Soulset Archives - TinaOLife

Writing as Witness

June 22, 2016

I’m intuitive and that doesn’t make me special or any different from you. I write to listen to what I already know but can’t hear.

It started last summer after a cancer diagnosis. I don’t call it ‘my cancer’, because I don’t choose to personalize it that way. It never belonged to me, nor do I take ownership of the creation of it. I may have ‘asked’ for a shift, or ‘attracted’ a change, but I most certainly did not ask for cancer.

That said, a black sticky-outy thingy arrived as the messenger for my particular ‘asked for’ shift.

In processing this I began to write in a way I hadn’t before. I’ve always had a journal… yawwwnnnnnnnn and as you can see, I had become rather tired of that. I’ve written poetry forever, but somehow that felt too dark, almost too intimate. Frankly too indulgent really. I’ve also written opinion pieces when I’m wrestling with things as a way to figure them out. Here’s one of my favourites, only because the sheer writing of it filled me up when I’d been feeling empty. But writing that way seemed far too daunting and frankly too cerebral a process for what I was aching for.

Nothing fit. At that time in my life, I had been ready to roll out my own life’s red-carpet and reallllly get shit done. At the time of the diagnosis, my business had just started to rebound after a self-enforced, four year hibernation, my husband and I had finally closed a painful chapter in our marriage – together, and our children were growing up. Life was ready for a new growth stage. I was standing on the precipice of right now, in the clearing, ready to act, to start, to begin again, and a stranger broke into my house. My body. My throat. Full stop.

The last bloody thing I wanted to do was write about it. I didn’t want to listen to my own self-reflecting. I didn’t want to ‘make friends’ with the cancer. I didn’t want to fight it, to ‘kick it’, to give IT any more of my life-force energy than it was already attempting to gobble up. I didn’t want to be in my own skin, let alone go into the depths of more self-discovery or listen to the words in my head. Good gawd. I’m a blabber mouth, blab blab blab blab blab. All I ever do is talk, and wonder, and question and press further to understand. Do you ever feel like you just don’t want to learn anymore?

It’s that place where entering one rabbit hole opens up another to lead to again more and more and then still more. How exhausting. I was empty. I know now, that’s how the cancer got in. I had left my post. I was too tired and forgot to lock the door. I probably didn’t even care really, if I’m truly honest. The door was abandoned open and the gate was swinging wide on it’s hinge. I did not have the energy to learn anything else. Instead,

I wanted to land.

I wanted to come home.

I wanted answers.

So I began to ask questions. I asked about the cancer, about being tired, about love, about soul mates, about purpose and work. I asked about my career and whether I had one, about being an artist, about my skills, about heaviness and healing. I asked and asked and I still ask today.

Sometimes the answers are deep like this one:

Dear Tina, what are the parts of my life that I must release to finish the journey?

…you are asked to release doubt. Between you and your call on your soul is doubt. Tina this circle is complete when the mask of doubt is dropped and transforms into the essence of what it truly is: curiosity, intrigue, fascination, perplexed, passion, drive. Tina there is shame around your curiosity and it has become doubt…

Sometimes they are informative:

Dear Tina, how are you today?

…Well you haven’t been taking great care of me these last few days. You haven’t been outside. You haven’t cooked anything and you haven’t written. These three things are your life blood and without them you will get sick, remain sick and everything else is just a measure to balance the toxicity instead of simply saying no to it. …saying no to what is not your life-force and saying yes to what is your life-force.

Sometimes it’s challenging.

Dear Tina, What is the story of this anger?

…Oh Tina, it’s before you – it’s young, it’s so young. When you are ready to go there you will.

Is it holding me back?

Yes.

This became my Dear Tina practice.

Today, I woke up in a fog and with a headache. I went back to bed to try to sleep it off. I woke up still heavy with it. I went to my desk. I pulled out my ‘to do’ list. I cracked it open pretending this is what I was supposed to do. Then I looked over at my Dear Tina Journal and knew that was the call for me. Today’s message was so ridiculously banal and perfect. Here it is:

Dear Tina, Something is wrong. What is it? Tina something is wrong. What is it? What is it? What is it? What is it?

Tina you are chasing again. Chasing the money. Chasing the life. Chasing the body. You are acting out and holding back.

