One of the best compliments I have ever received came from a 13-year-old boy. He told me I had taught him he was the author of his life. “Well, how about that?” I thought. “If somehow I helped him know that his story begins and ends with him, then I am doing something right.”

It is easy to talk about owning our own authority, being the author of our own life, taking full responsibility for who we are in the life we’ve created. It is much more difficult in practice. It is messy, confusing, and sometimes very scary.

Recently I had a chance to practice owning my own authority with some dear, dear friends of mine. I love them and they love me. That is a given. But I had a decision to make, a decision I feared would lose their love and respect. And I wasn’t even sure I was right.

Here is what our conversation sounded like:
“Even though I may be making a big mistake, even though I may have wasted a lot of money, even though I was sure when I signed up for this, even though you may think I’m being a coward, even though you may think I’m avoiding doing the emotional work I need to do — even if all this is true, I still need to say no. I am spinning in a vortex I can’t get out of. I can’t hear myself anymore, and if I can’t hear myself I have nothing.”

Fortunately for me, these are compassionate people, full of integrity. Their response was, “How can we support you?”

“Love me no matter what I decide,” I told them.

“That is a given” they said. I cried.

I was risking my friendship with these two beloved friends and I wasn’t sure I was right about anything. The only thing I knew for sure was that the cacophony and distress in my body was so loud and so distracting, I couldn’t hear the deep wisdom inside me, the voice inside me I have learned to trust completely.

I trust this voice, which I call the Muse, implicitly. When it tells me to sing a song to a group that I’ve never sung aloud to myself, I sing it. When it tells me to sing to a classroom full of third graders about my mother’s death, I sing it. When I put my hands on someone doing Reiki healing, and I get a vision, if they have given me permission, I share my vision, even when it makes no sense to me.

“Do rope swings mean anything to you?” I once asked someone I was giving a shoulder rub to on a rafting trip.

“Are you kidding? When I move into a new home, the first thing I do is put in a rope swing,” she said amazed. We were both amazed. Where does this stuff come from? I don’t know; I have just learned to trust.

This inner voice of wisdom is my authority. If I can’t hear this voice I am lost. When I have done everything I know to do, exercise, meditation, singing, when I have done everything I know to do to bring myself back into alignment, and I am still spinning and crazy, then I know I need to take some kind of courageous action.

I will probably have to risk disappointing people. I will have to risk being misunderstood. I will have to risk being wrong. And I do this because there is nothing else for me to do. Clearing the decks, as it were, so I can hear myself again is the most important thing I can do. This looks like whatever it looks like.

I’m thinking of the comedian Dave Chapelle right now. He was at the peak of his career, and he wasn’t having fun anymore. He left everything and went to Africa to find himself. Many people criticized him. Many people depended on him for employment, and yet he left the craziness of television to go find some place where he could hear himself again.

I saw him on “Inside the Actors Studio” telling his story, and I felt such compassion for him. It was difficult for me to own my own authority on a phone call with two beloved friends. He had to do it in public, in an atmosphere where people love misunderstanding because conflict sells papers.

But I digress. Maybe.

Making the decision to own your own authority is perhaps the most important decision you will ever make. You’re saying to the world, “I am the one who decides for me. I am the one who takes responsibility. I am doing the best I can, and my best has to be enough. I will change my mind if I need to do that later on. But for now, this is who I am, this is how I feel, and this is what I’m going to do.”

Gandhi had hundreds of thousands of people gathered to go on the march, and he changed his mind. “I don’t know the big T Truth,” he explained to his devoted followers, “I only know the small T truth and that small T truth changes as I change.”

Outrageous Visions: See Who You Are Meant to Be can help you clarify the connection between your life and this deeper wisdom, the true authority that lives inside you. At this moment, I am still offering a free 15 minute Play Date with Possibility. If you’re interested in setting up an appointment, contact Sandy Parker at sandy@myefficientassistant.com.

May you speak your truth and own your own authority today and forever,

Vicki

Yesterday I wrote about selling, saying that selling is not selling out. If you have something you believe in, something you think will help people be healthier and also make the world a better place, you, I, have a moral obligation to let people know about it.

I am a member of an affiliate networking company called Life Force. Their main product is Body Balance. It is a sea vegetable aloe drink that may be the purest food on the planet. All I know for sure is that since I’ve been drinking body balance, I’ve been much, much healthier. I fly a lot and jet lag is no problem for me anymore. I start to get a cold now, but it never gets a chance to take hold and take me down anymore.

