There is not yet a Lonely Planet guide to The Fluent Self, Inc — Pirate Ship At Large!

And yet, everyone who interacts with my business or the blog gets a visceral sense of what things are like around here.

Over the past few months I’ve been obsessively considering the elusive thing that is culture, and what makes spaces feel a certain way.

And wanting to put thoughts here, but they’re jumbled and disorderly.

So. Still processing the process on this one. But I’m convinced it’s one of the most vital elements of mindful biggification. So we need to talk about it.

A caveat.

I’m wary about the word “culture” because of its use in business circles to mean “how to force your employees to behave a certain way”, which is not what I mean.

Something more organic and less top-down. I mean the qualities, aspects and experiences that come together to form structures that contain this elusive something.

In my own business.

Just some of the qualities that the culture of this place includes:

[+ playfulness]
[+ mindfulness]
[+ curiosity]
[+ safety]
[+ sanctuary]
[+ support]
[+ silliness]
[+ joy]
[+ hilarity]
[+ healthy skepticism]
[+ wonder]
[+ unconditional love]
[+ self-inquiry]
[+ acknowledgment]
[+ spaciousness]
[+ quirkiness]
[+ ritual]
[+ freedom]
[+ belonging]
[+ trust]
[+ fluidity]
[+ flexibility]
[+ sovereignty]
[+ groundedness]
[+ intelligence]
[+ movement]

Some of the ways you might experience the qualities of this culture:

The comment space is welcoming and accepting.

There isn’t meanness. There isn’t arguing.

We state what we need. We appreciate each other. We make room for each other. Safety is a given.

People constantly remark on this phenomenon. And this is one of the only places I’ve ever been on the internet where this is true.

It is extremely rare that a tourist wanders in and can’t figure out how we behave and how we interact.

This also holds true at the Kitchen Table and on the Chattery (that’s the chat room) when I hold my wild bohemian salons (uh, teleclasses).

We agree to be mensch-like instead of having rules that force us to.

So, for example, confidentiality and not-giving-advices are always essential parts of any program I do.

But never presented as a rule — it’s just a thing we all care about that we agree to commit to.

I don’t do rules or guidelines. Qualities, yes. Rituals. Ways of being. Stuff like that.

No boringness.

A business like this requires certain things that are standardized — dastardly autoresponder messages that tell you what you need to know when you buy or sign up for something, for example.

My lovely First Mate and I have spent many a Drunk Pirate Council rewriting templates and forms to make them personalized, kind, loving, sweet, funny, alive.

Instead of a school or a studio, I run a glam pirate zen magical preschool-for-adults.

Even the “I promise not to sue you” release form at my Playground is pretty entertaining.

My partner is a duck. She’s on my card.

Special names. For spaces and experiences. But really, for everything.

We spend a lot of time with Metaphor Mouse. There’s even a Glossary.

I have a Pirate Queen Anthology instead of a business manual. We go on Rallies. We use The Log instead of Basecamp.

Stone-skipping instead of journaling. I decorate HATS instead of writing sales pages.

Instead of an application page to try to get into my Week of Biggification* program, there is a pickle page. With a pickle on it.

This makes everything better.

Also it gets things done. Because I would rather poke myself with sharp sticks than write sales pages, but actually decorating a HAT is kind of fun.

* password = pickles

Living what I teach.

This is how I transmit what culture looks and feels like, by modeling without explaining what I’m doing (except, you know, right now) .

For example, in the comment zen thing I model the culture by a) asking for what I need, b) stating clearly and lovingly what I do not want, and c) being clear about how we talk to each other here.

As always, there is a marked lack of prescriptive language. Everything is framed in terms of “so this is how we tend to do things around here.”

And I try to teach less by explaining concepts and more by sharing my own process with stuff I’m working on, including the parts that are hard, challenging and not fun.

Principles.

This is more subtle and hard to describe. But for example, I refuse to do emotional pressure/manipulation stuff in HAT pages. And it’s really important to me to always make clear that my people are my people whether or not they ever buy my stuff.

Or: when I play at the Twitter bar, it is play for the sake of play. Not once have I said anything remotely motivational or coach-ey.

Part of the culture of my business involves not having to act like an expert as well as the all-important if it’s not fun I’m not going to do it, dammit.

Yes, that’s actually on my dammit list.

Rituals for mindfulness, playfulness, curiosity, hilarity and acknowledgment.

Without saying “this is what you should do”, and just creating a space where it happens. Like the Friday Chicken. Or the Very Personal Ads.

These rituals are simple, pleasurable, meaningful, not-too-intimidating (I hope), and doing them together gives us a way to casually cheer each other on. Or up.

To give and receive comfort and reassurance but in an extremely informal setting.

Of course, there are other ways as well.

Like the look and feel of stuff we do (oh the fabulousness that is the Monster Coloring Book).

Like the clear explanations about how I connect with people, which is a way of demonstrating strong, loving, flexible healthy boundaries.

Or the things we do to maintain uh … I guess it’s called “brand integrity”. Gah. What a despicable word. I will invent a new one. But you know what I mean.

And then I haven’t even begun to cover how valuable and useful it is to have a culture that — even if hard to describe — is easy to sense.

I’ve never had to consider killing the comments here, the way so many biggified people have. We’ve had the same site design for five years. We don’t need policies.

Here’s the point:

The culture of this amazing place holds it all so that I don’t have to.

The culture of the pirate ship that isThe Fluent Self is so established, clear and filled with safety and permission for me and my people. At this point, it’s self-sustaining.

We can definitely talk more about how this works soon. For now — a useful theme.

And comment zen for today.

Talking about business and biggification stuff can be uncomfortable. I hope it’s clear my intention is to examine the culture here, not imply that yours is not good.

I am sure this theme will require some posts of explanations and reassurances. For now I will just say two things about culture:

1. It’s not like yogurt. There is no way to contaminate the culture of your business.
2. It’s is a reflection of qualities you already have. So even if you don’t have readers or customers yet, the culture is still a thing.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We try to let people have their own experience and meet each other with love.

p.s. We’ll be covering the how of building a culture that draws and welcomes your right people (and keeps mean people away) at the Week of Biggification in Asheville, November 3-10. I have not announced this yet. Most of the seats are already taken. Password: pickles.

*blows kisses to everyone*

I am thirty three years old and have not once seriously considered moving to Bolivia.

It’s weird, because normally I wouldn’t even mention that.

But here we are. Most women do end up moving to Bolivia.

And by my age, you’re pretty much expected to have already moved there or at least you’re supposed to be trying really hard to get there.

To be clear: I have nothing against Bolivia. It seems like a lovely place. Just not one that pulls me. It has never called my name.

And even though I don’t talk about my relationship (or non-relationship) to Bolivia, we will talk about it today.

Because I have words that need to be said about loneliness, power and the extremely problematic word: “choice”.

Loneliness.

There is so much of it when it comes to this hard topic of Bolivia. Or maybe it’s not so much loneliness as isolation.

Every woman has her own experience, her own relationship with moving or not moving to Bolivia. These relationships are often painful, challenging, hard to express.

So you have the women (like my dear friend E.) who are desperate to get into Bolivia. They wait in lines, jump through endless bureaucratic hoops, do what they can.

