This is Someday with Impact Media Producer Charlene SanJenko

What if your someday started today? Someday I’ll write that book, I’ll say that thing, I’ll push that envelope, I’ll take that stand, I’ll find that courage to become what I’ve always known I’m made to be.

I call this a core story. It’s the double edge sword of everything you are made as. It’s the story you can’t run fast enough from and the story you can’t run fast enough to. It’s the conscious, or unconscious narrative that drives every turning point of your life. It’s okay if you don’t believe me. This isn’t a faith-based thing. This is a story, and every story is a mystery. Your life unfolds clue by clue until in your very last breath you turn around to see, you’ve had the answer all along.

Your Story from the Core is also the medicine you give the world, and the same medicine you need. It is also your personalized poison, a consistent resistance that grows you…

THIS IS SOMEDAY is an interview series with people who are living, giving and contributing from the core of who they are. This is their medicine. This is also their poison. This is their someday that they are living today.

CHARLENE SANJENKO

This is Someday was recorded on the land known as Nex̱wlélex̱m (Bowen Island), in Kanata (Canada), Turtle Island (North America) on the unceded and ancestral territories of the Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish) people. TinaOlife acknowledges the ancestors, supernatural ones, hereditary leaders and matriarchs, all land, water and air creatures for their stewardship.  I offer this story within their story and this story within yours.  All relations as one story.

WHO IS CHARLENE SANJENKO?

Charlene SanJenko is an Indigenous Impact Producer + Media Visionary, braiding for better by brokering impact, building brand value using advertising dollars better.

She believes that impact media will follow in the footsteps of impact investing this decade. As the Indigenous Founder of PowHERhouse, Charlene SanJenko is a bridge between two cultures in our country. 

Charlene is from the Splatsin tribe, the most southern tribe of the Shuswap Nation in British Columbia and now resides on the beautiful Sunshine Coast with her husband, Ben, and step-daughter, Willow, since 2004, the traditional territory of the Squamish (skwxwú7mesh) First Nations where she enjoys hiking, horses, and regular connection with nature. 

A former two-term Gibsons municipal politician, competitive athlete + performance coach, social impact entrepreneur since 2000, YWCA Women of Distinction Award Nominee (2014), and community economic development enthusiast, Charlene is able to see the End Game, walk through a growth plan, and synthesize the efforts necessary to enjoy the greatest leverage, clarity, traction, and fulfillment for individual leaders, communities, and the collective whole. 

In the mid-90’s Charlene worked in a privately owned brokerage firm in the investment services industry. Her days were spent placing trades on various stock markets and keeping blue-buy tickets and pink-sell tickets straight. Now, Charlene brokers impact. Since 2013, Charlene has led a passionate team at PowHERhouse Impact Media Group in the digital media arts space, thriving to create and produce trajectory-shifting projects, programming, and meaningful experiences.

To shift society, we must shift the narrative. Charlene believes that media is the most powerful trajectory-shifting vehicle of our generation. The total advertising expenditure in North America (2019) was $253.6 billion U.S. dollars and is projected to reach $254 billion dollars by the end of 2022. Charlene is a media visionary and a broker of impact who is innovating a path to use brand dollars better to shift behaviours before they become social, environmental, and economic problems.

THE CONVERSATION

TinaO: I’m always happy to sit down and listen to a visionary, you specifically. So I’m super grateful to have this time to lean into some of the bigger questions that are unfolding for you into wisdom and answers and more questions. And I just want to thank you for being with me today and taking some time to check in and dive in. So thanks for being here.

Charlene: Thank you. Yeah, I appreciate it. It’s like the wiser we get the more questions we have.

TinaO: This feels like a really good segue into my first question for you as a visionary. I don’t think I’ve had visionaries in my life before, so getting to know and experience you has taught me a lot about all the things that come with that title. I’ve heard you say many times: I see you, I see all of you. I wonder if you can share with me what that means, and what it is like being a visionary.

Charlene: Well, it’s it’s both a really fun and a really frustrating place. As a visionary, you primarily see possibility, and then you immediately jump to the fullest potential of any situation, human being, or opportunity. You jump right to 100%, and then you gauge your conversations and your actions based on how prepared you think the other person or the other party is.

You jump right in at 100% then you gauge your actions based on prepared you think the other party is.

Charlene sanjenko – what is a visionary

TinaO: And of course, I’ve been on the receiving end of that. From my side, I want to share that sometimes it feels like the most exquisite invitation. We’ve talked before about the impact of really being seen. It’s as if the permission slips needed for that woman or leader just fall from the sky. I’ve been on that side of the visionary piece, and that alone has catapulted me forward in many places in my life and work.

I’ve also been on another side of it. I don’t know if this is just a Gen X thing, or part of growing up in a big family, but I’ve also experienced: “Don’t you tell me who you think I am…” I have felt that on the inside too. Usually about three days later, I ask myself What if she’s right? What if she’s wrong? What if we’re both right? What if we’re both wrong?

Charlene asked TinaO to open the FireCircle 2021 Global Conference with her solo-show OMYGOD, a storytelling for reconciliation experience about the women we burned, the babies we buried and the Gods we worship.

Charlene: I love that. I love that. That’s the invitation: healthy conflict, because then I say, ‘Show me’. So it’s kind of that baiting, you know, baiting someone or something on. Show me differently, you know, like, let’s go, let’s play. As long as I have sparked something, my job is done. As long as I wake it up so I can take a look at it, I will push a button and expect pushback. Great! Because then I know you’re alive. You know?

WHAT IS IMPACT MEDIA?

TinaO: Let’s jump into impact media. You’ve been working in media as an impact champion for the last decade or more. Can you help us understand what impact media means? I’m a core story person so I have to ask:

Do you think you chose impact media? Or do you think Impact Media chose you?

Charlene: That’s a good question. I think impact media ‘invited’ me with a curiosity or calling, but I chose it when I chose to make a commitment to pursue it and play the spark of an idea all the whole through to the full realization of a vision. Otherwise, it’s just an idea.

I can trace it back. I’ve always been inspired by Oprah’s impact in the world. I’ve always been frustrated by botox and fake boobs on magazine covers. I’ve always been deeply inspired by an uplifting musical performance or theatre show where your heart is opened right up.

For every sensory experience that we have, it’s either going to bring us up, or it’s going to bring us down. It’s either going to bring us closer to who we really are, or distract us away from it.

I just watched five people being shot in about five seconds… Is that taking me closer to the human being I want to be? Or is that taking me further away? I believe media is the most powerful influencer of us and who we currently are, and who we want to be as a society. I don’t think there’s anything more powerful. Impact media deliberately and intentionally chooses to lift society, one project at a time, one experience at a time, one creative endeavor at a time, and one impact champion story at a time. If it is the most powerful tool out there lifting society, I want to be a part of it.

WHAT IS AN IMPACT CHAMPION?

