recitals and end of school celebrations. It kicked off summer days roaming the acres of my grandparent’s farm.
Now I have a head of gray hair and wrinkles in spots they don’t make cream for, but I still love my birthday and making wishes for the year ahead. I’ve got 51 years of finding out who I am behind me. Now it’s time to become more of that person (for better or worse!).
“Breathe,” the dentist said encouragingly as we waited for my tooth to numb, “and go to your happy place.”
My happy place was anyplace but this chair. The dentist was replacing a filling on a tooth that a previous dentist wasn’t able to numb before he drilled three decades ago. The previous dentist declared, “You must have a windy nerve on this tooth!” Now I felt like full body nerve ending, gripping the sides of the chair, waiting to see if this time I’d only hear the sound of the drill against my upper tooth or I’d feel every scratchy movement of the drill like before.
My happy place? My mind starting searching for the place to go. A beach in Thailand? I’ve been to Thailand but never a beach there. They look nice in movies though. I scanned my mind for more beaches… Florida beaches I grew up on, the Red Sea, the Dead Sea, the Mediterranean, the Hamptons, or even one mile away from home in Santa Monica? All the beaches I do know and love didn’t feel quite right. “I can’t even find my happy place,” I thought to myself, clawing permanent indentations in the soft pink arms of the fully reclined chair. “I’m 50-years old! Shouldn’t I have a happy place by now?! My kids handle dental work with more ease!” I thought.
Then popped the image of my two teenage children in my mind’s eye. There they were, beaming at the absurdity of how nervous I was about this routine dental procedure and reassuring me that all was well. Next the face of my beloved appeared, also smiling brightly and encouragingly with his usual, “YOU’RE DOING GREAT!”
That was it! My happy place wasn’t a PLACE. My happy place was these three faces looking back at me.
I breathed. The dentist found the nerve and my tooth (and entire right side of my face) was fully numb. Plus, I’d found my happy place.
Instead of searching for some happy place, I’d found what worked for me and stayed right there. This has been the gift of trusting myself and my intuition. It’s been a journey, and I’m still walking this windy road. I’m learning and relearning what feels right in my body and what feels off. I now know what feels like a yes and what a no or neutral feels like, too. I don’t have to flip a coin to figure out my next step. I go inward and trust that the next step is inside of me, although it often doesn’t make sense in the moment. In today’s world where it seems everyone’s favorite interview question is, “What’s your morning routine?” it’s very tempting to use other people’s blueprints for success. I learn over and over that my way and my blueprint is inside of me.
I’m here to remind you that truth lives inside of you. Your truth is one breath away. Your blueprint for success, fulfillment, and where/who/what is your happy place is uniquely yours.
What’s come up for me a lot over the past few weeks is how life offers us scripts, just like actors get when they audition for a role. Scripts are what’s handed to us — for better or for worse. Scripts are the rules, the cultural programming, the identities we are given and take on, and even the stories we tell about ourselves and the world. My script tells me that there’s a right way to do things and a wrong way to do things, and that I’m limited by time and space and my past. It tells me what I “should” search and find that happy place in my mind.
When my beloved, a talented improviser and actor, rehearses for an audition, one of the things I admire is how he’ll veer off-script slightly. He gives the character and the lines new dimensions and layers with small adjustments. Going off script in life means turning some of the things we think about ourselves and the world upside down. For me going off script means there isn’t always a right and wrong way, instead there’s what feels most true and alive. Off-script means done is perfect, even if it’s not perfectly done and doing my best is good enough in a world full of striving and competition. Going off-script means when the dentist tells me to go to my happy place, I go to a feeling of love and connection and see three beautiful faces… instead of a white sandy beach.
If you’d like to strengthen your connection to your inner knowing, I’ve got some fun offerings coming up! Ambition to Action, my signature group coaching program starts May 17 and The Intuition Club reignites on May 16 and happens twice a month for the rest of 2024.
In case you could also use a reminder: There’s no need to look outside of yourself for answers. In a world chock full of knowledge and information, inside you lies oodles of experience and wisdom. The script can be helpful, but tossing it in the bin and doing it your way can be magical. Your happy place? Only you know where/who/what that is. 💜
Scroll through Instagram, FaceBook, LinkedIn, your text messages, even old photos on your camera roll.
