Ep #65: (Part 2) How to Let Yourself Shine with Andrea Owen

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Leah Badertscher: I guess what I want you to talk about is did that feel significant to you or has that come to feel like something you’ve grown into or it’s just part of who you are?

Andrea Owen: I think it’s both. And I remember the steps before that which I think is important to share and the part where you said, “There’s something powerful to watch. That kind of certainty.” I do believe that that is my natural state and I also believe that for the vast majority of women, if not all us, that is our natural state, but it is conditioned out of us.

Female Announcer: 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’s your host, master certified life coach, artist, and former lawyer, Leah Badertscher.

Leah Badertscher: Hello, hello, and welcome back. I’m actually batching these episodes so that they are ready to go for you while I’m away at Miraval down in Arizona and as I loved the conversation, the entire conversation with Andrea and I’m really excited for you, though, because I thought we were warmed already when we started and then we really kicked things into high gear in the second half of that conversation.

And it just was one of those moments, too, where it made me so grateful I am on the path that I’m on. There’s this Dolly Parton quote I love of many of Dolly’s quotes. “But if you don’t like the road you’re walking on start paving a new one.”

And I’m really grateful for the heavy lifting my younger self did to pave the road to get me to this place where when I thought about how I would love to spend my days it is immersed in conversations like these that are equal parts pragmatism and the grit of creative work and also the inspiration and divine download and flow and magic.

In this episode you’ll hear Andrea talking about manifesting book deals side-by-side about how she started – I mean, actually doing the work writing and the co-incidence I want to say instead of coincidence, the synchronicities that occurred from showing up and following the call and doing the work and turning the raw material and sometimes very difficult material of everyday life into something a beautiful offering for the world.

And later in the podcast she also delivers this- she talks about the divine download she got from her third book which I wanted to ask her about because I was present when we were at our retreat when this happened. Many of us were sitting around this beautiful, big dining room table in a gorgeous, historic mansion in Savannah and Andrea has been upstairs and she came downstairs and she looked like she had been struck by a lightning bolt.

She sat down and slapped the table and was like, “Oh my God, guys, I just downloaded the idea for my third book and it is so good.” And I get chills just retelling that story. It was an electric moment and I also so wanted to absorb what it was like to see a woman in her power and in her clarity in that moment.

That made such a great impression on me, the energy of it, and so I’m really grateful that I have here her, it’s not quite in person, but hey, it’s just a degree removed so that you can experience her energy. And also, then she delivers this amazing backstory into what made that possible.

So, I’m so excited to share this podcast with you today. I will be taking you all along with me, too, in my suitcase to Miraval. The desert down there, to me, just seems to hold this amazing vibration. Other important turning points in my life have happened in that kind of area and environment, and it felt like the right place to usher in a new year and a new decade. I just want you all to know that I am taking you all along.

Those of you who have been my clients in Art School, my private clients, and those of you who have written in to me, and tell me you’re listening to the podcast and also, those of you that I don’t know, but I know you’re listening because I see downloads happening and I see them happening all over the world.

So, please know I am opening up my heart and spirit, wrapping you all up in that and taking you with me for this massively, magical experience down in Miraval. So, send your intentions along and I do believe that we’re carrying all of your intentions along with us as we go.

Enjoy this episode and I will see you on the other side.

And then I wanted to go back because you said something that I think is so huge and I want to dive in and maybe parse it out for people. When you said, “I discovered that I had a voice.”

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm, I had a feeling you would pick up on that which is so interesting to me because, to me, that was so foreign in a way that I didn’t see it because it was me. Do you know what I mean? Like, it blew my mind that people would like something that came so naturally to me, because when I think about writers and authors and artists and musicians and creatives, whatever that is, I always felt like to make something beautiful there had to be a struggle and suffering involved.

I looked at these writers that we read about and learn about in school. I mean, even the big artists like Picasso and these musicians like Bach and Beethoven and you know all these white dudes [inaudible 0:05:57] like Hemingway and Kurt Vonnegut, I mean, even like Emily Dickinson, for some reason I just made up that their life was like… Anne Frank was a better example of the agony that she went through.

I always felt like a couple of things had to be in your life, either some massive life experience that was just tragic or great suffering and struggle in order to put your work out to the world. To me, to have success, whatever that definition is for you, and have it be easy was preposterous, like inconceivable. It does not compute.

Leah Badertscher: Yeah.

Andrea Owen: It was very difficult. Even as I’m talking to you I’m like wringing my hands. It still feels like, is this my life? When am I going to wake up?