TinaO: I think you just hit on the word that I’m really lit up about. I’m hearing you say that impact media is about bringing us closer to our human experience. I love this term impact champion, because an impact champion does just that. They aren’t the impact heckler, or an impact coach… they’re a champion.

Charlene: The cool thing about impact champions is that you can ‘do impact’ and develop or deliver impactful solutions while operating under the radar for years. You can be doing a world of good, and you certainly are a champion. However, most folks who end up finding and choosing to work with me have come to realize that the impact they’re here to make can be exponentially amplified, as they get brave enough to let others SEE them. When you’re hiding and doing good, you’re creating solutions, no doubt about it; but, are you shifting society? Are you shifting the behaviour of society?

When you’re hiding, you’re doing good and creating solutions, but are you shifting the behaviour of society?

Charlene sanjenko – being an impact champion

TinaO: You bring up a really interesting piece, having just completed a solo show and am currently beginning my campaign to release it beyond my control to hold it. Hands down, as an Artist of Impact, OMYGOD is the best work I’ve done so far. I showed up at a 100% I didn’t even know was possible. And the big aha for me is that I clearly have some control issues. What is this? Is it safety? Is it not wanting to be misunderstood? Is it not wanting to offend? I want to come back to impact champions and impact media, one of the great things about media is that it doesn’t belong to you once you release it. That’s impact. I wonder if that takes you anywhere?

Charlene: Yeah, it does. It brings up a few things. You’ve heard me say this, it’s not about you, it’s not about me, it’s about us. Your highest gifting doesn’t belong to you. We are all interconnected beings having an experience in this lifetime. When we find and bring out our highest gifting, that is for the interconnected mass that is us. It’s for all of us. For all of our relations. How did we get to be so insular? The release you’re talking about, when you experienced it, probably felt pretty good, because it’s natural. You are recognizing, Oh I get it. This is not about me, this is for us. This is for all of us. When I finally got that, things got lighter and more energized. I got out of my own way. But it also arrived with a sense of responsibility. Right? The world deserves all of you. How dare you not give it all. What gets me excited about impact media is, I feel like if I can work with those who are ready to show that, then that’s going to become the norm.

You’ve heard me say this before, humans are operating at only 15% of what I believe we’re fully capable of, if we would let ourselves play at our highest potential for our collective greatest good.

TinaO: Your story knocks, you answer, you serve it, and then you let it go.

MONEY LEFT ON THE TABLE

TinaO: You have this saying about money being left on the table. What does that mean in connection to impact media?

Charlene: If the game that we’re playing is to shift society by what we’re consuming through media every day, if we want our behaviours to elevate, to get upstream of the societal problems that are currently bogging us down on all levels, then let’s elevate what we’re paying attention to. 

As someone who came from an investment services background, I learned how to turn over all of the rocks to see who the players might be to put a deal together. The players in this game of impact media are: the impact champions or artists of impact who are creating the stories, impact producers like me who are willing, ready, and wanting to help those stories to be told, and the third piece, the conscious advertiser, brand and impact investor. I believe that the advertising industry wants to catch up with the social impact and social innovation industry. I believe that brands, brand specialists, conscious advertisers and marketing executives are out there who have done the personal growth work. Let’s call them the next level of more conscious and caring leaders.. They’re at a tipping point, and they want to invest in quality campaigns and quality projects. They have money to spend, and they are no longer happy creating commercials only to sell their products and services. Our job in the world of impact is to give them the clear and obvious stepping stones to really viable, interesting, quality campaigns, projects, and creative opportunities, because with them, their brand will be built, their customers and employees will be happy, and they’ll be positioned as an impact champion to all of their stakeholders, industry contacts, and future recruits. They are SEEN as the good guys they are, they’re literally helping to solve the world’s problems and elevating humanity, and again, pent-up energy is released that can be used for exponential impact  I just don’t see a downside. The market that’s currently being left on the table is over $250 billion in US dollars spent on advertising annually in North America.

TinaO: To quote you and your dry sense of impactful humour: This is a duhhhhh moment for advertisers and brands.

Their customers will be happy and the brand will be positioned as an impact champion. The market currently left on the table is over $250 billion US.

Charlene sanjenko – impact media producer

IMPACT MEDIA AND HOW HEALING HAPPENS

TinaO: I really think the world is sitting right on that edge of these kinds of decisions which brings me to my last question for you. You’re an indigenous woman, and I know that this year has been tremendously hard for you, specifically over the last few months (currently the remains of over 2000 Indigenous children have been located in unmarked graves across Canada). I also know that you’re grateful for the possibility of healing that can happen as the truth continues to be acknowledged. This happened. So there’s gratitude there for healing to happen, and I know that you care deeply about impact media for the greater good of the world. There’s so much I could ask here. Just this morning in GATHER for HER we heard from Indigenous Leader Nadine Bernard, Indigenous people are older than this country. From that core place, there are answers. I wonder what you might want to share with us as an indigenous woman with ancestral knowledge and wisdom, and as an impact champion yourself currently writing your first screenplay, what you might want to share with us about your journey. I realize that this question itself is its own conversation, but it feels key to me with impact media because it’s about coming home. Where do you want to go with this question?

Indigenous people are older than this country.

Nadine bernard – impact champion and guest on GATHER FOR HER

Charlene: For me, it is about coming home. At our very core, as humans, we realize how far we’ve gone from our center. I think when we let go of the distractions, I think we can all honestly agree that we’re off kilter. And I feel like if we can tune into our heart, our soul or whatever your word is, at our center, there is something that we’ve forgotten. I’m not going to say lost. I’m purposely saying that we’ve forgotten. We’ve gone a bit off track, and hence the coming home.

I think what pulls me to impact media so strongly is that ultimately, I’m an optimist. Ultimately, I’m the visionary, and I know it’s in there for most people. I see it. With enough little clues, enough little hits, enough little reminders, enough little insights I do believe as a society, that we can come back on track, and we can come home. Truth must come before reconciliation.

I think the power of what we see everyday can lead us there. Media can remind us of who we really are. Don’t forget who you really are… reminding us in little tiny hits of communication and conversation. I think it could be inevitable. I want to make it inevitable that as a society, we come back together. We come back to remembering why we’re here in the first place. We don’t need to get in a rocket ship and go somewhere else. We need to go deep inside with gratitude and remember why we’re here, that we are all connected.

THE POWER OF INDIGENOUS PEOPLE

Charlene: That’s the power that I believe, of indigenous peoples. We’re storytellers. There’s a reason that stories are passed down from generation to generation. It’s so we don’t forget who we are, and where we’ve come from, and what we believe, and what we value. So why wouldn’t we, being older than this country, why wouldn’t we choose to remember? We can return home and lift society with our media.

TinaO: I have two phrases that come to mind. One I will borrow from you: duh, and the other one is that Indigenous people are the original impact champions.

Charlene: Yes.

TinaO: This feels like a beautiful place to end.