Sometimes dying inside from the frustration of seeing how other women end up there with such ease.

Then those women — the ones who weren’t even planning Bolivia — they’re isolated too. An extra glass of wine and bam. Welcome to Bolivia.

There are women who aren’t in Bolivia and are happy. Women who aren’t in Bolivia and are unhappy. Women who wanted to move to Bolivia but now wish they hadn’t. Women who didn’t want to move to Bolivia but are now delighted to be there.

And the ones who don’t know if they’re going, but determined to be happy either way.

It’s hard for us to find each other and talk to each other, because each of us is having such a different experience. It gets lonely.

“Choice.”

This word. I have no more patience for it.

I feel frustrated and helpless when people ask me why I’ve “chosen” not to move to Bolivia because I don’t know how to answer.

And I feel uncomfortable when people support me, saying they defend my “choice”, because I need to know support is there even when choosing is irrelevant.

What choice? There has never been a question of choosing or deciding anything.

This concept makes no sense to me.

I didn’t choose not to move to Bolivia.

I didn’t choose not to move to Bolivia any more than I chose not to become obsessed with traditional Armenian embroidery.

I didn’t choose not to move to Bolivia any more than I chose not to take up water polo.

It’s not that anything is wrong with life in Bolivia or Armenian embroidery or water polo.

It’s this:

If it were not for the fact that so many of the women I know are either moving to Bolivia or talking about moving to Bolivia, it never would have occurred to me to even think about it.

The only reason I think about Bolivia is that so many of my friends now live there. And that so many people have opinions about me not being there.

But to say that I chose this life of Not Living in Bolivia? Impossible.

What is choice?

To me, choice generally implies at least some of the following characteristics:

[+ consideration]
[+ giving active thought to something]
[+ both sides have to be appealing or compelling in some way]
[+ caring about the outcome]
[+ weighing the odds]
[+ pros vs cons]
[+ following intuition]
[+ being pulled towards something]
[+ wanting]

It isn’t that I decided against Bolivia. That never came up. It didn’t need to.

There was no decision-making process, because Bolivia exerts no pull over me.

I heart Bolivia.

The food, the culture, the art. The warmth and friendliness. Yay Bolivia.

And I know a lot more about life in Bolivia than I’d ever planned to, now that so many friends and colleagues live there.

To be honest, certain aspects of life there sound pretty distressing to me. But then after they tell you about the awful parts, they gaze at you intently and wish it for you.

So who knows. It must be like when I lived in Tel Aviv for a decade and people thought it had to be awful when actually it was sublime. So I can be pro-Bolivia. And still not feel the desire to ever move there.

Things that are hard about not moving to Bolivia.

The social pressure. The assumptions. The way people ask you when you’re moving to Bolivia and you explain that you aren’t and they say “Oh, I’m so sorry.”

As if you’ve just said you were dying when you are actually expressing completeness.

Losing friends. Some of my friends who have moved to Bolivia are amazing. Like Pam and Naomi and Jen.* You can talk to them about Bolivia but also politics and business and art and creativity and seven thousand other things.

* Other neat people in Bolivia: Jesse and Amber and Jenny the Bloggess!

Other friends are full-time evangelists for Bolivian life. And while I’m happy to spend an hour looking at pictures or admiring the landscape, I can’t do all-Bolivia-all-the-time. I miss the opinionated, curious, hilarious women I used to know.

And the vocabulary of choice. The way it has to be about “decisions”. I don’t want to identify as “Bolivia-less by Choice”. Where are my people who also didn’t choose?

The pull of Bolivia.

I know this mysterious pull that Bolivia exerts on women must exist, because I keep hearing about it.

My biologist friends insist it’s a thing. Maybe.

Maybe a biological thing that not everyone is susceptible to, plus cultural programming and expectations that people are mostly unaware of. I don’t know.

All I know is that I have never felt it.

And that I have girlfriends who are considerably older than me and who also have never felt it.

And that they, like me, heard those hollow words over and over again: “When you’re older, you’ll change your mind about Bolivia.”

Without the pull, there’s nothing.

“Changing your mind” is another one of those choice things. Like decision. As if all I have to do is stop being so determined not to go there.

But I’m not “determined”. I just don’t understand why I should. And I’m pretty sure that if it were about choosing, and I weighed the pros and cons, my non-Bolivia life would win every time in the categories that matter to me.

Of course, if I had a burning desire to be in Bolivia, those other needs wouldn’t matter as much. They would pale in comparison.

And I’d find a way to make it work. Believe me, if I wanted to live in Bolivia, I would move mountains trying to get there.

But since there’s nothing that instills in me a desire to move there, it’s not about choices and choosing. It’s about living my life.

I’m living my life.

And loving my life.

Not because I made a choice. But because I’m here, and here — for me — is good.

And comment zen for today.

I’ve been wanting to write this post for years. And not wanting to at the same time.

Because I know that some people are not really capable of encountering a different way and still understanding that we are both allowed to have our way. Of knowing that my way doesn’t imply that your way is wrong.

I get my way. They gets theirs. Also, the entire culture supports the way that isn’t mine, so trying to tell me I’m wrong in what I know to be true for myself? Not cool.

Anyway. All that to say that this is a hard, sensitive topic. With so much potential for pain, misunderstanding, distortion.

I hope it is clear that I have love in my heart for women who live in a variety of ways. And that I am not picking on Bolivia. All places have their own charm.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We let people have their own experience. And we don’t give advice, unless someone asks for it.

What I don’t want: “I support (or don’t support) your choice”. This is not about choice for me. It’s about mindfulness and trust and many other things, but not choice.

What I’d love: Your stories. What you know about isolation and about completeness.

From my journal. About three weeks ago — shortly before the Rally (Rally!).

This was right when I was getting ready to write the HAT (Havi Announces a Thing) page for my Week of Biggification program this November.

And I knew I needed some mental and emotional preparation for this. So I decided to a) claim sanctuary in a blanket fort and b) talk to the person who knows how to write the copy, and also to the person who doesn’t want me to write it.*

* Yes, both of those people are me.

Anyway, it’s somewhat bizarre. No big surpise there. But useful.

And we begin.

It’s me from now. And the me who has issues and is scared, carrying all sorts of stuff from the past. She is … still in the past somehow. Past me.

I look around. We’re in a cave.

It is mostly round, with a remarkably high ceiling and four small shafts or openings in it that allow for light. The air is cool.

The ground is covered in thick layers of woven rugs that seem to have been casually thrown on top of one another but make for a floor that’s comfortable and stable.

There are candles. And a fat fireplace in a rounded corner, like a New Mexico adobe.

The messengers.

We have messengers. Apparently.

They’re kind of like royal assistants.

One brings us each glasses filled with mint leaves and a pitcher of hot water to pour over them. Another brings us plates of dates and figs.

Somehow we’ve moved from New Mexico seamlessly to the middle east, and I am equally happy in both. Edge of desert to edge of desert. I like the edge of the desert.

Me from then needs reassurances.

Me: It looks like you’re hurting. Tell us what you need.
Past Me: Need?

Me: I don’t know. What would give you comfort?

