“Time wasted rationalizing the mediocre could be time spent creating the magnificent,” Jen Sincero. My core functional creative philosophy is that it is by cultivating an extraordinary way of being in mind, body, and spirit that we make those extraordinary results we dream of inevitable.

I think it’s one of those things that seems like it should go without saying. But I find for myself, it is worth repeating. And I know that others feel the same. That if we are indeed cultivating this extraordinary way of being, we need to be so aware of those places where we are wasting our time and our precious life force, our attention, and our creativity on rationalizing the mediocre, on feeling ashamed or apologetic or embarrassed or insecure about creating the magnificent.

What would your life look like if you went 110% all in on creating the magnificent and didn’t look back? This was at the heart of a recent workshop that I taught on money and wealth coaching to the Art School community. I am offering you an opportunity today to download that workshop and in today’s episode, offering you too an overview and some inspiration as well as the kind of content and information that if you take it and apply it to your life, it will indeed not only transform your relationship to money, to building wealth, to expanding your capacity for abundance, but it will change every aspect of your life.

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, welcome to another episode of The Art School Podcast, coming to you from June in Michigan on the heels of first I was in Cancun for a week with Dr. Joe Dispenza and 1400 of my meditation buddies from around the world at one of his week-long immersion retreats. And then, after that, after a couple days home by myself solo here in Michigan, then I drove over to Iowa, Northern Iowa to meet up with my family, my immediate family, my children and husband, and they were up at my parents’.

And then two of my siblings came with their families, so it was the first time we’d been all back together on the farm in Iowa since probably two years, or maybe one and a half, since COVID. And it was wonderful. It was a packed house and awesome.

So, I got a great run in and talk with my brother. I got to spend time with my sister and all my nieces and nephews and my parents. And it was just so good to be home and soaking up that Iowa country vibe. And I was laughing because I had taken a picture of running in Cancun and then I took a picture without thinking about it of running in Northern Iowa and I’m like, “Huh, these legs and eyes have seen some pretty different vistas in just the last couple weeks.”

But runs are always a great way for me to process things. And I’m still processing everything from the retreat. And in fact, I shared quite a bit of it – well, I shouldn’t say quite a bit. There’s a lot to share. I shared more than I have shared anywhere else so far in the wealth and money coaching workshop that I offer today for the Art School community, which I am making available to you. There will be a link in the show notes to download.

It ended up being a 90-minute workshop. I talked for about an hour and then we had 30 minutes of awesome questions. This community, they’re so brilliant and so thoughtful and advanced and really do this work of taking the work and applying it to their life and think deeply and come back. And they are game on when it comes for deep swims, not just in the deep end. We are like off in the ocean deep swims.

And I’m so grateful for the brilliance of this group, their capacity for new ideas and for pushing the envelope, their ability to embrace paradox and think outside of the box and just their openheartedness and spirit. It was so good to back with a group after it’s been about a month since I’ve been with my Art Schoolers. And it was so good to see familiar faces and we had a few new people on the call too, which is always awesome.

So, that link will be available in the show notes and if you haven’t noticed from other episodes, I love talking about money. It’s sacred work. Abundance, wealth, prosperity, it lights me up and I won’t get too much into the why here. I’ve talked about it before. I talk about it a bit in this call.

But I feel like if it’s one of those areas that you’re called to, honor that because there is some epic growth and transformation in sight and I believe it’s bene the case for me and I’ve seen it happen for clients, an evolution, a personal evolution, A creative evolution, a spiritual evolution, an evolution of consciousness. And it has changed my life in so many ways to embrace this work and I continue to go deeper and deeper.

And also, I will say one of the reasons I like doing money work is because for many of us, it has our attention. And it is something we can measure. So then, how do we walk that line though of using it as a way to illuminate areas for potential growth and discovery within us and not using it as a measuring stick for ourselves, and particularly not using it as a measuring stick to beat ourselves up with, but instead using it as a friend and an ally and a companion and a mentor and a teacher.

And also like a resource, a neutral resource which we can use to support our creative work, support our soul’s growth in this world and amplify our values, amplify our power to direct attention and energy and life force and care to our values and to those places where we want to contribute and have an impact in the world and contribute healing, beauty, meaning, contribute our energy to fulfilling our purpose, and also having fun and living an unincumbered free beautiful authentic life.

I mean, the trip to Cancun, that wasn’t free. And I am so grateful that I’m able to do things like that, that I have created the sort of resources and abundance in my life where I can do that and I can do that happily and I can pay for it happily. It’s just so worth it to me, particularly when I think of the morning of meditating, one of the 6AM walking meditations on the beach, walking out there before the sun rose and people were already lining up and were still and silent, facing the east, from all over the world, all different kinds of people.

