The Power to Transform with Christian De La Huerta

Have you ever wondered about the power of book reviews for authors? This episode highlights the importance of Amazon's 50 review threshold algorithm, explained by our esteemed guest, Christian De La Huerta. An award-winning author, transformation coach, and a true believer in the power of the written word, Christian speaks about his book, Awakening the Soul of Power, and why he prefers the tactile experience of a physical book over an e-book.

We journey into the realms of spirituality, self-doubt, criticism, and power during our heartfelt conversation with Christian. He shares the story of my sister, Pat, a leader lost in the challenging phase of puberty. This leads us to a broader discussion about the societal conflicts with spirituality and the profound idea of viewing ourselves as spiritual beings having a human experience. Christian's insights into embracing personal power and uniqueness, overcoming self-doubt, and understanding the difference between worldly and soulful power are genuinely transformative.

The episode concludes with an interesting exploration of Christian's year-long coaching program, designed to support and provide accountability. We touch on the importance of creating a comfortable space for productivity and the power of breaking down large tasks into manageable parts. Finally, we delve into the art of creating a sustainable writing habit and the importance of audience reviews in helping authors shape their work. Discover these insights and more as we uncover the soul of power with Christian De La Huerta.

Find Christian’s Books on Amazon: 
https://www.amazon.com/Christian-De-la-Huerta/e/B001KINR1K
Connect with Christian here:
Website:   https://soulfulpower.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/christian.delahuerta.1
Instagram:  https://www.instagram.com/christiandlh/
LinkedIn:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/christiandelahuerta/
Goodreads:  https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/391544.Christian_de_la_Huerta
Newsletter: https://kb987.infusionsoft.app/app/form/unleashings-the-soul-of-power-email-list
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC4hOzeGdhkTcRxOHkV9tfbQ

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

There you go. Welcome back everyone to the Writers' Parachute, where we're guiding author and writer dreams to a perfect landing. We're glad to have you back Today. We have with us a very special guest. He's an award-winning author. It is Christian de la Huerta I'm hoping I'm saying that right and we're going to be talking to him about his book Awakening the Soul of Power. But of course you know we have some housekeeping to do up front. We want to make sure you go ahead and hit that like button and go ahead and subscribe here on YouTube channel or whatever podcast platform you're listening to us from. Also, we would like for you to follow us on social media. If you'll check the show notes, you can check out the link tree which will lead you to all of our different social media accounts, but of course it is on Facebook, instagram, twitter, tiktok and threads now at Writer Parachute. That's Writer Parachute without an S. So let's get on with the show.

Speaker 1: 1:00

Of course, we always start out with our topic of the week and I want to thank Christian for suggesting this topic of the week. We've been focusing season two on talking about reviews how to get reviews, the different kinds of reviews, the best way to use your reviews, all of these things. But one of the interesting questions that he had for me today that we're going to talk about is what is Amazon's 50 review threshold that triggers their algorithm? Now, I get this question a lot because it is not simply 50 reviews on your book. If you have different versions of your book and what I'm talking about is, let's say, a hardback, a soft cover, an e-book and or an audio book If you have 50 reviews spread across those different versions, that's great, but that is not going to trigger their algorithm. You need to have 50 reviews on a specific version. Of course, 50 reviews on all versions would be great, but to trigger that algorithm, it needs to be specifically 50 reviews on one version of your book, let's say, the hardback, the e-book. This is why you see a lot of authors offering their e-books for free, because they are directing readers to that specific book version to leave the reviews on. So next time you're checking to see how many reviews you are, make sure that you're counting reviews per version. Don't read the review listing that they have at the top with the title, because that is a combination of reviews over all of your book listings, as long as they're linked together, but that is not going to trigger the algorithm. Now, of course, there's a lot more details about this. If you have any questions, you can go to KDP or to Amazon and look in their reviews section of their community guidelines and it will outline that for you. So let's get on with our show.

Speaker 1: 3:05

We want to welcome Christian De La Huerta and we're going to be talking to him about his book Awaking the Soul of Power. He is an award-winning author, a transformation coach, a retreat facilitator and a TEDx speaker With 30 years of experience. Christian De La Huerta is a sought after spiritual teacher, personal transformation coach and leading voice in the breathwork community. He has traveled the world offering inspiring and transformational retreats, combining psychological and spiritual teachings with lasting and life-changing effects. As an award-winning, critically acclaimed author, he has spoken at numerous universities and conferences and is on the TEDx stage. His new book, awaking the Soul of Power, was described by multiple Grammy Award winner, gloria Estefan as a balm for the soul of anyone searching for truth and answers to life's difficult questions. He has received a Nautilus Book Award, a global book award and a book excellence award and a non-fiction book award. Wow, welcome to the right repair. Christian, how are you today?

Speaker 2: 4:14

Hey, Dana, I'm doing pretty well. Thanks for having me on the show Well you're very welcome.

Speaker 1: 4:19

I mean, you're kind of elevating the show with all of that. It's like wow, I'm very impressed and I've known you for a long time.

Speaker 2: 4:29

Yeah, you're responsible for my book being on Amazon. I don't know.

Speaker 1: 4:33

Well, I'm glad you think so. I think you would have gotten there eventually. I just kind of nudged you in the right direction, but thank you.

Speaker 2: 4:41

You held my hand through that process.

Speaker 1: 4:43

Well, you know, sometimes that's all it takes. So we've been talking a little bit about your book. Can you hold that up for everybody so they can see it? You know, of course, if you're listening to us, we're going to have the links to that in the show notes for you. It is Awakening the Soul of Power and it is an amazing book. It's a huge book. In fact, you had a index added to the book because it was so big and it's such a good reference book, not only a read. So can you talk a little bit about that and why that was added, because I think our audience would be curious as to why you chose to add indexing to it.

Speaker 2: 5:25

Well, I don't think it's that big of a book. It's 275 pages, I think, or 290 pages, something like that. I, you know I added the index because I like an index. I love my books. I haven't switched to e-books.

Speaker 2: 5:39

I love the feel of an actual book and so in an e-book you can search for a certain topic or a certain quote or something that you remember. But because I do reference a lot of quotes in my books, it's nice for me to know okay, it's easy. It's easy for me to go out to the back of the book and see well, that's on, that quote is on blah, blah, blah on such a page, or that particular theme is on that other page. So it's because I enjoy having an index. I hired somebody to do that for me.

Speaker 1: 6:13

Right. Well, and it is an amazing tool and I do like it. Especially if you're in the nonfiction realm, it is very helpful. I mean, I know 290 doesn't seem like that long of a book but you know, considering most people like the hundred to 150 page books, you know they kind of. But I do like that because I love your book, that it is a good read but it's also a great reference book, you know. And I do love the idea of this index in the back because, as you said, it makes it very simple to get to the information you really want to know. You know because it's sticking in the back of your head and I'm like I know it's in there somewhere. It's like where was that? Was that in chapter eight or was it?

Speaker 2: 6:54

Exactly, and I've had to do that too many times reading other books.

Speaker 1: 6:58

Exactly so I do. I do love that. So now you were able to get that through Jet Launch. Is that correct? Yes, yes, yeah, so it is. It is something.

Speaker 2: 7:12

You mean Jet Launch? Is that the book designer?

Speaker 1: 7:14

Yeah, that was the interior designer, so it is something you would have to request and pay for separately from most interior layout or format, but they didn't do that.

Speaker 2: 7:25

I had a friend who was helping with a book and so he just he probably used a search function. Okay, and you know, he had a copy of the manuscript, so he just searched and which is what I did. I did the index myself the first time with my first book, so it's not a difficult process. It's a little time consuming, but it's not a difficult process.