Past Me: I am so worried. So many worries! You can’t possibly want to hear them.

Me: Oh, sweetie. Of course I do. Anything that concerns you concerns me.

Past Me: But I need to know that my worries are legitimate. And they’re so tangled and intertwined I can’t keep track of them, it’s a neverending litany. And I’m so afraid you won’t like me anymore.

Me: Honestly? No one is judging you for having worries. You have lots of experience with things that give reason for worry. It is perfectly acceptable that you would have worrries based on that experience.

I don’t promise to take on your worries, but I respect your your experience, and appreciate you for being you. I mean, for being me.

The litany of worries. Here it is.

Past Me: So far you haven’t really made money at any of your live events and at most of them you’ve lost money, and you’ve spent crazy amounts of time working on them and planning and recovering from them, and that’s not even factored into the losses.

So it’s really like you’re not just losing money but losing everything.

But you can’t charge more because it’s already too much, and [A-lister friend] said she’d never charge more than what she does for X, even though she also makes no money on that event.

And by the time you factor in travel + car rental + hotel + staff time + reading applications + email back and forth + copying flyers + itinerary + creating the schedule and so on and so forth, you aren’t getting paid for the content or the actual time teaching.

But there’s pressure to fill the event, and pay the Inn. So many ways you can lose money on this! I don’t even know why you’d want this headache and heartache again.

Me: You’ve experienced a lot of headache and heartache, and you want to prevent a situation where that happens to me too.

Past Me: Yes!

Past me gets to help and give advice.

Me: I appreciate that. Thank you. You are very sweet. I also want to avoid headache and heartache. If you can help me plan effectively to avoid those, I would appreciate any advice you can give.
Past Me: Okay!
Me: You sound really cheerful.

Past Me: I didn’t think you were going to ask for my help. But now I have lots of ideas! If I’d known it would HELP you, I wouldn’t have minded all that pain so much. Helping!

Me: Alright. How can we avoid headache and heartache? Give me advice.

Her first piece of advice: everyone needs to pay in advance.

Past Me: At the Destuckification retreat, someone decided not to come. And didn’t even tell you she was canceling until it started. So you’d already paid for her room and food, and then you had to negotiate with her. Unpleasant.

It’s August now. People come in November. Three months. You need a higher deposit so you can pay the Inn from the participants tuition.

Otherwise it’s not a healthy, sustainable supportive way to run things, and it doesn’t help you do your best work.

Me: Got it.

Her second piece of advice. Calculate in EVERYTHING.

Past Me: Including your time. And the time of everyone who works for you. And the time you have spent so far finding the place and negotiating, which is close to 30 hours.

Not to mention the cost to your business of not working for a week, plus recovery time. You lose three weeks to each big event.

Obviously it ends up being like seven million dollars per person and you won’t actually charge that, but at least you’ll know what they’re getting and the copy can reflect that.

This may take time but it doesn’t matter. Everything!

Not just food, lodging and renting the space. Tissues! Gifts and swag! Photocopies! Worksheets. Staff tips. Whatever the center charges for serving water and whiteboard rental. Hiring consultants.

And write a blog post about how you calculate it and how you sit with the price until you get resonance. So they know what they’re paying is in a sense a symbolic price.

Her third piece of advice. Minimal payment options = less agony.

Past Me: Either your people pay everything at once (by paypal or check and get a bonus something) or they can do three monthly payments. Do not end up with fifteen options.

Last time your staff spent months negotiating payment options and invoices with a different set-up for every participant. Stressful!

Remind people to note which credit card they use because that’s the one that gets charged. And triple-check the email reminder system because last time it didn’t work and they (totally understandably) were upset. We can’t have screw-ups like that.

Her fourth piece of advice. The rooms.

Past Me: We went over the arrangement 700 times last time and it still came out wrong. This needs to get an entire dedicated Drunk Pirate Council.

And a chart for the office wall. So we can be extra clear. And not pay penalties.

Trash the application process. You don’t need it. Do something fun. With pickles!

Me: Okay. These are all really good. What other things do I need to look out for?
Past Me: I can’t remember. I’m getting a headache. Can I lie down?

Me: Of course, sweetie.

And then past me got to go on retreat.

Me: Can I say something else? Even though I am soliciting advice from you and I hugely appreciate everything you’re telling me, you do not have to run this program.

Pirate Queen me is going to run it with, along with many capable helper mice and with many forms of support, both visible and invisible.

You don’t have to do anything. Your hard, scary, stressful time is over. You get to retire.

Past Me: I do? Yay! What is retirement like?
Me: I don’t know, honey. What would you like it to be like?

Past Me: I want to be at the Week of Biggification! But not to participate.

I want to stay at the beautiful Inn and sleep in the soft bed and look at the mountain.

And I want to take the elevator down to the room and up to the lobby. I want to sit in the underground spa pools all day. And eat that one really good sandwich.

And drink cold beer and watch the sunset. Yes yes yes.

But she still might have a consulting gig.

Me: Go for it. We’ll get you a room.

Past Me: But I can still give you advice now? Like a consultant? And if I remember something else later?

Me: Absolutely. Not a problem.

And then she took off. And I realized it made sense that I’d been avoiding the copy. And remembered that avoidance is normal. Again.

Thank you, Past Me. Beer and sandwiches and sparklepoints for you!

And comment zen for today.

The thing is, talking to past versions of us can be … challenging. And even intimidating. It’s definitely one of those things that takes practice.

Some of the principles I’m trying to keep in mind while this is happening:

I want to acknowledge her experience, and the legitimacy of her pain/worry/fear without taking it on, or having it be true for me.

This lets me access potentially useful information without having to adopt any of her stuff — she can have her insecurities and I can know that these aren’t true for me.

Anyway, it’s a practice. Like everything.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We let everyone have their own experience, which means not giving advice (unless someone asks for it).

p.s. You can totally share disastrous planning stories of your own or anything else you’re working on. Kisses.

So I promised to tell you more about the spectacular projectizing Rally (Rally!) and then forgot.

The Rally (Rally!) was completely inspired by this post, which in turn was inspired by scooter rallies, and which I was inspired to write about because of my gentleman friend.

A rally, if you’re wondering, is several days of intense projectizing (working on your stuff and also on your stuff) at the Playground, my pirate-ey center of silliness and wonder. It was a wild zen rumpus of the best kind.

And despite the fact that we, the Rally-ers, could not decide what to call ourselves, we managed to have the most brilliant, hilarious time ever.

Rallying is now my new favorite thing, and I’m working on my 2011 calendar to make room for more rallies. In the meantime …

Some of the realizations people had while rallying.

And by people, I mean the Keepers of the Rally. The Rallyconteurs. The Rallyganders.

“That my project wants me to visit its different parts in a non-linear fashion, which was really surprising because that’s not how I do things. It’s time to bring in more non-linearity and this is exciting!”

“Not going online while projectizing is hugely beneficial. I knew this intellectually but this was experiencing it and everything is different now.”

“My project wants a letter written to it!

“My project is a sentient being that needs to be treated with respect, autonomy, love, reverence.”

“There’s a lot I’m not in charge of. And this is a good thing. Oh.”

