I have:: cried (that happens to me on retreat, like emotional catching up) napped, meditated, chanted (thank you Eric), danced, wiggled around on my yoga mat, giggled, and done a little wailing.

I have:: walked back and forth to the beach a half dozen times, eaten an enormous amount of roasted veggies, drank an enormous amount of green juice (this morning:: cucumber, kale, romaine, parsley, lemon, ginger, and beet), indulged in raisins and popcorn (what a wild thing I am).

I have:: dropped my computer (scary), read (poetry, Jack Kornfield, and a young adult novel I stole from my step-son), and ached for Bob and Lilly.

Mostly I have::

sat with my squirmy self.

Oh and I have written a few paragraphs.

Retreat time has its own rhythm. Of course, life does too, but we I often override that rhythm. So the first order of retreat business: trusting that rhythm. Self-kindness trust through compassionate vigilance. As in:: Am I walking to water again because I need to lighten up on my “agenda” to get a lot done or am I walking to the water again because I want to get away from the anxiety I often feel when writing?

Picture me here, asking::

Listening.

Sensing into this story.

Not checking the time.

And eating.

Here are some resources that are helping me::

My writing coach Jeffery Davis preaches the power of regular creative retreats — here’s his excellent post on just how to do it for yourself. The Post-it notes over the clock were his brilliant idea. Hire him!

For determination, here is a story by Robin Bradford (scroll down a tiny bit to Gone, Gone, Really Gone) on her nine month daily retreat and this delightful interview with short story writer and teacher Sarah Selecky about a two month retreat in which she didn’t write… until the last 5 days!

My book The Woman’s Retreat Book can be helpful.

Back to the writing I go.  May I be gentle and compassionate, and serve my best self.  May the fruits of this time away benefit you and all creatives everywhere.

Love,

Jen

P.S. I adore creating retreats for others. Please consider joining Marianne Elliott, Susannah Conway, and me for our upcoming Creative Joy Retreat. It’s just over a month away and we still have a few spots. It’s a once in life time opportunity and it will be deeply restorative playful magic.Like this post? You might also like:

• You are Creating the New Story
• How to Discover What You Want to Write
• Write to Change the World Books

“You need people. You can’t, shouldn’t, couldn’t do it alone. Anywhere worth getting to will take a cast of loving, lucid, masterminds behind you. All the way.

“Everything I’ve accomplished has had mastermind group support — high-minded, big strategy, sleeves-rolled up kind of support. No secrets, soul-bared, nuts and bolts hashing it out. Late nights in living rooms, emergency cellphone calls on street corners. Power advice by texts. Three-day retreats with coloured pens, calendars out and red wine. You get the idea.

“What’s more, not only have my masterminds helped my hurtle myself through space with their genius input, but my capacity to be of service to them has kept me sharp and sincere. Reciprocity is the engine of sustained greatness.

“I’m so passionate about the power of inner circles, I wrote did an entire session on it in THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS: SUPPORTING CHARACTERS . So when Jen Louden told me she was running a new program simply called, How To Start Your Own Mastermind Group, I applauded. Literally. “Jenny Bee! What a GREAT idea!” Here we are shaking our Masterminding poms poms.”

Here’s some of what we shake our pom-poms about in the video:

• Recognizing who you love and who sees life through the same lens – don’t settle for less.
• The power pajama party – with highlighters!
• Vulnerability vulnerability vulnerability or how much money do you actually make?
• Why you want a dark and stormy night.
• Give and receive or the magic can’t flow.
• What makes a sucky group or why it’s not about deals, networking, or start-up funding.

