When You’re Killing it On the Outside, but You’re a Mess On the Inside

I’m guessing you’re a lot like me and are a super high-functioning woman. You’re probably the type of person who can get a home-cooked meal to a friend whose life is falling apart, can put in a full day’s worth of work, pack your kids’ lunches, run an errand for your charity, and make sure the house is clean.

Plus you have huge dreams. Dreams of creating a beautiful life, dreams of making a lot of money, dreams of having a great relationship… the list goes on and on.

On the outside, you look like you’re killing it, but on the inside, you’re bone tired, overwhelmed, strung out, and you just don’t know how to stop. You can’t see a way out of the FULLNESS.

Let me tell you a story…

I came back to work after having Hazel at the beginning of September. I chose to do that because I knew I wanted to open the doors to Whole Woman before the holidays, and preparing for that to happen takes a lot of work and time.

My team and I created a beautiful, sacred container for women to experience Whole Woman through a Full Moon Workshop, Magic Week, and many nurturing, inspiring emails and notes on social media. We always want to make sure people can make a really educated decision to work with me, plus the decision to take our self-exploration to the next level deserves a lot of fanfare! And all of this takes a lot (A LOT) of work.

Within two weeks of working, I was exhausted, overwhelmed, and unhappy. And I felt so guilty for not wanting to work. I felt like a fraud for not loving what I was doing. I also felt guilty for creating a timeline and plan that didn’t allow me the space to be with Hazel. I was mad at my “boss” for not thinking about my postpartum system.

At the same time, we had a sewage backup and 2 inches of sewage water in our basement so our whole house smelled like poop. It was a clear sign that my energy was clogged, my foundation was shitty (haha), and I needed to have better boundaries. Point taken, Goddess!

I called my friend Kate Northrup from the parking lot of the laundromat because sewage had backed up into our washing machine (so gross). Kate is the master of running a business by the cycles of the Moon and the seasons, and she told me, “You are being called to use the philosophy of Whole Woman in the way you live your life right now.”

I sat in silence for most of the afternoon while I folded laundry and diffused essential oil all over the house. What was I being called to?

Then it hit me: I thought I could work the same way I did before I had Hazel. I thought my relationship with time and my kids and my work was going to be the same. I was comparing what I was producing to other high-achieving women in my industry. I had a goal of being insanely successful, of being the BEST.

But I hadn’t given myself the space to meet the New Me. The New Me that had obviously changed after becoming a mom to 3 kids, the New Me who is in a new season of life and a new season on the planet.

Here I was trying to act like I had the energy of a Maiden in early spring when it’s fall outside and the land is getting ready for rest, and my body is in winter and a time of postpartum hibernation and not cycling.

HELLO.

So I activated the magic in my life, which is what I do when I need answers. I went outside to soak in the energy of fall. I drummed and sang to connect with my body and imagined my ancestors and guardians sitting with me.

This is what I heard from the depths of my soul. “I am going to be a big deal someday; today is not that day.”

Today I am going to be mediocre. Today I am going to be a mess. Today I am going to half-ass a lot of things. Today I am going to let things go.

I texted my Mastermind to witness me, and I set it as my New Moon intention for that cycle.

I felt great. I felt the weight of the world and my work lift. But then came the lessons…

First it was little things like saying no to a good idea or cancelling an interview that didn’t feel in alignment. I felt like I wasn’t giving it my all or doing my best work.

Then I was called to outsource two major roles that I usually hold in the company. I felt like I was lazy for not being able to do all of the work by myself.

AND THEN I completed my Full Moon Workshop last Wednesday and instantly burst into tears. I felt like I totally bombed. I felt like I wasn’t making sense, like I wasn’t a clear channel, and that what I was saying wasn’t compelling. The thing was that I’d had a particularly hard day, the kids were really unhinged after school, Hazel was sick, and Jonathan was really stressed out.

All of my people-pleasing tendencies were being triggered with the family, and all of my perfectionist tendencies were being triggered with the workshop.

I went down the rabbit hole. I went way way down. I started thinking about ways to do another workshop, to show you guys how compelling, inspiring, and perfect I can be!

The next day I texted all of my people. “SOS I feel like I bombed last night, I know there’s a lesson but I can’t see it.”

And I was reminded…

Sarah, you claimed that today is not the day to be a big deal. You are standing for a new way of doing life. A life that is messy, imperfect, hard, but YOURS. A life that is always being crafted – not to be perfect or better, but to be more real, more in alignment, more authentic.

Oh right, I am right where I am meant to be.

Now, I know that if you watched it, you may have thought the workshop was awesome, or terrible, who knows, but that’s not the point. There isn’t a universal law for “success,” only our own expectations and wiring. The point is that I had a vision of how I was “supposed” to be that wasn’t based on my current truth in that moment, and that created chaos in my system that I needed to re-wire.

Whole Woman is based on 3 principles:

1. There is not a universal equation for happiness or success. We have to determine that for ourselves.
2. We are connected to the Moon, the Earth, and the Stars, and just like them, we are supposed to change.
3. We need other women in our lives who are willing to see who we really are and remind us when we forget.

All led by a woman who is learning how to not do things perfectly, but listen to my truth, be real, create space, and not get caught up in all of the rules.

It’s harder than it looks, which is why I want to do this together.

We need more women to …

• choose sanity over vanity.
• be driven by desire over pressure.
• choose being real over being perfect.
• be brave enough to say, I’ve changed, I’m different now.
• say out loud, Someday I am going to be XYZ; today is not that day.
• say to themselves, Today I choose to be gentle. I choose to let it go. I choose me.

If you are willing to give up who you think you are supposed to be and become who you are MEANT to be, join the waitlist today for Whole Woman. We need you.

Love,
Sarah