What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
What's in the gallery?
We dissolve stuck and rewrite patterns. We apply radical playfulness to life (when we feel like it!), embarking on internal adventures (credo of Safety First). We have a fake band called Solved By Cake. We build invisible sanctuaries, invent words and worlds, breathe awe and wonder.
We are not impressed by monsters. Except when we are. We explore the connections between internal territories and surrounding environment to learn what marvelously supportive delicious space feels like, and how to take exquisite care of ourselves. We transform things.* We glow wild.**
* For example: Desire, fear, worry, pain-and-trauma, boundaries, that problematic word which rhymes with flaweductivity.
** Fair warning: Self-fluency has been known to lead to extremely subversive behavior, including treasuring yourself unconditionally, unapologetically taking up space, experiencing outrageously improbable levels of self-acceptance, and general rejoicing in aliveness.
Triggers.
Observation number one:
Having a moth fly into your ear and not be able to get out is quite unpleasant.
Observation number two:
But what’s so much more unpleasant is not knowing that it’s a moth and thinking you have gone crazy.
Completely and irrevocably.
Crazy? Oh, yes. There’s no way back now.
It’s very late at night. Dark.
There is this frantic whirring and whooshing in what feels like the center of your head. But you’re the one who is frantic.
It starts and stops. It’s like having running water in your ear and cabin pressure at the same time but you’re in bed and anyway, there’s nothing in your ear but your ear.
You wonder for a moment if it’s possible for a hundred bats or thousand butterflies to be trapped inside of you… and then deciding that this is extremely unlikely, you jump to the next obvious conclusion.
You’ve finally fallen off the edge. Obviously.
Observation number three:
My triggers are not your triggers.
While I am preemptively mourning the loss of my sanity and preparing for a new life in which there will always be this awful, terrifying sound in my head, my gentleman friend is being shockingly sensible.
In fact, he’s going all scientific method on my ear.
Investigating with a flashlight: nothing seems to be there. A tentative q-tip search: nothing seems to be there.
Flushing out the ear with water at first yields nothing. But then there is a weird, uncomfortable, squooshy sort of sensation. And then there is a moth in the sink. Tiny and practically invisible. Poor little moth.
My trigger: something happens that I do not understand.
Therefore (says my fear), I must be crazy.
My gentleman friend’s trigger: something happens that he is trying to understand.
Therefore (says his fear) it’s probably something understandable. And horrifying. Like what if it’s Tinnitus? What if it’s a bizarre neurological disorder and he’ll lose me forever to ear-weirdness?
He is not even slightly worried about me being or going crazy. I love him.
Observation number four:
My stucknesses are not your stucknesses. My past is not your past.
My fear of the crazy has to do in no small part with the fact that my family fears the crazy and spent many years teaching me — both directly and indirectly — to always be on your guard so you can catch it when it happens.
My gentleman friend’s past has taught him that unexpected things happen and that you can lose people you love.
We got fogged over by our stuff. We are covered by our stories.
Observation number five:
Knowing what your stuff is like and what it says about you is useful.
The way I see it, the more I know about my monsters and my walls, the easier it is to remember that oh yeah, that’s my stuff again.
Because even if you don’t catch it right when you get triggered, eventually you remember that none of this is real.
My gentleman friend and I have had a few years now to practice separating it all out. We’re a lot better now than we used to be at stopping and saying hey wait a minute!
Actually it’s more like this:
“Whoops. That’s my stuff. Looks like it just set off your stuff. Okay. Mine. Yours. Mine. Yours. Yup. We’re cool.”
Ah, yes. As Tigger might say … freaking you out is what triggers do best!
Observation number six:
I feel better now.
Friday Check-in #42: “pirate milkmaid walks into a bar” edition
Because it’s Friday AGAIN. And because traditions are important. In which I cover the good stuff and the hard stuff in my week, trying for the non-preachy, non-annoying side of self-reflection.
And you get to join in if you feel like it.
I can’t believe we’re already at 42.* Apparently the answer to life, the universe and everything is chicken. Friday chicken. Not for eating, of course. Never mind. Back to me!