Speaker 1: 7:45

Okay, well, I'm trying to remember. I know that there was a couple of people that I worked with at the time that that added the index and I and I'm trying to remember if it was you or someone else that had had their actual formatter do it it was an extra request to do it, and some formatters can do it, some cannot, so it is something you would have to ask for. There are specific formatters that only work on indexes, and I do believe that there is a function in the in most word processing programs to create an index, but I'm not particularly skilled on that, so you would you would need to to check that out with probably some other YouTube training, but it is an option for those of you who are writing these big nonfiction self help books that you want people to come back and reference to. So let's get into the questions that we kind of talked about here. So number one is I want to know why spirituality was such an important topic for you to focus on.

Speaker 2: 8:49

I think it is such a is probably to me it's the most important aspect of being human, and I know that a lot of a lot of us have a conf. We confuse spirituality with religion and a lot of us have to have to go through a process of healing because we have been harmed by, by dogmatic expressions of religion and but to me it's, it's ludicrous to then try to go on. You know like I call it, because I try to do it myself. I threw the baby out with a baptismal water and it's just not possible to do it. As far as I'm concerned, it's just an integral part of who we are. Like to quote a theologian tell you how to shout down who says we're our spirit having a human experience, rather than we think of it as the other way we have a spirit. To me it's it's referencing him. It's the other way around. We are spirits that happen to be having a human experience.

Speaker 2: 9:46

So, you know, and I studied psychology, and one of the reasons that that I didn't go for the PhD my dad was a psychiatrist One of the reasons was that to me it was an incomplete because they were more scientifically focused, and I find more a couple of schools were that bring in the spirituality.

Speaker 2: 10:05

You can get a PhD in psychology with spiritual, you know, combination kind of thing, a hybrid. When I went to school that wasn't available and to me it was like it just felt short of understanding the human experience by just understanding the mind Definitely important to understand the mind and how it works, but to me that's we can't leave out a huge part of being human. That would be like saying, well, we're not going to do with sexuality, which I know a lot of people also have conflicts with, and yet it's just part of part of our rejected humanity, the type of the type of stuff that we try to hide in the back of a closet or the back of a drawer somewhere, and so to me it's impossible. My book is about fulfilling our potential as human beings and in being all that we can be and fulfilling that unique human potential, and to me you've got to include the spiritual in that.

Speaker 1: 11:02

Right and I do agree with you. I think that sometimes we see spirituality as something separate, something that we do when we have extra time, like meditating and stuff. And I agree with you, and especially after reading your book, it's an integral part of the way we think and act and do and be. It's. You know we have to realize I agree with you on this that we are a spirit having a human experience, rather than the other way around, and it kind of opens your eyes when you think about it that way and you know you can kind of accept a lot of the craziness that goes on a little easier. You know it doesn't unsettle you as much as otherwise if you were thinking from the other direction. So you kind of hinted at it a little bit and you jumped the gun here me on a little bit, but I want to know what was the specific inspiration behind this book Awaking the Soul of Power.

Speaker 2: 12:05

Well, I mean, and that's a big question, I love that question, but it's a big question because there's different levels of it. What got me thinking about this was I have one of a large family, I'm one of nine kids the oldest and there's only like 12 years between the oldest and the youngest.

Speaker 2: 12:23

So we're really tight and no twins, and the oldest is a woman, my sister, pat, who as a kid was a natural born leader. I mean like she would boss around and not in the mean way, like she would just say, hey, let's go do that, and we would go, we'll go, yeah, okay, let's all go do that. She would boss around not only the nine of us but the entire neighborhood of kids. And when she hit puberty, donna, something happened Like she turned that off. I don't know if somebody said something to her specifically that like girls or women don't behave that way, but she turned that natural skill, said that natural gift. She turned it off.

Speaker 2: 13:03

And I always thought that it was tragic, because I know, you know, I do a lot of work with women and women's empowerment, and I know she that's not exclusive to her that a lot of women believe that if they want to find a mate, if they want to be seen as acceptable women you know in quotes then they have to be a certain way, and so that's been. I've been thinking about that in the back of my mind and then I had a moment where, you know, probably 10 years ago, when I was sitting in meditation and I and I heard this I've only. It's only happened three times. That was the second time where I actually heard audible words and the words were the soul of power. It's like huh, what an interesting idea. I never thought of that.

Speaker 2: 13:44

I got the URL when I got up from meditation, forgot about it A month later. I had been working with an agent in New York at the time on a different theme, and she goes well, I want to, I want to, I want to work with you, but before we pitch it to a publisher, I want to see some of this marketing plan implemented, which would have taken me a year to implement. So, you know, it's like putting on the brakes and because I was already spending the advance in my mind and I thought okay, I thought like three days, I thought all right, all right, all right, so this is not going to happen. If I weren't writing for an advance, what would I really write about?

Speaker 2: 14:20

It took me a few days for it to clunk, for it for me to make the connect the dots. But then I thought, wow, if I really do believe that the single most important thing that needs to happen in our world is the empowerment of women, then what am I doing about that specifically? So then I thought soul of power, women's empowerment, wow. And one of those light bulb moments is like how do we step into power in a different way? That's not about hierarchy, about fear, about control, about force, about pushing somebody else down in order for me to prop myself up and feel powerful. How do we do it in a different way? So, rather than power over somebody, it's about power with, and so that's what got me thinking about this whole theme.

Speaker 1: 15:11

It is an absolutely amazing book and I mean we could talk for days on end about all of the you know, the empowerment and the clear vision that you had through going through this book, about awakening, you know, the soul, awakening that power and you know, in being, you know kind of all on this level playing field where we are, you know lifting each other, you know, rather than you know, fighting against each other, which.

Speaker 2: 15:45

Seriously, we don't have time for that.

Speaker 1: 15:47

We don't have time for that. It's like you know, I deal with this as a children's author where people are like, oh, you know you're my competition because you write children's books. I'm like, no, the competition is who gets on the bookshelf in the children's home. It's like if I get there, shouldn't I help you get there? Exactly, you know, I mean we have no control over what the kid's going to like, but you know it's exactly.

Speaker 2: 16:11

And you know, let me, let me let me explain that a little bit more, what I said about the single most important thing. Because, because women, you know, it's not, it's not about putting women up in a pedestal, it's not about idealizing women. Women also abuse power, sure, and, you know, tend to do it in different ways, but they do. And it's certainly not to give women more crap to clean up on this planet of ours or this collectiveness that we have made. It's because as a world, as a species, we're running very off kilter. It's getting.

Speaker 2: 16:44

We're moving in the right direction, but in terms of the balance between the masculine and the feminine energies that course through all of us, no matter what kind of body we're in, because those energies are balanced in all the cosmos, the entire cosmos. It's only in our minds, on this tiny little planet, that we think, oh no, the feminine is less than the feminine is weakness. It's like no, like so many faulty assumptions about that. So for me, when I think about it, it's I think about it strategically, like when I look at all the problems that we're facing as a species, any single one of which is, like you know, like the environmental crisis is just completely overwhelming.

Speaker 2: 17:24

And then I think, right, what can I do? What can I personally do? And then I think, well, you know what, if I'm going to focus on it strategically, what is the one thing that I can think of that will then impact all the other issues? That's what I land on, because I believe that when women are in 50% of power in this world and we're nowhere near close to that we're going to have a very different relationship to war and poverty and hunger and social justice and education and how we treat the environment and to all of it. So for me, it's a strategic approach.

Speaker 1: 17:58

Right, well, yeah, and I mean, and I mean there's no way to get around it. I mean, men and men and women do think different, but they think different to complement each other rather than to contradict. And I think this is where we get this confusion is, you know, when we feel like it's a conflict because of contradiction rather than a compliment to each other? You know, it's like when people collaborate. You know you're going with the strengths of each person and it works, but if you're trying to outdo each other, then it becomes a competition and it doesn't work. So I think this is kind of where we're landing with a lot of this, and I agree with you it's like we don't need to raise anyone, but we need to level everybody up to the same place.

