Ep #188: The Little Secret to Creating Massive Change

If you are listening to a podcast like The Art School Podcast, it’s probably safe to say that you believe life is too precious, and both too long and too short, to not be actually living your life. It’s likely that you’re already fully onboard that life is too precious and too long and too short to not give yourself permission to do what it takes to live a life that is actually yours, that you love, and that is built on this expansive, unapologetic, unabashed creative energy of you knowing you’re building, you’re living your dream life.

I know some of you will hear this and it will just pour fuel on an already-burning fire. It will stoke the flame. Others of you, I sense, will hear it, and then you may feel paralyzed, maybe by shame that you aren’t already doing this, or fearful that you can’t do it or that you don’t know how.

No matter in which camp you find yourself – and maybe it’s a mix – don’t worry because today, I have something for all of you, those who want this to be true, those who want to feel alive in your life and feel empowered, and all of you who want to know how to do it.

I have something that is immediately accessible at all times. It is doable. Today, we’re going to talk about how incremental one-degree changes can create massive changes in your life over time; the kind of transformation, the kind of life that you’ve always sensed is possible, that you’ve always sensed reflects who you really are.

You are listening to The Art School Podcast; a show for artists and creatives who want to become the next greatest version of themselves. Learn how to cultivate an extraordinary way of being and take the mystery out of making money, and the struggle out of making art. Here is your host, master certified life coach, artist, and former lawyer, Leah Badertscher.

Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of The Art School Podcast. I am coming to you from a beautiful, absolutely beautiful summer day in Michigan. I know not all of you are in this hemisphere, so I’m sending summer vibes your way. And no matter what season you find yourself in, today’s episode will be applicable.

So, our summer is off to a wonderful and a very swift start. The kids finished with school. We held a big party for my husband’s department and their families. We had over 60 people here, a food truck, charcuterie boards, lots of kids, lots of families, and it was awesome to have that much energy moving through the house.

I realized that we never had a house-warming party because we moved in – we finished building this house – in the summer of 2020. So, we’ve held gatherings. We’ve had friends over for dinner, hosted family. But this was the biggest gathering so far, and just so good to be around people.

And there’s a theme here. There’s going to be a theme here. I didn’t even realize it before I started talking. But then, after that, I was off to Lake Michigan for the Art School retreat, the ultimate luxury creativity retreat, VIP retreat on the shores of Lake Michigan. And again, to be with people in person, I wrote on Instagram, “The only thing better than being with Art Schoolers is being with Art Schoolers in person.”

And I’m grateful. I’m so grateful to have both and also looking forward to many more opportunities like these days we spent together. It was incredible. And I have so many takeaways from that retreat. I will share some today and some in upcoming episodes. It reminded me of why I initially was so awakened and so in love with, right away, life coaching. Because it’s magical, it’s life-changing – life coaching is life-changing.

And spending days together, having a sustained conversation, being beautifully cared for – I talk a lot in the Art School and this podcast and my work with clients about creating the kind of ecosystems, inner and outer environments both, that make the flowering of your potential inevitable, that make that creative dream that you hold as a seed in your soul that was planted there, that seed of who you really are, creating the kind of environments, putting yourself in those environments that make that kind of flourishing, that make that kind of fulfilling of your potential, that make that kind of expression of your highest self just a byproduct of how you live, that the importance of that ecosystem can’t be overstated.

And so, this retreat was an opportunity to do that in person. The Art School, the Art School Mastermind are opportunities to do that in this container space in which we operate online together. And also, the upcoming cohort of the Art School Mastermind is going to have a retreat as well. So, I could not be more grateful that we’re back in person.

And also, today’s episode, we’re going to talk about these one-degree shifts we can make to cultivate these kinds of sacred containers. So, if that seems to you to be out of reach, it’s not. I have so many stories, even from the last couple of weeks, of people saying, “I remember when we first met three or four years ago and I thought, I want to be in the Art School,” and now this person is.

