The Energy of Shame

Nothing kills the taste of a nice brie like shame coating your tongue. 

Shame is one of the lowest frequencies on the emotional scale. Spending time there - especially a lot of time - really, really blows. Because you know what doesn’t work when you’re hanging out in the energy of shame? 

Anything. Anything at all. 

If you’re telling yourself you’re bad and wrong because you haven’t achieved what you wanted to achieve or things haven’t worked out, you’re just anchoring yourself into future disappointment. Ask me how I know. Actually don’t. It’s embarrassing. 

Let me tell you about yesterday’s epiphany: 

I didn’t realize how much time I -hadn’t- been spending in shame until a fresh shame spiral hit. I remembered that feeling. I had spent so long in it for a few recent years that it was normal. It was life. It took finally lifting out of it to fully see how detrimental it is. 

So I dropped into shame. There are reasons (my brain does love a good reason), including more alcohol over the weekend than I’m used to. (Alcohol can tank my brain chemistry.) I wasn’t even sure what was wrong, I just knew I hadn’t felt this way in awhile and I didn’t like it. 

It wasn’t until Brandon said, “You’re in shame” that it clicked. (I am historically terrible at labeling feelings and emotional states.) 

THAT’S what this feeling is. The feeling that I’m bad and I’ve been doing things wrong and I’m a failure - a feeling that can lampoon any other thing that might be happening in my brain or emotions. 

The amount of shame I was in for a few years really explains a lot about why things weren’t going well for me. It’s impossible for things to go well when you’re locked in the lowest of low emotional frequencies. 

When you try to work in shame, it’s a disaster. Mostly you don’t get anything done, which just racks up more reasons to feel shame. Sometimes I would get something done but only with epic amounts of frustration. Then I’d just have to redo it later. If I did manage to finish something on my to-do list, it’s would be so marinated in the energy of shame that it wouldn’t go anywhere. If it was a piece of writing, crickets. If it was something to do with my business, it drops into the void. And rightfully so. The world doesn’t need anything else steeped in shame. 

So yesterday, I finally realized that trying to work in a shame spiral was pointless. So I decided to do some errands. Errands should be safe, right? WRONG.

Here’s how I learned not to do ANYTHING in a shame pit except do my best to feel better: 

The store I needed - and went all the way downtown for - was closed. I forgot my library card. Here’s the kicker: To make myself feel better, I got some nice cheese and crackers. 

BUT THE CHEESE DIDN’T TASTE GOOD. 

It was from Whole Foods! I love cheese! Even terrible cheese is good cheese! But it didn’t taste good at all. Shame had blunted my tastebuds. I know this for sure, because I’m eating the same cheese now, when I feel pretty good, and it’s delicious. 

Yesterday’s big lesson and the moral of my story: Do nothing in the energy of shame. 

Just do whatever it takes to feel better. Do whatever it takes to shift your energy, your frequency, the way you’re thinking about yourself. Even if it means pressing reset on the day and watching a movie until bed time. 

How To Feel Your Feelings

I still don’t know what to do with feelings. I can admit it.

At 45 years old, I still don’t entirely know what to do with feelings, even though “knowing what to do with feelings” is part of my actual job description.

We all contain multitudes.

The problem with feelings - especially if you are the brand of human who has big ones - is that they can be inconvenient. It’s hard to tackle your to-do list in the midst of quivering rage.

This is an actual response I got to a newsletter workshop I did last month: “Your superpower is noticing the feelings around things, working with them, and clearing them.”

AND YET I DO NOT KNOW WHAT TO WITH MY OWN ANGER AND DISAPPOINTMENT.

Aside from write a blog post and yell about it in all caps, I mean.

Also, this isn’t entirely true.

I spend a lot of time working with my own guidance and intuition - you kinda have to, when the way other people do things never seems to work for you (being a trailblazer is all fun and games until you realize you literally have to carve your own path out of the wilderness because WTF is everyone else doing?) - and this morning’s message from my intuition was to feel my anger and disappointment.

Cue: getting nothing else done. Thanks, intuition. My to-do list is mad at you.

How To Feel Your Feelings

According to me and the way I feel my feelings. Please comment with better ideas.

1. Admit that you have a feeling and should probably acknowledge it, before it crawls into your spleen, gets a mortgage, and never leaves.

2. Notice where that feeling is in your body and breathing with it.

3. Tell your partner you have The Feelings. Demand several hugs.

4. Sharpen a pencil and write three pages about your feelings, even though you start scribbling and making a mess at half a page in.

5. Shake it out like a kid having a tantrum when it starts feeling like too much.

6. Ask the ether for help and support.

7. Cry a little.

8. Get back to your to-do list.

We could sit here and pathologize my difficulty with feelings until the proverbial cows come home. Of note, the cows are not actually proverbial, because I live in Sonoma County, California (known for happy cows and also lots of chickens), and I can see cows on the hillside from my office window.

Or I could just accept that something about my nervous system, genetic makeup, and life has made feelings a bit of challenge for me, and continue doing the best I can.

It’s all any of us can do.

I will conclude by saying, Let yourself feel your feelings. Talking to the feelings, letting them out, breathing through them, asking them for messages will help you feel lighter and happier. The more you let your feelings breathe, the better you feel.

xo - Amber

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I made a thing to help you tap into your sensitive superpowers and feel better!

Why Do People Judge?

I once sat with a friend in her living room as she talked about another friend, the proud owner of a fancy new car. Her phrasing was judgmental - but buried beneath it was a yearning, an "I want this." In that moment, I knew she was being judgmental to cover up envy, a desire for something she didn't think she could have.

Years later, I saw a picture of her standing proudly in front of the very car she'd been judging that day in her living room.

I never looked at judgment the same way again.

Why Do We Judge Others?

As with anything relating to human emotions, judgment is deeply nuanced. But here are a few of the main reasons humans judge other humans:

They have something we want, something we don’t think we can have.

The second part is the key here. If someone has something we want, but know we can have, we might be more inspired to go get that desired thing. But if someone has something we don’t think we can have (or are capable of) (or are allowed), judgment will set in to protect us from that deep yearning.

