the beauty of real

Words from March 17: Today was a little girl home from school and pink eye and cancelled meetings and cuddles and movies and working in tiny slivers of time and a very sweet pediatrician and bangs that made me happy and cherry tree blooms moving on to unfurling green and chocolate chip cookies and taxes and paperwork and several "holy cats!" moments of adulting and more complaining than I'd like to do and a list of joy made in my head and a list of real made right here while I tried not to burn the hamburgers on this gorgeous night where the light is luminous and I'm feeling gratitude for the inbetween moments that bring me back home.

Sometimes you have to snap a photo and pair it with pieces of the true stories that make up a day. Use the prompt "today" and just start writing down every word.

There is so much beauty in telling the true, real stories. 

(Imagine a journal filled with images + words. Now imagine reading your grandmother's journal like this. Or even a stranger's. I think of that song "Virginia Woolf" by the Indigo Girls and the idea that someone else's journal can become a letter to your soul. Yes. Yes. Yes. And writing it out, taking self-portraits, telling the true stories is like writing a love letter to your own soul. For real. Love that image. Love it.)

and then there's laughter

Over here I'm in that space of climbing a somewhat steep learning curve with a few aspects of my business while trying to find a rhythm now that Jon and Ellie are back to school while also processing the news we received earlier this month that we don't have a lot of time left with our sweet golden Millie. And, you know, just being human in the midst of it all. Diving into these topics isn't actually what I want to talk about today (that will come); rather, I want to talk about one huge self-care move I'm making that's helping me right now. 

And that self-care move? Laughter.

If you've been around here a while, you know I'm a bit obsessed with lip syncing. As in there was that one time I recorded myself lip syncing "Jolene" by Dolly Parton and put the video up on the internet. As in having lip sync parties is something we do at my retreats now. For real. As in watching videos of Jimmy Fallon and guests lip syncing delight me to the tips of my toes.

And last week, while I was navigating this stuff over here, a dear frind texted me the link to Ellen Degeneres and Jimmy Fallon's lip sync battle first thing in the morning. After I finished up a few phone calls, I pressed play and in a few moments, I noticed that I was smiling so big my cheeks were starting to hurt.

When it was over, it was like I'd relaxed into myself again. I felt a lightness inside and around me. And laughter and connection and joy were the cause.

So I settled in for more. And over the last week I've been taking a little time each day to get my laugh on.

I watched Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. The Trevor Noah episode was brilliant - I laughed and my world view was flipped on it's head. (Seriously.) 

I watched clips from Stephen Colbert's new show.

I watched Kevin Hart on The Tonight Show and laughed until I cried over his Jay Z story. (You might not, but something about the way he tells that story just made me laugh. I'm. Still. Laughing.)

I rewatched Amy Schumer doing just about anything.

I watched Stevie Wonder sing (and maybe teared up while laughing).

And each day, for just a little while at least, I was grounded in the awesome that is deep, real laughter.

Sometimes when you're standing on an edge in your life, when you're deep in the learning or even in the grief, it helps to invite in laughter to remind yourself that the light is always there. 

Maybe call up that friend who always has the best stories to tell. Or ask your dad to tell you that one story that makes you laugh every time. Or invite that friend for coffee who is the person you can be your most ridiculous self with. 

Or spend your lunch break, like I've been doing lately, with Jerry Seinfeld or Stephen Colbert or Amy Schumer.

Laughter can bring you back to center honey. Choosing to laugh isn't about not acknowledging the tough stuff. No. It's about inviting in the light so the tough stuff doesn't feel so lonely. It's about standing with others on the common ground that laughter gives us.

What I find again and again is that comedians are the truth tellers of our time. They have their finger on the pulse of the absurd, of the challenging, and even of the truth of grief. I actually think that there's a real chance you'll feel deeply seen in the midst of whatever you find yourself experiencing when you take a few moments to spend some time with a comedian or two.

An invitation: Now tell me, what makes you laugh in your corner of the world? An author, a show, a person in your life? I'd love to know. Please share in the comments.

when first aid self-care isn't enough

from my one move mini inspiration deck 

I'm currently in the Great North Woods of Wisconsin visiting my mom and today began my "official" break from social media, work email, and several other areas of my business. 

Today, I want to share a story that will give you some insight into why I knew the time had come. When I wrote the following note to the beautiful souls on my newsletter list a couple of weeks ago, I didn't realize I was actually going to take a break like this. But writing those words and then having two really honest conversations with a few kindred spirits plus a conversation with my mom helped me to see that this really was the only option to truly help me water my soul in the deep ways I need to right now. I have a little post-script at the bottom of this note, so if you're on my list and you read these words already, I hope you'll scroll down and read it.

