Start as you wish to continue

The wisdom of prioritizing the foundational energy that nourishes you, and then spills into every nook and cranny of the meaningful, soulful work you do.

Thank you for being here. If you enjoy my writing, consider joining the community as a paid subscriber to receive exclusive content and conversations with me about healing, spiritual growth, and success as a woman in business.

---

My family and I just returned from a vacation in Berlin. We spent the entire ten days soaking up the city in the way we most enjoy, which (by some standards) may seem rather slow. We are not cram-it-all-in, see-everything travelers, but instead, we choose one thing to focus on each day, and then allow the day to unfold and develop naturally.

The thing is, it’s vacation. So for us that also means taking our time in the mornings - my husband typically explores the city by running, my teenage daughter likes to sleep in, and I start my days as I normally do, with the sacred - meditation, breath, some sweet stretches, journaling, and intentions. I listen for my deepest wisdom and consider who I want to be, what is most important, and how I wish to move through the day.

My sacred practice in the morning is an active embodiment of how I wish to continue my day - present, centered, alive, connected, and thoughtful.

Start as you wish to continue.

This sacred, intentional beginning to my day is something I became deeply committed to largely because of my work as a coach, teacher, and healer. I realized that when I showed up with an undercurrent of anxiety or distraction to client sessions, my marketing efforts, or even the administration of my business, things would inevitably go sideways. From crafting business models to writing website copy to the space created and held for clients, I wanted the foundational energy that I bring into every part of my work to be a reflection of who I want to be and what I want to offer women through my work: spaciousness, deep nourishment, clarity, and aligned, deliberate action. That means I need to, want to, create spacious ease, deep nourishment, and sacred connection for myself, first and foremost as the foundation for my best life and my most meaningful service.

This idea and practice is something I encourage and teach to all of my clients. When you commit to starting as you wish to continue, you are infusing your work and your life with the sacred. However, this choice comes with challenges.

What we are up against when we choose the sacred.

From the beginning, we are steeped in the energy and ideas of our capitalistic society and how we are supposed to work - it’s unavoidable. Here is what most of us do in the beginning and sometimes beyond the beginning (including me). We create businesses that mimic a traditional, capitalistic workplace. We follow the experts and what we “should” do to be successful. We overwork. We say yes to taking on clients and work that isn’t really what we want because we are deeply entrenched in scarcity wounding. We overcommit our time and energy to be good women. We are nice and let ourselves get run over. We hustle. We end up burned out and wonder what the hell happened.

Now I have personally stripped my business to the bones multiple times when I’ve recognized that I did it again - built the model of my work on something unsustainable due to the cultural bullshit that I’ve been indoctrinated with around productivity, worth, and work.

No one I’ve ever worked with has wanted to create a business of meaning that mimics the crap they dealt with in a typical *job*. Many of us take the leap into soulpreneurship to actually live and work in a way that is not only personally empowering and lucrative but deeply nourishing and regenerative for ourselves and our clients. But damn, it’s hard to stay on the path without a well-worn path, or a map, or a five-step process that is guaranteed to bring success.

There is no option, really.

It is hard to choose you and what you really want. It’s hard to say no. To take the space you need. To ask for what you want. To slow way down. It’s hard to move at a deliberate pace and to fashion a business model that nourishes your life instead of sucking you dry. It’s hard to let go of societal expectations. It’s hard to change your mind and your direction.

But if you have been called to the path of sacred soulpreneurship, it’s much harder to try and keep doing business in ways that are not aligned with your values, your integrity, and what you really want for yourself, your clients, and the collective.

Start as you wish to continue.

There is no prescription, my beloved, but this is one path to feeling success in the day-to-day doing and creating beautiful, nourishing space for yourself and your work. Cultivate the energy and the feeling you want for your work and for your clients in yourself and for yourself, first. Allow that to infuse your work. Let it inspire your larger decisions about business models and marketing and systems. Know, and claim, what you need to be enlivened and to do your best work.

You, and your work in the world, are sacred.

You and your work in the world are needed and necessary. When you choose and prioritize what you need to be at your best in your life and your work, you not only create something sacred for yourself and your clients, but the energy that you start, and continue with, is shifting the tide. Together, we are creating a new world.

Tell me everything in the comments: how do you want to feel as you move through your days? In what ways do you or would you like to cultivate that energy for yourself? What would it mean for you to start as you wish to continue?