They’re demonstrating an attribute that we don’t like, something that exists somewhere within us.

We often judge people who are reflecting back to us some part of us that we hate, whether consciously or not. Whether it’s something that we’ve been to therapy for, or it’s a small, deeply rooted kernel within our beings, if someone is displaying something that echoes what we don’t like about ourselves, the tendency is to go in hot with judgement.

They’re doing something that’s not okay.

Yeah, we’re going to judge people who cut us off in traffic or otherwise endanger themselves and others. We’re going to judge people who are cruel to kids or animals. We’re going to judge those terrible shenanigans people can get up to, especially when they negatively impact others. Our wiser selves may pipe up with some information about what may be going on internally with those people, but in this instance I say go ahead and judge. I feel good about judging truly shady people (after a full investigation of said shadiness) and if I’m ever being shady, you should go right ahead and judge me.

Why am I being judged?

Chances are really good that - unless you’re up to some truly shady nonsense - the judgment is all about them and not at all about you. (See the above.)

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One of the best places to practice discernment with your own judgement is in the comments of social media posts. Yeah, I said it.

Maybe the Dalai Lama can get on the internet with zero judgment… maybe. I bet even Mother Theresa cursed out Twitter a few times. They just didn’t add their fuel to the fire. They breathed, noticed what was happening, allowed the feeling to move through them as sensation, and then went about their day being lights upon the world.

My personal opinion about the internet is that it feels like a safe place for people to unleash their unprocessed anger and fear and judgment - so many of them do. Maybe it’s so they don’t unleash all their unhealed wounds on their family instead (and maybe not), but humanity tends to use the internet - and the people who post on it - as an emotional dumping ground.

How Do I avoid Dumping my unprocessed emotions in someone else’s lap, on the internet or otherwise?

What a great question, thank you for asking!

Notice what triggers you to judge - or to any big feeling. Especially things that make you start drafting irate comments.

Now take a step back and ask what’s really going on.

“Am I judging because deep down I want what they have, but I haven’t allowed myself to believe I can have it or that it’s okay to have it?”

If no, dig a little deeper: “Do I want that, but am only just realizing that I want it?”

If yes to any of these, congratulations! You now get to choose if you’re going to take your judgement to the comments (and thereby delay getting the thing they have that you want) or if you’re going to take this fresh new information about yourself and move forward with it.

“Am I triggered because I do this?” “Am I having this big reaction because it tugs at something I don’t like about myself?” “Am I judging because this is reflecting something I really hate about myself?”

If yes to any of these, congratulations! You now get to do your utmost to offer yourself love, forgiveness, and grace.

If your reaction is “I’m judging because that isn’t okay!”

First ask yourself “Is it really not okay?” Like, are we talking abuse of a living thing or are we talking about something kinda annoying or that you don’t personally agree with? Or are they reflecting something that has been an issue for you in the past and you’re angry that you were judged for it?

If it’s just something annoying or that you don’t personally agree with, you get to choose how you spend your time. Do you want to try to change someone’s mind on the internet or do you want to practice your empathy by trying to put yourself in their shoes? Or do you want to just go back to being a light on the world?

If it’s really not okay, you get to choose how to spend your energy. Do you want to yell about it on the internet or find some way to use your power to change it?

None of these answers or responses are wrong by the way. You get to choose how you spend your time and your internet comments - and the block button exists for a reason. If the internet is your therapy, go at it.

Just keep in mind that where you’re being unkind to others is also where you’re being unkind to yourself - and you, like everyone else, deserve a lot of kindness.

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Judgment is a totally valid human response. I’m not here to judge your judgment. I judge, you judge, we all judge. We are human beings and being judge-y is one of our many gifts. It kept - and keeps - us alive.

That said, we also need discernment. Discernment to understand what’s really going on within us. Because the more we can dig a bit deeper to understand our feelings and what’s triggering them, the better chance we have to release or heal or process them. And then move on to a better, happier phase of life.

Transmuting our emotions is a superpower like no other.

Love, Amber

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If this landed with you, and you’d like to hear more from me, hop on my email list.

If you want or need help ransmuting big emotions or giving yourself more kindness, that’s one of the things I do with lovely people like you.

What To Do When You Go Viral

1. Regulate your nervous system.

Your adrenaline will spike, so take good care of yourself.

Take a walk, stretch, get a hug, lie on the living room floor until you feel better.

When something like this happens, it activates our fight / flight / freeze / fawn nervous system response. You might want to take down every troll in the comments (fight). You might want to run away from the internet forever (flight). You might crawl into bed and not move for hours (freeze). You might try to pacify everyone who shows up (fawn). You might do all of them in quick succession.

Calming the nervous system is one of the most powerful things we can learn for ourselves - and it’s essential when something you put online goes viral and people start attacking you or having a lot of opinions about you out of the clear blue sky.

Some of my favorite ways to regulate the nervous system are:

1. Get out in nature

2. Move your body - take a walk, do some yoga, hit the gym, go for a run, dance like an unhinged muppet to your favorite song

3. Get into water (shower, bath, pool)

4. Do somatic or nervous system regulating stretches (google to find some ideas)

5. Breathe - in for 6, hold, out for 8 (or whatever feels right)

6. Eat something nourishing

7. Get a hug

There are also some energetic tips in the video at the bottom of this post.

2. Remember that other people's opinions are about them not you.

Full stop, end of story.

Remember that people are viewing you through their own lens, the way they see and understand the world.

If someone calls you a liar, it’s because they’ve been lied to (or are a liar themselves). If someone denies your experience, it’s because they haven’t experienced it for themselves and don’t have the perspective or empathy needed to put themselves in your shoes. If they say “That never happened!” it’s because their life may be so lacking in interest and magic that they don’t believe it’s possible for anyone else. If they call you names, it’s because they’ve been called names and are lashing out.

For some people, being a troll on the internet is the only outlet they have, for their trauma, their rage, their unhappiness. Not that it makes it okay, but it’s helpful to remember that it’s them, not you.

Happy people don’t troll.

3. Decide how you want to respond.

Decide how you want to respond. You get to respond however feels right to you. You can respond to everyone, you can respond to no one, you can block to your heart's content.