Then STOP! Find someone you haven’t connected with in a while. Send them a “hello!” Share a memory you have of them, thank them for something, acknowledge one of their amazing characteristics, or just say “Hey! I’m thinking of you!” After all, these social media apps were initially intended to keep us connected, right?
Anyone else out there scrolling? I scroll like a woman possessed but only when I’m bored, procrastinating, hungry, tired, waiting to wake up, waiting to fall asleep, waiting for my children, as well as a few other moments throughout the day. This week in my Ambition to Action course we’re looking at our daily routines, noting our energizers (peaks and gains) as well as our ener-geisers (leaks and drains). My biggest energy leak, or ener-geiser, is scrolling social media.
I don’t feel good about scrolling, even if for five minutes. It feels like an energy leak and drain. I could spend those five minutes on energizers like reaching out to a friend, taking some deep breaths, stretching, or even walking outside. I took FaceBook off my phone to help stop the madness. Yet scrolling persists.
On a walk with one of my few local friends I mentioned how although I’m busy, have a full life, and have an abundance of love in my life with my partner and kids, I don’t have the friends, community, and thriving social connection I used to enjoy in Amman and NYC. “I love it here, but my WFH-A “Working From Home Alone” life in Santa Monica feels lonely at times,” I admitted.
“Why don’t you pop over?” she asked. “I’m at home a lot on my own, too.” This particular friend lives right around the corner and if I crawled to her place I could still bumble my way over in less than three minutes. But that would never cross my mind! Much easier to seek pseudo-connection through a scroll on IG.
That’s why one of my ambitions for this year is connection; I want to reconnect with friends and family I haven’t been in touch with in a long time and create new connections nearby. I have 1.5k friends on FaceBook and 994 connections on LinkedIn, who are all actual people! They’re real friends, family members, colleagues, clients, and acquaintances I’ve met at some point, but I don’t really know how they are and am mostly out of touch with all of them. I may be thinking about YOU or grateful for YOU in particular, and you likely wouldn’t have a clue.
I decided to take my scrolling ener-geiser habit and make it an energizer. Each day this week I’ve scrolled to find someone I haven’t said hello to in a long time. What’s cool is that apart from my project three people I haven’t spoken with or seen in ages have reached out TO ME to check in and say hello TO ME (without knowing about my lil’ project)! One friend who’d last sent me a WhatsApp message in 2019 that I STILL HADN’T REPLIED TO🤦♀️ apparently forgave my radio silence. Maybe these 3 kind souls had tuned into my intention of reconnecting?! There’s a wave of reconnection happening and I’m surfing it!
If you’re a person I haven’t been in touch with for a while, please reach out. I’d love to know how you really are beyond the posts. What are you celebrating? What are you struggling with? How are you, really?
If I reach out to you and thank you for a memory or say that I’m thinking of you and asking how you are, it’s not because I’ve lost my mind or want to sell a property in the Bahamas that I don’t actually own. It’s because I’m on a scroll.
One of the participants in my Ambition to Action course sets up 15 minute calls to reconnect with old friends. It takes a little investment to make it happen, she says, but it pays off in connection.
Are you a scroller, too? Then start scrolling, stop, and reconnect with someone from your past. I’d love to hear how it goes (comments are open!).
There’s nothing wrong with supporting others. But when is it too much? How do you know when it’s TIME to pursue your own ambitions?
Supporting others is one of the most fulfilling things we can do! As a mom of two teens, I’ve got half a dozen part time jobs directly supporting our family of three, including my very own (but barely operational) fluff & fold laundry service, driver service, short order dining and catering service, and an expanding teen counseling practice.
I feel good about supporting my kids, as well as my partner, family, and friends. But when the scale is tipped too far on the supporting of others and not enough weight is devoted to nourishing my own dreams and ambitions things start to unravel.
I can divide up a typical day into parts:
my energy pie
I certainly think about my ambitions and goals each day. I dream of doing my own creative solopreneur venture full time every day. I aspire to doing more stand up comedy here in LA. But no one is gonna to write this blog, market my work, write my jokes and wheel me onto the stage, or fan the flames of my ambitions for me.
If you’ve read this far, I bet you also have some ambitions that have been on the back burner simmering away but not forgotten. I’m guessing you’re also a devoted family member and friend, and don’t hesitate to support the dreams of others. Only you know when the scale has tipped too far and you’re not filling the cup of your own dreams and ambitions.