Two LIVE 90 minute classes (recorded of course) with time for Q & A. Everything I’ve learned since convening our Brain Trust 6 + years ago + all that I’ve learned being in various peer groups for the last 25 years (including writer’s groups and women’s groups) like:

• Different styles of groups and how to determine what style you want – you might want more than one!
• Structures — what meeting style and focus works, and what doesn’t; how to handle virtual groups
• Finding the right people and handling when your group doesn’t gel (our initial group did not) + how to step away from groups that aren’t a good fit for you
• How to establish trust and intimacy, and why being vulnerable is the secret to a powerful group
• How to handle competition between members who offer something similar
• How to recover from disagreements, hurt feelings, and different styles of communication
• How to refresh as you go along (our group has reinvented yearly)
• How to bring in new people to an existing group
• What processes to use to go deeper, especially on retreat
• Tech details on how to meet (forums, Facebook group, conference services)

AND

Short spicy interviews with:

• Danielle LaPorte (audio version of the video so you can listen again)
• Andrea Sher
• Tanya Geisler + Rachel Cole + Kate Swoboda + Bridge Pilloud + Julie Daley + Jamie Ridler 
• Fabeku Fatunmise
• Elizabeth Marshall 
• Mark Silver + Michele Christensen + Molly Gordon + Michael Bungay Stanier + Eric Klein (my group)

AND

• Facebook group to connect with like-minded people to form your group.
• A Self-assessment Criteria to fill out for what you want in a group.

May 22nd & May 29th
4 pm Pacific / 7 pm Eastern
calls recorded of course

To win a book (I’ll be giving 5 copies away sent directly from Amazon) or a spot in the class (if you’ve already registered, we will cheerfully refund your money) just

a Rafflecopter giveaway
Like this post? You might also like:

• Who’s Influencing You?
• I Smell A Wombat
• Own Your Gifts Please

Late Fragment by Raymond Carver

And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so?

I did.

And what did you want?

To call myself beloved, to feel myself

beloved on the earth.

This is the only poem I can recite from memory.

***

It’s what we are all hungry for, isn’t it?

Hungry to know this as THE truth, and hungry to share this knowing with others.

To feel yourself beloved, to call yourself beloved, on this earth.

Part of the kith and kin of the universe. Here.

***

In kindergarten, I had a nightmare that I still vividly remember. Vividly.

I was on the playground and my classmates – even Beth who had a wonky heart and was always so pale and quiet – were chasing me. Around and around the monkey bars we went, a pack of screaming kids on my heels screaming, “Jennifer LoudMouth, Jennifer LoudMouth.” (It’s true, I do have a loud mouth. I like that now. Then, not so much.)

I can still hear their tiny feet in their StrideRite shoes clattering over the shells (I grew up in Florida and the playground was carpeted in crushed shells.) I can still feel the sting of being ostracized. The feeling of not belonging, of not being beloved.

***

I believe that dream has stayed with me, as has Mr. Carver’s poem (yes that’s his tombstone in the picture; he died of lung cancer at 50), because I am here to practice being beloved. And to teach this practice. To help you and me know, through every cell of our being, that we are beloved. To know that truth as the glue that holds us together.

And by knowing ourselves beloved, we hold every creature beloved, too.

And act accordingly.

***

The course I’m teaching is, at its heart, about belonging and being beloved. If it’s a fit, I hope you can join us.

 Like this post? You might also like:

• Savor & Serve with Susan Piver
• Savoring in the Face of It all
• Savoring & Serving

• How we avoid (hopefully) being sleazy, slimy sales manics and get known — no chicken suits or sandwich boards required.
• How we made the leap between following our bliss to serving others — and earning a great living.
• Insights into how we each handle pricing for different projects and offers, and what profit really is (took us awhile to learn this one).
• How we finally found ourselves worthy (cue Wayne’s World).
• How to reinvent especially after great success or why the $100 Start-Up isn’t just for 20 somethings who want to travel the world.

Here’s the complete audio of our rollicking conversation — including guffaws andback ground noises (we were siting outside by the water of a flawless spring day) + transcript. I hope you find this useful — I sure did.

P.S. There is a lovely buzz around my course Creating Your Own Mastermind Group. Listening to this interview and reading the transcript makes me want even more for you to have this same level of peer support for your work and dreams. Click here to see if this short course might help. Thanks!

P.P.S. You want to get a copy of Chris’s book if  you have any interest in having a small business that actually works.Like this post? You might also like:

• The GPS of Your Soul
• Savor & Serve with Michael Bungay Stanier
• How to Start a Mastermind Group. Danielle LaPorte + I Jam on the Power of Your People

Influence is a profound factor in our health, well-being and success — it can make the difference between creating deep happiness and making real progress on your desires or floundering, getting lost in yet another eddy of your own fearful thoughts and out-of-date patterns.

