Ep #175: The Practical Mysticism of Consistency

“Consistency is an underappreciated form of intentional magic, disguised as a mundane doing,” Victoria Erikson. As you listen to this episode, I would love for you to create a relationship between this episode, where we’re talking about consistency as a form of intentional magic disguised as a mundane doing, loop this into a relationship with the podcast prior to this where we talked about big leaps and living in your zone of genius.

Because too many times, it’s really easy to assume that those things are mutually exclusive, that it’s a binary, you’re either making leaps in consciousness and that’s what the zone of genius is all about and forget any consistent, repetitive practices and actions, or we are totally in the weeds and bogged down with an overcommitment to consistency and to thinking consistency has to look like the way the world has taught it to look, rather than a consistent relationship with our own internal, natural rhythms.

So, today I want to integrate these two concepts, leaps of consciousness and consistency as intentional magic that sometimes looks like a mundane doing, and how these all can help facilitate you living more and more from your essence, from your soul, from your zone of genius, and really creating the ability to be unstoppable when it comes to creating anything you want.

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. So, behind the scenes info, I’m creating this right after I created last week’s podcast on the big leap, on the overview of the retreat, the Art school Mastermind Retreat. And I wanted to, again, create a continuity of energy in the conversation between some of these episodes, so that you can listen to them back-to-back and you can move back and forth and see the bigger relationship.

Because this is for sure not a linear process. And always, one of my own personal challenges in doing any episode is coming to peace with the fact that they all feel a little bit incomplete to me, that I would love to give you the whole thing and to sit down and work with you one-on-one and to figure out what exactly is most important for you to focus on and what you need more of, what you don’t need to focus on.

But I make peace with that in order to create as much impact as I can with a wider audience by providing this resource, and a free resource like this. and also, I’m trusting that you will take any information always offered in this podcast, any transformation that I’m inviting you to in this podcast and you will make it even greater than what I’m offering you because you will take it in, mix it with your own genius, your own life experience, and make it your own, and work your own multiplication miracle, like the loaves and the fishes.

I’m giving you loaves and fish and then you combine it with your own internal genius and magic and multiply the miracles in your life. Because creativity, conscious creativity is absolutely a miracle of healing and expansion for your own life, and works miracles of healing and expansion in the world.

So, building off last week’s podcast, where I shared with you more of the high-level framework of things that we were diving into in the mastermind, and in particular in our virtual retreat. And so, today, I wanted to give you a more specific framework, an outline of steps of a process that you can follow to create magic and miraculous results in your life.

This is, again, like a framework, like a scaffolding. Use this and then also make it your own. What I want to point out is essential here. If you take away nothing else, I cannot overemphasize the importance of repetition, of seeing this as a building of the neural pathways in your brain. You are building a gold mind.

You know, in the prior podcast where I talked about realizing that you’re sitting on a goldmine. Well, in our exchanges that we had in Slack for our mastermind, there kept being an autocorrect where it would correct mine into mind. And I’m like, “You know what? That’s essentially the same thing.” Learning that you’re sitting on a goldmine is really learning that your mind possesses this golden potential. And that is what we are mining and refining, and it’s that realization, and also the cultivation of that golden mind.

So, building a way of being, which includes mindset which specifically I’m speaking to the neurological aspect of what it takes to unwire networks in your brain that have been wired to create results in your life that are less than optimal, unwiring networks in your brain that deny that you possess a gift of creative genius, unwiring networks in your brain that create programs and results in your life that seem to prove to you that you’re incapable of creating the kind of life and results that you want.

That’s one process of building the mind, the way of being of an affluent artist, is unbuilding, unwiring those things that build not that result, that build evidence that seems to prove undesirable things about yourself true. We are unwiring, unbuilding that part of the brain. We are deconditioning the body, deconditioning our propensity to feel emotions that make us feel it’s just true that we feel less than.

When clients say to me, “I just feel this is true,” and whatever that truth is, it feels like such a bummer and so heavy and such a weight, that is always an indication that they’re not actually thinking. They’re not tapping into their truth, into their soul. They’re not thinking with their rational mind. But they are just thinking equal to how they are feeling.