Here’s how to assess where your energy is going and get clarity on what you’re ready to focus on:
Map out the pie chart of your day or your week.
Notice: Where does your energy go?
Highlight the areas that nourish you, your body, mind, and spirit.
Underline the areas that are energy draining.
Circle the ones that directly fan the flames of your dreams.
Put stars by the areas that directly support others.
Draw lines between the ambitions that are directly connected.
What’s reflected back to you in your energy map? What’s missing?
Not sure where to start? Imagine in 12-18 months you took your last breath. Which ambition(s) would you want to be sure to bring to life before that last exhale? Morbid, I know, but it’ll lead you to your truth.
💡 Your ambition could be something you’d like to be, feel, or embody. We’re human beings after all, in a doing world. As an example, I want to feel healthy, strong, and agile in my body 50-year old body. I want to embody playfulness and peacefulness.
💡Your ambition could also be something you’d like to do, create, or experience. I want to write more consistently, move into a more spacious space, and turn my solopreneur passion project into a full time gig.
There’s a virtuous cycle between what you’d like to embody and create. Find the connection between the two.
Maybe you also can’t and don’t wish to jump ship on your life and dive head first into writing that first book, starting that podcast, moving to that new place, or finding that amazing partner/community/job. But your dreams deserve 15 minutes a day of focus. Break down one ambition into small steps and take one baby step today. If your dream is to write your first book, you can dedicate 15 minutes to journaling, reading about book writing, brainstorming what you’d like to write about and why, or even opening a word doc and staring blankly at it until your fingers start to type. You might even sleep better tonight.
Beginning on Friday, May 10th I’ll be launching another cohort of my 6-week workshop series called “Ambition to Action” to support a group in actively pursuing and bringing to fruition their ambitions. If you’d like to get on the fun and put your name on the pre-registration list, email me at KimberlyBlanchardCoaching@ gmail. com or sign up for my newsletter list. More details to come soon!
Your ambitions are seeds planted in you for a reason, and pursuing them is a divine act. Try taking a focused 15 minutes of one small step toward your goal in the next 24 hours and let me know how it goes in the comments. You’ve got this, my friend. 🙌
“Remember to put the face mask on yourself before putting it on your infant,” said a flight attendant to the young father in the row behind us. My favorite guy and I were traveling back from our holiday adventures in Wisconsin and had the good fortune to be seated in front of a well behaved baby.
“Got it,” replied the young dad politely on hearing this reminder now for the third time.
Putting on your own oxygen mask before putting it on someone depending on you seems right, even if in the moment it goes against parental instincts. We know deep down it’s true, but we need reminding at times. Maybe not three times at takeoff, but every once in a while. Parenting a 15 and 13-year old, I still need this reminder, and it has nothing to do with actual face masks.
As 2023 comes to a close I see my email inbox and feeds filling up with reminders. What did you learn in 2023? What are you taking into the New Year? What challenges did you overcome? What did you accomplish? These are well and good. I spent this morning back in California jet lagged and hyped on coffee reflecting on my year in review. I looked through my camera roll, journal entries, and my calendar month by month. For each month I wrote down my highlights and lowlights. The good, yummy stuff — like the people I met (including my wonderful boyfriend), the places I traveled to, the work I got to do, and the fun I had back in NYC performing comedy again and turning the Big 5-0! There were plenty of lowlights, too — the times I got reactive, lost my patience with my kids, lost nights of sleep worrying, didn’t take care of my physical health as well as I needed too, and more. You could say that I learned things in 2023 from the highs and lows and in betweens.
But here’s the thing. You can’t learn what you already know.
I know that I need to put on my face mask before assisting others. I know that I can’t control what my children do, don’t do, or how often they want to get their haircut (Goddess knows I try!). I know that loving kindness is way more powerful than fear, negativity, and hate. I know that living in comparison to others only brings me pain. I know that I can trust in the great spirit of the Universe, and in myself as I’m a part of it, even when times are difficult and I don’t understand or like what’s happening in my life or the world around me. I know that the only way through hard times is through them.
So, if I know all these things already I can’t learn them. I can only remember them. This year I’m choosing to look back and remember.
I remember that progress is better than perfection.