*****

I drove up to Seattle and met with my yoga and meditation teacher today, something I've been doing every two weeks or so this summer. And somewhere during our conversation and chanting practice, I shed a layer of skin. I mean I literally shed it and left it behind me to be carried out her front door by the wind.

Driving home, I was listening to Mary Oliver read poetry, and when she read the poem "Yes! No!" I was struck, like I always am, by the line, "To pay attention, this is our endless and proper work." 

As she continued to read, I felt the lightness that had started to grow within me while sitting on the floor across from my teacher begin to shine through my fingertips.

This is it. This is when you need to pay attention, when the deep hum inside you begins to sing. 

After the end of the school year and the June retreat and the visit from my inlaws and the launch of the Inner Excavate-along, which has more than 500 people participating in a read-along of Inner Excavation, I was beginning to feel depleted. I mean to look at me was to see this busy, getting it done, pretty positive woman. But to really see me was to see shadows under my eyes and lots of swirling thoughts and a feeling of letting people down while being pulled in many directions and knowing I just needed to be still.

To be really really still.

So I did my thing. I danced it out. I reached for gratitude. I made lists of things that bring me joy. I took five deep breaths. I used my oils. I connected even more with a new friend who I can go have coffee with and just be me.

And these things helped. A lot. But they weren't enough. 

One night found me looking up my teacher online and booking a private session with her. Well, actually the window to book the session was open for four days before I made my move. And when I say, "my teacher" here, I mean Laura Yon, the magical, wise woman who I did my two-year yoga teacher training with 10 years ago. 

On the day of the first appointment earlier this summer, I chatted and chatted and chatted, hardly taking a breath for the first 10 minutes or so. Bringing her up to date on "all of it." It had been a few years since I'd seen her, so words about my business and marriage and motherhood and so many followers on Pinterest and on and on and on just kept tumbling out.

And then we took a few deep breaths. And chanted. And sat in the quiet. And when we opened our eyes, she looked at me and said, "Oh, there you are."

I sighed deeply knowing I was in the right place.

Her next words were, "What are you doing for self-care?"

And I was flummoxed for a minute. I'm not kidding. I didn't really have an answer. I mean I started saying all these things about coloring with Ellie and taking five deep breaths and dancing it out, but I didn't have an answer to what I knew she was really asking, an answer to "What is your practice? What are you doing alone to be still and quiet your mind?"

And in that moment I felt the deep truth of knowing I had let first aid self-care take over.

As my business has grown so much in the last two years, as so many changes have occurred behind the scenes in the last 9 months or so, and in my zeal to help others find their practices, I had forgotten to notice when it was time to sit in the quiet and notice my own deep needs. Well, I had noticed, but I kept pushing it away and filling the space with something else.

It feels like such a risk to share this because the fear is of course that saying it aloud means no one will want or respect a teacher who admits what real life looks like sometimes.

But the truth is, so often we teach what we need. And we don't always practice what we know even when we know we need it. 

This is why it is called a practice.

What came to the surface today is that it's time to really commit to the practice I've been working with over the last few weeks since beginning to meet with Laura again. To commit. Like big time. To shed the excuses and the other stories that stop me and commit.

As we talked today and then as we sat in the quiet together, I began to realize that I want to go even deeper here in this space with you. When I'm here writing the words, "Hello Beautiful Soul," I don't want to be distracted by all the pins on Pinterest telling me what I "should" be doing to grow my audience/use social media/stand out/get you to "click through" and how the list goes on.

No.

Instead, I want to invite you to come along to another layer of a conversation about creative self-care and mindful living and building that bridge between daily life and our longings. In some ways, this won't be new, but it will be a return to making this newsletter space about stories that I share just with you. 

And it feels really important to say this: First aid self-care is a good thing. It is needed. We all need it. I love it and will continue to teach it and share ideas here and in the other spaces you find me online. It's what gets us through "survival mode" and the big stuff and the small stuff too, especially in certain seasons of our lives. We need to use it daily. But we also need something to deeply anchor us each day, something that gives us space to separate from the noise and find stillness and find a place to hear our own deep, true voice within and to connect with whatever we're drawn to that is greater than us. 

If you're reading this and thinking you don't know where to begin, you're in the right place. We'll have these conversations together.

Blessings,

Liz

PS Since writing these words a couple of weeks ago, I've received quite a few emails from people with words of kindness (thank you!) and a few wondering about the difference between first aid self-care and the kind of self-care practice I'm talking about. Some people have wondered what my practice is. Others have shed some tears realizing that they've been practicing only first aid self-care as well and don't know what to do next. I want you to know that I hear you. I'm going to be sharing more about my own practice and talking more about this topic in my newsletter and here in this space. 