My tummy is upset. Why?

Because of restaurant food. That is all.

I have a headache. Why?

Because you’ve been wrapping your body up in knots.

I’m in a fog. What do I do?

You do what needs to be done. You sleep.

Why does everything seem so stupid?

Your period is coming.

Oh right. That’s what it is.

You are chasing the money. Chasing the body. Chasing the peace. You are still fighting the shift Tina.

No coffee. No, low, No, low wine. No sugar. More gardening and veggies. This fog you are in is self induced. We wouldn’t want a fog for you. You have everything you need. Your children are happy. Your marriage is strong. Your network is with you. You can rest in your Arbonne business. You have everything you need. Simply show up and do. You needn’t push. When you push, you get angry and push back. Pushing for you is counter productive.

Find the groove Tina.

Live in the groove of it all.

You got this.

This one made my laugh. You got this? Ha! Has my higher self just entered into today’s date. Who am I to judge?

The message was clear.

#1 – my period is coming. Let go of high intensity today. How ridiculously simple is that?

#2 – the insight is that I’m chasing again and it’s taking me away from my centre. It’s a familiar feeling so when it landed I knew exactly what it meant.

#3 – the take away, because there is always a take-away, ‘pushing for me is counter productive, find the groove instead.’

Why do I share all of this with you? For lots of reasons. It’s part of what I’m designed to do. I write to share and in the sharing, you all become part of my own ‘witness protection program’. When you witness me, I can hear my own voice. So thank you for being my witness today. I also do this because I want you to see how accessible your inner-wisdom is to you. I want you to see how, with just a few breaths and patience you can come home to yourself, for yourself. For some this practice becomes their prayer, for others it’s their meditation and still more, simply, their listening.

All of us are intuitive. All of us are more than our five senses. All of us can listen our way out of a fog as I did today.

On July 23rd on beautiful Bowen Island, just outside of Vancouver, BC at Rivendell Retreat Centre, I am offering Writing as Witness, a one day retreat into the story and/or wisdom inside of you that wants to be heard.

The day includes: Walking meditation, Writing, baring Witness to others, and witnessing our own wisdom. The retreat time will be as private or as connected as you want it to be, which means, you needn’t share your writing or insights if it doesn’t feel right.

There will be a few ‘how to’s and offered best practices’, but mostly, the day is a guided conversation with your-self and the ‘practice’ is in the following of how and what you are wanting to have heard.

Journals are provided. Snacks are also offered however, please bring a picnic lunch to enjoy outside (weather permitting).

July 23rd, 10am-4pm, maximum 16 participants.

Cost is $79 for the day.

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Announcing – Dear Soul Dude with Soul Interpreter, Chris Dierkes

April 24, 2016

Sooooooo this is a beginning I’m a little nutty about. Why? Because if it ain’t for my ‘soul dude’ – a lot of things wouldn’t have began for me last year while so many pillars of my life were crumbling into ruin.

You’ve heard me talk about him. You’ve watched me shout out about him, and now I’m really, like really thrilled that I can share him with you too.

The truth is he has more humility than I do. He doesn’t need a website named after him, nor a desire to have his face or voice plastered all over everything (ahem, like I do), and yet, here we are. I’m going to do my absolute best to keep his roster full of clients and his website pinging with subscribers because he’s just that good. Damn good. So damn good.

And he cares.

I’m not a fan of the ‘woo-woo’ movement, nor the ‘selling of spirituality’ craze that seems to be taking off as an answer to the soul-less world we’re building and weirdly celebrating (Oh Trump… Don’t even get me started), and so announcing to all of you that TinaOLife is bringing in a Soul-Interpreter to add to the life giving hub that we are might look like I’ve just filled our life-school hallways with Coke machines as a thirst quencher…

But I’m not.

He’s the real deal. I’d say he’s ego-less but that would make him non-human. I’d say he’s got his shit together, but that would mean he’s complete, finis, and that ain’t true either. Come on now, he’s a dad to a pre-schooler, how together can he be?
I am saying that he’s a guy who speaks the language of the soul. He has a rich spiritual and religious background (is this a good place to let you know about his 4 years as a monk?). He’s versed and practiced in multiple healing practices and he’s damn funny too. Okay, a bit dry, maybe a lot dry and beautifully articulate.