So, do not underestimate the power of these incremental and one-degree shifts. They truly are life-changing.

Also, so then after the retreat, I was then off with my family to Tennessee. My husband is on a committee at Vanderbilt. They have a music city conference, and so he was on that committee. The conference was happening during Nashville CMA Fest, and so he stayed there. We dropped him off in Nashville and then kept heading south to Murfreesboro, which is where I have family.

I have an aunt and an uncle. I have cousins that grew up there. I grew up going there, spent not every summer, but many summers would get to spend a week there.

So, the kids and I went there, and then my mom came with another of my aunts, who is also from Iowa, another aunt of mine from South Carolina came. Another aunt from Pennsylvania came down. My mom is one of 11 and one of eight sisters. So, lots of aunts and uncles.

And then one of my cousins came up from Huntsville, Alabama, with her four beautiful, awesome, adorable children. And it was so good. Let’s see, we were there Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. They have a pool, a beautiful home, a beautiful, big back yard. the kids were chasing fireflies and making smores with a bonfire, swimming all day long.

And just to be around family and get to see my kids get to see some of their more distant cousins and get to know them better and how well they just fell into place together, it was this beautiful reflection on the power of nurture.

And I have so many images from this weekend in my mind, so many of them include laughing so hard you could pee your pants. One of them though is my daughter – I took a picture of this too. My daughter is smushed between two of my aunts who are hugging her, and then the dog jumped up and got in there too. The dog’s name is Sully.

So, it was like a Sully and Blaise sandwich between my aunts. And then, you can just see little Blaise’s face beaming out and she’s smiling her toothless grin right now, and just beaming. And it reminded me of feeling like that, feeling held by these aunts, these very creative, funny, loving, also fierce and strong women.

And I thought, yes, that is a nurturing ecosystem right there. That is one of the ways that we can continue to cultivate opportunities for all of us to flourish, and just the joy I saw beaming out from her face, it reminded me of why I’m doing what I’m doing too. Because it is something extraordinary to be held by that kind of environment and by that kind of support as a human.

And, as I was driving back too – well, we were all driving back. My husband drove, actually. Thank you, Brad. And I was thinking, it’s kind of sad leaving, and also feeling a little overwhelmed because, when you’re in the car for seven and a half hours and you know all the things you have to do but you just can’t do any of them, it’s just not a fun thing, not a fun place that my brain goes.

Even now I know and I can remind myself that I have great plans and I’ve got great structures set out from the summer, just sharing with you, being fully transparent, my humanness too and where my brain likes to go.

Because I know that things like the Art School, my calls, my coaching calls, the group calls, I don’t worry about that at all. That seems so rooted and also something so easily recognized by others in my environment as this untouchable, unshakable thing that I know I show up for it and it flows and I have a very high level of confidence in my ability to do that and in the delivery.

And then, I was noticing other areas where I’m like, oh shit, I’m feeling a little bit like, how am I going to do all of these things? And even in the course of recording this episode, and I had told – my boys are upstairs assigned to their different tasks, and I told them, I was coming down to record a podcast, and you know what that means? Don’t interrupt me.

And then, one came down though and said, “Mom, mom, just a second. Can I have a friend over?” And I said, “Sure, that’s fine.” And he’s like, “Can he stay for a few days.” Sure, which is awesome, which is the kind of summer and the kind of family summer plans that we want and that we are embracing. And then it’s too thinking about, so then how can I also have an experience of summer where I’m also feeling fulfilled, by work, by rest, by play, creatively, and in a way where I’m not feeling pulled multiple directions?

And I have an idea too that pertains to this, the content, the core, the heart of this message and this podcast that I’ll share with you. So yeah, because there are paintings for me in my summer and there is a lot of writing and again, the Art School, to me, I know I’ve set up an environment, so that is inevitable.

And so, the work in process still for me in the summertime, the other thing that feels inevitable to me is the kind of family summer we’re going to have. That, to me, I feel really dialed in, really attuned to. And my ongoing work too is to expand my vision of the richly textured life that I’m living that allows abundance, spaciousness for me, including quiet time, including the painting, including writing, including just being outside by myself sometimes, long swims, long walks.