*42, you say? But wasn’t last week Friday Chicken #40? Yes, it was. As was the week before. Whoops. Anyway, here we are.
Okay. My week was seriously challenging and hard.
I met up with a lot of internal resistance and external crap and … yeah, there was just a lot of hard. Lots of feeling extremely bleargh and wondering why I do what I do.
So I must say that one of the really lovely things about this particular ritual is that writing this post brought me back to how much good there was too, which was cool.
The hard stuff
Feeling like dirt.
Ugh.
You probably already read about it but dirt dirt dirt.
YUCK.
As if existential angst weren’t bad enough …
On Sunday I gave the worst class I’ve ever taught.
And that’s including that awful, awful time in San Francisco when they put my workshop next door to the extremely loud African drumming class.
I choked. I bombed. I screwed up like I’ve never screwed up before.
And I know why, which is worse.
You know what happened? I let a chunk of external criticism wallop the hell out of me. And it absolutely paralyzed me. And I lost my confidence.
The craziest part? I’ve been teaching since I was fourteen years old. I have never lost my confidence while teaching. And it happened.
Of course, having a horrible headache and some not-very-fun stomach cramps made it worse, yes. But I gave a less-than-good class.
And I felt bad for everyone who took it. And I felt like dirt about it all week.
Then I gave another crappy class the next day. And it was really, really, really depressing.
Forgetting why I do this.
Thanks, existential crisis.
I got so down that I just could not remember why I do what I do.
Usually I’m walking around being all I’m on a mission from god, people … but for a couple of days this week the spark was elusive and tiny and not always there.
Scary. Really, really scary.
The good stuff
Remembering why I do this.
So I felt like dirt and then I went into the Kitchen Table and saw these amazing people helping each other destuckify with kindness and attentiveness and patience and love.
Using my concepts and techniques.
It just about knocked me over, it was so heartwarming and beautiful.
And it reminded me that even on the hardest, hardest days, I can’t possibly be as big as a screw-up as I think I am.
Amazing. Grace.
Hooray for The Fluent Self! Woot. Oh, yes. You heard me.
So my gentleman friend got offered a gig doing logo design stuff for Microsoft.
And he was able to turn them down because my business does well enough that he doesn’t have to take work that doesn’t make him jump up and down with glee and stuff.
Take that!
It feels really good.
Two new pirate hires.
I’ve added two more people to my wacky pirate team this week.
One is the wonderful Kelly Parkinson who is now my copy-editor pirate milkmaid.
This was our conversation:
Kelly: Why would you hire me? You’re a fantastic copywriter. You don’t need me.
Me: I hate the polishing. I need someone to polish. You’re the best there is.
Kelly: Cool! So … you want this to be a one-time thing or is this like, you call me when you’re out of milk and eggs and then I bring milk and eggs?
Me: Oh, milk and eggs. Definitely. Bring me milk and eggs.
Kelly: I mean, if you decide you want to go vegan for a month, that’s fine too. It’s not like I need to be constantly bringing milk and eggs.
Me: We’re out of milk. Get over here!
And then I hired ____________ (I’ve had a massive crush on her ever since she gave a brilliant class for my students) to be my new bookkeeper pirate monies lady.
She is the Keeper of the Treasure. She is the Reconciler of the Log.
We like her.
I heart Pistachio.
My class with @Pistachio on The Strategy of Not Being Strategic was so. much. fun.
It completely made everything better.
She’s a terrific teacher and just shines goodness and wonder. I love everything about her. What a pleasure!
And … the best thing that happened this week.
So I’m at this bar. And I’m holding a gigantic box with a bunch of ducks on it. Also there is an illustration of a duck sailing a pirate ship on it.
Because Fabeku (one of my Kitchen Table people) decided to send me an enormous package full of wacky pirate duck accoutrement.
Including (because he’s awesome) an especially fluffy pirate hat, an eye patch with a duck on it … and plenty of assorted booty.
But I didn’t know that yet because I hadn’t opened it yet.
Bartender: Whoah. What’s with the mysterious-looking duck package?
Me: Oh. I run a cult. It’s kind of a duck-centric … cult.
