• When I was seven, I stole the cloak from Damien Kelly’s batman figure. I was jealous. My batman didn’t have a cloak. It was second hand and by the time the previous owner had passed it off, the cloak had disappeared. I remember him crying with the teacher, snot pouring down his face.

    I stole different things as an adult – women’s hearts, men’s dignity. I just took what I wanted and ignored the pain it caused. I justified it to myself, I told myself I deserved what I wanted.

    At some point I had to look at this ugly part of myself – the narcissistic me that would steal or manipulate to get what he wanted. It hurt. Because when I really looked, and named it, I had to admit that I wasn’t who I told myself I was.

    I told myself I was a good man, a conscious man. I had high ethics. Integrity. I meditated for God’s sake. People who meditate are good, they don’t steal.

    I think there’s always some part of you that knows. Something lurking below the surface, that knows you contradict yourself, that knows you’re not who you claim to be.

    But better not to look if you can help it. It’s much easier that way. Then you don’t have to acknowledge that the story you tell about yourself actually doesn’t work. You don’t have to unpick the narratives, include the new data, and find a new story that fits.

    Easier to ignore it all. Let it remain in the dark.

    Just keep facing the other way, don’t look at the shadow you cast.

    The Shadow is the dark that follows you

    The shadow is the darkness that follows you. It is the shape that is made from the places where light cannot go – where you do not want to look.

    Robert Bly likens it to a great bag that you carry around behind you, and inside it are all manner of things that you don’t want to acknowledge.

    Some of the contents may even belong to someone else! Your father perhaps or your great grandmother. But you carry it all around with you nonetheless, and wonder why on earth life feels so very heavy.

    The original benefit of this is that it kept you safe when you were too small to deal with the dark. Children are delicate.

    As an adult the benefit is different.

    You get to remain ignorant.

    You can’t outrun your shadow

    Have you ever watched a small child playing, trying to run away from its shadow? No matter what direction it moves in, no matter how fast it shuffles along, no matter how determinedly it tries to escape, the shadow remains.

    It’s right there, behind you. Always. In the place you don’t want to look.

    You can fool yourself into thinking you no longer possess it. This is achieved by removing the light source.

    The child experiences this when the sun disappears behind a cloud, and its shadow is miraculously removed.

    For you, this deception is achieved by removing the source of light that illuminates your own psyche, that is, the light of conscious awareness.

    This can be achieved in all number of ways. In fact, the world has never contained a greater variety of ways in which to turn off the light of consciousness.

    I am particularly partial to cheesecake and “ultimate fail videos” on YouTube. They work particularly well in combination. If I eat enough of the rich fatty cheesecake, I seem to lose the ability to stop the never-ending, dopamine stimulating cycle of video clips, each showing another way in which someone makes an ass of themselves. And I can watch, smug in the unconscious knowledge that I am in fact not the biggest failure on the planet.

    You will have your own particular tastes. Perhaps you turn off the light of consciousness by working too hard. Or drinking too much. Or fucking too much. Or reading stacks of spiritual philosophy that assures you that you are in fact “perfect just as the universe made you”.

    But you cannot outrun your shadow. Because as the child finds, when the sun reappears, the shadow reappears along with it. It was there all along, waiting for the light to reveal its presence.

    Look where you least want to look

    When you consciously and deliberately turn the light of awareness toward the dark corners and the shadowy recesses of yourself, you walk the path of the hero – you voluntarily face what is most dangerous, and are transformed by the event.

    This is an old idea.

    “No tree, it is said, can grow to heaven unless its roots reach down to hell.” – Carl Jung

    So where do you look? You look where you least want to look. The shadow is conspicuous by its unwillingness to be seen.

    When I find something I don’t want to look at, I’ve noticed that my mind has this habit of going all cloudy. I try to look and I just see fog. “What did you ask me again?” I say, for it is as if my memory of where I was has been completely wiped.

    Shame is a dead giveaway. Shame is the manhole cover that separates the sewers of your past, from the cleanliness of your present. Going down there is messy as fuck.

    Or you could just send notes to all your ex-lovers and ask them what your most blind to. That will work too.

