This topic has been circling around in my brain for weeks, literally. I remember sitting in my living room while my dogs were at daycare, reveling in the peace and quiet – I cued up the latest Danielle LaPorte podcast and was listening intently, hanging on every word she said. By the way, if you want to know my girl crush, it’s her – I can listen to that woman speak truth for days. Anyways, she said something in that episode that’s stuck with me since. She was talking about her past and how she used whatever pain she was going through at the time to create. Create work, create art, create something – literally transmuting the pain into some form of creation rather than just letting it eat her alive.
I got to thinking – we’re always going through something painful. I think that’s the human journey, we’re always learning, we’re always growing. Even if we’re at a standstill in life, that can still be its own special form of pain. What we do with that pain though is our choice. We can either let it destroy us – completely eat us alive from the inside out, and most often allow some kind of physical illness to manifest in the body as a result. Or…. we could use the pain as fuel to create something.
I’ll give you a personal example. The last few months have been…. Overwhelming to say the least. After being at a standstill with my work for far longer than I care to admit, a light sparked and I dove deep into different rabbit holes with different projects. As vulnerable as I can be here, I have some stress-triggered autoimmune issues to be aware of and sometimes even I lose sight of my own self-care. I felt like what I actually did was dig my hands into fresh dirt and pull up all kinds of crystals and gems of ideas and projects and instead of picking one, starting it and completing it before moving onto the next, in great Misty fashion I chose multiple to start on. Afterall, what better way to get the ball moving than to create massive momentum in all the things – isn’t that what business leaders teach us? So I did that, and it was going amazing for a while – I was making so much progress on writing my first book, I already had my visionboard workshop created to be cued up for online release, tons of ideas flowed through my head – and I struggled to keep the balance between all of that, my health, my personal life, my responsibilities, all of it. And as the October 2019 me recapitulates back to Misty’s of old, this is usually when I stop listening to my intuition. It’s when I let my ego and my fear take over and steal the show, and rather than allowing divine flow to course through my veins and overflow into everything I do, I allow my fear and anxiety and not-enoughness to override. This doesn’t just happen in my work life by the way – this happens in all the areas. Instead of listening to that intuitive voice – something Meggan Watterson, author of Reveal, the book that’s currently rocking my world – calls the soul-voice, I let my brain decide what to do, completely ignoring every red flag and blaring stop light being raised inside of me.
Fast forward a bit, still not listening to my body, still not listening to my intuition, still not listening to that soul-voice that says you need to stop, you need to rest, don’t go on that trip, you’re actually really craving ________. I did what I knew to do and press on with the plans I had for myself. Sound familiar? One thing in particular I was extremely on the fence about was taking a work trip to Utah for the doTERRA convention. This is a trip we go on every year, but this year was so different – I literally had no desire to go. In fact, everything inside me was telling me not to go. I felt like i had an obligation to show up though, and truthfully there were some magnificent women I missed terribly that I really did want to see. But aside from that though, I just had no interest. And instead of following that intuitive guidance, I went. It was a good trip, don’t get me wrong, but looking back on what happened after the fact was so poetic that I wondered if I had followed that intuitive guidance if I would’ve ended up in a much different place health wise.
Stress, anxiety, lack of really quality sleep and good food mixed with travel always ends me up in a pickle. Not long after I landed, there it came – a sickness that knocked me out for a good week and a half or so. The interesting thing about me when I get sick, it always seems to happen when I have a lull in my schedule – it’s like my body knows, ok you know what if we’re going to get sick, we’re going to do it now because it’ll have the least amount of ramifications for her. So much happened in that week and a half though.
Because I was literally forced to stay home and rest, literally forced to mind my own health and self-care, I actually ended up getting more work done than I probably would have had I been healthy. And, to be truthful, from a much different vibrational space. I had so much time to look back over the last few months and see all the signs and signals that were so clear to me now when I paused to actually look at them and see how they compounded into what was manifesting now. There were intuitive hits and guidance along the entire way – both things to do and things not to do, people who magically came into my life and people who I tried to force to be in my life, opportunities that were actively seeking me and things I was trying to force to happen. Remember the last podcast episode about force vs flow? Yeah, that’s what I’m talking about here. It was like someone took my blinders off – except what needed to happen all along, was just to pause, observe and act accordingly. And trust. That was a big awareness – the lack of trust I have within myself that my soul actually knows exactly what’s right and wrong for me and that I need to trust listening to it because it’s actually for my highest good.
The good news – In the week that I was sick, I finished my book and sent it to a proofreader, I got my online visionboard workshop cued up and ready for a launch, I received some intuitive guidance to create a monthly self-care forecast newsletter, I looked into so many different ways to bring an art project to life, I finished reading one of the books I dove into and started 2 new ones that are just magic to my soul – I’ve taken care of myself in a way I haven’t in a really long time, I’ve fed my body amazing food, I’ve taken a long break from working out (something my body has actually been asking me for also), I’ve slept – so much – another thing my body has been asking me for. I’ve just been giving my body the things it’s been asking me for, and in return I’ve been able to infuse amazing energy into my projects. While painful in so many ways, that week was full of beautiful awareness and healing. The awareness was stark for me – There’s room for both – there’s room for self-care, self-love and growth and expansion in all areas of life.