I made a little video (Noir style!) in which I ask  you powerful questions to suss out who’s influencing you — and if it’s time to less or more. (If you are getting this via email and can’t play the video, click here.)

Ready to optimize your influence factor for your greatest good? Check out my Creating a Great Mastermind class here. I’ll be sharing all that I’ve learned from 25 years being in peer groups plus offering  spicy interviews with other groups about what they do, what works and what doesn’t. Hope you can join us — click here for the details.Like this post? You might also like:

• “What do I have to contribute? I’m no one special.”
• Can You Save the World?
• How to Start a Mastermind Group. Danielle LaPorte + I Jam on the Power of Your People

I planned on baking her cake. Carrot. No nuts. Lots of frosting.

I also planned on spending time in quiet reflection. I imagined myself walking pensively through the woods, finger on chin, recalling the last 18 years while harps filled the sun drenched air. Then I would come home to thoughtfully wrap sweet presents for her (one of her “love languages” is gifts so in an effort to speak her language…) while the scent of baking carrot cake wafted through the tidy, quiet house. Finally, I would prepare for the small surprise party with her girlfriends, smiling beatifically all the time.

You know how this went down, don’t you?

Not the way I imagined, suffice to say.

Baking? I can’t even find the word in the dictionary. My “love language” doesn’t speak thoughtful gift. Surprise party? Lilly knew weeks ago but only because I asked for her friend’s phone numbers. Sure I had no appointments but managed to work until noon, giving me no time for that walk in the woods or any quiet reflection. Harps were also absent.

But here’s the very cool thing and where Cake Boss comes in – none of it mattered. I got to see my desire for Cake Boss perfection, notice it, notice what really happened, and laugh at myself the whole time.

I’ve only watched Cake Boss (a reality TV show about making fancy cakes) a few times with Lilly (you take together time when you can get it). What I noticed when I watched the show was the story in my head, running along the lines of “I could never do that.”  I have had this ancient shame story that I’m a craft impaired impatient ditz.

But when, at 4 pm, my carrot cake was a truly homely lopsided mess, I laughed.

When I ran into town to buy a fancy bakery carrot cake, I giggled. Here is my pattern – go for someone’s else perfect solution. I watched myself buy the cake without getting down on myself or ashamed my cake was a mess. This is huge!

When Lilly admitted she knew about the party, I giggled.

When the chain on the custom-made necklace I had ordered months ago was too short for her taste, and I realized the fancy toothpaste and socks I bought her didn’t quite fit into the category of sweet thoughtful gifts, I shrugged.

And when the fancy bakery cake was too lemony and heavy, and my homely held together by enough cream cheese frosting to cause an instant heart attack tasted better, I guffawed.

Take that perfection!

Our patterns are so adorably persistent. I love my desire for beauty and order. I will continue to see my desire for perfection with humor and love.

Even when coated in too much frosting.

 Like this post? You might also like:

• A Guide to Being Yourself
• How to Let Go
• Gifting Mania Revealed – and Possibly Healed

I feel liberated. Seen. Supported.

Lightened.

As Mark Silver said in his beautiful recap of the retreat:

 ”These five people are among the brightest lights in my life, and have patiently and compassionately helped me walk ever more deeply through my core pattern.”

Here’s where the wombat comes in. Every year we spontaneously come up with a “code phrase” that we use to signal, “Hey, you’re doing that thing again” but with humor and lightness. (That thing being your core pattern, your habitual knot, the main lesson you keep learning, you know, that thing.)

There is perhaps nothing sweeter (nor perhaps odder) than sitting in a living room with five of your closest friends talking about what you most want to create in the world, getting stuck and lost, and having someone call out:

“I smell a wombat.”

(Take a moment to picture this. Lovely cabin on the water, sailboats bobbing outside, crisp white sofas and chaises to relax on, healthy snacks in abundance… and then here comes the wombat.)

You squirm and hem and haw, insisting (perhaps loudly with your hand held out like a big stop sign but only if you are me), “This is not a wombat. This is a real problem. This is different.”

Some people might back down at this point, especially when faced with a loud Scotch-Irish temper and shall we say, a certain level of intensity. These people? Not.