    Name what you find there

    In Ursula Le Guin’s Wizard of Earthsea, Ged the story’s protagonist runs from his shadow. He travels across the entire known world trying to escape its malevolent intent as it seeks to hunt him down and destroy him.

    But it is only when he faces the shadow and he names it that the pursuit and the battle come to an end. And its name?  Ged. His own name.

    As you look far off into the distance, you will see two figures. One is the strong and beautiful form of your higher self. The one that you become when you walk the path of consciousness. The other is harder to see, it’s obscured, vague. This is your shadow self. The one you become when you hide from the light of consciousness.

    To become the first, you must name the dark. You must name what you find when you look into the murky corners of yourself.

    “I’m afraid that my ambitions are made from hubris, and that I am in truth, ordinary.”

    When I name this, and learn to consistently name it when it is present, I am illuminating what was hidden in the dark. I see the little boy who never felt recognized for his abilities. I see the youth, who used hubris to cover his insecurity.

    Now I’ve named them I can choose another route. I take them by the hand.

    “It’s ok. I’ve got you. We’ll do this together.”

    By naming what is hidden, you bring it into the light.

    Reclaim what was hidden to you

    The shadowy corner is illuminated.

    The dirty shame is purified.

    The trapped vitality is released.

    You reclaim what was hidden, and you integrate its power back into yourself. You become more whole. You enable capacities that were held in a karmic trust fund, waiting for you to reach your maturity.

    For this is the archetypal test. Are you courageous enough to look where you least want to look, meet what you find there, and to take it into yourself?

    The journey is what makes you worthy of reclaiming the treasure.

    Ewan Townhead

    , ,

  • You want to make it don’t you? That thing that’s been nagging at you for weeks or years.

    It feels big. It’s tugging at your sleeve. It won’t leave you alone, although you do your very best to ignore it.

    “Create me!” It says, so innocently. As if it were the simplest thing in the world.

    But simple it is not!

    The stakes are high. Your sense of self is on the line. Your level of self-worth will be appraised. Because this thing is not just a cool idea, or a part of your career strategy, it’s the thing your soul wants you to create.

    I know you know what it is. And if what I’m saying is starting to irritate you, then you definitely know what it is.

    So what are you waiting for?

    You’re waiting until you feel stronger.

    You’re waiting until providence arrives to help you.

    You’re waiting until you have more of a cushion to fall back on.

    You’re waiting until you feel ready.

    Because there’s this point in the future, when things will be different. Right?

    You’ll be braver, or more prepared. You’ll have more experience. Or maybe a bunch of people will ask you to make it, so you’ll know it will work. You’ll have evidence that it will work! You’ll feel inspired!

    Better to wait until then, when you’re ready.

    None of this is actually true. But it’s the only story your mind can spin that will protect you from the truth. It’s the only way it can spare you the humiliation of admitting that actually, you’re scared.

    Who wants to admit they’re afraid, and bottling it!?

    No, much better to justify the whole thing to yourself.

    You’re not ready

    God. You’re so tired of believing it all. And believe it you do.

    You believe it in the moment you load up Facebook, or pour another glass or wine, or turn on the TV, rather than turning toward your soul, and at least hearing what it wants.

    “You’re not ready.” The fear whispers.

    You believe it when you notice you feel jealous about everyone else who seems to be so on mission.

    “It’s fine. You’re not ready to be like them anyhow.”

    You believe it when you just diligently get on with your tasks, and go through the motions.

    “Yes, better to just stick to what you’re good at. You’re not ready yet. Just wait.”

    He’s so sure of himself. He is adamant about the risks at hand. He seems so strong. He has so much authority. It’s no wonder you’ve followed his advice.

    But it’s not working. Under his leadership, you’re suffering. He promises much. Much never delivers.

    Go gently. But go.

    So, what are you waiting for sweetheart?

    I know. It’s fucking scary. That’s a good sign. It means you were right, and this is indeed the call of your soul.

    But you’ve got to be brave. Ok?

    Don’t push yourself too hard. That will only get good old fear freaking out again. You need to look after him too.

    Take it easy. Go gently. But go!

    Otherwise you’ll be waiting until it’s safe. And it will never be safe.