Charlene SanJenko and I have been friends and colleagues now since I was merely months out of cancer treatment (2016). I saw what she was up to with PowHERtalks and I reached out to her. We had one conversation, one, but that conversation changed everything.

When she says: I see you, I see all of you, she means it. While neither one of us could’ve seen the book that is coming (Story Stones), the show I completed this year (OMYGOD), and the Storytelling for Reconciliation work I am building, she saw me. She saw my potential, and she named it, and gave me an opportunity to speak on stage. At that time (2015) I was far from being what we might call ‘ready’. I shook through the entire talk. I opened on a verse from a song that was playing during my first radiation treatment and I was so nervous, this singer (me) could barely stay on key.

But she’s a visionary. She doesn’t see who you are today, she doesn’t even pretend to see what you will do, she sees what is possible, what has potential, and what may be peaking around the corner for you if you’re willing to look.

In Charlene’s core, her story is one of calling.

She calls us to the Fire.

The Fire where we gather to remember, weave, and tell stories for seven generations of impact.

Thank you for listening.

To become an Impact Champion or Impact Investor reach out to Charlene directly at charlene@powherhouse.com

Tina Overbury is the writer and storyteller of OMYGOD – a storytelling for reconciliation experience about the women we burned, the babies we buried and the Gods we worship. She is a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection.

Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is devoted to global reconciliation through the exploration of origin stories, sharing our oral history, land-based knowing, and a continued focus on communication as a sacred practice.

She is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media as a core-communications specialist working with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a co-host of GATHER for HER, and a PowHERhouse Artist of Impact Amplify Coach helping leaders become artists and artists become leaders. 

OMYGOD – Press Conference



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday May 17th 2021

CONTACT:

Media Relations: Zoe Gray social@powherhouse.com

Impact Producer: Charlene SanJenko charlene@powherhouse.com

Artist: Tina Overbury tina@tinaolife.com


STORYTELLING FOR RECONCILIATION

AN IRELAND & CANADA STORY

Press Conference & Digital Premiere of OMYGOD by TinaO


Storytelling for Reconciliation

May 17th 2021 – Vancouver, BC Canada – PowHERhouse Impact Media Group with TinaOLife announces the three country press conference and the global digital premiere of OMYGOD, a Storytelling for Reconciliation experience about the women we’ve burned, the babies we’ve buried and the Gods we have worshipped. 

There are Some Stories only Art Can Hold

On May 28th 2021, the digital press conference and screening of OMYGOD will connect audiences of Ireland, Canada and the United States to introduce the social impact project Storytelling for Reconciliation, and meet the writer/storyteller TinaO alongside the core creative team behind OMYGOD.


OMYGOD Press Conference

Friday May 28th at 10am (PDT)
 

OMYGOD Screening

Ireland 7:30pm BST / 11:30am PDT
New York / Toronto 6pm EDT / 3pm PDT 
Vancouver / Los Angeles 6:30pm PDT 


What is OMYGOD?

It’s not a feminist show or a witch burning show, and it is not a “dead-babies” show. It is a weaving of complexity and historical scar tissues that exists not to entertain, but to invite transformation. It is a production offered in a spirit of restorative justice, reconciliation and as a bridge of humility between cultures. 

In Canada we have a Highway of Tears.
In Ireland, they have an Irish Triangle.

In our current time, the narrative of OMYGOD follows a little girl named Cristiona who loses her mother, and her 50 year old self says yes to a call to Ireland as she wrestles with her own story of God, faith, Indigeneity, and grief. 

The Tuam Babies and the Death of 9000 Irish Babies

In Tuam, County Galway Ireland, the remains of 796 unnamed babies were found buried in an abandoned septic tank outside of the Bon Secour Catholic Mother and Baby home. Such homes existed across Ireland, and more than 56,000 children from a ‘fallen’ mother were born there. The anonymous testimony from residents compares the homes to prisons, and recalls that the nuns verbally abused the children, often calling them the “spawn of satan” or “devil’s spawn”.  Some were adopted out of the homes illegally to the United States and across Ireland, others spent their whole childhoods in such home. Across Ireland, some 9000 of these children died in Mother and Baby County Homes, each erased from their mother’s care and for many, from their actual existence.

Canada’s Indigenous Genocide and the loss of 6000 Children

Before we can have reconciliation we must have truth. Starting in 1831, the colonial governments in what we now call Canada removed Indigenous children from their families and forced them into residential schools with the explicit goal of cultural genocide. Priests, nuns and clergymen belonging to Christian Churches operated these homes and effectively carried out the task of “civilizing” more than 150,000 children, thousands of whom lost their lives in the schools, thousand more of whom suffered through abuse of all kinds and subsequent trauma.

The Murder of Women

In 1487 The Malleus Maleficarum, or, the “Hammer of the Witches,” was written by Catholic Clergyman, Heinrich Kramer. This manual detailed the how-to of naming, torturing and burning a witch, and it became a founding trauma tool in the Christianization of Pagan and Celtic Ireland.

Seven generations of children watched their mothers emerge from cages and prison cells after being crushed and tortured, becoming screaming witches before their eyes.

Witch burning continues. In 2010 Ama Hemmah, a 72 year old grandmother was burned alive in Ghana after being named a witch. 



OMYGOD is a Storytelling for Reconciliation experience. It is a poetic, often humorous and harrowing journey across time, cultures, and faiths to invite each of us to walk a full story all the way through the trauma to acceptance, to grief and ultimately to a place of rest beyond blame. As a storyteller, this is TinaO’s offering to reconciliation: even if we weren’t there, we can still say we’re sorry and mean it.

Before we can have Reconciliation we must have Truth.

OMYGOD is Executive Produced by Impact Media Producer Charlene SanJenko. PowHERhouse Impact Media Group is a 100% Indigenous owned organization who champions social impact projects that change the narrative for H.E.R. – Human Expansion Realized. 


OMYGOD – KEY CREATIVE TEAM 

Writer/Storyteller/Performer – Tina Overbury

Dramaturg – Nicolle Nattrass

Creative Consultant – Dean Paul Gibson 

Digital Director – James Gardiner

Director of Photography – Randal Hrytzak Bemoved Media

Sound Designer – Paul Tedeschini

Editor – Jay Lehmann 


OMYGOD, a Storytelling for Reconciliation piece about the women we burned, the babies we buried and the Gods we have worshipped, premieres on Friday May 28th with a Digital Press Conference at 10am PDT, followed by three individual screenings: Ireland/UK screening 7:30pm BST; New York/Toronto 6pm EDT; and Vancouver/Los Angeles 6:30pm PDT. 



To book your seat and receive a full agenda and press kit, click the red button above, or rsvp here.