I’ll say it again: Do whatever feels right to you.

If you decide to respond, the more you can respond from a place of regulation (take care of that nervous system!) and a place of compassion and desire to understand, the better things will go.

If you don’t want to do all that emotional labor, you don’t have to respond at all.

Remember that the block button exists and you are allowed to block in whatever manner you please. (I block anyone who is mean or feels off.)

(My personal opinion is that the internet trash fire is a reflection of people's trauma, so when we can approach people with kindness and a desire to see and hear them, things often resolve. Unless they're straight trolls. In which case, hello handy block button!)

4. Remember that you’re worthy.

You’re worthy of being seen, being heard, having an opinion, and taking up space on this planet. You don’t have to earn anyone’s respect.

No matter what gets said on the internet, you’re a good person, a worthy human, and you are loved.

Do whatever you need to do to remember that.

5. Viral posts are a flash in the pan.

It may seem endless in the moment, but it will die down and you can go on about your life.

I hope this has been helpful as you navigate the wilds of the internet’s attention!

Sending you lots of love,

Amber

P.S. Want to read my story about going viral for the first time?

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This video includes some energetic ways to help you clear your energy from the massive push that is internet attention, so listen to the end if you'd like those tips.

If you've experienced this and want to share something you've learned, leave a comment for anyone else who happens to find this post!

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Feeling overwhelmed? need some emotional and energetic support?

As an intuitive and energy healer (with a bit of experience in the realm of The Internet Has a Lot of Opinions About Me Right Now), I’d love to help you regulate your nervous system, receive whatever messages, guidance or wisdom this experience has for you, and help you move forward in a way that feels really good.

We can turn an influx of internet trolls into spiritual and evolutionary gold, my friends.

Why Am I Emotional?

Do you ever feel super emo for no discernible reason?

ME TOO.

I recently had to cry like a toddler whose lollipop was taken away and then get wrapped up like a burrito on the couch to chill me out. I’m fine now (thanks for asking) but my scheduled CEO Monday was less power-suited-whirl-o-motion and more human-burrito-and-snacks.

If this is you too, today or any day … fist bump, friend.

Four Reasons You Might Be Feeling Emotional

1. Human Design

One of the aspects of human design is the emotional center. Your emotional center is either open or closed. (To find out which applies to you, google ‘human design chart’ and enter your birth date and time.)

If your emotional center is open, you have a tendency to take on the emotions of others. You’ll pick up on the emotions being felt around you and feel like those feelings are your own.

(I have an open emotional center and so sometimes when I’m feeling something big … it’s not even mine. So if I do a little clearing or get away from the person who’s having the feelings, boom. So much better.)

Learning to stop taking on other people’s emotions could change your life.

2. The Moon

When in doubt, blame the moon.

The moon changes signs every few days. When the moon is in a fire sign, you’ll have a lot of energy to get things done. When the moon is in an air sign, you may feel a little ungrounded and extra chatty. When the moon is in an earth sign, your focus will be better, especially if you take plenty of breaks.

When the moon is in a water sign, you may feel more emotional. You may also want to rest more.

(I use an app called iLuna to figure out where the moon is on any given day.)

3. Parasites

While a bit gross, learning about parasites was such an epic game changer for me that I would be remiss if I didn’t include it. A lot of people have parasites. It’s a fun little aspect of gut health that I never really thought about until I needed to heal it. Parasites can be picked up in sushi, from pets or pork.

Parasites will eat your soul. Or at least all the happy chemicals that make life worth living.

Fun fact: Parasites are more active around the new moon and the full moon so if you find yourself full of angst for no particular reason at those times, it’s probably worth getting your gut checked.

If it’s determined you have parasites, there are supplements that can help you clean them out. It may be the best thing you ever do for your mood.

4. Sometimes we just feel things.

And that’s okay.

Feeling your feelings as physical sensations without getting all tangled up in the story will help your feelings move up and out.

Meeting the feelings like a friend and giving them some compassion and acceptance is often all they want from us.

xo - Amber

If you’d like more tools to help you feel better, I have something for you!

The Staggering and Long-Winded Mental Aftermath of Unfollowing Friends on Social Media

At the height of my “I desperately want a baby but don’t see how that can happen” panic a few years back, I unfollowed all my friends with children on instagram. 

Announce your pregnancy? Immediate triggered unfollow! 

Show your adorable children doing adorable things? Immediate triggered unfollow! 

It was the social media equivalent of a tantrum in the grocery store and NOW I’M TOO EMBARRASSED TO RE-FOLLOW MY FRIENDS.

There’s a lot to unpack here, my doves.

My first thought as I started thinking about this, rather than letting my brain skitter away like usual, was “These are not the actions of a mature adult.” 

It’s been years since this happened, these are actual real-life friends, and I’ve just been letting it ride. Letting my mind jump merrily away to something else rather than confront it.

Honestly, I hoped to just have kids and then accidentally delete my account and start over. Yes, that was a real plan.

My second thought: “Be kinder to yourself.” 

It was the right thing for me to do at the time. I would get on Instagram and start sobbing big ugly cry tears. Removing the triggers felt like the only real option in that moment. (I guess the mute button wasn’t around yet? Or I just didn’t know it existed?) (I’ve officially hit Grandma Wants Her Typewriter Back levels of technical savvy over here.) 

My third thought: “Why is this still a thing?”

It became a splinter that moved in and set up house. It didn’t hurt much, but it would jab me every so often. 

It’s probably because this whole issue is a splinter in my soul and I genuinely don’t know what to do about it. 42 isn’t too late for kids, but it’s too late to not be chasing it down with every fiber of my being, a being that’s still concerned about things like paying bills and social media and committed relationships, things I genuinely did not expect to still be an issue into my forties. Hitting your midlife crisis at the same time as (the ninth iteration of ) your I Really Want To Have Kids crisis is inconvenient.

Since I don’t know what to do about the bigger issue (kids), but I do know what to do about the smaller issue (social media), here’s my plan:

Talk about it (hi!), because expressing things is how I move through them, and I haven’t done nearly enough of that in the past few years and it’s definitely affected my general wellbeing and mental health. 

