write your spiritual resume 🌻

on qualifying ourselves.

the problem.

many of us do not feel qualified to go after our own dreams.

we ask ourselves:

• who am I to have a podcast?

• who am I to call myself creative?

• who am I to write a book?

• I'm only 23, what do I know?

• I'm already 66, isn't it too late?

• I don't have a PhD in this topic, so who am I to speak on it?

• I need to do more research before I am ready to talk about this...

as the Marianne Williamson poem says: we ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant?Actually, who are you not to be?

we have grown up in a society that has made us fearful of claiming who we already know ourselves to be.

a society stuck in a narrow, institutional, and elitist understanding of "qualification".

instead of waiting for permission that will never come from an external source, we have to practice the skill of qualifying and giving ourselves permission and encouragement to pursue our creative dreams.

a solution:

your spiritual resume takes into account the fullness of your life experiences. it says: you are not an imposter.

in the face of the question: who am I to do this thing? it asks you to answer that question without implying that you are not the one. subtract the self-negation, and add the self-acknowledgement.

it asks you to convince yourself you actually ARE the person to do the thing, and list out all the reasons why.

we need to honor our life experiences.

each and every experience you have had throughout your life is a form of knowledge that you draw from and that no one can take from you

it's a kind of knowledge that encompasses all: felt, embodied, experienced, studied, revised. the kind that no institution is going to pat us on the back for because they have a vested interest in maintaining a social heirarchy through inacessible degrees and qualifications.

your spiritual resume includes:

• every friendship and what you learned from it

• every piece of advice you have given yourself or others

• every job you've had

• every relationship

• every joy

• every sorrow

these are all rich experiences that we can draw from and that can inform us as we approach our scariest and boldest dreams

we need a cultural and relational view of ourselves.

• what has your culture taught and instilled in you?

• what do your friends love about you?

• for those without friends, what have people remarked about you throughout your life?

• are you the person they always go to for advice? that always makes them feel seen, safe, heard, or valued? are you the person who provides the tough love they needed?

or even more inclusively given all the isolation and loneliness imposed on you/us: who have you been to yourself?

• what situations have you supported yourself through?

• what did you tell yourself during that breakup, that divorce, that firing, that period of no self-worth, that isolation that you have now overcome?

• if you are in that period right now, what are you telling yourself each day to support yourself through it?

each of these answers stitches together a rich tapestry of knowledge, relational, personal, and experiential, that we each carry within us.

you are like a fish in water.

if you're reading this, i am sure you are familiar with the analogy of the fish that does not realize that it lives in water.

the analogy is usually used to show that cultural values and conditioning are so pervasive that they become invisible.

the matrix is invisible to most. so much so that it becomes difficult to realize that we are perceiving and experiencing every reality through this invisible filter.

but the variety, depth, intrigue, and potential offering of your life experiences are exactly the same.

your life, your ideas, your experiences, the knowledge within you -- collectively these are the air that you breathe: so obvious to you that you deny that they could be of interest to someone else.

so obvious to you that you can't even begin to imagtine how useful, interesting, enlightening, and enlivening they could be to someone else.

we are so used to our own lives and ideas that we cannot see what may be intriguing or informative about them to others.

what if there is an audience that is seeking your exact experience to speak to, make sense of, or illuminate their own?

my experience.

before starting my podcast, i thought to myself -- who am i to have a podcast? i'm only 27, i don't have a PhD (i don't even mostly listen to podcast hosts who do, mind you), there are so many podcasts out there, why would mine work? what do i know?

and then, i was sitting on a plane and i had a stroke of insight. an idea, from and through the universe:

write your spiritual resume. it came to me just so.

write down every experience in your life that you've had that qualifies you to do the thing. qualify yourself!

my spiritual resume went like this:

• my friends and family members often say things to me like:

  • "i still think of that conversation we had, and what you said to be about..."

  • "that question you asked me, really shifted my perspective"

  • "i always love talking to you, and i always feel like i learn something in the process"

(to me, the resume could end right there! if this was about someone else, i'd think, that's it! i'm sold)

• i did debate in high school and i took it really seriously, i loved it and i was good at it

• i have always loved, been terrified by, and felt drawn to public speaking. even though it makes me shit-scared nervous, it also feels so powerful to share my voice in this way. i think what we are willing to be terrified by and do anyway is tied to our purpose

• i am deeply curious. i loooove learning. i particularly love paradigm shifts, and my reading and podcast listening is a quest for them

• i love speaking to people. some of my favorite moments on earth are in conversation

• i literally love podcasts and i love the voice as a medium. if we love consuming something, we can harness that energy and knowledge and taste to create our own!

why is it called a spiritual resume?

everything goes.

the feelings you have. the experiences you've had.

what sets your soul on fire.

the person you know yourself to be even if no one else in your life sees it yet.

the person others view you as. your world view. your curiosities. your doubts.

all of this form a tapestry that you have relegated to the cupboard and forgotten about. the magical tapestry of your experiences.

let me give you another example from a different angle.

i have a dear friend who is an entire angel.

she has maintained best friends from every stage of her life: highschool, college, post-grad, work, and also is extremely close to her mom and grandmother.

one thing that shouldn't matter but in our amatanormative culture, seems to: she has never been in a serious romantic relationship, and she worries she doesn't have what it takes to sustain one.

her spiritual resume would ask, well, what does it take to sustain a beautiful romantic relationship?

• intimacy

• loyalty

• love

• open-heartedness

• transparency and honesty

• conflict resolution

• patience

• commitment

she can find examples of ALL of these things in the decades-long friendships and family relationships she has maintained.

her spiritual resume shows that while she may not have DIRECT experience in the long-term romantic relationship field, she has plenty of experiences from all of her life that translate profoundly onto that experience.

western society is shaped by a linear and one-to-one relationship between experience and qualification.

you don't need that thing you keep telling yourself would make you better suited to go after the thing.

- you don't need to be a psychologist to be a healing presence on this earth. we have always, awlays had healers, shamans, the trusted, wise people in the community who everyone went to for advice

- you don't need a college degree to have a podcast, let alone a PhD

- you don't need to have an MFA to be a writer

- you don't need millions of followers to be a creator or podcast host

- you don't have to WAIT for permission to move forward. more often, you need to be willing to give that permission to yourself.

so, if you are reading this and you are reluctant to move forward with your goal, i have a challenge for you: write your spiritual resume.

give me every single reason you can think of from every facet of your life -- culture, relationships, jobs, emotional journey, highs and lows, what you crave and desire, your curiosities -- and convince me why you are the perfect person for this dream that YOU have.

after all, if the dream came from you, like the seed of a flower within you, its blossoming is yours for the taking -- and ultimately, the flower of your efforts will be an offering to the collective in one shape or another.

what will it take to finally view yourself as worthy and capable of nurturing the seed that already lies within you, today?

write that.

🎙️ Watch or Listen to Episode 22 here:

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