Speaker 2: 18:55

Yes, and to be clear too, this is not putting men down. We I'm not advocating at all that we go back to a matriarchal system like we had before the patriarchal one that we're in right now, that I think we're witnessing the end of. What I think we need is balance, and starting with balancing those energies inside each one of us. And, by the way, for the record, this patriarchal, our over system and relationship to power, doesn't serve anybody. Of course, it doesn't serve women, but it doesn't serve men either, like there's a price to pay for that. And so, for example, you know, I think about the longevity question.

Speaker 2: 19:35

In the US, women outlive men by five years. You think about those numbers globally. At seven years, we look at the rate of suicide in the US, men commit suicide four times as frequently. And here's what's interesting, donna 70% of the suicides in the US committed by middle aged white men, which I think it's pretty undeniable that it's still the group that holds the majority of the power in this world. And so we would think well, you know, they should have the most privileges, they should live longer than anybody else, but they don't, and they're actually taking their own, shortening their own lives.

Speaker 2: 20:13

And so what's up with that and I think part of it is we have this limited and mistaken and limiting definition of what it means to be a man. And so we and these you know the stereotypical gender roles that somebody made up along the way about the way women should be and the way men should be, and so we've landed on the journey to be a man. You can't feel and you got to be this robot on carrying on feeling. Well, there's a price to pay for that, because what used to be spiritual teaching that everything is energy Now we know from quantum physics that it's true, it's all energy. This chair that I'm sitting on this table that's holding my computer up, the body, the emotions, all energy and energy we know from physics cannot be destroyed. So all that lifetime of suppressed emotions just doesn't go away just because we don't feel comfortable with it. It stays in the body, stays in the tissue, and they've got to come up one way, come out one way or the other.

Speaker 2: 21:08

So what happens is we suppress and we suppress and we suppress, and then the next poor, unfortunate soul says something to us the wrong way and boom like volcanic eruption and we cause harm to our relationships or suppress suppress, suppress and this is the part that I think relates to longevity those energies start seeping out and showing up as physical symptoms, as disease, cancer, heart attacks, respiratory problems, ulcers, and so to me it's like really important that we get clean and clear with our relationship to power, and that's what this book, that's the intention behind this book.

Speaker 1: 21:47

Right, and it's so true. And you add in the factor of definition of success, which I find just very limiting, and I keep being reminded of this thing that my mother used to say over all the time she goes the only roadblock to what you want is the wall you built.

Speaker 2: 22:10

Yes.

Speaker 1: 22:12

And she goes so knock it down and go after what you want. It's like, don't let anybody else tell you that you can't, because that's them building that roadblock. That's not you doing that, and I think she's right. And it goes back to these definitions and guardrails and guidelines about how we should speak and how we should talk and what we should do and what's right and what's wrong and who does this, and that it becomes exhausting to just try and keep up with all those rules and then, when you want to do, something different.

Speaker 1: 22:51

Everybody keeps telling you well, no, you shouldn't. And I'm like you know me, I'm kind of one of the disruptor people. I'm just like wow, exactly. Okay, you say I can't watch me.

Speaker 2: 23:06

Exactly, exactly, and I think that's the way we all, you know, have the potential to be. Like these rules that we're allowing to controllers are made up. They are going to make them up along the way just because it's been. That's what our parents believe in their parents before. That doesn't make them true, doesn't make them real.

Speaker 1: 23:27

I find a lot of people that make up the rules or just happen to be the loudest person in the room. They're not generally the smartest, because the smartest person is paying attention to what everybody's saying. So I'm like, hmm, should I follow the person that's loud or the person that's being quiet? Let me think about that logic for a minute. But you know, we're emotional creatures and we tend to react.

Speaker 2: 23:53

So, yeah. And we tend to. We're also social creatures, so we part of the way that we've been taught to be is that we need external validation. We know, and because we grow up as we know we're species were where I think we have one of the longest you know, infancy time is proportionally toward to our age, where we're long, you know, completely dependent on our parents, were much longer than other species.

Speaker 2: 24:20

And so we grow up with that ingrained dependency, right? And so that's where the patterns began of giving away our power. The patterns began of stuffing ourselves into more acceptable boxes. That's where we started. That's where we learned to say yes when inside, it's really no, it's really not okay with us. So those are all different ways in which we override or in which we sell out on our power, and you know many reasons for that. In addition to that conditioning, we've also been conditioned to believe that power is a bad thing. You know, with quotes like power corrupts and absolute power corrupts Absolutely. What good person wants to be corrupted? We don't want to be corrupted, so. But what they didn't tell us about that quote is that Lord Acton, who spoke those words, were speaking specifically about political power, not personal power, right? So we've come gotten confused about that.

Speaker 1: 25:18

And.

Speaker 2: 25:18

I think we've also, you know, learned along the way that if they, that if we really beat all of who we are like, if we really stepped into our power, that other people might not be able to handle it.

Speaker 2: 25:30

And they might be jealous and envious and they might, you know, try to knock us down and that we might end up rejected and alone, and no fun. Who wants that? And so then add to that what we're talking about the emotions, you know, because we've been conditioned to fear the emotions, to run away from them, to numb them out. And we hate conflict, we avoid confrontation. And when you put all that together, what happens is that we end up giving our power away, or innate power, inherent. Nobody can give it to us.

Speaker 1: 26:01

Nobody can take it away, not really.

Speaker 2: 26:03

We are the only ones who can give it away. And to me, what's really sad is the reasons for which we give it away, Like we settle for an illusion of security or a false sense of acceptance, because it's it can't be real because we're not showing up as real fully, authentically. So anything that gets mirrored back to us from other people is not going to be real either. It's going to be, is not going to be, an authentic mirroring of who we are. And then you know it's the emotional thing and we said we settle for crumbs of pseudo love and so it's not a good strategy.

Speaker 1: 26:42

Well, no, and you know and I talk about this in relationship to writers and stuff you know we end up in this self sabotaging kind of oh you know, imposter syndrome, because we speak the worst about ourselves, yes, and we're conditioned to kind of check ourselves and go you know you're, you're really not that smart. You know, quit showing off. You know you're really not that that famous. You know you need to work harder. You're really not. You know, whatever it is and and it gets us into the fear state that just freezes your mind, you can't be creative, you can't be forward thinking if you're afraid. Exactly, they're, they're, they're, they're incompatible emotions.

Speaker 2: 27:38

That is so critically important what you just said, because it's that's that harsh inner judge and that lives inside each of our heads. You're absolutely right the things we tell ourselves about ourselves we would never say to anybody else.

Speaker 1: 27:54

I'm not even our worst enemy.

Speaker 2: 27:56

I know, I know and so, and so that's what the first part of the book is about is like, how do we free ourselves from that? How do we understand how our minds work? Is what we're talking about is the ego mind and that's the part that's that inner judge that's also very defensive and control freak and projection and reactive and all the things that ego minds do. So really important if we want to be free, like really free, really important if we want to have relationships that have a chance of working, is that we understand how that part of us works, how the mind works. So that's why I spent probably the first quarter of the book on that.

Speaker 1: 28:33

Right and well, and after reading your book when we were working on it. You know, reading through the is like I actually made a conscious decision that my internal critic or you know, the one that's always giving me a hard time and telling me I'm not good enough or whatever I just named him George and he starts annoying me. It's like he sent to the closet and then my internal critic about my writing, telling me that I'm not a good writer and all of that. I've named him Richard and he gets to go join George in the closet. And you know it's very freeing just to have that power to say George, I'm done with you, go away.