Re-follow my friends. Sure, I may trigger again when confronted with evidence of Family Life, but I am so much better at handling triggers than I was a few years ago. (Not, like, great. But better. Definitely better!) 

The small child in me worries that they’ll be hurt or mad. The grownup in me recognizes that this is not an issue in anyone’s life but mine.  My friends are kind and well-adjusted people who, if they give it any thought at all, will think something along the lines of “I totally get it. You do what you need to do. My loud children will be here whenever you’re ready.” 

I am proud to announce that my reaction to the most recent round of Beautiful New Facebook Babies has triggered more “I can share your obvious joy” than “My fingers are now big and green because I am the Unfollow Hulk.”

Which feels like progress. Good progress, because there’s also a lot to unpack here energetically.

When we react negatively to someone else having what we want, we hold that very thing away from ourselves. When we’re in the sheer cyclone of joy that “this thing that I want exists in the world and someone I love has it”, we’re summoning that thing like we have a wand from Ollivander’s and a solid understanding of the Accio charm. I’m not saying I don’t have kids because I unfollowed some of my favorite humans on social media once and then didn’t know what to do about it after, but it probably didn’t help. 

And that’s okay. We can always clean up our energy and our actions and re-follow and express and be embarrassed and then stop. We can always step back into expecting our desires to show up like we graduated from Hogwarts with honors.

Taking a Stick of Dynamite to Sad Island

Is there a Facebook group for women who want kids but whose partners are terrified-slash-ambivalent-slash-negative about the prospect of small humans? Because I can’t keep breaking up with people over this. But my friends mostly have kids or don't want kids, I end up feeling like I’m on my own sad island and I’ve had about enough of Sad Island for one lifetime.

I used to talk more about being sad. It felt important to be transparent about my feeling status, especially on social media, that bastion of Best Face Forward and My Autumn Decor Is Prettier Than Yours. But then I felt like I was just marinating in misery and it was all I talked about and who wants to be an instagram downer? So I stopped. But then my entire life stopped too. Because if I’m not expressing myself, I’m not happy, and if I’m not happy the mechanics of my existence grind to a halt.

So I’ll cry over baby pictures on Facebook and contemplate blowing up my entire life - again - over this issue and then ultimately decide that’s a terrible idea and go back to whatever I was doing, probably eating grapes or contemplating the nature of cats.

Even though my 42-year-old biological clock wants to set the world on fire over this issue, the rest of me just wants to relax about the whole baby thing. Yeah, I want one. Yeah, I cry when I see pregnant women. But also, I really like free time. I really like my boyfriend. Maybe I can just let life take its course without having to strong-arm it into doing what I want. Maybe I can just focus on other things that make me happy. Like finishing a novel, and contemplating the nature of cats.

Sensitive Superwoman

My boyfriend finds me sobbing on the couch a lot these days. I need to make a sign that says “MAGIC IN PROGRESS” to put over my face when that happens so he can stop worrying.

Sometimes you have to go deep into the breakdown to get to the magic on the other side.

Because I forget this always, here’s how a lot of my life has gone lately:

I’ll need to cry, I’ll avoid crying. I’ll get all locked up and frustrated and everything in life will slam to a halt and I won’t know why so I’ll get more frustrated and the locks will turn to cement. I’ll finally break down into the serious ugly cry - and a few hours later get a fresh influx of energy, inspiration, and joy.

No matter how many times this happens to me, I’ll insist on forgetting, insist on Not Needing To Feel Things, insist that my sensitivity has gotten better, and then my whole life will turn into an escalator that’s just stairs because the electricity is out. As we all know, that’s super annoying. Who wants to climb stairs when you’re supposed to get a sweet ride to the top?

My sensitivity is my super power. When I let the feels out, the electricity turns back on and everything starts working again. When I insist on ignoring it, life gets real aggravating.

Moral of the story: When life stops and looks at you with exasperation, feel whatever’s clawing at your chest and trying to get out. It helps.

On Waking Up at 4 in the Morning

Every morning I wake up at 4 a.m., which is terrible and has to stop.

Because I’m me, I googled what Chinese medicine had to say about waking up at such an aggravating hour.

Chinese medicine says that waking up at 4 a.m. is terrible and has to stop.

But it also says that waking up between 3 and 5 in the morning is often due to an imbalance in the lungs, which is related to feelings of grief and sadness that haven’t been dealt with.

Grief was my number one feeling state in my thirties and I was hoping my forties would bring the prevalence of a different emotion, preferably joy or satisfaction, but I would honestly take any other emotion. Anger. Annoyance. Ennui.

Suggestions include breathing exercises, meditation or yoga to improve lung capacity, counseling to deal with your grief, and journaling about your emotions before bed each night.

None of those things sound appealing, probably because I’m suppressing a lot of grief. But I also want to get enough sleep to be able to function like a normal human.

I didn’t know organs could get exhausted, but it seems they do. My poor lungs are so tired. I just want to feed my lungs chicken soup and put them down for a nap.

Moral of the story: Our bodies have a deep wisdom and will give us guidance, if we're willing to listen.

So I either need to deal with my grief or resign myself to being exhausted and cranky for all time.

Joy Is Knocking On the Door

Yesterday afternoon, I wrote up a business plan.

Yesterday evening, I wrote “FUCK THIS” across the whole thing in blue felt tip marker.

One of my themes lately is doing things because I think I should, not because they bring me any particular joy. 

Reframing the oatmeal to bring you joy is always a possibility - even if that doesn’t make it taste like a fresh chocolate croissant - but it takes some effort. If you’ve let the joy drain out of you for so long that you don’t really remember what joy feels like or why you should make that effort, you’re screwed. (Meaning, I've screwed myself over a bit.)

So I’ve been thinking about joy and how to have some.

One of the things I've noticed about joy is that it’s like working out. You can’t just target your arms and do a bunch of weight lifting and expect your arms to look amazing. You still have to eat nutritious things and do cardio and work on your whole physical self before you get to have amazing arms. Unless you’re 23 and can thrive on pizza and tequila shots and still look amazing, in which case don’t talk to me.