The body, the feeling has become a mechanism of thinking, and not in a helpful way. We can use the body as a way of feeling our emotions and accessing the wisdom of the emotions. But when we’re not actually in conversation with emotions, with our body, rather we’re just taking orders from the wash of chemical that we feel.

We feel a wash of chemical that feels like worthlessness to us. And then, we just think thoughts equal to that wash of chemical, of worthlessness. So, the work we are doing too is interrupting that process, realizing that it is a pattern and is a program, and interrupting that.

And one of the biggest challenges can be to acknowledge that just because you feel something, does not mean that it’s the truth. And I want to be so clear here that I believe 100% in the intelligence of the body, in the intelligence of the heart, in the intelligence of the gut, in the intelligence of the energy that we experience moving through our bodies, AKA emotion.

I am not discounting any of that. What I am drawing awareness to is being very nuanced and aware, sophisticated, elevated in your awareness of the difference between not looking at continued washes of chemical states in our body that are just like, “I just feel like my personality is depressed, is lethargic, is failure, is constant frustration.”

No, that’s when feeling becomes a means of thinking, as Joe Dispenza says, that is not serving us. It’s not serving your soul. It’s not serving your art. It’s not serving your financial health. It’s not serving your physical health. It’s not serving your highest purpose in the world.

So, one aspect, one part of the work that I do, that we do in the Art School, is this building of what is. What is the mind, the way of being of someone who is an affluent artist? Meaning then, the results that they want are just inevitable? Results of art, results of success, results of money, results of fulfillment in the process, results of resilience and strength are all inevitable byproducts of who they have become.

And it is this process of becoming that includes unbuilding renovating, unwiring, deconditioning neurological networks, networks in the brain, neural pathways, and also deconditioning the body’s habitual states of being.

Then, there is also this process of, then what are we intentionally building? What do we want? How do we want to think? What are the neural pathways that would be advantageous for us? What are the neural pathways that would create a superhighway for our prolific AF creativity and essence to roar down, like the autobahn? What would be the chemical states, the states of being that would facilitate us tapping into our gift, into our imagination, to what would facilitate turning down the dial on anything that inhibits the free-flow of ideas, like our ability to jazz – even if you’re not a musician, jazzing as a verb, as a way of describing, in the moment, free-flow of creativity and ideas that sparks.

And also, I think jazzing assumes that you are also feeling your audience and that there’s a collaboration. What is the network, the brain, the mindset of someone who is able to do that? Asking yourself that, what is the network, the mindset, the brain, the way of being of me as an affluent artist?

That’s what we are intentionally building in the Art School. So, both the unbuilding, the unwiring, and also then the intentional construction, building, rewiring, reconditioning, teaching a new way of thinking and being, that’s our work. And that is work that requires lots of reps, lots of repetition, lots of passes.

Think of it as a spiral. We keep moving around the same core curriculum, but every time a little higher, every time upgrading ourselves neurologically, physically, emotionally, spiritually upgrading, evolving our consciousness and our creativity.

And because this is a podcast all about repetition, doing it again and again and again, so much more than you think you need to. Which is why I hammer home that concept of the Art School like an Olympic-caliber training facility.

Because if you are going to live at the level of an Olympic athlete, you need the mind and the body, skillset of an Olympic athlete. And that skillset, what is the equivalent of that, I think, as a creative, is what I’m using as a metaphor but also a literal affluent artist. What is the skillset of an affluent artist?

And I am particularly focused on that inner skillset. What are the thoughts? What is the mindset? What becomes just the second nature way of being of somebody who creates prolifically, creates art prolifically, creates contribution, value, meaning prolifically, and also receives in abundance, way more than adequate compensation, rich compensation, both in terms of fulfillment and money.

In order to do this, in order to really embrace that building the mindset, building the brain, the body, the way of being that makes extraordinary results inevitable, we really have to be aware of our tendency to be transactional, where we think education has seemed to us, “Well I learned something once and then now I know it, therefore I should be changed.”

