Why I Left My Corporate Job

Nov 26, 2021 | Sovereignty, Women's Voice & Power, Women's Wisdom

My thoughts on fear, courage, and being an entrepreneur.

In January of 2018 I left my 10-year-old online business for a job as a trainer/facilitator with a Leadership Development company. Though it was a complicated decision — walking away from my website, blogging, subscribers, my online presence — I knew it was the right one.

I was right. I loved the work. I loved the content I got to teach. And I loved the people I worked with. Just a year later, I was promoted. Then, just over a year later, Covid descended. Then, months after that, there was an unexpected senior leadership change. Then, everything changed.

In the midst of such, and regrettably, I watched myself move into my highly-honed default behaviors of compromise and compliance. I kept my head down. I didn’t speak up. I pulled back. I did what was required — but with less heart, less presence, less “me.” Until…

I pulled back far enough to notice. I had to honestly acknowledge that I was behaving in ways that were completely antithetical to who I knew myself to be. And though I couldn’t have known where it would lead, I said to myself, “No more.”

And then, things got even harder (as is almost always the case when we choose our own integrity, authenticity, and alignment over compromise and compliance). And harder still. Eventually, through a “mutual separation agreement,” I left. September 17, 2020.

It is hard to make choices on our own behalf when they are costly, when there is so much at stake, when fear of the unknown looms.

I believe this is almost always the nature of it — at least as I look back on the most significant decisions and transitions in my life. I also believe that bearing those costs and facing those fears exponentially increased the reward, my sense of strength and capacity, my awareness of my own value and worth.

If you are sitting at a crossroads, where the laundry list of costs feels nearly overwhelming, where what’s at stake is pretty much everything, where the fear of the unknown feels dark and scary, here’s what I want you to know:

  • Consider that the complexity and cost is the very evidence you need to confirm just how important this choice is, just how capable and worthy you are to make it, just how much you and your desires matter.
  • If it were simple or benign, you would have already made the move, had the conversation, left the job, risked it all, started your own business, enforced the boundary.It’s NOT simple or benign. Which is WHY it is asking so much of you.
  • Know that your costs and fears are real. You get to acknowledge them instead of push them under the surface. Not once, but over and over again. Though this feels daunting, it is like Olympic training: building strength you didn’t know you had in order to face and surmount challenges you didn’t know you could.
  • Trust me when I tell you that you are no less worthy if you wait, if you hold off, if you can’t bear those costs right now. I understand. You are still more than enough.

*****

Now just over a year out from my seemingly-stable corporate position that offered me a steady paycheck and benefits and frequent flyer miles and an expense account — I feel the to-be-expected angst of being on my own.

Day-in, day-out I see the costs, what’s at stake, and all my fears lined up like toy soldiers in front of my computer monitor waiting to be addressed or ignored, tackled or given into.

Day in, day-out I remind myself of what I’m doing and why it matters.

And day in, day-out I recognize that in spite of it all, I am choosing me — over and over again. Most days, that is more than enough benefit to stay the course, trust myself, and persist. Easy? Not at all. Worthwhile? That IS the risk, the gamble, and the focus of my endless hope.

May it be so.

Boom-Boom, Boom-Boom

Jan 18, 2016 | My sort-of Sermons, Sacred Stories, Women's Voice & Power, Women's Wisdom, Writing

I often listen to podcasts in the morning. Out of the shower, getting ready for my day. Today’s didn’t really offer anything all that new. But apparently I need to hear the same thing – spoken a million different ways and a million different times by a million different people – before I actually hear it. Today was that day.

The guy was talking about his career. Well, his previous career, actually. He’d been the pastor of a huge church, thousands upon thousands attending every Sunday. The role required that he wear two predominant hats: one as leader, the other as teacher. He loved the teaching hat – the writing, the reading, the research, the crafting of new and innovate ways to communicate all that he held in his head and his heart. And though he didn’t often say it out loud, he saw this aspect of his work as “art.” The leadership part? That drug him down and made him crazy. So, he did what any person might do in a similar bind: he asked for advice. The “wisdom” he received? “Maybe your art needs to be sacrificed for the greater good, on behalf of your larger and more important responsibilities” (my paraphrase).

When seeking guidance, don’t ever listen to the tiny-hearted. Be kind to them, heap them with blessing, cajole them, but do not follow their advice. ~ Clarissa Pinkola Estes

He did not, thankfully. He eventually walked away and crafted an entirely different (and un-advised) life for himself that didn’t turn out all that badly, (He was recently on tour with Oprah).

Back to the podcast: there was more of his story, what happened after he walked away, etc., and then the part I’ve heard at least 999,999 times:

“You know that thing you just keep hearing inside, like a big kick-drum that just keeps going boom-boom, boom-boom in your chest? That thing? That’s the thing you’ve gotta do! No matter what! That’s your art. That’s your passion. You’re on the planet to pursue that beat!”