This is one of the many gifts of a great mastermind group – getting to know with your whole body you are not alone in your struggles. That alone would be worth the time and energy invested.

But when you add in what you learn from each other, feedback of your business and creative projects, helping you see what you can’t see because you are too close to it, sharing fantastic resources  – you get true preciousness. Or as Eric said at the end of our retreat, right after we took that picture,

“It is a rare thing in this world to find a group of people who can hold you close, love you as you stumble, see your radiance and lovingly challenge you to bring it forth.”

It has been deeply healing to be held to my dreams by these folks, to not be able to float away into fantasy and projection, but instead to be called to take real, measurable, inspired action day after day. To not allow my whining and self-doubt to rule me. To be held to my best self by being held to reality.

With lots and lots of silly jokes, You Tube videos, and the best snacks ever!

P.S. I’m putting together a How To Create Your Own Mastermind class – so you can have what we have. Two classes, some interviews, criteria, Facebook group to meet each other. Affordable. Deets soon.

 Like this post? You might also like:

• How to Start a Mastermind Group. Danielle LaPorte + I Jam on the Power of Your People
• What Your Fantasies are Trying to Tell You
• Savor & Serve with Susan Piver

***

What are you savoring these days?

Jen, one advantage of approaching my 50^th birthday (Alex: me too!) is I’m learning to savor the ordinary moments a little more. Things like the first sip of coffee in the morning; helping my wife prepare dinner on a Tuesday night; and taking my daughter to school every morning are special to me.

No matter what happens with the time I have left, I think on my last day I won’t remember the promotions at the work or the recognition I’ve received as much as I’ll remember the ordinary moments and how each one contributed to a beautiful life.

Do you have a favorite passage in your new book that might help us savor?

This is my favorite passage and it’s a reminder to savor each day.

The sun waits for you every morning.

Before filling the sky with bursts of orange, yellow and red, it looks to see if you are on the way. The sun hovers beneath the horizon until you are ready. Then sensing your presence, it begins to inch its way higher into the sky.

You light up the sky with your amazing power. The sun simply soaks it in for the world to see.

How are you serving these days?

I’m serving others by remembering what most people want is to be treated with kindness, shown respect and to be loved. With that awareness…

• I’m serving my children by being an example of honesty, character and trust.
• I’m serving my wife by showing her I appreciate exactly what we have.
• I’m serving my readers by providing inspiration.
• I’m serving my friends by being dependable, supportive and patient.
• I’m serving the world by demonstrating kindness as often as I can.

If you could serve in any way possible—no restraints, limitations, or boundaries—what would you do? 

I would dedicate all of my time to writing and to speaking with as many people as I could. My message would be a simple one: I would remind people that are worthy to have their heart’s desire. I speak at churches, civic organizations, community centers, schools and business to spread the word about this powerful truth.

Do you believe we must serve ourselves first in order to serve others? 

Yes I do Jen.

We can’t serve with a whole heart unless we serve ourselves first. Self-care begins with giving ourselves grace – it begins with being love from the inside, out. We are in a stronger position to love others when we give our hearts the strength it needs to be of inexhaustible service to others.

***

Alex Blackwell is the Founder of The BridgeMaker. His first book, Saying Yes to Change: 10 Timeless Life Lessons for Creating Positive Change is now available on Amazon.Like this post? You might also like:

• 19 More Random Acts of Kindness + Small Acts of Love
• Savor & Serve with Natalie Goldberg
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We asked a smattering of friends to think about creative joy. We hoped to both understand it more deeply to create a richer retreat and we wanted to spread creative joy by prompting people to think about what feeds theirs and to encourage you to do the same.

This little exploration has turned my world upside down because it has helped me see that, at my heart, I am devoted to creative joy. But I haven’t owned that because it has felt too… fluffy. Inconsequential. Lite (which is not the same as light.)

Yet reading the extraordinary creative offerings that our invitation brought forth — which you will in a moment — is anything but a fluffy experience.

It is like receiving a transfusion of life force. Of color and beauty.

Please enjoy this spacious feast of creative joy. (If you’d like to share your own thoughts on creative joy, please do and leave the link in the comments).