To connect with Impact Producer Charlene SanJenko, please respond to: Charlene@Powherhouse.com

To connect with TinaO or the creative team please respond to Tina@TinaOLife.com


CONTACT:

Media Relations: Zoe Gray social@powherhouse.com

Impact Producer: Charlene SanJenko charlene@powherhouse.com

Artist: Tina Overbury tina@tinaolife.com

OMYGOD – THREE COUNTRY PREMIERE

May 28th 2021

OMYGOD – A solo-show by TinaO

Premieres in Three Countries

IRELAND / UK

7:30pm BST / 11:30am PDT

NEW YORK / TORONTO

6pm EDT / 3:00 PDT 

VANCOUVER / LOS ANGELES

6:30pm PDT

On May 28th 2021, you are invited to Christina’s 50th Birthday un-party in Tuam, County Galway Ireland where an 8 yr old girl who thinks she’s a witch meets Jesus, a woman who knows how to boil an egg, lights three fires of reconciliation, and the special guest at the party is The Morrigan, a shape-shifting Irish deity of prophecy, battle and sovereignty.

OMYGOD is a mythical tale about the women we burned, the children we buried, the Gods we worship and the fires we light after seven generations of children witness their mother turn into witches before their very eyes.

In this special place of Inglenook… 

Writer/Performer, Tina Overbury catches us off guard with her humorous, poetic and harrowing tales of life as a woman who loves the sacred, but offers: “I love God, but does he have to be a man?” She reminds us about the power of books by showing us the Malleus Maleficarum, the ‘Witch Burning for Dummies’ instruction manual which shaped us for 300 years. She asks us to come and sit by the fire with all aspects of what it means to be a woman. She offers, we are The Morrigan, The Three Mary’s of the Gospel, and the infamous Lady M herself. We have a conversation with Jesus, and we’re introduced to Mouse Woman, the North American Indigenous mother of Raven.

As guests at her un-party, audiences will witness the makings of a mad woman and say we’re sorry as we sweep up the ashes of those we have burned in the name of being holy. 

OMYGOD is a mythical and redemptive tale across time, culture, and faith that is as funny as it is brave. As world patriarchal structures crumble, we are not left with void of wisdom, we need only look to the cultural stories that exist within to remember that God belongs to everyone, and power within gender is not hierarchical, or a conversation about sex, witchcraft or worthiness. 


This is STORYTELLING for RECONCILIATION

Before there can be reconciliation, there must be truth.
And there are some truths that only art can hold.



Storytelling is a way we can honour the scars left behind from unspeakable atrocities.
It’s a way through the bruising to remember, witness and move toward reconciliation through a restorative process of embodied listening.

Theatre can do that.

OMYGOD is the first storytelling experience offered by TinaO. Semi-autobiographical and inspired by real-life events and historical references, this storytelling experience is offered in the spirit of reconciliation and restorative justice, and as a bridge of humility between cultures. It is a feminist narrative combining humour, storytelling and poetry which brings together two Indigenous cultures rich in oral history and a shared scar of cultural and human genocide.

From the residential schools of Turtle Island (North America) to the Mother and Baby homes of Eire (Ireland), from the triple essence goddess of The Morrigan to the three Mary’s of the gospel, from witch burning to the everyday making of a madwoman – OMYGOD offers historical explanations as to why we are the way we are, and asks us: 

‘Who do we become when seven generations of children watch their mothers burn?’


This story is personal, hopeful, humorous, and deeply tender.
We are human.
Storytelling reminds us of this.

WRITER / PERFORMER – TINA OVERBURY

DIGITAL DIRECTOR – JAMES GARDINER

CREATIVE CONSULTANT & LIVE THEATRE DIRECTOR (for winter 2021 performances) – DEAN PAUL GIBSON

DRAMATURG – NICOLLE NATTRASS

DIRECTOR OF PHOTOGRAPHY – RANDAL HRYTZAK – Bemoved Media

EDITOR – JAY LEHMANN

SOUND DESIGN – PAUL TEDESCHINI


Tina Overbury is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is devoted to global reconciliation through the exploration of origin stories, sharing our oral history, land-based knowing, and a continued focus on communication as a sacred practice. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Stories from the Core – her weekly writing and conversation series. She is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media as a core-communications specialist working with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a co-host of GATHER for HER, and a PowHERhouse Artist of Impact Amplify Coach helping leaders become artists and artists become leaders.

And The Day After

Listen to TinaO read this poem below.

A feminist on the day after the 2016 USA election

I want to complain and trash the beach 

spill obnoxious tins of paint

confused by yellow shades of not-quite-green hues

all over the rocks


crash multiple bins of soot wrecking the sand

smearing clouds of murky shadows out to the wind


I am stained by this

I am slashed by this 

and I want to crumple the shoreline


drenched in wax

from holding a vigil

for an exhale that turned to anguish

with no chance to settle


I am furious

I bet I can swing King Tide logs over my head

fling them 

into the ocean

followed by these legs on a torso

this is no longer my body 

for I have left


Instead, 

I walk the beach

to make sense

of the madness 

I somehow

never saw coming


I fucking hate surprises

avoidable fingers

caught in windows and snagged in doors

or train wrecks we say never happen

until they do


now 

I bring 

teapots and towels

rings and rodents

fire and feathers

bobbles and babies

to this water


my hair is on backwards

and my neck

lays on the ground

I am not here


She screams into the pillow

suffocating

the trembling

the shaking 

and the bruised women

out from this silent

nod to misogyny in power

one hand on his bible

the other up her skirt

This is the man

they freely chose

to lead the very country where feminism

cut her teeth

so today I can walk

with multiple careers and a baby on each breast

Today I am a fraction safer on the street

even if every woman still knuckles 

her keys in her hand

to reach her car


For the next four years

you will find me

smashing teapots

and bleeding into the ground


This reality

is not mine

and yet 

if you visit my kitchen

you will find

I haven’t a cup left

Four years ago I woke up in shock that the world had gone mad. When Donald Trump was elected president it haunted me for days.

This is the morning after…

The day after the 2020 election, it was a very different walk on the beach for sure.

2016 and the Day After

This year on December 25th, which is both Christmas Day and my 50th Birthday, I am stepping into a new story…

and I know what I know what I know about how stories work:

Stories won’t let go of you until they’ve been fully heard.

This is release #8 of sixteen Story Hits (vlogs) from as far back as 2013. Some are my favourites, some are yours. If you missed week #1, you can start at the beginning with: Out of the Water here. 

I will be writing more about these moments in both my upcoming book: STORY STONES (coming fall 2021, and in my one woman show: O MY GOD (touring spring 2021).

On my 50th Birthday, if you’re on my VIP list, I’ll be sending you 50 Days of Christmas Story Gifts from Dec. 25th to February 12th. If you want some story goodness filled with sneak peeks into the creation and rehearsal process, plus be able to pre-order the book, and order tickets to the show, click here and the let the gifting begin! (You’ll get a bunch of cool story right away)

UNDER THIS, PLEASE PUT THIS IN THE PARAGRAPH FORMAT:

I have to close one story to open another. 