And so, this gets to be the ongoing adventure of our life, continuing to cultivate. I’ve been talking to my clients about these concentric circle symbols when we think about our life. Rather than it being a linear, point A to point B, and we just make our way along, that we are moving along this spiral towards the center that represents our truth.

And it might seem really daunting that we’re not there yet. But how can we continue to move closer and closer to that truth? So, before I talk specifically about that, I also want to invite you to open coaching, free coaching that I am doing this month, June 2022, these last two weeks of June.

So, if you listen to this later, don’t feel like you’ve missed out because I have done this popup free coaching before and I will do it again. And you can also join this free Art School group at any time and also sign up for my newsletter at any time so that you don’t miss any of these free popup opportunities.

But I thought it would be a great way, if people are feeling like their summers, or whatever season it is where you are, like you are getting off track and you’re not sure how to continue moving towards that center, or if the big dream feels so far away and so out of reach, how to regain that feeling of competence and traction and groundedness.

And I was telling a colleague, she had asked how the retreat was on Lake Michigan. And I said, it’s hard for me to sum up because, on one hand, I want to say it was off the hook and also deeply rooted and profound and quiet. And also, there was this huge electric lightning bolt kind of energy, and also deep peace.

And she just took a moment and was like, “Yep, seems about right for you. That seems correct for you, Leah.” And I appreciated that because I love that kind of energy in a container, that vastness that embraces that paradox and allows for all of those things.

And I think having a community in which we’re talking about that, that kind of vastness in our own lives, is really helpful. And so, that’s the kind of conversation that I want to facilitate in the Art School group, in the Facebook group, through the coaching this month, with a particular focus on today’s topic. And that is the power of one-degree shifts, incremental changes, to create massive change in your life over time.

So, in the aviation industry, there’s a rule of thumb called the 1/60. I heard of this rule years ago, long before I’d ever heard of life coaching or thought of an application of it to life when I was a teenager and I really wanted to be a pilot. I really wanted to be a pilot too so I could be an astronaut.

And so, some friends and I were taking ground school. Now, two of those friends went on and became fighter pilots in the Air Force, and I did not, if you haven’t figured that out already. But I was fascinated by flight and I really enjoyed ground school.

And one of the principles we learned in ground school is this mathematical rule. So, the 1/60 rule is a simplified way to calculate an aircraft’s drift angle in flight. So, drift angle means how far it’s going to get off course.

If an aircraft has drifted one nautical mile off track, after traveling 60 nautical miles, the drift angle is one degree. So, a one-degree shift might seem so small it’s barely perceptible, and actually, if I’ve done my math right here – and anyone listening who’s in aviation navigation or in the aviation industry and I’ve got this wrong, please write in and correct me.

But my understanding is that a one-degree shift of the nose of an airplane is about 25 inches. So, that would mean if you just shifted the nose of an airplane about 25 inches at the point of takeoff, that would be a one-degree shift. And so, that though, over time if you magnified that flight, if you’re starting in New York City and you magnify that on a flight across the US, your destination would be hundreds of miles apart from where you had intended to go.

A popular example I’ve heard of this is that if you were flying from LA to New York and if the pilot leaving from LA adjusts the nose of the airplane just three and a half degrees south, you’ll land in Washington DC instead of New York.

And again, if you were to continue to take one-degree shifts during flight, you can imagine how that ultimate destination, how much more that’s going to change.

So, the takeaway is that these very small incremental changes lead to very impactful, meaningful changes in the results that you get over time and in who you become over time. And I thought it was interesting too, as I was doing some research for this episode, to basically check my math, make sure I wasn’t conjuring the 1/60 rule. I wasn’t.

But then, it also brought up other ways others have applied this metaphor. And I was struck by, as I scanned and I read the beginnings of some of them, how they seemed to be cautionary tales about not getting off course, about the danger of not pointing yourself in the right direction and the danger of not course correcting and that the longer you travel off course, the further you’ll be.