That’s what I’m talking about with using pain to create though – all the month of September with the fall equinox was asking us to pause, to take care of ourselves, to listen to our hearts over our heads. Let the heart lead, let your love pour out to yourself first. As with every fall, things fall away to make room for other things to flow through. A lot of the time we have a death grip on these things, as most people I’ve found have a scarcity complex – we’re afraid to let things go, even when we know they aren’t working or don’t serve our highest good. There’s such a beauty from allowing things to go that want to go though – there’s so much gratitude to be gained, so much respect and honor for those things or people and what they brought to the surface for you to help you heal through something, awaken to something. That’s the power of this time of the year – so many people are going through such deep healing and the best thing we can do is take care of ourselves. In October, the energy is asking us to say no to overload too – you can read more about that by signing up for my monthly self-care forecast newsletter, but suffice it to say that September forced us in a lot of ways to pull back and focus on ourselves and our own growth so we could really operate from a space in October to decide what’s really in alignment with our growth and what we say yes to. Remember, if it isn’t a hell yes then it’s a no. Always. Listen to your soul and what it says.
I do think it’s important though to have something to bring all that pain into though. I remember when this happened last year around this time and before – I felt like I had nothing to plug all that pain and energy into, and so conversely I allowed it to eat at my energy most of the year. It was awful, and remembering that deep internal pain, I have so much compassion for that girl when I look at this season of my life this year and how it’s so vastly different from the me just a year ago. I think that’s the beauty in life though, I think we can grow and expand like dandelions every day if we let ourselves – one day you don’t see the growth and then the next day it’s everywhere. I think one of the keys to this though is to have the courage to become still long enough to breathe, take a step back, observe. It’s almost like coming into a state of our higher self where we’re taking a bird’s eye view of what’s happening in our life. Where are we clutching? What are we feeling? How are we using those feelings to create things in our lives? How are we showing up to life? Are we taking steps towards the life we actually want? How are the people in our lives showing up, are they contributing to the life we want? I think this might be what’s most scary for people – the pause. We’ve come so accustomed to the busyness and the chaos and the struggle – there’s so much comfort in those energies for most people that not having that energy is terrifying. I wonder if it’s something you can work on giving yourself in any small way in October though? Can you mindfully set aside some time each day, even if it’s 5 minutes, to just not do anything. Don’t be on technology, don’t listen to music, don’t input any information – just be still with your body and your thoughts. Work at it, it’s like a muscle, you have to build it over time. But start, please.
Back to using the pain to create – I have to wonder for you – if you don’t currently have a project, be it work or art or creative or something – is there something in you that’s been dying to come out and be created? I have to offer you the invitation too – if whatever your thing is, if it’s something you currently don’t know how to do or have no idea how you’d bring it to life, what better project to pool any pains or struggles or frustrations into than birthing something completely brand new for you and bringing that into the light? Marie Forleo always says everything is figureoutable – and I know that to be true. You didn’t come into this life with the skills you currently have, you learned them somewhere along the way. You can learn whatever it is you’re needing to learn to birth this new project into being – even if it’s only for you. Even if no one on the planet knows about it or sees it but you – it’s still worth doing. Allow it to be cathartic. Allow it to absorb all the emotions and thoughts of what you’re going through, let it be your therapy. When you birth something into the world, I feel like you’re doing it for you, but you’re also doing it for others benefit in some way – which is great, and it’s noble and it’s inspiring. But sometimes…. You just gotta do something for you, for your own healing, something that no one else needs to know about.
Find that thing. Give that gift to yourself. Go after that time with yourself as fiercely as you can and with as much love as you can muster up for yourself. That’s where it all begins afterall, with ourselves.
Oh and one last thing – I have to tell you thank you. So much. I got a message from a friend the other day telling me that he sent one of my podcast episodes to a friend of his that was going through some stuff and he said it really helped him. I kinda went whaaaa?! Really? It’s a funny thing about doing these – you don’t really know if they’re having any impact, if anyone is really listening or even interested or if you’re just…. Literally talking to yourself. Not that I mind that, I have some of the best conversations with myself, but really, truly, thank you for spending some time with me – it’s always my intention to bring to you what’s helping me in the moment in hopes that it finds someone somewhere that needs it. Afterall, I think that’s the way I find these things – from the people that are doing the very same thing. When I heal, you heal, when you heal, I heal – one by one we collectively get to raise the vibration of the planet together just by choosing to work through our shit, individually but collectively.
So again, thank you, I’m so grateful for you.
Until next time, adventure on…