Please join me in welcoming Chris Dierkes, my ‘soul guy’, TinaOLife’s ‘soul dude‘, and now yours too. Tomorrow we’ll share his first article.

I kinda want to break into the Blues Brother’s Soul Man, but I bet he gets that all the time.

Tune in tomorrow…

Ps… Just gotta shout out to TinaO’s Tara Caffelle for putting the two of us together.

XxT

TinaO is a writer, speaker and the founder of TinaOLife – a hub for all things worth living for, the workshop Live Your Best Story, and her coaching practice: Tall Poppy Living. She’s also a professional network marketer with a decade in the industry and with her Tall Poppy Living for Network Marketers Coaching Program, she teaches: selling isn’t slimey and marketing isn’t make-believe. You can be yourself and be successful in Direct Sales.

Dear Tina – Your Hands Needn’t Feel Small

March 26, 2016

It’s a funny thing this Dear Tina practice of mine. I do it for me, but I see now, that I also write them for you.

Dr. Gordon Neufeld speaks of emergent energy and the importance of cultivating time for that in our children’s lives. He suggests that we find out who we are when we’re doing what we do for no other reason than the sheer pleasure of being in the doing of it.

It’s when our doing has no ego.

For example, my strongest memory of this was when I was filling time as a 10 years old one pre-supper time afternoon. I gave myself ninety minutes worth of full on dancing – frolicking really, because I had time to kill before I was to be called in. See I grew up in a rather tumultuous home and going inside to that noise was always the last thing I ever wanted to do, so on that particular day, I decided to… dance. I found wacky ways to wind myself up the old chipped cement steps, entangle my willowy body up and over the black enameled 70’s style railing, roll my arms across the glass bottle stucko, and leap back and forth across our paved walk dotted by my mom’s spring favourites: orange marigolds. Oh yes I did. I can only imagine what our city neighbours thought about this curly haired wild child dancing like a fairy in her front yard. But I learned something about myself that day – though I didn’t know what.

Flash ahead a few months and now I’m running at full tilt down Fraser Street, 49th ave all the way down to 60th to visit some friend of mine (no idea who – clearly didn’t matter). It was summer. I had on lemon yellow shorts, a halter top and too small sneakers but I was on an adventure. Time stood still and I was running. Again, I learned something yet didn’t know what.

And the hours of walking, walking, and still walking, back and forth to my best friend and boyfriend’s house after school. I seemed to never have enough bus fare, so I walked, sometimes for two hours – and that’s a lot of alone time for a 14 year old. I loved it. Again I learned something, still I didn’t know what.

But now, at 45 years old, I do. I know what I was learning.

Dr. Neufeld suggests that it’s in these silent times of doing ‘nothing’ but ‘doing’ for the sheer enjoyment of the ‘do’ – while no one watching, or praising, or noticing – when there is no audience but ourselves that we become fueled by our very own emergent energy, and in doing so, we can listen to the story that is who we are.

We can hear who we are.

This Dear Tina practice that I do – is just that. It’s tapping in to the story that wants to tell me, to the wisdom that is timeless and to the emergent energy that fires up the effortless listening we all have access to.

I’ll write another post about what I didn’t know I was learning later, but if you want a glimpse into that now, here’s a piece I wrote a few years back as I was wrestling with being in my 40s, unsure of my purpose and feeling time tick tick tick. It answers the beginning questions of mine behind whom I’ve always been.

Welcome to Dear Tina #2. If you’re just tuning in to this thread and want a bit more context to what this Dear Tina thing is all about, click here for Dear Tina #1. Bottomline: This is how I listen to what I call my innate wisdom, or soul.

May 2014 – Dear Tina

Your hands needn’t feel small for you have access to the mother of all.

Whichever piece of me you need today – I am here – as father, as mother, as girlfriend, as daughter, as mentor.

I am all for you at all times. Step into my heart beat inside you and let your colours be seen – you are all that is needed. There is no need to impress, simply be. Be in your body, in your stomach that shakes – give of yourself as you always do. Give of you – dear one – you are needed today.

Step into my heart and together we can give it all away.