Bartender: Right on. Is it nefarious?
Me: It has been known to be. On occasion.
Bartender: Is it international?
Me: Indeed.
Bartender: Far out.
Every once in a while? I love my life.
And … STUISMS of the week.
Stu is my paranoid McCarthy-ist voice-to-text software who delights in torturing me misunderstanding me. I can’t stand him.
Anyway, the gems from this week, including Stu’s little acetyl moments:
- “from to your caucus” instead of come to your class
- “crime is swell” instead of Bye Michelle
- “got to love Seamount aptly” instead of that he loves you madly
And … for extra meta:
- “stew them as” …. instead of Stuisms
And … for extra depressing:
- “have these” instead of Havi’s
This refusing-to-say-my-name crap is actually starting to be a thing. I think he does it just to piss me off because we’ve been working together since like, January, so really, he should know my name by now.
But no. He will still insist on referring to me as Heidi, Harvey, Hailey, Havee, Hobby, Jaime and (his latest favorite) hubby before getting around to guessing right.
That’s it for me …
And yes yes yes, of course you can join in my Friday ritual right here in the comments bit if you feel like it.
Yeah? Anything hard and/or good happen in your week?
And, as always, have a glorrrrrrrrrrrrious weekend. And a happy week to come.
Ask Havi #22: The Anti-Strategy Strategy
Note: it is almost impossible to get on the Ask Havi list. This person got in by a. being one of my clients or students, b. flattering the hell out of my duck, and c. making life easy on me by being clear about what the question was and what details I could use.
During yesterday’s (crazy-fun) Strategy of Not Being Strategic call with Pistachio, there were some fantastic questions.
And because we were answering a gazillion questions a second (the official stats aren’t in yet, but that’s what it felt like), a couple of those questions are still lingering in my mind. Three, actually.
Lingering because they need more attention.
This stuff relates to a lot of what we talk about here when we talk about vulnerability and serving your Right People and not hiding from the people who need you.
Even if you’re not a Twitterite yet. Even if you’re not hanging out with me at the world’s greatest bar/cafe yet.
It’s relevant.
FYI: You can also read the search results for the hashtag #NotStrategy to follow some of what we were talking about, as well as some of the related conversations that emerged between the smart, fun, interesting people in the class.
“How do you reach the people who don’t know they need your message?”
Background: I was talking about Michael Port’s concept of the red velvet rope (anything that draws your Right People in and keeps out the people you don’t want to connect to).
For example, my duck Selma is a very useful red velvet rope.
So Lisa Scheff (who is a lovely person and is @doorsopen on Twitter) wanted to know how this could work if the people you want to talk to aren’t necessarily open to or interested in your message.
“I am not selling a service or a project. My project is about opening hearts and minds to same sex marriage. If I am “selling” anything it is compassion and change of heart.
It seems as though my right people are the ones who disagree with me. So I don’t really want a red velvet rope, do I? I want the people who *are* resistant to what I am selling reading me.
Can I use Twitter to connect to my readers? Or maybe I should just be using it to connect with allies and find other ways to connect with my target audience… thoughts?”
My thoughts on this.
1. You’re right. It’s a problem.
The people whose hearts you want to change are — in most cases — not going to be the ones who will be following you and interacting with you on Twitter.
Twitter is a place people go to hang out, to learn, to connect, to network or to goof off completely (if you’re me). Lot of ways to use it.
As a general rule though, most people aren’t going to be looking for something to change their minds. Most people don’t show up (to anything, really) wondering “what’s going to alter my preconceived notions of the world today?”
(And if you are that curious, open sort of person, you’re probably not going to be especially challenged by the concept of equal marriage rights).
2. Here’s who is going to be following you and connecting with you on Twitter.
Activists, advocates, people who are pro-change, the gigantic and ever-changing undefinable queer community.
And, of course, gay couples whose cause and hearts you are championing. Which reminds me …
3. I think you might want to redefine who your Right People are.
The people whose hearts you want to touch so they can open up to same sex marriage are your indirect right people. Your down-the-road right people.