Leah Badertscher: Yes, and you and I were also talking before we officially started, too, about how – again, how this is not linear, right? We all are working through our own next levels of things and the next upper limit. And how that next upper limit can so often be like, you mean, I’m supposed to get better at ease, like at being myself?

And there is this kind of inner – to me, it feels like an inner-kickback or a recoil about that there’s some guilt to work through there or am I doing it wrong the easier it is? And then when you were talking about I discovered I had a voice and you said, “So, well, when it’s yours it’s hard to see it because it’s what comes naturally,” and I think that is so common that we are kind of asleep to our own magic and so, can you remember what helped you start to awaken to yours? You mentioned a coach, but like –

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm, yeah, a few people messaged me either on social media or emails. This was in the early days of Facebook and they said things like, “I love your writing because I feel like you write 100% from your heart.” Or they would say things like, I got this one a lot, “You describe to me what I’ve been feeling that I haven’t been able to put into words.” Those are the couple of things that I – the comments that I got where I thought to myself, “I think I might actually have a gift.”

Of course, there’s upspeak on that because like tip-toeing into that could this really be real? Because the people that I would describe that way are the Glennon Doyles of the world, the Elizabeth Gilberts, the people who – Elizabeth Lesser, who crack themselves open.

Even like Maya Angelou, like that to me – I put those women on a pedestal. I had for so long and would not describe myself as that kind of writer and I had to hear it a lot before I finally surrendered and also surrendered to, it’s okay if I’m not for everyone.

Not everyone is going to like my voice and for a long time I also had agony about that and that’s where writing gets hard. Once I really started to embrace, “Oh, people like me. They like my writing. Oh, everyone needs to like me and like my writing. Oh, you don’t? Okay, let me do what I can to move some words around,” which, as a writer, that means moving your entire soul around. It can’t be done because that’s painful.

That’s really where the struggle is. You want me to struggle, then have me try to please the people who I’m just not meant to please. That’s when you talk about not linear, that’s where my struggle as a writer has been.

Leah Badertscher: You touched on something else that I know a lot of people struggle with, and that’s this. We have our role models and ideals and they seem so other.

Andrea Owen: Right.

Leah Badertscher: I always felt like an artist, even if I wasn’t making art. I just felt like I had this knowing that I was kind of built for that, but I was a farm kid in rural Iowa. Artists live in New York City and have this fancy life, and also this –

Andrea Owen: Artist parents, yeah.

Leah Badertscher: Parents with different demeanor. It was so other. Now, even though I now work with people who have MFA’s now or art in galleries or have albums out, have books published, and they will still have this, some say it’s the imposter syndrome, and I think though there is a little bit of a nuance in this sense of that person that does that, and that’s just who they are, they’re a different species and I’m not that.

And yet, so for you, now that you’ve written one book, so you’re like, there’s no, “Oh, can I write a book?” because you did it.

Andrea Owen: I did it once. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Leah Badertscher: You did it once and then there’s no, “Oh, could I only do that once?” because you did it again.

Andrea Owen: I did it again. It kind of knocks it out of the park the second time. It’s like, wow. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Leah Badertscher: Yes. You have –

Andrea Owen: Which I thought the first one was a fluke too.

Leah Badertscher: Oh, really?

Andrea Owen: I was worried going into the second one. Yup. I told my agent, I have two, they’re a husband and wife team. I can’t remember if I told – I think I told them after the book came out. I didn’t want to say anything before, but I told them, after the book came out, and they’re so great. They have reassured me several times that, “No really, Andrea, you are good at this.”

But yeah, I thought it was a fluke. I thought that I had a catchy brand. Who wouldn’t want to work with a company called Your Kick-Ass Life? It was still early on in the game and I just made up all these stories about how it was a fluke and that I just really wasn’t that great of a writer at all.

Leah Badertscher: Just dismissive.

Andrea Owen: Yeah. And then I was like, “Well this second book is surely going to be my answer.”

Leah Badertscher: And then you did kick it out of the park.

Andrea Owen: I did, yeah.  And then new fears come about, obviously, with that one.

Leah Badertscher: Yeah, and so now in this one, and so you said realizing now that it’s not for everyone, you’re not for everyone, your writing’s not for everyone, and trying to do that is like trying to rearrange your soul.

Andrea Owen: Yeah. I don’t even read bad reviews.

Leah Badertscher: Yes. That’s awesome to hear, because a lot of people think you should just have thick skin.

