I’ve been waking early — long before the sun — for more than 15 years.
It’s the only time I can truly hear my intuition.
It’s the only time the world (well, my world) is slow enough and quiet enough to be able to sift through what’s mine and what’s everyone else’s desires, needs and good-to-haves.
It's only through a quiet mind and an open heart that you can start to imagine more for yourself.
Hush.
Breathe.
Listen.
I do this through meditation and journaling/writing each morning and have taught thousands to do the same.
But, I’ve learned through a decade of coaching women around the world that most people skip this ritual of hush, breathe, listen and head straight into their busy day without taking a second to think about their needs or desires.
And, for good reasons: Going quiet and letting thoughts bubble up can reopen trauma and heartbreak and so most like to keep it closed off, afraid to go too deep, scared to dream too big, afraid to want more than they have, fearful of allowing themselves to do what it would take to have more more pleasure, joy, or ease.
That open-heart state, though, is exactly where you’ll find meaning in your life — where you’ll find your Brave YES.
My client Katie was struggling trying to get her life and health coaching practice up and running. After a number of coaching sessions she decided to take a pause on building her business and we agreed to work on rebuilding her creative capacity. She was stressed out and depleted from her full-time job, which often had her working at 5:30 a.m. to 4:30 in the afternoon and, on top of that, tending to the house and everyone else around her, including tending to someone going through chemo. And, she had also encountered urgent health issues she needed to address for herself.
But, as it turns out, it wasn't the energy that was the issue.
"Everyone tells me I should be a coach because I am good at that and I do that all day at work," Katie told me. "I'm good at doing what people tell me I should do. But is this what I want?"
Full STOP!
Katie had been so busy hustling and tending to others -- which is a top value for her -- that she hadn't been making time to ask herself and listen within for what she really wants, what she really desires to do now and in her future retirement. She had been so busy checking all the boxes — the boxes every woman sets out to check for herself. The job. The career. The partner. The house. The family. The holidays. The vacations.
Now, staring down retirement and aging she realized she needed to stop pleasing everyone else and start pleasing herself.
What was that going to look like?
Well, it started with the homework I had given her that led to a huge realization.
What gives you energy? What is on your energy booster list?
"I love to paint, Shawn," she said.
That day, after we discussed her situation, Katie decided to set up a painting studio in her basement near her work at home station. She decided that whenever she felt like it, she would go over and paint.
Later, as she truly began to listen to her needs and desires, she realized her Brave YES was going to be about offering Reiki — something she had started but not really taken seriously as a passion project for herself.
She and I paused our work together and Katie had the biggest smile on her face.
She had discovered the greatest gift: How to listen to her deepest desires — and then act on them.
Braving YES means to listen to your heart and your soul and follow those breadcrumbs of what brings you alive and lights you up.
Once you lean in and listen for all the whispers and murmurings rumbling through your nervous system, you'll start to feel lighter, more alive, more energized -- and you’ll learn how to say YES to yourself.
Too often, though, what happens is we stay trapped in hustle culture doing and doing and moving through the motions of something that barely resembles a life until we bottom out, burn out or bored out until we are forced into a deep reckoning of change.
Those whispers and murmurings not only need to be heard, they need to be taken seriously.
Hush.
Breathe.
Listen.
And then … ACT.
— Shawn
How to Say YES to Your Heart Through Journaling
Every morning for 15+ years I’ve let my heart and my intuition have its way with me through hush, breathe, listen journaling.
The act of writing out what your heart really wants is a powerful way to unleash the Brave YES Mindset that is the foundation of my business strategy and coaching work.
CONFESSION: In fact, it was through journaling when I realized I needed to retool this Substack channel to prioritize what brings me alive and what I am most passionate to write about each week. My heart was telling me I needed a creative writing outlet that is just for me and my soul. Soulwork is vital for my own creative energy.
Braving YES is different in that it’s about the soul work we need to do as creatives and visionaries to have the courage to do the passion projects we want to do in this world — despite burnout, bored-out, self-doubt, imposter complex and capitalism.
Morning journaling isn’t about when you wake up, it’s about what you do when you wake up. You can wake up at noon and still do “first thing” journaling.
Set your alarm to get up 10 minutes earlier than necessary and grab your notebook while still groggy and let your subconscious mind have its say.