I’ve been talking a lot with my nearest and dearest about growth lately.

…about how hard it is, and how slow it is, and how disorienting it is to keep leaving behind the pieces of your experience and your self that you thought would always matter.

Growth is a slow walk down a very hot, very long, unpleasant corridor, in which you meet strange and wondrous creatures who challenge your most cherished ways of being at every turn.

To be less vague about it: last year, I deleted over HALF my e-mail list because they weren’t opening my e-mails anymore. I chose to send them a few ‘hey it seems like I’m bothering you e-mails’ with the option to re-engage, and then I cut ’em loose. (Here are the other things you may have missed in 2017, if you’re curious.)

Translation: I have fewer subscribers right now than I did six years ago.

SIX. YEARS. GONE.

When you’re growing, the reframe is important.

I could freak out about my shrinking influence, or I could be happy that I chose to unsubscribe from the peeps who are no longer feeling me instead of clinging to the hope that someday, maybe, they’d tune in and pay attention again.

You can focus on what’s falling right the fuck apart, or you can focus on the new thing that’s forming before your eyes.

The money I’m saving from no longer paying to send e-mails to those thousands of people more than paid for my first round of breathwork training. (You can try the Receive breathwork class right here.)

So: YUP, I lost a bunch of folks.

Also: I gained the ability to pay for a new project and then some.

By choosing to cut the dead weight, I found the money to make something completely new and exciting happen. (And if, by comparison, you need to feel better about firing a client or deleting a few e-mails because you’re reading this: AWESOME!)

If you’re like, ‘What is breathwork?’ — it’s a combination of simple breathing and all-out healing that you can do by yourself, in the comfort of your own home, using no words at all — and in my life, it’s helped me stay more centered, more sane, and more willing to engage in difficult inner work than ever before. Click here to check out the Receive breathwork class!

Growth always involves a leaving behind.

It might be physical, like moving your belongings in a giant truck and leaving your old Tupperware in a pile on the lawn, but more likely the leaving behind will be more subtle.

You’ll have to ask for waaaaaay more help. Here are 22 ways to do that.

You’ll have to stop hiding. 29 ways to do that live here.

You’ll have to rebel against the status quo again and again.

You’ll have to turn up the volume on yourself, on what you want, and on your inner wisdom, even if ‘inner wisdom’ sounds cheesy and new age and YAH WHATEVER YOU KNOW WHAT I’M TALKING ABOUT.

You’ll have to ask people to buy your work — and you’ll have to show your work — instead of hoping they’ll notice how amazing you are and getting it on their own. Speaking of: I write books and you can buy them here.

You’ll have to make friends with discomfort as you scoot along the long, long hallway that leads to new ways of being. Tara Leaver and I talk about this very thing in this episode of That’s What She Said.)

And in the end, you’ll have to embrace the new self that emerges from your time in the chrysalis.

Here’s hoping you’ll love what you find when you finally choose to step into the light.

With love —

P.S. If you bat down compliments, have trouble caring for yourself, or have trouble accepting money for your work, the Receive breathwork class is for you. Get it for $22 right here.