Andrea Owen: I don’t know anyone that does, and I don’t believe people who say that they do. I just don’t believe you, who can read a terrible review and not feel anything from it.

Leah Badertscher: I love that.

Andrea Owen: Yeah. Elizabeth Gilbert said, and then she’s not the person that said this, she was quoting someone else, this person said, “Reading bad reviews is like eating a sandwich where there might be glass in it,” and razorblades. It’s like, I want to add that, and razorblades. Yeah, I just don’t unless –

Every once in a while I tell my team, go and read my reviews, and if there’s anything constructive in there that you feel is repeated, let me know. And I also need you to soften it for me because I just have not gotten to that place yet. It’s my goal to get to that place where I can read it and completely pull myself out, not take it personally, and not obsess on it for a month. That’s my goal, but right now I’m still not there yet.

Some people may listen to that and be like, “Oh, wow, she needs to get her shit together.” That’s fine if you think that, but I just am like, “No, it’s just not helpful to me right now.” And I do think that there is some feedback that can be helpful, but if somebody’s just criticizing and saying things like, “Oh, enough with this self-help psycho babble bullshit,” that’s not thoughtful and helpful to my work.

Leah Badertscher: Right.

Andrea Owen: It just pisses me off.

Leah Badertscher: I think it’s wise to have a strategic filter about who you’re going to receive feedback from. I was recently talking to a friend about this, because with my creative work that is writing, and also with my art, I spent so much of my life being like, “I’m open for feedback. I’ll listen.” And then having to recover, spending so much valuable time then trying to put myself back together after that, or like, “Come on, Leah, you should be stronger than that.”

And then I just decided a couple years ago, I’ve done that for about 25 years. I’m good.

Andrea Owen: Wow.

Leah Badertscher: I’ve taken feedback. I’ve taken it. I’ve done it, and now let me try an approach where –

Andrea Owen: We’re tired.

Leah Badertscher: Very, very discerning about where I get feedback from, because I even thought too for the longest time, “Well, if somebody is further along than me, then that’s a great person to trust,” but not everybody has the ability. It’s like with your baby. I didn’t just hand my newborns over to anybody.

Andrea Owen: To Amazon, to tell you how you’re doing.

Leah Badertscher: Right. Exactly. A perfect stranger. And I’ve discovered there are some people with the gift when it comes to art that’s trying to be born. There’s some people with a gift of being – You might give them your vomit draft and they can see through the grossness and be like, “Right here. Here’s what I see is trying to happen. Here’s what you’re going for.”

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: Those kind of special people, but they have, I don’t know, they’re pretty special people.

Andrea Owen: Yeah. That’s different, I feel like. Editors, I’m so glad that God made editors. That part of my brain is not as keen as a trained editor. Those types of people, and I have had editing feedback that has just wrecked me, that’s different, I feel like, than a finished product, put it on the shelf, and then people tear it up. That’s the reviews that I’m talking about where I’m like, “That’s what I’m going to be discerning about.”

Leah Badertscher: Well, and I think this is such an important topic because when I propose this to people, maybe we could be discerning with where you share and at what stage you share your work. Well, I’m afraid I won’t ever get better if I’m not constantly – But you’re on your third book. You have a book. You have a six-figure book deal.

Andrea Owen: I do. I had multiple offers for six-figure book deals, which still I’m like – Even my own agent had to be like, “I don’t know if you know what a big deal this is.” And I’m like, “Uhhh, yeah.”

Leah Badertscher: So, your strategy of being very discerning about accepting feedback is working.

Andrea Owen: Apparently.

Leah Badertscher: They said you’re a very strong writer, Random House wants to work with you. Random House is not –

Andrea Owen: They’re not a piddly little editor or publisher, yeah.

Leah Badertscher: They’re pretty discerning, right?

Andrea Owen: Yeah, they are.

Leah Badertscher:  It’s not like your strategy isn’t, your writing, or your writing career, are suffering from this. So, that’s something I want people to hear, is that to have that, take that, I talk about having this inner guardian, this genius that’s inside, and thinking of it as this guardian outside of you. And how are you going to steward and shepherd your work like a fierce mama would?

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Yeah. It sounds like you’re pointing a little bit towards the creative process.

Leah Badertscher: Yeah. That’s part of the process.

Andrea Owen: Oh yeah. Okay. Yeah, and what’s also interesting is I have to be really careful; I think this is directly related, about hearing about other people’s processes, especially really successful writers and authors. David Sedaris, who I think is such a phenomenal storyteller and writer.