I remember that I can’t offer others what I don’t provide to myself (insertlove, compassion, forgiveness).
I remember that I’m a spiritual being in a temporary meat suit having a human experience.
I remember that the best way to teach my children that they belong in this world and are worthy of acceptance and love is through my example.
I remember that anxiety and worry are negative prayer.
I remember that the energy I put out in the world — good, bad, or neutral — comes back to me.
I remember if I’m making everyone else happy I’m likely feelin’ miserable.
I remember that every moment is sacred, especially the most ordinary ones.
I remember that humor and play heals, even when life seems downright serious.
What are you remembering as the calendar turns toward 2024?
Cut to springtime in Amman, Jordan 2017. We’re moving in July. But where? The school year was soon ending, the kids then seven and nine years old, and the summer was on our heels. Recently divorced, the lease on my apartment was coming to an end as were our Jordanian visas. I’d scheduled our going-away parties and a moving sale. We were headed somewhere on a one-way ticket. But where?
Plan A was to move to Washington D.C., where I’d accepted a state department job. My security clearance was in process and my job now frozen under the new adminstration. Over the past six months I watched Plan A go from blazing fire to smoke and ashes. As the flames waned I just kept heaping on more logs, certain that having a plan B distracted me from my plan A. I thought my sheer focus and attention on Washington would help bring it to life despite the state department hiring freeze. I was sure that considering alternate plans might confuse the very busy Universe. But moving to D.C. without this job didn’t feel right.
Over a plate of tabbouleh, my friend Lily asked, “Wherever you land this summer, do you know you’ll land on your feet?”
“YES!” I answered definitively. “I’ll land on my feet… even if I fracture a leg in the process.”
That same evening I opened up my bedside journal. Earlier in the year I wrote an entry creatively titled, “My Dreams.”
The kiddos looking out over Petra, Jordan May 2017
The entry was like a shopping list made up of the secret ingredients for a meal I was hoping to cook up. The first ingredient on the list was Write. I’d written a blog the summer before about our quest to travel on kindness and wanted to write a book about our journey and keep blogging. I had a list of people I dreamed to meet, so I added Oprah, Ellen, and Liz into the soup like bits of saffron for good flavor, and as if we were already on a first name basis. I put Travelon the list. I had Relationships and added a descriptor, New modern love (hoping to uncover what that meant and which aisle I’d find it on once I was at the store). Soul Coaching was on the list, even if I didn’t know what it meant either; I liked the way it sounded. I put Women on this list with an underline, wanting to focus my life’s work to the benefit of women especially. And I wrote New York –big and bold with a long dash next to it.
New York– meant New York City. It was the place that had intrigued me since my first visit after college.
New York — meant a dream coming true. Each day I stared at an imaginary picture of myself in Washington D.C., the with the kids, the new office, and the neighborhood in Arlington, Virginia where we’d live and I wondered if it was the most supportive place for us to be. Politics very much not aside in 2017, was D.C. where we wanted to be now at this point in history? I froze up too.
The rest of the story is in the book I’ve been working on since that summer! But I share this here because in the depths of my uncertainty about where to leap to with my two young kiddos, mapping out where to go that summer was not about a rational list of pros and cons. It was not about following the dreams of where other people wanted us to move to. It was about following the direction set by the ambitions of my heart. After looking at that list in my journal, I started to consider New York.
Looking back I can’t imagine our lives without our three years in New York. It wasn’t easy to sell and give away all of our belongings to land in the Big Apple with two suitcases each. But it was right. For us. New York was a launchpad for all of those other dreams — writing, soul coaching, leading circles and workshops for women, and my first tastes of modern love. We may not be on a first name basis, but I even met Liz Gilbert at a meditation event and she wrote me a love note, “I’m in silence today! But I love you!”
What are the dreams of your heart? What are the ambitions you’ve tucked in the middle of some journal, tacked onto a vision board, uttered to a close friend, or lie in the depths of your own heart?
Your ambitions are no joke. They give you direction in life. When you set out on a trip you plug the destination into an app. It’s not about which roads you take as much as moving in the right direction. Same goes for your ambitions.
Want to move to another country, travel and work all over the globe but don’t have a passport or job that’ll take you? Want to run a marathon although you’ve only run a couple of miles? Want to write a book but you’re only scratching out emails now? Want to start a solopreneur business based on your passion even though you’ve done something “normal” most of your life? Want to perform comedy on stage in NYC although you’ve got serious stage fright and only your kids laugh at your jokes?