In the meantime, your actual right people need you. Now.
Your actual right people are the ones you care about the most. And the ones who need your love and support the most. The ones who inspired this project to begin with.
The ones who are ready right this second to join your tribe and spread the word and be excited about your mission because you’re excited about theirs.
And they’re the ones you’re already talking to (and with and about). You’re sharing their stories and bringing their light to the world. It’s big stuff.
4. You always want a red velvet rope.
Ideally, several.
5. That’s because the charm of the red velvet rope is it creates a certain sexiness.
Hard to get is a good thing.
Your message will not be accessible to all people at all times.
But that’s part of what will create buzz and excitement around it.
The people who are ready for your message will be talking about it and planting it and living it.
Which is the sort of thing that brings it attention and press (I have no idea how I would have ended up in the New York Times without Twitter) and love.
And eventually, the people who need to hear you the most won’t be able to avoid you.
In the meantime, preaching to the choir is not a meaningless service. The choir needs you to remind them about why they were so inspired about the message to begin with.
“What if my thing isn’t ready yet?”
For example, what if you’re Jason Lay (the wonderful @metanoid) who hasn’t launched his business yet?
He wanted to know if he should be connecting with people on Twitter before he had something worth promoting … and is this a useful, relevant thing to be doing with his time?
(If you’re not following Jason yet, let me mention that he has argyle robots on his page and his battlecry is “Give me whimsy, or give me death!” This guy is going to do great things in the world, clearly.)
My thoughts on this.
1. Hell yeah!
See above.
2. Here’s a story.
When my brother was getting ready to think about starting his business, I told him that I wouldn’t help him until he got on Twitter.
Between me and my gentleman friend, we knew we could hook him up with a gorgeous website, decent copy (still in the works) and everything else he needed.
But none of that matters without a bunch of fun, goofy, interesting people who are genuinely excited about you and want to know more about what you do, whatever it is.
So I forced um, encouraged him to start hanging out and being his nutty, kooky, unpredictable self. No business. Just fun.
And now he has four hundred people who adore him. When he officially launches his products, that’s four hundred people who are going to be recommending him to his right clients. Because why wouldn’t they?
3. Here’s another story.
I didn’t have a blog until after Twitter.
The Fluent Self website will be four years old this August (shakes head) but the blog is a little less than a year old.
It wasn’t until my Twitter friends started complaining that they wanted to share the genius bits in my noozletters with all their friends that I realized it was stupid to keep my content available only to subscribers. Twitter made me create this space.
And I could not be more grateful for that.
“What if I don’t know what my thing is yet?”
We all wonder about that. Seriously.
I still haven’t found my thing. I’ve just stopped worrying about it.
My thoughts on this.
1. Your thing is the beautiful quality that’s in your heart.
It doesn’t matter what form that takes. Or if the form keeps changing.
That quality will infuse every single thing you do. And the people who need that quality will flock to you.
If you’re having trouble getting in touch with all this heart stuff, I highly recommend Mark Silver‘s book and Hiro Boga‘s work.
2. We care about you. So it doesn’t matter that much what your thing ends up being.
If I love hanging out with you on Twitter, that’s enough. You’re a fellow helper mouse, right? It will be fine.
I’ll be there while you’re figuring it out. I’ll help you promote it when it has a form. I’ll connect you with people I think you’d enjoy.
3. You are a complex, multi-faceted person. That’s what keeps things interesting.
The nice thing about Twitter is that — unlike a networking meeting or a brochure or anything else that demands that you actually know what you do — it’s about people.
And there’s room there to share many, many, many aspects of people’s own unique selves.
On Twitter I’m not an expert being all expert-ey. I’m @havi. I’m someone who makes ridiculous puns. I’m someone who gets belligerent at Roller Derby. I’m someone who bakes bread and dances barefoot and makes fun of things.
So show up with all of you (or as much of you as feels comfortable) and just see what happens. I bet it will be pretty freaking magical.
That’s all for now.
Hope it was helpful. Mad love to all of you.
Before I die maybe I’ll get better at making lists.
Pre-post disclaimer about my tongue: it is spending some time in my cheek today.
