Happy Valentine’s Day, Lovers!

It is one of my two favorite holidays (the other one is Halloween).

I guess I’m naturally drawn to love and magic. When my girls were young, I loved creating valentines for their classes. I believe Valentine’s is a day for ALL LOVE, not only romance. As a highly sensitive person I had anxiety about the day when I felt it was about romance only. I had expectations that were rarely met when I didn’t even want to have those expectations!

When I applied the yogic concept of aparigraha (meaning ‘nongrasping’) to the day, it opened up in a fantastic way. I think of it thusly: nothing can be put in a closed fist. When my palm or my heart is open, all kinds of love comes to me. I see the world through an expanded lens.

In Bend they tie little felt hearts to the trees downtown. People are free to take one home. A flower shop I’ve long loved in Seattle scatters petals all over the sidewalk in front. So, yeah, love AND magic!

The story I shared last year for Valentine’s Day is a fun tale that taps into the theme of it is what’s on my mind again this year, so I hope you’ll indulge a reprise ...

Author + Podcaster Kelly Corrigan interviewed Steve Kerr, coach of the Golden State Warriors, as part of her ‘Tell Me More’ series for PBS.  Kelly asks the best questions, so even as she was fangirling Steve beyond reason, she nailed it. The team is hugely successful. “What makes it work?” she asked.

They wondered together for a sec. One piece of it came a few minutes later. Steve, a former NBA player himself, played for the Chicago Bulls under legendary coach Phil Jackson. “What do players miss when they retire?” Kelly asked a guy who is personal friends with Michael Jordan. They don’t miss the games or the adulation, Steve said. They miss the locker room. They miss the bus.

The locker room and the bus?  So … connection, healing, and empowerment?

Huh. It got me thinking.

MEN have had it great forever. They really have. I mean. Right!?

As we break apart old structures, we need to take what works. It’s like remodeling a house. It isn’t a teardown if it’s got good bones. 

To make good money doing the work we love we need support, consistent healing, and visionary empowerment.

Basically, we need a bus. I sound like a broken record but the obstacle in your path IS your path. Getting past it feels Sisyphean, until suddenly it does not.

Being seen and shored up personally gets people past a block, a fear, a stuck spot. This works if you are talking about a rough night on the court, or a challenge in work or life. In phone conversations, in group calls and interactions, and in person we untangle, validate, heal and strengthen one another. It happens on the bus. “Bus conversations” get people into new relationships, out of limiting fears, into new levels of peace and prosperity. They help people push publish, ask for the sale, invest at a new level, see how they could double their numbers. They help when people get depleted or are dealing with old toxicity.

In my life and in my work, I'm finding that 2023 is a time of rebuilding.

“It takes a village” has long been one of my favorite quotes, turned mantra. Small businesses and empowered people are essential sources for their communities. The mission for my business is to be the key mindset education resource for those individuals and companies, with a particular focus on the Pacific Northwest. We’re opening enrollment for creative group mindset work later this month, and we’ve still got a few spots open for private mentoring. If you are a coach or creative yearning to really be in LOVE with your practice, work, community and more, please reply and tell me what’s keeping you from falling head over heels in love.