Speaker 2: 29:09

That's it.

Speaker 1: 29:10

And it does kind of give you that control that you need to kind of stop yourself. You know, if it was somebody else speaking to you that way, you would have eventually turned to them and it's like you know, stop.

Speaker 2: 29:24

Cut it out, yeah.

Speaker 1: 29:26

Yeah, do that with your internal critics in the closet. Give him a name. You know, monster with a name. My mother always said if you name the monster, it's not scary anymore.

Speaker 2: 29:35

Exactly. And, by the way you know I should, I want to. I should say too that I know self doubt. Right, that's where the imposter syndrome comes from. It's self doubt. Who do I think I am, who do I think I am thinking that I could write a book, and so I know that one intimately. I know self hatred. My entire adolescence was one long depression and flash forward to today. And no matter what happens in my life, no matter the details, the circumstances, whether a relationship works out or doesn't, whether a project succeeds or it fails quotes never, ever, ever do I question my sense of stuff. So that too was a driver for the book, because I know if that can happen in me, that can happen in anybody, and I guide the reader by the hand in that process of transmuting self doubt into self confidence.

Speaker 1: 30:27

Right, which which is amazing, and I always tell people it's like I don't understand this failure thing, because the truth is we don't learn anything from being perfect. We only learn from making mistakes. So why do we make mistakes a bad thing?

Speaker 2: 30:45

Exactly, exactly. That's that's how I see it done. As long as we're growing, there are no such thing as failures. As long as we're learning, there are no such things as failed relationships. But that, to me, that's the measurement for relationship, you know, because we can't go by the ups and the downs, because every relationship is going to have ups and downs, absolutely. So if we can't go by the up with the down, like how do we know how long to stay?

Speaker 2: 31:09

because I think too many people bail when when things are having a navigating rough waters and to me, the measurement, the way that I gauge for myself when it's time to go or how long to stay, it's growth happening.

Speaker 1: 31:27

Well, and you also have to look at to you know, have you you know? Is this right for you? I mean, is this compatible for what you need in your life? It's like sometimes we hang on to things. It's like, you know, I laugh about this. We're cleaning out my closet and I actually found a top that I wore in high school. Now I don't want to mention how many years ago, high school was yeah, we're not going to go there, but I felt emotionally attached to that top and I have kept it all these years.

Speaker 1: 32:00

It doesn't fit me, it's so out of style, it's ridiculous, you know, and it was like, but I held on to it because of that emotional attachment and it didn't serve me in any way or purpose and it's just taking up room and it's like, you know, that's the other side. Again, yeah, is there growth? Is there potential? Is there, you know? Is it serving you? If any of those answers are no, then you really have to kind of look at going. Well, you know, am I willing to admit that this is not working for me? And I think sometimes that's the second hardest part is getting to that, admit that I need to do something different.

Speaker 2: 32:45

I think it might even be the hardest part, like seeing it first, because we're so good at blinding ourselves and not seeing what we don't want to see, and numbing out and running out from emotions, running away from problems and medicating ourselves in all the creative ways that we do that, whether it's drugs or alcohol or food or sex or gaming or social media or whatever it is All the ways that we do to distract ourselves and keep ourselves from thinking and from feeling which I hope anybody watching this has discovered by now that it's not a good strategy, because that stuff doesn't go away, it's only going to get worse, it's only going to fester under the surface, and then you're going to have to face it eventually.

Speaker 1: 33:32

Well and see, this is what I love about being a creative writer is because I can.

Speaker 1: 33:40

I can expand on those thoughts and ideas in a very creative way that's not harmful to anybody. I can look at myself and be almost the third party in that conversation, which is what I love so much about writing, which is why I think everybody should be a writer, whether or not they publish or not. But it does help give us distance to kind of look at what's happening. And it's like, well, you know, and I know you remember this from working together it's like one of the questions I get is like, how do I write an author bio? I don't know how to write about myself and I'm like, okay, well, here's an exercise for you. Go write it about somebody you admire and then, when you're done, go replace your information with theirs. Because we are, we're able to critically look at other people and see their strengths and their, their, their I don't want to say weaknesses, but you know things that maybe they're not especially good at, or maybe things that they're not interested in, but for ourselves, all we see is just weakness.

Speaker 1: 34:54

We just see the failures, the mistakes. We don't see the good parts about ourselves. And you could walk around and ask 100 people, what is your, your greatest gift to the world? And they would all go, oh, I don't, I don't have one. I mean, you're going to run into a few that you know, maybe a slightly delusional idea of what their greatest gifts are, but you know, truthfully speaking, most of them would shy away from that answer and not want to to offer anything. And again, we're taught to not stand out, we're taught to be very self deprecating and you know, and not you know, focus the spotlight on ourselves. You know that's what people that seek fame.

Speaker 2: 35:39

Yes, and, by the way, for as far as I'm concerned, that is false humility.

Speaker 1: 35:43

Yes, it is.

Speaker 2: 35:44

That's not authentic humility.

Speaker 1: 35:45

No.

Speaker 2: 35:47

I see it the other way around. Like we have these certain gifts, skills, superpowers, whether we came with them innately or whether we have developed them and deepened those particular skill sets and expanded them. Who the blankety blank? Do we think we are Like stuffing those are hiding the and hiding them and acting as if we aren't. That you know. From my perspective, we're like living in critical, critical times, like, I think, make it or break it, point you know the planet will be fine.

Speaker 2: 36:20

You might take several million years, but life will eventually find balance again. Homeostasis life will continue. Maybe in the end it turns out to be an enlightened cockroach planet. Who knows whether we make it, hmm.

Speaker 2: 36:35

That's what we're beginning to witness now, whatever we have unleashed on our environment, right. And so when I look at it from that perspective and anyone who has had the suspicion, like you, have got a message that to share through my writing, through my teaching, through my speaking, through whatever it doesn't matter. The medium is secondary. What matters is that we do it because, and that we don't act that false humility, like we need to shine bright, now more than ever, so that somebody else looks at us, looks in our eyes, or reads, or read something that we wrote and there might go, huh, interesting, let me, let me. I want to find out more about that. And so for me, it's like to me, like there isn't anybody out there who has the same genetics, the same set of experiences that make each one of us uniquely human. If we don't give expression to that uniqueness, ain't nobody else going to do it.

Speaker 1: 37:33

And then I had a. I went to a conference on time and one of the speakers said a quote that I will never forget, and he says what we find ordinary, other people find extraordinary. And we just have to remember that just because we're good at math doesn't mean everybody's good at math. To somebody that struggles with math, we have an extraordinary mind and and that's just it. We have to own that extraordinary, even if it just feels ordinary to us.

Speaker 2: 38:08

Yes, yes. And what matters is then what do we do with those guests? Exactly so. So it doesn't mean that we're going to feed our feeling that, because we don't feel good about ourselves, that we're going to feed our egos but oh my God, I'm so good at math, or whatever. Whatever we go, that's like. No, our sense of self doesn't depend on them.

Speaker 2: 38:27

No these are. These are skills that we came in with naturally, so I personally don't take credit for them, but I do take credit for giving them expression and for bringing myself fully present when I'm with, with somebody else or teaching a retreat, facilitating a retreat, so that those gifts can be used to help somebody else, for you themselves, or empower themselves. Who do I think I am by hiding them? No, we don't have time for that either.

Speaker 1: 38:56

Well, I know I get that question a lot of people. They're like oh, you give away so much information on your podcast and I'm like why not? It's like it's just information. I don't necessarily own it. Just because I know it doesn't mean it belongs to me or that I should constantly try to monetize that information. It's, you know, it's about raising, as you said, everybody up.