Thank you for listening.

xT

Tina Overbury is a core-communications specialist who works with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Story Stones, TinaO’s online gathering of listening in to sacred stories. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse media where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s approach to STORY and receive updates about STORY STONES the book, and O MY GOD, her one woman show, click here and you’ll be added to her ‘stay in touch’ list plus she’ll send you a few short intro videos about what story means to her. CLICK HERE for TinaO Story stuff.

An Angel in my Car

Listen to TinaO read About it here.

About it

I’m struggling with it

It’s not new

but it 

looks 

so damn easy,

also not new

I hear

it 

can be,

easy

I keep hearing it

I should know it

by now 

Like really know how 

by now

Like if I don’t know,

it 

by now,

then there’s got to be something wrong with me

because I’ve watched every damn video there is

about 

it

and I still can’t seem to get 

it

So I read the books 

you recommend 

about it

Listen to the words

you tell me

And keep telling me

And telling me

And telling me

And telling me

About 

it

And I ask for more

Because I want 

it

And it 

looks so easy

it seems

So easy

But it’s

not 

for me.


I ask

What else don’t I know about

it?

You know I even had someone create a meditation for me 

About it.

I slept with 

it,

the meditation

and I dreamt about 

it

Woke up with it

Spoke with it

Joked with it

Croaked with it

I didn’t toke with it

I don’t 

smoke 

it

I think I’ve had it

Because your encouragement is 

starting to feel 

like nagging

The truth is

I suck 

at it

being supported

and ocean swimming

has been my greatest teacher

Where We’ve Been – Circa 2017

Pre-Triathlon Iron Man 5150

I was four months out of cancer treatment when I started training for the Iron Man 5150 (Olympic distance triathlon). I could barely swim ten strokes without losing my breath.

I had suffered a shoulder injury after a full on knock down drag ’em out with young son and couldn’t rotate my shoulder.

But I was committed to the race. I trained with a kickboard up to ten days before the swim. After being told I would be disqualified if I brought my trusty board, I panicked. This video is less than seven days before the swim.

So an Angel took a seat in my truck today. Just in time.

This year on December 25th, which is both Christmas Day and my 50th Birthday, I am stepping into a new story…

and I know what I know what I know about how stories work:

Stories won’t let go until they’ve been fully heard.

This is release #6 of sixteen Story Hits (vlogs) from as far back as 2013. Some are my favourites, some are yours. If you missed week #1 or more and want to start from the beginning, you can start here with: Out of the Water

I will be writing more about these moments in both my upcoming book: STORY STONES (coming fall 2021, and in my one woman show: O MY GOD (touring spring 2021).

I have to close one story to open another. 

Thank you for listening.

xT

Tina Overbury is a core-communications specialist who works with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Story Stones, TinaO’s online gathering of listening in to sacred stories. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse media where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.

If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s approach to STORY and receive updates about STORY STONES the book, and O MY GOD, her one woman show, click here and you’ll be added to her ‘stay in touch’ list plus she’ll send you a few short intro videos about what story means to her. 

CLICK HERE for TinaO Story stuff.

Too Woo Woo for Me

Artsy

Listen to TinaO read the poem here.

I’m one of the girls you think about 

*

Listening to snowflakes

growing holly from my elbows

cedars flanking my spine

and this collarbone, 

dotted with red berries

*

I walk these paths,

barefoot, 

toes, who can’t help themselves but flirt 

with you, 

each padded foot-fall 

across the forest floor

smirking

and winking, 

sparkles lifting off 

from the soft bed 

of the earth

with each step

*

You notice

She’s cute

you think.

Skirt smudged with sand

jacket dripping with ocean behind her

always 

with a stone in her pocket

*

The wondering 

where her mind goes

How her hands move 

How her throat opens

How sound carries through her body

How she breathes in colour

*

Artsy

is what you say

not at all, what you think

but it’s the only way 

you know how to explain 

the taste of how she lives

from your mouth

WHERE WE’VE BEEN – circa 2016

I was working through the label of ‘woo woo’ which is thrown around lovingly and always jokingly… but always with an element of judgement underneath.

It was time to say… I am woo… and it’s what makes me think the way I do.

A little time in one of my favourite places – Mt. Gardiner Dock – 2016

This year on December 25th, which is both Christmas Day and my 50th Birthday, I am stepping into a new story…

and I know what I know what I know about how stories work:

Stories won’t let go of you until they’ve been fully heard.

This is release #5 of sixteen weeks of Story Hits (vlog) from as far back as 2013. Some are my favourites, some are yours. If you missed week #1, you can start at the beginning with: Out of the Water here. 

I will be writing more about these moments in both my upcoming book: STORY STONES (coming fall 2021, and in my one woman show: O MY GOD (touring spring 2021).

On my 50th Birthday, if you’re on my VIP list, I’ll be sending you 50 Days of Christmas Story Gifts from Dec. 25th to February 12th. If you want some story goodness filled with sneak peeks into the creation and rehearsal process, plus be able to pre-order the book, and order tickets to the show, click here and the let the gifting begin! (You’ll get a bunch of cool story right away)

I have to close one story to open another. 

Thank you for listening.

xT

Tina Overbury is a core-communications specialist who works with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Story Stones, TinaO’s online gathering of listening in to sacred stories. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse media where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.

If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s approach to STORY and receive updates about STORY STONES the book, and O MY GOD, her one woman show, click here and you’ll be added to her ‘stay in touch’ list plus she’ll send you a few short intro videos about what story means to her. CLICK HERE for TinaO Story stuff.

Hold on to What You Know – TinaO

Drivers

Listen to TinaO read this poem here.

Four wheels don’t make a driver

Some of us are gap fillers

Never considering how long it takes to stop before we start

or leaving a space between the cars

or a breath before the accident

Drivers read the room

they notice the way the rain hits

the window

It’s the rhythm of our repetition 

and our listening through the weather

that keeps us rooted,

We drive through the exhale we can no longer hear

Drivers always take in

what doesn’t move around them

they drive conversation so they don’t sputter and fall  

they grab up all the discomfort 

like doughy circles of bread

squishing them into cubes

between our fingers 

and palms

smaller and smaller

until just dense enough to stomach them

in one 

efficient swallow

We drive the impossible 

into the wreckage of exhausted potential 

We’re weird like that

Drivers

We think anything can be done,

rescued,

revitalized, 

made into something it’s not 

and never has been

We tell ourselves 

capacity 

is a moveable thing

and not a boundary 

or a sign of where something ends

where we’re so full we simply cannot take any more in

Drivers look at these lines as cartoons, 

something we can erase and redraw

or pick up and put down wherever we need them to be

But drivers don’t read maps this way

on paper

on the road

or in actual life

where breathing back and forth 

can happen,

No,

valleys, cliffs and deserts are not

merely suggestions 

there

We are drivers

and we will drive til it’s done

I am a driver

I have driven the things I want into what I want them to be

Til I see a moment like it’s not 

Til it’s better

Because I made it that way

I get shit done,

I make up new rules for the road

and I can see in the dark

So why?