Leah Badertscher: Yeah.

Andrea Owen: He was on a podcast and he was talking about his writing process. Well, I was going to say it’s so much better than mine, but I stopped myself. It’s different than mine. His, he carries a notebook all around and he has really honed his craft on storytelling, and I think that’s phenomenal. But then I walk into that place in my mind of, “Oh, I’m clearly doing it wrong because I don’t even write every day.”

I want to and that’s really where I’m headed, and those are my goals, and that’s another conversation for another time about business and time and things like that. I start to, even reading the book Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert, and she’s talking about the years and decades that she spent honing her skill as a writer. And I’m over here like, “Well, I wrote some angsty poems when I was 15.”

The comparison of creative processes I think can end up shooting yourself in the foot with, because we make up that ours isn’t right, therefore we aren’t a good artist, therefore we suck as a human, therefore we should just quit and go get a job at Trader Joe’s. No offense if you work at Trader Joe’s. That is my backup, just FYI, that’s the only other place I’d rather work.

Leah Badertscher: If the next book doesn’t work out.

Andrea Owen: Exactly. I’d be a good manager.

Leah Badertscher: I think, again, what inherent in that they can pick out is that there are infinite paths and what seems to work for people who are also pretty enjoying a robust level of mental health and happiness at the same time, you’re not a tortured artist –

Andrea Owen: No. Oh my God.

Leah Badertscher: Is trusting yourself and finding that place where you just trust yourself. And so much of your coaching work too is about helping people navigate the inner critic, so I know that’s come from work that you’re not only trained in that, but you live that.

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: And that’s what I really wanted to highlight, is that there are so many paths, so many different ways the creative process can look, but then to trust that yours is legitimate and to trust that you can build a career trusting your own path. It doesn’t have to look like David Sedaris. It doesn’t have to look like Liz Gilbert.

I had to coach myself on that one too when she said she’d always known, because when I would hear people say they always knew, and they’d been working on it since they were seven, I was like, “Well, shit.”

Andrea Owen: I’m late!

Leah Badertscher: I’m three decades behind. I’m three decades late to the party. But I wanted to tell the story of one of the retreats. We were in Savannah, sitting around the table, and this stuck with me, because to me it is a demonstration of trust and seeing it in action felt very significant to me. So, you came downstairs. I think you’d been writing, and you’re like, “Guys. I know the idea for my third book, I’ve got the ADF for my third book, it’s amazing. I am vibrating, my body’s on fire, I vibrate and I’m so exhilarated and so scared. And I even know the title.”

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm (affirmative). Now I remember.

Leah Badertscher: Now you remember.

Andrea Owen: That was our second retreat, wasn’t it? In March or April?

Leah Badertscher: I think so. I don’t think it was the first one.

Andrea Owen: I think it was the second one. Yes. I remember. Yeah. I love those moments so much, those downloads. What did you want me to talk about, the scared part or just the whole thing?

Leah Badertscher: I wanted you to talk about your certainty and that giving yourself permission to have that much certainty.

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: What was also striking about it was what was not there, and it wasn’t like, you didn’t declare this and then be like, “Oh, but I might be wrong.” You didn’t [inaudible 0:21:04] your bets. There was just this, yeah, like you downloaded it, you knew it, and it’s also not to say you’re like, “Yeah, and the rest of the process is going to be easy breezy.”

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: Right? But you had such this moment of – And it was the, I don’t know, the absence of pulling back or apologizing. This made a big impression on me.

Andrea Owen: Oh, good.

Leah Badertscher: I wish I could replay that for people, to be like it’s powerful to see another woman be that certain and assertive.

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: And feel like that example. Again, everybody’s process will look different, but for everyone to know there’s power in that, and it takes a certain level too of the power that flows from that. I guess what I want you to talk about is did that feel significant to you or does that just come to feel like something you’ve grown into, or it’s just part of who you are?

Andrea Owen: I think it’s both. I remember the steps before that, which I think is important to share. And the part where you said, “There’s something powerful to watch that kind of certainty,” I do believe that that is my natural state. And I also believe that for the vast majority of women, if not all of us, that is our natural state.

Leah Badertscher: I love that.

Andrea Owen: But it is conditioned out of us.

Leah Badertscher: It’s a very powerful [inaudible 0:22:24]. It was very powerful for you to say that that’s art, I love that. I do believe that too, that is our natural state.