But I really want you to let go of feeling bad about first aid self-care. Reread the part above where I say it is a good thing. It really truly is. But when it isn't sustaining you anymore, and you know this, it's time to turn inward and look at what you really need. I realized that I needed an almost full stop break from the stacked up life of a woman running a home-based business. And I realize being able to take this break is a privilege. Big time.

After Labor Day, I'll be back here in this space sharing some of what I've noticed during my break along with stories from the last year that I've been wanting to tell you. Getting back to more stories in this space is a priority.

And another priority is sharing an even deeper layer of the stories with the beautiful souls on my newsletter list. When I write to you in that space, I really do feel like I'm sitting in the quiet early morning hours before everyone else is awake writing a letter with pen and paper to a friend who I know will catch my words and listen. It's such a gift to write back and forth in that space. And I do read every reply. I almost always reply back, though from time to time it takes a while, like it will with my last note.

Thanks for reading this long note, for being here, for walking beside me. I'm off to play in Grandma's backyard with Ellie. 

and then on a day in June

There are so many stories inside me about the photos I don't have. 

Over the years I've seen so many mama and baby photos and I've wished I had those photos. Those gorgeous, real-life, this is holy and hard and gorgeous photos of a mama with her baby. I've wished I'd had a photographer take photos of my little family when Ellie was born, and then right before her surgery, and then right after, and then when she was one and two...

Of course, this wishing hasn't meant that I haven't been present to the beauty of the everyday moments. Noticing the everyday beauty is "my jam" as they say.

But you can be present to that beauty and still wish sometimes.

I wanted a photo that captured how it felt to be her mama. A photo that captured the joy that is there even if only at the edges some days. A photo that said, "Amidst it all, she feels this joy, this love." A photo that said, "You're doing a good job Mama. You really are." A photo that captured both of us - the magic, the silliness, the softness, the connection. A photo that would gently push me to shed another layer of how I wish that first year could have been for her, for us. And honestly, a photo that did all that while capturing me in a way that wouldn't distract me from the story. I wanted to feel beautiful in that photo.

Of course I could tell the story with my words and with my camera and I have again and again. And that piece is so important. Self-healing, as my friend Pam says, is an important piece of unpacking the stories and feeling seen by one's self, which is vital in my opinion. But still, I felt that ache of wanting to be seen by someone who would deeply get it. I wanted to hold that evidence in my hands so I simply couldn't deny it.

And then on a day in June, Tara Whitney arrived, and Ellie took her hand within minutes and said, "Come and see my room." And a little girl's laughter and a photographer's wisdom and kindness created space for me to relax into myself, to relax into that joy and love. And before I even saw the photos, that little wish that was more like a crack in my heart stitched right up. 

There are so many gorgeous photos from this day that I'll be sharing, including one of me and Jon that has me saying, "Yes, this is exactly how I feel" even when that feeling can feel far away from time to time after this many years together. And several of all three of us that make my heart burst with joy. But this photo. This one. I had to show you because I'm so grateful for the ways you've held my story these past few years and I knew you would get it. 

Photo by Tara Whitney (who is full of magic and grace and delight.)

let it be simple

Bonnie snapped this photo last week of a corner of my desk in the studio, and it just sums up the mantra I need right now. Today, I'm alone here at home for a few hours, and all I want to do is just sit in the quiet and be still for a while. No work. No people. No social media. No business strategies. Just quiet. Just me. 

My list of posts I want to write and things I need to do is long. And I'm excited about so much on that list. But there is also the piece of needing rest. Of needing space. Of needing to let it be simple.

And I don't mean suddenly deciding to declutter or try a capsule wardrobe or make a big change that actually isn't simple at all (for me) but seems like it should be, which is a move I often make when these feelings arrive.

No.

I mean listening even more closely to the deep desires within me and moving from there.

Letting it be simple by continuing to shed the shoulds and the "who do you think you are" stories that try to crowd back inside my brain and heart even when I think I released them long ago.

Letting it be simple by opening up and sharing more of the stories here even if it's hard to know if anyone is actually reading them because we're so focused on scrolling and likes and social media strategies these days.

Letting it be simple by recognizing that I'm only one person but that I can ask for help.

Letting it be simple by making one move toward the longings. (Just one move today.)

Letting it be simple by saying no.

Letting it be simple by saying the deep, true "Yes" when it calls to me.

Letting it be simple by showing up and letting the words just come out onto the page even if they're clunky.

Letting it be simple by just being me.

That doesn't mean it is easy. 

No.

It means that so often we look for the answers outside ourselves when we simply, truly, need to step back and find that quiet and simply look within.

And listen.

So I'm off to sit in the quiet for a bit this morning before diving back into the juiciness this afternoon.

When your soul is saying you need to be alone in the quiet, I've learned that you should listen honey.

Because that's the kind of should that isn't a should at all but is instead your own wisdom guiding you.

Yes.