Why would I stop driving now?

Listen to this poem ready by TinaO here.

Story Hit #3 – Hold on to What You Know

(or How Live Your Best Story Came to Be)

From Where We’ve Been: TinaO’s Story Hit’s Compilation

From October 2016 – almost three months post cancer treatment

These vlogs track where we’ve been together over the last seven years. I share them with you to close one story and open another.

This year on December 25th, which is both Christmas Day and my 50th Birthday, I am stepping into a new story…and I know what I know what I know about how stories work:

Stories won’t let go until they’ve been fully heard.

This is release #3 of sixteen weeks of Story Hits (vlog) from as far back as 2013. Some are my favourites, some are yours. If you missed week #1 and #2 and want  to start from the beginning, you can start here with: Out of the Water

I will be writing more about these moments in both my upcoming book: STORY STONES (coming fall 2021, and in my one woman show: O MY GOD (touring spring 2021).

On my 50th Birthday, if you’re on my VIP list, I’ll be sending you 50 Days of Christmas Story Gifts from Dec. 25th to February 12th. If you want some story goodness filled with sneak peeks into the creation and rehearsal process, plus be able to pre-order the book, and order tickets to the show, click here and the let the gifting begin! (You’ll get a bunch of cool story right away).

Thank you for listening.

xT

Tina Overbury is a core-communications specialist who works with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Story Stones, TinaO’s online gathering of listening in to sacred stories. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse media where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.

If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s approach to STORY and receive updates about STORY STONES the book, and O MY GOD, her one woman show, click here and you’ll be added to her ‘stay in touch’ list plus she’ll send you a few short intro videos about what story means to her. CLICK HERE for TinaO Story stuff.

This is Someday

Earlier, as many provinces in Canada headed into lockdown, I had the pleasure of diving into a rich conversation with James Gardiner as a guest on his show: Conversations in Courage. Jim is a performance coach, speaker, athlete and performer. He is one of the lead coaches with Leapzone Strategies and is described as a ‘super freak’ processor who helps heart-centred entrepreneurs connect the dots to lead spectacular lives driven by heart and soul. From my lens, I’d say, bam – they got that right. 

Here’s a snippet from the first fifteen minutes of our 45 minute conversation. Yep… all this in just fifteen minutes. Yep… that means there’s two more pieces coming to you… For now, this is #1.

Reconnect Inward Conversations in Courage #1

Jim: Hey there everyone, Jim Gardiner here from Leapzone Strategies and welcome to our first of a series of conversations about courage. Quite frankly, these are conversations for you, the viewer, to add some positivity to the stream of consciousness that is ever-expanding around us in this day and time. I invite you to reconnect-in with these conversations. Today I am joined by one of my dear friends, a colleague, and a peer, Tina Overbury.

Jim:  Hey Tina how are you? You’re on Bowen Island, which is a small little island off of the city of Vancouver right?

Tina: I’m great, and yep I’m on Bowen and it’s a bit of paradise for sure. As far as isolation goes, being here, (and not to minimize what we’re in right now), is not so bad. The truth is, I kinda choose to live this way anyway.

Jim: You know, yes, yeah, and I’m living on Vancouver Island which is a huge island yet it’s still an element of being secluded too. I’m in a small town, and it’s the same thing. No matter where we are we can’t hide from what’s in front of us. Before we dive in, why don’t you introduce yourself to those who may not be familiar with your genius. Take it away.

Tina: Cool, thanks Jim. Thanks for having me, and thanks for starting this conversation. It’s a really important time for listening, and that’s what I do, I’m a story coach. When I say that outloud to people, I get: oh that’s interesting, I kind of get it. But if I actually tell you what I do, you might say:  that’s a bit weird, but it’s not weird. Not to me. I’m a professional listener, that’s what I do. I work with people who feel called by a communication of some kind. You might have a book you’re writing, or a keynote taking shape, and some people don’t even know the shape of the communication they’re here to give the world and that’s part of my job too. People come to me when they hear in their heads: I might be crazy but… I think I really need to say this, or I’ve had this thought that’s been keeping me up all night for months  – what do I do with it? 

I’m a collector and sometimes I call what I do story keeping, where I work with people to help them keep the story that’s been entrusted to them. Then I support the structures for that communication to live in the world. Not all of us are made to write a book, and not all of us are made to keynote, but we’re all made to relate and to communicate. My job is to listen to each communicator as the instrument they are and help them align their message. In basic language, I help them write their book, write their keynote, create their blog… but it’s so much more than that.

Jim: We were talking about this a while ago, you take the someday conversation, as in someday I will,  someday I want etc. and you turn that into right now. I think that’s why we’re here. Right now. Having this conversation. Right now more than ever, everyone has the chance to stop and look inward and say okay what are those some days I’ve been toying around with and discussing? How can I make that now?

Tina: Come on out the skinny branches with me if you will. In story language, I say to people: stories are like toddlers. They will chase you around, tug on your sleeve, they’ll throw themselves at your feet – all because they simply want a good listening-to. And in this conversation about someday, just like stories, they are waiting for us. Whatever you want to call it, your purpose, your mission – whatever. Someday is today. It starts now.  Shake hands with that impulse, that mission and say: I’m in. We have the time. Our someday is right now.  

“Shake hands with that impulse and mission and say: I’m in. We have the time. Our someday is right now.” 

Jim: Let’s break that down because I know you know that I know, in my community of people, we’re all kind of cut from the same cloth, and many of us recognize, ironically that what we have more of right now IS time. And alternately, time is our only non-renewable resource. It is our constant limitation. It’s always 24/7. Seven days a week, right through, and 365 days a year. The same time. In this time, how can we inspire others to engage in that inward conversation. What is my someday? What is now? And let’s see what we can do to break open our courage, that rock of courage to stimulate this thought pattern and choice. 

“Let’s see what we can do to break open our courage”

Tina: I think that’s one of the things I appreciate about your work in the world Jim. It’s the way you know how to break down time, and pull it apart into pieces so that we’re present right now. We are doing something each day which can lead us to the thing we’ve been some-daying about. You are skilled in that time piece, and not just the management of time, but the maximizing of our potential in that time, all in bite-sized pieces. You do the whole strategy piece.

Jim: It is incrementalism and its finest, and whether I’m helping somebody build a business or helping somebody check off a bucket list item, it’s the same methodology. It’s the same principle. It’s breaking things down into incremental steps of growth. I find that time is the one constant which can be played on the macro and micro level. I think that’s why, to do well in high-performance sport, time is how we understand our volume of training. It’s periodization of training on a larger scale, and time becomes the cornerstone of everything. 

Tina, what would be a catalyst for people on this to start this journey of time?  Because I think this is where you come in. What is the story we want to create for ourselves? Ultimately if it’s a dream or a goal to write your book, or run a marathon, the reality is, we’re already creating that story in our head.Maybe you can shed some light on that.

“It is incrementalism and its finest.”