Knowledge does change us. Knowledge is an important piece. But then, it’s what we do with that knowledge to change ourselves internally, sustainably, and then permanently so that it becomes who we are. If you want to change who you are, if you are ready to embrace that this work is about who you become, including changing how and what you think, then you cannot overestimate the amount of reps, the repetition that it requires, which is why I chose the quote that I did for the beginning of the podcast.

“Consistency is an underappreciated form of intentional magic disguised as a mundane doing.” Because we think, “I know this, then why am I not changed?” It’s because we’re not embracing it as a magic because it looks like a mundane doing.

And we almost always underestimate the amount of reps that we need to do to unwire and also rewire. And also, shoutout to my friend and colleague and Art School alum Amanda Gibby Peters. She is my hat-tip source for that quote from Victoria Erikson.

I wanted to really set up the next part of this episode with an emphasis on repetition and on consistency before I share with you the framework, the process that I’m sharing next. Because again, I think it is always underestimated, the amount of repetition that’s required to truly create change and transformation in your life from the inside out.

There’s a caveat here. I also believe that you can change your mindset in a snap, in an instant. It doesn’t have to be long and arduous and difficult. It’s important to embrace the paradox though. Be willing to be in it for the long haul. Be in it for the long game. And when you do that, a part of you settles down, which also paradoxically make it, when you’re accepting where you are, you’re accepting, “Hey, you’re committed to being in this for the long game and for the right reasons.” That settles something in you that makes change easier and also facilitates the ability for it to happen more quickly. Sometimes, so much more quickly than you would have anticipated.

So, that’s my caveat there too, is embracing that paradox. And I also wanted to say something a little bit more nuanced about consistency. I view consistency as being valuable when you are attuned to your own inner creative rhythms. So, for me for instance, at this point in my life, I am very aware of when I am using consistency from a place of, “Someone has told me I need to do this consistently in order to be a good girl,” and also when I’m doing it from a place of, I am scared to trust my own internal rhythms.

We are creatures of nature. Nature is very consistent. Nature has rhythms. Our days in nature has rhythms. The sin rises. The sun sets. We have seasons. The same applies to our own nature, which we then often distrust, grow to distrust because it doesn’t follow post-industrial revolution society’s ideas of what consistency are. Which is built around a 24-hour schedule, but then, even more so, around a workday where you clock in at eight and then you clock out at five.

Or, in now this more modern society where not only do you clock in at eight and clock out at five, but you’re really expected to be on all around the clock. That’s not the kind of consistency, adhering to that solely capitalistic consumer culture society idea of what a good productive quote unquote worker is.

That’s not the framework, the paradigm that I’m referring to when I’m talking about consistency. I’m talking about a consistency, it’s a fidelity to your own desire and creative rhythm, a fidelity to your own way of being, where if you’re a creative person and attuned with that, have integrated your intuitive self and your rational mind is serving that, you want to create because it’s nourishing. It feeds you. It makes you feel alive, just the same way you want to sleep, because your body is tired and it feels good.

So, I really wanted to present that more nuanced look at consistency from this creative consciousness approach, where it’s trusting yourself to your own internal rhythms.

So, for instance, a specific example, I feel very consistent with how I show up in my business and in social media. But for Instagram posts, I don’t have a schedule that I create. I don’t create an editorial calendar for these podcasts. I really trust my intuition and I really trust that I’m going to be tapped into what needs to be talked about, what needs to be said when. And I don’t schedule it out.

Because I’ve tried to live that way. I’ve tried to schedule everything out every week, and then every year. And I’m like, “How many times do I need to do this before I just realize that’s not how I work?”

And instead, what has been so transformative for me and is for my clients is to get in touch with and trust and be consistent, and consistent in a fidelity sense, be loyal, faithful, trusting of their own inner rhythms and then working to sluff off and release any impediments to flowing that out into the world.