And I thought, that’s interesting, like, valid, could also be true. I think this I empowering. Yes, it’s true that one-degree shifts can also take you off course, absolutely. I don’t want to discard that and actually I’m glad that I saw that so that I can include it in this.

I also want to emphasize though the power of one-degree shifts as you’re in flight, so that if you feel, “Oh gosh, I didn’t get off to the right start, I didn’t point the nose of my proverbial plane in the right direction…” no, you can course correct. And always, in flight, I’m course correcting. I’m learning as we go.

And I think we all are if we’re being awake and really living, alive and in the moment, and presence-ing and being creative. Where life is happening and we are responding.

And maybe, midflight, we decide we don’t want to end up in New York after all. We actually want to turn the plane around and go back actually to Hawaii. James Clear writes about this concept in his book Atomic Habits and makes what I think is a very encouraging statement when he writes, “You should be far more concerned with your current trajectory than your current results.”

Because our results are our outcomes of where we have been pointed and the choices we have made in the past. So, our outcomes will always be a lagging measure of these choices. But where we are headed, we can influence that tremendously. Again, we can make incredible, profound changes in our life through these small, incremental shifts, choices, these one-degree changes.

And that is a place that I’d love to go to with my clients and myself over and over again if something feels overwhelming, sticky, just there’s so much resistance there or it’s very daunting, the question, what would a one-degree shift in my relationship with whatever this is right now, whatever is the current distressing, sticky situation, what would that look like?

It also doesn’t have to be a distressing or challenging situation to start with. It could be something that is already going well, but you want to amplify your results by, like, magnitudes of 10 or 100 over time. So, you can ask yourself, what right now, what one-degree shift can I make right now that, over time, could increase, amplify my results by an order of 10, by an order of 100? What would that look like in the area of my creativity?

Maybe you think of a particularly large project or dream you have in mind and you break it down into one area of that. What would a one-degree shift look like in that one area? In relationships with money, with health? A story from my own life where I made a one-degree change that has since grown many times over – I’ve told it before, but it’s the story of the origin of my Miracle Monday practice.

So, back when I was in a time in my practice – it’s been several years – where I was really struggling to have consistent income from my coaching practice. It seemed like feast or famine. Usually it seemed heavier on the famine side than the feast side. And I was often feeling the scarcity around clients, when’s the next one coming? Or, I don’t have enough clients.

And so, I took myself for a long walk one day and went through this thought process of, okay, if I am creating the results that I want, if the results that I have in my life are here because, at some level, conscious or unconscious, I am choosing them. I want them. It somehow serves me. How might this be true? How might it be true that I actually have the exact number of clients that I want? Which was not what my mind thought I should want.

But what if this is true? How is it true? Why would it be true? How is this serving me? Why am I choosing to create this exact situation? And the answer I got – I mean, it came from the fact that I was walking along a peaceful sunny road on a Monday afternoon. And I actually realized I enjoyed that.

I realized, I love having space in my days. I think I’m choosing, quote unquote, not enough clients because I am afraid that too many clients, too much business success, financial success will squeeze out areas of my life that are precious to me, like quiet, like solitude, like time for my mind to wonder, like time for my creativity, like margins in my day between things, so margins between work and then margins between children coming home, the kind of places where I can just be, reset, recharge, relax, rest, or create with abandon and not feel that I’m under the gun or that I have an appointment coming up later in the day.

Even if I do thoroughly love appointments with clients, you know, if you’re in a creative flow, you don’t want to break that for anything. So, I realized I was actually choosing to have fewer clients and therefore, at that time, less money because of the value that I place on space, on time, on quiet, on mind-wondering time, on margin, on solitude.

And also, then I could see I was coupling two things that do not need to be coupled. And that is the belief that more money equals less time for what I really value. That became clear when I had this conversation with myself about, why am I choosing this? Because I have competing beliefs here and competing desires. I desire free time. I desire autonomy and creative freedom and spaciousness.