    What’s the first step? The first tiny step. The smallest step you can imagine.

    If you can’t do even that, just write down what it would be.

    “If I were to follow the call of my soul, the first small step would be…”

    Pin it on your refrigerator. And keep looking at it. Breathe. Don’t forget to breathe.

    That’s it. That’s your first step. You just took it.

    Say “well done.” Say it out loud.

    Then take the next step tomorrow. Or next week. Just make sure you keep moving.

    The speed at which you progress is not the point. Moving is. This is how we feel good about ourselves. This is what tells us we’re doing the right thing.

    Look with honest eyes, at what it is you are called to create. And then watch yourself as you move slowly toward it.

    That is the feeling of being on purpose.

    Ewan Townhead

    , , ,

  • You’re here for a reason. It’s not a mistake.

    You have to work to do. You have things to create, wisdom to convey, gifts to offer. Your work is just that. It is your Work. It is unique. And if you don’t create it, the world will never have it.

    Your work is something you did not ultimately choose. But it is something that if you commit to uncover and give it, will transform reality in ways you can’t imagine.

    Your work is to create the Work you were made for.

    And yet as we follow the path of living our work, reality tests us. God challenges us. We doubt it. We doubt ourselves. It’s inevitable.

    There are stories we so often tell ourselves, that stop us from offering our true work to the world. They’re stories I’ve told myself, they’re stories my clients tell themselves, they’re stories my friends have told themselves.

    The stories will always spin. But when you mistake them for the truth, the world is robbed of your genius, and you are robbed of your destiny.

    Here are 6 such stories. And how to re-frame them.

    1. Who am I to…

    Who am I to write about the spiritual nature of business? Who am I to coach people on business success? Who the fuck am I to call my brand The Realized Entrepreneur!?

    I doubted it all. I was terrified of arrogance. Of pretending a level of authority that I neither felt nor deserved.

    There’s a myth that we need to have mastered something in order to teach it. You train to become qualified, and then you teach.

    I train for 5 years to become an engineer, then I start engineering. I spend $12,000 on coach training, then I start being a coach.

    This myth relies on the notion of expertise; that I need a certain amount of knowledge to qualify as someone who can then practice. It’s a two-step process. Novice, expert. Student, teacher.

    On the deepest level however, we are each asked to teach that which we most need to learn. The very thing that we are afraid of, yet are attracted to, is our teaching. The very thing that we struggle with, yet are captivated by is our lesson.

    Do not wait until you feel qualified to teach it. Do not wait until it feels safe to give it.

    The journey into the unknown is anything but safe. The winding cosmic pathway toward expressing your God-given essence is littered with discomfort.

    But it is also imbued with light. Follow the light. It’s in you.

    It is you.

    2. I’ll be Judged

    They’ll say I’m arrogant, or delusional. They’ll condemn me, as worthless, or worse. They’ll dismiss me as a naïve narcissist. I’ll be judged.

    Yes. You will.

    People will judge you. They’ll judge you for sticking your head up above the safety line. They’ll dismiss you. They’ll attack you. They’ll ignore you. They’ll bad-mouth you.

    You can’t escape it.

    As Seth Godin says: “You can’t both fit in, and stand out.”

    If you offer your true work, you’ll stand out. And you’ll indirectly illuminate the fact that there are people who are scared, and who are hiding, and not giving their work, and they know it.

    When you shine, they’ll squirm. And the more they squirm, the more they’ll look for a source of the pain and discomfort. And if they don’t look at themselves, they might look at you.

    Your enlightened offerings, have illuminated their shadowed ambitions. Your piercing brilliance, has highlighted their dark desires.

    And if they aren’t vulnerable enough to burn in that discomfort, they’ll disperse the energy.

    The more you offer your true work, the more those who aren’t, will assess and judge you. It’s not a sign that you’re getting it wrong, it’s a sign that you’re getting it right.

    It’s nothing to do with you, or even them. It’s just God inviting us all deeper.

    3. This will ruin my reputation

    My family will never look at me the same way. I have a carefully created reputation with my community and customers, I don’t want to risk that by putting out this risky stuff. No-one will take me seriously if I say what I really think.

