the shift that's happening in the swirl

How often have well-intentioned people given you this advice recently?

You need to put your own oxygen mask on first before you can help others
You need to take better care of yourself—you're so hard on yourself
You need to relax—you're doing too much and need better boundaries
You need to meditate more, rest more, exercise more, practice loving kindness more

If we were to listen to that on 2x speed, it would sound like this: YOU NEED....MORE, MORE, MORE!

Which is exhausting isn't it? And if we're being honest, what it's really saying is this:
You're not doing something enough...or right. Or worse: Something's wrong with you.

All of this is complete and utter bullshit.

So that well-intentioned advice we hand out so freely?

It gaslights us into believing something is wrong with us—instead of the world we're living in.

But I suspect you know in your bones there's something wrong about this world we're living in right now. Many things, in fact.

I get it if you feel like sometimes all you do is pick up broken pieces and try to cobble them together with a stick of gum and a chip clip. Only to trip over another broken piece. And jot down notes of things to do in the middle of the night (how you sleeping, by the way?) that you know will never get done.

Because you're the one that's going to get the call at 11:00 pm when one of your aging parents has been taken to the ER—you're their power of attorney, you're the one that knows their medication list, you're their memory, their advocate, and their ride home.

Because you know all the passwords for the 10,000 services that make your home and business run, and when they go on the fritz, need updates or get hacked—which they will—bills won't get paid and things simply won't function until they get sorted out.

Because your intuition is going to be the one that picks up when something is off with your kid—or friend, colleague or partner—who says that everything is "fine", when it's not fine at all, but just hanging on by a thread.

Because, because, because....

And I know Rumi reminds us that the cracks are where the light gets in...and Pema teaches us that things are always falling apart and coming together...and Byron says that "loving what is" is the surest way through (and don't even get me started on Mel Robbin's "Let them" theory that's not even her's...)

Some days—especially these hot and sticky ones— it's just...a lot. Full stop.

Is that just me and my clients or are you feeling this too, ? Please hit reply and gimme a hail yas if that resonates with you. It really helps to hear you out there.

But here's something interesting that's happening...

There seems to be a fascinating up-leveling going on—maybe even a digging in—among me and my clients.

It feels like a shift is happening in the swirl of it all.

Almost like a stake has been planted in the ground that reads: ME. Or a line has been drawn in the sand with a pink toenail that suggests: ENOUGH.

It's been most noticeable in the hot and sticky July conversations I've been having with my clients, and (lucky us) they gave me permission to share specifics with you here.

When I begin with new 1:1 clients, they complete a questionnaire for me that is the basis of their initial discovery session. It's filled with what my clients lovingly refer to as "annoying Lael questions." When one of my clients got to this question (What do you take a stand for? What has you dig in and take a stand with your whole spine?) her response was two simple words:

"Now? Myself." BOOM!

I stopped in my tracks. I fell in love with the simplicity—the audacity, even—of her response, and later told her that in 20 years of doing this work with clients, I'd never had the experience of not having a follow-up question to that. It was just so clear.

This woman had raised many kids and was the center tentpole of not only her family, but multiple businesses—she is no stranger to hard work or devotion. But now she wanted to plug back into herself—her energy source—so she could get her vitality back to fuel her for the next leg of her journey.

Then there was the client who said this:

"Being in a relationship with myself feels like a really worthwhile enterprise right now." BOOM!

She's been in the corporate world—with the same company—for over a quarter of a century and has been actively exploring what life outside that company would be like, much to their chagrin. Her comment was about realizing her power isn't tied to staying or leaving the company—it's about being in a relationship with herself no matter where she is or what she chooses.

And then a long-time client of mine said this gorgeous phrase to me yesterday:

"The only person I want to make space for right now is the entirety and wholeness of me." BOOM!

This woman has owned her own business for even longer than I have, and I've watched her grow it from a small consultancy to a thriving global company. And she's done it all with heart, integrity and a fierce commitment to social justice practices that plug us back into our humanity.

None of these women expected to say the things they said. They just sort of...came out.

What was most noteworthy about these three examples (and there are more I could tell you...) is that nowhere in what they said is a question. It was just a clear, simple statement.

So often when I work with clients who want to create a change—to make a move, to choose something new or different, or go beyond where they find themselves—we discover something that makes them light up. And then inevitably they ask this:

Wait, can I want that?

Hear that question? Like we need permission from someone else to want what we want?

The poet Mary Oliver reminds us: You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.

What an awesome responsibility that is these days, isn't it? Doesn't that feel heretical when there is so much pain and suffering in the world—so many broken things that are being held together with chewing gum and chip clips?

There's this other poem I've been reaching for as I've lived passed the mid-point of my 50s. My clients and women's circles have often heard me refer to this as "where the work is at": the fifth stanza of Oriah Mountain Dreamer's poem, The Invitation.

"It doesn't interest me if the story you're telling me is true.
I want to know if you can disappoint another to be true to yourself;
If you can bear the accusation of betrayal and not betray your own soul;
If you can be faithless and therefore trustworthy."

I didn't even understand that the first time I read it. I had to read it like ten times.
But I know it when I'm living it—because I feel it.

Do we listen to ourselves? Do we trust ourselves? Do we tell ourselves the truth? And do we believe it—enough to act on it?

Doing the work of that fifth stanza feels really selfish, really hard, and really lonely. Even as I know it's my true north. My wisdom.

So when I was running the other day, trying to sort something out in my tired brain, I heard myself say:

Don't betray yourself. Don't betray yourself. Don't betray yourself.

I knew I was at the edge of betrayal—and I backed away from it. I chose to believe me.
And just like that, the Sara Bareilles song I Choose You started playing in my ears as I smiled (music always speaks to me).

My whole heart will be yours forever.
This is a beautiful start to a lifelong love letter.
Tell the world that we finally got it all right.
I choose you.

I hope something in here spoke to you. Let me know if it did, okay?

But please choose you. If not you, then who will?

Sending you so much love under this new moon in July.
Thank you so much for being with me here. I appreciate you.
Mwah.

Lael

PS: I got loads of wonderful responses from my email in June, so if you missed that one—especially for those who are feeling overwhelmed by it all right now—you might want to check this one out.

PSS: Some of my favorite things I've shared this month...Halla Tomasdotir's (president of Iceland) interview with Adam Grant on his podcast...it's so freaking good. The late Andrea Gibson's poem: 93 Million Miles (such a loss to this world). Frankly anything by Kate Forester on Instagram.

PSS+ If you're hungry for more of my favorite resources, head on over to the Community Garden I set up for my subscribers. It's free to use and all ours, with loads of things to watch, listen to, read, and play with. All of my favorite things in one place.