Speaker 2: 39:26

Yes.

Speaker 1: 39:27

You know it's. You know, I was so frustrated when I was writing my first book that I published and I couldn't get anybody to help me because they felt like, oh well, you hadn't suffered enough, you didn't go through all of these conferences or all of these programs and stuff to learn it. And I'm like but you know why can't you just tell me? And they're like oh no, no, no, no, you have to go the hard way. It's like you had to earn your place. And I was like, well, that doesn't make sense to me.

Speaker 2: 39:55

It makes no sense to me either.

Speaker 1: 39:58

But alright. So we've talked so much about this book. I absolutely love the book. So what would you like readers to gain from Awaking the Soul of Power?

Speaker 2: 40:09

I think the main message is that there is a way that we can step into our power that is a match for who we are. That doesn't have to be about force or fear or domination or manipulation or hierarchy. That doesn't, again, doesn't require us to push anybody down and step on them or put our need to their neck in order for us to feel powerful. There's a way that we can do it that is a match for who we are. So one of the ways that I get around or guide people to that place is realizing that there's different kinds of power, and we've gotten confused. So I talk about worldly power or ego power, which is the way that the world tends to relate to power, which is we associated with people who are rich, who are famous, who are high up on some kind of hierarchy, whether it's a corporate ladder or some other institution. The thing about all those expressions of power is that they're external, they're outside of us so fickle, here today, gone tomorrow, as so many people found when corporations went belly up during the pandemic, and for so many people whose identity was connected to that particular job, it's like, suddenly, who am I?

Speaker 2: 41:20

And that kind of power, worldly power always has an agenda, so it's always trying to get something for itself and it's always kind of self aggrandizing, so blowing itself up to seem more and bigger than it is, in contrast with what I call soulful power or spiritual power or authentic power that is inside each and every one of us. We all have access to it because it is in us. We are the only ones, again, who give it away, who sell out on that, and this relates to the humility that, whereas one is really like self aggrandizing, this kind of power is about service and it's humble, so it doesn't need to prove anything to anybody. It knows. And so I think of a Gandhi or Gandalf.

Speaker 2: 42:08

If you're Lord of the Rings fan, you know in their simple monastic robes, their sandal feet, from looking at them from the outside, we would never know how powerful they are until it's needed. And then get out of the way. Gandhi brought the British Empire to its knees when it was at its highest point in terms of global reach and influence, and he did that without ever shooting a single gun or landing a single punch. Talk about power.

Speaker 1: 42:40

Absolutely, and we forget. We forget the power of words, and you know it's. There is so much more that you can communicate with words and emotions than you could ever communicate with any kind of violence, because violence is just violence itself. It doesn't prove anything, it doesn't have any actuation to it at all, it just, it's a moment of everybody just lost their mind.

Speaker 2: 43:22

Yeah, and, by the way, anybody watching this as a lover or lover of words, words too can be used as weapons. Words too can abuse power. So yes to what you're saying, and I think it's how we express that power that makes a difference. How we express those emotions, like the emotions themselves are neutral. Right, the emotions are just energy. They're not good, they're not bad, they're not strength, they're not weakness, they're just energy. Sure, how we express them, depending on how we express them, they have a good or not so good effect.

Speaker 1: 43:56

Absolutely, I agree with you there. So if you could go all the way back to the beginning, when you started this journey, what do you wish you had known or that somebody had told you?

Speaker 2: 44:09

I'll tell you what a breakthrough was for me as a writer and out of all the stuff that I do in my life, what I resist the most is writing. I know for people they have a daily discipline, for people get lost in the writing.

Speaker 2: 44:26

For me it's work and I know I'm a good writer, but I have to get myself into the frame of mind in order to be doing that. I have to kind of get into the creative flow. So when I got my first book, I was published by a New York, published by Penguin Putnam, and honestly, they didn't give me enough time, they just gave me a year. But every time I thought I had to write a book I would freeze. And then all this is like 30 years ago.

Speaker 2: 45:00

And so the voices of self doubt who do you think you are that you could write a book? I've never written a book, I don't know how to write a book. And so then I would freeze and do I want my writing to be judged and seen and criticized? And so I missed the first deadline and they gave me another nine months, and this time I'm like right now I really have to write it. I've already spent, you know, have the third of the advance that they had given me. And so I had this breakthrough and thinking I thought about well, what if I think of a chapter?

Speaker 1: 45:34

as a term paper.

Speaker 2: 45:36

I know how to do papers. I've done a bunch of term papers in high school and college. I can do that Well, and so that's what I did. I kind of fool myself into breaking it down into smaller, more manageable pieces and then in this, in this last book, I even broke it into even because I think our as a society we're getting more and more ADD, so we have a more limited attention span, so the chapters have gotten much shorter and and interactive. So I have power practices at the end of each chapter designed to engage and in a way, gamify is not a game, but to engage. That in a sense like the type of gamification, and so I think that was a big breakthrough. I wish I would have known that like. It would have saved me some time and a lot of grief.

Speaker 1: 46:25

Well, you know, and you know I think we everyone struggles with that to a certain extent. And you know I talk about that. I get this question a lot. They're like, well, you know, how do I create that writing habit? And I'm like, well, you know, it's not that simple of a question. You have to back up a little further. You have to figure out when you're creative, how you're creative. You know it's like are you only creative on certain days, like when it rains or when it's sunny, or, you know, do you write better at night? Do you know, is it weekends better for you, or do you need a quiet place? Do you need to be a coffee shop? You know it's like you have to figure out those things, because what you're ultimately trying to do when you're saying you're trying to do a writing habit is you're trying to find that creative space and you have to recreate those instances when you are best able to write or to reach that creative space.

Speaker 2: 47:28

And you know, there's so much wisdom in what you just said, Dana.

Speaker 1: 47:31

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 47:31

When I wrote my first book I was living, you know, in San Francisco and running a business out of the home.

Speaker 2: 47:38

So, you know, I started to write and then I get an email or a phone call and I was managing it and I realized that when a friend let me once, I missed the first deadline.

Speaker 2: 47:47

The friend let me his cabin up in the Russian river, about a couple of hours north of the city, and I was just me in the Redwoods and I realized that whenever I came home, like I'll be up there for a week, two weeks writing, and then I come home and do business, when I came back up to the cabin, it would take me like a day to get back into the floor of it and I started to think of it as a column, like a creative, a column of creativity, like you'd make me think of it when you said a creative space, because I started to feel of it Like if I stepped in out of this column and so when I went home and I was, you know, managing a relationship, managing a business, it was in and out, in and out, in and out. So I never dropped into that creativity and that, you know, that would have been helpful to know, too, about my own relationship to the creative process.

Speaker 1: 48:35

Right, and it is part of the important reason why a lot of people write in spits and spurts and why they have difficulty finishing. Or you know, there's a lot of different things, but you have to create that space. You have to protect that space. As you said, you went up there alone. You didn't take, you know, your, your family members or you know your relationship person with you. You went there alone and you didn't go up there to, you know, have parties and go see sites. You went up there with a purpose and you can kind of recreate that in your own personal space, but you have to be very protective of it.

Speaker 1: 49:20

You have to say this is my writing time. You know it's like all the, you know social media and everything. All the notifications get turned off. You know the noise gets turned off, the phones are, you know. In fact I'll put my phone in the other bedroom just so I don't notice it. You know going off. You know and you know, create that space for me that works and it's just I protect. You know it's like I, sometimes I do better in the morning, sometimes I do it better in the evenings, but I know which days that works for is like early in the week is like mornings, later in the week is evenings. So I create my schedule around that creative space and I'm very protective of it.

