Often people ask me, “but how do I get past my block?”
They know the block is there, but they aren’t sure what to do about it.
And they try to think their way out of the block.
And guess, what? It doesn’t work!
How many times have you spent hours, days, months, or even years (I spent 10 years in the Self-Help aisle!) trying to figure out how to get a different result, and yet nothing changes?
Here’s the deal. You can’t think your way past a block. You absolutely, without a doubt, have to give yourself a new experience in that area!
And if you don’t move past it, you can’t possibly grow into the next level of leadership and profit that is calling you. (It keeps your purpose elusive as well)
So what is a clarifying experience?
As long as we stand on the sidelines and try to think, rationalize, or logic-ize our way to a new result, we will remain stuck. One can’t discover distant lands without consenting to lose sight of the shore.
A clarifying experience is one that flies in the face of whatever belief is keeping us stuck.
I once heard the phrase, “Understanding is the booby prize.” That applies here. You can do your best to understand your block, and even become intimately familiar with it, and it makes no difference until you start to operate in a way that is inconsistent with the block.
This might look like:
- Finding a speaking gig even if your block makes you feel like you should stay hidden.
- Wearing sexy clothes even if your belief is that you are not sexy.
- Staying in a conversation long enough to be understood even if your belief is that people just don’t get you.
- Being completely and utterly in the moment and self-expressed even when you are terrified that people will judge you. (Improv class is a good idea for this one!)
- Dancing/ singing/ playing as loud and hard as you possibly can when you “should” be being serious.
- Loving someone as-is when you really want them to be different.
- Trying something you secretly think you might enjoy even if you are afraid of the implications.
- Telling your significant other what you’ll be doing rather than asking for permission.
- Writing a message in your marketing that scares you to death.
- Signing up for an event that will hold the space for your clarity. (Like the upcoming Inner Alignment Intensive :))
If you don’t create a new experience for yourself, you can’t possibly know what the new you is like! And I promise, the new you aligns further with your Truth, and your ideal clients will notice!
Some of my personal Clarifying Experiences:
- Hiring my first coach at an investment level of 10 times my current monthly revenue! Let me tell you, the mere experience of spending money based on where I was going rather than where I was at the time changed my life.
- Speaking on a big stage! I committed myself both with my agreement and my money to take the stage for an event in San Diego, CA when I was at the time living in Cincinnati. I didn’t know whether I wanted to speak as part of “my thing,” but I did know I felt called to say yes to the opportunity. In preparing, I had to face my own demons about wanting to stay hidden and safe, and I have never been the same.
- Being Ten Times More Excited! I took a class in which one of the “assignments” was to BE ten times more excited than I normally was. I had been someone who didn’t really lose control (I still work on this daily), but for the assignment I needed to deliver a line from a play at a totally AMPED energy level in front of hundreds of people. I had to leave my inhibitions at the side of the stage and GO FOR IT! Have you ever done it?
- Asking for Money and Asking for Help! Both the experience of asking for money (in an exercise at an event) and the experience of asking for help (I renovated a 1911 house and was not nearly as capable of doing so as I had thought!) required me to look at how I was showing up, what I believed about myself, and how I experienced what was “valuable.”
- Moving! I lived in Cincinnati, OH for 15 years. For 12 of the 15 years I considered moving somewhere else. I’d think about moving, look at the map, pick out a location, and then try like hell to analyze via a pro-and-con list whether the move was worthwhile. Eventually I realized that I wouldn’t know if I liked moving until I actually moved. Hence my move to Denver, and soon to the Northwest!
The list could go on and on for me personally, but here’s the point. Whenever I recognize a block I have, I ask myself the following clarifying question:
If XYZ Block were no longer there, who would I get to be instead?
And THE MOMENT I get my answer, I look for a clarifying experience to help me establish my own knowing of myself as that person.
If you ask yourself the question and the answer is, “I’d be a leader,” IMMEDIATELY find something to lead.
If your answer is “I’d be self-expressed,” find the scariest way to express yourself and IMMEDIATELY go do it!
If you say, “I’d be relaxed,” go do something relaxing immediately NO MATTER WHAT ELSE YOU THINK YOU SHOULD BE DOING!
If you know that you’d be someone who speaks her Truth, get your real message into your marketing immediately! (I can help :))
Entrepreneur, these actions will take great courage, because they fly in the face of everything you’ve always believed about yourself! And they are the actions that will change your life. Put yourself out there, sign yourself up for something from which you cannot back out, be brave, and give yourself the experience that clarifies who you really are once and for all!