Happy Easter all. While I’m a woman of spirit, religion isn’t really my thing. Stories that are given as absolutes seem to divide us, but wisdom from those same words and the rituals they create do bring us together.

May you be blessed, warm, colourful, and funnnnnnnnnnn. Smile and tilt your face to the sun. You belong. You are loved.

xxT

TinaO is a writer, speaker and the founder of TinaOLife – a hub for all things worth living for, the workshop Live Your Best Story, and her coaching practice: Tall Poppy Living. She’s also a professional network marketer with a decade in the industry and in her Tall Poppy Living for Network Marketers Coaching Program, she teaches: selling isn’t slimey and marketing isn’t make-believe. You can be yourself and be successful in Direct Sales.

Dear Tina #1… What is the Story of this cancer?

March 18, 2016

It will be a year next month from when I picked up my cel phone while in Vegas during a conference to receive the news that the wacky black thing that had been growing in the back of my throat was indeed, not a tonsil crypt but instead was most definitely cancer.

Doc says: “We’re as shocked as you. While we knew there was a chance that it could be, none of us thought that this is what the biopsy would come back as. I wanted to reach you as soon as I could. I’m boarding a plane in ten minutes…”

Some doctors are called to be doctors. Clearly the level of mindfulness and care by my ears nose and throat specialist is from the ‘calling’ ilk. I wasn’t just a test result on a piece of paper. Note how I called him MY doctor. That happens when you’re handing your body over to an expert other than you.

He was going on vacation (or so I think), and wanted to catch me before he was unavailable in the air. He had left me a message the day before, but I don’t pick up voice mail that often (that’s what voice mail is for folks), so he left me a text to call him on his personal cel phone. To him, I was a mom, a wife, a writer, an artist. I have a history and a future and the sooner he could reach me the better.

To me, he is a man who cares, with a specialty in the ear nose and throat department. Thank you Dr. Smith. (No kidding, his name is Dr. Smith).

After the diagnosis came in… well, that’s a whole other post, book actually. It’s on the move through me but hasn’t arrived in full yet. For now, I want to share with you a little something that changed my life. That sounds ominous, and while cancer is totally that, what I stumbled into is not. See, a whole year before the C word arrived, I had started working with Chris Dierkes, whom I now call my ‘soul guy’ or the ‘soul dude’ of TinaOLife. He’s a soul interpreter (What the hell is that right? – no pun intended). Well, it’s difficult to explain the intangible (soul) with the tangible (words), but here it is in brief:

“Okay Tina, so think of it this way. I’m going go to the ‘soul library’ and check out your ‘book’. Then I’m going to read it and share it with you so you can fully realize it”.

Ohhhhhhh… that’s all. So, you’re taking my book out of the library? Cool. Got it. And then I’m going to get to know myself? Ohhh okay. Well, that’s how it made sense to me anyway.

See, soul work doesn’t make sense, it feels sense. For me that’s been my experience anyway.

So, what is the Dear Tina thing and how does it connect with cancer and with Chris and with soul work???

As you can imagine, post diagnosis, I was thrown into mental chaos. It was as if I was a pile of sticks: legs upon ribs, jaw upon pelvis, toes upon teeth, thoughts upon terror, blank upon nothingness, despair upon acceptance. I was sifting through the gnarly bits because within them was me, a timeless me. One who was here before my body arrived and one who would continue on once my body left. FYI… it’s not that I didn’t ‘get’ all of this before, it’s just that once I was thrust into the world of time passing without hearing a clock ticking because there is no fucking clock – well, it all just kinda fell into place because I was now out of the way. Trauma has a way of doing that. It cuts through the noise of what we call knowledge or understanding. Hmmmmm… like really? Who cares how much you think you know at times like this. It’s cliché but true, you can’t take it with you.

I couldn’t hear myself think anymore, or maybe that’s not really true. I could hear everything I thought, the issue was that everyone in my head was talking all at once. I couldn’t hear what I think… Just all what all of my experiences think. You get that right? All the voices in our head are just reactions to the various experiences we’ve had in our lifetime. I fell down the stairs once, now I have a voice that says: hold on to the railing. I’ve been heartbroken before, now I have a voice that says: go slow, trust slow if ever. I’ve been applauded before, now I have a voice that says: you rock, you got this, step out lady! See? Those are voices from my stories past, but they’re not me as in not, fully, wholly, without reaction me. Those are just my fragments talking (not soul fragments either – oh it’s so intricate isn’t it?).