Speaker 1: 50:02

I schedule it like an appointment in my calendar and it's like you know I block out that time and that that's when I work on those things, and you kind of have to do that for yourself.

Speaker 2: 50:14

I think you're right about that. I haven't mastered that yet. I think ideally I would do that. I would. I would blog a couple of hours in the morning, first thing before I get into emails and the you know the day to day and the running of a business so that I get it out of the way, because once I answer that first email then I'm gone. I'm gone for the rest of the day and then by the end of the day, I'm tired.

Speaker 1: 50:37

Right.

Speaker 2: 50:38

So, but I haven't learned that discipline that you're talking about, of really dedicating two hours every morning.

Speaker 1: 50:43

Well, I'm going to give you guys everybody, and especially you, christian a helpful tool that is absolutely 100% free. There is a program out of San Francisco you're familiar with called shut up and write. It is a free program. They do in person and online meetings, generally anywhere from an hour and a half to two hours to longer. They again, like I said, they have online. They have been in person in every city area around the world. They are free to attend. You can sign up for any of them. Show up. It's basically a very quick introduction and then quiet writing time. Nobody's going to ask you to read it, nobody's going to ask you to talk about it other than, yeah, I'm working on my book or whatever. I mean as much as you want to share or not share, and it has been very helpful for me to not only attend those meetings, but now I host several of them a week to try and get that blocked out writing time. That works for me. So check it out there at shutupwritecom.

Speaker 2: 51:58

I like it, thank you.

Speaker 1: 51:59

Go check it out. I think if you can figure out when, then I just gave you the where.

Speaker 2: 52:09

Yeah, yeah, and I love the name of it and the intention behind it, because it goes back to what we're talking about, about understanding the mind and all the excuses that the mind comes up with, and so I love this is like shut up on right, don't listen to that inner voice of self doubt, don't listen to all the excuses that, oh, I have, you know, I have, you know, kids I have with. All of it is true.

Speaker 1: 52:33

Right.

Speaker 2: 52:34

I have to have a deadline for a project, not saying it isn't there, but if you are committed, if you have that passion in you and if you have got that message in you, that is demanding expression. Shut up and write.

Speaker 1: 52:48

Yeah, exactly, and they have meetings as short as an hour up to you know, multiple hours, so you can pick and choose what you want and it's like everybody can find some time in their schedule. You know, if they're serious about writing and this, this is a space that you know helps you get to that creative space on a regular basis. And you know again, like I said, I schedule it as an appointment, you know.

Speaker 2: 53:19

I'm going to do that I like.

Speaker 1: 53:21

I think you'll find it very helpful and I would love to hear from our listeners to see if any of them tried it and what they thought about it. You know, if you go to a meeting or you attend one online and you're not happy with it, go check and see if there's others in your area, because you know. You know hosts are human, you know we interact with people. You know in different ways, so it's like you don't have to be married to it. I mean mine. That I do. Here in the Sacramento area in California. I have people joining me from France, from North Carolina, from Iowa, chicago, texas, louisiana, seattle. You know all over the world. You know anyone is invited.

Speaker 2: 54:05

So I love it.

Speaker 1: 54:06

Yeah, so go check it out. Like I said, it doesn't have to specifically. If you want to attend online, it doesn't specifically have to be in your area. Just check the time zones. So what do you want, or what do you think readers are going to have to say about your book in 10 to 20 years from now?

Speaker 2: 54:28

I think. I mean, I wish I could say that my book will have outlived its purpose in 20 years. I wish I could say that, but unfortunately I don't think it will. You know, everybody, we all struggle with with this kind of stuff. We all struggle with confused, ambivalent relationship to power. And maybe not all of us I hate to make a whole generalization but most of us, you know by far struggle with that.

Speaker 2: 54:56

Most of us, I would say, struggle with that issue of self doubt and self questioning and the self sabotaging behaviors even in relationships, how we sabotage them, not only professionally. And so I think, I mean I hope that the book will have reached a much bigger audience by then and that thousands of millions of people will be coming from that place of understanding the mind and how to break free from it, self made prison of fear and doubt and insecurity and disempowerment and being dependent on external validation and what other people think. And that reactivity, you know that gets us into trouble because we react and say something or do something that then, once the adrenaline dissipates, we move into regret. So we free ourselves. How do we free ourselves from that react and regret cycle? And I don't. I think that it'll still be very relevant in 20 years and helping people ultimately get free.

Speaker 1: 56:03

Oh, I 100% agree with you. I think your book is going to be to the go to book for people who are trying to harness the power of their spiritual self to get out of these and negative emotions and reactions.

Speaker 2: 56:21

Yes, and.

Speaker 1: 56:22

I hope that somebody quotes me in 10 years from now and it comes true. So what advice would you offer to other authors and writers?

Speaker 2: 56:39

Well, I mean, like you and I have been saying is like shut up, I'm right and get yourself out of the way, because that voice of self doubt and am I good enough? It's not going to serve anybody. So learn how to identify that voice and get it to shut up, like you do, like send it to the next room, like you do, george, and whatever his name is Send them to the next room.

Speaker 2: 57:06

Hey, go play, go outside and play, but this you're not going to have a say, so I'm not going to buy into that scary talk or that self doubting talk. I'm not going to buy into it anymore. So that realizing that we have a choice over even what we think and what thoughts we give credence to, that's incredibly empowering and liberating. And I think also from a logistical perspective, like I'm really like I'll say it again I'm really grateful to you for your help and your assistance in helping me get the book on Amazon. That I don't. I mean, I'm sure that I would have figured out another way to do it, but it's not an easy process to do so. So I would say you know, if you don't let that stop, you, hire somebody, hire, you, hire somebody who's going to get it done much more quickly and much more effectively and you're not going to make the mistakes that could. That could really throw a wrench in the process.

Speaker 1: 57:58

Right, and yeah, I've worked with with clients that have had to come to me after the fact. And you know and you're not just on Amazon, we got you pretty much in every bookstore worldwide. So you know that, that. You know that is something to think about. Some people prefer to just be, you know, in a very narrow audience and only one place to purchase your books. And you know we talked about that and you made the choice that you prefer to go wide and make it easy on your readers to get to you, you know, to go to their preferred you know bookshop, which I 100% agree with. It's like you know, my mother would say don't cut your nose off, despite your face.

Speaker 2: 58:37

Right, right, and for me that that choice wasn't a hard one. It's like I knew. I feel I'm very mission driven, so I knew that part of my intention was to reach as many people as possible, and that's to me that that route made a lot more sense.

Speaker 1: 58:52

Right. So here on season two of the writer's parachute, we've been focusing on reviews, so I'm going to put you on the spot here. I want you to write us a review right now of Awaking the Soul of Power.

Speaker 2: 59:06

Oh God, donna, I mean I think you and I have both been speaking about it. I think it's a book that will help you heal and transform your relationship to yourself, your relationship to power, that's going to unfetter you. It's going to give you the the, the like, going to guide you by the hand so that you can really step into all of who you are and leave all the BS behind. And it's going to support you in so many different ways, like relationships that will actually have a chance of working, because we haven't really been taught how to approach relationships and, by the way, the second book that I'm halfway done with is going to focus specifically on on relationships, and so it's going to help help you in every area of life, in your profession, like we have been playing small and hiding ourselves and hiding our light under a bushel and saying yes when we really feel no. And so not only is it going to make possible profound self acceptance that makes, that makes makes possible self love, but it's going to give you the means to to like really step into all of who you are and express that fully in the world, because, like we were saying before, if you don't do that, nobody else is going to do that.

Speaker 2: 1:00:33

And to me, like I know that anybody who's watching this with and who has stayed with a conversation this long knows that there isn't anything out there or anyone out there that's going to make us happy, like nobody can make us happy and it's not their job to like how unfair to put that responsibility on somebody else.