I also desire to have this strong financial foundation. I also desire to be affluent, to be wealthy. And I am making those two things in my mind at opposite with each other, like they cannot coexist.

And that was then when I had an epiphany and I realized, neither of those things need to be true. I don’t need to believe that. But if I am believing that, if I am believing that it’s one or the other and they come at the expense of one another, then that’s what I’ll create.

And if that is my mindset, if that’s my belief, then unconsciously I’m choosing, “Oh, well actually, I value free time and time to myself and creativity more than I value having clients on my calendar. And also in my mind was the idea that clients on my calendar equaled money, which is something else I had to uncouple.

So, so many fruitful discoveries from this one course of inquiry. And I realized, that day, walking along that quiet country road, I’m actually – I love this. I’m choosing this.

So, now also having the awareness that I also can choose spaciousness, creativity, freedom, autonomy, strong energetic boundaries and I can choose to serve clients at a high level and I can choose to be present with my family with margins and I can choose creative freedom and being prolific myself, if I can choose all of these things, then how will I go about setting up my life?

So, the one-degree change I decided to make from that moment was, on Monday mornings, rather than going through a weekend where I’m very immersed and present with my family and then right into seeing clients, as soon as my children leave, as soon as I return to work, like right at 8am or 8:30am on a Monday morning, that I was going to give myself that first liminal space hour, that hour between family and hour between work starting for the week, I was going to give that to myself. That was going to be my miracle hour, my time for just me, for spaciousness, for nothing at all, if that’s what I want.

And from that, it seems so tiny that it wouldn’t make a difference. But the huge infusion of energy that I got back, the joy from that precious hour, the joy from just sitting down with a cup of coffee and sitting out in the swing or walking around the yard or journaling if I want, but no expectations, no obligations, not belonging to anyone or any other thing, but just to myself and to the moment for an hour at the beginning of the week, the amount of energy that came back to me from one hour is disproportionate in terms of, I mean, one hour back gave me 10 times as much energy back.

And with that energy that came back to me, I could be more creative. With the energy that came back to me, I started to feel even more solid and competent and restored in both my creative work and also in my coaching work and in the entrepreneurial business money-making aspect of my work.

I took another incremental one-degree shift and I raised my rates. Now that I was feeling better, I was like, you know what? I can see, I am undercharging and overdelivering. So, I always want people to have the value of what they invest in and coaching exceed, many times over, the cost of the investment.

But I knew I was giving away too much and undervaluing myself including in what I was charging. And so, I raised my rates. At that time, it was an incremental raise. I also made the decision at that time though, I think I raised my rates to $125 an hour and I also made the decision, at that time, I was taking the nose of my airplane and pointing in the direction of the day when I would be charging $1500 per consult, per hour, that that would be my quote unquote billable rate for coaching, for a coaching session, a one on one.

And that was several years ago, but that is actually where I am now and I can trace it back to that small one-degree change of paying myself in terms of energy and space in my calendar, those precious real estates, by giving myself back that one hour at the beginning of the week.

And so, I’m not suggesting that you just follow that formula and it’s that miracle hour that changes everything, But I am telling you my process so that you can see, in a meta way, how this incremental change, how making a one-degree shift worked in my life and you can extrapolate from tat how it might work in yours.

Now, I also want to offer you a little more nuanced, complex version of the one-degree change, the incremental shift. And that is to look for opportunities to apply this by looking for the places where your growth edge is.

Rather than blasting through something, maybe there’s a place where you currently experience resistance, and instead of avoiding it, instead of just not going there, instead of telling yourself you can’t, instead of gritting your teeth and plowing through, play with, what would a one-degree shift in my relationship to this resistance, to how I usually go through this, what would a one-degree shift or change in my behavior or thinking look like in this particular application?