These are all dreams that lived in my heart until I fanned their flames and decided they were all roads worth taking.
Write down at least five big or small DREAMS and AMBITIONS. Writing them down gets your subconscious brain working on them even if they seem far reaching and unattainable. This is not goal setting time. This is not the time to say, “These dreams are impossible to achieve because of x, y, and z.” This is allowing yourself to dream and dream big of the future you most deeply desire.
As the year winds down, it’s the perfect time to dream.
Beginning January 26th I’ll be coaching a group of people in a six-week series called Ambition to Action. I’ve helped successful organizations like Lego and the LVMH companies, teams, executives, leaders, and myself move ambitions to actions, and I’m so excited about offering this to you. Let’s turn your vision board into an action board!
On October 22, 2022 I grabbed my phone at 3 a.m. to check the time. “Wedding,” popped up as a calendar entry. There was no wedding planned on this day, but it was a reminder that earlier in the year I’d picked out potential dates based on the roundness of numbers. Wedding on 10/22/2022. Mark was a numbers guy, and after two years together I believed we’d make it official on a Saturday in 2022.
Another calendar entry notified me of today’s “Mount Sac Cross Country Race.” Close your eyes. You’ve still got time to sleep before you need to make Sam french toast and get him to his race. Mark will be here at 5:45 and you’ve got a big day ahead.
I never got back to sleep and Mark never woke up. His heart stopped at some point during the wee hours of that morning even though I wouldn’t discover he’d died until a few hours later. On first glance this story seems to be about the heartbreaking loss of my groom on my imagined wedding day.
Beyond the wedding notification and the unanswered texts and calls of 10/22/22, there’s more to the story. Mark left his beloved calculator with Sam that week for the PSAT test, which also added up. He also left our two toothbrushes next to his sink standing bristle to bristle, the way he preferred to leave them as a sign of love. There was the soulful conversation Mark and I had the day before, sitting next to the pool where we’d met. Mark passed Friday night when our family — his daughters and son-in-law plus me and the boys — were are due to be ceremoniously carving Halloween pumpkins together on Saturday afternoon. And Mark left us on 10/22 without me sleeping next to him, which wouldn’t have been the case on 10/23. This is also a story of hope, connection, and grace.
There are more stories within the stories and more layers to these layers. There are stories that are easier to tell while others remain untold. One year later, some parts of the story begin to fade. Other parts, like the hallow echo and pale color of the sky that October morning, will never leave me. There are my stories, as well as Mark’s stories, plus the stories of my kids, his kids and his family, and all of the people who know us. All of our stories distinct and webbed together.
I’ve been working on this piece of writing for a few weeks, unsure of what to share at the one year anniversary of Mark’s passing, or even what I’m trying to say with the sharing. I simply wish to share some of the story, without needing to make it mean something or having it all come together in a nice, neat way because the story is more nuanced and complex than what words can express.
There’s a post floating around social media calling for, “No more false binaries.” Indeed constructive conversation about all meaningful things in life expand us beyond a binary. The stories of October 22, 2022 certainly do for me.
Comedian and writer Judd Apatow said, “The greatest gift you can give people is your story.” Each of our lives shares a story, whether told or untold. Each day we live is an essay tucked into the greater multi-volume memoir. Through story we connect to ourselves and to each other. Through story we allow ourselves to be seen, or remain unseen.
Today many cultures celebrate The Day of the Dead, and it feels like the right day to share the story of these moments early in the day of Mark’s passing.
My prayer is that today and everyday I make space for story. For my story, and your story, and all of our stories. For those who live, and those who died. My heart is heavy for humanity and for the wars we wage on ourselves and each other. The story of our lives is the story our children and their children inherit.
If you’d like to share a story with me or a prayer that lives in your heart, I’m here for it. I’d be honored if you’d write to me or leave a comment here. Your story is my story and I’m here for it. Thank you for witnessing mine.
“I’m gonna get wasted this weekend in LA,” shared the young mother traveling solo. She sat next to me at a bustling bar at the Boston airport, and had just ordered her third glass of Pinot Grigio.