    When a relatively little known researcher on vulnerability decided to see what would happen if she presented her study findings while actually showing her own vulnerability, she was terrified it would ruin her professional reputation. 20 million video views later, and Brene Brown’s reputation as a global leader in vulnerability is well established.

    A reputation that is not based on your true work, is a reputation that insulates you from what you’re called to create.

    Something old needs to be broken down, before something new can be created.

    What is the box you have created for yourself? What is the label you’ve carefully applied to you and your work? Is it truly you? Truly you?

    Maybe not.

    4. I don’t know if it’s good enough

    I don’t know if it works. I don’t know if I like it, or if anyone else will like it. I don’t know if it’s good enough.

    Doubting quality means you’re in true creativity. Creativity comes from the frothy space of tension between success and failure. If it’s sure to work, it’s not creative.

    It is not your role to judge the value of what you create. That privilege lies with your tribe, those you’re serving.

    It’s not about perfecting it, then giving it. It’s about experimenting and then experimenting. It’s about the never ending dance, at the edges of your lived expression, as you offer what seems to be in your soul, and the world around you responds with peculiar originality.

    It’s about never knowing if it’s good enough. Because it’s not about good enough anymore, it’s about brave enough, or surrendered enough.

    I wrote a piece recently. I didn’t like it. I wanted to bin it and write something else, but I didn’t have time. So I threw it out, and people loved it. They wouldn’t have, if I’d have listened to my own judgement.

    Are you brave enough to share the work that you literally don’t know the quality of?

    Are you surrendered enough to discover who you are, and what your work is, as you continually give it, and the world continually responds, and you continually pivot and weave, and the world continues in its immeasurably beautiful dance?

    5. I don’t want to be seen

    A couple of months ago someone plagiarized one of my articles. And I don’t mean ripping off a few lines here and there, I mean the whole 1800 word thing, copied and pasted, under his own name.

    I swapped emails with the guy. I assumed good intent. He gave me some pseudo-spiritual justification for the deception. I asked him to attribute it to me. He refused. I decided to share about the episode on Facebook, as it was happening.

    The thread went crazy. My website traffic sky-rocketed. I felt delighted. I felt uncomfortable.

    The next morning, I sat down to journal about the experience. And I realized that the uncomfortable feeling was one of not wanting to be seen.

    I felt exposed. I felt illuminated. I felt witnessed. I wanted crawl back under the cover of obscurity.

    I knew this wouldn’t be the last time. It felt like a watershed moment. I knew I couldn’t go back. People were starting to see me. I was scared. And it was exactly what I wanted.

    I do want to be seen. I want my work to be seen. By thousands of people. Maybe millions. And I’m scared. And so are you.

    6. What if it’s not my true work?

    I’m just not sure this is my true calling. I’m just not sure that this is what I’m here to do. What if this isn’t my purpose? What if I’ve got the wrong thing?

    Your true work is not a thing. It’s an ever evolving expression. It’s not something you discover once, and then spend your life making. It’s something you continually deepen into, finding new edges, new delights and new expressions.

    Your true work is discovered by continually creating what you believe your true work to be, and weaving as you go, reflecting, adjusting, pivoting, embracing.

    To try and clarify and define it before you start creating it, is futile at best.

    If you don’t know what your true work is, then you have a huge open space within which to go and explore. Don’t deliberate. Create.

    A wonderful man taught me something recently. He said: “Ewan, just jam a stake in the ground and then fucking go at it. And if things change? Move the stake, and then fucking go at it.”

    It’s not about getting it right. It’s about going at it, and getting it wrong. It’s about the going, not the getting.

    Go create your work.

    Releasing yourself  from story

    Stories are like old soundtracks that you used to like listening to, but forgot to turn off. Can you hear them? They’re humming along in the background, drowning out the voice of your creative expression.

    Don’t shout louder. Get quieter. And when you really hear them, you can find the off switch.

    The world wants your work. And I know you want to give it.

    It begins with the smallest step imaginable.

    A whisper.

    “Yes. I want to create my true work.”

    Ewan Townhead

    , , , , , , ,

  • Entrepreneurship and anxiety go hand in hand. You can’t separate them. Though I tried.

