Before I dive into today’s message, I have a very exciting announcement! My friend Catherine Porth, Founder of Let Her Speak, and I have launched the landing page for our first (hopefully of many) retreat for women entrepreneurs. This event has been more than a year in the making and we have big dreams for the future.

If you are a woman entrepreneur (or if you know any women entrepreneurs) who could use a weekend to reconnect with your own wisdom, release the parts of your business that aren’t working, and build community with other like- minded women, I hope you will join us at the Whole You: Returning Home Retreat happening November 3rd-6th in Ocean Isle, North Carolina. A pay in full discount is available along with three month payment plans for reservations made by September 1st. Invite your friends!

In my last newsletter, I spoke about the gooey middle which seems to have become my temporary home for these last many months. As I write this though, the butterfly’s reemergence feels more in reach than it did even a month ago. She’s coming. I feel her.

But before we get to the feel-good part of the hero’s journey–which frankly is still being written–can we tell a little truth about “leveling up”?!?

First, let me just say that I think the term has been over-glorified and oversimplified in today’s buzzy world of social media.

Second, having been an Icarus who flew too close to the sun and melted her wings (because she forgot she was a human being)–see my Crash and Burn story if you don’t know it–there is a part of me that wonders, and sometimes worries, if what goes up must truly always come down.

But what I really want to talk about today is the fact that growing (the less sexy term for leveling up) often asks us to release something we are holding on very tightly in order to have space to reach for what is next.

And that letting go involves fear, and grief, and sometimes caffeine withdrawals, even if we know without a doubt that what we are reaching for is the next right step on our path.

I have held tightly to the gym as a lifeline ever since I have been able to get back in and stay healthy; approximately four years. My gym is one of my happy places. My countenance changes when I walk in the door.

I re-built some of my belief in myself and what my body could do rep by rep by rep in this gym. I have found community in this gym. And I have been there 4-5 days a week for the last few years, COVID excepted.

But my body has started yelling at me. Over the last few weeks, my joints haven’t been bouncing back from workouts. The pain lingers in places where it doesn’t normally set up camp. And my muscles never seem to be recovered even with sufficient protein, carb and water intake.

This is where I mention that part of my residual trauma is being dissociated from my true pain levels most of the time. I am always in some measure of pain. But now, I can feel the pain through my sleep.

And so, I am about to take the next three weeks off of the gym. I cried today when I was talking to the coaches about it.

Along my path to healing, there have been a number of moments along the way when I have been asked to trust myself again. To trust what I can do and stay well.

You see, the crash that I experienced decimated my self-belief. I went from someone who trusted herself implicitly to someone who had no idea what was true anymore. Everything–including me–felt like a potential landmine.

From that profoundly different and unfamiliar baseline I have re-built one decision at a time. By stretching a little further than I thought I could, but not so far that it would send me into a tailspin. Re-learning what was possible. Again. And again. Like a baby bird learning to fly (but not too close to the sun).

Along the way, I have held on with white knuckled grasp sometimes to the routines that helped me get here. Cue the voice in my head . . . the very same voice that tells my clients that often, what got them here, won’t get them to where they want to go next. UGH.

Now, I am being asked to release my grip on the workout app. Yes, I know, three weeks is a drop in the bucket in the context of time, but for me right now, it feels like forever.

And I am afraid. Not terribly afraid because I can look back at all the work that I have done to heal my body and mind and trust that I have made the deposits. And I can also trust (because I have been here before) that I wouldn’t be being asked to take this step if I wasn’t ready. But still, there is fear. And FOMO.

I turn 50 next month. This body has survived so much. And held so much. It is asking me for a break. And I am going to listen.

You better believe that this is part of my butterfly story. And maybe, you can remind me if I forget.

What are you being asked to release and trust that what comes next is just what you need?

Speaking from experience, I can assure you that choosing to release–as opposed to having that thing violently wrested from your grasp–is the gentler option. Even if you are afraid. Even if you don’t yet fully trust yourself.

And who knows what butterfly might emerge on the other side?

Maybe we can fly together. But not too close to the sun.

Love,

Booth