You can’t just say “Hey, I want joy.” You have to target your whole emotional body. You have to feel all the things. Now, this is for those of us who habitually repress. Joy can be one of the easiest things in the world - just look at a happy baby. But if joy is hard to find, you’re probably a feelings represser like me.

After my dad's death, I went through a few years of enforced feelings because none of my well-honed repression techniques were working any more. Anger and frustration joined the grief standby of crying on the floor. The up side of my dad’s death was that joy came more easily, because all feelings came more easily.

But I don’t think that means that having joy requires a whole lot of grief. Joy just asks you to feel all your feelings, not just the fun ones.

Babies can be little joy machines - and they haven’t had to plow through deaths and breakups and getting fired and whatever else life likes throwing you as an adult. Babies find joy in flinging oatmeal onto the walls. Babies find joy in yanking the dog’s fur.

Sure, babies can be jerks and some of that joy comes at the expense of the caretaker who has to scrub the oatmeal off the wall and the dog who has to hide under furniture until the yank stops smarting, but joy is joy.

Babies get that kind of joy because 1) someone else will clean up for them and 2) they’re taking care of their whole emotional selves. If a baby is unhappy, you will know. Everyone in earshot will know. They aren’t repressing anything, they don’t know how. So as often as they shriek with utter abandon in the grocery store, they’re just as often beaming out instantaneous and effervescent joy.

It's time for joy again. Because joy is necessary for humans - and it can fuel all the other things that need to happen too, the ones like job-hunting and weed-pulling and tough-conversation-having that don't necessarily scream "Hey, this will bring you deep and abiding joy!" but will ultimately make your life better. 

We don't even need to make it that complicated. Because, hey, meeting a new tree brings me great joy:

Joy is Holding a Baby Goat

Someone once told me, “You really understand pain.” 

What a terrible tag line.

While I would argue that every human on this earth has a more thorough understanding of pain than they’d like, this is still true. Pain and I have been bunkmates on a fairly regular basis.

We could say that those who understand pain understand joy on a deeper level, but do we really want that to be true? Can’t joy just show up without needing a PhD in Ouch first?

Here’s a new world belief I would like to instill:

JOY HAS NO PREREQUISITES.

Doesn’t that sound nice? Can I call myself god and make it so? [Poof! It is done. You’re welcome, world.]

My real problem with pain is that sometimes I take a nice snack of pain and turn it into a multi-course meal of suffering. I need to stop doing that. Pain, fine. No one gets through life without some pain. But suffering is a more self-inflicted syndrome and I for one call bullshit on suffering.

I stopped writing for awhile, because I worried that I was getting whiny, what with all this pain and suffering and who wants to read that? But then my soul started shriveling up from lack of verbal expression and that’s not a good look on anyone.

Apparently, I would rather whine than let my soul shrivel. Or declare myself god and prescribe joy that doesn’t require an equal balance of suffering.

Or maybe I’m just thinking about this too hard, because clearly the only thing joy requires is a baby goat.

Here’s me and a baby goat in Half Moon Bay awhile back. It fell asleep in my arms. Best thing ever.

Where's My Montage?

Like so many of us, I’ve been trying to write a novel for, oh, thirteen years now. 

My first attempt was so long ago that the technology needed to access that draft no longer exists.

A few weeks ago, I took a class on plotting your novel, because I have a terrible habit of writing ten pages of some story that occurs to me and then forgetting about it completely. 

It’s not even giving up - giving up implies some form of active plan. Instead it just vanishes from my mind, like I’m a goldfish with a laptop. 

Having a plan in this area of my life might serve me well, even if plans do very little for me otherwise. So I show up to the class with my brand new Harry Potter moleskine and diligently take pages of notes.

When the instructor started talking about the crisis point that leads into the third act of a novel, I felt a deep sense of relief unwinding through my being.

I thought, “I’m not failing at life, I’m just at my crisis point.”

Someone please print that on a t-shirt, and make it available in pink.

I’m not sure why this was such a revelation, but I have an Instagram account and so maybe can be forgiven for thinking that life needs to be an endless upward cycle of victory.

Sure, my crisis point has lasted about a year - approximately 51 weeks longer than the crisis point in most movies (or maybe life isn’t served up in montage form, though it should be) - and instead of reaching a resolution, it seems to be extending itself via world circumstances and socially-isolated lockdown for the foreseeable future because apparently our lives have turned into a dystopian novel. (I never realized those were supposed to be instructional.) 

I’m now realizing that maybe I was in preparation for this moment. Maybe that’s all my crisis was about. I’m not sure why preparation had to be “Learn the lessons early” rather than “enjoy your last months outside with friends” but the universe works in mysterious ways. 

As for my novel, I’m not forcing anything right now. I’m going to let myself write for fun, write to entertain myself. Write something I would like to read, rather than something that feels Important. Because we are not required to write King Lear right now, plague or no plague.

When Your Wings Aren't Waterproof

Being in a human body sometimes feels like roaming a crowded shopping mall on December 23rd.

People are shouting things, I’m being bumped into, all the emotion and energy is overwhelming, there’s a lot to do and I can’t manage to do any of it, and I just want to go home and crawl into bed.

Unlike the shopping mall, which you can leave any time, experiencing this from within the confines of your body means you can’t escape it. Not without some serious pharmaceutical assistance.

I don’t know what escaping the human body looks like - floating ephemerally through the Northern Lights maybe? - but I want it. Sleep sort of works, but I get yanked awake between 3 and 4:30 a.m. by Jerk Brain who wants to get a nice early start yelling at me.

I was feeling wildly uncomfortable this morning, like the expansion that’s trying to happen in my body and life is at complete odds with all the things my brain is screaming about - write the book, earn the money, throw food in the crockpot, go for a run. So my nervous system started panicking. Jerk Brain is really good at turning Meek Nervous System against me.

When I remember to check in before I get too far into the spin cycle, I can sometimes pull myself out.

Luckily, I got there before panic became meltdown this morning and heard:

“Your only job today is to breathe and keep finding home in your body.”

