Owning Your Intuition

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Owning Openness: The Accidental Benefit of Seeing With Magical Eyes

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

Hello Pinkies. Dana here, with something I wrote on the plane as I left California in early March.

I’ve had a magical time on the West Coast last week. Many things made it wonderful, but as I sit on the plane on the next leg of my journey, I am distilling down what gave it such energy for me. I’m a people person and so it’s no big surprise that it was the collection of amazing men and women I met in personal, professional and social contexts. Many, but not all, were swirling around Lissa and Owning Pink, but I’ve met a lot of people in my years and this bunch was unique in a very special way. Every person I met, including Lissa herself, was completely without pretense. And let me tell you, there is nothing in the world more gorgeous than a human being who owns who they are today, while also owning the fact that they are still on a journey to learn and grow and become.

These people were from all walks of life and between the ages of four and fifty-five, they were living and playing and writing and creating world-changing businesses. When I say they were without pretense, I mean that they were self-confident and also open about what they still had to learn. They weren’t afraid to ask for help and they weren’t afraid to hear advice. I am tempted to give Lissa great credit for having fantastic friends (which is true!), but it was more than that and extended to people I’d known for years who somehow seemed different this time. Why were all the people I met so open?

Reaching Out

Having so many conversations about where we were and what we need to grow got me thinking that in my business life, I work with many different kinds of clients and the most successful ones make good use of a Board of Advisors (sometimes, but not always, this is also a Board of Directors). The advisory board members are recruited by the president or executive director to provide him or her a special perspective they know they can’t get from people closest to them – such as customers, investors or employees. These leaders reach outside their immediate circles and align themselves with outside advisors who have knowledge and experience that can bring them a much needed outside perspective on their business and themselves.

This isn’t just a business leadership skill, it’s also a personal leadership approach I see very effective people use in their daily lives as well, regularly reaching out to people they trust and being authentic with them so they can see themselves through their friends’ eyes. I’ve done this very intentionally for the last ten years or so, myself.

I didn’t used to do this, by the way. Many years ago I was seeing a therapist because I was a young working mom on the path to burnout and beginning to careen off balance. After beginning to get my emotional legs under me, I realized I was beginning to see her as a friend instead of a therapist, someome I could chat with about what had been going on in my life and get some perspective back.

About two sessions after I came to this realization, she asked me,“Do you have any friends?”

Surprised, I said , “Sure! I have tons of friends.”

She smiled and asked, “Do you ever talk to them?”

I blinked. “No. I really don’t have time.”

She smiled more broadly. “Why don’t you make time for them?”

Two weeks later I gave her a hug and released myself from therapy, promising myself and her I’d come back if I ever needed to. Though I’ve thought about it a few times over the years, I’ve never been back because, in part, I’ve created an interlocking circles of friends who I make a point to see regularly, both in personal and professional contexts. This doesn’t mean that my therapist wasn’t a good investment (she absolutely was, believe me!). But that therapy had a limit. Once I became emotionally capable enough to reach out and make myself vulnerable to people I trusted in a new way, I no longer needed therapy. When I did this, I discovered a whole pleathora of personal development opportunity in the people that were already around me.

Opening Up

Today, my advisory teams are large and diverse. My advisors include friends I’ve met while kibuttzing on the soccer field as our kids chased butterflies instead of soccer balls (i.e., a while ago!), and they are former clients and people who I simply admire for their personal strength and journeys. I really value their perspectives on my life and I enjoy supporting them because in doing so I learn more about myself.

But this last trip, and the amazing people I met, were not just an accident. I’ve been on lots of trips and met lots of people before without having met so many who were all so open, in many cases, with someone they barely knew. When I look at the one common element in each interaction that delighted me this trip, I see only one consistent variable: me. And I realize that while I’ve been collecting my advisory teams around me for years, I’ve only recently opened myself to others in a way that encourages their deeper openness to emerge and feel safe.