 AND DON’T MISS

At the bottom is your own gorgeous interactive highly inspiring Creative Joy Journal and Playbook. You can get your free copy using the link below (no sign up needed — please share widely!)

The Creative Joy Feast

Christine Mason Miller‘s creative joy loves “the possibility of every moment in front of me.” (Don’t miss Christine’s art — I love it all.)

Janet Goldstein created an inquiry for finding your creative joy that will make your brain and your heart buzz.

Jeffrey Davis‘s braids a path to creative joy that you will want to print out and paste by your desk or easel or yoga mat.

Lisa Rough brings creative joy into the midst of a trip home to see the parents – alchemy indeed.

Chris Zydel opens your heart with an invocation of color.

Tanya Geisler heals the split between “Suits” and “Creatives” — if anybody can do it, Tanya can.

Jamie Ridler tickles you with the possibility of creative immersion — 24-hour creative vision quest anybody?

Ronna Detrick reminds you when you feel furthest from your truest self, it is creation (and creativity) that brings you home. Say it sister!

Darrah Parker finds creative joy by letting go of what should be (boy can I relate!)

Samantha Reynolds wrote a poem on the power of creative joy that will make you grin BIG

Kyeli Smith made a video that will have you bopping right into finding your joy.

Lianne Raymond offers a wise, wise equation: deep rest + wild play = creative joy

Marney Makridakis teaches you how to make a joyful clock to free you for creative joy — you know you want that!

Eric Klein asks are you on fire for creative joy? And if you aren’t, you can be.

Amanda Oaks finds poetry in everything (how to be a poem is a book I want to write someday).

Bridget Pilloud shared some tips on creative joy from her dog Olive – sweetness.

Liz Lamoreux clears the space.

Heather Plett gives you a mantra that already changed my life – hope it does yours too.

Justine Musk brings her usual deep, wide and smart insights like “creative joy is an arrow that points us to meaning.”

Julie Daley asks and explores what keeps us from being our fullest, most joyful, most orgasmic self.

Andrea Scher talks about her creative joy.

Lisa Sonora Beam helps ignite a delightful explosion of creative joy.

That’s it isn’t it? In a nutshell. Creative joy points us to everything.

Now it’s your turn.

Our gift to you — your own freeeee Creative Joy Journal + Playbook that you can write in, draw in, and dribble crumbs and paint and tears over. Click on this link and the download will start automatically. Please share!Like this post? You might also like:

• Your Creative Joy is Speaking to You
• Savoring & Serving with Lisa Evans
• Liberate Your Genius Now

Valerie Frankel, From Girl to Goddess

This quote has rocked my world. It feels very, very important.

Frankly, I started Savor & Serve because I was exhausted by the “creativity for creativity sake” message I saw in so many books, blogs and retreats. It seemed so self-indulgent. The world is burning, people, we need to do something!

I still believe we need to do something – doh – but I now know – KNOW in capital letters – that the only way to do  something is to regularly imbibe, inhabit and bathe in creative joy.

As Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. says,

“When you help, you see life as weak. When you fix, you see life as broken. When you serve, you see life as whole. Fixing and helping may be the work of the ego, and service the work of the soul.”

The soul needs creative joy so it can serve.

But here’s the rub, the key, the most important part my friends: if you go to creative joy with any agenda, even one as noble as recharging yourself to serve, creative joy hides. It goes underground. Does not come out to play.

Creative joy is pure. It is a state you invite for its own self, not for what it might get you – which might be everything and which might be… nothing.

It may recharge you. It may give you ideas for projects and solutions. It may make you feel more alive. Or it may leave you feeling frustrated and crabby, lonely and thwarted. You can’t know ahead of time, you can’t insist, you can’t force it.

You can create conditions that help creative joy thrive but after that, it’s a wide open mystery.

All my life I have worshipped at the altar of creative joy – and often, as an adult, I have excommunicated myself from that worship because I had “work to do” or even more deadly “creative work to do.”

No more. Making time for creative joy is holy work and part of how we will reclaim the world.

Are you with me? Do you agree? Or am I all unicorns and rainbows?

Like this post? You might also like:

• Your Creative Joy Magnified
• What Your Fantasies are Trying to Tell You
• Savor & Serve with Chris Zydel