“It is possible to keep working on your project even when there is a scary thing happening with it that you don’t understand.”

“Now I’m working with my project instead of on my project. This is so much better.”

“Biggification is connected to rest and play! Resting and playing! That’s how I’m going to biggify — not from pressure and urgency.”

Some of the fabulous superpowers we discovered we had.

We being the Rallions, of course.

Fast typing!

Clarity. Patience.

Shape-shifting.

Focusing. Inspiration.

Victory dance!

Play. Rejoicing.

Closure. Completion.

Some of the actual things we got done.

We? The Rallyscallions of Doom. Each of whom I am now madly in love with.

Jesse got eighteen thousand words written on her novel.

And not just words but good words. Without the pressure, agony and abuse that can sometimes come with writing.

And Emmanuelle managed to get months of work done in our three days of rallying.

Someone showed a story that had never been shown.

Someone planned a world.

I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. And planned the timetables, content, copy and everything else for our Week of Biggification in Asheville in November.

Some of the experiences with Rallying.

From — in Jesse’s words – the Rallyites! The Rally Cabal! The One True Order of the Rallions!

One person described experienced EXTREME FOCUSING after a long time of not having access to anything even remotely like it.

Someone else had laser clarity that lasted two whole days, and turned everything around.

One person talked about the experience of not forcibly silencing the body anymore, and what a difference that makes to Projectizing.

We were inspired like crazy. It was like mainlining pure undiluted inspiration.

Someone else talked about what it was like to experience productivity without struggle, strain, pushing … probably for the first time in her life.

One person wanted to have more of herself in her project, and discovered that this was less complicated than she’d imagined it to be.

Some of the ways our projects wanted to be put to bed at night.

Our projects! Or missions, if you don’t like the word “project”, which is fine by us.

One project wanted to sleep under the stars.

One project wanted to have a pillow and sleep at the Playground.

One project wanted songs sung to it all night.

One project wanted extra snuggling time.

One needed to eat something orange.

Mine now insists on being put to bed every night.

Quotes from the Rally.

“You can take the girl out of the Playground but you really can’t take the Playground out of the girl.”

“Shiva Nata is like falling off a really complicated log.”

Q: You see a Queen, Flowers, Ziggy Stardust & Shiva’s Horns sitting in a circle & the Pirate Queen walks in…where are you? A: The Rally.

“Victoryyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!”

Favorite bits from the Rally.

Some of what the Rally mice mentioned:

The mad epiphanies from Shiva Nata, of course.

The chronicling (my techniques for processing the process).

Having trusty companions.

Not feeling alone.

Blanket forts.

Dedicated time and space.

Getting things done that you didn’t even think you needed to work on.

And all the other incredible things that happen when you’re in a supportive environment with warm, loving, zany people.

That’s it for now.

Usually when I review an event I’ve done (like I did with the Destuckification weekend in North Carolina or the week of destuckifying in California), there’s all this stuff I have to say about the things that went horribly wrong.

Not with the actual event, of course. We always have a crazy great time, and everyone gets phenomenal results. That’s a given.

But with the planning. Administrative crises. Things costing more than expected. Crossed wires with the retreat center. Stuff like that.

I have nothing to say about the Rally that isn’t completely positive. This is new for me, and I’m enjoying it.

In terms of comment zen for today? I would love cheering and appreciation for the wonderful thing that is rallying. One day we will get you to a rally somehow.

Or I will come to Australia or whatever far-away place you are, and rallying will happen there.

In the meantime, adoration from me and much enthusiastic waving from the Playground (while wearing fairy wings that Cairene gave me yesterday, of course).

Personal ads! They’re … personal! Very.

So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.

And now it’s my Sunday ritual for clarity and remembering and stuff like that. Yay, ritual!

Let us dooo eeeet.

Thing 1: The Week of Biggification!

Here’s what I want:

So I’m teaching a thing that is quite possibly the most crazy-inspired brilliant life-changing thing ever, and I am far too excited about it.

It’s eight days of Biggification* in Asheville, North Carolina. November 3-10.

* Biggification! Mindful biggification! Growing yourself and your thing in creative, fun, hilarious ways, dissolving fears, making things happen, coming up with the most genius plan possible.

Even though this program is already more than half full (because my clients insisted on first dibs), it would probably be a good thing if I put up the copy and announced it and stuff like that.

Right now I cannot even begin to describe how impossibly fabulous this is, but you can at least peek at the outrageously great itinerary to get an idea.

Ways this could work:

I can do the three things that need to be done for the HAT (Havi Announces a Thing) page to go live.

One of those things? Remembering to un-password-protect it. Right.

I can write love letters to the right people.

And dance dance dance.

My commitment.

To remember how much fun this is going to be.

To adore all my people, and remember (remind them too) that even if we can’t be together this time, we will do wonderful things together eventually.

To bring this joyfulness and appreciation and silliness into every single thing I do related to our Week of Biggification. No work. Just play.

Thing 2: Being immune to other people’s angst. A perfect, simple solution.

Here’s what I want:

Someone close to me is dealing with pretty high levels of existential angst right now. Oh! So much hard.

I want to be able to love this person with my whole heart, and still take care of myself so that my distress doesn’t get triggered by their distress.

Ways this could work:

I can remember that I already know how to do this.

I can practice separating my stuff from their stuff. Reminding myself that I get to work on what’s mine and not on anything else.

What else? I can process the process and do a bunch of writing about it. Have conversations with my monsters, and with my sad, scared selves.

I can work with Hiro’s excellent advice to create safe spaces for myself.

My commitment.

To be receptive to perfect, simple solutions other than the most obvious one (me doing more with my stucknesses).

To avoid certain topics of conversation.

To be loving to myself when I can, and trust that it will come when I can’t.

Thing 3: So close to done!

Here’s what I want:

I have a project that I have been projectizing and it is so almost ready.

It really just needs a few more hours of love from me.

But this week has client calls and teleclasses and visitors and brunching the Week of Biggification.

Can it be done? And how? And in a way that doesn‘t involve a descent into madness? Oh I hope so.

Ways this could work:

Not sure.

Maybe some early morning cafe time with Selma (my duck) and Mack (my computer).

Maybe some writing to myself about creating pockets of time like we did on the Rally (Rally!)

My commitment.

To want this. And to trust that wanting counts.

To stay connected to myself. To sneak off and have a sexy love affair with this project.

To hang out with metaphor mouse some more.

Thing 4: Anyone driving from San Francisco to Portland?

Here’s what I want:

Last week I asked for costumes for the Playground, and then LeeAnn made us the charming offer of three boxes she has.

She’s in San Francisco. We’re in Portland. Maybe we can find someone who is planning a drive up the coast who would like to perform the mensch-like service of costume-delivery!

Ways this could work:

I can put out the ask here, among my lovely readers and into the ether.

We could look on Craigslist. My amazing uncle Svevo, who often does odd and unlikely things — some of which involve creative ways to move things from one place to another — might have ideas too. I can ask him!

Also, I can choose a date by which I would like this to happen, so that if it doesn’t, we can arrange to have her ship them to us and pay the costs.

My commitment.

To appreciate the wealth of creative ideas and possibilities that are available to me.