So, I wanted to share with you a story – I mentioned I would – from the retreat this last weekend. So, there are many one-degree shift stories here. So, Risa Kuhlman, who is an extraordinary coach, and I would again highly recommend following her and getting on her waitlist if you have the opportunity and you’re looking for a one-to-one coach.

Risa, I met in a mastermind, a high-level mastermind a few years back. And she has told me since that, when we sat down at that table and I was talking about the Art School, that in her mind, she was thinking, “I want to do that. I want to join that program. I’m going to be in that program someday.”

So, that was her already adjusting the nose of her plane and then fast forward, she did end up joining the Art School and then she has been in the Art School Mastermind. And she is someone who just impresses me so much and it’s moving to think about.

When I remember her talking about what she wanted to create a few years ago and to see the shifts and the changes and the choices and the corrections that she has made along the way, some huge, big, brave gestures, and then also she’s got this mountain energy and she makes steady course corrections along the way.

So, fast forward from that day when we had just met in the mastermind, I didn’t even know she was interested in the Art School at the time. I don’t know, it feels like a year, to now when she’s in the mastermind, and then she came to the retreat.

And she shared a story about when I announced the retreat and invited the masterminders, that she said her first thought was, “I want to do that.” And the second thought was, “I can’t.” And she shared how that her awareness around, “Oh, that’s a pattern, I want to do that, oh I can’t.” And the stepping back to question, “Really, can’t I? Or is that an incremental shift that I can make?” Just being willing to not say, “Oh no, I’m going to. I can.” But just to really question the, “I can’t.”

And the reason that she first thought she couldn’t was because she was throwing a baby shower for a niece on that Sunday. But then, when she took a closer look at it, given the time change, given the timing of the retreat, she’d be able to get back and be able to do both.

And it was incredibly insightful how that pattern of, “I can’t,” how her sharing that opened so many things for other participants, myself included. Those places where we automatically tell ourselves some version of, “I can’t,” to me, that’s one way that resistance manifests, is just a feeling that we can’t, a feeling that we can’t look at it any differently, a feeling that precludes us from even exploring the possibilities that maybe we could.

And so, she shared that story. And then, she had another great story about – so, we’ve been talking a lot in the Art School about creating these ecosystems that take very good care of us, so that we are so well nurtured and so well cared for that these potentials within us, these dreams, they take root and they bear fruit and they blossom.

And the importance of not only, you know, doing the work of going towards your dreams, but really remembering this aspect of creating ecosystems, inner and outer, mindset but also your outer environment, and it’s all related.

These ecosystems, these environments that take very good care of you, and about how we can create ecosystems to an extent that our results do become natural byproducts of us, humans, of us having these seeds of divinity, these dreams, these souls. These souls, in the right ecosystem, will produce fruit.

And again, bringing the conversation around to this phrase, what does it mean to be a woman, to be a creative, to be an artist that takes very good care of themselves and that sets up systems, even their business and their life – especially their business and their life – to take very good care of themselves.

And so, that’s what this retreat was built around, really, was taking such exquisite care of people on so many levels, mind, body, and spirit. So, Risa was going to take this a step further, did take it a step further and was like, “You know what? I’m going to come early and I am going to book a beautiful place to stay and really enjoy the lake area and the energy before the retreat begins.”

And she talked about how she loves balconies. She found a room with a balcony. But when she arrived at the inn, the room that they took her to didn’t have a balcony, and realized her first thought was, “Oh well, I’m not going to say anything.”

And how many of us – I know I’ve had that experience, of there was what we wanted, and there was what we were given, and we just took what we were given. And the thought came up, “Well I can’t ask for what I really want.”

She just stayed with it a little bit more and said, “Oh, you know what? I really wanted the room with the balcony. That’s what I requested, actually. Is it possible or are there any of those available?”

And, sure enough, there was a room with a balcony. And that was hers. So, that became a great symbol and a story and a metaphor throughout the weekend. And it is an example of a one-degree change.

Where do you usually hold back because there is this membrane of resistance of, I can’t feel the discomfort that if I actually stayed longer in a place of asking for what I really want.

