The Painted Ponies

It is 7:01 am on Tuesday, July 26th. My morning song is ‘Perfect Girl’ by Sarah MacLachlan.

What a beautiful message from the Universe this morning with Sarah MacLachlan’s lovely song as the vehicle…

‘Don't worry
You will find the answer if you let it go
Give yourself some time to falter
But don't forgo this knowing that you're loved no matter what
And everything will come around in time.’

I needed that this morning.

I needed the encouragement and the perspective.

I needed the reminder that I am allowed some time to falter…and that everything will come around in time.

After my 11:00 marketing meeting yesterday morning and the ensuing flurry of unaccustomed social media activity (including the posting of my very first TikTok video and Instagram story last night), I had a very restless night of sleep with lots of ‘horizontal thinking’ (thank you Liz Gilbert for that gem) between 2:45 am and 4:30 am.

I feel as if I spent the entire night on a carousel ride of social media confusion and overwhelm. And all night I just rode round and round with too much motion and too much noise to settle.

I mean, really, who can sleep with all those painted ponies going up and down?

It was my sweet puppy who finally settled me when I whistled for him at 4:00 am. I could hear him respond immediately to my call and, within seconds, he was up on my bed in all his golden protectiveness ready to offer the comfort I needed. He licked my face, settled in, gave a great big sigh of puppy happiness, and we fell into peaceful sleep together.

As a result of my frenzied night on the social media carousel, this morning I feel a curious coupling of distinctly unsettled and wildly excited.

And as I look at that bewildering dichotomy, I hear the coach inside me utter the two words that have been so much a part of my life these past two years as I have been navigating the close of the arc of my morning.

Myth change.

Yup…my Inner Coach has nailed it again!

I am, indeed, in the throes of a major myth change in my life.

And what exactly, you may ask, is myth change?

Let’s shift gears for a moment and define the concept of the ORSC Myth Change tool- with credit going to the brilliant Marita Fridjhon and Faith Fuller who founded CRR Global and continue to weave their magic in the world with their Relationship Systems Intelligence (RSI™) body of work.

Myth change is the closing of one arc of life experience and the launching of another. We all experience them, and they are as much a fact of life as death and taxes.

The tricky aspect of myth change is that, as an old myth draws to a close and a new myth is being launched, there is a distinctly unsettling period of transition that is fraught with the full range of human emotion.

And that is where I find myself at this very moment in my life. Swinging like a highly skilled trapeze artist between crushing grief on one side and heady elation on the other. And never quite knowing, from one moment to the next, whose hands I will grab as I hurl myself into the air with complete trust that I will indeed be caught.

My myth change is the closing of the arc of my morning.

And the latest piece of this major transition in my life was my youngest son flying my nest a month ago.

I am one month into being an ‘empty-nester’.

I have resisted that catchy idiom until now because the concept of ‘the empty nest’ feels so barren and so sad.

But the truth is that all three of my sons are now launched from my nest and are flying on their own.

I am no longer needed on the front lines of mothering so I am in the process of walking off the field to take my place on the sidelines where I will cheer and champion and tend to the hurts when I am needed. I will step in when I am called but, otherwise, my job now is to remain on the sidelines and wait for the call.

I must say that being on the sidelines is taking some getting used to.

I loved the front lines.

I loved the daily chaos of life with my three sons. I loved the highs, the lows, the stress, the joy, the demand, the laughter, and the love.

If I am honest, however, I will admit that, while I was living the front-line life, I would often find myself yearning for the freedom and the independence that I knew would come when my kids were grown and gone.

Oh, the human experience of the grass which always seems so much greener on the other side!

Truth be told…as much as I miss my sons, I am ready for this next phase of my life.

I am ready for freedom and independence.

I am ready to claim The Five Pillars of my Extraordinary afternoon (Freedom, Fulfillment, Health, Impact, and Wealth).

I am excited to test my own wings as a ‘free agent’ who finds herself with all kinds of time on her hands.

And I am ready to have the bandwidth to hurl myself headlong into my work and breathe life into this new business of supporting, cheering, and championing other women who, just like me, are doing their very best to navigate the profound and unsettling myth change that lies between the morning and the afternoon of our lives (whether we had children or not).

Okay…the carousel ride of my restless night is receding.

I have, once again, written my way through my upset and the painted ponies are slowing and settling so that I can step off the carousel ride.

I have landed safely in the arms of my Inner Coach, and I know that she will continue to whisper in my ear and help me navigate all the uncertainty of my new myth.

But what about the woman who does not have an Inner Coach?

What about the woman who is going through this bewildering stage of life and not knowing that the incessant swing between grief and joy is completely normal?

It is that woman to whom I feel called to be of service.

And it’s not that I have it all figured out (because I certainly do not).

What I do have is my Inner Coach supporting me moment-by-moment and Marita and Faith’s beautiful safety net under my high-flying trapeze act.

Connecting with the fact that there is a woman out there without that safety net propels me to figure out how to speak the complicated and bewildering language of social media so that I can reach out my hand in solidarity and support and so that she absolutely knows that she is not up there on that trapeze all alone.

That is my work in the world.

That is what this is all about.

That is why I am prepared to wade into the choppy waters of social media…even though I don’t know how to swim there yet.

Okay…I am solid again.

I am stable.

And now it is time to close my missive and get ready for a day of coaching.

But first, there are some acknowledgments that must be made…

Thank you, Inner Coach, for your expertise and your unwavering myth change support.

Thank you, Marita and Faith, for your brilliant body of work in the world.

Thank you, Universe, for the gift of song this morning.

Thank you, Sarah MacLachlan, for such a beautiful message that you wrote so many years ago but feels, this morning, as if it was meant just for me.

Thank you, Liz Gilbert, for reminding me that horizontal thinking gets us nowhere.

Thank you for the full range of this beautiful myth change.

And…thank you for the bone-deep knowing that I WILL be caught every single time I hurl myself off the trapeze! 💗