Well, that sounds doable. I mean, my breath is coming more sporadically these days. I’ve finally realized that I feel like I can’t catch my breath when I’m not fully in my body. This weekend I was asked, “Where do you go?” I didn’t have an answer - this person specializes in Let’s Stump Amber Questions - but I can only assume it’s to float disembodied through the heavenly ether. That said, I really like breathing and it’s apparently good for circulating oxygen and so I should probably do more of it more regularly.

So, okay. Today, I breathe. Consider it done.

Even being able to contemplate that “keep finding home in your body” thing is an improvement from yesterday when a friend asked, “If you weren’t being hard on yourself or looking backwards or forwards, is there a space you can sink into inside yourself that you can trust?”

And I thought, That’s a wonderful idea, I will try it. And then I tried it and everything in my body said NOPE UH UH THERE IS NO SAFE SPACE EVERYTHING IN HERE IS GOING TO TRY TO BITE YOU NOW. To which I thought, perhaps now is a good time for another meltdown. Because this is very uncomfortable and shows no sign of stopping and I do not enjoy.

I’m just in a process right now.

I don’t know what it is, I don’t know when it’s going to end, I don’t know what will happen when it’s over.

I just know that it can be wildly uncomfortable, it can incite my brain to riot, it can send my nervous system into unfamiliar rapid fire response, and make me feel like I’m going to jump out of my skin.

Mostly, it feels tender and raw. Like I’ve emerged from the chrysalis but my wings aren’t waterproof yet. If something unexpected or triggering happens, my responses are vintage Amber. Namely, panic and crying.

All my deepest wounds are floating to the surface. My biggest fears are a free-form barrage of terrible. (No one will ever love you enough to take on this level of crazy on an even semi-regular basis, which is really too bad because you’ll never be able to afford kids on your own, etc.) (Typical Jerk Brain stuff.)

If it happens at the end of the day, I feel safe crying and then watching a movie to help Jerk Brain return to Heh Heh Lake Bell Is Funny! Brain.

If it happens when I feel like I should be working because it’s day time, that time when most people are earning money and being good citizens, the panic accelerates because Jerk Brain suddenly has a lot of mean things to say to me, things that seem to be backed by reality. (Most of these things are about money and being productive and you’re already so far behind you can’t afford to be self-indulgent by having feelings or being human. Says Jerk Brain.)

I have no answers for any of this, besides the fact that I’m in a process. A lot of people are in a process right now. We’re shifting and integrating something new. What that means, I can’t say. How it will end, I have no idea. All I know is that I need to do my best to not get frustrated with the time it’s taking or the panic that ensues when I think about money and being a responsible human and all the things I think need to happen.

All I can do is move through each day the best I can, avoid taking on what isn’t mine, nurture myself through this wildly uncomfortable process of feeling and embodiment, and trust that my life has a path and I’m on it and doing a good job (no matter what Jerk Brain says).

All I can do is breathe, and feel, and sink in, and appreciate whatever floats in front of my eyes: blue sky, a dog carrying a pack, a toddler in a sparkle skirt and rainbow boots, my own fingers on the keyboard, the teal converse on my feet, the trees growing nimbly through the concrete.

I don’t have my own answers, let alone anyone else’s. My channel knows a lot more, but I’m giving it a rest while my body catches up. But I can write my experience, in case it’s useful to anyone else who feels like even the simplest elements of life - like breathing and being in a human body - are challenging right now.

I would also like to remind us all that great joy can be found in sending T Rex and giraffe emojis to your friends and loved ones. It helps more than you might expect.

Sometimes being in a human body is fun. That’s a good thing to remember too.

Meltdowns Lead to (Parentheses). Apparently.

I always feel so much better after a complete meltdown that I should put them in my weekly calendar.

"Friday, 4 pm, mental breakdown."

Breakdowns empty out the cup - dumping out every emotion and worry, everything I didn’t even know I was carrying, and suddenly I’m all free and light.

Meltdown: 5 stars, would have again.

I always resist the break like mad. I do everything I can to avoid it. I grit my teeth and stuff my emotions into my spleen, because I’m not supposed to have feelings. I watch TV to stave off that wave of fear that really wants in. I eat a hamburger, because - well - I eat a hamburger because I’m hungry and a person’s gotta eat.

But once it finally overtakes me - usually because the universe pushes me to the edge of the cliff and boots me over - and I spend an hour or two sobbing and throwing a, let’s just call it what it is, temper tantrum, clutching my stuffed therapy otter until I finally drag my soggy carcass out for bagels. I’m still kind of cranky as I bolt down my bagel, but at some point, I begin to feel better.

Surprisingly better. Better than I’ve felt in weeks. Incidentally, just about as long as I’ve been attempting to stuff my feels into my spleen where I hope they’ll die a quiet and unremarkable death.

On the heels of feeling better after the ignominious breakdown usually comes an answer to the situation(s) that led to the breakdown in the first place.

(This time, my answer to the work breakdown was “It’s time to be channeling star families now. Yes, it’s weird, but is channeling aliens really that much weirder than channeling Jesus or unicorns? Right. So get on with it.”)

(My answer to the relationship portion of the breakdown was “Hold your self-worth and self- esteem and stay focused on yourself and your work, no matter what the other person is doing or saying or how either of you is flying off the trigger handle.”)

(Two very helpful answers, it must be said.)

But we usually have to allow the meltdown before we get the relief and the answers. Which can be really hard for those of us who fancy ourselves adults who no longer have meltdowns or maybe were scolded or shut in our rooms for having meltdowns as children.

(Which has got to be a conundrum for parents. I don’t pretend to have the answer for this. I’m just trying to parent myself the best I can and not be too hard on myself over the inevitable breakdown.)

But when we finally let it just flow through, the post-meltdown relief is palpable. It’s like you’ve emptied out the bucket of everything you’ve been carrying around - judgment, overwhelm, fear, sadness, worry, pain - and then tossed the bucket into the Pacific Ocean.

When we’re emptied out and feeling better, that’s when answers come.

So what if it requires four bagels, a stuffed otter, and a temper tantrum that would make a three-year-old blush?