To be receptive to this working out in a way I might not normally think of.

To dance happily around the costume room in my feather boa, of course.

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.

Oh the joyfulness. So yes, I asked for a wild rumpus of costumery, and all sorts of wonderful people gave me ideas and suggestions.

And then some people offered to mail us things! Hooray!

If you are one of those people, you can send things here:

The Fluent Self
1526 NE Alberta St #218
Portland, OR 97211
United States

Thank you!

I also made an ask related to a dining room table for Hoppy House, and, more specifically, figuring out why I am stuckified around this. Some progress was made.

A gorgeous table was peeked at. The realization that we may need someone with a truck was pondered. And it was thought about. So this case is not yet closed but I will keep thinking about it.

And then I wanted to do some more thinking about my Shivanautical epiphany that not everything needs a response, and that has definitely been happening. A good week of VPA-ing, all in all. Happy.

Comment zen. Here’s what I’d love today.

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!

What I’d rather not have:

• The word “manifest”.
• To be told how I should be asking for things.
• To be judged, psychoanalyzed or given advices.

Wishing love and good things for your Very Personal Ads! So glad for everyone doing this with me.

Because it’s Friday AGAIN. And because traditions are important. In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of self-reflection.

And you get to join in if you feel like it.

One hundred and eight of them.

Anyway. It’s Friday! Time to chicken.

Which, by the way, I protest as being thoroughly preposterous. Friday? There is no way whatsoever that Friday could be here again.

Clearly my calendar is full of the crazy. That is the only reasonable explanation I’m willing to accept.

The hard stuff

Soreasaurus mouse. I am one.

First the sore back from nightmares and thrashing around unhappily.

Then exacerbated by spending an entire day clearing out the Pirate Queen quarters at the Playground and doing way more heavy lifting than was good for me.

I’m sorry, sweet body of mine. That was not nice. You are right to be annoyed with me. I will try not to forget that we are twice as old as we are in my head.

Sadness and memories.

Worked through a lot of crap this week.

Old stuff. Getting closer to resolving some of it. Still not fun, though. Surprisingly.

Ayiiiii.

My gentleman friend’s car was run into (he was fine) in New Mexico, and the bill that we might or might not have to pay is exorbitant and depressing.

Trying to maintain faith that this will be taken care of and not by us.

The heat wave that will not end.

Enough. Really. I would like my brain back, please.

Airports!

We were at the airport way too many times this week.

And I always think that picking someone up won’t be a big deal but then it somehow devolves into chaos and absurdity.

Delays and miscommunications and we never remember to pack food and water because we never expect it to be an ordeal but then it is an ordeal.

Too many ordeals this week. I am done.

And just generally tired, cranky and ready to hide under a bed for a while.

Yes, well.

The good stuff

Yard sale fabulousness in our neighborhood. Score!

Oh, I bought the most perfect and delightful presents for my dear, sweet Playground. For practically nothing. Schnäppchen!

We are now the proud owners of two hobby horses, an assortment of alphabet blocks and puzzles, a pirate trunk and spiderman on a motorcycle.

Awesome. As were the thoroughly entertaining conversations that accompanied this.

Neighbors down the block: “Wow, so how old are your kids?” Me: “Huh?”

Even more shivanautical epiphanies. Hot!

I do Shiva Nata and then I have unbelievably brilliant ideas and then run around shouting gleefully about what a genius I am.

It is probably extremely annoying for everyone else in my life but oh the fun for me.

I did a smart thing.

Not letting Mack (the laptop, of course) stay home but instead having him sleep at the Playground.

Less internet-ing. More designated times and spaces for computerizing.

This was a very good thing.

Clarity and spaciousness and things like that.

Hugely energized from a session with Hiro, my sister-in-silliness-and-wonder, I performed minor miracles.

That is to say, I cleared out my office and the bedroom closet and entirely transformed the Pirate Queen Quarters at the Playground.

It took an entire weekend but it is making everything better.

Summer! It is so delicious I can hardly stand it.

The farmers market!

Peaches and nectarines. Blackberries! Cherry tomatoes and basil on my gentleman friends’s homemade sourdough bread.

Homemade cheeses.

Red pepper soup!

At least seven times a day I declare whatever it is I’m currently consuming to be the ambrosia of the gods and then I must immediately swoon again on the nearest fainting couch.

Jane!

My dear, sweet Jane, the friend I do not get to see nearly as often as I would like, was in Portland for THREE WHOLE DAYS and I got to monopolize her time completely.

So lovely.

Hope and trust.

The notion that one day I will be okay (and not just okay but ENTHUSIASTIC) about the having space that is just for me.

The idea that I will gleefully claim it and no longer be ambivalent and/or resentful about space and having it …

This is a hard thing for me right now, but feeling hopeful about it is really good.

Gigantic full moon plus porch swing plus blackberries.

Really, summer is blissful.

And … playing live at the meme beach house: it’s the Fake Band of the Week!

Yes, that’s a Stuism too.

My brother and I have this thing where we come up with ridiculous band names and then say in this really pretentious, knowing tone, “Oh, well, you know, it’s just one guy.”

This week I’m delighted to introduce you to:

Nubble Dots

This is from @butwait on Twitter. You will love this band. Of course that it’s really just one guy.

And … the not hard and not good but occasionally kind of accidentally hilarious.

So there’s this guy on Twitter who also goes by a name that sounds like mine but his has a second v.

And his friends are either not especially bright or not perceptive or both, because they are constantly tweeting things to me that are meant for him.

It is quite clear when this happens because my people do not (generally) misspell things in extravagant ways, nor do they (generally) say things to me about jesus or partying or partying with jesus.

So I know that a person who has just said something especially bizarre and nonsensical to me (but not the usual kind of bizarre and nonsensical that I would totally expect from say, you) will turn out to be one of the other Havi people.

Anyway, it happens all the time but for some reason this week it was more entertaining than usual.

That’s it for me …

And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.

Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?

And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious day and a restful weekend-ing.

And a happy week to come. Shabbat shalom.

Among the many weird, marvelous and extraordinary things that happened at the Rally (Rally!), this one was possibly the most surprising.

After some badass group Shiva Nata, I chose six questions and we let those questions be like stones skipping through water.

We scribbled furiously, documenting whatever emerged from the brain-scramble. From our mathematically-overloaded chaos-infused beautifully restructured minds.

And, among other things, this one VERY clear, very insistent sentence:

Not everything requires a response.

It kind of shook me up. If “kind of” = a lot.

To be clear! This is all me-talking-to-myself, yes? The responses are also me.

The conversation.

Me: Wait, what? WHAT?! WHAT?! What is that even supposed to mean?
Response: Not. Everything. Requires. A. Response.

Me: But that’s crazy. Also: that cannot possibly be true.
Response: And yet, not everything requires a response.
Me: *finds nearest fainting couch and collapses upon it dramatically*

Assuming truth and going from there.

Me: If not everything requires a response, what does this mean for me?
Response: Well, it gives you a lot of freedom.

It also gives other people a lot of freedom. They are sovereign beings. They can either deal with their stuff or not deal with their stuff.

It can actually be very respectful of you when you intentionally don’t respond.