    I spent the majority of my early adult life trying to run from anxiety. I was scared about feeling scared.

    My first job was putting cheese on shelves in a big supermarket. It felt perfect at the time, because it was almost impossible to fuck up. And I was horrifically anxious about fucking up.

    Throughout my professional life, I used my considerable intelligence to avoid things that scared me. I turned down promotions, I dodged taking on more responsibility, and I tried to stick to stuff I knew I could do.

    Anxiety was something I felt but didn’t want.

    It was also something I considered a dysfunction.

    “People who are successful, and have their shit together, and are talented don’t get anxious. Anxiety is for people who get burn out or panic attacks.”

    And then I started getting panic attacks.

    It started right around the time I quit my last corporate job, nearly four years ago now. It scared the shit out of me the first time it happened – an intense pain across my diaphragm and solar plexus. 30 minutes where I struggled to breathe and keep my head above the panic.

    There was nothing in particular that would seem to trigger them. One would just erupt, and I’d try and ride it out. When I started getting woken up by them in the middle of the night, I got really scared.

    Something had to shift.

    I got interested in anxiety

    Even as an entrepreneur, I’ve spent considerable time and energy avoiding things I felt anxious about.

    It’s why I liked being the marketing guy. I could hide behind the scenes, and construct powerful strategies and funnels, without having to actually face people.

    My anxiety hit new levels during a hugely challenging, yet ultimately transformational period where I started asking the most powerful question I know.

    My relationship had fallen apart, my work was a mess, and I was living back in England with my parents at the age of 32.

    Things were not going well.

    I felt stuck in a loop. Desperately wanting to quit the start-up I’d co-founded, but having no idea how on earth I could earn money without it. I’d churn it round and round in my mind, day after day.

    The anxiety levels in my body were so high that I started meditating every day, simply to allow myself to function. I’d go on long daily walks in the woods or fields, caressing myself through panic and hopelessness.

    It was during this period that I started to actually get interested in anxiety.

    Anxiety comes in two (very different) varieties

    It was last year that I got interested in work of the amazingly pioneering, yet frighteningly under-celebrated business philosopher Peter Koestenbaulm.

    His work is quite unlike anything else I’ve read, and was a huge inspiration to me while I teased out my early ideas for The Realized Entrepreneur.

    In a freakishly synchronous moment, I discovered that one of my clients had been a student of Dr. K (as she called him). During a work week with her in Colorado, I found myself thumbing through an old out of print book by Dr. K that she’d lent me.

    I came across a distinction that has utterly fascinated me ever since. He said there are two kinds of anxiety.

    One is dysfunctional. One is not.

    One is inevitable. One is not.

    Neurotic Anxiety

    “Anxiety is experiencing failure in advance.” – Seth Godin

    Neurotic anxiety is simply a poor use of the human mind.

    As human beings we have a quite remarkable gift. We can imagine the future. We can imagine possibility. Neurotic anxiety is taking that gift, and using it to envision futures that we really don’t want.

    “But if I publish this thing, what happens if no-one at all likes it? What if it doesn’t work? And I discover I’m actually talentless, and a fraud, and I have to go back to stacking cheese on shelves for the rest of my life, and die, miserable and alone…?”

    Neurotic anxiety is experiencing failure in advance.

    The failure hasn’t even happened yet. Yet you’re already imagining it, and visualizing it, and expecting it.

    But your nervous system can’t tell the difference between your neurotic dragon, or a real tiger in front of you. The sensations in your body are the same.

    It’s an insidious habit. It’s a destructive habit. It’s a useless habit. It’s a warped and kinked experience of the true nature of anxiety.

    Existential Anxiety

    “Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.” – Soren Kierkegaard

    Or to put it another way. Anxiety is the feeling of the unknown. Anxiety is what you experience when you step into something you don’t know.

    The feeling in my nervous system is exactly the same, whether the anxiety is neurotic or existential. In other words, my body is hard wired to feel anxiety when faced with something I can’t predict, and something important is on the line.

    Anxiety is not an emotion. It’s a condition. It is the natural condition of a human being

    It’s the condition of aliveness, and being faced with a level of freedom that no other being we know about has access to. It’s the condition of having our feet on earth, our head in heaven, and the consciousness to notice.

