Sigh.

You know when you go on a trip and you’re kind of nervous cause you’ve never been to that state before, travelling makes you stressed, and are about to spend a weekend with 70+ women…and you are crossing your fingers that it is going to be good but your heart might be a little sore from going to a big retreat or two in the past years and feeling really alone in a crowd, or felt like you didn’t fit in at all…and hope this one will be different?

I don’t know if you’ve ever been there, but that is exactly where I was last Wednesday flying down to Texas for the Lucky Star Art Camp.

Then I arrived at Camp Waldemar near Hunt, Texas…in Hill Country as they call it.

I’ve got to share my friends, I need not have worried.

For the next 4 days I felt so at home, so nourished, so charmed by Texas, so welcomed and so a part of something really beautiful.

The setting itself was unreal.  As in…Painting Workshops on the bank of the Guadelupe River, the cutest cabins and buildings, gorgeous light morning to evening, the most beautiful yellow flowers everywhere, sweet cats and dogs that wandered as they please, a circle of colourful chairs waiting for us to gather us around the campfire, even horses cooling themselves off in the river!

Then there was the people.

The loveliest collection of campers, amazing down to earth teachers, spunky brave folks who came on self-portrait adventures with me, our fabulous camp leader Lisa & the most nurturing cook and kitchen crew (who made this gluten-free girl feel so well fed).  Oh, and my fabulous roomate Aleli!

It was such an inclusive, welcoming group of ladies.  I was literally grinning from ear to ear all week.

Then there were my classes!  I had two classes I was leading…one deliciously small which allowed us to go on some big adventures and really get to know one another.  The other class packed full of such lovely gals, all so brave and it made me SO happy to see them not just get to know their cameras better (which totally did happen) but to leave grinning, proud of themselves (as they should be) and feeling empowered to take self-portraits.

There is something so incredible about teaching Be Your Own Beloved online and incredible community that happens in online classes.  Then there is teaching in person….and really getting to be hands on in helping people through their nervousness, or technical challenges and seeing the smiles on their faces as they run up to me to show me a photo they are mighty proud of.  That is something that absolutely fills me up and I’m so grateful that I get to do both online & in-person classes.  These classes at Lucky Star really have me hungry to do more in person workshops!

Then there was the solo time (which this introvert needs), little moments to wander and take photos, an afternoon to sit by the river and make it my ‘office’, and that amazing turquoise truck near my cabin that was the absolute perfect place to go on little self-portrait adventures to (and to take my classes too)!

I know I’m gushing, but it was that good.  For reals.

Every moment of it.

I’m home feeling so energized (which I really needed after I let late September become so stressful) and so grateful that I got a chance to get to experience the Lucky Star Art Camp goodness.  Camp will definitely be on next year and as you can tell by my gushing…I highly recommend coming!

I have a few more stories to share with you from my adventures in San Francisco and this one, well…I’ve got to share it with you.

You see, on this trip back to the Bay Area, I had to return to one of my favourite spots in the East Bay, the Mountain View Cemetery (226 acres of park-like gorgeousness).  I went their with the lovely Anna to take some photos.

Just as we were leaving, I stopped by my favourite Magnolia tree.  I usually come to the Bay Area in February of each year (to take a break from the grey of winter here in Vancouver) and it is always just the time when the Magnolia’s start blooming and this specific tree and I have along history with this tree.

Every time I visit I have to see it in bloom and take hundreds of photos of it.

So going in September, I was excited for a little California sunshine, but knew it wouldn’t be the same as my February visits when the blooms are just beginning.

Except as we walked up to the tree my jaw dropped because there it was.

One single pink Magnolia in bloom on the entire tree.

Of course I’m sure that there is some logical reason that it was there, with the entire rest of the tree long since empty of any blossoms.

But in that moment it felt like a gift from the universe.

In Be Your Own Beloved there is a day where I invite participants to be open to love notes from the universe, and that they’ll know one when they see it!

This felt like just that.

A little bit of serendipity.

Somehow it felt like I was supposed to see it.

Like it might have even been there for me.

Have you ever had something like this happen? Do tell!

I wasn’t sure if I was going to share the ‘behind the scenes’ experience of this with you…but I want to.

Because this path of being a creative entrepreneur (and…well, being human)…oh my, it is full of highs and lows.  Of celebrating and struggling.

I confess it has been a pretty great year.  My courses are thriving and I’m madly in love with my work.

Then I stepped outside of my comfort zone when I was asked to do a ‘talk’ at a local gallery.

I’ve taught before, but have never done a ‘talk’ which felt totally different, and it was.