When this lack of response comes not from avoidance or resistance but consciously recognizing that this is not something that needs to be responded to.

Me: Overwhelming resistance jumping on giant trampolines in my belly!
Response: Nu …? So what does the resistance have to say?

But everyone else does it.

Me: X always responds! Y always responds! Look at all these people I hugely admire who always respond to everything! How can I not respond?

Response: You are responding.

By determining that a response is not necessary. By respecting their sovereignty.

Not everything has to do with you or requires your attention or needs to be in your world. Part of not being a shepherd is discernment about what gets to come in.

Sovereignty includes this certainty: knowing that not everything requires a response.

How do you know what needs a response?

Me: How am I supposed to know what does or doesn’t need a response?
Response: If it’s a hurt, sad, scared part of you, that always needs a response.

However, it doesn’t have to be an immediate one and it doesn’t have to be a jumping-in-and-helping one. You acknowledge your hurt and discomfort, and that is enough.

Me: And if people are upset with me or say hurtful things?
Response: If you are hurting, you interact with your pain around being misunderstood.

That is the response. The first response is to you. Always. If you choose to respond to them, you can choose if that happens internally or externally.

You can use compassionate communication with them to meet them with love. But that process can just as easily take place in your head or on paper.

After that, if you truly wish to respond out loud, you may do so. While still knowing it isn’t required of you.

If people hate me for not responding?

Me: What if people hate me because I’m not responding to them?
Response: Unless they’re trolls, they’re working through their own stuff anyway.

It is not your mission to be the acknowledger for every single person in the world. One of the things you model is how to acknowledge your own stuff and destuckify.

They can either use those tools or not. It’s up to them.

If they can’t handle it, that’s their stuff. If you’re bothered by whether or not people like you, that’s your stuff.

But what about …?

Me: What about how A says “every conflict is an opportunity”?
Response: Well, he is correct in a sense. There is truth in that.

And yet, not responding at times when no response is required of you is ALSO an opportunity for establishing the culture and for learning.

It’s actively, consciously not taking responsibility for other people’s stuff.

And that is part of what makes the culture you are establishing so brilliant, so safe, so grounded, so loving and so full of freedom.

Anyway, when has A ever been 100% right? He is never more than partially right, at most. So assume only-partial-truth by default, and then find what is true.

How do you find what is true?

Me: How do I find what is true?
Response: Part of you believes you absolutely have to respond to everyone in order to acknowledge them and set the culture. What is her hidden truth?

Me: That there is tremendous power in acknowledging things.

That when you acknowledge something you release the essence, just like I’m doing now. That love is what is given when you acknowledge pain.

And that when I consciously choose to not give something a response, this is also an acknowledgment, both internal and external. It’s like answering a greeting with a smile. Responding can happen on many different levels other than verbally.

Response: Yes.

But but but. Again.

Me: I still have this but but but feeling coming up.
Response: And what is feeling uncomfortable for you with this?

Me: Okay. So theoretically I can consciously choose the response of not responding. But then all this negativity is headed my way. I will be flooded in negativity.

Response: And whenever you remember that a) it is not yours, b) it has nothing to do with you, c) there is nothing you are required to do, it is transformed.
Look at how little you respond emotionally now when someone throws a shoe at you now compared to a few years ago. You have worked miracles.

How is this connected?

Me: Alright. How is this theme connected to my project of getting ready to announce the mindful, hilarious, intense, life-changing Week of Biggification in Asheville?

Response: You will know how to give people structures and space to have their own experience and work through it. Right now what is needed is this:

Me: I cannot wait. I love it when you say shit like that. Tell me what to do!
Response: What’s needed is this:

Continuing to have this conscious relationship with yourself. Resting. Saying no to things. Not responding to things. Rallies and mini-rallies and Rally-like things as a place to practice this. While wearing costumes!

But louder.

Me: So basically … keep doing what I’m doing?

Response: But louder. More intentionally. More transitions. More actively recognizing the ways in which receiving supports you.

Taking care of yourself is a requirement, not something to consider thinking about.

Me: Tell me more about the power of not responding.

Response: People appreciate it when you hold back.

They will recognize that it is respectful of them and their process. They see it as modeling. They are intelligent enough to recognize that this is what you’re doing.

Your work is becoming more and more a meeting of equals. Caretaking and over-responding won’t be appealing, and you’ll encounter fewer people who want it.

Oh.

Me: Really?
Response: This “always-responding” is attractive to you because it was modeled for you your whole life. You were repeatedly taught that the “good” teachers and educators are ones who give of themselves, who put other people’s needs above their own and who are always care-taking.

You were not taught, explicitly or otherwise, that there are better ways to respect people’s sovereignty and to give them space to work things out on their own. If you give your people the techniques, the culture and the containers, and then challenge them to help themselves, they will.

This is all new to you so no need to be so hard on yourself. Of course this concept challenges you. It’s not part of the culture / vocabulary / training you grew up with.

Me: You’re right. I didn’t really get it before.
Response: You’re getting it now, and this is good because this will help the Week of Biggification be even more of a success in the world.

Wait, what?

Me: What do you mean?
Response: The people who come there are going to do big and beautiful things in the world.

They will be part of EVEN BIGGER things than anything you can imagine.

And the reason they will be able to do this is that they will not have you as a crutch.

They will know their own capabilities because you have backed off.

They will trust themselves more. They will BLOSSOM through the experience of being treated as a capable, competent, sovereign being who knows her (or his) own heart.

You will show up with the pirate ship, with the magic, with the zaniness and the process and the tools … and they will have their own miraculous experiences that are not because of you but because of the way your essence and your radiance contribute to spaces in which anything is possible.

Wow.

Me: Wow.
Response: Yes. Wow. This is really big stuff. You have no idea.

Me: So what happens next?
Response: You commit to practicing the art of not responding.

You say: “I am choosing to not have to respond. Because not everything requires a response.” That is your response.

Me: THANK YOU. This is crazy and awesome.
Response: Uh, okay. Glad to be of assistance by repeating back to you the stuff you know already.
Me: *giggles*

And comment zen for today.

This is a tough subject, conceptually and really in every other way too.

It’s something I’m still working through, processing, assimilating, trying to wrap my brain around.

We’re all working on our stuff. It’s a process. We let each other have our own experiences, we don’t give advice (unless someone wants some), and we meet ourselves with love. I adore all of you.

I hope you know that each of my posts here is a response to something. And that I am always responding to your you-ness with appreciation and sweetness, even when I don’t always do it out loud.

My dear wonderful friend Jane is visiting me this week, and we have been laughing ourselves to tears and exclaiming in astonishment over the many ridiculous things that have happened in our lives.

And we are also remembering our shared memories from a long time ago when we worked together on the kibbutz. When we got to see each other every day instead of every few years.

This has brought up so much sadness for seventeen-year-old-me who is the star of these hard, hard memories. And so much love too.

So I am writing her (that is, me at seventeen) a letter, and imagining/asking for it to be delivered to her, in the most non-invasive way possible, with as many translators and negotiators as necessary.

My love.

Can I just say how beautiful you are?

And how proud I am of your toughness, your resilience, your passion, your creativity.

I appreciate you tremendously.