    Are you scared of your own freedom?

    You are. It’s hardwired. When faced with the possibility of greater freedom, wider awareness, larger wealth, we’re built to pull back. Is it safe? We get dizzy, like vertigo.

    Anxiety is just the feeling of unexpressed creative potential. Anxiety is the jittery pulsing of a manifesting force, yet to be uncovered. Anxiety is the consequence of not daring to grasp the latent power we carry.

    Anxiety is the material from which the road of growth is made. Anxiety is the excess energy that you haven’t yet learned to conduct. Anxiety is the inevitable consequence of creating something that didn’t exist before.

    It’s not something to be avoided.

    It’s not even something to be tolerated.

    Anxiety is something to be sought out, like the bread crumbs of God, leading us deeper into the magnificence that we are.

    Ewan Townhead

    , , , ,

  • I started asking myself this question just over a year ago.

    Last autumn I went through one of the toughest periods of my life.

    After returning from 7 months of traveling in June of 2013, things were on the up. I was full of audacious ideas, a new business partnership, renewed juju.

    And then it all started to crash.

    The woman I’d met in Bali, and for whom I’d returned from America to be with, was not happy with how I was being. Our relationship was really struggling. I was really struggling.

    While I was finding success in the work I was doing – the entrepreneurs academy I’d co-founded was doing really well – I was not happy.

    The new business partnership I’d started in San Francisco had petered out before it really got going. I knew I wasn’t doing what I actually wanted to do, but I couldn’t think of what that was. And I needed money.

    So, when my relationship hit crisis point, and I realized I didn’t have anywhere to retreat to (I’d been crashing with my woman in her room – big mistake), I had to take drastic action.

    I called my mum in tears.

    “Mum, things have got really bad here, and I don’t have anywhere else to go. can I come and stay with you for a little bit?”

    That ‘little bit’ ended up being 4 months, split between my parents houses (they’re separated). here I was, at 31, living back with my parents, my relationship on the rocks, my business ideals in tatters. My ego was crushed.

    My bright mind couldn’t get me out of the twisting maze.

    1. I’m not doing the work I’m supposed to.
    2. I don’t know what that is, or how to get paid from it.
    3. But I need money to get a house, and get myself grounded again.
    4. But I can’t do work that my heart isn’t in anymore.
    5. Repeat.

    I kept trying to strategize it – come up with the smart plan that would get me what I wanted, without stress, and without betraying my heart.

    But it just kept looping, around and around.

    So I turned to God.

    I don’t know why. It just seemed like the right thing to do. Even though I didn’t really know what that meant. And I still carried a bunch of Christian allergies. But I went in.

    I started reading Christian mysticism, and meditating and praying profusely.

    And somewhere in the tumult of swirling experiences, the question was given to me.

    What is being asked of me?

    It’s a question I’ve asked myself countless times since then. And one I’ve asked my clients, and friends too.

    I like it as a question. Deeply.

    It’s powerful. Fucking powerful. And yet, it doesn’t assume anything, except that something is possible. And that that possibility is greater than I am.

    It pulls at my edges. It pulls at what I consider possible. It pulls at the edges of my individuality, connecting me to a greater whole. A greater plan. A greater play.

    And so, as I sit back and reflect on this year, it is this question that has pulled and called me forth into things I could not have manifested alone.

    It’s the question I ask when things get confusing. It’s the question I ask when I’m freezing up in fear. It’s the question I ask when I want to connect with something infinitely wider than my mind.

    I could list so many things that this question has opened up for me.

    Here are 5 big ones.

    1. Quitting the Business Academy I Co-founded

    It wasn’t simply the academy that I stepped away from, but the business partnership I’d had for two and a half years.

    It was a huge decision.

    I didn’t know where money would come from afterwards. I didn’t know exactly what I wanted to do instead. I didn’t know whether I was being sensible or idiotic.

    But it was what was asked of me.

    I could feel the truth of it. And I could hear the truth of it from the mouths of loved ones around me.

    All the while my rational mind was going loopy. It couldn’t make sense of it. And my anxiety was spinning itself up, telling me what I was doing was ‘not safe’.