I might have mentioned this already, but it’s kind of getting me choked up just thinking about it. I paused to take that in. It took my breath away and I thought, this is something I want to remember for the rest of my life. If it wasn’t on my bucket list before, it certainly should have been. It was quite a human experience actually. Quite an experience to have as a human.

And again, that all made possible, thank you, to money work and to doing it unashamedly, unabashedly, and working to get to that place of peeling back layers of shame and holding back. And that points to, for me, the deeper message, which is why I started the intro to this podcast with that amazing Jen Sincero quote, “Time wasted rationalizing the mediocre could be time spent creating the magnificent.”

One of my most profound takeaways from meditating for hours and hours and hours and being with myself and my mind and overcoming my body and my emotions for hours and hours and hours that week in Mexico was being kind of blown away at the loyalty my mind still has to wanting to agree to a mediocre life, to pulling back, drawing down on my goals and dreams and spirit. That was very eye-opening.

I will admit, I was unaware of that week to the degree at which that was still going on in my mind, and so that right there too, that awareness, priceless. And I really think too, this is where money work is priceless, because it’s a great way of raising your awareness on some of your deepest core beliefs about who you are, what the universe is like, what’s capable for you in this lifetime, what life is really about.

And another of the most profound takeaways – and this is something again I knew at various levels but it just hit me at a more profound, deeper level, was really the preciousness of time and that yes, we can come from an abundance of time, and also still acknowledge it as very precious. It just hit me how precious our attention is and what we do with that attention in the time we’re given in this human form is such a privilege.

And as I watched my mind bounce around to, for instance, being immersed in one moment and the energy of the belief and possibility and love for life and myself and in belief of my dreams and then watched it like want to go back to doubt or want to get sidetracked by some small thing. I thought, wow, why? Why would any of us do this? Why would any of us trade these smaller things or trade doubt for giving our attention, because our attention is our life force, to what we want to grow, to what we want to nurture and to what we want to love into being, to love into life. That is being a creative powerhouse.

Where can you focus your attention and love something into life. Where can you go more deeply into loving yourself into life? So, I want to back up a bit because I’m getting a little ahead of myself, as that’s part of the coach with me, spoiler alert. But there’s more.

I also wanted to share with you a newsletter I recently wrote to my community on this topic and then use that to segue into my coach with me, taking information and applying it, being actually creative and making that information transformational.

So, again, I quoted Jen Sincero. She writes, “RICH. The ability to afford all the things and experiences required to fully experience your most authentic life.” And I included that just to drive the message home of what you can do when you allow yourself that rich wealthy abundant prosperous gets to be something you get to decide is yours in this lifetime.

And then the newsletter goes, “You know that saying, what you focus on grows, let’s break that down a little bit more. Let’s talk about it in terms of both an ultimate creative tool and an investment strategy for creating a rich life, however you want to define a rich life, money included. After accounting for the life force that keeps our hearts beating and our lings breathing, our attention is our most valuable resource. Our attention is, I believe, an aspect of our life force. The energy that gives life to all things.

How we spend our attention is how we spend our lives. Where we give our attention is where we give our lives. And our ability to direct our attention, or focus is one of the most powerful creative tools we have.”

Sidenote here, I did my 100^th milestone podcast on focus, and I want to mention it again here because I think it’s one of those things where we’re like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah focus is important. But we pay it mostly lip service and give it a little bit of attention, and yet fail to really harvest what it’s offering us and to truly give ourselves the bandwidth that training our focus requires.

Okay, back to the newsletter, “Directing our attention in fact is how we create anything and everything in our lives. Often, we direct our attention by default. That is to say we don’t direct it, either because we don’t know we can, we underestimate the extent of our control and power here, or we simply choose not to. We abdicate.

And then, there are the times when we do focus deliberately, saying no to other places we could focus and train ourselves to be more masterful in our focus. My experience meditating eight to 10 hours a day for a week in Mexico earlier this month was incredibly eye-opening in terms of how much more opportunity there is for me to train my focus. And I want to say here too, if your brain wants to glaze over this part when I’m talking about training to be more masterful because it does not want to include you in the category of people who can be masters, of people who can be extraordinary, catch that.”