So, for instance, perfectionism, that protectionist perfectionism is a place that slows down just consistent, mundane doing, offering of our work in the world, showing up in the world because perfectionism always will say, “That stupid, silly, mundane thing, that’s not good enough yet. That podcast episode, that’s not good enough yet. That painting, that play, surely you need to work on that, labor over that for seven more moths before god-forbid you should even show it in a first draft or workshop it before you’ve done that.”

That’s what perfectionism does. And that’s where consistency is like the disciple of creativity, the faithful disciple where it is not your job to judge the work. It’s just your job to keep flowing the work and to keep that channel open. And the same applies, the same process, the same orientation applies to doing this work of building the neural pathways of an affluent artist, of a prolific creative, of a wealthy creative, being consistent, being faithful to the process of building that mind, that heart, that way of being that serves your highest purpose, that serves your soul and helps flow your work uninhibited into the world.

So, I’m going to give you the framework to break down this process. And also, I’m going to say for the thousandth time, when your brain says, “This is not working,” ask yourself, “Have I done enough reps? Is it not working because I just haven’t built the strength up yet? I really haven’t done enough reps to literally physically change the shape of my brain, to shape the way that my brain works and then moves energy and information and ideas out into the world.”

So, here’s the framework. Number one, believe in capital C Creativity, this other intelligence, and believe that you have it, that you have this gift, and that it is valuable.

If this feels mystical to you, it is. And our society denies us, like I said in the prior episode, we live in a modern society that defiles the divine, defiles the mystical, scorns that and instead worships the rational mind, which is meant to be the servant of the soul, of consciousness, of creativity.

And so, I see so many people denying their gifts and not owning it. And instead, it’s like, “I don’t know how I do what I do.” It’s like tis confusion, this wall of fog comes up because it’s felt dangerous in the past to lean into mysticism, to own that, to own that you have this self-organizing intelligence, this capital C Creativity, this pure consciousness flowing through you that informs you, that is wise, that is knowing. So, the first step is acknowledging that. It’s acknowledging your gift and it’s owning it and then it’s owning that it is valuable, believing that your gift is valuable and powerful.

Again, powerful meaning the ability to create so that your gift actually has the ability to create what you want, what you desire in the world, it has the ability for you to fulfill your highest purpose, which often comes to us in the form of our desires, goals, and dreams.

So, I’m saying believe this, it’s step one of the framework. And then there is so much work to be done around that. So, again, this is a high-level framework. And then, if you’re asking how to believe, keep listening to all of my podcasts. Join the Art School. Hire a coach. Really commit yourself to learning what it means to unbelieve things, to believe new things. Learn what it means to unwire old pathways in your brain and to create and rewire new ones.

That’s the work that we do in the Art School. That’s the high-reps work, that’s the Olympic training gym work, that’s the cross-fit for the soul work. So, step one, believe in your gift, believe that this creative gift, your creative genius enables you, empowers you to create the results you want to create in the world. Including, not excluding opportunities, meaningful work, and money. Have the audacity to move our creativity and your gift and your belief in it into those spheres.

Step number two – some repetition here, but there is a design and a reason for this. You build the neural network and the way of being. So you’re building the mind, the body, and the spirit that support this belief. So, this is the neural network and way of being of someone who is a creative genius, who is an affluent artist, who knows their creativity, their gift to be valid, legitimate, valuable, powerful, not only behind closed doors and in the closet and in closer inner circles, but also out in the world.

And they’re moving that, taking up more space, and taking their place with their gift, with their intuitive gift, with their creativity out in the world.

So, beneath this step two of building the neural network and the way of being, I have two sub-steps for you. Sub-step number one, when you’re building this neural network and way of being, look for additional thoughts and evidence that support your belief that your creativity is valid and valuable and powerful. Look for evidence and new thoughts that support this neural network, that you can be an affluent artist, that you can be someone who not only creates prolifically, is fulfilled by the process, is stronger through the process, is very resilient, knows how to navigate challenges, and then also creates exciting, meaningful opportunities and money.