Teaching, I feel like my introvert self comes out and its hard to get my words out sometimes.  Would a talk be like this?  Or would it be like when I used to play music and I felt good onstage once I got past the nerves of getting there?

I had no clue which one it would be, all I knew was that I was wildly nervous to speak in front of a group.

Then another layer of nervousness arrived.

Would anyone come to my talk?

As the talk was nearing, I reached out to all my local offline friends.  My online and offline world have always felt quite separate and I don’t necessarily talk to my offline friends about my work too much but I really really hoped I would be able to have a few of them come support me (and maybe learn more about what I do).

I also contacted all the local pals I knew who had taken my classes and who I did know through my work.

One by one the No’s came back.  Everyone had a good reason.  Work, dr’s appointments, family obligations, self-care.

But as they came back as No’s one after another, I fell deep (WAY deep) into feelings of failure, of loneliness, of isolation, of not being loved or valued.

“Its not personal” my family said as I’d confess my feelings of failure.

I knew it wasn’t personal but it was truly so hard to convince my heart of that.

I also kept on getting emails from people saying “oh you’ll fill it” assuming that things come easy over here.  I think so often we assume everyone else’s entrepreneurial path is simple and without struggle, but likely none of ours are.

In my mind I knew no matter how many people came, it didn’t mean I wasn’t worthy of sharing my message or worthy of support, but our inner critic sure has a way of shouting louder and pulling at our heartstrings to make us believe something different to keep us in the fear.

But I had to come to terms with the fact that my specific fear, of none of my offline friends showing up for me…was coming true.

I fell into a deep state of panic for days and tried to reach out to more people to see if they could come and the no’s just kept on coming back.

It was looking like I was going to be doing a talk to about 4 people (I knew this cause I was obsessively checking how many tickets were sold).

I knew that I needed to focus on those 4 people who said yes.  That they were showing up (2 were even travelling from Portland for the talk)!

But I was in such a state of sadness and panic that I really wanted out.

I was THIS CLOSE to cancelling the whole thing.  I was literally crying for days.  I even reached out to some friends online and asked “Do we always need to push through the fear?  Isn’t it okay sometimes to listen to ourselves especially when our bodies are shouting NO”.

I felt like a protective Mama Bear wanting to keep myself safe from all this intense emotion.

It was quite honestly pretty interesting to experience (not in the moment but after the fact) as I mentioned yesterday…in my classes I talk a lot about facing fear and pushing through it and my friends, this was truly so hard to push through.  My body was truly in panic & stress mode and wanted out of the situation.

Then the day of the talk finally came and finally, after truly days of feeling very upset and in panic.  It finally subsided.

Relief.  Release.

Fear let go of its hold of me.

I had somehow walked through the fire and made it to the other side.

As I headed to the talk, I suddenly (and somewhat miraculously) felt pretty darn Zen.  

I found myself finally (FINALLY) able to focus in on the people who were showing up (and on showing up for myself).

Because I do feel like I have something of value to say, that I have worked hard to find my voice in this world and that I do want to share it.

The talk?

Well, it was AWESOME!

A few incredible friends I know from the online world and am getting to know in person came and oh my heart swelled as they came through the door.   Thank you so much Pace, Kyeli, Jennifer & Tonya!!! And so much thanks to Rachael Ashe for asking me to do the talk!   Then a few other gals came who I didn’t know at all.  They came to see me talk and learn about self-portraiture?  Wow wow wow.

Then I stepped in front of them and began.

I had practiced the talk a number of times and as I got up there I finally felt totally calm and I felt in tune with the energy of purpose.  My lovely friend Pace shared after the talk that “You could tell you have something to say to the world and that you were on a mission to say it”.  It was truly amazing to have my friends Pace & Kyeli there (all the way from Portland) as they helped me realize a few things I did right in the talk that I had no clue I was doing.

It felt amazing.

I felt like me.  Silly playful me.  Yet also that woman with a message to share and a story to tell.

It felt totally different from teaching and in fact it felt really good.

After the ‘talk’ part of the night I gave the folks there a few activities to try and was SO overjoyed when they jumped right in.  There were self-portraits happening everywhere.

I honestly wasn’t sure I’d say this but I am SO glad I pushed through the fear and did it.

Am I bummed that no local offline friends came?  Yes, but I’m slowly letting go of that.