The difference lately in my outlook is beyond nonjudgment and it’s beyond acceptance (both of which I’ve practiced intentionally). On this last trip West I practiced my magical eyes and seeing people with love – not just a few people or difficult to love people – but on everyone I met. And it worked. It drew out the most beautiful part of each person for them to be, and me to see.

The Accidental Benefit of Seeing With Magical Eyes

And here’s my ah-ha! At Owning Pink we like to use Magical Eyes to make others feel seen and support their healing, but I don’t know if these people even needed “healing,” and I don’t know yet what affect my magical eyes had on them. Now I realize is that I don’t really need to know. What I’ve learned is that it had a strong and wonderful affect on me. I am lighter. I am happier. I am enriched by these wonderful people who allowed me to see them with love. As I open myself up more and more with my new and old advisors, I expect to continue this happy spiral. I can’t wait!

What about you? Have you used your magical eyes? Have you used it on difficult people and “easy” people? Have you noticed the difference it makes on how you feel?

Stumbling into magic,
Dana

Tags: friendships, healing, journey, leadership, magical eyes, openness, work
Posted in Owning Love, Owning Success, Owning Your Emotions, Owning Your Intuition, Owning change, Personal Empowerment | 2 Comments »

Owning Emotions: The Compulsion to Comfort

Friday, March 12th, 2010

Who doesn’t love a good cry?

Turns out a lot of people don’t. Of course, there are safe spaces where we can own our tears … workshops, retreats, support groups, the Pink Posse. But there is still much of the world where the sight of someone crying will send an entire room into a silent panic.

You’ve been there. You’re sitting at a meeting table at work, or standing in line at a store, or hanging out at home. You are fatigued, frustrated, moved, or overwhelmed. You surrender to your emotions. Tears begin to flow.

Suddenly, everyone else in the room stops breathing. They look away. Talk amongst themselves. Pretend it’s not happening. Or worse yet …

They tell you to stop.

“Don’t cry,” they say, out of a desire to comfort and support you. And as loving as the gesture may be, it is not about you feeling better … it’s about them feeling better. Your tears make them uncomfortable. Stop. They say. Don’t cry.

Why? What is it about crying that freaks people out? Where in our evolution did it stop being okay to have our feelings? These of course are rhetorical questions, age-old and contemplated and theorized to death. And really, the “why” isn’t important. What is important is to own our feelings, and make it okay for others to own theirs.

Aliveness ≠ joy

One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned over the past year is that being fully alive doesn’t mean being happy all the time. To be human is to have the full gambit of experiences and emotions. Kind of like the seasons, cycling through times that are more challenging to get to the bright spots makes life richer and, dare I say, a bit more fun.

Plus, the only way past any experience is through it – not around it. If we stifle tears, rage, grief, sorrow, or even joy – it’s going to lurk, distract us, even make us sick – until we acknowledge and HAVE the emotion. If we grew up this way (many of us did), there is so much stored in our bodies and psyches, affecting us in ways of which we’re not even aware. How much easier would this be if we simply gave ourselves and others permission to let out whatever’s going to come anyway?

Holding space

As part of our commitment to seeing each other with magical eyes, next time you’re in the company of someone who’s having some emotion – no matter where or when or how “appropriate” or not it is – I invite you to simply hold space for them. Don’t try to comfort them, tell them it will be okay, suggest that they stop crying, or even pass them a tissue. But don’t turn away or pretend like it’s not happening, either. Simply be there. Depending on who it is, a hug might be welcome, or a held hand. Let your intuition tell you what is needed.

How does that feel, Pinkies, to know that it’s actually not your responsibility to make anyone feel “better?” That being the kind and loving spirit you already are is enough – more than enough? How much more space might you hold, knowing that you don’t have to manically run around inside that space trying to make everything okay?