You’re looking for thoughts and evidence that support and help you build that intentionally. And then step number two, practice. Practice, practice, practice this process every day. You have to practice bringing awareness to what you are unwiring, which means those old neural pathways in the brain that you’ve learned over the course of your life, they’re wired in there, but the brain is plastic. They can be unwired and changed, bringing your awareness to that every day. That’s part of what coaching is, what’s so sacred about coaching is the heightened awareness.

So, bringing awareness to old pathways that still get activated. But also intentionally moving your attention, your consciousness to what you are creating intentionally, constructively, creatively on purpose.

So, you can use your imagination against you, or you can use it for you. But it’s up to you to practice becoming masterful at moving your attention, which means moving your energy and focus. Because what you give your attention and energy to, what does it do? It grows what you’re giving your attention and energy to.

So, reinforcing every day the neural networks, the thoughts, the beliefs that you want to have. And so, again, it’s repeating sub-step number one. Every day, you’re looking for thoughts and evidence that support your beliefs that you are a real artist and you are capable of creating everything, anything you want. You are capable of doing it in a way that builds soul, makes a meaningful contribution, and is healthy and holy and healing for your life and others. Every day, your job is to practice reinforcing those beliefs and then unwiring, deconditioning what’s inconsistent with that.

So, step number one, believe. What are you believing in? What are you believing in about your creativity and your ability to be creative and successful and fulfilled? Step two, building the neural network, the way of being that supports this belief, building the neural network, the way of being that allows you to flow your creative essence into the world and to make a beautiful life and living from doing that.

The sub-steps for step two – number one, every day looking for additional thoughts and evidence, seeking the thoughts and evidence that support your intentional, your on-purpose beliefs. Sub-step number two, practicing this every day, reinforcing these neural networks that you want to grow. Because these neural networks that you want to grow, that’s what’s going to help you create results in your life. That’s what’s going to help support the flow of your essence and your creativity into the world.

And then, pulling out of number two, moving onto the big number three. Again, there is repetition here because this is so meta, I can’t say it enough, repeat all of these steps. Repeat, repeat, repeat until it begins to feel fulfilling in and of itself to do this work. Repeat, and it will become more familiar, less unfamiliar. It will feel more right and less unnatural.

Repeat this process until you create the evidence. This is about not, “I’ll believe it when I see it. But I’ll see it when I believe it.” And you keep repeating this process. You keep doing this practice of building belief, of building the neural network, of building the way of being.

This is absolutely a skill. It’s a physical skill. It is like training your body to be stronger and to be able to perform any sort of athletic physical endeavor. You do it by going to the gym. You do it by doing reps. You do it by embracing where you’re currently weak and not making that a reason that you’ll never succeed, but just making that then the place where you know you’re focusing.

And then, you have the opportunity to ask yourself, what energy do I want to bring to this process? What relationship do I want to bring to this process? Because whatever you practice is what you’re growing. So, again, meta when you’re bringing that question, “What’s my orientation to this this process?” I’d bring one of love. I’d bring one of joy. I’d bring one of, “You’re somebody who can create meaning, see the meaning, find the meaning anywhere you go.”

I’d create one of being somebody who is able to celebrate every step of the way, celebrating not only when you get the results, but someone who celebrates their internal gains, someone who celebrates the energy they bring to the results, somebody who celebrates how they evolve their awareness and their energy and their attitude, and also their compassion for themselves when they’re just feeling downright negative, someone who celebrates their ability to embrace paradox and embrace, “Yeah, I’m kind of digging that I’m somebody who has so much more tolerance and ability to embrace things that feel terrible sometimes on the process to creativity and growth.”

That’s a beautiful, compassionate resilience. That’s not grit your teeth and bear it. But that’s true strength and building a strong and beautiful and true heart from the inside out. It is a willingness to do this and have an orientation of devotion, of meaning that this is about evolving yourself as a person. This is about creating a space within you that allows your essence to flow. This is about creating a lifelong relationship with yourself that is trusting, unconditionally trusting and loving of you.