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm (affirmative). And I say that generally speaking, and I also say that specifically for that moment. And also, that moment comes with, when did I really start diving into my own work, around 2006. So, that came with 13 years of my own work. I’ve done a lot of work just by getting sober and being in the world of recovery, and also doing this for a living.

There are few things less painful than being a hypocrite when you are giving your clients advice and teaching curriculum, and then you’re not doing it in your own life. I get called out on my own stuff by my highest self a lot. I say that because I just am immersed in it, but that does not mean that you need to do this for a living to be immersed in it. Not at all. You can immerse yourself in it, whatever that looks like for you.

But, a couple of things that happened in that moment of divine download for this idea for this project, one of it is that I asked the universe. I told her that I was ready for the idea, because I think that we can either consciously or unconsciously block the ideas from coming to us. That goes back to what we were talking about in the beginning of the conversation, the fear of success, the fear of what other people are going to think, the fear of the process of making our art, the fear of outshining people.

The list goes on of what your fears might be. I had done a lot of intentional work on that, of identifying what those are. It’s still a work in progress, I’m not going to say I’ve let go of all of them. I’m not married to them anymore, but they still come over as unwanted houseguests. I just say, I’m like, “Oh, there you are again. You can stay for a couple days and then you’ve got to go.”

But it’s the identifying all of what the obstacles and fears are and then inviting it in. I love Jen Sincero, who graciously gave me a blurb for my second book. One of the things that she says in, I believe it’s her second book, You are a Badass at Making Money, she says, “A great mantra to use when you’re feeling stuck, instead of saying I don’t know, I don’t know, you could say the clues are all around me.”

That’s one thing that I’ve implemented in my life is just when I feel I’m spinning, like I don’t know what this next book idea is going to be, or just staring at a page, just let it go and say, “The clues are all around me.” It just feels better. If nothing else, it feels better.

Leah Badertscher: It feels amazing.

Andrea Owen: It does. It feels so much more free and open. And so, I had set the intention and asked the universe that I was ready for this next idea however it may come to me. I also was intentional about what my own muse is, and for me, it’s music. I had made specific playlists that gave me energy, that made me, I mean, I don’t know about y’all, but sometimes when I’m alone in the car I am singing my heart out and it’s the kind of performance where your children are questioning your sanity, like, “Who are you?”

I might act that way with my best friend in the car or my husband, but even that, I hold back just a little bit as to not scare them or laugh. Those moments, what are those songs?

Leah Badertscher: Okay.

Andrea Owen: That’s what I want everyone to have on their playlist. And so, I would really lean into that, and there’s a particular band called the band Dorothy, and Dorothy, god, what is her last name, Harris? Is that her last name? I don’t even know what her last name is. But she’s the lead singer of this rock band and she’s a little bit Stevie Nicks, a little bit – Are you familiar with the band?

Leah Badertscher: Yes.

Andrea Owen: Okay.

Leah Badertscher: Yes. I love them.

Andrea Owen: I love their music. It’s really just classic rock and roll with a tiny bit of modern flair to it, and she’s beautiful. It doesn’t hurt. Her music was a big influence on the idea for this book. And then there’s a third thing, was that after 2016 my dad died, also it was the 2016 election, which did not go the way that I wanted it to, and then my uncle died, which was his twin brother, right after that.

This was all within about six weeks of each other. Kicked my butt. Then, 2017, the Me Too movement really kicked my butt up and down the street and pointed at me and said, “You need to go back to therapy. You have some unfinished business.” So, I spent a lot of 2017 and 2018 healing. And came 2019, early 2019, where I spent with you and had that moment.

That was, that birth of that idea, came from those three things. I one hundred percent attribute it to telling the universe I was ready for the idea, tapping into the muse and the things that make me feel most alive, and feel my most electric self. And feeling the terrified, vulnerable place of diving into my own shadow self, my own trauma that has happened to me, working with someone who was wonderful during that process, and healing from a lot of that.

And then boom, the universe, she delivered and was like, “Here you go.” I wasn’t ready to receive it before.

Leah Badertscher: That was like a master class. [inaudible 0:27:43] with a capital ‘C’. And now, I totally understand why that moment felt like, I felt lightning bolts in the room.

Andrea Owen: It was like an orgasm. I was like, “Oh my god, finally! Can I get a beat drop?” Yes. And then you smoke a cigarette. I don’t smoke, but I probably should have in that moment.