Letting you do your thing (and loving you all the more for it),
Joy

Tags: crying, emotions, holding space, relationships, surrender
Posted in Owning Surrender, Owning Your Emotions, Owning Your Intuition, Personal Empowerment | 9 Comments »

A Pink God’s Pleap off the Corporate Cliff

Thursday, March 11th, 2010

Dearest Pinkies, please welcome Pink God Ryan Rigoli, founder of (and blogger at) rigolicoaching.com. Ryan works with solo entrepreneurs and organizational leaders to build heart-centered businesses that inspire change in the people and communities they wish to serve. He specializes in helping them to create a unique, personal brand that aligns their core essence with their life’s work. Ry’s here today to talk about his own, major, life-transforming Pleap, and the wisdom he’s gleaned along the way. Bravo, Ryan, and thank you for inspiring us all.

*****

The Matrix

It was about three years ago and I was exhausted. I had recently come back from a trip to Australia. My intention was to spend time with a good friend and rejuvenate. The spending time with a good friend part was great. The rejuvenation part didn’t last long.

My vacation buzz quickly wore off and before long I was back at work. I felt the weight of the world on my shoulders. I had just been moved to a newly formed team at Yahoo!, where I worked, and what we were tasked to do was starting to feel like trying to move entire mountains with a pinky. I was getting burned out after years of trying to ‘move the needle’ and putting everything I had into high priority projects at the company.

I found myself dreaming about my next vacation. Peru, Iceland, India…where to go next? Only I wasn’t there. I was here, smack dab in the middle of the matrix working harder than ever before, and simply pushing on through to the next vacation. Wash, rinse, repeat.

The feeling in my gut was screaming: “Are you nuts?” But I wouldn’t listen. I was too scared to make a change, and even if I did, I wouldn’t know what to do next anyway. It was just too fuzzy of a plan to make a move.

Claustrophobia

One night I woke up around 3am and felt the walls closing in on me. I had to rush to my patio to catch my breath. Still feeling enclosed, I ran out of my building and onto the street. I sat on the sidewalk and started to catch my breath. I knew right then that this was the beginning of the end for me in this kind of life.

When you start feeling claustrophobic in a 1200-square-ft. loft with 30 foot ceilings, then you know something’s wrong. My body was telling me it was time for a change or it would shut down. I liked my body and I also enjoyed being on this planet, so I decided to listen for the first time in a very long time to see what it had to say.

After a few minutes some images came to me. I envisioned what it would be like in five years at the age of 40 – working in the same company and with the same two-hour round-trip commute. Only this time I imagined being an SVP of Marketing, the role I had always been striving for. That claustrophobic feeling immediately started to come back. And there it was. The path I was headed down made me feel more and more compressed, less fully alive, and, frankly, physically ill. And the funny part about all of it was this: I’d created this world for myself. Not because I had to, but because I thought I would be happy and fulfilled. I felt that if I just pushed a little bit more, I’d be totally secure and free of all financial worries.

Practically speaking, of course, staying on with my company was somewhat of a known quantity. And, if not there, then another similar company. Another couple of years and I would have had the chance to become a VP making even more money and in charge of an even larger team. I imagined what that felt like and observed the sensations in my body at the very thought of it. First, the nausea (spitting up what I knew would poison my soul), then the claustrophobia (feeling trapped on a path that wasn’t for me), and finally a feeling of sadness and helplessness (my anger at myself turned inwards that I wasn’t owning my freedom to choose).

Exploring the Unknown

Quitting and maybe even traveling abroad, on the other hand, was a complete unknown and scary, but again I observed my feelings and physical reactions — lightness (freedom to reinvent myself) and nervous yet energetic excitement (the prospects of new people, new passions and new adventures).

That was enough for me. A week later I handed in my resignation and started planning an extended trip through Latin America, many of the experiences of which I captured in my travel blog.

And it was from that day onward that I started a three-year journey into the unknown. Travels through remote lands, ‘successes’ and ‘failures’ of new businesses and relationships, universal mysteries revealed, even more questions and mysteries surfaced, moments of complete confusion and fear, times of absolute clarity and peace.

Would I trade any of it? Never. The most challenging three years of my life were the ones during which I felt most fully alive.