It’s about being willing to repeat this process for the rest of your life as an act of love, and then also it’s that paradox of doing these mundane things sometimes that you can also bring meaning to by knowing that it’s a form of intentional magic disguised as a mundane thing, knowing that that too, these small things, these repetitions are very much the same part of the process that creates great leaps of consciousness, great leaps where you will wake up sometime without knowing it having arrived squarely in a life built living from your zone of genius, living from your essence, living from your soul.

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.

So, what I want to offer you today is to take the framework that I just laid out for you and then fill it in with specifics for your life. What do you need to believe in order to make the results inevitable? What, when you believe it, will create results in your life? And then writing out like a training program.

How often do you think you need to do this? I do this work daily. Yes, because it’s my craft. It’s my life’s work. Coach sometimes seems too small of a word. And I find that sometimes, if I think of it, “I’m a coach,” I’m not able to tap into the same kind of passion and meaning and enthusiasm.

But that’s my own brain error because I’m also creating – I feel like and so many of my colleagues are – really with their life’s work and the energy and the orientation that they’re bringing to their work, very much elevating what it means to be coached.

I do think it’s sacred and it’s a place where the mystical meets the pragmatic. I feel like it’s something that our world needs, so many people wanting to live lives that are meaningful, and wanting to shed any idea that living a life that is meaningful and in touch with your intuitive aspect, your spirituality and your divinity, that that means you’re going to be broke and irresponsible and unsuccessful and living under a bridge.

That paradigm, its time has expired and we’re building a different one. So, again, filling out the framework I gave you with specifics for you, imagine that I am your actual coach and I’m saying, “Here, part of this process is I’m here to guide you and support you and I’m rooting for you, helping you along the way.” But you also have to build connections in your brain that acknowledge you have the answers.

So, this is an important part. Don’t just consume information I’m giving you and then not take it further. This is the part where you can really create transformation in your life. If I’m your coach, I’m going to ask you, “No, you tell me what you need to believe, the same way you believe the sun comes up in the morning. The same way you believe you’re capable of putting your shoes on.”

It’s a matter of fact, almost take it for granted belief that you’re going to create the evidence for this belief, that you’re going to create the results that you want. What do you need to believe about yourself? What do you need to believe about your gift and its power and its value?

And as your coach, I would ask you to identify those things specifically. And I would ask you to also tell me, what is creating not that result? What is creating something inconsistent with that belief? And being aware of those, because that’s the part you would want to be aware of so you can prune those neural networks, so you can unwire that.

And I would then say, “Okay, now tell me, how do you envision the mind, the brain, the heart, the way of being of your version of an affluent artist? Who are you becoming?

And then together, through a back and forth, we would talk about what you think your training plan, your regimen needs to be. I would want to know what you think are the thoughts, what’s the mind, the heart of your highest self, fully expressed, thriving, successful in the world. And then, I would ask you, “Okay, you tell me, what’s it going to take to build that?”

And then, we’d probably also have an exchange where I’m telling you, you have to do it a lot more than you think you do because no shame, it is just the tendency of our human brain to be very transactional and kind of entitled, and to think, “Oh, I got that. I got hat Leah was saying. Why am I not changed? Where’s my money? Where are my results? Where’s my opportunity?”

And again, when you believe it, you’ll see it. When you are really in this space of, like, you know it’s inevitable, you don’t need a deadline, like one of our masterminders Risa Kuhlman said in our retreat, when you’re in that space of knowing you’re creating something and it’s inevitable, you don’t have a deadline. There is no expiration date on your dream.

And that speaks really too to the energy of the paradox. No expiration date on your dream means it’s a long-term commitment. It’s not a, you know, a fair-weather friend, I’ll believe in you if you give me something. And it also then helps you move into the space of really feeling inevitability.

When you are so in belief, the evidence is on the way, but you don’t need the evidence. You’re allowing yourself the desire, the beauty, the vision, the fullness of the dream. You’re allowing yourself the fullness of your own creativity. You’re allowing yourself your own genius and the uninhibited expression of that. And that, you’ve got it, and you just know the results are inevitable. You no longer want them because you’re no longer in lack of them, and yet that’s also when they come.