    I kept checking in. Is this what is being asked of me?

    “Yes.”

    It was the hardest decision I made this year. It was the best decision I made this year. It’s changed my life.

    2. Reaching out to a Mentor

    For about 3 months, I kept having intuitions about it.

    A voice kept saying: “Reach out to him, ask him to be your mentor.”

    I couldn’t make sense of it. He’s an incredibly busy guy. A leader of a big and successful business. I don’t even know him that well.

    So I’d let it go. And forget about it. And a few weeks later, it would pop up again.

    “Reach out to him. Ask him to be your mentor.”

    This is what’s being asked of me? To reach out?

    “Yes.”

    So I did. And he said yes.

    We meet every month. It’s incredibly powerful. I feel so blessed. Being with him and receiving his help has had profound effects on me and my business.

    3. Signing my First Long-term Coaching Clients

    They wanted to work with me.

    I’d coached them through the academy I’d just stepped out of. I’d gone way beyond the coaching they’d paid for, because I just loved them and their business.

    I’d coached people on and off for several years, but I’d never signed my own private clients to a long-term package deal before. I’d always done it on a session by session basis. But this needed something way bigger than that.

    I wrote them a proposal. It took me two days. The package and price I quoted them scared the shit out of me. It was big.

    Is this what I’m asked to do? Is this what I’m asked to quote them?

    “Yes.”

    Fuck.

    I sent it to them, and felt all the tension drip off me.

    I’d spoken my pure truth. I wasn’t anxious about what they would say. I’d spoken my heart. There was nothing more I could do.

    And then they said yes.

    And then I called them and checked their commitment level. I could feel some hesitancy in them, and I wanted it to be a full yes.

    They said that had them trust me even more.

    We did some fabulous work together. We learned a huge amount. They’re now some of my favorite people on the planet.

    4. Hiring a Coach I Couldn’t Afford

    I’d known for some time that I wanted to invest in a coach of my own. I knew it was time for me.

    I’d spoken to Steve Chandler, one of the biggest coaches around. He was an option. But it didn’t feel right. I half-approached another couple of people I knew, and sounded them out. But none of it felt right.

    Then my friend Lisa had an intuition I should reach out to Sam, a coach and good friend of hers. Which I did.

    We ended up talking for two and a half hours. It felt so right to be coached by him. And the price he quoted me scared the shit out of me.

    I slept on it, and went for a walk in the park early the next morning. I tuned in.

    Am I asked to sign up for this?

    “Yes.” Fuck. But I’m scared. I can’t afford this.

    I’m really asked to do this?

    “Yes.”

    So I biked over to a cafe, and sent him the money.

    The coaching with Sam has taken my business to another level. And it’s taken me to another level of myself.

    5. Publishing Things I Didn’t Want to Publish

    It must have been just before I finally launched this site (it took me over 7 months from sketch to launch, seriously). I was meditating, and could feel that there was something wanting to come through.

    I tuned in deeply, and cast my closed eyes upward. There were two guys sitting there in big stone chairs. One was old, un-attached, immovable. One was younger, fiery, charming. I trusted them completely, immediately.

    What’s being asked of me?

    The answer was instant.

    “Ewan. You must speak. You must speak.”

    I knew it was true. Truer than ideas or concepts. Truth in its rawest form.

    So I vowed to speak. To speak the things I felt in my heart, but was deeply resisting to utter with my lips.

    I published the blogs here on this site. And each and every time I could feel the counter-force fighting me. I’d squirm as I hit ‘share’ on facebook.

    But I trusted it. I knew it was what was being asked of me.

    What is being asked of you?

    It’s the most powerful question I know.

    It’s one you can’t get wrong. You can’t get it right either.

    But you can ask it. Deliberately. Resolutely. Faithfully. And you can feel the truth of what is asked in return. And you can make a choice. To listen.

    What is being asked of you?

    Really. Be with it. Now.

    What is being asked of you?

    It’s not a homework assignment. It’s the call of your being.

    What is being asked of you?

    It’s already there. The question is already in you. You just need to reach out and listen.

    What is being asked of you?

    Write it down. Breathe it in. Offer it up.

    Ewan Townhead

    , , , , ,