Sometimes that’s what being an adult is all about.

Channeling my inner child in a more photo-friendly fashion.

Talking to Dragons

On the scale of delightfully strange jobs, talking to dragons is probably near the top.

But now that it’s been a few years, I probably need to stop claiming that channeling unicorns and hurling light with Archangel Michael is weird.

Not that it is or isn’t, especially as jobs go, but because it’s mostly my way of trying to make people more comfortable. Like, “hahaha, I know I’m crazy but what can you do?”

Yes, making people comfortable is generally a good thing, a kind thing, but not when it means diluting yourself for common consumption.

Recognizing my worth has been one of my greatest challenges. It’s tangled up in owning my weird, allowing myself to receive, and … oh my god this is all exhausting. Like, I just got really tired and want to take a nap now.

Part of me just wants to wash my hands of the whole thing, but that’s the problem with Talking To Dragons As a Job (TM). You have to keep plowing through these self-constructed webs. You don’t get to stop, because then you won’t be as effective. (And might not be able to make rent.)

I want to be effective. I want to know my worth, not just as an intellectual concept but as something I fully embody and never have reason to question.

So what would the dragons tell me about this? If I can talk to dragons, may as well ask them for help when I’m riding the struggle bus.

Therefore:

Hi, dragons! How can I recognize and feel my worth?

“By knowing that the wounds of your childhood do not need to inform your adulthood. By steeping in the joy of each moment and knowing that life is ever-changing and you are never stuck. You are never trapped. You are always loved and supported and in divine hands. Surrender into those hands and give yourself a goddamn break.”

(Sometimes the dragons swear.)

Choosing joy and play and fulfillment and abundance sometimes feels harder than anything you could ever do. This is why I talk to dragons. This is why I teach this stuff. Because we teach what we need to learn.

Good Old-Fashioned Primal Shrieking (And Squirrels)

I’ve been doing a lot of primal screaming.

Also, a lot of actual screaming.

This is when living alone is glorious - there’s no one to frighten with your occasional cleansing shrieks. I may have scared a squirrel or two, but since they dive bomb my roof at least once a day, sometimes waking me out of a sound Saturday morning slumber, I feel zero remorse.

Forest rodents beware.

So much has been rumbling to the surface lately that sometimes it’s necessary to let it out with a solid yell. The occasional yelp. Even a whimper or two. Though sliding into the pathetic whimpering usually means it’s time to do something else. Like take a walk in the woods (provided the air quality isn’t currently at You Gonna Die because of the wildfires). Do the dishes, write something, make something, color something. Stand under, sit in, or drink a lot of water. Visit your friend Adriene on her yoga youtube channel (she’s not really my friend but isn’t she really the whole world’s friend?). And of course… yell. How to best shift the sticky, crispy energy is a constant curiosity, something my sensitive peeps (which is all of you, hi!) understand 100 percent.

OH MY GOD I JUST GOT DIVE BOMBED BY ANOTHER SQUIRREL. It sounds like frantic skittering right over my head, mostly because my roof seems to be a major squirrel thoroughfare as they dart between trees.

Anyway, life, am I right? It’s good, all and all. I just shift between feeling like I’m standing on a precipice and like I’m stuck in an extra confining box and I know it’s completely within my power and capacity to shift it in a hot second, but then I don’t. Or I do and then I shift it back again. I don’t know. Energy is weird and I’m still learning (remembering) how it works.

Part of me can’t wait for change, part of me fears change, the rest of me wants potato chips. I think that’s called being human.

Hi, human friends. I hope you’re doing well and letting a good old-fashioned primal shriek whenever necessary.

Here, have a soothing dragon.

How To Shut Up the Mean Brain Hamsters

Grief Anniversaries

As much as I congratulate myself on understanding grief - hey, take the wins where they come - there are still so many pieces that elude me.

Someone posted on Twitter about how today would have been her three-year-old's birthday if she hadn't miscarried, and that struck a rather resounding chord so I did the math and realized HEY ME TOO.

Perhaps that's the cause of all the emotions today. I don't remember what happened this time last year or the year before - I'm so emotional most of the time that this stuff honestly doesn't register until I'm sobbing wildly and it somehow clicks in that "Oh, it's my dad's birthday" or "Oh, the baby I miscarried would be three today" or "This was the day I finished reading the final Harry Potter book."

But I do remember the first year, and the first year was bad.

On my actual due date, I went to a dance class to make myself feel better. It was with a teacher I didn't know, and she was one of those who walks around the room, yelling at people to smile. (Which is super obnoxious, no matter what your gender.)

When she got to me and I couldn't smile - like, literally, couldn't, even if I had wanted to or was willing to, which I 100% was not - she stopped the whole class and started yelling at me about how I was what was wrong with Mill Valley and just because you all have money you think you can do whatever you want.

First off: Sister, have you seen my bank account? I had to use a credit card just to get into this $15 class.

Second: That all sounds like a personal problem that has no place in a dance class you're supposed to be teaching.

So I walked out of class and the tears that are always pretty close to the surface on a normal good day rushed up, post-miscarriage and random admonishments from a short she-demon in yoga pants.

As I was sitting outside sobbing, an older woman came up to me and crouched down next to me and just kept saying "Jesus te ama, Jesus te ama."

I didn't retain enough high school Spanish to read the Taco Bell menu, but that translated.

For every she-demon, there is someone who will send you love and sit with you as you cry.

How To Deal With Grief

I've learned a lot about grief in the past ten years. From watching my father die to a miscarriage to more breakups than I willingly admit, I feel like a bit of an expert. 

Therefore!

How To Deal with Grief

Here’s What I’ve Learned:

Grief is the heaviest emotion.

As the grief rises through your system, it lifts every other emotion up and out with it. Misery, fear, sadness, anger, loneliness, you name it. It's a feelings cocktail mixed by one of Satan's underlings and served with a maraschino cherry.

So you think, "Well, hey. This royally blows, but at least I get a maraschino cherry." Then you bite into it and have to hack it into your napkin because it's so damn foul. You didn't even think it was possible for maraschino cherries to go bad, but then your horned bartender turns to you and grins the grin of someone who ruined a maraschino cherry on purpose. 