“Oh, fun,” I hesitated, mentally ordering her three waters and putting an imaginary Tylenol on her napkin. I was totally projecting my own experiences with long flights and hangovers onto the young mom. Although I now imbibe on rare occasions, I still remember the morning after a glass or two too many of Pinot Grigio all too well.
But another kind of hangover has crept into my life this last decade or so. After my first experience with it my coach said, “Oh, you’ve got a vulnerability hangover.”
“A wha?” I asked.
“You did something big and vulnerable, so you’re feeling exposed. It’s a natural contraction,” she answered.
I hired this coach to help me prepare for my first keynote presentation. I’d thought after I’d succeeded with this task I’d feel relieved or maybe even elated! But instead I wanted to hibernate in a dark room with two Tylenol and a pot of herbal tea. I guess my coach was right: I was hungover without the Pinot Grigio.
I get this kind of hangover after vulnerable conversations, after trying out new jokes on the comedy stage, and after doing something new and stretchy at work. When snakes shed their skin as they grow, they also feel vulnerable and hide away. I imagine their new, bigger snake suit feels glossy and nice, but also tender.
I’m sharing this because these vulnerability hangovers still surprise me when they happen. “Shouldn’t I feel amazing? I did a new/hard/good thing!” I think to myself. “Why do I feel so crappy?!”
When a vulnerability hangover strikes me I try to be gentle with myself and remind myself that this kinda hangover means I’m growing. Lots of water and cozy blankets help, too. I’d rather have a vulnerability hangover than an old, too tight, dried out snake suit.
Do you get vulnerability hangovers, too? If so, how do you take care of you when they come your way?
If you’re looking to grow, shed some skin, and have groovy snakes to slither with (sorry, not sorry!) there’s still time to get in on the fun we’re having starting today and for the next six weeks in The Sandbox for Intuition Development + Creative Expression.
You can join one or more of the playshops, even if you’re not available for the whole 6-week series:
Playshop 1: Creative You – Creativity as Your Essential Nature (Fri, Oct 6)
Playshop 2: Creative Blocks – Healing the Creative Wounds (Fri, Oct 13)
Playshop 3: Creative Nourishment – Practices that Support Your Creativity and Flow (Fri, Oct 20)
Playshop 4: Creative Expression – Connecting with your Unique and Authentic Expression (Fri, Oct 27)
Playshop 5: Creative Expansion -Coloring Outside of the Lines and Expanding Your Creative Range (Fri, Nov 3)
Playshop 6: Creative Force of Nature – Creative cycles and the Magical Art of Completion (Fri, Nov 10)
When you register for a Playshop, you can hop into any of the Sandbox sessions as well to spend time creating in community.
By the way, the solo traveling mom ended up sitting a few rows in front of me on my flight back to LA last week. I noticed she took a nice long nap on the six hour trip, and I trust she had a lot of fun in LA and has fully recovered from any and all hangovers — vulnerability or otherwise. 🙂
I hope if you’re also feeling a bit tender, vulnerable, or stretchy these days you know that you’re experiencing new/hard/good things and you’re not alone. And if you’ve got a vulnerability hangover, hang in there and do what feels good to you in times of growth.
“Does that mean they can’t fly to Italy?” I asked the Swiss Air agent at the Los Angeles airport.
“They can fly because they’re old enough, but we don’t offer the service to help them transit in Zurich,” the agent relayed, scratching the black stubble of his beard. He looked up and said, “Swiss Air allows them to fly unaccompanied if they’re twelve or older. But they have to get through passport control and change gates on their own.”
This conversation took place a year ago as the boys prepared to fly to Italy for to visit their Papa. I scanned the faces of Sam and Oliver, then 12 and 14 years old. They seemed fine.
Me? I wasn’t fine. Ripples of anxious heat pumped through every vein in my body thinking of them getting stuck in The Terminal: Zurich Edition (cut to scene of two young kids sleeping on the floor at a gate and living on Swiss crackers for days like mini-Tom Hanks).
This was a bridge we’d never crossed.
In Will Rogers State Park there’s a bridge high up in the Santa Monica mountains. In my couple of years in California, I’d hiked to this bridge dozens of times and always stopped at the bridge, stretched, and turned around. Maybe it was the steep drop on both sides of the bridge that boomeranged me back down the hill. At some point it became habit.