The Free-Fall

Anyone who goes through a process of breaking free of their own version of the matrix may have a different set of circumstances but the emotional experience is often the same. Right before it starts and the black hole of opportunity opens, there’s a sense that there’s something more. There’s a feeling of longing for something that you just can’t put your finger on. There’s a terrified feeling of the unknown and questions about how you’re going to manage without all of the answers laid out right in front of you. There’s exhilaration at the thought of freedom — the freedom to be who you really are and to live that fully whatever that may be.

And then one day you take the leap off a cliff only to realize that you’re falling without an end point. It just keeps going. Ever changing. Ever moving. The exhilaration, the fear, the joy, the anger, the sadness, all rolled up into one big leap of faith into the giant unknown.

And it’s that jump for me that led to an extraordinary journey that continues to this day. Yes, when I returned, I took adventurous leaps in my travels, new businesses and relationships, but the real jump was inward. And with that came a process of remembering who I really am. ‘Self-remembering’ was not just a set of words anymore but a deep feeling of who I am as a Spirit in this body. Of what I’m here to do and be. Of how I’m here for others. And a new and completely unexpected version of that continues to unfold.

A Grand Mystery

This kind of path is a different one than before. Although there’s a time for planning and goal-setting, there’s a different quality to the experience. A recognition perhaps that no matter how many goals we set, or plans we make, there’s still a grand mystery to it all. Maybe we’re not meant to completely understand everything or know how every intention we set out will turn out. Maybe it’s more about how we respond and awaken to the mysteries that unfold right in front of us rather than to the actual content or outcome that we originally expected.

Perhaps it’s really about the type of person we become along the way. It’s about the capacities we cultivate in ourselves to speak our truth with strength and dignity but also with compassion and discernment vs. blame and judgment towards others with a different view. Maybe it’s a holding of our intentions with a powerful, energetic, focused presence but also with a kind of gentleness, or lightness, for how the outcome will really appear to us in the end. Perhaps it’s about a sense of openness about what wants to emerge from deep within…something much bigger than ourselves. It is life expressing itself through us. And it’s the very art of surrendering and then allowing that brings forth this new creation into the world.

Maybe it’s really a journey about how we treat others under the most trying of circumstances. And, of course, how we treat ourselves even with all of the mistakes we make, the shame or guilt we feel, the broken promises we’ve made along the way. Perhaps it’s, ultimately, about how much love and kindness we can show ourselves in the midst of it all.

The Sacred Journey

There’s a painting in my house that says: “Sometimes your only available transportation is a leap of faith.” As people on a spiritual path, we are all on a sacred journey that takes an extra-ordinary amount of faith and trust in ourselves. We are on a personal journey of healing and through our presence we create a space for the healing of those all around us. For our clients, our friends, our families, our communities, our partners.

Whatever our path may be, creating social change through personal transformation is no easy calling. It takes patience, diligence and immense kindness towards ourselves to explore the truth behind who we really are and work with others to do the same. Our work does not come with a rule book or a set of predefined answers but simply with the presence of our hearts and the support of others to help us move forward.

I want to thank you for doing what you do and for the very presence that you bring into the world.

I will do my best to support you in this journey.

Blessings,
Ryan

Tags: adventure, aliveness, change, leap of faith, pleaping, transformation, unknown
Posted in Guest Pinkies, Owning Joy, Owning Surrender, Owning Your Intuition, Owning change, Personal Empowerment | 9 Comments »

Taking the Next Step Toward Self-Discovery

Tuesday, March 9th, 2010

Dearest Pinkies, please welcome Mojo Mentor and Pink Goddess of Intuition Caroline Diana Bobart. Caroline will be hosting the upcoming Owning Pink Self-Discovery Workshop, a bi-weekly teleconference series running from April 8 – June 17. (Pinkies have already signed up, so go ahead! We invite you to register soon.)

Welcome Caroline as she talks about the upcoming Self-Discovery workshop, the Pink Group Agreement, and the vast potential within all of us.