Tina: You know I think you nailed it already. Just geek out with me a little bit okay?  When I’m listening to people, it’s almost as if their words shimmer, and thats how I hear them. They come up to the surface and shine so I can hear them. What you just said about time as the cornerstone – I was like: that’s it, that’s the message, that’s the answer to the catalyst of this time. It’s really asking the question: What is the cornerstone of this time for each of us?  What do I want? If I really centred in, and remember, some of us work from the outside in, others from the inside out. My writing partner totally works from the outside in. She writes that way. It’s completely opposite to me who hears, or is peaceful working from the inside out. It doesn’t matter which way you work, neither is better than the other. All I’m trying to say is: when you sit with what is the cornerstone of this time for you? – and just get quiet, or write, or do what you do to connect to you, and just LISTEN to what you want, what do you hear? Jim, are you an internal or external processor? 

“What is the cornerstone of this time?” 

Jim: yeah yeah yeah I definitely work nucleus out. I use a lot of acting analogies, and I enjoy creating a character from the inside out. Adding those layers upon layers upon layers until it becomes a reality. 

In the work that I do, we always say: be clear about what you want, and the how will surface. I think for anyone, this is the point where we take that first step. For those that know me, I talk about stepping into the arena and engaging our warrior mindset. I know some people have reached out because they are kind of hesitating, or paralyzed because they don’t really know what the first move is, and I say: that’s fine, you don’t have to know but remember to take courage and ask what do you want? For some, those answers happen quickly, while others have to really peel back the layers to figure it out.

“Step into the arena and engage your warrior mindset.”

Tina: That’s so what’s cool. You gave us the ‘how’,  which is courage. As a story person I process the world and communication through: who what when where why and how, so the ‘what’ of this question, as in what do we do at this time? = cornerstone. The how, which just arrived = courage.  

Jim: Hmmmm… this is what I love about this. We’re just having conversations and hopefully inspiring others with some insights, and we’re educating each other too. It is about conversation and it is about connection. With your family, and people who are close. It’s keeping that sense of community alive, and above all, it’s time to elevate ourselves. I think we have a duty. I honestly believe in my heart that we each have a duty to multiply our impact. To figure out what our impact is, and what is our potential, and to step into that. Now is the time.

Tina: Wow I love that. I was just going to ask you, which you kind of answered already but, what do you think this time is about? We’re all talking about it and thinking about it. We’re all having conversations around the topic, but not really. You know? What I heard you say is: understand or get to know your potential and impact. This is the time for that. Did I hear that right? 

“We have a duty to multiply our impact.”

Jim: Absolutely. I feel wholeheartedly right now, it is our duty as human beings. We have a duty to ourselves, and each other, to figure this out. I feel we should come out of this time more evolved, whatever that means to you. If people come out of this and don’t change, don’t move the needle forward… it would be sad. It saddens me to think that way. This isn’t about financial means. This isn’t about race, or status positions. This is a horizontal even playing field, and everyone should grow from this experience. 

Tina: Wow. Horizontal playing field for all of us. I hear that. 

Watch for part #2 & #3, and more about the romance of courage in the coming weeks.

Click the pic to watch the entire conversation

James Gardiner is an Adventurer, Author, Speaker, and Performance Coach with LeapZone Strategies. He works with entrepreneurs and high performers to get in touch with their authentic selves and maximize their business and personal brands in congruence with their life design. As a high performance athlete and accomplished rower and coach he tackles personal and business growth as an athlete, through health and wellness and playing the game to win. I have constructed bodies and minds to perform at peak performance. To James, mindset, is everything.

Find out more about James as a speaker here.

If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s upcoming book: Story Stones or performance dates about her upcoming show O MY GOD, click here.

Bio Photo

Tina Overbury is a core-communications specialist who works with individuals and organizations who feel called. She is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She brings thirty years of collaborative storytelling in theatre, film, marketing, team based selling, and workshop facilitation. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife, home to Story Stones, TinaO’s weekly online gathering of listening in to sacred stories. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse media where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow. 

If you would like to know more about Tina’s approach to story, click here

Entitled

Last fall I had a particularly hard time. Between September to January I had three emotional surprises, which took me out. Looking back now I can tell myself, they were no big deal: a break-up, a spiritual dumping, and a date gone badly, very badly. In light of what is going on right now, it seems insignificant, but I can tell you, it was not.

I know this zone. I was on the verge of literally coming apart, and I’ve been here before. I started writing letters to an old friend I feel really ‘seen’ by.

This is one of them. 

As I read it just a few months into this pandemic, I can’t help but notice how prophetic it sounds. I needed this. Not what happened in the fall. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. 

But this.

This time we’re in.

This pause which has changed everything. 

It has given me what I’d been crying out for. 


Dear A, 

I’ve begun working again like she’s a lover.

Damn.

It’s not that I don’t enjoy working, I do. Like I really do. Like I’m kind of obsessive about it, but once I finally stop for the day, I can’t help but hear in my head:

‘this was supposed to be the fall-back plan’.

You know?

It’s always been my ‘fall back plan’ but for all the reasons, it keeps becoming my actual plan. If I am honest, which I’m not, not about this anyway. I never wanted this life. I have created it. I’m not complaining. This is the coping that looks like happiness and keeps me away from knowing what love is.

When I was sixteen I had five jobs. I’m not even kidding. How on earth did I ever think that was normal? You’re going to laugh… Wanna know what I did?

I was a birthday party clown on Saturdays at a community centre… seriously.

I was a Saturday morning receptionist at a realty office, for three hours only, 9am to noon, and it took me 90 minutes to get there by bus… seriously again.

I was a late night waitress at a pizza joint. I started at 11pm and worked until 3am, on Friday nights — which comes before the ninety minute commute to my 9am job the next day (see above)…yep, still seriously.

I worked at Kentucky Fried Chicken during the week… not even kidding. I was Miss KFC in the Miss Teen Vancouver Pageant.

And I can’t remember the fifth. Hmmm…what on earth was it? Maybe I was teaching cooking or running a spring break day-camp for kids, or who knows what else. That was me at 16 years old. I worked.

I worked hard.

I still work hard.

Back then, I did all of that and sang in three choirs, and was the lead in the musical, and and and and and and…

Back then I worked because I never wanted to go home and I needed the money. I moved out at seventeen and was making my own way in the world. I work now because I have three kids, I live in a stupidly expensive part of the world, and there’s no one at home to nestle in with but me. Yes, I’m a mom and everything but they’re getting older and who wants to hang out with your mom? And I don’t want that for them either. Go. Get. Your. Life. is what I always say to them.

And this. This. What I’m doing right now. It’s ridiculous really. I woke up at 2am and couldn’t get back to sleep so I started scrolling, then the obsessive thoughts started as they do for me, so I had to shut it down by writing to you, so thanks once again for being the ear I can go to. But this. This isn’t what I want at 2am.