And I also have to acknowledge the extreme shittiness of this year you’re going through.

Ohmygod! So much hard. It’s beyond absurd, really.

It saddens me to say this part.

There are not very many trustworthy adults in your life right now. Very few indeed. Fewer than you think.

You are going to need to tread carefully here.

They are making promises they cannot keep.

They are saying things they do not mean.

At times what they say is completely untrue. Most of it, actually.

Not out of malice, at least not always. But not trustworthy and not dependable.

Here is who you can trust:

Rena.

She won’t take action to help you but she will not lie to you and her advice is solid.

One more thing about Rena. Before she dies she leaves you a message that is very important. Pay attention to this.

If you don’t make it to the hospital in time, forgive yourself. Please.

Guilt sticks up the works. Guilt is an impediment to flow. It slows your ability to be receptive to the information you’re in the process of receiving.

Take care of yourself.

Avoid people you don’t like spending time with.

Avoid people who criticize you for being the way you are.

You are completely right to be wary of all the people you are wary of. This is wise. Stay alert.

Sleep. Sleep is unbelievably important.

99.9% of the painful and regret-filled things that happen this year occur due to extreme sleep-deprivation.

All these people who say things like “you can sleep when you’re dead” and “you’re young” and “deal with it” …. they could not be more wrong.

It might be right for them. It might not. Who knows. It is clearly not a right way for you and obviously you know this all too well because you’re experiencing it.

Worry less about hurting people’s feelings and more about being able to function.

Take a stand. Sooner and louder. Insist on access to your room. And if you don’t get it, make a big deal out of it.

Let friendships fall apart if they need to.

Right now you are agreeing to this situation of no-sleep because you don’t know how to stand your ground without further jeopardizing two friendships you care about.

This is not friendship.

They will fall apart anyway. If these friendships knit themselves back together later, they’ll come together anyway.

You are a sovereign being. You are not defined by these friendships. And my love, you really, really need to get more sleep in order to be able to function.

Here are some very useful phrases.

“This isn’t working for me.”

“I feel very uncomfortable right now.”

“This needs to change. What are our options?”

Also: If you sense you are in danger, do whatever needs to be done to get out. It is okay to make a scene. Later you will learn other ways. For now, use whatever works.

There is a book.

Next to X’s bed there is a copy of Catch-22. Read it now. It will shed some light on the absurdity of the situation you’re in, and give you enough perspective to get through the next part.

It will remind you that you are not alone.

Many, many people have also found themselves in ridiculous, impossible situations and taken solace in the hilarity of how impossibly wrong it is.

This is why you are friends with Jane. This is partly what you do for each other.

Can I give you one more piece of advice?

Your instincts are so right on.

Everything you’re instinctively doing right now to preserve your emotional well-being: dancing, walking, climbing trees, writing, learning …

It’s all good for you.

Being with your body is good for you. Being alone and having time for yourself is good for you.

People will criticize this isolation because they do not understand it, but you are building cocoons of safety and canopies of peace, and it is exactly what is needed.

And I will tell you the truth.

You are not crazy. You are inspired.

You are not wrong.

You are not alone.

I am with you. So many of us are with you.

You are loved and cared for and supported even when you can’t feel it.

The skills from now will serve you forever. In ten months you will be in the States — though not for long — and you will find Braude and that will make everything different and better in subtle and interesting ways.

Other things will happen. You will find out what you know. You will trust yourself more.

One day you will know that you are the queen of your life, without having to be reminded of it.

In the meantime, remember that you are not alone. And remember that you are loved. And remember to sleep.

And … comment zen for today.

I don’t even know what to say. Interacting with the past is hard. Interacting with now can be really hard too.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. We give each other room to have our own experiences. We don’t give advice (unless someone specifically asks for it).

That’s it! You are more than welcome to write letters to past selves or to wish each other love or to remember things or to not remember things, as you like.

Wishing you comfort and sweetness and good things. Internet kisses all around.

One of the quirks of self-employment:

There aren’t generally procedures in place to stop and acknowledge how hard you work and how much you have done and how much you care.

This came up again yesterday during a chicken with the group leaders from my Kitchen Table program.

That sense of come on! I want a promotion! I want a corner office! I want all the ridiculous amounts of work that happens behind the scenes to be admired and noticed!

So of course now I am unable to stop dreaming up unlikely ways that we could do this for ourselves.

Something more fun (and less intimidating) than a “performance review” … and more profound than just having a beer and awarding yourself thousands of sparklepoints, which is what I usually do.

Performance. Of course!

I called upon my favorite superhero (Metaphor Mouse!) to deconstruct “performance review” for me.

Nothing conclusive so far, but some fun and thought-provoking associations. Like cheshbon nefesh, that perfect Hebrew phrase that is, loosely, “soul accounting”.

And the truth is, while I bristle at the thought of anyone “reviewing” my work, performance does sound like fun.

Like my own personal drag show. Like cabaret. Like dancing in the park.

Like the way I am playing at business. And in business. And with business.

I play at business in many ways:

In the daily acts of steering the pirate ship (that proudly flies the Jolly Selma!).

At the Playground, my center, which I have been alternately describing as a glam pirate zen yoga studio or “preschool for adults!”.

When I wear my red sovereignty boots and my giant feather boa.

When the First Mate and I go have Drunk Pirate Council instead of “meetings”.

And when I scramble to find matching socks so I can pass as a grown up when we have to council with our CPA.

So this act of reviewing my performance could be something playful and silly and hilarious too.

The timing, also, is perfect.

I generally do go into contemplative mode towards the end of August.

This week marks five years since I launched this website (not the blog but the site) and The Fluent Self received its name.

Five years!

Not only should I totally get a corner office and an awesome plaque (wait, I already have both of those things), but it is definitely time to have some reviewing.

As long as it’s going to be sweet, deguiltified, appreciative, playful and fun … I’m in!

More of a revue than a review. But here’s how we did it.

I put on my pirate queen costume.

Then me from five years ago this week came and sat in the center of this gigantic pink couch. Which is weird, because the Playground doesn’t have a couch, but I’m just telling you what happened.

She was almost immediately joined by me from five years from now and also me from next week.

And the three of them were all smooshed together in the middle, hugging and exclaiming over each other and giggling. Like at a crazy reunion slumber party.

Then we all put on our lopsided tiaras and raised a toast to the good ship The Fluent Self, Inc. and Five Years Ago Me was astounded that it’s possible to have a corporation and not be gross and evil.

She was extremely relieved. And then Next Week Me was kind of teasing her a little until Five Years From Now Me said, sweetie, you aint seen NOTHING yet.

The four of us decided to appreciate these five years.

We acknowledged the hard (and how freaking impossibly hard the hard has been), and glowed happily over the good.

We named all the qualities that make up the culture of this crazy, silly, playful world that we have brought into being.

And pointed (literally, with these glow-in-the-dark sticks) at everything we appreciate and everything that makes us laugh.

Here’s what we are appreciating most at the moment:

The culture.

The kooky, sweet, funny, loving, warm, non-judgmental, everyone’s-freak-flag-gets-to-fly-just-as-high way of being that sets the tone for every single space in the business.