Catch your brain if it does that, if it’s like, I’m not a master, extraordinary, just raise your awareness around that. Okay, back to the newsletter, “So, back to what you focus on grows and why this can be the creative investment strategy you use to create wealth and a rich life. What we choose to focus on grows because it is what we are choosing to invest our attention, our energy in. Where we invest and direct our attention is what we are giving our energy to.

Giving energy, which is our life force, to anything grows it.” So, just think about that for a moment. I want to pause. What do you give your attention to? That’s you giving your life force, your energy to it, and your life force grows things. Think of your life force like the sun. It’s where you’re shining it, it’s what you see, it’s also what you are growing. You are that powerful. You have that innate creative ability just through the power of your attention.

So, if what we invest our attention, our energy, our life force in is what we are growing in our lives, why don’t we talk more about expanding our capacity for abundance? Why not stop ruminating on the negative what-ifs, the negative evidence, our negative stories about the evidence, and why not stop arguing for our limitations and arguing for our past stories that keep us defeated, heartbroken, victims, and stuck? And why not instead be passionate and obsess, obsess, obsess about our yet-to-be-tapped potential for focusing amazing, breathtaking possibilities into life?

And I do think for me, that focusing those possibilities into life, to me that is synonymous with loving those possibilities into life, with loving this potential, these potential dreams, this potential within ourselves, this potential in the world, our visions, loving those things into life. Because love requires that kind of faith and devotion that is greater and unconditional, that is greater that the current circumstances, that is greater than your past, that is greater than your current evidence or your current stories, your limiting stories about the evidence, a love that is unconditional, sees that potential, believes in it, sees it, loves it into life, knows it before anyone else can see it.

Why not have more conversations about the outer work and the inner work that’s required to build wealth while also constructing our rock-solid self-concept as someone who creates and receives massive value in this world and can do it just because they decide to and focus upon it, give their attention to it and not to the absence of it, and they do this relentlessly.

And then, why not round it all out by celebrating the astonishing remarkable things you can do with these greater levels of self-belief, AKA self-love, freedom, and resources? Wealth, just like creativity, is an infinite potential. And being so much more aware and intentional about your thoughts, your emotions, your past habitual ways of being in this area will enrich you and your life in so many ways.

So, I riffed a little bit there too because once I started reading, I’m like, “Oh, I really want to get this across too and I really want to add that.” So, this then brings me to the part of the podcast where I want you to do more than just listen. I would love for you to lean in and really work with me, coach with me.

Take this information, don’t a passive consumer. Be a creative force of nature in your own life. Take this information, implement it, come contemplate what it means for you, apply it, tweak it, mix it, marry it with your own wisdom, your own intuition, your own life experience, make it your own and make it transformational.

So, I had asked earlier, what would that look like if you loved these potentials that you dream of into life? And those outer potentials, to me, really are these sacred mirrors for the potential within you, for what is within you that wants to come out for aspects of yourself that you have yet to completely see, know, understand, appreciate, work through.

Some things, we have to overcome and then other things in the overcoming, we can fall more deeply in love with ourselves and with life. So, think of a dream, a vision of your most extraordinary life that you want to love into life. And then, get down into the brass tacks.

I talk about a tool in the class that I talked about today, in the workshop taught today about having a contemplation aspect and then having a creation aspect. And the contemplation aspect, you are building out the neural network in your mind that builds a model.

So, you know what you would be thinking in this aspect of you that has loved something into life and is living in the reality of it, this truest version of you, this most fully expressed quote unquote future self version, what would they be thinking? You want to get into the brass tacks. And then especially, what would be the energy of that? What would be your energetic way of being? What would be your frequency or vibe would be another way of saying it. What would be your emotional state?

And you want to get into that and not just the thought of it, but the feeling of it and really contemplate then, as this person, how are you different in the world than you are now? How do you feel differently?

Because you don’t want your emotional belief as it currently stands to be your upper limit. And if you don’t allow yourself to imagine a greater energetic way of being, a greater emotional life, then your thoughts are going to continue to be equal to your emotions. Your emotions are going to continue to be equal to those thoughts and you will be just wrapped up in this loop. And I go into this in more detail in that workshop.

So, I also share in the workshop, don’t let yourself again be confined by statements like, “Well, I just don’t feel it.” You don’t feel it yet because your body has habituated to the past way of feeling. It takes time and it is a process to teach yourself to elevate your energy, to feel differently. It is a process and it is a training to learn how to condition the body to experience the world in a different way. Not just try to positive think your way through something when truly you’re not feeling it, but to really get our entire state of being, mind, body, and spirit, aligned with this next evolution of you.