The turnaround point
At the Swiss Air check-in, Sam and Oliver glanced at each other. “It’s okay, Mom,” they agreed nonchalantly. The boys had never flown as solo global airline travelers before, but I knew I’d taught them all I know about travel, relying on themselves, each other, and asking for help. I knew they’d be accompanied in all ways.
I wasn’t sure they’d make their connection or drink anything but Coke on the trip, but I trusted throughout this sixteen-hour journey and beyond there’d be goodness for us all.
After watching them wave goodbye to me at the Los Angeles airport through eyes soaked in tears, I headed to Will Rogers Park for a hike.
I hesitated at the passing but finally walked across the high up bridge. It didn’t even teeter in the wind, I thought, and kept climbing. The navy and silver currents of the Pacific Ocean to the west and snowcapped San Bernardino mountains to the east were even more magnificent up here. Walking back down to the now not-so-formidable bridge, a father and daughter sat at my resting spot. “She wants to turn around here,” said the father to me casually, plausibly looking for my support.
“There’s a beautiful view on the other side,” I nudged, smiling at them as they chugged water in unison. “I used to always turn around here,” I confessed. “I guess I was afraid of how steep it was. But today I went over and up, and I’m glad I did.” The father winked at me in silent thanks. Then the pair stood up and strolled across the bridge.
The kids now always fly to Europe on their own and I now always ceremoniously cross the bridge on my hikes.
I’m sharing this story with you because there may be a metaphoric bridge or two you haven’t crossed. Maybe you haven’t felt ready. Maybe the timing wasn’t right.
And I’m guessing life is presenting you with a bridge or two you think you aren’t ready to cross but the wind is pushing you in that direction. Maybe you’re not “ready” but you are prepared, accompanied, and stronger than you know. Maybe it’s time to check out the view on the other side.
If you need a little or a lotta support crossing a bridge, I’ve got you. We’re beginning The Sandbox for Intuition Development + Creative Expression on Friday, October 6th and I’m extending the early registration window for one more week until Saturday, September 30th. Also, there will be a way to join us for parts of the series if you can’t join the whole shebang. More details to come!
The formidable bridge looking not so formidable from the other side
Two years ago I started writing morning pages, described by Julia Cameron as three pages of longhand, stream of consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. According to creativity expert Cameron, morning pages serve as a bedrock of creative recovery. On day 4 of my newfound creativity practice in barely readable cursive I penned, “So far I’ve just written two pages per day but I’m sure I’ll get to three! Keep writing! Keep the pen moving and just write! Can I refill my coffee now? It’s 7:30 a.m. Okay, just come back quickly.”
Awakening creativity in this mama includes a lot of self-talk and caffeine.
After a first page of blabbering about my waking dream and the groovy new purple gel pens I’d bought at Target the day before a shift happened. It’s as if my pen was writing to me, or dare I say to all of us:
Creativity isn’t an aspect of your life; it’s WHO YOU ARE. It’s your truth. It’s your expression. Your divine nature. Your birthright. It may be expressed in infinite ways and isn’t just the words you write, the story you tell, or the picture you paint. It’s the spirit of your soul. You ARE A CREATOR and your expression yearns to flow through all parts of your life.
Kimberly’s morning pages, August 30, 2021
What followed were the practical and energetic steps to declare, nourish, express, and remove blocks of creativity in my own life.
Did I sit up straight in my chair and implement these key steps to ignite my own creativity immediately? Um, no.
Rick Rubin describes the Source of creativity as a cloud. “Clouds never truly disappear, “he writes. “They change form. They turn into rain and become part of the ocean, and then evaporate and return to being clouds.”
My own ideas about creativity that bright morning were burgeoning cumulus clouds floating over me, raining down wisdom on my morning page, and then moving on. I’ve come back to the precipitious words many times over the last two years but never moved the inspiring ink to action. Until now!
Over the summer I’ve cultivated a series of “Playshops” and an offering called Reimagining the Sandbox: Connecting with Your Creative Essence. I’m THRILLED to offer this series, to help myself and others reconnect with our essential nature as creative beings. The six-week series will support our creative goals (no matter how small or big) and provide an environment where we can playfully express and expand our creative abilities.
To find out more about what we’re going to get messy with as we reimagine the sandbox of childhood days past, please visit: https://www.newyorkminutes.org/sandbox/
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