Leah Badertscher: Yeah, right? We were all smoking at that retreat.

Andrea Owen: Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: Oh, wow. Well, no wonder that story was tapping me on the shoulder to be talked about for this.

Andrea Owen: I had totally forgotten about it until you mentioned it. I don’t remember that, but I love that it was meaningful for you.

Leah Badertscher: It was. I just also feel like, you know, Steven Pressfield has these little mini books on creativity that he writes.

Andrea Owen: I’ve only read The War of Art.

Leah Badertscher: Yes. I guess I crave a woman writing a book like that, and it’s not about art as war. Like we were saying, does it have to be in battle?

Andrea Owen: It’s a little masculine-ish, yeah.

Leah Badertscher: Right? How much of our own struggle are we fabricating to keep ourselves, our power, under control? But I just feel like, again, that was like a master class, that was like a book in itself right there.

Andrea Owen: Well, thank you. It’s so funny how you don’t realize how helpful a story could be or a process could be. I didn’t even realize it until you brought that up, and then immediately I was like, “Oh, I can tell you exactly what was happening.”

We were talking before, I think this might be helpful for people, we were talking before we started recording and you said that you remembered that moment, and I said, “Wait to tell me the story until we get on the – And we start recording, because I’ll bet you I can backtrack,” and I did.

Leah Badertscher: Yes, you did.

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm (affirmative). And I did not realize it, but when you were telling the story, my mind went there and I was like, “Oh my god, yeah. One, two three. I remember those exact things that happened.”

Leah Badertscher: Oh my gosh. And you know what I feel like, it’s then the four, and this to me is an emerging theme over the last few years is for the [inaudible 0:29:46], and that does mean just women, but in terms of creativity, like that kind of energy drives in community.

Andrea Owen: It does.

Leah Badertscher: And the witnessing of one another and holding a very extraordinary kind of place. And not extraordinary in that it should be rare, but I think we’re all learning more and more how to hold this place the way that a certain kind of community draws creativity out. And I think creativity loves it, thrives.

Andrea Owen: Oh, it’s like throwing fuel on a fire. Yeah.

Leah Badertscher: That was your big creative, but I felt like, I don’t know, it felt like a spiritual experience.

Andrea Owen: I love that, and I’m so glad you shared it because that would have looked very different if I didn’t trust the room. If this was a mom group, nothing against mom groups, I love them, but if it was a mom group that didn’t get me and didn’t get what I do for a living, I probably would not have had that moment.

I might’ve told one person on the side or waited until I got home to call you or something, but it was that particular group and also, I want to say this because it’s so important, a group where I was not worried about making anybody uncomfortable, because I have been in those groups a thousand times and it’s my stuff, it’s my stuff, it’s not blaming anybody else.

Well, maybe I’m blaming the culture that created us, but that is so incredibly important.

Leah Badertscher: And I think to know that – Because I know for me, it took me years to be like, “Oh, I deserve to create that kind of environment for myself.” I want to be in those rooms, and I want to be at tables with those kind of women, having those kind of conversations.

If I could go back and tell myself something, and this is something I always tell clients and listeners, save yourself those years and do that thing. Deserving it is off the table, but it’s a powerful catalyst for so many things, like relationships.

Andrea Owen: Yeah, not just art. Mm-hmm (affirmative).

Leah Badertscher: And to be intentional about it, and then to have to give that to yourself is something I wish for every listener.

Andrea Owen: I totally agree, and I know that you’ve created that with your groups and I just want to throw this compliment out because I’m thinking of it, and I try to have a resolution where I do not jump over compliments and gratitude when I hear them. You have such a quiet power about you that you create space where I have always felt so incredibly safe to shine.

And you’re such a powerful leader that also, I think, is so great for people who might be intimidated by people like me who are big, loud, and gregarious. You embody strong, exquisite leadership as well as so much talent as well.

Leah Badertscher: Aw, thank you for that.

Andrea Owen: You’re welcome.

Leah Badertscher: Thank you. And I am so looking forward to seeing your – I just have visions of fireworks for you.

Andrea Owen: Oh, maybe that’ll be the next cover of the book.

Leah Badertscher: Hey.

Andrea Owen: Can I say one more thing about that story you just told and the creative process that I think is important and might help people? It’s that I got that idea for that third book, and then I got immediately an idea for a fourth book. Which, let me also say that after my first book, I declared, “I cannot write another book because I put everything I know into that first book.”