*****

From the moment I first laid eyes on the Owning Pink website back in July, 2009, like many of us, I felt utterly moved to take a closer look at this creation that Lissa had birthed just a few months before. As both a natural and a trained professional intuitive, the urge was too irresistible for me to not take a look at what this energy looked like on the unseen realms of awareness. What, I wondered, was the glue that was holding this community together and why on God’s green earth did it glow so brightly?! It had captured my imagination and was like nothing I’d quite seen before. It was incredible to me that all this goodness and love I was feeling coming from a community that had an online home. And so, during one of my daily meditations, I sat down to take a look at the energy flow and spiritual dynamics around Owning Pink that was causing such a visible stir in so many people’s lives.

What I saw

What I found was profoundly beautiful and as I looked at it, I could see that part of Lissa’s inspiration for birthing this creation was that intuitively, she’d been picking up on the unspoken communication from people on the same or similar wavelengths about the magic, healing and transformation that can take place in a like-minded community based on unconditional acceptance and love. As part of my inner explorations, The Pink Group Agreement was crystallized and subsequently adopted by the community to be shared with other Pinkies and consciously engaged.

One of the really unique things that I’ve noticed about Lissa’s style as a leader is that she has a huge heart and a spirit that comes alive and sparkles with celebration with each and every wave of passion, support and goodness that ripples through the community. Indeed, many would call her fearless. It has been such a huge process to witness the growth that both the community as a whole has taken since its conception as well as the Pinkies within it. What has been even more crucial is that Lissa and her team have effortlessly been able to keep pace and dimension with the physical, emotional and spiritual needs of the community delivering tangible structures and supports upon which the community can continue to flourish and build. Perhaps the most visible and grounded of these is about to take physical form in the shape of the Owning Pink Center: the co-creation of the Owning Pink team and all Pinkies over the past months – those of you who have been sharing, growing, healing, integrating, processing and participating in Owning Pink Workshops, Mojo-Live Calls, posting and sharing on the Posse forum, blogs, and on many many other levels and less overt ways.

How the Self-Discovery Workshop Factors In

As a part of this momentous step-up into a place of more interactive, accessible, conscious vitality and wellness for Pinkies on the virtual side of things, I am thrilled to be leading the first ever online Owning Pink Self-Discovery Workshop which starts on April 8. This workshop series incorporates all the abilities and gifts that I bring to Owning Pink as a Mojo Mentor … my intuition, clairvoyant and healing abilities, experience in creating sacred space, spiritual counseling, teaching and group work. Through the inherent multidimensionality of the 6^th chakra or third eye, these sessions involve powerful guided visualizations created to meet each of us where we are on our spiritual path.

Within a shared group agreement we will light up and amplify the voice of our true Selves!

Self-Discovery is a process, and one of the most magical aspects of embarking upon a program like this with other Pinkies who are in agreement to their own healing and evolution – as well as that of others’ – is that there are no limits to the levels and layers on which you will be positively affected by this inner-work.

If you have been searching for a way to turn up the volume on your intuition, release your past and move forward into the future, a brighter, lighter, more on-purpose YOU in the company of other bright, capable souls, then perhaps you might consider that this Owning Pink Self-Discovery Series might have been created just for you. At this critical time in Owning Pink’s evolution, I’m so looking forward to sharing this 12-week journey with you, and seeing what magic we can create!

With love and exuberance,
Caroline

Note from Owning Pink founder Dr. Lissa Rankin:

Pinkies, I will be present, helping hold the sacred space, during these workshop. Caroline will be guiding us, but I am on my own path of self-discovery and can’t wait to see what she has in store for us. Join us and take the next step towards realizing that you already have all that it takes to have all that you want. Big hugs and love- Lissa

Tags: creation, energy, healing, intuition, meditation, pink group agreement, self-discovery, spirituality
Posted in Guest Pinkies, Owning Joy, Owning Spirituality, Owning Success, Owning Your Intuition | 4 Comments »

Claiming Our Divine Selves: Why We Don’t Need to Wait

Sunday, March 7th, 2010

Dear Pinkies, please welcome back Audrey Vitolins, a motivational speaker, consultant and intuitive coach for transformation, who helps her clients uncover their truth – or what she calls their gold. She’s a Magical Eyes coach, Pinkies! And she’s here today to talk a bit about why we wait to follow our dreams … and why we don’t need to any more.