So, also, the other conversation that we would really have in a coach-client relationship is creating a new paradigm in your mind of what it actually takes to do this work. Because I find a lot of people are curious about changing. They entertain the possibility of transformation. But what’s really needed is an energetic change within where you are all in. You’re like, “No, I’m doing everything. I am doing everything. I’m not holding back because I’m hedging my bets, because I want some proof that this works.”

You can’t be in that place and get this massive kind of leap and transformation. You can’t really create from your zone of genius if you’re holding back because you’re still a little bit in this transactional, “I’ll wait and see,” kind of place.

Being all in means your life is for giving, your gifts are for giving, you’re not holding anything back. And then that’s when the world starts to mirror that back to you. That’s when you start to experience that, you not holding anything back means now the world’s not holding anything from you either.

So, my final coach with me point for you would be to ask yourself, “How can I stay in consistent, alive, faithful conversation with who I am becoming? How can I stay consistent and faithful in my practice, in my repetition, in my consistency of performing this intentional kind of magic, sometimes disguised as mundane doing?”

That’s why I created a container for this. Because we underestimate on our own the amount of work, the amount of effort it takes to really rewire our brains and recondition our bodies. This is like a devotion to a meditation practice.

It’s not just a meditation of sitting down, closing your eyes, counting your breaths. It’s a meditation and a live one where you are working with all your internal systems and out in the world too, to really change who you are and become who you’re meant to be, align yourself with your highest purpose from the inside out.

That is deserving of great amounts of our attention and focus. Maybe in the past, it was something that was relegated to the paths of monks and saints or artists who didn’t have any families and could go off in an attic studio by themselves, take a sabbatical to write their novel for a year.

But the truth of the matter is that there are many of us who are householders, who have families and other pats of our lives that we care deeply about. And that doesn’t mean that great creativity and creative genius and the expression of that in living lives that are soulful and fulfilling and impactful for us and others that are successful and thriving and exciting and fun aren’t available to us.

This is also the paradigm we’re rewriting that we all get to belong to our gift, our intuitive gift, our creative genius, and that our creative genius also belongs out in the world. And it does take a change. It requires prioritizing it. It requires giving up certain things like a devotion to TV or a devotion to worrying that it won’t work, and instead devoting your time and your intention to, “What do I want?” And devoting your time and attention to a faithfulness, a belief that it will work if I do the work, a devotion, a practice of developing unconditional trust in your highest self, in your capital C Creativity, in your gift. If you do that, you are going to be blown away by the results that you’re able to create.

Thank you for listening to another episode of The Art School Podcast. You know, I had a vision for what I hoped this podcast would be. And then, I allowed myself to believe what it might be. I allowed myself to want what I wanted it to be.

And not only has what I wanted it to be come to fruition, but even better. And all of you are to thank for that even better. I am so grateful for you out there listening and the even better, you know, includes the times when you share, you reach out, you post about where you’re listening to this, and what it means to you and what you are doing with the work to make it your own and to create transformation and art and opportunities and success and meaning in your own life.

That, to me, I didn’t even know I wanted that until now when it happens, and I’m like, “Oh gosh, something in me knew that even before I did, like how meaningful that would be. So, thank you for that. Thank you for listening. Thank you for sharing. Thank you for sharing on social media.

And also, if you want to connect with me, if you haven’t shared yet and you want to connect with me on social media, the first place to do that is on Instagram, @leahcb1. You can tag me, you can #theartschool, #theartschoolpodcast and let me know which episode you’re listening to. Let me know what your takeaways are. Let me know what you are doing with this work and how it’s moving the needle for you in your art and in your own life. I so love that opportunity to connect. And I also might pop into your DMs with a voice message just to say hi and thank you.