So… there I was digging through bones from fragments past and I couldn’t hear the peaceful voice. You have one too. The voice that was with you when you were little and swinging your feet up to the sky all by yourself. The voice that woke you in the morning while you were still sleeping feeling the warm summer sun on your face. The voice that you hear when you were nestled deep, resting your cheek on your mama’s stretchy post baby belly. The voice you can sometimes hear as an adult if you spend enough time with yourself. That voice. That’s the one I was craving to hear.

So I started to write.

It came out without thinking.

I picked up a journal made for me by Ciel Ellis’ Thirsty Journals – (here’s the active link for the journals cause I know you’re gonna ask) and started writing.

Dear Tina…

and then just like that, with a few deep breaths and a lot of following instead of leading, I began to listen to the answers to many of my questions.

Some people call it automatic writing with the idea that the pen moves without you moving it, like a spirit coming through you – mehhhhhh… maybe. Who am I to say that it is or it isn’t? I’m not interested in holding a position on it, I just know that when I surrender to the process of letting the story tell me instead of the other way around, I can hear that loving, peaceful voice again and I’m 45 years old in the centre of crazy town and not five and blissed out on my mama’s lap.

I think of this process as more of a way to cut through the noise and really listen to what my innate wisdom (or soul) wants to say.

After the cancer diagnosis came in, I needed to write because I needed to hear. This is what this post is all about. It’s not about automatic writing and how to do it, it’s about what I heard and what I learned.

Here it is for you. I am starting a series of Dear Tina posts on TinaOLife as a way to invite you in to the world and words that speak to and through me.

Dear Tina, Dear Tina, Dear Dear Dear Tina, What is going on in my body?

(I often keep repeating myself until I feel the ‘click’ of letting go of my own thoughts – call it ego if you like).

Dear Tina, what is the story of this cancer in my body?

Why do you call it cancer Tina? It’s a name only. Breathe Tina, you may not be ready to hear this.

I am listening.

You are dying Tina. Your body is not dying. Your body is not dying. Your body is fine. Your body is holding a piece that is dying. You are dying. You as you as you have been is dying – this time this view of you is dying, this thought, this way is dying. You are dying Tina – your body is fine.

There have been years of you. There is years in the thing you call cancer. You can let it die. You can radiate it, chemo it, destroy it. You are dying, not your body. Let it die.

Let it leave your body. Let the doctors do what they must. You can let it die.

Do not fight the death of this, do not resist the death of this, this wants to die, and has been dead for a long time, the spirit of you died and has wanted to leave for a long time but you have kept holding on, kept transforming it into something else. It is time to let it die.

A new you is transcending – a new you is waiting to move in, a new you like teeth is ready to come down into place. This is death Tina and not the kind you know death to be.

Tina it is okay. Let it die. Your body is fine.

Soooooo… as you can imagine, I was a little startled. That’s the thing about surrendering to the unknown – you don’t know what’s gonna come out of you until it arrives.

My take on this, and let me tell you, the truth of this message knocked me down like the anvil of grief that it was, I got it. I had been living my ‘old, dramatic, deep, sad life’ for far too long. I had been building accomplishment after goal after success on top of a graveyard of grief, and it was costing me dearly. I was clutching and white knuckling the old dead scars of my story as my identity for so long that the powers that be decided to turn up the dial on my experience so I could wake the fuck up and decide to live.

Get it?

That’s enough for today’s Dear Tina… I just wanted to let you in. There will be more, I assure you. I jumped in today with Dear Tina for TinaOLife because I’ve been impossible to live with for the last week or so. I’m full of resentment and walking in a fog… I have had no idea why. I decided to ask myself for some more answers, but I’ll share what I discovered later. For now… consider yourself invited in.

Welcome.

p.s…. I’m feeling so much better. Clearly, all I needed was to be listened to. Thank you Dear Tina.

xxT.