I know my growth edge has been letting people feel uncomfortable, letting myself speak my truth and letting people sit in how that might make them feel uncomfortable. I’m not speaking my truth from a place of hurting anyone. But there are times when being n integrity for me, saying what I see and how I see it and how I feel it, where I would tend to stuff that down because I don’t want to stomach the other person’s discomfort.

So, that for me is really a profound one-degree shift and also I know a massive change over time in terms of course correction, bringing me back in alignment with my truth so that the destination, the place I end up is actually where I want to be, is a reflection of that truth, is really the X marks the spot on the treasure map, that dream life, a life lives from the inside out.

So, this brings me to the part of the podcast where I want you to do more than just listen. I want you to lean in and really work with me. Coach with me. I want to keep today simple because that is the beauty and the power of the one-degree change, of the incremental move that, over time, changes everything.

Think about an area in your life where you’re wanting to create change. Think about an area in life where you’re working towards a dream, a vision of life that you hold dear. What is a one-degree change you can make in your relationship to that area?

Also, for today’s coach with me, I want to invite you, strongly encourage you to take action on this. And one way you can take action is to find an accountability ally. You can also join the Art School Facebook group. It’s totally free and we are going to be coaching this month of June 2022, on this exact topic.

It could be, what are the one-degree changes you can make this summer in order to have the best season ever? So, my friends down under, you’re invited too, whatever season you find yourself in right now. It might help you to revisit what your destination is, reflect, remind yourself, where is it that you’re headed? Who do you want to be?

And then, I love this question, this way of wording one-degree changes; how can I evolve my experience in the direction in which I am headed? Even if it’s just one degree, especially if it’s one degree, how can I evolve my experience today in that direction of that intended destination?

Thank you for listening to another episode of The Art School Podcast. My intention, my intended destination for this podcast is that I create something that helps you make the changes in your life, whether they are grand gestures or incremental changes that change the trajectory of your life’s course, so that you do become who you’re meant to become, that you do create the life of your dreams, a life that you love from the inside out.

And if this has helped you do that, I would love for you to pay it forward by spreading the word. At this point, the growth of this podcast is all organic and we have listeners all over the world, all around the country, and I appreciate each and every one of you and also love hearing from you.

So, if you want to connect, I’m on Instagram, @leahcb1. You can also reach us by emailing support@leahcb.com And whenever you tag me or hashtag on Instagram an episode that you love or where or how you’re listening to it, I always love those shoutouts and it gives me an opportunity to really feel like this work is connecting and meaningful in real human’s lives, so thank you for that as well.

And if you are someone with a great bog creative dream who just knows they’re rocking it in life and you also have so much more potential to give, something is calling you, I highly encourage you to apply for the next cohort of the Art School Mastermind.

You can find out more about the details on my website, www.leahcb.com and go to the work with me link, find the mastermind page. You can also email us to set up a consult and ask to see if it’s right for you by emailing support@leahcb.com, and also the link to apply is always in the show notes.

So, the Art School Mastermind is six months long. But the most important information I can give you is that whatever you are thinking about doing in this container, in the Art School Mastermind, it is going to happen. That is how high the energy. That is how powerful the coaching. It’s how elevated the conversations and next-level the community.

If you feel like it’s hard to stay on track, that you’re somebody that is disciplined, that really believes in their potential to achieve this creative dream, this set of creative goals, but you feel like you get often sidetracked in life or something is slowing you down, you get in your own way, other things get in your own way, that’s precisely why I created a program like this, so that you can become someone who is intentionally, powerfully, capital C Creative, that you can become someone who points the nose of their aircraft in the direction, in the destination in which they are headed, and then develops the skillset along the way, the awareness and the skillset in order to course correct, to continually modify their flight path so that you are creating the results that you want, so that you do end up exactly where you’ve always known you were meant to be.

What you gain when you do this is that you have that self-trust. You can trust your instincts and you can also trust yourself that you are somebody who sets and achieves your goals and is someone who sets an intention and who follows through with that.