And I wanted to give a shoutout to one of our listeners. She has some beautiful shares of The Art School Podcast and then I love getting to see too, connect with her art. So, thank you to Laura Madden of @refashionedart on Instagram. If you want to see her amazing paintings and her beautiful, inspiring Instagram feed, we will have the link to her Instagram in the show notes.

So, again, thank you Laura Madden, @refashionedart. Thank you for sharing your art and thank you for sharing the podcast and listening in.

And if you are a listener of this podcast and you have been thinking, “Gosh, I want to join the Art School, I want to take this work deeper, I want to work with Leah as my coach,” I want to work with you too.

So, the best way to find out more on opportunities to do so is to go to my website, www.leahcb.com and sign up for my newsletter. Sign up for the waitlist for the Art School and the Art School Mastermind. Even complete and application for the Art School Mastermind. Just doing that, people have told me, creates a shift. Something changes for them in those moments.

And setting the intention now that you don’t need an expiration date on this dream, you don’t need a deadline, but allowing yourself the intention, “I’m going to be in the Art School. I’m going to be in the Art School Mastermind. I don’t need to know how that happens. I am just declaring and so it is.”

I have clients right now in the Art School Mastermind who just this last weekend in our virtual retreat said that’s exactly how they wound up where they are. It started with, “I want to do that,” and not getting lost in the weeds of the how, not forcing it. And then, here they are. So, I would love to have you in one of those seats someday soon too.

So, to close today, I’m actually going to segue a bit from something I just mentioned about clients who said, “You know, I just knew I was going to be in the mastermind. I just knew I wanted that and I just knew it was going to be.”

I wanted to share that and then share with you how many times I see that being a force of powerful creativity and manifestation, how many times when clients have allowed themselves to say, “I just knew,” and then they didn’t break down or undermine that knowing with, “But how? But when? But how?”

There is a feeling. There is a solidness where you really know the inevitability of, “I just know I’m going to do that.” And that bring said, that kind of inevitable knowing is something you can also learn from others, from osmosis, from mirror neurons, from being taught. And it’s something that we do in the Art School and I want to offer to you what I offer to my clients.

And that is, for instance, my clients are in a place where they’re allowing themselves now to want what they want, to own what they want. But they’re not yet in belief that they can have it. I’m going to tell you what I tell them. I am holding that inevitability for you. I am holding that belief. You can borrow my belief. You can borrow my knowing in the inevitability. Because I can see it, clear as day, right as rain.

That, my friends, that’s the kind of energy that moves mountains, that changes lives. I recently watched Mulan, the non-animated one with my kids. It was their pick. And I was like, “Oh my gosh, all the themes in here, crazy synchronicity.”

And one of the lines was in talking about qi, that four ounces can move 1000 pounds. That is the kind of energy, the energy I just shared with you, where allowing someone to mirror to you what the inevitability energy is, what the knowing energy is, where you don’t need to know the how, you’re just solid, like a mountain, deep and true in your knowing. That’s the kind of energy that with four ounces can do the unthinkable, can do what seems impossible.

So, let yourself steep in that. Let yourself play around with, what would you choose to just know? Play with that energy this weekend, this coming week. And then, if you want to learn more about the fundamentals, the skillsets of building the mindset, the neural pathways, the way of being of an affluent artist, then sign up for the workshop that’s coming up at the end of March, beginning of April.

So, a week-long series, I’m going to be teaching, breaking down the fundamentals, the skillset that I work with in the Art School. This is also a great literacy program. It’s like becoming literate in your own creative process and how to harness your own gift, tap into it.

A lot of the things that we’ll be talking about are skills that we develop over the course of the Art School, but that you can then use as a self-study program. You can join us live, listen to the class work, participate in the course work, and also get coached. And then, you will also have the videos available on replay for self-study, so that you can really take the framework that I offered in this episode, apply the skills that I’ll be teaching in the workshop, and then do it on repeat, like your own home Art School gym.

So, again, that workshop is coming up at the end of March, beginning of April. We’ll have a link in the show notes to sign up and we’ll also be talking about it on Instagram and in the newsletter. Have a beautiful week, everyone, and I look forward to talking with you next time.