Yep. Got it. But this time, apparently the millionth time, here’s where I went:

What if Eve heard this podcast? What if having an interesting conversation with a snake and bucking the system and breaking the rules and reaching for the fruit and eating it and giving it to Adam and leaving the Garden and venturing out in the world and creating and living was the boom-boom, boom-boom in her chest?

Still a leap beyond-imagining? OK. How about this?

Once upon a time there was a woman who lived what appeared to be an idyllic life. Still, she felt like something was missing, like there was more to be seen and experienced, like something was calling her to a world beyond that one she currently knew. She could almost taste the opportunity to step into her truest self, to seal her destiny, to create her legacy. It was a HUGE decision, no question about it. There would be consequences to be sure. Still, how could she not reach out and grab all that she’d been imagining and dreaming and planning and hoping for so very long?

If she were my client here’s what I’d tell her:

That boom-boom, boom-boom? That’s the spark-of-the-Divine beating within you! Trust-trust, trust-trust that when you listen to and follow that beat, the life you will live will defy all stories ever told, will surpass anything you’ve imagined, will create legacy and impact beyond belief! In fact, your story, one of these days, will probably be one that is told until the end of time! How can you not reach for what you want?!? Yes, it will be hard. Yes, people may disagree with your decision. And yes, it’s highly possible there will be hell to pay (some would say, literally). But the story that is yours to tell and live? Epic stuff, truly!

That may be what I’d tell her (and you and certainly myself), but it’s hardly what we’ve been told about her. Instead, we (well, the collective, cultural “we”) have used her story as perfect example of what not to do, as irrefutable evidence that listening to and trusting the drum that beats within is just asking for trouble.

The stories we are told create the ways in which we make sense of the one in which we live. The way those same stories are interpreted define the rights and wrongs by which we live.

Eve’s story has determined how we understand right choices and wrong ones, risky choices and safe ones, wise choices and foolish ones. So instead of honoring her boom-boom, boom-boom, we have learned to listen to a familiar hiss that sounds a little something like this:

“Don’t follow that beat. Disaster and destruction surely await the entire planet (or at least your corner of the world) if you take that chance, state what’s true, write that post (or book), leave that job (or marriage), make that choice, eat that fruit, follow that beat. Don’t do it!”

But here’s the thing: Eve’s story is just a story…just like yours!

And because that’s true, I have total permission to tell her story as I wish (my boom-boom, boom-boom) and you have total permission to write, tell, and live brand new ones for yourself! Boom-boom, boom-boom!

Even if you don’t tell her story differently, I’m hopeful that hearing it for the millionth time will help you see it (and Eve) a new way; more importantly, that it will help you see your story a new way.

What story would you imagine, write, tell, and live if you could?

That, that is your boom-boom, boom-boom!

I’m right about this.

Boom-boom, boom-boom…May it be so.

Women Together: the best kind of danger

Sep 27, 2006 | Hope & Encouragement, My sort-of Sermons, Women's Voice & Power, Women's Wisdom

I just returned from three glorious days on the waterfront in Gig Harbor, WA. If that wasn’t good enough, I was in the company of 15 amazing women – half of whom flew in from all over the U.S. and the other half of whom are located here in the Pacific Northwest.

Sally Morgenthaler was with us as the “host” of what she calls Conversations. Together we reveled in each other’s company and the beauty of not only the location, but the faces, hearts, stories, and lives of those by whom we were surrounded.

I’m exhausted tonight, but I am also overwhelmed by the beautifully dangerous power present when women are together.

That danger is not to be feared, but embraced, welcomed, and aggressively ushered into many places that are deeply in need of the power women have to offer. It is not a command-and-control kind of power, but power that is deeply connective, deeply intuitive, deeply generative, deeply creative, and deeply committed.

16 powerful, dangerous, beautiful women in one place for 3 days are now disbursed into their larger communities. They came strong, broken, tender, wounded, growing, struggling, rejoicing. They left more powerful, more dangerous, and more beautiful – with even more to offer, more tears to shed, more voices to raise, more eyes to open, more lives to change, more worlds to alter, heal, and lead.

I am not the same woman I was on Monday morning. Their voices have shaped and changed me. I am now more powerful, more dangerous, more beautiful, and more heartbroken, more committed, more compelled, more prepared, more tender, more strong. And I am not alone.

I am surrounded – in heart – by 15 amazing companions; women who have and will continue to labor on behalf of one
another and all that we are yet to birth. I’m grateful to every one of them. I’m hopeful for many more such conversations. And I love that danger abounds in their beauty and strength – and in my own!