For example, this blog. It is really, truly the safest, most permission-filled, most respectful place I have ever been on the internet. The commenter mice here are amazing.

There is so much kindness (for me, for themselves, for each other) while still maintaining complete freedom to be sarcastic, cranky, grumpy, silly, obscene, whatever.

The sweetness, the acceptance, the hilarity, the curiously respectful way of relating … this is even more palpable at the Kitchen Table and even more so at live events that we do.

If I were to write a Lonely Planet style guide to my business, there would be a lot of stuff about how awesome the locals are.

The safety.

Safe spaces are a really big deal to me.

So far everything I’ve created has been a form of sanctuary. Literally or figuratively or both. Places to hide. Blanket forts! Invisibility cloaks!

Ways to feel safe being in your you-ness, and bringing more of it into the world.

Ways to take yourself seriously while still having permission to be completely silly and ridiculous.

Ways to process the process without being impressed by the fact that there are stucknesses.

The freedom.

Freedom to flail around and make mistakes and laugh and cry.

Freedom to dress up in costumes and not know what you do for a living and to avoid the things you love.

Freedom to not have to love your monsters and not to have to fight with them either.

Freedom to talk to yourself. And to be a total wackopants. And to sometimes care about things so deeply that it hurts and sometimes not remember what you care about at all.

To be who you are and where you are and how you are. And to have moments when you don’t want to.

Oh, we reviewed so many things.

But the main thing that was fun about revisiting these past five years was the spark of hopefulness.

If my business has gradually given itself the freedom and permission to be more goofy, more playful, more childlike, more wise, more sovereign, more hysterically funny (mostly just to me) …. yay.

And it seems to bode well for the future. Five Years From Now Me totally approves of bringing the silliness.

So my sense is that things are just going to become even more lighthearted and go even more deep.

There will dancing and singing in the streets. There will be worlds unto themselves. There will be chaos and there will be new form. There will be goodbyes and beginnings. There will be trust and faith and wishing.

There will be pirates. There will be pie.

I have seen what is, and it is good. And I have seen what is possible, and it smells like lilacs and wet earth and happy tears. But also like Roller Derby and sailing ships and something equally badass but entirely indescribable.

And … comment zen for today.

Reviewing things is totally hard. I do not mean even slightly to imply that it isn’t.

All this Looking Back involved remembering a lot of pain, a lot of fear, a lot of anxiousness.

Much comforting was involved. And support. And giving myself reminders that even the really crappy stuff has brought good things (and that I’m still allowed to hate it and resent it, if that’s where I’m at with it).

Anyway. Wishing you love for all the things you’re working on. Love and freedom and permission and safety and as much goofiness as feels comfortable.

We all have our stuff. We’re all working on our stuff. And we try to let everyone have their own experience.

Sparklepoints and beer for everyone who would like some. Kisses.

Personal ads! They’re … personal! Very.

So my itty bitty personal ads made me realize that it’s time to make a regular practice of trying to feel okay asking for stuff.

And now it’s my Sunday ritual for clarity and remembering and stuff like that. Yay, ritual!

Let us dooo eeeet.

Thing 1: More costumes for the Playground.

Here’s what I want:

One of the most marvelous things about the recent Rally (Rally!) we held at the Playground was this:

Somehow everyone spontaneously decided to raid the costume box in the Treasure Room to adorn themselves with silliness for the evening Chicken.

It was awesome. Even better? The collection of extremely fabulous costumes that Cynthia brought for us to play with while rallying.

Now that the Rally is over, I am hyper-aware of how limited our collection is.

I would like to have more silliness! More crazy hats! More feather boas! More unlikely and ridiculous things to wear exuberantly.

And, while I’m asking, I would also love to have one of those … it’s like a rack? on wheels? to hang clothing on? … whatever it’s called, I wish to have one at the Playground.

Ways this could work:

Let’s see.

I might happen upon some good costume elements at a neighborhood yard sale.

A mysterious patron might donate some.

There could be a crazy thing like a costume sale and someone could tell me about it.

Some of my readers might have wonderful things for us. Or ideas about where we might find them. Or both.

My commitment.

To be receptive to just how many ways there are through which these delightful garments can make their way to the Playground.

To remember all the bizarre and beautiful things than can happen when you incorporate costumes into everything you do.

To dress up! To wear my sovereignty boots and my pirate queen necklace and ride the hobby horse. To share pictures when we have more costumes.

Thing 2: a table.

Here’s what I want:

Our dear Hoppy House has an empty dining room again (long story).

I have been looking for the perfect table (locally made, reclaimed wood, broad, simple, a work of love) for it.

But then I keep tripping over things.

There’s a lot of discomfort for me in this.

So I want the table to find me or for me to find it. But really I want to work through whatever stuff is coming up.

Ways this could work:

Of course. I can process the process by writing about it.

I can ask for table recommendations.

And write love letters to the table and to the me who is feeling weird about it.

My commitment.

To be patient with myself while I work through whatever it is that needs attention right now.

To remember that whatever this is has to be legitimate, even if it’s also feeling awkward and embarrassing and stupid to have issues about a table.

To invite Denise over for dinner to be the first official guest at the Hoppy House table when it comes.

Thing 3: more understandings related to a crazy Shivanautical epiphany.

Here’s what I want:

So at the Rally last week, we did a fair amount of Shiva Nata for extra brain-scrambling goodness.

From the delicious chaos emerged all sorts of big understandings, realizations and pieces of intriguing information.

But the one that is messing with me the most:

I got this very clear understanding, in five words:

Not everything requires a response.

To which my brain said WHAT?!?!

And whenever I poked at it to find out more, I just got the same thing but slower and louder.

Not. Everything. Requires. A. Response.

Fascinating! But what am I supposed to do with this? Other than the obvious: not respond!

Ways this could work:

I can journal about this. Ask questions. Interview various parts of myself.

Talk to my monsters and my negotiators and the Greek chorus in my spine.

Brainstorm various situations in which a response might or might not be required and see what happens when I bring this sentence in.

I don’t know! It’s breaking my head. But in a really, really good way.

My commitment.

To be curious. Receptive. Loving.

To be willing to interact with the idea that I am in fact wrong about all sorts of things, and that I might also be wrong about what requires a response and when.

To take lots of notes and share some of them with you.

Progress report on past Very Personal Ads.

Just to update you on what’s happened since last time.

I wanted progress on a HAT (a Havi’s Announcing a Thing page), and boy did that ever happen. The Rally did brilliant things.

Not only did I write all the copy but I also planned the entire schedule, the content, the exercises and created an entirely new way of handling applications. GENIUS! Yay, Rally.

The next thing I wanted was rest, and I got some. Not really as much as was necessary, but significantly more than I’d thought possible.

And right people for Hiro’s call. She got a gazillion sign-ups so that totally worked. Thanks, guys!

Comment zen. Here’s what I’d love today.

• Your own personal ads, small or large. Things you’ve asked for. Or are asking for. Or would like to ask for. Or updates on last time!

What I’d rather not have:

• The word “manifest”.
• To be told how I should be asking for things.
• To be judged, psychoanalyzed or given advices.

Wishing love and good things for all your Very Personal Ads! So glad for everyone doing this with me.