And so, from this place, what choices do you make when you have committed to this process of loving something into life? What are the different choices that you make? Especially, what do you no longer choose to do? How do you act differently today and tomorrow than you did the day before and the day before that?

And especially paying attention to where you are investing your energy, where you’re investing the attention you give to certain thoughts, certain emotions, and where you want to disinvest your attention and your energy. Again, this was another, like, blow me away with its obviousness and simplicity, and then also profundity.

The sublime insight of really seeing how much of my own attention and energy is still invested in smaller things that are not my core things. And I am definitely in contemplation phase and still processing all of this and doing this very work myself, like what different choices, knowing what I know now, what different choices am I going to make?

How am I going to disinvest all of the attention and energy that I can currently see has been tied up in smaller things and things that just don’t belong in the core of my life and having this insight about how this realization at a deeper level of how precious life is, what I really want to focus on, because that’s really what I’m going to grow and that’s what my life is going to be about.

And realizing what a power we have with our attention, what a creative power we have for me is like getting so clear on what I’m disinvesting, where I’m disinvesting attention and energy, and where I’m focusing more and more on being more and more masterful and evolving my ability, remaining conscious of being intentional about investing my attention and energy in what I love and what I want to grow and what I want to see more of in my life.

So, I’m right here with you doing this work and already feeling and seeing the benefits and changes. I mean, I can feel it immediately on the interior and then I can see it up close in my own life already, behavior changes already, clarity already, clarity over immediate things but also long-term things and feeling a sense of renewed power and energy and aliveness.

And that may or may not be apparent to other people immediately or in the short-term, but I can guarantee there is no way, like doing this work, feeling the difference that I’m feeling now, there is no way that it doesn’t change the trajectory in the long-term.

And so, I am really excited to share this with you and to hear from you, what are you intent and committed to loving into life? What different choices are you going to make? Where are you going to disinvest attention and energy and what are you going to give your precious life force to?

Thank you so much for listening to another episode of The Art School Podcast. At this point in the podcast, I often ask if you’ve enjoyed the podcast, if you’d share and subscribe and leave a review because that definitely helps me reach more people.

And also, one of the choices I’m making is right down, again, to the brass tacks of things, like, I get tired of hearing myself say that every week. And I’m like, if they haven’t left a review by now, do I really need to say it in every episode? Maybe I will now wait a few episodes. Maybe there will be new listeners come on and I will trust they’ll get it again.

But I know your time and attention is precious too and I don’t want to go through the motions of anything. If this inspires you, I think you’ll share it. I’ll bring it up from time to time, but just so you know, I’m changing things up a little bit here.

As too with sharing about upcoming Art School events. I mean, our epic 12-week program officially kicks off August 31^st and I also offer a pretty kick-ass summer workshop series as a free bonus for anyone that enrolls early. I mean, it’s three months to get your game on before the Art School starts. And I’ll mention that a few more times before we hit August, which is our big launch month.

And until then too, I would love it, if you’re interested in joining the Art School, love it if you’re called to that. I also believe too that my people find me in mysterious ways. And if you’re interested in working with me in other ways, you can find out more by visiting our website, www.leahcb.com and also by emailing our lovely team support@leahcb.com. We love to hear from you. We would love to have you.

So, I won’t be negligent or dismiss the opportunity to share with you ways to connect with us. And I also know that for myself, I want to focus on working with the kind of people that, if I wanted to hire a coach, I would hunt her down. Not in a creepy way, but I’d figure it out. And that is the kind of energy that I love in a client. Those are my favorite kinds of clients, are those kinds of clients, the kind of client that I am, so I know that you also know how to find me. So, changing things up around here.

And then this brings me to the close. I just love this quote. I have it written many places. I can’t be reminded of it enough. I have it up on post-It notes. I have it rewritten in my journal. If I were into tattoos, I’d probably have this tattooed somewhere, and so I want to share it with you in the spirit of today’s episode and also this workshop that I’m offering you.

By the way again, that workshop is available in our show notes for download, free. Just a thank you to all of you. Here is your parting inspiration, words of wisdom for today.

“Overcome the notion that you must be regular. It robs you of the chance to be extraordinary,” Uta Hagen. Let’s just say it again because it feels so good. “Overcome the notion that you must be regular. It robs you of the chance to be extraordinary.”

I hope for all of you listening, you do not rob yourself of that chance to be extraordinary, that you give yourself the opportunity to create the extraordinary, to embrace your magnificence, to shine, to astonish yourself. I hope you have a beautiful, amazing week everyone, thank you so much for being here. I really do appreciate you. And I look forward to talking with you next time.