How self-sabotaging is that? How self-limiting is that? And again, went through my process, got ideas for other books, so now I have ideas for this third book that I just an offer for and a fourth book and a fifth book. And here’s another reason I think that I got those idea, is because I declared that I want to be a career author.

Leah Badertscher: Oh, yes.

Andrea Owen: Because before, this even goes back to my first few years of being a life coach, I held onto my personal training certification as a plan B, because I was like, “This might not work out and I want to be smart about it.” Coming from working class parents who were just like, “You’re going to do what for a living?” I think now, finally, they’re like, “Okay, you’re good.”

But we put these limits on ourselves. And I’m not saying don’t ever have a safety net or a plan B. I’m not saying that at all. But it’s really a mindset thing of where are you putting your limits on, and what I was doing is I was saying, “Okay, I want to be an author, but nobody makes money from being an author.”

We make money from speaking and the group coaching programs, and I got to a point where I was like, “What if that’s not true? It might be the exception and not the rule, but what if I could legitimately make a living from the royalties and book advances, and if I want to, go speak up on stages and make money from that as well? If I want to, I can keep coaching clients, but what if I could declare that I’m going to be a career author? What might happen?”

So, for me, it was a total upper limit thing. I was also, again, closing the door on any ideas. The universe was like, “Well, if you don’t want to be a career author, we’ll just give these ideas to Elizabeth Gilbert or Leah. She’ll take them.” Once I declared that, it was scary as all hell, I’m not going to lie and say it felt freeing, like taking my bra off and I’d it on for four days.

No, no, no. It was still scary, but it was also exhilarating and then the ideas come in, and I don’t think that was an accident.

Leah Badertscher: Amazing. Amazing. Thank you.

Andrea Owen: It is. You’re welcome.

Leah Badertscher: Well, I could talk to you for hours and hours and hours.

Andrea Owen: Same.

Leah Badertscher: I would love to have you back, especially anywhere in the book writing process. I don’t want to wait until the next book comes out, so I’ll have you back on before then.

Andrea Owen: Yeah, I’ll come back when I’m halfway through and I’m not as excited.

Leah Badertscher: Yes. That would be awesome.

Andrea Owen: It happens. I feel like it’s so much like having children. I never ask an author who has a brand new book out if they’re going to write another book. It is like asking a woman who just pushed out a baby, or even a woman who has adopted a baby, who has a newborn, “When are you going to have another one?”

Leah Badertscher: Get ready for the punch. Oh my god. Actually, let’s do that. That would be an amazing episode. Can you just text me?

Andrea Owen: Okay. I will.

Leah Badertscher: This is the real deal.

Andrea Owen: Mm-hmm (affirmative). You can always count on me for full transparency, to tell you everything in raw detail.

Leah Badertscher: Awesome. Well, again, thank you being an example of shining and you embody creative power. You have inspired me and [inaudible 0:36:30] and I’m so glad I know you’ll inspire my listeners and [inaudible 0:36:34] as well. Where can people find more about you and your books, how to work with you?

Andrea Owen: I’m at YourKickAssLife.com. I have a podcast of the same name, and I mostly hang out on Instagram at that same handle.

Leah Badertscher: Hilariously on Instagram I might add. If you want to add crying until you pee your pants to your day, your Instagram is perfect.

Andrea Owen: Have you listened to – Okay, real quick. I know we’ve got to go, but I started a creative project with my dear friend Amy Smith. We started a podcast together with no plans to monetize it or do anything. It is purely for a fun, creative outlet, and it’s called Not Another Self-Help Podcast. We got her childhood best friend, who’s a musician, to do the intro song and all of our tags.

I guess they’re called zingers or something like that. They are so funny. And she’s a legitimate musician and she was like, “This is the funnest thing I’ve ever done.” The lyrics to the opening theme song we co-wrote with her. She helped. It is so funny. I listen to my own podcasts and laugh my ass off.

We talk about some real and gross things about life and about peri-menopause and all of these things. That has been the most fun I’ve had, and I know that that is also helping my creative process in my personal development writing just by having that much fun.

Leah Badertscher: Oh yeah. I’ll take more Andrea humor. So, what’s it called again?

Andrea Owen: Not Another Self-Help Podcast.

Leah Badertscher: Awesome. Okay, everybody check that out too. Thanks, Andrea. Thank you so much.

Andrea Owen: Thank you so much. And thank you listeners. I know how valuable your time is, so thank you for coming and spending it with us today.

Leah Badertscher: And she’ll be back.