*****

“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
– Anais Nin

Can you feel the excitement?! The buzz of energies, a sense that what you have been waiting for is indeed possible?! Or perhaps you are feeling an uncertainty as you face a blank canvas knowing that it is indeed your time to fill it. Are you feeling that you almost cannot deny the call to respond? As written above, that it’s almost becoming too painful to wait any longer? Or maybe you are feeling dead in the water knowing that the old way no longer fits.

I’ve walked this path and know what it’s like to make the conscious decision to unfold and how challenging it can be. I’ve streamlined what I’ve learned so that others have an easier time, and this is why I now guide beautiful, amazing, passionate souls through this process.

Divine Timing

It is key that during these times you understand the difference between the patience involved in allowing something to manifest, aka “divine timing”, versus waiting to step into what you sense is possible or into the embodiment of your Divine Loving Self.

Waiting to be who you are here to be is not the same as being patient. One is victim consciousness and a lack of action, the other is acknowledging that all is in divine order. Hear this again – hoping that your feeling doubtful or fearful of living authentically will one day dissolve is not patience. It’s just waiting.

You experience how it can be challenging to pick up senses about things to come such as the endings of relationships, beginnings, possibilities, moves, creative ideas, etc. You have this sense but are not sure as to the timing. So you wait and delay stepping into the power of the now opportunity.

Ways we wait

We do this on several levels. On an external level, we wait to move forward on practical matters because we know that change is coming. Perhaps you ignore a job opportunity or new relationship because you sense an upcoming change and don’t understand how these new opportunities will fit into the change you sense.

This also occurs at an internal level. You wait to be less afraid, to be more loving, to speak up, to treat your body with respect until you arrive at your new destination whether this new destination is energetic (e.g. you release blame or guilt) or physical (e.g. you move to Georgia). Or you continue to act defensive and closed down with people around you who cause you stress because you know that one day you will get a new job, new spouse, move away from your family or those neighbors or that group of friends and all will be well in this new land.

In other words, you are waiting for something outside of yourself to make it easier for you to be you. When really, you sense that right now you would rather laugh more, act softer, more nurturing, take a risk, let go of old regrets. And instead of just being or doing those things, you wait until others change, until you feel validated and safe. All the while not owning that the place of safety and validation is completely within yourself.

What happens is that you wait for your future to begin. You wait to arrive in Oz and then you will have courage and then you will know how to live from your heart space and then you will be at home and then you will be able to think clearly and paint like the wild artist you always knew you were. And what happens is that it takes much longer to arrive in OZ than you ever thought. And you begin to realize that you are exhausted, irritable, uninspired and you believe this is due to not being in OZ. Rather . . . it’s because you have decided to wait to be who you are divinely coded to be.

What are you waiting for?

Who or what are you waiting to be? Why are you waiting and what are you waiting for? Stop waiting and click those red heels. You do not need to “get” a new life to experience a healthy body, to be calmer, to be more loving, to step into your passion, to master your energy. You do these things, embody these things and thus create a new life.

If you want to get along better with that co-worker, don’t wait for him/her to change. BE who you want to be with them. If they reject you, you will not die! And if you are afraid you will shrivel up, then that is your indicator that you are waiting for something outside of you to change. Claim the freedom and expansion you will experience as you live from your truth and your integrity in that moment. Do this over and over and perhaps that person will change and perhaps not. But YOU WILL.

This planet needs as many of us to be in our power, to claim our Divine Heart Based Self. Please be the inspiration in someone’s life today and use your magical eyes to see other beautiful souls who are wanting to blossom!

Seeing you in your Joy ~

Audrey

Tags: connection, divine order, divine self, divine timing, magical eyes, patience, power, waiting
Posted in Finding Mojo, Guest Pinkies, Owning You, Owning Your Intuition, Personal Empowerment | No Comments »