Speaker 2: 1:00:50

You are going to make me happy, yikes and so. And also, no amount of money, no amount of worldly success, and quote like, how many more examples do we need of people who have all the money, all the power you would want from the perspective of the world, and they're miserable, thin skin, like the, the, the single person who just tweets sends them into a total reactive overcompensation. That it's clear for anybody who knows what they're looking at, how poor their self esteem is. The rate of addictions, the rate of suicide in in in celebrities, like we know, like that's not the answer to me. The only thing that is really going to fulfill us is giving expression to that uniqueness that lies inside each one of us, and we don't have time to play, to play this game of life half asked anymore. We just don't have time for that. It's it's time to play life full asked.

Speaker 1: 1:01:43

I agree with you, and that's a beautiful five star review. So you know, and you know, that's it. You know, the reason that we're doing that here on season two on the writer's career shoot is we're putting our guests on the spot to write a review about their own book, which is really hard. It's kind of like reviewing yourself. It's hard, um, but it's also to show you that it is quite that easy.

Speaker 1: 1:02:10

And a review is an opinion. We all have opinions. We read something we like. We read something that we think somebody else would like. That's what a review is. Authors and writers are extremely dependent upon reviews to be noticed and to get out into the world in the public sphere, and so we encourage all of our listeners the next time you read a book, the next time you check out a book, write a review. Let the author know if you liked or did not like. This is how we get feedback, as authors, on our work. So don't forget, we value your opinion as a review and don't forget to leave one. It can be as simple as I'd like this book to, as long as you want to make it, so don't forget to include that. So you hit it at it a little bit. So what's next?

Speaker 2: 1:03:07

Well, this, this first book, Awakening the Solo Powers, part of a series of three. The second one is on relationships, and then the third one is about life purpose and conscious leadership. Like what is it? To me, it's like all right. So once you go within and you figure out what's been holding you back, you free yourself, you heal your past, so that we're not longer running our lives and making choices out of stuff that sometimes we're not even aware of, stuff that happened to us.

Speaker 2: 1:03:32

We were five things, we misheard, we misinterpreted it, you know, we observed our parents, you know, fighting a lot. So we made a choice when we're young, I'm never going to do that, I'm never going to get married. So then we end up sabotaging our relationships, and it's coming from a belief that we don't even consciously are aware of. And so, and then, and then stepping into to me is like we've done that work, we freed ourselves, we've cleared all the stuff that's been holding us back. Well then, what? What are you going to do? What are you going to do in this world of ours that is so desperately in need of help?

Speaker 1: 1:04:10

That is it. So do we have titles for these books and any approximation of when they're going to be available?

Speaker 2: 1:04:17

I do have a title, but I don't remember them and I think, well, I just made the choice I was going to. I had made the choice earlier this year to to finish book number two in 2023, but I've switched gears and own chosen that and re-chosen that. I'm going to finish the translation for this book. First, and because part of what part of my intention is, I want to be able to teach in Spanish. It's my first language, but I'm a bit in the US and reading and studying in English since I was 10. So you know like I could do Spanglish really well, but I want to be able to teach fully in Spanish, and so, for the last year, I've been doing the digital nomad thing. I'm in Ecuador right now, in Quito. I spent time in Columbia and I'm, you know, forcing myself to, to, to learn Spanish fluently, to expand my vocabulary. Like you know, I can speak it, of course, but what I needed was to expand my vocabulary and ways of expressing myself.

Speaker 1: 1:05:19

Right, you needed that immersive language.

Speaker 2: 1:05:22

Exactly, exactly, and I hired somebody to do the initial translation. But once I read it it's like no, no, that's not what I would say at all. And some of it is you know, regional differences Like each country has, like like you. You know you go to Australia or the UK and you understand 95% of it, but then there's 5% is like what?

Speaker 1: 1:05:45

Yes, yes, well, yeah, we have different. You know, I mean think of the. You know the difference between elevator and a lift. You know.

Speaker 2: 1:05:52

Yes.

Speaker 1: 1:05:54

You know, you know the restroom and the Lou, it's like you know if you didn't know both of those words. It would be a bit confusing, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:06:02

And so. So that was part of it. And then the part of it was like stuff that I could tell you he, the translator wasn't a native English speaker, because it felt like Google translate, it was stuff that just didn't make sense, right, like no, you don't say that at all in Spanish.

Speaker 1: 1:06:20

Right, you want your writer's voice to come through in every language.

Speaker 2: 1:06:24

Exactly, exactly. So what I've started to do now is go through his translation and put it in my own words.

Speaker 1: 1:06:30

Okay, awesome. Well, we're very excited for you. Of course, we want to welcome you, to come back when your next book is available and, of course, where can they find your books?

Speaker 2: 1:06:41

I love that, Dan. I'd love to come back and love your work, by the way.

Speaker 1: 1:06:46

Thank you.

Speaker 2: 1:06:47

You know, probably the best way to the book is available wherever books your souls. You can order it and support your local bookstore if you want to, and you can get it on Amazon. In terms of reaching me, probably the best way is my website, which is soulfulpowercom S-O-U-L-F-U-L-powercom, and then from there they can access my social media and, for your audience, anybody who goes to my website and gets on my email list and we know how easy it is to click on subscribe if it doesn't work for you, so but just by getting on it, we'll send you a chapter, a sample chapter from the book, and it's a book that talks about what it means to live heroically in the 21st century. So to me it's very inspirational and it's a call to action, and we'll send them some power practices that we were talking about that are designed to integrate the teaching so that they don't stay at the level of information. We don't need more information. We've got information overload. What we need is transformation.

Speaker 2: 1:07:50

And that only comes from really taking on and living from set of teachings, and so that's what those practices are designed to do To increase our self-awareness as to why we do the things we do. And then we'll send them a guided meditation that I created in the middle, in the midst of the pandemic, in the beginning part of it that talks about how do we maintain a place of center in the midst of chaos, and so so yeah, we'll just send that, for your audience will send them that.

Speaker 1: 1:08:22

Oh, that is amazing and wonderful, and I would say that that meditation is probably really good when you're reaching that creative space, to make sure you're protecting it.

Speaker 2: 1:08:33

Yes, getting getting yourself to that that mindset?

Speaker 1: 1:08:37

Yes, absolutely so. Of course we don't want you to run out of the room and grab a pen and paper. We will have all the links to reach Christian to his website, to his social media accounts and to his book His book purchase links for you in the show notes, so you don't have to run out and grab those will also list all the items that Christian is very generously offering the audience. So please do go take advantage for that. As he said, you know, if you do subscribe to get these items, if you later decide that this is not for you, you can easily unsubscribe. Those are very easy to do a lot of times. If you don't know how to do it, you can scroll to the bottom of the email and it will have an unsubscribe button for you, for those of you who are unaware of that. So do you have any upcoming events that you would like to share with the audience?

Speaker 2: 1:09:31

Yeah, I've got one of the things that I've that I've started doing since the pandemic was because I've been doing live retreats and, you know, weekend retreats, week long retreats. I take people on spiritual adventures, you know, to Egypt and Peru and southern France and Hawaii. And then it came and we had to put all that in halt. I'm just starting now to do live events again. So that's part of by getting my email list, you you'll receive information about what events are happening, are coming up, and I have one of the things that I started was coaching, virtual coaching. So I have a year long coaching program and I know a year sounds like a long time, but we only meet every two weeks, like for two hours every two weeks, and and and and.