I just started using a new product called True Boost. It is all natural and helps with stress reduction and sleeping. The Life Force company has even created a stress test to help you decide whether you need to drink one or two of these small bottles per day. Here’s the link for True Boost Energy Drink to Relieve Stress
www.rateyourstress.com

This month they are having a special on True Boost. If you decide you want to give it a try, you can order this month and get extra bottles for free. You have 45 days to try True Boost, and if you don’t like it, you get your money back with no hassle.

I love this company. Take health and friendship and love and combine them with a way of making money to support yourself and your family — and you have Life Force.

My mentor in Life Force is Francie O’Shea. If you decide you want to look into ordering True Boost, here is how you can do it:

Life Force Information

From Francie:

Here is the Life Force Customer Service number: 1-800-531-4877.

Give them Vicki Hannah Lein’s number: 20648860.

-They will ask you about becoming a member or just a customer. If you want to help others, choose member, just for yourself, choose customer. The price is the same.

-You have to be a member to receive the affiliate payment. Doesn’t cost ANYTHING to join as a member. They will ask for your SS number to send an earnings statement for taxes.

-Also they will ask you if you want to have an autoship. That means they will ship it next month, unless you tell them otherwise.

-With autoship you get a wholesale price around 10-15% less depending on what you order. Usually this makes the shipping free.

-They are very helpful and easy to deal with.

Confession: I am feeling uneasy right now. I am feeling pushy and nervous that my sharing about True Boost and Life Force will make you not like me. I can feel this uneasiness fluttering in my chest as I dictate this post.

But I’m sharing this with you anyway. I’m posting this for all the world to see anyway. I’m breaking through my own fears, my old body stories, because I believe your health and well-being, financial, emotional, and physical, are worth my taking this risk.

If you have felt any resonance at all with what I have written here, please give True Boost a chance. I hope you get hooked. I hope you then say, “Tell me more about that Body Balance.”

May the Joy be with you,

Vicki

Gilligan’s Island ruined a generation. What did we learn from Gilligan’s Island? We learned that rich people are superficial, cowardly, and self absorbed. Having a lot of money was bad. Money corrupts.

What did we learn from the tobacco industry? We learned that selling is evil. We learned that people, corporations, will do anything to sell their product. Even if it kills us. If this isn’t evil, it’s pretty close.

Many of us got confused about selling. We thought that selling was something we did to people. But if you are connected to your mission, your movement, as my coach Suzanne Evans says, then selling isn’t something you do to someone; it is something you do for someone.

If you believe in what you’re doing, if you believe you have something to offer that is good for people, good for the world, then it is your moral obligation to let people know about it. This is selling.

I am a recovering selling-phobic. I am in the process of unlearning many things. Money is’nt bad; money is a magnifier. If the greedy, corrupt, narcissistic sociopaths have money, then they will do bad things. But if people with heart, empathy, compassion, and the vision for a better future for the world have money, then money magnifies their mission as well.

So those of us who were ruined by Gilligan’s Island and cigarette commercials need to get over it. It’s time, it’s way past time, for people of integrity and courage to step up and get abundant. And we need to take over the world! And the time to do that is now.

So here is my call to action for you: get over yourself, get over your fear of bothering people, get over your fear that money is inherently bad and step up. Lean in. Let go of all of your excuses. Get support, make a plan, and stick with it.

And here is an example of me stepping up and leaning in: do you need a coach? Do you need someone who can listen in to the deeper meaning that’s living inside of you and help draw you out? And have fun while you’re doing it? I’m offering free 15 minute consultations while I still have time to do that. I’m calling them play dates. If you want to play with me, contact my business manager Sandy Parker, at sandy@myefficientassistant.com to set up an appointment.

And remember: selling is not selling out.

Blessings,

Vicki

David Neagle, one of my mentors, tells a story about the most successful network marketer he knows. I don’t remember her name, this is how my brain works, but I do remember the essence of the story. This is also how my brain works.

She makes several million dollars a year. She has one simple plan: in the morning she takes 10 pennies and puts them in one pocket. Each time she asks for a sale, she moves a penny from one pocket to the other. She doesn’t stop until she has moved all 10 pennies from one pocket to the other.

You don’t have to be interested in network marketing to use this idea successfully. Anything you are trying to do that you are having trouble doing can be shifted by using this 10 pennies a day system. Want to exercise more? Put 10 pennies in your pocket and every time you move or dance or jiggle, even if it’s for only one minute, you get to move one penny. If you do five minutes per penny — I’ll bet you can do that math in your head and figure out that’s 50 minutes of exercise a day. Fifty minutes of exercise a day without doing anything elaborate.