I’m also starting to explore how much the support/friends/worthiness part is not at all about the talk.  I should also note that I’m freshly home from the Wise Bodies, Wise Hungers retreat so I’m still very much thinking about Rachel Cole’s amazing work and it is pretty deeply moving me these days.  Of course I knew all along this was not about the talk, but couldn’t emotionally separate the two at the time.  Rather, I think I am so clearly aware right now about the hungers I’m working with, one of those absolutely being ‘worthiness’ and this really showed up in not feeling worthy.

My stories, the ones that hold me back…were shouting wildly and I was listening to them wholeheartedly.

I wanted to share this with you in case you might be a creative entrepreneur and perhaps the e-course you’re teaching or the talk you’re doing isn’t filling.  This is wildly deeply vulnerable work we are doing and it truly does tap into our emotional world.

As well, I wanted to share this with you in need it the next time you go out of your comfort zone and fear starts hunting you.  You’ll be okay and you’ll make it through (though I know it sure doesn’t feel like that at the time).

And maybe I’m writing this for myself too, for next time I go out of my comfort zone and fear rears its head again, because going outside of our comfort zone is a good thing but mighty hard work isn’t it!

To remember that sometimes your fear DOES come true and you make it through, and that sometimes these kinds of moments actually help us build resilience, help us cope better next time that fear comes up again.

I also wanted to share a few photos from the talk with you.  If you saw these photos alone you wouldn’t know there was a ‘behind the scenes’ viv-saga, would you!

Because of course what we share on Instagram is only part of the stories and we are all a collection of choices of what we share and what we keep private.  So today I thought I’d pull back the curtains and share this with you even though it feels mighty vulnerable to (especially to share that crying self-portrait above which I never intended to share…I just wanted to take it in the moment to offer the feeling of being seen, to myself).

Fear.

It doesn’t feel good at all but it sure is a BIG teacher.

This past week has been a BIG fear facing week for me.

Of having every cell in my body want to do anything but go out of my comfort zone and of being seconds away from running wildly away from the fear and back into my safety bubble.

I confess it hasn’t been pretty.  It has been tears streaming, hyper-ventalating, panic-inducing and truth facing.

But I made it through.

Its been pretty exhausting to face fear like this (I’m going to share more of the story tomorrow in another blog post) but it was all about doing a ‘talk’ at a local gallery that wildly unearthed a whole lot of feelings around worthiness, public speaking, being an introvert on ‘stage’ and feeling supported.  It was a whirlwind of fear.

But I made it through it and across the threshold of my comfort zone (and I totally was okay doing the talk…I was so worried I either would cry or wouldn’t be able to get my words out…neither of which remotely happened…oh the relief)!

Now that I’ve made it outside of my comfort zone and past the fear, I feel more able to look at the process of fear from outside the experience itself.

Facing fear is such a big part of taking self-portraits too….hearing those stories of the way we might have seen ourselves in photos and saying ‘No, I want to try this, my way, and see what happens’.

Our inner critics don’t like change, do they!

They want us to stay in the comfort of what we know.

Even if it doesn’t serve us.

Even if it doesn’t encourage us.

Our inner critics priority is keeping us in our comfort zone and not letting us out.

In my classes we talk a lot about our inner critic and pushing past it as taking self-portraits is outside of the comfort zone for so many of us.

The hardest part is often just getting to the point where we pick up the camera and go for it or click the button and sign up for the class or share that first photo in the Flickr group.

Once we elbow our way past our inner critic, perhaps even filled with fear, we get past the threshold and find ourselves held in the company of people doing exactly the same thing.

Today and yesterday have been the first days of 2 brand new classes: Beloved Beginnings (for those just beginning their journey to see themselves with kindness through self-portraiture) and Beloved Body (for those who have taken the original Be Your Own Beloved class and are ready for more).

The first day of class as I send out the prompts there is always this big pause between people reading it and posting their photos and I confess I got teary seeing all of the photos of those Beloved Beginners pour into the Flickr Group.  Seeing people push past the fear and say YES, especially since they don’t know what opening the door to self-portraits might hold and that it might put us knee (or neck) deep in old stories that we might need to let go of.

Now that I’m past that 5 days of full on fear I’m slowly feeling the gratitude for it seeping in.

Because I don’t want this lifetime to be stagnant.  I don’t want to stay in old stories just because they are safe.

I’ve always loved this quote:

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.
-Anais Nin

and this past week really makes me think of it and how painful it can actually be to remain in that bud, even excruciating and how scary it is sometimes to take that risk when everything in us is telling us to remain the bud….and what a release it is to push past it and take the risk to blossom.

Oh…and if you’re interested in joining in for Beloved Beginnings or Beloved Body…registration is only open for a couple more days and class has begun (but its not at all too late to get caught up)!