Leah Badertscher: Hello again. Wasn’t that awesome? I hope you enjoyed that so much and had so many takeaways. 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, today me and Andrea, Andrea and I, and coach with us.

So, I want to, for today’s Coach With Me, to run back through those three things that Andrea said were part of that backstory that paved the way for her, paved the road for her, and made an opening and a clearing in her life, and made it possible that she had the capacity to receive that divine download of her third book idea, which again, not insignificantly, also resulted in a six-figure book deal with Random House.

I’m so glad that I get to share this kind of information with you and again, do this. Do this work. Don’t just think about it and don’t dismiss it as, “Oh, but that’s not going to work for me.” The work works if you work the work. You can tag Andrea and I in this. You can tag her at YourKickAssLife on Instagram, and you can tag me at LeahCB1 and tell us how you are implementing this process.

Update us too on your assignments from last week. Wouldn’t it be amazing if? We would love to hear about your process, your challenges, your work, your manifestations. And do share, because the more we share, I think, the more this collective energy and powerfully creative momentum flows.

So, Andrea listed three things. One was that she had healed and cleared a lot of obstacles. She had given herself the time, space, grace, support to really identify what her obstacles and fears were, invited them in, in a safe and constructive masterful way, again, with support, and worked through them.

So, as she said, we can consciously or unconsciously block receiving the ideas and the creativity and the opportunities, so it’s so important to do this work of paving the way by clearing it out. So, ask yourself, “What obstacles and fears am I aware of? Which do I maybe need outside help in order to see? And how am I going to make sure that I take care of myself and work through these?”

Second, she said telling the universe that she was ready, declaring to the universe, literally saying, “I am ready for the idea.” What is the idea that you want to be ready to receive? Again, go back to one, do the work to make sure you are ready, and then two, declare that you’re ready to receive it.

Three, tapping into your muse, and what does that mean for you? I love the words that she used. It makes her feel like she is her most electric self, and it makes her feel she is fully alive. I know that for me too, those are the sweet spots. That fully alive feeling is something that I have been answering the call of and seeking and working more and more to implement in my life in the quiet ways that are both journaling, coaching, meditating, and then also very active ways.

That is so much what the decision to give myself the VIP sound check experience with Brandi Carlile and the front and center tickets at the Ryman. I felt so electric and so alive and it could feel like my capacity for creativity and the flow that I can receive just widen and expand, and I just felt like I had my fingers on the pulse of the universe and it was beneath my skin.

So, for you, what does your muse love? How can you give it to her? What makes you feel electric and most fully alive? Take care of your muse. And then, this is kind of the fourth one. She said three, and then I went back and listened and also identified what I think is a number four.

So, as you continue to do the work, and you might get stuck, or you might feel like you’re disconnected from the original vision, the dream or that electric energy. Use the mantra that she learned from Jen Sincero, and that is the clues are all around me. So, when you’re tempted to say, “I’m confused. I’m lost. I don’t know,” instead say, “The clues are all around me.”

And then don’t stop there. Identify what they are, write them down, acknowledge them, and follow through on them. We all know the more we acknowledge the clues, the information we are receiving, the more it comes and the better we get at identifying and receiving it.

Thank you so much for listening to another episode of The Art School Podcast. I hope this podcast is useful for you. I hope it’s meaningful and it helps you shift the needle in your life in the ways that matter most for you. If it has, the best thing you can do to share the love, spread the message, and pay it forward is to go iTunes, subscribe, and leave a review.

I read each and every review. It means so much to me, it helps inform me as well of what is working for you and what you would like to hear more of. It also helps me get this work to more people, so thank you very much for everyone listening. And if you haven’t left a review yet, why not? I would love it if you could take two minutes to go and do that right now. Thank you.

And, if you would like to stay in the loop about what’s happening next in The Art School and private coaching openings that I may have, the best thing to do is to go to my website, www.LeahCB.com and join my mailing list.

So, to close this podcast today, what I want to offer that you can meditate on for the next week is that statement, “The clues are all around me.” No matter where you are on that three, four point journey that Andrea described that allowed her to receive her third book idea and the publishing deal, no matter where you are on that journey, I know that this belief, the clues are all around me, can tune you in to what you need to do next that will keep you aligned with the magic and make those results you’re dreaming of inevitable.

Thank you so much for listening, everyone. Sending you lots of love and magic from Michigan, from Nashville, from Miraval, and after that I’ll be in Atlanta. So, from all over the place, thanks again for listening from all over the world.