Again, it’s creating this link where you trust your instincts and then you also trust yourself to become someone who follows through and creates that vision no matter what. And once you can do that, it’s a meta process. It’s a reinforcing process. It’s a life skill. It’s also a lot of fun and it’s also an incredible life-affirming, life-giving community and process. Which is why we have such a high – I don’t even want to say retention ate because I never intended to have a retention rate. It’s just been something that people want to continue on with because it works and, again, it’s an area in their life that becomes a no-brainer because what you are able to create so far exceeds the investment and that decision to point your nose in that direction and to put yourself in this kind of environment.

When you apply, you are not committing yourself to anything, but it does put you on the waitlist for the next cohort so that you have the opportunity to be enrolled int his next session if you so choose, and then also be informed of upcoming events, whether they’re retreats, whether they are free workshops, all things designed, whether you join or not, to continue to support you in creating lifelong change and empowering you to really create from the inside out a reality that is the life of your dreams.

To close today, and as a thank you for those of you that listen all the way to the end of podcasts, I wanted to share a recent example of a one-degree change in relationship to something that really has helped me. And it pertains to the summertime and something I mentioned at the beginning of the podcast, of having all of these different facets of life that are so important to me, the family, the creativity, Art School, and a shift in my thinking about that, a one-degree shift that has been tremendously helpful.

I realized that, as I looked at everything going on in the summer on the calendar, from things I mentioned about the end of the school year, the party, the retreat, that I was starting to feel overwhelmed when I looked at it as this linear to-do list or your typical planner, calendar, schedule.

I know all of these things are things that I love. That’s how they ended up there in the first place. And it was my way of thinking about them that was causing sort of the kink in my flow of energy, and hence the overwhelm.

So, I asked myself, what would be just an incremental change in my thinking? What would be a one-degree shift in relationship to these things that could help get my energy and my creativity and my joy and peace and satisfaction flowing again?

And I did realize that I was thinking about it in terms of a to-do list, all of these things to do, and in a linear fashion. And it reminded me of when I was in law school and when I tried to make myself think in outline from when that didn’t serve me either. And that made me realize and remember that I’m really much more of a spatial thinker and a constellated thinker.

And I just sat with it a little while, trusting that there was a solution there, much like I do with coaching. Always, I can sense that there’s something for me to know that I already know that hasn’t risen to the surface yet. But then, it did. And it happened when I was actually on a visit over to the lake to prepare for the retreat a few weeks in advance of it.

And I took some of my own medicine by going down by the shore and hiking along the water to take in some of that water medicine. And I remember one of my favorite phrases – I think it’s a story I’ve told on this podcast before. I’ll retell it soon. But the phrase is, “Be the lake.” Now, that means many things to me. But what it conjured for me in this moment was the wisdom of water flowing. And it reminded me of another time in my life when my creativity, when my energy wasn’t feeling like it was flowing.

And the phrase, “Be like water flowing,” was such medicine to me. So, I realized I had been looking at things like a linear to-do list when, instead, I could look at things like all of these containers, all of these gardens I had created for beautiful possibilities. And with a container, all I needed to do – because I have the container set up, the container of the Art School, the container of the retreat, the container for painting. I have containers set up for writing, for family.

And then, I just need to let my energy, my creativity and my life force be like water flowing into these containers that I have already established. So, that’s a pretty idiosyncratic description of a one-degree shift, but it does give you an idea, a portal into understanding how you can couple tis question, “What would a one-degree change look like here?”

You can couple that question with your own imagination and trust your wisdom, trust the wisdom of your soul and psyche to deliver something so profoundly perfect for you that it restores you, again, to that sense of, “Alright, now things are moving again. Now I am back on course. I have course corrected. I am definitely aligned with my truth and also moving, evolving in the direction of that destination, of that desired, intended result, dream, vision of who I’m meant to be.”

Wishing all of you a very beautiful week. Thank you so much for being here and I look forward to talking with you next time.