Last fall when I started my Ministry of Story, and I was leading at church, the rhythm of my life was just starting to feel ‘right’, like my true rhythm. I was excited to get up every morning. My timing was slow and my days were full. I do love full days. I want to squeeze every ounce of life out of each beautiful moment. Slow is good, and full is good.

I was beginning to let my guard down.

I was married for 17 years and all I wanted was that rhythm and I did have it briefly when we first met, but it didn’t last. He fell into a massive depression which lasted for years and I filled in the emotional and financial gaps for all of us, by working, baking, crafting, and everything else you do when you are loving on a family. When he left, I had to throw myself back into work again to keep the lights on, and I have been functioning on and off of overdrive for the last three years. I swear I’m sixteen again and working five jobs. I’m never home. I’m clutching my way to get there, and scrambling just as fast to get away.

But that’s the piece I’m craving.

I want to be ‘at home’ somewhere.

When the Ministry work arrived in my life it was if God was saying: Read. Write. Walk. Listen. Share. Rest Tina. Rest.

Rest into this.

I’m not a religious person, and I wrestle with the Minister part of my nature but it’s actually what I want.

I want a contemplative life.

I want a rhythm of love.

I want to drift through my days.

I want time to listen.

But right now, my time is so full. There isn’t a minute in my day when I’m not doing something and I’m scared I will lose another ten years of my life running away from the quietness I crave.

And yet I am starting over and work is required. I don’t own a home and I would like to. I pay my way. I have very little debt. I will be able to pay for my kid’s education — somehow. And I’m building multiple streams of income so I have a retirement plan to move forward with. But hon… it’s still too fucking fast for me, and it’s too much.

That’s the truth I’m afraid to say. I actually don’t have enough space in my life to say it.

It’s too fast.

It’s too full.

And it’s actually not who I am.

I just needed to say that out loud so I can wake the fuck up and stop before it takes over. I know this path and it ramps up slowly. I have lived this cyclical rhythm my entire life. First at 16 to survive. Then in my 20’s to feel worthy. Then in my marriage to feel wanted. And it’s starting again so I can run faster than rejection. Because work doesn’t leave. It’s actually the one part of my life I can hold on to and I won’t be alone there.

That therapist I started seeing last week (she’s lovely btw) did the usual ‘story collecting’ process with me, her pen and her pad of paper to map out my relationship with attachment. I don’t want to spend ten sessions just talking about my past so I blasted her like a fire hose with all of my details in the fifty minutes we had together. I haven’t told my story in awhile. Not like that anyway — all at once, and not in the experience of asking for help.

At one point she looked at me, down at her page, then back up at me again and asked ‘have you ever been in a relationship where you can let guard down?’.

It’s a funny question, because the answer is yes, but then maybe the answer is no.

I know that the way I’m working right now is not sustainable, nor is it going to make me happy. I will get all ‘the things’ I tell myself I need like: a house, a car, no debt, my kids education paid for, a business that pays me… And I do need some of those things, but not at the expense of me.

I don’t want to be an expense. I want to be a treasure.

I don’t know how to do that.

I can self-care. I can therapy. I can consciousness group. I can exercise. I can mastermind. I can wisdom circle. I can pray. I can I can I can I can…

What I want right now, is the I without the can.

I want to let my guard down and rest for awhile. Oh God. I just really want to rest for awhile.

I want the rhythm that started to happen for me last August before everything blew up. Work is not the lover I want, nor the partner, and definitely not the rhythm I am.

There. I said it.

And you heard it.

And now I can hear it too.

I know you work as much as I do. I’m not sure what your story is here, but maybe one day we can just sit for awhile and not talk about it or do anything. I’d like that. You can pull out your kite on the beach. That would be fun.

Thanks for listening. I think I’ll try to go back to sleep now. I made it to 5am.

hahahaha…

Love you.

xxT

p.s. I’m so glad the fires are out over there. My heart my heart my heart.

This poem was originally published on Medium.

Bio Photo

If you’d like to know more about TinaO’s upcoming book: Story Stones or performance dates about her upcoming show O MY GOD, click here.

TinaO is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media Group where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.

As part of TinaO’s audience, CLICK HERE to receive a personal message from TinaO about the power, beauty and invitation of Story, and your personal Story from the Core. You will also be able to stay up to date about TinaO’s performances, storytelling events,  and upcoming retreats and workshops.

I Want

This is from a box of poetry I uncovered in my office as I was tidying up. I can’t help but notice how self-conscious I feel about it now at fifty, like I want to hide my blossoming from the world as if it’s silly.

I am noticing how embarrassed I feel.

So I’m posting it.

I’m a mom, and as I watch my kid’s mortified fascination as they watch obnoxious videos of themselves at eleven or twelve, I can’t help but think of me here.

When my boys shrink back from their fresh-faced ridiculous selves in their young days, I want to hug them.

Because each stage of our life is a discovery.

And we discover who we truly are by our courage.

Courage to be seen.

Courage to be creative.

Courage to be naive.

Courage to be angry.

Courage to blossom.

So… here is a piece I wrote in my early twenties. It makes me want to cringe now, but then, I really felt like I was being bravely feminine.

I grew up with eight pretty rough and tough brothers and being ‘feminine’ made me a target.

When I remember that, this piece fills me with delight.


I WANT

…to wear candy apple

Red toe nail polish and put my hair in braids

…to go topless on a white beach in the Mediterranean.


I want to be held naked in the water

an ocean, or a lake


I want to wear sarongs

orange, turquoise, purple, emerald green

the colours of tropical fish

and walk barefoot in warm places


I want to ride my bike in France with the taste of exotic wines

on my lips

I want to meet a lover while I’m there

have him speak French to me

as we make love in his loft


I want to write

scads and scads of racy, erotic stories

and spread them around the world under a different name

I want one to come back to me

but read by someone else’s lips


I want to taste succulent

tangy, and salty things

fed to me at some ungodly hour with my eyes closed

and my mouth full of laughter


That’s what I want

more laughter, more desire, more fun


Oh yes,

and some terribly thrilling man who will feed me

mouthful, upon mouthful of

strawberries and cake

This poem was originally published on Medium.

Bio Photo

To find out more about TinaO’s upcoming book: Story Stones and performances of her solo show O MY God, click here.

TinaO is a storyteller, performer, and a professional listener who works with narrative and story structure as a vehicle for human connection. Her work is rooted in Myth, Mysticism, and the practice of personal faith. She is the founder of Live Your Best Story, a weekend retreat of deep listening held on Bowen Island, BC, Canada and is the voice and story behind TinaOLife. Tina is a proud associate of PowHERhouse Impact Media Group where she listens and supports the ‘stories’ of whole and integrated leaders of tomorrow.

As part of TinaO’s audience, CLICK HERE to receive a personal message from TinaO about the power, beauty and invitation of Story, and your personal Story from the Core. You will also be able to stay up to date about TinaO’s performances, storytelling events,  and upcoming retreats and workshops.