So I tried to make a list of one hundred things I want to do before I die.
Because I read about it in a book that I absolutely love. I’ve read it three times.
And — like with all useful books that are full of cool exercises that I haven’t done yet (but want to!) — I started with the one that seemed like it might be easier than the rest of them.
Except that it’s either the hardest exercise in the world or I am an utter mess. Suspecting a combination of both at the moment.
Because I was completely unable to come up with one hundred things.
In fact, it was more like a grand total of fourteen.
And that was after two hours of staring at the page and trying to think of anything that would be remotely worthy of a go-ahead-and-do-it-while-you’re-still-on-this-planet list.
I don’t know if this is a good thing or a terrible thing.
Argument for how only being able to come up with fourteen things to do before I die is somehow a good thing:
Maybe it just means that I’ve already done a lot of the crazy foolhardy ridiculous adventurous things that most people don’t ever do even though they secretly want to.
Like moving to Berlin from Tel Aviv without any real reason other than that I needed to.
Like starting a business with 20 euros.
Like leaving Germany and heading out to San Francisco on the basis of a dream. And not the “I have a dream” kind of dream. The “I fell asleep and my dream told me I needed to be in San Francisco” kind of dream.
Maybe the reason I can’t come up with more things is that I already have a habit of actively taking off in pursuit of the stuff I want to experience.
But actually I suspect it is a terrible thing.
That might be my monster talking, yes.
(Of course, if “everything against me is an illusion“, the depressing, horrible things I tell myself are probably not true.)
But since I’m letting you in on what’s going on in my head, let me just put it out there.
It seems far, far more likely to me in this moment that I am completely unimaginative and also devoid of all creative impulse. Where is my enthusiasm? WHERE? I have no idea.
I honestly don’t know how it’s even possible that I only have fourteen things I want to accomplish.
Then to make matters worse, most of them are completely boring things to strive for.
And a lot of them except for #10 and #12 are (clarification: for me specifically, at this particular point in my life, no one’s list is ever the same) almost embarrassingly achievable.
Which means my list might actually start shrinking soon, bringing me closer to death and to the fact that I am still lacking in both drive and imagination.
I should also note that my father refuses to read Thomas Mann’s The Magic Mountain because he vaguely hopes to read all of it before he dies and he is convinced that the sooner he finishes it, the sooner he will die.
But back to my list.
Update:
Okay, I just thought of another one, but #15 is also stupid.
Also, it only occurred to me because I was taking out the recycling while trying to think of more things to put on this list and I got first distracted by the fact that there are always hot people on the cover of Inc. Magazine and then annoyed by the fact that I’m not on there.
Also, I need to note that while coming up with this post, I also had a nice Freudian typo with the word unimaginitiative.
Which really needs to become a real word. Leave your (creative) definitions in the comments and they will distract me from feeling (pun totally intended) listless.
Here is my list.
- Publish a book.
- Publish another book.
- Visit Paris with my gentleman friend.
- Own an apartment in Berlin.
- Teach Shiva Nata at the Midwest Yoga Conference (with my duck, of course), then get invited to teach it at the San Francisco Yoga Journal Conference and then turn them down.
- Learn Italian.
- Live in the same city as my best friend again.
- Climb an orange tree again.
- Learn swing dancing.
- Learn how to skate backwards (!)
- Go on sabbatical.
- Do the splits.
- Meet Suzette Haden Elgin and be a googly-eyed fangirl.
- Take a long-term yoga training with Paul Grilley of Non-Sucky Yoga fame.
- Be on the cover of Inc Magazine before a) it folds and/or b) everyone realizes that they only put hot people on the cover so it doesn’t even mean you’re necessarily that good at business or anything, just that you’re hot and have a decent publicist or know how to pitch a story.
- Ummm …
So I’m still working on it.
Item! It’s not even slightly Wednesday!
A somewhat goofy mini-collection of stuff I’ve been reading, stuff I’ve been thinking about and oh, some completely random crap.
Basically the stuff that never gets mentioned here because I’m not the kind of person who can just make some teeny little point. Not into the whole brevity thing, as the Dude would say.