There’s a Crack in Everything

March 3, 2016

A lot of my work- and the work of music writers/ journalists / bloggers who’ve been kind enough to write about it- focuses on the hardships I faced as a child, teen and early adult. Why that is isn’t a mystery. Intense situations and struggles are the stuff of drama. They push us past normal and safe where we feel in control into the painful and chaotic realm of trauma, but that’s also where beauty, transformation, love, mystery, compassion and profound connections can swoop in to reveal who we really are and what we’re really capable of. As Leonard Cohen sings:

“There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.”

A mentor of mine who passed away ago a few years ago used to say to me “When I need to touch God Rodney I touch you.” He wasn’t referring to me specifically, he meant that reaching out to others, sometimes for help, sometimes to help was where he truly found himself over and over again.

While I had to deal with a lot of pain as a child and an adult, I’ve also been extremely fortunate. I’ve had many generous and gifted people come into my life to guide me. It’s crazy how lucky I’ve been. It’s like in Greek myths how the hero (or in my case the anti-hero) keeps getting helped by mysterious strangers (the gods in disguise) when he or she needs it most. A folksinger I know, Rick Keating, has a lyric in a song that says “I keep on getting saved.” Yep.

GONE
by Rodney DeCroo

My first apartment was a basement suite
near 41st and Oak. The owner Craig,
a drug dealer turned contractor
after a five year stint in Okalla,
rented cheaply to young men
in trouble. I found the place
through an ad on the wall
in the Social Assistance office.
The interview was in his kitchen.

“Come on!” he says “Have something to eat!”
when Diane asked if I was hungry.
I hadn’t eaten for two days
after spending my money getting drunk
at the Cobalt, but I told him
“No, I don’t want anything”.
“Listen,” he said “you’re not leaving this kitchen
until you’ve had one of Diane’s sandwiches.
So what’s it gonna be?”
“Okay, sure.”
“There you go! he shouted smacking the table.
“Are you looking for work?”
“Yes”.
I’m looking for laborers. You want to work for me?”
“Okay.”

As I ate the thick bread and rich meat
and drank the dark coffee offered to me,
I felt the hunger in my stomach,
my unwashed clothes and my shaking hands
as if for the first time. After he left me
in the furnished suite, I stood with my back
against the door looking at the room.
I wondered who’d been here before me
and why they were gone.

FYI… Rodney has two gigs coming up in Vancouver.

Check it out below.

MARCH 6 / House Concert @ Cliff’s House

Catch this intimate solo set from Rodney DeCroo, with support from The Minimalist Jug Band.

Time: Doors 1pm / Show 2-4pm
Where: # 2-868 Cassiar Street East Van ( near PNE )
Cost: Suggested donation of $15. Ticket reservations are recommended by the host as seating is limited.
Contact: kali@tonicrecords.com for reservation details.
Drink: BYOB ( please drink responsibly )
Food: Tasty finger foods provided

Link: http://www.tonicrecords.com/mar-6-house-show-from-rodney–decroo/

MARCH 10 / “A Circle in the Fire” @ The Heatley

Rodney DeCroo will be hosting and performing in the first event of a new monthly series, “A Circle in the Fire”, a songwriters-in-the-round evening. This evening will feature an eclectic mix of local folk songwriters + performers: Doug Andrews, Elise Hall-Meyer, and Caroline Allatt.

Date: Thursday, March 10th

Time: 8:00pm

Where: 696 E Hastings St.

Cost: No cover!

Link: https://www.facebook.com/events/199995010359722/

Rodney DeCroo is a songwriter, poet and playwright. He has released 6 full-length albums, an album of poetry set to music (Allegheny), a book of poetry (Allegheny, BC) and a theatre production (Stupid Boy in an Ugly Town) that received critical acclaim at several Canadian fringe and writers festivals. DeCroo wrestles with regret, loss, aging, love, memory, death, art—always with his own ongoing recovery embedded in the background. DeCroo’s album and performances draw upon his greatest natural resource—his poetry.

Want to buy his music? Find him here on itunes. Want to catch him in concert? Check out his calendar here.

Truth Tuesday – Listening so as to Be

January 5, 2016

The truth is subjective right? I mean, I have one idea and I KNOW it’s true, but you do too and you KNOW it’s true as well. Okay, so if that’s the case, then which is it? Why all the fuss and fighting about it? And why are we on this incessant pursuit of knowing it? Why the pre-occupation with ‘finding our truth’?

