Becoming sovereign

“Precipice moments.” Ever had one? They are those moments when you are standing on the precipice and you are clear that this is it, this is the moment when you will either step over the precipice into something new, or you won’t.

If you’ve had one, you know that they are distinctly uncomfortable. Rather than being all, “Oh hey, precipice moment, a sparkling adventure awaits!” they are more like, “Things have to change. They just have to. I can’t keep on, keeping on, the way that I have been. This just has to stop, and change must start now,” followed by a swirl of overwhelming questions like, But how am I going to do it? and Can I even do it? and What am I going to do, now?

I’ve been at the threshold of many precipice moments, and one of the boldest in my entire life happened in the summer of 2010. There were multiple things in my life that felt out of control during that summer, and it was during a time of intense transitions all around. Then one of those dark nights of the soul hit, where everything was wrong and lack of sleep was intensifying it all, and somewhere around 5am after that sleepless night I bottomed out:

Things just have to change.
They just have to.
I can’t keep on, keeping on, the way that I have been.
This just has to stop, and change must start now.

Faith in Change

The most difficult moment in all of that wasn’t realizing that things needed to change. It was realizing that I had been at these precipice moments several times, before. This wasn’t new territory. Haven’t we all looked at our lives and decided, “Things must change!” and then put change in motion…for a week, maybe a month, before things go back to what they were?

Each time I had sabotaged myself in this way, I eroded my own self-trust. To change, you need self-trust; you need to trust yourself enough to know that if you say something needs to change, you’ll be accountable to yourself and follow through. Because I had sabotaged myself so many times before, I didn’t know how I would change. I doubted my ability to do it.

Oh, I knew logically what you were supposed to do—don’t get me wrong. I knew enough to journal about what wasn’t working and write out a list of what I wanted to be different. I just didn’t trust myself to actually follow through and make it into something different.

I had diminished faith in myself or my faith to change, because I had diminished that faith through not remaining accountable to myself so many times, in the past.

Consistency + Soul-Affirming Habits

Somehow, it occurred to me that the missing piece in my efforts to change was consistency. In particular, I had been going to coaching sessions with my coach, Matthew, for about two years, and he had been suggesting different daily tools to practice in between sessions. I would work with them for a week, then drop them; I’d get stuck again, go in for coaching, work with the tools for a week or a month, then drop them again. The tools were relatively simple stuff: take a moment each day to acknowledge and validate myself in some positive way. Pause to think of what I’m grateful for. Access the body. Connect with others.

This time, I decided that I would commit to those tools like I had committed to nothing in my entire life, before. I made a grid in the back of a Moleskine notebook, with columns for each tool and other columns for dates. Then I would put an “X” when I had completed the tool for that day.

I didn’t know it at the time, but I was utilizing habit-formation. The more I followed through consistently on these tools, the more they were becoming ingrained habits, such that with enough time I didn’t need to stop my day and ask, “What am I grateful for?” because I was already noticing things throughout my day that I was grateful for.

The small habits ended up becoming, simply, the way that I lived my life.

I began feeling more grounded, effective, and most of all…sovereign. There was an internal stability and sovereignty that I’d longed for, and it no longer felt like something I had to make to-do lists to see in my life.

Becoming Sovereign

I want others to become emotionally sovereign, as well. I want others to have the support of being able to get clear on what they desire—the desires that go beyond the stuff like building a business. I’m talking about the desires that get into the heart of the matter:

I want to…live life easy…reconnect with the kind of joy I felt when I was a kid and could get lost in creating…find my community, my people, my group that I can lean into…feel in control of my money and my time…have more capacity for giving something back to the world without feeling drained or afraid or stressed.

And, here it is: The Sovereign Experience.

It’s a six-month intensive where we’re going to unhook from the habits that have become exhausting and rewire to the habits that boost us up and strengthen our resilience.

It’s a program where you very well might say that standing on the edge of your own precipice moment, there was a “before” and an “after,” and things are very, very different after. During that messy middle (because yeah, change is messy—this will not be without challenges), you’ll have a deeply connected community. Me. Other powerful teachers and coaches who share their wisdom. One-on-ones, small community breakouts, and the hug of the larger network that sees you, hears you, and says, “Come sit by me.”

You can learn more about the program, here ( The Sovereign Experience ) and…already, my heart overflows with a big, huge welcome.