Actually, I’m under the strict compulsion to write ten pages about anything on my mind. So this is me. Practicing brevity.
Still feeling like dirt.
So I used magic wishful thinking to make today Wednesday. Of course, it isn’t Wednesday, which is actually fine by me, because I’m a pretty big fan of Tuesday. But I’m acting like it’s Wednesday, and putting up an Item! post.
What? This isn’t making any sense? Now you know how I feel. 🙂
Also, I include links to Twitter handles too, when I can. If you’re not a fellow Twitterite, here’s my post about why it’s so great.
Item! Post No. 20 in a semi-ongoing series that lets me alter the calendar at will.
Item! This is a fantastic post. You should read it!
It’s called “O is for Openness”. And that’s all I’m going to say about it. Because — wow.
As it was, I held onto to my secret for weeks, smoldering like wet leaves on fire, wrapped up in my judgment and perception of how others would judge me. If I hear one more person pontificate on how diabetes is TOTALLY avoidable, I will rip their living heart from their chest and eat it in front of them, saying to their glazing eyes, “THAT was totally avoidable, dumb-ass.”
I absolutely cannot remember how I got to this amazing post. It probably came from one of you guys, or through the magic of Twitter.
Remind me?
Item! Awkward family photos!
As if I didn’t already adore Jason Lay enough, I will forever love him for introducing me to this collection of supremely awkward family photos.
Jason writes: If your family photos are as awkward as these, I am hoping you have a good sense of humor.
Luckily, they are and I do.
He’s @metanoid on Twitter.
Item! You still can’t get milk from a stone!
A beautiful post from Hiro:
Woman 2: Yeah, you totally deserve milk. You do so much for everyone. You SO deserve milk. (Pause, followed by worried look). So, did he give it to you?
Woman 1: No. He just sat there like . . . like a stone! No milk! How hard could it be to give me milk, after all I’ve done for him? Running around after those kids all day . . . all I need is a little milk. That’s not so much to ask for, is it?
Now you have to read the rest, right?
She’s @hiroboga on Twitter.
Item! I am in a strop!
“In a strop” = a phrase I learned from Tatty Franey whom I’m completely mad about. Apparently it’s an Irish-ism for being in bad mood. Or something.
It is the best phrase in the entire world and I must adopt it at once.
I was in a strop when my site got hacked. I was in a strop when I got out of bed today, and I’m still (kind of) in a strop right now!
You see. It is very useful.
She is @tattyfraney on Twitter.
Item! The Star Trek version of my pirate ship!
Here’s a great post that totally uses my metaphor thing.
It’s inspiring! Despite the utter lack of pirates.
Spock (First Officer): This is the guy that keeps that tension going between the vision and the reality. The poetry and the logic. He grounds Kirk, protects him, does his best to see things through his eyes. Occasionally gives in to his human side. Super-powers: capable of the mind-meld and the Vulcan death grip. This is my husband.
You should read it.
She is @tentativequinox on Twitter.
Item! Etsy sidewalk sale!
It’s dangerous! It’s distracting! And I love it.
Lots of Twitter-centric Etsy sales happening this week (through May 23rd) — you can get gorgeous handmade things at lovely prices… and support artists and craftspeople while you’re at it.
Hooray!
I picked up all sorts of good things (especially from Mrs. Kwittys and Aquarian Bath).
That’s @inmyheadstudios, @misseskwittys, and @aquarianbath that you should be following on Twitter.
Item! My class with Pistachio is tomorrow!
If none of this Twitter stuff is making sense to you — or even it it completely is — you should take my class tomorrow on the Strategy of Not Being Strategic.
Because it’s really useful to know how to use Twitter to grow the cool thing you do (or the cool thing you want to do, or the cool thing that you’re still figuring out).
We’re going to be spewing smartnesses right and left.
And @pistachio is an amazing teacher. Read more about why you should listen to us!
That is all.
Happy reading.
And happy Blustery Windsday. See you tomorrow.
PS: And maybe I’ll get to say hi to you in class (also tomorrow), which would be awesome. Today’s the last chance to sign up.