Because we’re unaccustomed to living it.

And that’s perfectly natural.

We are born as itty bitty babies relying on those around us to be there, to take care of us, to make sense of us, to be the bubble that is our world. Our first conscious exposure to our living story is a completely EXTERNAL one. Our truth is based on what others do around us.

We see our mother’s face, feel her touch, hear her voice and that’s how we know we’re not alone. We don’t even know what alone is, we just know that we’re more than one.

We hear, smell, taste and sense our environment and that’s how we know where we are.

We are born without words, without context, without place, yet with a soul story to know and to give away, but we can’t yet because we haven’t developed the tangible tools like language to do it.

It’s as if it’s a set up! Life positions us to meet who we are through how we’re received. Now this is a beautiful opportunity to grow if our ‘truth’ is always reflected back at us which is probably why we call this life thing a magnificent journey. There’s so much to learn. But come on, it sure seems wildly inefficient though. Doesn’t it? That we should come in to the world perfect, whole and living our ‘truth’, only to spend the first 40 years of our life (usually) living on auto-pilot then waking up during a mid-life crisis, or a 20-something existential emptiness, or our 30-something drive to ‘be someone’. And then Some of us just skip it all together by playing the ‘acceptance game’ which isn’t acceptance at all, but rather resignation. Ewwwwww. I’ve seen it and so have you. I’ve even lived it a few times.

When my husband and I couldn’t stand each other for about ten years of our first fifteen together (yup no kidding), the only way I knew how to cope was to say to myself: Okay well I guess he’ll just watch TV and I’ll live in the kitchen (I’m simplifying but you probably get it). No wonder I crash and burned. Resignation ate me up and spit me out.

Here’s the thing, once I took the dangerous step of actually LISTENING for whom I’ve always been, I realized, I’d never actually left. I wasn’t lost, I just wasn’t found.

Did you know that we can’t ditch ourselves? There is no where we can run to lose ourselves either. It’s not like we get to shed our ‘truth’ on the floor as a rumpled outfit as we reach into the closet to wear someone else. We’re not a costume nor a wardrobe. We’re not inter-changeable, well, at least not on the inside.

All the self-help books, personal growth workshops, inspirational wall-art and lit up catch phrases that we devour as a way to ‘find’ our truth is the habitual way we’ve moved through world since we arrived. It makes sense right? We think: I am because you see me, I do because you know me, I say because you hear me, I love because you love me… There’s beauty in this ‘we’, in this interconnectedness. There is. I get that, but it still has nothing to do with the ‘truth’ quest we all end up on.

Today I ask you – Who are you in relation to only you? Who are you beyond what fills your mind all day? Who are you outside of where and how you live? Who are you and who have you always been?

Oh mannnnnn big questions and you’re probably feeling the desire to skip it. I mean, why ask when you can’t ever truly know. There’s no proof, no check mark, no enlightened someone to say: Yes, you’re right, that’s who you are. There’s only you and all you can do is listen for you. Listen to the story that has been telling YOU since you arrived.

A life and business coach I once worked with Isabelle Mercier Turcotte said to me in a day long session together: “That’s not your gig” and she wrote it on a yellow sticky and stuck it to one of the many massive post-it notes on the wall. For months I walked through my life with two imaginary yellow stickies: one that said THAT’S MY GIG, and another that said THAT’S NOT MY GIG and in every single interaction I would figuratively hold up my two stickies and decide which one was true: my gig, or not my gig. If you’re interested, here’s a quick video in my own words that I made for Isabelle about it.

I had a good life five years ago when I was holding up those stickies, in fact, most would’ve thought that I was at the top of my game. I was at the pinnacle of my profession, by all accounts I had a great life: two kids, a house, husband, career, passions and my health. My truth however was that a lot of that good life wasn’t actually mine, I just lived it like it was.

Today, I ask you: What’s your gig? What’s not your gig? The truth will always always always tell you, you need only listen for it.

I challenge you this week to hold up your two yellow stickies and see what answers come back.

Many thanks to Charlene Sanjenko and PowHERhouse women for the opportunity to host and moderate Truth Tuesdays. So cool.

xxT

You can’t stop the truth

December 9, 2015