Got the bends?

Hello Reader,

I'm sitting at my desk, listening to the dishwasher sloshing, coffee percolating, white sage incense fills the room, and I’m ready to write and murder my prose darlings. I feel lighter.

Even though my pipeline is uncertain, giving me needed space to edit my book, I’ve shed that gnawing anxiety about finances and the future. My bones tell me I am right where I am supposed to be.

Sure, worry visits, but she doesn’t take off her coat. I can do cartwheels in the space within, instead of being able to wash my hands from the toilet.

I've rounded a bend. I’m in a new space. I’ll enjoy it while it lasts, because it won’t. I’ll keep growing and going along the upward spiral.

When it comes to growth, this visual brings it home for me. As we enter bigger spirals, we expand to meet and inhabit them.

It’s a party once we’re in the new palatial room, chandeliers clinking along with flute glasses, but rounding the bend can feel like a bad, nauseated hangover. We’re in between, not where we were or where we are going.

During the first two years building kollektiv studio, I rounded several. The first one was the hardest. Leaving a cushy, salaried job as a creative director and building my own business left me feeling anxious, grateful, and excited, but often clenched, wondering where the next paycheck would come from.

Leaning into trust and partnership got me to the next spiral. I learned how to be in the bend, even when it felt really uncomfortable, instead of trying to get out and sliding back down, simply by staying in it. I fell backward into life and trusted that not only will it catch me, but so will my future self. And of course, I kept showing up and doing the work.

My husband, a seasoned entrepreneur, says experience helps. After a couple of years of seeing that business and opportunities do come, and that perpetual summer is not only impossible but undesirable, you relax into the uncertainty.

After 3 years, I’m in a new inner space. This too shall pass, and I’ll have the honor of entering bigger bends and loops, but I’m enjoying being right here. I’ve never been here before. I’m not worrying about what’s coming or not, instead deeply focused on writing my book and working with the amazing clients I have, even though the funds are not heavily flowing. If my client roster was full, I wouldn’t have the time to write.

This has also meant releasing another security blanket - social media (worry was the first safety duvet. If I worried now, I'd somehow avoid future disaster [lies]). Not entirely, but not giving it as much time and energy. I lost a mental muffin top by letting go and being lighter feels damn good.

Understanding this space is a gift and an investment relieves the pressure. Knowing I’m on the right track (or loop) makes this feeling possible. Not only that, all the corners I’ve rounded have led me here, prepared me for this.

It helps to know the bends come with growth. I can recognize when I am in the stretch and give myself grace and a glass of water. I might even get excited about having motion sickness because I know what it means.

Here’s the interesting thing: Nothing external has changed. I didn’t hit 20K months or sign a life-changing deal. I built my capacity to be in the uncertain unknown and inhabit bigger spaces. I’m starting to realize even if I had earned 20K a month, anxiety wouldn’t have magically disappeared. I would have found new things to worry about (because the inner landscape hadn't changed).

I’m working on my relationship with life. I didn’t trust her before. I kept catastrophizing and expecting her to cheat on me or leave me, so I gripped tighter. I often slept on the couch. It wasn’t working anymore.

I decided to start building trust and let go of fear. Believing in her and me, and us. Imagining the best possible scenarios and being totally open to her surprising me. Trust and love form the foundation I need to round bends and inhabit wide open spirals.

I don’t know about you, but I want to keep expanding my experience of life.

Our nature is to expand, just like the universe, and as Tony Robbins puts it: “Progress equals happiness.” My twist on this is: “Growth equals fulfillment”.

When growth is intentional and directed, we access different parts of ourselves and arrive in new dreamy spaces to experience and inhabit. This feels fulfilling af. Usually, after we've rounded the bend.

Keep creating,