You don’t have to go to a gym, you don’t have to ride that exercise bicycle in your garage that you bought two years ago that you’ve never used, you don’t have to do hot yoga. You just use your 10 pennies to infuse your day with movement. And you’d better have fun doing it. Fun is not a four letter word.

Or what if you are working on being more grateful? Same thing. Every time you speak your gratitude or an appreciation, you get to move a penny. You could transform your family or your workplace being grateful 10 times a day. Speaking your gratitude is the single most important thing you can do any day to improve your mood, and improve your health, improve your effectiveness, and make the world a better place. You are only 10 pennies a day away from saving the world.

Now here is what is really beautiful about this system: all of your excuses get exposed and you get a chance to let them die. Does the system seem too hard? Too bad. Do it anyway. Does asking for help 10 times a day seem impossible? Too bad. Do it anyway. Do you feel guilty not helping someone in need? Too bad. Let them help themselves.

Ten pennies a day is going to bring up all your guck. Yahoo!

Here’s my penny for the day: want to work with me as a coach? I’m still offering a free 15 minute consult. Just contact my business manager, Sandy, at sandy@myefficientassistant.com, and she’ll help you set up an appointment.

That’s one penny for me! Now it’s your turn.

Blessings,

Vicki

Excerpted from Woman with a Voice: Daring to Live Authentically Ever After

by Vicki Hannah Lein, MS Counseling © 2005

When we listen to a racist, sexist, or anti-Semitic joke we are colluding with hate. It is not easy to be the one who says “No.” We risk losing friends, approval, even family members. But what are we saying about ourselves and what are we teaching our children when we allow beloved Uncle Joe to tell yet another racist joke this year at Thanksgiving? Fighting injustice may be very expensive, but allowing injustice to flourish is toxic for our souls.

I don’t say this lightly. Stopping my dad from telling me a racist joke was one of the bravest things I have ever done. The irony is that my dad had taught me the evils of racism when I was a child, but on this day, when I was in my early thirties, he decided in a phone conversation that he could tell me such a joke.

As I realized what kind of a joke we were headed toward, I was terrified, my heartbeat was drowning my hearing, but Dad had crossed the line. Maybe I couldn’t always stand up for myself, but I could stand up for my children. I would not bring them up in a racist environment. There was not a cell in my body that could hear a nigger joke and remain silent. (I can barely type the letters to make that word.)

When I saw where the joke was heading, I interrupted Dad and said, “Dad, I don’t like those kinds of jokes.” I was as brave as I had ever been, facing a scary enemy, a man who I had seen physically attack my mother and verbally assault anyone who got in his way.

“My, aren’t we high and mighty,” he said. High and mighty — for not wanting to hear a racist joke? He was trying to shame me into submission, but I repeated, “I don’t like those kinds of jokes.”

He hung up, and that was the end of my relationship with my father. Oh, we have seen each other since, had a short lunch even, where I gave him pictures of my children and copies of songs I had written. But this was the end of his calling me or coming to visit, the end of the thin semblance of a relationship we had.

My father does not know my full name, nor would he recognize his grandchildren if he met them on the street. I have not spoken to him for more than ten years, not since I lost my vision, got divorced, remarried, and became an international speaker. Simply saying “no” to my father severed our relationship.

Was it worth it? Would I do it again? You betcha! The entry fee for a relationship with my father is too high. I will not sacrifice my deeply held beliefs in the hope my father might love me. I will not allow anyone in my life to abuse me or abuse those I love. I take a stand for justice, and I will not change that because I want someone to love and approve of me. This was a huge act of courage for me, the first of many steps that have led me to the life I now lead. I do not know how people can be truly happy, truly authentic, if they sacrifice their honor in order to be loved.

Epilogue

At Oregon State University in the summer of 2006 I was asked to present to a faculty class on the subject of “Finding Magic in Adversity.” (I am legally blind.) While there I passed around my book from which this excerpt is taken. When I wrote the book, I put a “spell” on it, — the “spell” is that I wanted it to be a book someone could turn to and find just what she needed.

When I paused for questions a woman at the far end of the table, way too far away for me to be able to see her, said, “Vicki, I was looking through your book and it fell open to the story about your dad trying to tell you a racist joke. I read the whole story. I am African-American and when I teach my class on discrimination, my students must deal with this issue when they return home for holidays and are faced with their relatives’ habits and attitudes. Thank you for writing this.”

I got chills. What were the chances that the one story I wrote about stopping a racist joke would be the story she would turn to and read? I guess my spell works.

Blessings,

Vicki