Tag: Renegade Conversations

Review: The Fire Starter Sessions by Danielle LaPorte

Ignite Your Most Remarkable Self

Earlier this year, Danielle LaPorte published her multimedia masterpiece, The Fire Starter Sessions. I discovered this gem of  (and from) White Hot Truth (yes, this is the name of LaPorte’s web site) through the brilliant Ronna Detrick’s Renegade Conversations site and ezine. So that’s the meandering path I took to get to this entrepreneur’s treasure trove and believing mirror, allowing us to reflect back for ourselves our greatest power, insights, and opportunities.

The Fire Starter Sessions encompass an inspiring journey, with its clean design, vivid stories, video lessons/messages, and 43 pages of worksheets and questions that get you delving into your own flaming core essence, so you can bring those gifts from the core out into the world. It’s called a “digital experience.” LaPorte says, “This is about you defining your vocation, your work, your livelihood, your career, on your own terms.”  Lessons from her own entrepreneurial high-flying, interviews with thought leaders, and lists of resources round out the message.

Especially these past couple of years, so many people have been “trying” to play it safe life-wise, vocation-wise. There is no safe harbor anymore, if there ever was. And so, more timely than ever, comes this fiery voice of Danielle LaPorte, spilling out her White Hot Truth. I can’t say that our energies are a match. In fact, it seems an unlikely pairing, me and Danielle LaPorte in the same breath. And yet there is something so compelling in her message, something that makes me want to take out my eyeliner and put on high heels.

There’s deep truth-telling here, like in her discussion of “quality-easy” or what about this game-changer? “True strength is not necessarily about skill or adeptness. It‘s about vitality.” How many of us entrepreneurs choose to do what we’re decent at, even when there isn’t a spark of passion to be found any more? If you are suffering from such a lackluster approach, this is the antidote.

With its tagline, “Spark Your Genius. Ignite Your Business. Make it Matter,” this “digital experience for entrepreneurs” covers dreams and feelings, content, courage, and design in four modules:

  • module 1: strength + desire: define yourself on your own terms
  • module 2: identity + branding: you are not a box of cereal
  • module 3: content + services + promotion
  • module 4: reverie + courage

Most crucially, Danielle LaPorte shares the lesson of “How do you want to feel in the work you do?” This is absolutely at the heart of it all, and allows dreamers to pull on the dream that is their own — the one that fits just right. I also adore the thought that when something really fits, there’s an ease and grace in the doing.

The Fire Starter Sessions is a multimedia experience definitely worth checking out. Yes, I am an affiliate, and I recommend and believe in the value of this package. You can click on the links in this post, or click the orange box on the sidebar to learn more.

It’s Not Bragging

If your family was anything like mine, bragging was discouraged. Do you remember being admonished not to brag? Not to be too full of yourself? And now here we are — many of us — entrepreneurs, soul-preneurs, professionals in private practice, the tribe of Conscious Creators, caregivers, healers, writers, authors, artists.

Everyone is being asked to market — not only products, services, but ourselves!  With the old family tapes running in the background, it’s not easy. How are you supposed to talk about yourself, your services, your projects, creations, ventures, and businesses without what sounds suspiciously like “bragging” — at least to those old critical deeply internalized voices?

And some of us are pushing the envelope even more: We are determined to stand fully in our power and presence, to finally shine our light full on. Now that’s something those internalized voices of yesteryear really perceive as over the top. It’s like an internal thermostat. Nope. Not THAT visible. “That’s even worse than bragging,” the internalized critic seems to say.

What to do? How do we work around the critic? How to come out with the work and be able to stand in our own power and possibility?

What if that inner critic is doing its best to  protect you? Based on the old programming, of course, but doing its best nevertheless. What if we could enter into a conversation with that inner critical voice? I can hear the guffaws already.

Here’s an excerpt of what I told Ronna Detrick over at her Renegade Conversations site. It’s all about an approach that befriends those troublesome inner voices.

In Ronna’s post, she wrote: “…far more about my deepest, age-old insecurities. They rear their ugly heads in times of fear. They are familiar. And I fight to keep them at bay.”

What I suggested is:  “What if you didn’t? Fight to keep them at bay? What if you were simply able to  be curious? What if you had a conversation with them? What if you sat with them and let them sit with you? What if you said, “Thank you. I’m curious. What are you trying to protect me from? You’ve done such an amazing job of protecting me. Can we talk about this?”

Open a dialogue. Put it on paper. Say thank you to the parts who are doing their best, perhaps based on old programs or instructions. And talk to them. Take your strength and your gift, (and yes, Ronna is amazing at nurturing deep conversations) turn it on that part of yourself that seems so troubling. Bring it into the conversational circle. Let it have its say.

Your protectors are there to protect you. You don’t have to squash them or get rid of them. You just have to talk to them, get them to work WITH you and your dreams and your purpose instead of against it. I know…it’s a lesson I have to keep learning over and over again. But it merits consideration I think.

This advice is inspired in part by the True Purpose and parts work of Tim Kelley and Jeffery Van Dyk over at True Purpose.
There’s also a Parts work workshop. To find out more: Audios from Aligning Your Psyche Teleclass 6/11 & Understanding Your Psyche Teleclass 5/25

Blown Away by for about Writing 31 of 30

Blown Away 1: Ronna
READ THIS. It’s not mine, but it is utterly amazingly delicious: http://www.ronnadetrick.com/the-truth-about-writing/
In the twitter stream ( @RonnaDetrick ) during the 30 day blogging challenge, I think I came upon Ronna and her Renegade Conversations site courtesy of Molly Gordon (@Shaboom). Ronna’s conversations and writings completely illuminate my path. They help me to shine a little brighter. Check it out and step into the conversation if it’s a match for you, or at least dip in from time to time. She is so smart, so moving, so heart-full. You will find yourself transformed and waking up in spite of yourself.

Blown Away 2: Amy
Again out of the river of tweets, I discovered (thanks to Ronna Detrick) Amy Oscar and another heart-full and deeply resonant blog and sister-writer-inspiratrix.  Congrats to Amy on one book done! Look for my own (upcoming) posts that acknowledge finishing.  Like right now: I acknowledge myself for completing the prior post — #30 in #blog30. Celebrate completion!

Blown Away 3: Danielle
Also a connection via Ronna Detrick: Danielle LaPorte of whitehottruth.com, in praise of women.

Blown Away 4: Isabel
And while it’s technically not writing, I’m deeply moved by Isabel’s mother’s day video to me. Thank you from my heart. Maybe it will give me the courage to start something over there. Isabel’s writing regularly blows me away, so she’s earned her space on this page.

Words of wisdom from soul sisters in so many many places.