What I (didn’t) read and listen to in March | no. 3
a cry with my business coach, a look inside my morning pages, & the importance of balancing internal and external sources of learning
Welcome back to WIRALT, a monthly roundup of the books and podcasts that impacted me most over the past month! For more background, see the first edition.
!! Unlike other WIRALT editions, this one is available to both free & paid subscribers because it’s less about external resources and more about learnings from my personal experience, which I typically keep open to all subscribers.
March called for even more space* than February did. Every time I had space to listen to a podcast, I found myself struggling to pick one. When I forced myself to pick one, I felt unengaged and repeatedly paused the episode mid-way in favor of quiet or music.
My experience with not listening to or reading external resources is the learning this month. I experienced beautiful growth as well as confrontation with old wounds.
I burst into tears in a meeting with my business coach yesterday.
I felt confused.
I added the source of the tears to our agenda as an afterthought, in case we had extra time in our meeting. I didn’t realize such sad, raw emotions were floating at the surface, especially after five joyful days of travel with a few of my best girlfriends.
But when she pulled me into the present moment, asking how I was doing, this item moved to the top of our agenda.
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As I’ve shared before, I chose to leave a safe, familiar career path, one that embodied my historic definition of success. I wasn’t happy following the path I was on. But many of my friends are happy & thriving on more traditional career paths in the corporate, law, and medical sectors.
When we get together, work naturally arises as a topic of conversation given how much time and energy we all give to it. But this past weekend, the dialogue about the schedules, money, and community that make up my friends’ wonderful careers hit different. It was a dramatic change from the conversations I typically engage with in my day-to-day life in Amsterdam, where “hustle culture” isn’t valued. Work is rarely discussed, and when it comes up, it’s typically brief.
I didn’t realize how much my new context might change the way I experience these conversations, until those tears started flowing on the call with my business coach.
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I felt like an outsider.
I didn’t feel any sense of wanting to rejoin those worlds. I didn’t feel a shred of regret for leaving those worlds.
But I learned to value those worlds growing up, and as they discussed their work, my old values resurfaced and I felt like my work was of lesser value. I could also more easily engage in conversations about their work experiences due to my corporate career, whereas I imagine knowing what to ask about the solopreneur coaching space is tricky. They don’t have many breadcrumbs from which to facilitate questions.
And they don’t have the breadcrumbs because I hold back on what I share.
At one point, we talked a bit about how, when you’re first starting a job you’re really excited about, you want to talk about it all the time. As I sat there agreeing, I realized I don’t talk about my work very much relative to how excited I feel, how right it feels, and how much time I spend thinking about it.
I think there’s a part of me that doesn’t want to share–a part of me that doesn’t want to feel that feeling I get every time somebody asks about what I do. Dis-ease and insecurity lurch into my shoulders, chest, and arms as I project validation of my fears onto the people I’m speaking to: I’m not doing enough, I’m wasting my potential, I’m selling out to the “easy path” because I’m building a path that doesn’t involve the same type of pressures of traditional esteemed jobs (corporate, law, medical, etc.).
Why do I presume they’re thinking these things?
Maybe because I don’t have anything to validate how right this job–this life path–is for me beyond how I feel. I don’t have a promotion ladder, a raise, or a glowing story from a manager to share. I don’t have an “I got the job” moment that provides validation of my skills and fit for the work, something that people separate from the work can grasp onto and use as proof of my capabilities in a field they don’t understand. Though I don’t know or understand the intricacies of many of my friends’ jobs, I have indicators they’re great at them because of the promotions, job offers, and raises they get.
Without either proof of fit for my job or an understanding of the intricacies of my job, there’s not a whole lot for people to grasp onto other than what I choose to share, and because I don’t share much—because I decide before I share that there will be judgment—the work, this huge part of my life that I’m so excited about, becomes something I want to push into the shadows. I make myself “the other.”
I realize now that this “othering” experience was compounded by my need to go inward and be reflective* in March, listening to and reading less content about the topics and ways of being that resonate with me. Though I don’t necessarily engage with authors directly, the books, podcasts, and newsletters about the topics that interest me–the places where I geek out on positive psychology, wellbeing, mindfulness, and beyond–offer me community. In hearing their stories and research, they provide the proof points of what I’m feeling and the path I’m taking. They provide a sense of belonging.
I’m so grateful for the way the past month unfolded, painful emotions included.
So, these are my three big learnings from March:
I have room to grow in allowing the excitement I feel about my business to spill out. I can use the dis-ease and insecurity that flood my body as signals to express my excitement rather than silence it.
Taking part in dynamic and fascinating conversations–something I did a lot with my brilliant girlfriends this weekend–fills my cup. Doing so by opening my eyes and ears to people who feel passionate about the work I do is imperative for the sake of my sense of belonging and community.
When I change the way I live, the way I experience historically familiar situations may change. The context from which I enter an experience impacts the experience itself.
I’m getting started on #2 with “Hidden Potential” by Adam Grant (nonfiction) and “Brave New World” (fiction). I’m excited to see which podcasts and newsletters call to me this month!
Before I go, here are two podcasts I listened to in prior months that I continue to think about regularly:
See ya next month with the next update, which my gut says will be content-rich!
Have a lovely April! Don’t forget to smell the budding flowers :)
With love and light,
Syd
*Here is a beautiful, private (now not so private, if you’re reading this!), lightly edited entry from my morning pages about March, written before these difficult emotions surfaced:
My March learning is all about space. About noticing the ebbs and flows in what we need, and listening to those signals.
I needed more introspection time this month. I needed more time for listening to and reflecting on what’s happening within me. Perhaps I needed time to water the seeds of the podcasts I listened to in January and February.
But what does this actually look like in practice?
In the space between meetings and other obligations, I’ve been intentionally staying in the space when I’m considering what I could or want to do next. This means noticing when nothing’s really speaking to me as I scroll through podcast options, and introducing a new option: to not pick anything and to simply enjoy the space. I observe what’s around me and what I’m feeling in my body.
It feels so good to allow space between the doing for simply being. My body feels more relaxed and time feels expansive. I often still do all I’ve planned on that will make my day feel fulfilling, but I’m not jumping from one thing to the next and feeling as though I’m wasting time if I’m not filling every corner of my schedule with something “productive,” which for me feels like doing something that clearly and directly enables progress toward a desired outcome.
I’m realizing that when I allow for space, time spent “just being” is very productive because it makes the more structured scheduled time so much more fruitful and enjoyable. I feel more in touch with myself and less pulled in many directions and instead capable of walking into each moment more centered. It’s the sacred pause. I walk into moments and meetings with a fuller cup from a place of attunement. Of an open path to my heart and gut.
I’m not living in my head all day long. It’s like these spaces, they give me an opportunity to drop into my body and heart so when I enter experiences that historically and habitually I’ve approached very head dominant, I’m able to bring my heart and body into the experience more. The pathway of communication, the awareness of my heart and body is primed so they can work with my head in whatever the typically heady meeting or obligation is. and when my heart and body is involved, when i feel in touch with them like the line of communication is open, every experience feels more natural, more open. every experience feels easier, like I don't have to work so hard. like I don’t have to worry my mind won’t have the answers or will do something wrong, leading me astray, because i know my heart and body will always have the answers. i can check in with them at any moment and listen and find an answer and in that, i feel less worried. i feel less stressed about interactions less threatened, less pressure to force what's not there.
With my mind, that’s the worry: I’ll have to look for an answer that’s not there because my mind feels like a failure if it doesn’t have the answer but my heart is okay with not knowing the answer.
My hearts wants TRUTH OVER ACCURACY!