Speaker 2: 1:10:18

Yes, like I said, I'm going back to do the retreats, but what I'm loving and the reason I'm going to continue with this year long coaching program, is that it what I've noticed that it makes the transformation a lot more sustainable and years of notice, people would come to a weekend and amazing, have an amazing expansion of how they saw themselves, how they do life, how they did the relationships and, in a certain number of them, when they went back home if they didn't have a support system of practice to help them stay connected and remember to, to, to, to not distract themselves, and it's easy.

Speaker 2: 1:10:53

They don't have a system of accountability helping them, helping us to do what we said we want to do. It's easy to get sucked back into the distractions and the responsibilities of day to day so that people would then have a contraction again and then they'd have to come do another retreat to get another boost. And what I'm loving about this this year long concept is that you got to stretch out the teachings like over the course of a year, delivered bite size, piecemeal, a little bit of content, right so short chapters, interactivity, delivered weekly and then coaching calls with me every two months to come to help integrate those teachings and understand them and apply them to our lives so that we can all free ourselves. Because, like you, I don't believe in competition. I do. I believe that we're all in this together and that we, by supporting each other, we all get there faster.

Speaker 1: 1:11:48

Absolutely, and and I think you know that there there's something in that you knew to reestablish that center point that we're all aiming for. It's like you know it's. It's easy to find the goal, to keep pointing yourself towards it every single day is the hard part of yes, that re reaffirmation that you know, that check in moment with you know, am I still pointing towards what I want?

Speaker 2: 1:12:19

Yes, and it's a group process, which I think there's also a lot to be said for that, because sometimes we all have blind blind spots. Sometimes I don't be able to see some behavior that is self destructive we're not not good for, for us. I'm going to see it more clearly up there, then I'm going to see it here, but then you know, once I see it there, then it becomes easier. It's like, oh, I do that too in a different way, the details are different, but the dynamic is the same. And that's like you were saying, is like we got to see it first. We can't do anything about what we can't see Right. So going through this year of transformation with a group of like minded others makes it like it's really empowering to really an beautiful set of community develops.

Speaker 1: 1:13:05

And I prefer myself. I mean I work one on one with with people, but I do also like working with groups, because what I find, especially with anything like that, with their, in that learning space, it's like it changes the dynamic between the person who knows and the person that doesn't know to. We're all in this together to get better. You know there's that camaraderie that comes, you know, in that merging and melding of we're going to help each other so you don't feel the weight of that person individually, because as a teacher and a coach you can see that they're they're. You know they're finding their own center. You don't have to be that center for them, which is kind of what we all want. Is we want to teach them fish, not keep handing them fish.

Speaker 2: 1:13:58

Exactly so, yes, I've got. I've got a new cohort starting soon, a couple of weeks, and then I've got another thing that they might be interested in. Somebody's not ready to commit to a year long program. I always do a three hour New Year's retreat on the 31st, which is a great way to complete free for that one on our own charge. It's a gift that I give to people and a way to begin to for them to have a taste of the work that I do. So it's probably, I think I think it's three hours, but it's a beautiful way to wrap up the year and get clear about what we're leaving behind and then what it is that we want to give birth to or energize and emphasize in the next year.

Speaker 1: 1:14:40

And that that is amazing. Of course, we're going to have links for all of this to Christian and get that information to you. If you are interested in his year long program or if you'd like to check out this year end, check in, check out. I'm going to call it I don't know what else to to name it here, but I think it's. It's an amazing thing. I'm going to have to make sure I clear my calendar see if I can join you for that. So is that going to be online or online.

Speaker 2: 1:15:10

It is awesome we have people from all over the world coming to that.

Speaker 1: 1:15:13

Well, that that will be amazing. So we will get that information for you and add it to the show notes. Was there anything else that you want to include before we go jump over to our tip of the week?

Speaker 2: 1:15:24

No, I just wanted to say thank you and thank you to everybody who who stuck out this long and watch the whole thing or listen to it, and I want to thank you for having me on the show and for having the show because, in your willingness to do that, I know that a lot of lives and other authors are being supported and helped. And then the ripple goes out right each one of those authors that you have helped which I think you've done, more than 200, now that you've helped get their books on up there some of them you've edited Like, in my case, you just help me get it up there and the different Amazon and other media, other platforms, but because of your willingness to do that, all those people who are going to be reached through every one of those authors. So thank you for doing the work that you do.

Speaker 1: 1:16:10

Well, thank you so very much. I it's always so nice to know that it is appreciated and I do feel that appreciation with each and every person that I help and you know that's that's a better payment for me than money could ever be. So I do appreciate that. So thank you and I'll head and jump over to our tip of the week. So Christian talked about several things and we did talk about them slightly in the moment. He was talking about this resistance to writing and creating this ritual and creative space around his writing.

Speaker 1: 1:16:45

So I just want to reiterate that. You know, number one, writing is a marathon, it is not a sprint. So give yourself time and grace. There are going to be moments when you're very verbose and prolific in writing and there are going to be other times when I like to say you're in a learning age where maybe you just don't have quite enough information or experience or you haven't quite figured out how you're going to approach that particular topic or subject. And that's okay too.

Speaker 1: 1:17:24

I you know my husband will walk in and I'm laying on the couch and he's like what are you doing? And I'm like I'm working, I'm plotting, because a lot of what we do is writers is deep brain work. It is deep thought. We are figuring things out. Whether we're writing fiction or nonfiction. We still have to have a game plan, we still have to have an approach, and this is why it's so important to create that creative space and that ritual around writing that works for you.

Speaker 1: 1:17:59

I can tell you all day long what works for me, but I'm a different person than you. You have to look at yourself. You have to look at when is the best creative time for you, what is the best creative space for you, what are the things that interfere with your ability to reach that creative space? And see if you can find the things you need to eliminate and you need to recreate and, as I said before, protect that creative space and try to replicate it, duplicate it and keep working forward. If you find that you are not reaching your goals and we've talked about goals, you know multiple times and I'm just going to very quickly say I would rather you have a small goal that you go flying past every day than an ominous goal that you're struggling to reach, because that has negative consequences to. But if you're struggling and you don't feel like you're progressing the way you would like, then go back and look at your creative space your ritual, your habit of writing?

Speaker 1: 1:19:11

are you missing something? Is something seeping into that space that is keeping you from writing A lot of times? One of the things that we start with in my writing space is to get rid of the could have would have shut us, and you all know what I'm talking about. It is a don't forget to buy milk at the grocery store. Oh, I need to make a dentist appointment. Did I pay the electric bill? We all have that.

Speaker 1: 1:19:37

Our brain works that way. So Julia Cameron, in the artist way, talks about this and she says the best way to deal with that is what she calls morning pages. Although they don't have to be done in the morning, they can be done at any time. So I start my creative time with just emptying out all the could. What it should is from my brain to clear my mind so that I don't have to deal with. Those are something about the act of writing down all of those things that you need to remember, need to do that, get them out of your space so that you can go directly, tap directly into that creative part of yourself that needs to come forward to get the writing done. So I hope those tips are helpful for you.

Speaker 1: 1:20:25

Of course, there's so much more we could talk about this. So if you would like for us to focus more on that topic, or you'd like to have a special episode specifically focused on any of the topics that we've covered here or the tips that we've covered here in the Writer's Parachute, go ahead and reach out to us. You can leave us a message in the with the show, wherever you're listening or watching. You can reach out to us at the writers parachute, calm, and leave us a message. Or you can reach me through social media at writer parachute, on all of the social media platforms.

Speaker 1: 1:21:00

It's helpful for you guys. And, of course, we want to thank Christian for being with us today. Don't forget to go out and grab your copy of Awaking the Soul of Power and check out his free, generous offers on his website. We will have that for you in the show notes. Always, I am so thankful to be the host here on the writers parachute, guiding an author and writer dreams to a perfect landing, and we hope that you find this a creative space that you feel safe and welcome in until next time. Bye.