I joke about hell's minions, and that's often how the process feels, but my father's death was one of the best things to ever happen to me. I say that feeling like a grade A twisted asshole in my human self and like it's 100% true and perfect in my higher self. 

Being forced to drink the grief cocktail is nothing you'd ever want to put on your calendar, but it swept me clean of so much emotion that I'd been carrying around my entire life.

I think of my dad's death as my Cracking Open Moment. Those are the moments that shatter you, but in the breaking, you let all the sticky emotion flow out, everything you were holding onto and protecting without even realizing. 

After you put yourself back together, you realize that there's so much extra room now. Room for joy, room for love, room for peace. 

Grief comes in waves. 

Sometimes when you're angry, you're really grieving. Sometimes when you're lonely, you're really grieving. Sometimes when you're pissed at the world and especially everyone currently driving a car, you're really grieving.

Sometimes you think you're done, and you aren't - and the grief wave knocks you into the sand. 

See: grief cocktail mixed by Satan's minion. This time with gritty sand in indelicate places. 

Don't beat yourself up for riding the emotion roller coaster. 

Be extra careful with big financial decisions while you're in a grief cycle. 

Everything is all over the place, so stay out of your bank account and away from your credit cards if you can.

But since life happens, you may need to sell a house or something. Call in someone you trust with a dispassionate perspective to help you do whatever needs to be done. 

But also trust yourself. If you need to take some fancy trip, maybe that's the exact perfect thing for you to do. 

(But don't do what I did, which is try to take a trip and then end up not taking the trip after paying for half of it. Whoops.) 

Love doesn't die, it only changes forms. 

Love isn’t gone because the object of our love is gone, we simply learn to love them in a different way.

Do whatever you need to do to get yourself through. 

Be extra gentle with yourself. Rest as much as you need to. Lean on your friends, watch your favorite shows, read your favorite books. Give yourself whatever feels like a soul sigh of relief.

If it means developing a weird relationship with a stuffed otter and taking her on road trips, so be it. 

How To Deal With Grief: Try a stuffed therapy otter!

Go on long drives with your therapy otter, take classes in things you're terrible at, read anything you want, eat fried chicken in bed, upgrade to first class.  

Ramp up your self-care exponentially. Shower every day. Treat yourself like a toddler, making sure you've napped, eaten, cried, and played in the grass.

Tap into your creativity. Journal, draw, paint, sing. Tap into your innate ability to move through emotion and come out the other side.

Let yourself feel without making it mean anything. 

One of the grand challenges of being a human is allowing your feelings to be felt.

Feel them as physical sensations, as something passing through, rather than something that needs to be stuffed into your spleen until one of you dies. 

As the feelings are rising, your brain will frantically try to give you reasons why the feeling is happening, and it doesn't care if those reasons make you feel better or not. So your brain might make those feelings mean something about you, something about your life. Do your best to disengage your brain from the process. Just feel. Let the energy move through your body. Up and out. Hush, brain. 

Keep crawling through the tunnel of sewage, Shawshank Redemption-style.

Keep going, keep crawling, keep putting one foot in front of the other.

You've got this. It will pass. You will feel better. You will feel joy again.

You just need to move through this season of your life until the next season arrives with cherry blossoms and red convertibles driven to Mexico by Tim Robbins. 

Lots of love,

Amber

If these musings on how to deal with grief were helpful, there’s more where that came from. Subscribe here.

If you want to dive more deeply into your feelings, Feel Better was designed to support you as you move through your emotion and tap into your power, intuitive guidance, and ability to heal.

Magic Requires Space

Making space can be one of the hardest things for smart, driven people. What do you mean, space? Won’t the world crash into some unseen barrier if I stop working? Shouldn’t I be doing something?

Nope. Not always. Sometimes when you give yourself some time to just sit on the deck in the sun, mind blank, the problem your brain has been wrangling will suddenly snap into focus.

Sometimes it doesn’t, but you still got to sit outside in the sun rather than glaring angrily at your computer and a project that refuses to cooperate.

I’m in big building mode right now and it is vaguely terrifying. And by “vaguely terrifying” I mean MOSTLY TERRIFYING.

I am terrified. Sometimes when humans get terrified, they freeze. So do deer. But, unlike deer, when I’m terrified I get to crawl onto the couch with Sally and watch season four of Mozart in the Jungle. Instead of, you know, getting shot by big game hunters.

But the terror actually feels similar. When you step outside your comfort zone, your brain immediately yells UNSAFE BAD IDEA GO BACK. And will flood you with fear and adrenaline and, if you’re a delicate peony like me, sometimes you collapse.

Onto aforementioned couch.

(At least I’m dog-sitting right now, so I’m being kept company in my terror by Homer, the biggest floofer that ever floofed. When I got here, I spent a solid seven minutes singing about how fluffy he was. Homer was not impressed.)

On Monday, I was accidentally still in Napa, sitting on a deck in the sun, not expecting anything of myself. It seems that when I don’t expect anything of myself, it unlocks that flow state and suddenly I’m having a merry time creating things on my phone and eating truffle fries.

I’m trying to hack this quirk. Because my aim is to be in that glorious soul-flow most of the time, just letting things unfold in a way that also makes me a lot of money.

But apparently my subconscious is too smart to be fooled by me not expecting anything of myself in order to be massively productive. Or maybe such convoluted hijinks are too much and my subconscious just rolls its eyes and wanders off to do something else.

I think I’ve spent a lot of time suppressing my Type A drive because I have trouble turning it off. Once the switch gets flicked, I push myself until I collapse, and I know that's not the way I want to live. 

So what's the choice here? Because I believe our choice is the most powerful tool we have. 

I choose to allow it to be easy. I choose to let my business be guided by my joy. I choose to show up as me and have that be more than enough. I choose to allow myself to be visible so that anyone who needs or wants my work can find it. 

If that looks like sitting on the couch with a fluffy dog and watching TV instead of creating the business thing I told myself I'd make today, that gets to be perfect. 

I choose to create space for magic. Maybe that's all it takes.